1989 Topps Doubleheaders All-Stars

There are those who spend hundreds of dollars on boxes like Topps Five Star and Topps Museum Collection.  Then there's me.  The guy who drops $9.95 on a box (24 packs) of 1989 Topps Doubleheaders All-Stars.

If you're not familiar with this product, it was a oddball issue marketed to a generation of collectors who craved rookie cards.  Each pack contains one two-sided card sealed inside of a plastic holder.  One side of the card featured a photo of the player's 1989 Topps base card, while the other side contained their reprinted rookie card.

The cards are a lot smaller than the standard 2 1/2" x 3 1/2".  The holders are 1 7/8" x 2 1/2", while the actual cards are only 2 1/4" x 1 11/16".

There are only 24 cards in the set: 12 American League players & 12 National League players.  The checklist is made up from members of the 1988 MLB All-Star rosters.  According to Beckett, the whole 24 card set books for $8 to $20.  Don Mattingly, Roger Clemens, Mark McGwire, Ryne Sandberg, and Ozzie Smith have the highest book values in the set at $4/card.  Everyone else is listed between 25¢ to $2.50.

The pack above is the first one I pulled from the box and it contained #6 Mike Greenwell.  In 1988, Greenwell had the best season of his career with career highs in hits, doubles, triples, home runs, RBI's, and stolen bases.  That season he set the American League record for Game Winning RBI's with 23 and finished second to Jose Canseco in AL MVP voting.

Although he'll never make it into Cooperstown, he had a solid 12 year career for the Boston Red Sox and eventually went on to play a few games in Japan.

After playing around with the holder, I was surprised at how easy these cards pop out of their holders.  It's actually a stretch to call these cards, since they're paper thin.

But overall, if you're a fan of 80's oddball... I definitely recommend you tracking some of these down.  I mean... for less than 50¢ a pack, can you really go wrong?

Happy Friday & sayonara!