Baseball and Card Collecting

[Archive]

Posted By: ErikV.

All,

I'm sure that this message board has as much baseball knowledge as it does card collecting knowledge so I'm going to throw this somewhat difficult question out: Is there a correlation between the evolution of the game of baseball and card colleting?

In the mid-1800's baseball was more of a tournament style game which evolved into a "gentleman's game" and then an organized Major League. In the 1900's came the Deadball Era followed by the 1920's and the homerun/Ruth Era. The 30's and 40's followed with the War Years and then came the expansion era of the 50's and 60's, which leads all the way up to today's game. Each era has seen the dawn of a new, more modern game (ie, the designated hitter, the specialty of relief pitching, pitch counts, caculated moves like right handed pitching vs left handed hitting, etc.)

As for card collecting, from the early cabinets cards to tobacco and gum cards, to TOPPS and the innovation of grading cards, collecting baseball cards is not what it used to be! Has card collecting grown and changed WITH the game or did the game and collecting both evolve seperately into their modern day entities? And finally, what sort of changes can we expect to see in the future for both the game and collecting? Any thoughts?