Freaked out for 20 + years, wow. That explains a lot Cliff :)

I’ve collected blank backs and wrong backs for a long time and 1979 is the only year I’ve seen the wrong year on the back. Mine are 78 as well. As Al mentioned, you can also find some with non-sports from the same year. I’ve personally seen star wars and mork and mindy on the back on 1979 Topps. People paid about $50 a pop for those about 4 years ago if my memory serves correct.

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Was going through my 61 Dodgers team set yesterday. The Fairly gets a lot of notoriety for it green ball variation because it’s recognized in publications, however, there are other cards in the set that aren’t recognized that have the same characteristic. One, is the Lillis. Not only does he have a green ball variation but he also has stray ink at the stat box that comes in a variety of shapes. Same is true for the Koufax/Podres Southpaw card.

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Those are cool, they came from a find by a dealer in 79.

The story I heard was that they routinely visited the dump near one of the printing plants. One day they found a bunch of strips of these.

I bought a strip, but it wasn't packed well at all, just coiled into a box and it got a bit crushed. Still have it somewhere.
All were vertical strips the full sheet height.

78-79 they were using a lot of leftovers for other stuff.
79's with 78 backs
Some with Mork and Mindy "stickers" on the back (I forget if they are 78 or 79)
Sheets of both 78 Baseball and Black hole backs are used to print Bazooka boxes- grocery store verions, about the size of a mac and cheese box.
Probably one or two others I don't know about.

Finally....
While going through another overgraded ebay lot I received today, I finally found the one variation I have been searching for over the past 15+ years. I was muttering to myself about the condition of the cards being 2-3 grades lower than stated when I see the nicest card in the whole group, the 67 Spiezio missing the "Spie". Many of you probably have multiple copies, but this was my first copy of this card. More than got my money's worth out the lot afterall.

Awesome! What a great surprise! Congrats on the find!


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Congrats Larry.

It is interesting to me how some recurring print defects gained general hobby recognition as variations while the vast majority do not.

Who is in charge of this stuff anyway ?

61 topps
 

so I took a page from Cliff's playbook and looked up the sheet that Lillis was on (sheet2). Lillis is at the top row and the cards to the left and right on the top row, Walt Moryn #91 (cardinals), Jim Woods #59 (phillies), Joe Amalfitano #87 (giants), and AL HR Leaders #44 (with Mantle/Maris) all have back print defects with stray ink if anyone is so inclined to add them. Not super attractive since it is the back of the card but cool nonetheless. The HR Leaders card is the least obvious. The bottom left corner of green is a sharp square on most of the cards but a select few have a soft rounded corner and wavy bottom. I also found a green in ball (variation) for the Dodgers Southpaws card #207 which is on a completely different sheet. Couldn't find a 61 topps sheet with the Fairly on it to see what other cards are around it.

Thank you Joe and AL....yes AL, in my haste to post about one of the more elusive cards now in my collection, I should have not used the word "variation", but indeed called the card what it is, a recurring print defect.