1981 Topps

Oh, what a glorious summer. This was the summer that the T-family returned from Spain to live in the good old U.S. of A. June 8th as a matter of fact. In the three years since we'd left the States, young RobbyT became a huge baseball fan. Even made an All-Star team in Little League.

So imagine my excitement to finally return to the States. No more waiting on three day old box scores in the Stars and Stripes. No more waiting on three week old issues of The Sporting News to show up in the mail. No more waiting on Granny to send me a box of baseball cards that I would only get half of. Nope, this was going to be one awesome summer.

So guess what I got for my 12th birthday that summer? That's right, my birthday, June 12th. Summer of 1981.

You know what I got? Yeah, a @#$%!& strike!!! I got four days of baseball for the next two months. Whoo-hoo....

But the other thing I got on returning was discovering that there were three companies making baseball cards. Whoo-hoo!!!!!!! How was this possible? Why hadn't I been notified? Who cared? I was going to get them all!!!!!!

We went back to my grandparents in Arkansas that summer, and you can bet that I begged like hell to ride along with my mom to Wal-Mart to get whatever cards I could talk her in to buying for me.  Wally World had these rack packs for 85 cents a piece. And despite buying what I thought was approximately 1000 packs that summer, I still don't have the Kirk Gibson rookie card! D'oh!!!

This is another one of those sets that I love without question. I can't explain it. (The 2009 RobbyT cards also borrow a prominent feature of these cards as well) It might very well be the fact that any time you went in any place in 1981 that sold anything, you could find packs of these. I swear I bought a pack at church that summer.

I can't wait either, the 1981 Topps Detroit Tigers:

27 Champ Summers

59 Dan Petry

79 Bruce Robbins

102 Dave Tobik

123 Al Cowens

150 Mark Fidrych

177 Rick Peters

196 Duffy Dyer

217 Richie Hebner

234 Lou Whitaker

251 Tom Brookens

273 Stan Papi

291 Aurelio Lopez

315 Kirk Gibson

337 Lynn Jones

358 Mark Wagner

373 Pat Underwood

392 Lance Parrish

417 Dan Schatzeder

448 Tim Corcoran

468 John Wockenfuss

572 Jack Morris

593 Steve Kemp

614 Dave Rozema

626 Tigers Future Stars Dave Steffen/Jerry Udjer/Roger Weaver

658 Milt Wilcox

666 Detroit Tigers Team Card

709 Alan Trammell

This was also the year of the debut of the Topps Traded set as we would come to know it in the 80's. In 1981, it was more of a novelty than anything, as it really didn't have much more than the first solo card of Fernando Valenzuela, but it would become a staple from Topps in years to come. For the only time they would number it as a continuation of the base set. I guess it had that going for it.

The 1981 Topps Traded Detroit Tigers:

760 Bill Fahey

779 Mick Kelleher

827 Kevin Saucier

Mick, I'd be mad if they got a picture of my coif looking like that too....