Slightly OT/Big Lead Story About Upper Deck

[ctownboy]

Wasn't it also alleged that a few years after the Ken Griffey Jr card was released and had skyrocketed in price that someone at Upper Deck had thousands more printed off and kept some for themselves and gave (sold cheaply?) others away to influential friends?

David

[Exhibitman]

Card Sharks covers it all; a must-read.

What everyone seems to forget is that the UD product was beautiful. Just so many great looking pictures, front and back, on that '89 set. If it looked like '81 Topps no one would have cared. They also invented the signed chase card.

[steve B]

Originally Posted by Exhibitman

Card Sharks covers it all; a must-read.

What everyone seems to forget is that the UD product was beautiful. Just so many great looking pictures, front and back, on that '89 set. If it looked like '81 Topps no one would have cared. They also invented the signed chase card.

They did make a nice card, although I never really took to them. I think at the time the thin cardboard made them feel cheap even with the hologram and better printing than other brands. (To me anyway, lots of people really like them)

By the mid-late 90's, their standard product seemed like they weren't making much effort. The usual nice picture with a foil name. I did like some of the higher end stuff, SP and eventually SPX mostly for the die-cuts and the SPX layered look.

I bought a couple packs of the semi- unlicensed Goodwin cards they made a year or two ago, pretty disappointing considering what they'd been able to do in the past.

The new semi licensed stuff might be interesting.

Steve B

[midwaylandscaping]

From 89-93 they made some nice looking cards. Good pics, very nice.
After that, it was by the numbers.

[Rich Klein]

The 1988-89 Score sets were beautiful as well. Full color photos on both sides. 1989 UD was just a better set, as it was also beautiful AND made with the best card stock at that time. And better times were just around the corner for UD. It's been a fun ride and I agree, Card Sharks is a must read for the background to the Big Lead story.

My Sports Collectors Daily story -- no advancing of that story, just some more random notes

http://www.sportscollectorsdaily.com...nd-upper-deck/

Rich

[whitehse]

I traveled to the Field of Dreams show that was mentioned in this article and set up at the card show the Upper Deck sponsored for that event as well. My kids still talk about the great time they had and it was 20 years ago. There was the show, a baseball game of baseball greats and a evening of entertainment with many Hollywood "stars" of that time period.

What really hit home to me about that article was that I was able to have a rather long conversation with Jay McCracken at that show as he sat at my table going through a large pile of 1992 Leaf black border cards I had for sale. He was putting this parallel set together for his own collection and I always found it curious that this Upper Deck Executive was putting together a set from another competitor at the time. I found Jay to be a genuine guy who loved what he was doing and was happy to talk about the company to anyone who would listen. I knew he left the company but I had no idea he was fired three days after this event.

[rhettyeakley]

I have very vivid memories selling at card shows in New England in 1991 how high the demand was for the French Upper Deck product. Packs were $20-30 each or more and I remember selling a Pavel Bure or Sergei Federov for more than $100. Then a few shows later it seems like everyone had the product and the prices were still high but they came down fast after that. Seems like any time there was a hot new Upper Deck product they started with a lower print run then flooded the market a few months later.

It sounds like the CEO was a real pos doing what he did to his customer base and rightfully had the rug pulled out from under him after a while. Too bad they didn't use a bit more common sense instead of applying the Gordon Gecko tactics that they did.

[ScottFandango]

Originally Posted by whitehse

I traveled to the Field of Dreams show that was mentioned in this article and set up at the card show the Upper Deck sponsored for that event as well. My kids still talk about the great time they had and it was 20 years ago. There was the show, a baseball game of baseball greats and a evening of entertainment with many Hollywood "stars" of that time period.

What really hit home to me about that article was that I was able to have a rather long conversation with Jay McCracken at that show as he sat at my table going through a large pile of 1992 Leaf black border cards I had for sale. He was putting this parallel set together for his own collection and I always found it curious that this Upper Deck Executive was putting together a set from another competitor at the time. I found Jay to be a genuine guy who loved what he was doing and was happy to talk about the company to anyone who would listen. I knew he left the company but I had no idea he was fired three days after this event.

I guess we now know why he was fired!