2009 Upper Deck 1989 20th Anniversary Buyback #102

   

Card Review: 9.2  I'm grading this card slightly lower than I graded the 1989 Upper Deck base card due to the foil (hologram) stamping on the front.  I understand the "20th Anniversary" stamp on the front is what makes this a different card, but from a design perspective, it's not an improvement.  At least it covers up the catcher a little (I think it's Joe Girardi, could also be Damon Berryhill or maybe Jody Davis?), and I've always felt this card could have been cropped a little better.  Either show more of the catcher, or none at all UD.  I guess I'm the only person in the hobby who complains about the photography on '89 UD.

That last sentence sort of sums up why I'm not a huge fan of "buybacks" and don't really view them as "new" or "unique" cards.  This is an 1989 Upper Deck.  That's objectively true.  It's just been altered.  All the online data bases catalog it as a "unique" card from 2019, so I will too, but it doesn't feel honest.  To me it's just a gimmick.  But I'm a slave to my collection, so if it's listed as a "unique" card, I'm going to pick them up when they become available at a reasonable price.

Speaking of adding "new" cards, this is the first new Wallach card post since 2019, when Topps included something like 20 different versions of the same Wallach card as an insert in their Archives set.  The "Green" non-autographed version was the last one I picked up and posted.  The last time I added a Wallach card after the year it was issued, was way back in in July of 2017 when I picked up my first copy of the 1991 Panini French sticker.  For the first few years of this blog, it was almost entirely post like this, now they're few and far between.

I'll be reluctantly counting this as my first copy of this card, rather than my 301st copy of 1989 Upper Deck (which if you were to carbon date it, I'm confident you'd find it is).  As for this buyback "set," I couldn't find much on it.  They were inserted in packs back in 2009.  I don't what packs.  I don't really care.  I don't know how many there are, if they were done for every card in the '89 UD set, just the '89 UD set minus the high numbers, or just for the superstars.  The most informative information I could find on these was from a Rickey Henderson blog, and they didn't seem to know much about them either.  I don't see too many of these pop up on eBay, and when they do, they're usually what I deem to be wildly overpriced.  When this one appeared recently at on only a slightly grossly overpriced "buy it now" option, I went ahead and added it. Feel free to provide any additional information you may have on them in the comments.

Number of this card in my collection: 1

I'll give you a penny, not $25.00

This is currently up on ebay.  $25.00 for a rare 1989 Upper Deck "error" of Wallach.  I'm going to go ahead and call out this seller by name below.  He's either an idiot, or this is a pathetic attempt to rip someone off.  This is not an "error."  This is the work of a someone with a pencil and eraser.  You see, you can erase 1989 Upper Deck cards.  As kids, my friends and I used to do it all the time.  My brother and I still have Dennis Eckersley cards we erased and filled in my father's name (he looked a lot like Eck and played on a Men's League Team that wore A's uniforms).  You can also take the eraser to the photo and leave white streaks.  It wasn't a secret.  Beckett Monthly used to have a feature called "Fun Cards" that featured a lot of Upper Deck's doctored in similar ways.

Here's an example I just did today to make sure it still works: 

 The top card is a regular Ivan DeJesus.  The middle is the DeJesus after some light scrubbing with the eraser on that green pencil.  You can clearly see the black lettering beginning to fade.

The bottom card is the finished product.  I assure you, there is no photoshopping here.  Try it yourself.  You do have to put a little bit of elbow grease into the erasing, but it's nothing you won't be able to handle.

I wonder how much this rare "Jesus" error can fetch on ebay?  Perhaps if I erase an image of the virgin mary into the background I'll be able to get even more for it.

I'm not sure that the seller "rookieredsoxcards" was specifically targeting me, but he doesn't have any other of these "errors" listed.  If it was just an all-out scam I would think he would have more than one up with some story about a screwed up print run.  But the Wallach is all he has up.   And I can make my own at home.

1989 Upper Deck #102

Card Review: 9.7  Initially I was disappointed with this card.  My father was so impressed with these "new" cards that he went out and bought my brother and I an entire box, something he never did.  We tore through it and didn't pull a single Wallach. The photography in this set was pretty cool, with some really unique shots.  Based on what I was seeing,  I had really high hopes for the Wallach.  So my initial reaction upon pulling this card was a bit of disappointment.  However, it's grown on me over-time, and has actually become one of my favorite Wallach cards.  But as an 9 year old, it was a bit of a let down.

Like every other kid in the country, I was infatuated with Upper Deck in 1989.  That infatuation did not last, and by the mid-90's I had all but stopped collecting cards.  This had a lot to do with starting high school, but it also had a lot to do with what Upper Deck did to the traditional baseball card with it's introduction of the "premium" card.  I still hate the glossy card, like the one's Topps does today.  I'm sure they would have gone that direction eventually, but I can't help but think Upper Deck sped up the process.  I hate Upper Deck.  But there's no denying the historical significance of this set, and that as a whole is very nice looking one.

This card was also the first Wallach card I ever obtained 9 copies of.  This was important at the time, because back then I kept them all in 9 page sleeves in 3-ring binders.  So this was the first card I was ever able to completely fill a page with.

Number of this card in my collection: 39
2012 update: 43
2013 update: 74
2014 update: 136
2015 update: 162
2016 update: 176
2017 update: 180
2018 update: 190
2019 update: 212
2020 update: 270

2021 update: 278

2022 update: 291

2023 update: 304

2024 update: 318

2025 update: 320

2026 update: 321