2009 Topps Legends of the Game insert

Year: 2009

Manufacturer: Topps

Set: Flagship

Card Number: LG-RY

Card Type: Insert

Insert Set: Legends of the Game

I was just contemplating what the rest of this year's baseball products hold in store for us with new Yount cards.  Allen and Ginter comes out in about a week, with Panini Chronicles and Triple Threads  not far behind, all those sets could feature cards with Robin on them.  But I digress, it's been a pretty good year with a good amount of card across the spectrum on price point and attributes.  So let's take a trip back more than a decade to 2009 and the Legends of the Game insert.  The insert comes with two parallels, Gold and Platinum, as well as a relic and autograph versions.  Robin has cards in all those sets as well.  A nice photo that looks to have been taken at Spring Training maybe. The card celebrates, mainly, his 1982 MVP season and the Brewers only appearance in a World Series.

2009 Upper Deck Goudey 4 in 1 #35-29

Year: 2009

Manufacturer: Upper Deck

Set: Goudey

Card Number: 35-29

Card Type: Insert

Insert Set: 1935 4 in 1

COMC Black Friday Haul #32

Still working my way through the new Yount cards I picked up last year and had delivered after COMC's Black Friday event.  Next up is Robin's 2009 Goudey 4 in 1 that he shares with Prince Fielder, Mike Schmidt and Ryan Howard.  Robin also appears on another card in this set.  I like the past and present theme of this card.  With Mike and Robin representing the past for their franchises and Price and Ryan the future (at least at that moment).  There are a few parallels to this set which pays homage to the 1935, hence the 35 prefix in the numbering, Goudey 4 in 1 cards.

2009 Upper Deck Goudey 4 in 1 35-29 Black

Year:2009

Manufacturer: Upper Deck

Set: Goudey

Card Number: 35-29

Card Type: Insert Parallel

Insert Set: Goudey 4 in 1

Parallel Set: Black Border

Card Attributes: Serial Numbered

Serial Number: 12/21

Today we have one of Upper Deck's forays into the vintage homage sets.  Fleer actually brought back Goudey as insert in 1997 baseball and did a full blown Goudey Football set the same year.  After Upper Deck bought the Fleer brand it was only a matter of time before they brought back Goudey as well.  The 4 in 1 insert was a nod to the 1935 Goudey 4 in 1's, or R321.  However where the original Goudey cards were 2 x 2's, or something like that, these cards are the standard 2 x 3.  Robin's actually featured on 2 4 in 1's, this card and #35-23 which features all Brewers.  The card also features Prince Fielder, Mike Schmidt and Ryan Howard, kind of like a past and present for each team.  The black bordered cards are the rarest of the 3 parallels for the set and the only one that is serial numbered.

2009 Upper Deck Goudey Relic

Year: 2009

Card Manufacturer: Upper Deck

Card Set: Goudey

Card Number: GM-RY

Card Type: Insert

Insert Set: Goudey Memorabilia

Relic Type: Jersey

Card Attributes: Jersey Relic

Let's get back into the swing of things with a great little relic from Upper Deck's last issue of the Goudey tribute set from 2009.   The 2009 set was a homage to the 1934 World Wide Gum set and also featured a homage to the 1935 4 in 1's.  Robin has a base SP card in the set and the parallels,  as well as, being featured in a couple of the 4 in 1's and this lovely relic insert.  I'm a sucker for a good gimmick and I do love that the relic opening is a die-cut G even if the swatch is just plain gray.  

2009 Topps Legends Historical Commemorative Patch 1980 All-Star Game

Year: 2009

Manfacturer: Topps

Card Set: Flagship Baseball

Card Number: LPR-142

Card Type: Insert, Manufactured Relic

Insert Set: Legends Commemorative Patch

Card Attributes: Manufactured Replica All-Star Patch

I've never been a fan of Topps calling these cards relics and having them count as hits in their products.  That said I don't hate these types of cards.  I actually like the "Manurelics".  Robin has three cards in this set commemorating all three of his All-Star Appearances.  This one, obviously, commemorates his first All-Star appearance in 1980.  And while I don't hate these types of cards I do hate how cheap the patch looks.  I also hate that it looks like it was just hot glued in, which it probably was.  You can't tell from the scan but the background is just the gray backside of the back of the card.  It would have been nice had the opening been cut to fit the patch better.  If memory serves me these were inserted into Series 1 and Series 2 packs, with 75 in Series 1 and 75 in Series 2.  Although I don't remember and a quick internet search didn't help me all that much.  

2009 Topps Tribute base

Year: 2009

Card Manufacturer: Topps

Card Set: Tribute

Card Number: 56

Card Type: Base

I've always liked Tribute.  I don't like the steep price for boxes and packs, but I do love the look of the cards, the parallels, the inserts, and the hits.  Robin has been featured pretty consistently since Tribute came out in the early 2000's.

The card looks great in hand, it doesn't scan too well, like most shiny cards.  We get a great posed fielding shot of Robin in a classic mid-70's uniform.  As a matter of fact we can place this photo somewhere between 1974 and 1977.  I'm sure it's been used before, but not so much I can place the photo or the  usage elsewhere.

On the back we get the standard write up and career stats.

2009 Topps Sterling base

Year: 2009

Manufacturer: Topps

Set: Sterling

Card Number: 72

Card Type: Base

Card Attributes: Serial Numbered

Serial Number: 074/250

The second to last year of Topps Sterling.  This year was a little bit of let down with the 2008 set having so my Robin in it.  This year he gets a lone base card and all the parallels, plus a nice selection of relics and autographed cards.  But that pales in comparison to the 2008 release were he had 10 base cards and what seemed like hundreds and hundreds of relic autograph cards.  

This year the base card, still numbered to just 250, is framed in black with some cutouts at the top.  Sorry for the terrible scan, looks like I really needed to clean the scanner before that one.  It's hard to tell, but the card is set up like a shadowbox with the frame being raised up and Robin's photo is on foilboard or something like that.

2009 Upper Deck SP Legendary Cuts Generations Memorabilia Dual Relic with Ryan Braun

Card Manufacturer: Upper Deck

Year: 2009

Card Set: SP Legendary Cuts

Card Number: GM-BY

Card Type: Insert Dual Relic

Insert Set: Generations Memorabilia

Card Attributes: Dual Jersey Relics

I really do like the 2009 SP Legendary Cuts set.  Maybe it's because Robin has a significant amount of card to chase in it or it might be this card and it's sister card with JJ Hardy.  

2009 was a time before the Braun PED scandal and it was looking like he might be the second coming of Yount.  Ryan was on fire, having won the Rookie of the Year award in 2007 and having a hot bat  he was emerging as a bonifide superstar in Milwaukee and that's something we hadn't had in a while.  This card made perfect sense.  Sometimes I'll look at a dual player card and wonder why the hell were these two players put together, but not here.  This card works on so many levels and back before Ryan's fall from grace this was a pricey card.  Not insanely pricey, but I had to shell out a few bucks for it.

And for some reason I really dig Upper Deck's postage stamp theme throughout the set.  The perforated edge adds a nice inside border and the card is laid out nice.  There's not a ton of foil on the card, but the the foil that's there accents the relics and the logo in the center of the card.  I also like that at least one of the swatches has a little color with a pinstripe.  Back in the early 2000's when relic cards were taking off these two or dual color pieces commanded a premium over their plain swatch brothers.  Overall a great card.

2009 Upper Deck 20th Anniversary Retrospective #1296

Card Manufacturer: Upper Deck

Year: 2009

Card Set: Upper Deck 20th Anniversary Retrospective

Card Number: 1296

Card Type: Base Insert

At the end of Upper Deck's multisport licenses they were putting out huge sets.  I mean their 2009 baseball set was over 1000 cards.  They also put out a Yankee Stadium Legacy insert set that was 5000 cards, so this set falls right in the middle with 2500.

These 20th Anniversary cards were seeded though out all of Upper Deck's products in 2009.

The good news, Robin has 5 cards in the set, 1296-1300.  The bad news, all the card use that same photo and look exactly the same.  Sure each card focuses on a different aspect of Robin's career, but if you were to lay them out side by side there's almost no difference.  I guess that's how you can make a 2500 card set fast.  

We do get a nice crotch shot of Robin in a classic Brewers blue uniform and pinstripe pants.  The back is pretty simple with just about as much information on the front.

2009 Topps Legends of the Game Gold Parallel

Year: 2009

Card Manufacturer: Topps

Card Set: Topps Baseball

Card Number: LG-RY

Card Type: Insert Parallel

Insert Set: Legends of the Game

Parallel: Gold

Card Attributes: Serial Numbered

Serial Number: 28/99

Might as well keep with the Gold theme this week.  The Legends of the Game insert ran through all three series of Topps Baseball in 2009.  Robin's card appeared in Series 2.  We can tell this by the labeling on the back.  Series 1 cards were labeled with numbers like LG1...LG13 etc.  Series 2 featured the lettering with the players initials like Robin's here LG-RY, and the Update series went back to numbering but the prefix included a U for Update, like LGU1.

There were three levels of the base insert, plus relics and autographs.  Robin does have an extremely rare autograph with this insert set.  And by rare, I mean of 1 of 1.  Robin isn't included in the relic set, but does have the base and two parallels, gold and platinum. 

The green border of the base insert is replaced with a golden border and is numbered to just 99.  The serial numbering is a little camouflaged just under Robin's name.  It would probably have been better placed off to the side then right under the name on the shield.  

It's also refreshing to see an image that hasn't been used a hundred times.

2009 Topps Series 2 retired base variation

Card Manufacturer: Topps

Card Set: Topps Baseball Series 2

Card Number: 595

Card Type: Base Variation

Variation Type: Retired Photo Variation

Unless you live in a cave you probably know that 2015 Topps Series 1 baseball is out and all the rage.  The reason I bring this up is that Topps once again has inserted unannounced variations.  Some are photo variations and some are those terrible sparkle variations.  I bring that up because it makes me long for the days when Topps use to put former stars and Hall of Famers as their variations. 

And while this years set of the Topps flagship is the first time in a while they've done anything to really shake up their formula, getting rid of those stupid variations should have been one of them.

Alright enough ranting.  I featured Robin's 2010 variations a couple months ago.  I remember back in 2009 and 2010 being really excited to see Robin featured as one of the player variations.  And looking back I'm also glad to see Topps used photos that hadn't been and still haven't been recycled to death.

I still wish Topps would go back to this type of photo variation in their sets.  It's easy to tell you got a rare card and who doesn't love seeing one of their favorite players on the current design?