1976 Caruso Hawaii Islanders Baseball #5, Dave Roberts

I like it when cards get a little ostentatious, going the extra mile to make a silk purse out of a sow's ear, as the saying goes. Let's say you can only print in two colors on white. Any other year, you might seem cheap, but that's no problem in 1976! Red + Blue = America!

The bicentennial was all over the place for 1976, hence the stars and stripes and bunting borders for Caruso's PCL team sets. Barack Obama would've been 15 and living in Honolulu at the time, so it's not beyond the pale to think president #44 saw this set for sale at an Islanders game himself.

The Islanders played AAA for San Diego, who drafted Dave Roberts first overall in 1972. While never a star, he played long enough to overlap careers with another Dave Roberts, hence my confusion as an 8 year-old when these came around.

1981 Topps #57, Dave Roberts

Being a kid in Seattle, this was "my" Dave Roberts. The "other" Dave played in Texas.

1981 Topps #431, Dave Roberts

Topps didn't stop there, because "other" Dave switched Texas addresses during the 1980-81 offseason.

1981 Topps Traded #824, Dave Roberts

No matter what decade you're in, that's a lot of Dave. (Gotta whole lotta Dave! Whole lotta Dave!)

UPDATE: Enjoy even more Dave Roberts in my 1977 Hawaii Islanders post. This time, there's video of Dave's only post-season appearance, as he pinch-hit with two outs in the ninth in the deciding game of the 1981 NL Division series.

Value: Bought this on eBay in July 2024 for $7. Teams from this era cost $15-25, since Caruso-made sets rarely include a major star.

Fakes / reprints: Haven't seen reprints in the marketplace, as Caruso's PCL sets are obscure and inexpensive enough to discourage the requisite investment of time.

"I feel like pigs in a waller," a.k.a, Topps exhibit at the Louisville Slugger Factory!

Louisville's hosted baseball since before a bat rolled out of Bud Hillerich's woodshop and into Pete Browning's hands (1884, courtesy their history page), but the Louisville Slugger Factory and Museum is my favorite icon in a town synonymous with the pastime. I make it to Louisville about once a year, and this time, I lucked into extra baseball, as a Topps-themed spread occupied the factory's free exhibit room.

Here's my @Number5TypeCard twitter rundown of exhibit highlights; click through for bigger photos. Note how the mega-Mantle sits alongside Star Wars, reflecting Topps' open mind toward selling what's popular throughout their history.

Topps exhibit at Louisville Slugger factory. First mural is quite an object d'art. pic.twitter.com/byzUETe4Gt
— Matthew Glidden (@Number5TypeCard) April 9, 2015

Topps legend Sy Berger's smiling mug appeared ten feet inside the door, placed above a table of card components as "Cookin' Up Cards In The Kitchen."

Cookin' Up Cards in the Kitchen with Sy Berger. #Topps pic.twitter.com/6cgewZceVA

— Matthew Glidden (@Number5TypeCard) April 9, 2015

Mounted on the wall, here's my favorite piece in the exhibit: a custom Louisville Slugger bike with a card pinned in the spokes! Now you can move that 1986 Topps Sid Bream faster that Sid Bream ever could himself! (I kid Sid, but he really could've benefited in a sport with bikepaths instead of basepaths.)

Highlight of the exhibit, custom Louisville Slugger bike with 1986 Topps Sid Bream pinned in the spokes. pic.twitter.com/OwhOXRRuQ9

— Matthew Glidden (@Number5TypeCard) April 9, 2015

I voted on a bevy of competitions between Topps subjects, spanning Superman to Major League's Jobu totem. Heck with you, Elvis, it's Beatles across the board for me.

Voting at Louisville Slugger exhibit among stars of past Topps sets. pic.twitter.com/F4f4i5Rsfk

— Matthew Glidden (@Number5TypeCard) April 9, 2015

A bunch of Hollywood ephemera on display came from a deep-pockets collector of both cards and props, who coordinated with Louisville Slugger to fill cases with Luke's lightsaber, Indy's whip, and...damn, that really is Indy's whip. A variety of Topps sports cards filled other cabinets, covering football, hockey, soccer, basketball, and more.

Luke's lightsaber, Indy's whip, the Jobu Totem & a liberated Leia at Louisville Slugger Topps exhibit. pic.twitter.com/Y9cF4SbJDi

— Matthew Glidden (@Number5TypeCard) April 9, 2015

There's the real Jobu totem, which (heads up to Cleveland fans) sits in neighboring Kentucky for another month or two.

Auto Mantle ($3K) & Mathews ($2K) bats at Louisville Slugger store. The b-stock runs $19.99. pic.twitter.com/nss5Lqqh7j

— Matthew Glidden (@Number5TypeCard) April 10, 2015

Several autographed bats by huge names sat on display in the factory store and looked, to this fan's opinion, quite vulnerable to theft. Maybe they have a bunch more in a back room? At the other end of affordable, the blacked but unfinished bats cost $20 each, thanks to errors prior to the finishing process.

This run-through doesn't even cover the factory tour itself, which guides you through the process from raw timber to a sweet range of pro finishes. Slugger's factory isn't just a thing to do in town, it's really a baseball Mecca not many steps behind Cooperstown. Pair it with a Louisville Bats AAA game and you've got the meat and potatoes of baseball, past and present.

(And Slugger wasn't the only baseball meal I enjoyed on this trip. Next post, I'll cover a Cuban exhibit just around the corner.)

1979 Cramer Hawaii Islanders Baseball #5, Sam Perlozzo

Hey there! I'm Sam, and is this a great day for baseball or what? How about a game of pepper and a non-cola soft drink?

If "Sam Perlozzo" rings a bell, it's likely from his mid-2000s stint as Orioles manager, during a time of team roster and management turnover. Along with a shuffling of their front office in 2006, vets Rafael Palmeiro, Sammy Sosa, and B.J. Surhoff all left Baltimore and touted prospect Nick Markakis made his debut. This double-handful of new contracts didn't change the year-end standings, as Baltimore still placed 4th in the AL East. They wouldn't finish higher until 2012 (2nd) and finally won their first division crown in nearly 20 years in 2014.

"Cramer Sports Promotions" is the same company that first received a MLB license during the 1990s as Pacific, thanks to their focus on Spanish language sets. They were later granted a "full" English language card license, but lost it, as did several others, when MLB cut back licensees to Topps only after the junk wax era imploded.

In 1979, Cramer Sports and TCMA both sought business from western minor league teams and Hawaii is just one of several franchises who purchased a set from both.  I ran into a problem tracking down today's type card, at least as the "real #5." The above card is Sam's TCMA version, which shows a "5" right on the front. So why doesn't it appear that way in catalogs? I'll blame the confusion over "numbering by checklist" or "numbering by player uniform."

Many team sets simply used a player's uniform for their card, even if that meant skipping over unused team numbers in the checklist. Other times, they created a real checklist without gaps, regardless of the player's jersey. In 1979, TCMA blended these concepts by putting "5" (his uniform) after Sam's name, but checklisting him as #11. So the TCMA isn't a "real" #5 for my type collection, but the Cramer version at the top is. One small mystery solved.

That's not the San Diego Chicken on Hawaii's 1979 souvenir yearbook, it's a bird. What kind of bird?

Just "The Bird." I feel the Islanders marketing department could've tried harder here.

Team photos likely came from MLB spring training, so you get to see most of the squad in San Diego uniform. As the Padres AAA club, many received a MLB call-up somewhere along the way.

Cramer used the aforementioned "uniform number" scheme, so its set checklist goes to 29 but includes 23 players plus a title card. Players who reached the bigs in bold.

• Team Insignia Card
• 3 Al Zarilla (Coach)
• 5 Sam Perlozzo
• 8 Tucker Ashford
• 9 Steve Brye
• 10 Vic Bernal
• 11 Chuck Baker
• 12 Bob Mitchell
• 13 Juan Eichelberger
• 14 Craig Stimac
• 16 Tom Tellmann
• 17 Dennis Kinney
• 18 Rick Sweet
• 19 Al Fitzmorris
• 20 Lynn McKinney
• 21 Jim Beswick
• 22 Randy Fierbaugh
• 23 Fred Kuhaulua
• 24 Dick Phillips (Manager)
• 25 Jim Wilhelm
• 26 Gary Lucas
• 27 Tony Castillo
• 28 Andy Dyes
• 29 Dave Wehrmeister

For those scoring at home, #28 Andy Dyes is TCMA's #5 for the "other" 1979 Hawaii Islanders team set.

Value: Singles like Sam Perlozzo run a dollar or two, when available. It's more common in the minor league marketplace to buy complete team sets for $15-20. This particular card came from a trading friend (Sam of OBC) who purchased a lot of Islanders team sets from eBay and pulled a type card for me.

Fakes / reprints: Haven't heard of any Cramer Sports reprints and it's unlikely this particular team would've been reissued, since it lacks big name MLB stars.

Site news: This year, 2015, I finally registered Number5TypeCollection.com as a real domain for this blog. Pop the champagne!

1914 T222 Fatima Baseball Players #5, Ed Reulbach, Jimmy Archer, Larry McLean, Oscar Vitt

2015 vintage card forums continue to bustle with gossip and check-ins, as collectors take the temperature of what their market likes on a regular. Buyers (and thus, sellers) appreciate certain teams or players today more than our forebears and there's a continual hunt for discoveries in dusty estates or cigar boxes. Part of advanced collecting is feeling poised on the edge of new cardboard territory, even when "new" means "compared to Abner Doubleday."

I'm ten-plus years into the type collection, but discovered a new-to-me, century-old, Turkish cigarette entry just this week: T222 Fatima Baseball Players, a follow-up to their unnumbered T200 Team Cards. As seen in this excellent OldCardboard.com gallery, four of its players feature a "5" below their name and team, which is good enough to pique my curiosity.

The first #5, Ed Reulbach, would be a special find as one baseball's hardest-to-hit pitchers. He threw one of its finest curves and is the only man to pitch a doubleheader shutout (Sept 26, 1908); much more at his SABR bio.

How difficult is it to capture catcher Jimmy Archer in a single sentence? This Irish-born member of the Canadian Baseball Hall of Fame could gun down base-stealers while crouched thanks to an industrial soap vat accident that bestowed upon him the proportional powers of a spider shortened and quickened his throwing arm. That's about three different novels in one guy.

While I don't own any of the #5s yet, The Trader Speaks' set gallery showed me what all four guys look like. How do they look? They look warm.

Phew, the sweating! Those dark woolens on Larry McLean speak to season after season of humid afternoon games, dreaming of 21st-century light-knit uniforms and cool evening start times.

(If Larry looks like a tall drink of water in that photo, it's because he stood 6'5", still the tallest catcher in MLB history.)

Like Billy Martin, Ossie Vitt's antagonistic managing style eclipsed his skills with the bat and glove. The public kerfuffle over his handling of Cleveland's Crybabies made the 1940 season especially juicy for fans of tight playoff races.

Despite its claimed "Collection of 100 photographs," collectors agree only 52 baseball players exist. Eight other athletes and cinema stars round out the T222 set at 60 total and there's a full checklist at Sports Collectors Daily.

Not a #5, but T222 Vic Saier is the most gleeful prewar card you'll see today. Omg weeeeeeeeeee!

Value: HOFers Walter Johnson and Grover Cleveland Alexander fetch 4-digit prices, but non-star singles can run under $100. (I hope to find the #5s for below $50.)

Fakes / reprints: Fatima cards are old enough and interesting enough to be a high risk for reprinting. How to detect the bad ones? Fatima cards are real photos, so won't show any dot-printing pattern under magnification. Also, as with most prewar shopping, know your dealer when buying type cards.

1948-49 Caramelos "El Indio" Cuban Baseball #5, Orlando "Tango" Suarez

With the loosening of Amerca's decades-old Cuban travel and trade embargo on our horizon, I dusted off a dormant entry for one of my type collection's White Whales: the Caramelos El Indio cigarette set. These black-and-white photos celebrate Cuba's 1948-49 Winter League, a warm-weather haven for baseball pros from a time before Castro's revolution. This particular #5 features Orlando "Tango" Suarez, catcher for the Almendares city team and veteran of several Cuban pro seasons.

Multiple Latin American and Caribbean countries hosted "winter leagues" between November and February, so Cuba wasn't the only such off-season league. Mexico, Puerto Rico, Panama, and others  have hosted similar leagues on-and-off since the early 20th century.

On the collectibles front, various tobacco, photo, and magazine publishers printed cards or stamps to support these winter league seasons. The 96 cards packaged with El Indio products show 24 players for each city in Cuba's 1948-49 league: Almendares, Cienfuegos, Havana, and Marianao.

The bio text notes Suarez played regularly for the Havana Cubans of Florida's International League (a Cuba-Florida crossover) and this Havana club served as a low-level affiliate for the Washington Senators for several years.

Baseball Reference has a starter profile for those new to Cuba's league history, though its easiest demarcation is pre- and post-1961, the year Fidel Castro banned pro sports nationwide. This socialist shift also put an end to the scouting connection between MLB teams and Cuban winter league rosters, though some players took the risk of defecting to America when they felt baseball success was within their grasp.

Tango's APBPA card for the 1949-50 season reflected his move to America's Southwestern minor leagues and he appeared on their pro rosters through 1953, though he never made the bigs (minor league stats).

This isn't a union card, as the APBPA's a fraternal assistance organization for current and former players; find the summary of their mission at APBPA.org.

Why is this type card a White Whale? In short, rarity. Very few El Indio cards survived to reach modern collectors hands. As of writing, PSA's report lists just six total, with half-a-dozen players graded once each. Old Cardboard's set profile says a collector album exists, but I've never seen a scan for it. As with many vintage winter league sets, completing something from this era's almost impossible, no matter how much money you can throw at it.

Value: Low grade El Indio singles have auctioned for $40-50 at CubanBaseballAuctions.com, with much higher prices expected for Hall of Famers or Negro League stars. Many of the Negro Leagues' best played in Cuba and other winter leagues, which sported integrated teams well in advance of an American equivalent.

Fakes / reprints: It'd be hard for fakes or reprints to surprise advanced collectors, so I doubt you'd see something so rare faked for the marketplace.

1976 Indianapolis Indians Baseball #5, Joe Henderson

After 100-plus years of MLB card sets from tobacco and candy companies, one forgets how few releases exist for teams that played in America's minor league zip codes. Prior to the 1970s, those cities rarely turned local interest into collectible cards, thanks to the prohibitive cost of small-scale photo printing.

Indianapolis represents a bright spot from this period, as creator of 1970s cards replete with high stirrups and sweet mustachios. I've covered three of their team sets prior to today's post.

• 1976 team set #5, Joe Henderson (today)
• 1977 team set #5, Tom Hume
• 1978 team set #5, Mike LaCoss
• 1979 team set #5, Harry Spilman 
• 1980 team set #5, Joe Price

For modern collectors, the downside of these 1970s sets remains small print runs. Even an established minor league franchise like the Indians would run out of reasons to print cards after ten thousand or so, just drips and drabs compared to the millions of Topps gum cards. I borrowed today's #5 scans from TradingCardBB's set gallery because I've yet to locate a type card of my own in the public market.

I love the back of this Joe (nickname: "Fred") Henderson because of the story it tells. He briefly gave up pitching in 1967 and baseball itself in 1969. Born on the 4th of July, Joe still put in time as a Mexican Leaguer with Union Laguna in 1971. He was 1975 MVP for Indy, despite being a reliever, paralleling the era's emergence of star firemen like Rollie Fingers and Bruce Sutter.

While not reflected on this card, "Fred" also played parts of three big-league seasons, even winning a pair of mid-season games for the 1976 champion Cincinnati Reds. Joe's nephew Dave Henderson made some World Series noise himself in 1986, figuring in the game Peter Gammons called his top World Series moment.

The 1976 Indianapolis set comprises 26 cards: 22 players, 3 team staff, and a checklist.

1. Jim Snyder (Manager)
2. Larry Payne
3. Ray Knight
4. Arturo Defreites
5. Joe Henderson
6. Tom Spencer
7. Dave Revering
8. Jeff Sovern
9. Tom Hume
10. Rudy Meoli
11. Sonny Ruberto (Coach)
12. Tom Carroll
13. Junior Kennedy
14. Lorin Grow
15. Dave Schneck
16. Manny Sarmiento
17. Don Werner
18. Mike Thompson
19. Keith Marshall
20. Rich Hinton
21. John Knox
22. Carlos Alfonso
23. Tony Franklin
24. Mac Scarce
25. Ron McClain (Trainer)
26. Checklist (unnumbered)

I've bolded all players with MLB experience. As the Reds AAA affiliate in those days, most players got at least a September call-up during their careers.

Value: Ray Knight's the best-known Indianapolis emeritus from 1976, but several of its players appeared for the Big Red Machine, pushing collector demand above your average 1970s team set. I'd expect $25-35 as the set cost and most singles would be a few dollars.

Fakes / reprints: Haven't seen any in the marketplace.

1967 Kabaya-Leaf Japanese Pro Baseball #5, Minoru Nakamura

I don't often get to write about pros who never played the American game, so Minoru Nakamura's arrival was my first big hit for 2015. After 15 years of working on this type collection, it's no surprise I'm down to the rarest of the rare for both domestic and foreign sets.

1967 Kabaya-Leaf #5 (design from 1959 Topps)

1967 is a watershed of sorts for Japanese collectors, as this marked their first comprehensive "American-style" card set. Prior to Kabaya-Leaf's effort, Japanese companies highlighted specific teams or star players in more traditional designs, like the rounded Menko game chip.

1948 Flower Edge Menko

If you Google for "Kabaya-Leaf," this single 1967 baseball set is their company's legacy, as collectors and auction houses post about its famous and obscure players. Their set, in turn, tapped into American tastes by mixing the Topps designs from 1959 (like my #5) and 1963 (below).

1967 Kabaya Leaf #11 Sadaharu Oh (design from 1963 Topps)

According to Japanese specialist Rob Fitts, American collectors have more access to Kabaya-Leaf cards because stateside importer Mel Bailey purchased a significant amount of the Japanese print run and resold them via collector newsletters in the 1970s. This also explains the higher grades found in what exists in the hobby, as collectors would be less likely to handle and mangle them than kids at a candy counter.

The first stat column isn't age, as Minoru was in his late 20s in 1967. It reflects Japan's traditional, Imperial dating system and 1966 marked year 41 of Showa, under the long-lived Emperor Hirohito.

The second stat column, mostly as quote marks, tracks Nakamura's one-team career with the Yomiuri Giants. He pitched there for 13 years (career stats) and for five straight title-winners (1965-69), a nice entry on any pitcher's resume.

It's possible Kabaya-Leaf prepped a larger set for the entire league, but printed just the most successful teams for financial reasons. Their complete 1967 checklist includes players from six of the 12 Japanese pro teams and skips whole swaths of numbers, with just 105 total cards despite numbering to #410. Several players catalog as "short prints," probably because the American importer couldn't obtain those cards in the same quantity.

For a wealth of individual 1967 card scans, check out PSA collector Mark927's near-set. For a further wealth of classic Japanese card designs, see Sayonara Home Run! by John Gall and Gary Engel. Amazon sellers ask $180+ for a physical book, so I flipped through Amazon's "Look inside" preview and checked my local library system. (The Boston-area system has a single copy.)

Value: I bought this EX #5 for $30 on eBay. A top-tier set auctioned for $17K in 2010, so you'll have to compete with deep pockets if you go after high-grade cards.

Fakes / reprints: It'd be pretty easy to fake this cheaply made set, but advanced collectors might see right through them, so I doubt many exist. If you're purchasing Japanese HOFers, stick to dealers who know foreign sets well.

1973 Topps "1953 Baseball Stars" (aka 1953 Reprints) #5, Hal Newhouser

Let's start today's entry by saying farewell to Sy Berger (1923-2014), whose guiding hand in what "baseball cards" mean today reached well beyond the Topps Chewing Gum (T.C.G.) offices. Keith Olbermann did a nice job saluting our modern hobby's most influential creator, in matching bubble gum pink blazer.

My own post dives into similar "retro" ground via a long-awaited show find, the #5 type card from a Topps test printing created on the 20th anniversary of their own elegant, hand-painted 1953 set. Sy Berger might've created the 1952 cards on his dining table, but the follow-ups showed real artistry.

I'd been hunting this #5, a clean-cut Hal Newhouser, for more than a decade, so imagine my surprise seeing him behind an innocuous glass case on a Massachusetts show table. No protective lucite slab? No trumpet calls or wings of angels? Never mind the honorifics, I nabbed it straightaway. (Catalogs speculate that Topps printed just 300 of each card, hence the challenge in finding them today.)

1973 Topps "1953 Baseball Stars" #5, Hal Newhouser

Hobby catalogs sometimes call this a "1953 reprint," but even a cursory inspection shows it's repurposing (and improving) 1953's original painting, with no other reference to the earlier design. Newhouser's newer card restores significant details, like the ads on the outfield fence and additional depth in his uniform.

1953 Topps #228, Hal Newhouser

No 1950s or 1970s Topps base set used the full-text back style seen below, which more closely resembles cards from an earlier era.

1973 Topps "1953 Baseball Stars" #5 (back)

The set's 8 players include both HOFers and lesser-known players, without an obvious theme that connects them all.

1. Satchel Paige
2. Jackie Robinson
3. Carl Furillo (picture is Bill Antonello) -- Carl didn't appear in 1953 Topps
4. Al Rosen (picture is Jim Fridley)
5. Hal Newhouser
6. Clyde McCollough (picture is Vic Janowicz) -- Clyde didn't appear in 1953 Topps
7. Peanuts Lowrey
8. Johnny Mize

Did this set honor a group of actual players for a Topps event? I doubt it, given those three mislabeled names. These eight cards feel more whimsical or ad hoc -- and sources even differ whether they printed it in 1972 or 1973. (Find that discussion at Net54.)

Perhaps this came together because 1953's original artist (Gary Dvorak) played a more meaningful role than specific players in card selection. I can believe Topps creative man Woody Gelman wanted to highlight Gary's work somehow or printed the set for employees, a la 1970 Topps Teamates, and their editor made a mistake matching names to portraits.

Here's an uncut sheet, auctioned by REA in Spring 2019.

UPDATE: Thanks to Jason Schwartz, who compared these to 1934-36 Diamond Stars, which make a great match. To my eye, there's now a chance you're looking at something created to honor someone who served in both companies, first at 1930s National Chicle and later for Topps.

Value: I bought this EX-MT Newhouser for $35 at a 2014 show table, a decent price in my opinion. Bigger names like Robinson and Paige naturally command bigger prices and the few cards I've seen were all in nicer grades.

Fakes / reprints: Haven't seen any reprints of these "reprints" and they're likely too obscure to profitably fake. Finding a type card won't be cheap, but keep your eye on eBay for one of the lesser-known singles to get at least a decent deal.

1926 W512 Strip Card Baseball #5, Glen (Glenn) Wright

I want to think Mr. Wright looks mean here. Someone threw a pitch at his head, called his puppy an insulting name, or said his nose looked like a handful of raspberries. (In this set, it does.)

On the field, Glenn's cannon arm earned him the awesome nickname "Buckshot." You picture someone like that as all glove and no bat, but Wright regularly cleared .300, first for Pittsburgh and later in Brooklyn. Like Joe Sewell, another top 1920s shortstop, he rarely struck out. SABR wrote a nice profile for Glenn, starting with his unassisted triple play in 1925.

Buckshot earned a minor level of support for the Hall of Fame in the 50s, though eventually dropped off the ballot, probably for lack of overall production. Of all things, a 1929 handball accident ruined his throwing arm and cut his fielding ability from great to average. It's not on the level of some bizarre player injuries, but it's not something you'd expect from a baseballer today.

1926 W512 #6-10 uncut strip

What you see on the card is what you get with the W512s: hand-drawn players, paper strips sold from machines, and fruit-like facial features. The set does have a distinct advantage over others from the 1920s. Its total baseball checklist is ten (10) cards, with names like Cobb, Ruth, Hornsby, and Alexander. If you want to finish an early set full of "legends" for smaller money, this is the one for you. You can even expand into the multi-sport sections, should two handfuls of cards prove unsatisfying.

1926 W512 uncut "left" sheet

This "lefthand" sheet shows Glenn at one top corner and the "righthand" sheet completes the set of 50. You might recognize Hollywood actors, aviators, and other athletes following the initial 10 baseball players.

1926 W512 uncut "right" sheet

Speaking of things that derailed a career, former Boston and Seattle shortstop Rey Quinones had my favorite reason not to play every day: he was too good.

Value: Low-grade W512 singles cost a few dollars, unless they're one of the big baseball stars or a notable name like Charlie Chaplin or Charles Lindbergh.

Fakes / reprints: It'd be easy to fake these, thanks to the crude art and paper stock. Be wary of buying Ruth, Cobb, and other stars without confidence in the dealer.

1920 W516 and W529 Boxing #5, Lou (Lew) Tendler

Despite the low-grade condition of most strip cards, a repeated appearance of Babe Ruth in the #5 slot made those type acquisitions more costly than most.

1920 W519 #5 (correct image)

1921 W521 #5 (image reversed)

With those big hitters out of the way, you can imagine I'm happy to find lower-cost sluggers like slim Mr. Tendler, even if it means stepping off the diamond and into the ring.

1920 W529 #5, "Lou" (Lew) Tendler

Quickly-issued (some might say slapdash) strip card sets like W516 generated several variations and I compared some Ty Cobbs and Tris Speakers several years ago in the post 1920 W516-1-1 & W516-2-1.

The variations continued for their boxers, as W516s are just flipped versions of my W529.

1920 W516 Boxers (uncut strip, #5 Tendler at center)

The properly-named Lew Tendler received enshrinement in several sports Hall of Fames and boxing experts have called him "one of the best boxers to never have won a world title."

UPDATE: In a Net54 post on W516 variations, the well-named boxingcardman identified six designs collectors can find in this W516/W529 set.

Type 1: IFC symbol correct, numbered starting at 1, handwritten legend
Type 2: IFC symbol reversed (i.e., image flipped), numbered same as Type 1, handwritten legend
Type 3: IFC symbol reversed, numbers reversed (i.e, card #1 is now card #10), handwritten legend
Type 4: IFC Symbol correct, numbered starting at 50, typeset legend
Type 5: IFC symbol reversed, numbering same, typset legend
Type 6: IFC Symbol reversed, numbering reversed, typset legend

There are also a ton of color variations, shading variations, etc. It is by far the most complex set of boxing strips and I have no reason to believe that the baseball cards aren't just as confusing and complex.

It's like Pokemon!

Value: Mr. Tendler cost me just $2 at a 2014 card show, a fair sight better than $100+ for Babe Ruth!

Fakes / reprints: Haven't seen any in the marketplace, but they'd be cheap to fake, so know your dealer when purchasing any big names.