Recent Acquisition: 1988 Fantastic Sam's Disc Set

In poking around on the internet ("doing research") for this post, I discovered that Fantastic Sam's still exists.  We never had it around when I was a kid -- a lot of national chains didn't make it to Delaware in the 80s.  I would see the 1988 Fantastic Sam's Disc set advertised in Baseball Cards magazine, and had no idea what Fantastic Sam's was.  I guess I asked around at some point and someone knew that it was a place to get your hair cut.  Well, I don't think I've ever seen one, but they're still a place to get your hair cut, if there's one near you.  The fact that a chain of hair salons issued baseball cards (if you want to call a disc a card) in the 80s is a good illustration of what the 80s were like for card collectors, I think.  So, when I made a few purchases recently, including the 1987 M&M's set and the 1988 Chef Boyardee set, I decided to get the Fantastic Sam's set, too.

Pedro Guerrero.

The ad on eBay said that these were in their original condition, and I see what they mean.  Each disc had two halves, with one half featuring the player and the second half featuring a contest.  These that I bought are all still attached along the perforation.  Also, the contest half has a scratch-off portion on front, and all of these are not scratched.

Pedro Guerrero card back (disc back?).

The back has an entry form on the contest half, and some minimal stats on the player half.  So, you can see that Pedro Guerrero hit .338 in 1987 for the Dodgers, for example.  That .338 finished second in the NL that year behind Tony Gwynn, and fifth overall in the majors, with Wade Boggs, Paul Molitor, and Alan Trammell all finishing between Gwynn and Guerrero.

Darryl Strawberry.

Julio Franco.

I won't show every player in detail.  Daryl Strawberry was still a huge deal back then, having recently won the World Series with the Mets.  He led the NL in homers with 39 in 1988.  Having checked out of baseball after the 1994 strike, I sometimes am surprised to see what became of some of the good players of my era.  For Julio Franco, that means discovering his extreme longevity, as his career spanned 1982-2007.

Don Mattingly.

Wally Joyner.

Absolutely every set like this from the 80s had to, absolutely had to, feature Don Mattingly.  And this is no exception.  Wally Joyner was hot for a few years as well, and was also frequently included.  He had 100 RBI in his rookie year in 1986, and followed that up with 117 in 1987.  He didn't top 100 again, but had many good years before retiring in 2001.

Will Clark.

Mike Schmidt.

Will Clark was huge back then, too.  Clark led the NL with 109 RBI in 1988, and his last great season appears to have been 1991.  He continued producing until retiring in 2000.  And the last disc I'll feature is Mike Schmidt, a personal favorite, who was at his end around then, having just recently hit his 500th home run during the 1987 season.

Paul Molitor, Wade Boggs, Tony Gwynn, Tim Raines, Dale Murphy, George Bell, Andre Dawson, Eric Davis, Ozzie Smith, Alan Trammell, Mark McGwire, George Brett, and Kirby Puckett.

Finally, I wanted to take a picture of the rest of the set.  These were kind of a pain to scan, so I only did a few.  But you see that all of them are attached to the contest panel, and all of the contest panels are unscratched (and the backs aren't filled in, either).  So these have made it in pretty good shape for the past 30 years.  You see the usual suspects, really, for the remaining cards -- Dale Murphy, Kirby Puckett, Ozzie Smith, and so on.

Thanks for reading!  I made a few more purchases around the same time, and will keep showing them as they arrive.