Some Fleer Sets Not in My Collection

Today I'll feature a few cards from my collection which are from small Fleer sets of the 80s, in cases in which I don't actually have the whole set.

Two of Charlie Leibrandt.

Early in my collecting days I liked the small boxed sets from Topps and Fleer.  I guess I got more sophisticated and viewed them as being a bit silly, as they all featured the same players and there were so many similar sets.  But even when I liked buying these sets, I never went for the Fleer Baseball's Best: Sluggers vs. Pitchers.  A big part of my dislike of the set is it's visual design -- it looks to me like it's for little kids.  Another part is the conception of baseball as sluggers vs. pitchers -- I think it leaves out the team aspects, and the role of defense and baserunning, for example.  In any case I ended up somehow with a handful of the cards, including these two of Royals starter Charlie Leibrandt.  Leibrandt was in the majors 1979 through 1993 with the Reds, Royals, Braves, and Rangers, and won the World Series with Kansas City in 1985.  He's apparently well known for generally having a rough time in the postseason in several appearances.

Pedro Guerrero.

Tim Raines.

I have two more of the Slugger vs. Pitchers cards, one more from 1986 and one from 1987.  The 1986 is Pedro Guerrero, and the 1987 is Tim Raines.  It's great to see Raines in the light blue road uniform of those Expos.  Guerrero would just miss a second World Series with the Dodgers a couple of years later; he won with them in 1981, but was traded in August of 1988 to the Cardinals for John Tudor.

Kevin McReynolds.

Greg Maddux.

Another boxed set I don't have is the 1989 Fleer Heroes of Baseball.  The one card I have is of Met Kevin McReynolds, who joined the Mets in 1987 from the Padres.  Those post-1986 Mets challenged a few times, but didn't win another pennant.  Then I have this 1989 Fleer For the Record of Greg Maddux.  For the Record doesn't really fit with the other sets here, since it wasn't a Fleer 44-card boxed set.  For the Record was instead a 6-card set, and I'm not sure exactly how they were found.  I don't know that they were inserts like the Fleer All-Stars, but maybe they were.  Or maybe they were included with factory sets.  It's not even clear to me what the point of the set is -- are they record setters?  Are they just notable players Fleer wanted to issue an extra card of?  In earlier years I think these were Fleer Headliners.

Thanks for reading!