27 February 2015

Go Home, 90's; You're Drunk: Hakeem Olajuwon Gravity Denied



Sometimes you look at cards from a certain set or time period, and you say, "What the heck were they thinking?" Most of the time that period is the 90's, or the 70's, but each decade has its share of weird cards. I'd seen a few copies of today's card on eBay, and I decided I just needed to buy a copy to see what it was all about.


The thing that really intrigued me is that grommet in the upper right. Why was it there? What did it do? Was this intended to be hung on your keyring? So many questions. I don't think it looks quite that scratched up in real life, but I could be wrong. I guess I should mention that this card features my favorite basketball player, Hakeem Olajuwon. The insert set is called Gravity Denied, and comes from '97-'98 eX2001, probably a Skybox product.


Fleer was nice enough to list the set name on the back of the card. This is especially helpful for years I was away from card collecting and there were a million sets put out by thousands of brands, The back also contains the usual paragraph of text extolling the virtues of the featured player. But what is the grommet in the corner for?


Apparently it's for an acetate layer containing a color photo that swivels up to reveal a sepia-toned version of the same photo. Now that we know what it does, the question that remains unanswered is, "Why?"

5 comments:

  1. Cool post. Definitely a very weird card.

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  2. OMG... that's just awesome!!


    And I want it known that Hakeem learned his post moves from Coach Guy V. Lewis. I saw him when he first got here. He was clueless when it came to hoops. From that to Top 50 All Time list is pretty special.

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    1. Yes, Hakeem was a very special player. Thanks for the reminder on how he was brought into the game.

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  3. I pulled the Barkley and Jordan from this set...which is pretty good as I opened less than 10 packs. They are kind of cool, but you do NOT want to store these with others cards- that grommet will damage whatever card it is next to. I found out the hard way.

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    1. That grommet is pretty sharp. I could see it doing some damage to other cards. I'll probably stick this one in a thick top loader or something.

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