Contested Shots 28: A Vintage Game Prize from All Trade Bait, All the Time

There have been a few games with the same basic format run in the card blogging community over the last few months. The game starts with a participant choosing a number tied to a mystery lot, and future participants can either steal previous picks or choose another numbered lot. There are other variations and wrinkles based on the individual running the game, but that's the basic idea.

I participated in the Lucky 13 game run by Stealing Home of the All Trade Bait, All the Time blog. I wasn't involved in any steals or other shenanigans, so the lot I initially took with my pick is the one I ended up receiving in the mail. It was described as the 70's Vintage lot, and included a bunch of cool cards from that era.

Oscar Gamble's cardboard is quite famous among collectors due to his big hair. I had a copy of his 1975 Topps card in the set I purchased a while back, but now I have another for my 'Cool Cards' collection. Between the photo and the bright colors on the border, this is just a cool card.

There's some neat stuff here. That Dave Winfield from 1979 Topps is a good one. I like awful color schemes like vintage Astros rainbow uniforms and the brown and mustard Padres gear. Johnny Bench looks like a total creeper in that 1982 Topps photo. All he's missing is a patchy mustache. I also really like the Ted Williams manager card, the Phil Niekro, and the Carlton Fisk that is scanned sideways because I was lazy and wanted to do two 8-card scans instead of an 8, a 6, and a 2.

This group doesn't have quite the star power of the last one, but you have to love the action shots of the World Series cards from the 1972 Topps set and the off-kilter stadium in the background of the Jorge Orta card from 1973. I really need to search out a 1973 set one of these days. I bought a starter lot for that year a long time ago, but never gained any traction on actually building the rest of the set.

During the game there were a few bonus contests for additional prizes. I was the first to answer one of the questions in a game, so in addition to the 70's Vintage lot I also won this Press Proof card of Starling Marte from 2014 Panini Donruss. I have a bit of a Marte player collection, but some of the shine came off of collecting him with his PED suspension this year. I guess we'll see what happens when he gets back out on the field. I pretty much forgave Bartolo Colon (who was released by the Braves after a terrible start, and is tied to rumors about signing with the Mets again) for some of his baggage, so I guess anything can happen.

Thanks for running this game, Stealing Home! I had a good time participating, and this lot of cards was a lot of fun to sort through.