Best of 1978 Topps

[rats60]

Reggie Jackson
Felix Milan
Len Randle
Kent Tekulve
Eddie Murray

[mrmopar]

My top 5 would be, in no particular order:

Reggie
Murray
Millan
Randle
Ault

A couple great cameos here. Parker and Munson showing up on "common" cards. I love the Ault card. If only he had a similar career to Murray, what a card this would have been.

The Reggie is by far his best card. An incredible image and that AS badge seals the deal.

Honorable mention to:

Koosman
Parker
Carew
R. White
Ruppert Jones
Rivers
Dawson

This was my first experience with new baseball cards, so this set is forever burned into my brain. At one point I could name any card by player w/o seeing the name. I could probably still call out 3/4 of the set that way today, maybe a little more.

[deweyinthehall]

1978 was also my first year of collecting - like others, I knew that set backward and forwards, could guess any card's # and come within 10 either way, etc. Because it was my first set, I had never heard of most of the players or several teams...the Mariners? Where do they play?? I was 10 and baseball cards made me a fan of baseball, and not the other way around as it might have been for most. As for my favorites, I have to start with the very first cards I ever owned - got them as a panel in Dynamite Magazine that April - here they are (the Dynamite panels were 6 cards...just my luck I got two DPs).

[deweyinthehall]

Then there were the quartet of Twins at the plate during a night game...always thought these were cool...

[deweyinthehall]

I've always loved these images of Rice, Simmons and Lopez - just having fun and loving being a big league ball player...

[deweyinthehall]

Now with pics...

[deweyinthehall]

Some other favorites - the wild action of Halicki, the gritty determination of Pocoroba, the unusual shot and lighting of Collins' image, the all-American, perfect composition of Garvey's card, with the All Star shield (we all thought he was Hall-bound for sure) and just because I have to, the "somebody find me a bucket, I'm about to puke" look that we all thought Twitchell was sporting...