Frankenset Page #27

With all the major MLB awards set to be announced beginning Monday of next week, the baseball season festivities are officially set to come to an end a week from today when the winners of AL and NL MVP are announced.

For me at least, certain awards seem to already be a guarantee, though there's no way to know for sure until they're announced. However, it doesn't seem like anyone is solid enough to beat out Jacob DeGrom for NL Cy Young nor does it appear, Miguel Andujar will miss out on the AL Rookie of the Year award.

Even so, award season is an exciting time of year as it ends the baseball season with a bang. Given that Spring Training starts in late February or early March with the awards being announced in mid-November, it's evident why the baseball season is so long. And after the thrilling year that was 2018, the final awards will be a good sendoff into the offseason until we start to see baseball being played next year.

Once the winners are announced next week, I'll be sure to access my MLB award predictions that I made back in April, choices that will almost certainly end up incredibly wrong. Still, I did the same for my division predictions, so I have to do the same for awards as well.

While we wait to see who made history in 2018, I have page 27 of my frankenset ready to go, featuring cards 235-243.

#235 2016 Topps Archives Lou Boudreau

The beautifully-captured wooden red seats in the background of Boudreau's 2016 Topps Archives card catapults it to the top 5 list of favorite cards from that set. Not to mention the Indians cursive writing logo that adds another historic element to this Topps Archives card.

#236 2016 Topps John Lagares

A quick message to Topps; I will always love any baseball card that shows an outfielder making a leaping or diving catch at the wall or on the grass. Even if the set includes a cut-off logo and too much smoke, I will easily toss that aside in appreciation of these types of photo choices.

#237 2005 Fleer Tradition Joe Randa

Adding on to the previous comments, I will also forever enjoy shots of players sliding into bases, especially when it's home plate since we can often see the catchers as well. There you go, 2 options for baseball cards that are way better choices than simply having the same photographs of batters at the plate and pitchers in their windups that we see on almost every card nowadays.

#238 2016 Topps Archives Rod Carew

I try not to include 2 cards from the same set on the exact same frankenset page, so either I didn't have other options for #235 or #238, or these 2 cards were just too great to choose one over the other. Looking closely at each option, I'm starting to believe more and more that it's the latter of the 2 choices.

#239 1987 Topps Juan Espino

Either I received a poor quality copy of this card, or all of the 1987 Topps cards of Juan Espino ended up this way. No matter what, owning a copy of this card with a higher-quality image could easily make this one of the stronger cards of the Topps junk wax era, or at least one of the best from the 1987 Topps set.

#240 1991 The Sporting News Conlon Collection

Since I can't remember the exact reason for choosing most cards in the frankenset, I'll just say I chose this one because the player must have one of the most interesting names to ever make it onto a baseball card. I know there are a few that are slightly more iconic, but "Rabbit Warstler" has to be one of the most unique names ever on cardboard.

#241 2014 Topps Gypsy Queen Tommy Milone

If I had my way, I'd choose to include this old-school A's uniform on way more Oakland A's cards than Topps currently does. It's not even that they don't wear these uniforms a lot, but rather that it's easier to find images with standard road or home jerseys. With that being said, it's nice when Topps puts in the effort for more unique uniforms to be included on cards.

#242 1991 Fleer Junior Noba

It's cards just like this one that gets me to miss the Montreal Expos more and more. Not only was it great to have baseball represented in Canada, but their teams, especially in the 70's and 80's, were simply fun to watch, filled with characters and crazy things that no other team in all of the game of baseball dared to do with the possible exception of the Charlie Finley Athletics.

#243 1991 Topps Lance Johnson

You really can't blame me too much for having 3 cards in the 1991 Topps design included on one page of the frankenset. Granted, I may have slightly overdone it with 2 from 2016 Topps Archives and 1 original card, but the design is one of the most underrated ever that I felt I just had to give it the recognition it deserved.