Even though the Yankees are the arch-rivals of my Boston Red Sox, and The Rivalry is more alive now than it's been in a decade, that hasn't stopped all sorts of Yankees cards from finding their way into my collection, one way or another.
Whether we're talking about the big lots of vintage cards my Dad bought for cheap back in the 70's or the Yankee Stadium Legacy insert cards like the one shown at the top of this post, Yankees cards have always been a part of my collection, whether I want them there necessarily or not.
In addition to having player collections for legendary Yankees (how could I not collect Derek Jeter and Mariano Rivera), I also have my fair share of other Yankees cards. These cards range from vintage Yankees cards from the 60's to Mickey Mantle Home Run inserts 2007 Topps and Topps Heritage to finally the extreme Yankee Stadium Legacy insert set. Today, this Red Sox fan will be going over some of my favorite Yankees cards in my collection.
I might as well continue with what I have at the top of the post, the 2008 Upper Deck Yankee Stadium Legacy insert set. A continuous insert set that extended through multiple UD products, the Yankee Stadium Legacy set has one card for every game played at the old Yankee Stadium. That's right, there's one card for each of the 6,743 games at the original ballpark. A few years into when I started collecting, I remember pulling these out of packs of 2008 Upper Deck Goudey.
Unbelievably, someone actually completed the set and was able to travel to the new Yankee Stadium and meet Derek Jeter as a reward for his astonishing accomplishment.
Better yet, the guy lives in Arkansas and is a Cubs fan.
I'm not sure what the white bordered cards like the Mariano Rivera are for, but the blue bordered YSL cards are from the box set. Although I've never seen this set before and only have a couple cards from it, I assume this set pays homage to the best players to ever play at the original Yankee Stadium as well as significant events that took place there, meaning it should be filled with highlights from there 26 World Series wins at that park.
Damn their success really is depressing to anyone who's not a Yanks fan.
In 2006, Topps produced a continuous set commemorating Mickey Mantle and his 536 career home runs for the New York Yankees. Another insert set with cards included in a few of their products, the Mickey Mantle Home Run History set had one card for each of his homers. I guess my Dad and I didn't buy a lot of cards back in 2006, because I only have a handful of these. I haven't heard any major stories about people completing this set, but I assume it's way easier than the Yankee Stadium Legacy set.
Similar to what they did for Mickey Mantle, Topps did the exact same thing for Alex Rodriguez back in 2007. While he was on the road to 500 career home runs, Topps produced another continuous set, this one in a few of Topps' 2007 products including Flagship, Heritage, and Moments & Milestones. Although I don't have any of these inserts showing A-Rod as a Yankee, I still keep my 2 pages of these inserts in the Yankees binder with the rest of the stuff I've shown thus far.
However, my special Yankees cards don't only consist of continuous insert sets. One of the most iconic cards of all-time, Derek Jeter's 1993 Topps rookie card, is another one of my most special cards of a New York Yankee. Although the over-production of cards in the 1990's means his 1993 Topps rookie isn't worth a crazy amount, I still got this card at a pretty good price. I bought the entire 1993 Topps Factory set for $15 and instantly separated the Derek Jeter rookie which I would argue is equivalent in value to what I paid for the entire set.
Like I said, my Dad bought a huge lot of vintage cards for around $20 back in the 1970's, a purchase that gave me some of the most valuable vintage cards in my collection today. Included in this lot were most of the cards from the 1962 Topps World Series subset, commemorating the 1961 Fall Classic. To my knowledge, I'm only missing either game 5 or 6 to have the entire World Series set completed. I'm thinking of just going for it and buying the best-priced card I need once the COMC Black Friday sale comes along.
Truth be told, you can't mention the Yankees for 2 minutes without bringing up the greatest athlete to ever play the game, Babe Ruth. Similarly to the 1962 Topps World Series subset, there is also a Babe Ruth Special subset in 1962 Topps highlighting milestones in Ruth's illustrious career. After checking today, it appears I have 5 cards from this subset, but I'm not sure how many are in the set. Even though there are probably way more out there and it would be expensive to track them down, this is a set I'd be interested in finishing off someday. However, only if I'm able to find them in the right condition for the right price.
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