1994 Score Select Series 2

I've had a fairly fond appreciation for 1993 Score Select over the years. To me, it was a much better attempt at a "premium" type set for Score than the Pinnacle brand and it played off of the fairly recent trend of throwing in horizontal card designs along with the traditional vertical cards. 1993 was the cutoff period in my card collecting days, however, and after purchasing this pack I'm wishing it was from the previous year. The design gives me a headache.

311 - Alex Fernandez

373 - Sean Berry (I'm not sure who Sean Berry is, but he played for the Expos and that's all that matters.)
334 - Eddie Taubensee (Eddie is wearing a white Reds hat. When is the last time the Reds had those?)

389 - Steve Trachsel 1994 Rookie Prospect (Whenever I hear the phrase "worst pitcher in baseball" for some reason Steve Trachsel's name always comes up. Maybe it was the McGwire home run, or maybe it's the fact that he hung around so long without ever doing anything well. Er, yeah, let's go with the latter.)

321 - Omar Vizquel
412 - Rob Butler 1994 Rookie Prospect

401 - Rikkert Faneyte (This is photographic evidence that someone actually named Rikkert Faneyte played a baseball game at some point. The. Next. Barry. Bonds.)

299 - Jim Thome
219 - Dave Hansen

261 - Kent Hrbek (It's sad to say that I actually think I like the backs of these a lot better than the fronts.)
247 - Greg McMichael (McMichael was the Braves closer for at least a portion of the 1993 season.)

234 - Jeff Bagwell (Bagwell must have a pack of Bubble Tape in his rear pocket.)

1995 Select

I've waited thirteen years to bust a box of 1995 Select.

Yep, thirteen years.

When 1995 Select was released card collectors everywhere went batshit over it. Why you ask? It's all because of the sticker sealing the lid of the waxbox.

BOX		CASE
15		3925

of 24

of 4950

Only 4,950 24-box cases were made and each waxbox was serial numbered.

Big deal, right?

Well, armed with that information (and other variables such as pack insertion ratios and set size) mathematically-inclined collectors were able to calculate exactly how many copies of each card were made.

So even though none of the individual cards were serial numbered; nonetheless, you could figure out that there were 9900 copies of each Can't Miss, 4950 Big Sticks, and 3168 Sure Shots inserts printed. But more importantly, there were only 475 copies of each one-per-box Artist Proof parallel were made. 475 copies may not seem all that scarce -- at least to the collector of 2008 -- but in 1995 it was, and that's why The Hobby went batshit over '95 Select.

Base

Just to make things, interesting, I will attempt to write one or two sentences about each player, as if I had written them in 1995. In addition, I will not use a period at the end of any sentence.

Mike Greenwell
Mike was shafted in the 1988 AL MVP balloting!

Randy Johnson
In 1995, Heather Roszell turned six!

Roger Clemens
In 1995, Roger was five years into a relationship with 20-year-old country music star Mindy McCready! Guys Do It All the Time, indeed!

Man-Ram
While informed about the enfolding O.J. Simpson "White Bronco" chase, Man-Ram reportedly responded, "What did Chad do?"

Midre Cummings (Select Rookie)
Popular baseball card blogger Chris Harris once spent $20 on a lot of Midre Cummings rookie cards!

Chad Mottola (SR)
Chad was the Reds First-Round draft pick in 1992!

Brad Woodall (SR)
Brad was the International League's Pitcher of the Year for 1994!

Dave Winfield
On July 31, 1994 Dave was traded from the Twins to the Indians for a player to be named later! After the two teams failed to come to an agreement, the Indians "traded" Dave back to the Twins -- FOR A DINNER TAB!


You're supposed to get 10 cards in a pack, but as you can see, I only received eight. In the rest of the box, I received one pack that had nine cards, but the other 22 packs had the allotted 10 cards.

The video box bust is already on YouTube, and the full review will be on Stale Gum later this week.