1990 was the second year for Upper Deck, the upstart of the sports trading card industry. Their approach was to deliver a higher end card than the Topps, Donruss, and Fleer. They used white card stock, included high quality photos on the front AND back of the cards and included a hologram on each card to prevent counterfeiting. But with pictures on both sides of the cards in an 800 card set, there’s bound to be some oddities. This is final installment in a series of four examining the beauty and quirks of ’90 Upper Deck, baseball and the ’90s. (#1 – The Fashion, #2 – I’m Too Sexy, #3 – Epic Fail)
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The final installment of this four part series covers the WTF moments of 1990 Upper Deck. Maybe it magic or the super natural, maybe it’s just an oddity or a circus freak (wait a minute Aaron Judge wasn’t playing the strong man in 1990), nevermind that last part. Anyway, sometimes you just gotta say WTF. You just can’t explain it. Maybe this set even inspired some X-Files episodes that came out three years later…
…the truth is out there. Or maybe I just thought it was funny and I didn’t have another category that it fit in.
Choose a Sport Deion
Year 2 and 13 cards in and we’ve already got a problem. When does a baseball player have a football uniform on? When he’s a football player, duh.
Not only is the airbrush job one of the lowest quality ones ever, he’s not even in a baseball uni. Honestly, who cares? Put him in his football uni. Does it really matter? Why bother airbrushing?
Hubie’s Prom Picture
This has to be my favorite of this bunch. How does this make it to a card? Oh yeah, it’s the only Hubie picture we had.
I can’t even explain the situation here. They are literally spooning each other! Jeez fellas, get a room!
The Magic Trick
Mike MacFarlane is a magic man. I mean EVERYONE says so. Witness the patented MacFarlane Force Job.
Mike perfected this early in his career and it helped him to be known as a great framer. But in all reality, Mike wasn’t framing anything. MacFarlane was a Jedi catcher, very rare. While it looked quite odd behind the plate it was clearly effective.
You Ain’t Goin’ Nowhere
Hold on! You don’t walk off the mound until Jack Clark says you walk off the mound… OK, now go.
This was just a little bit of Jack showing his dominance while in San Diego. Sure, maybe he was trying to stop a fight after his pitcher hit a batter, but do you think Jack would stop something like that. No way man! This is clearly Jack trying to show up is manager after his manager decided to pull his pitcher. But this is Jack’s pitcher dude. You just don’t understand.
