Overrated / Underrated / Favorite / Least Favorite (OUFLF)

[JollyElm]

Overrated: 1971 Topps.
The folks in Duryea, PA had no business handing out a black bordered set to kids. So short-sighted. You look at them wrong, and the cards start turning white. Just a ridiculously poor move. Find a random stack of cards from any other year, and there's a good chance some (a lot) of them will look nice. Find a stack of 71's in your closet, and it doesn't matter how nice the action shots are, each and every card will have white rounded corners and edges and look like deteriorated garbage.
However, in the graded card world we live in today, the set skyrockets to one of my most favorites ever, but that's simply because with the cards sitting in their protective prisons, there's no chance now of them deteriorating right before my eyes.

Underrated: 1960 Topps.
This set grew on me so much, so quickly that I started a thread about it a couple of years ago. It's definitely one that needs to be re-examined by the haters.
https://www.net54baseball.com/showthread.php?t=270971

Favorite: 1972 Topps (hands down).
Also love 1965 and think 1974 was a beautiful stroke of genius, with the mix of colors and all the terrific action shots. Near perfection.

Least Favorite: 1959 Topps.
For the love of god, who at Topps said, "You know what, let's squeeze each picture into a tiny circle and eliminate a huge portion of the image area by blocking it out with wall of color!!"??????