[nolemmings]

Overrated: 1954 Topps. I’ve posted this many times. I look at sets as to how I would have received them as a kid enjoying his hobby and his sport at the time. This set has hideous player selection, is stuffed full of old men coaches, and lacks most all players of the AL Champ Indians team that won 111 games. As ten year-olds or whatever, we would not have yet appreciated or foreseen the greatness of Henry Aaron, Al Kaline and Ernie Banks– the only saving graces from the set. I get the contract dispute with Bowman as a cause, but c’mon man.

Dishonorable mention: 1975 Topps. Loud colors for their own sake, not coordinated by team, were a turnoff for me. Many of us sorted by team and it was great to have the color coordination as was found in ‘66, ‘68, ‘69, ‘71, ‘72 and ‘74, which were during the primary years of my collecting.

Underrated: 1974 Topps, 1966 Topps. I really like the designs of these two. As others mentioned, the ‘74s have some really great shots.

Favorite: 1966 Topps. My first year of collecting probably has much to do with it. Too bad Topps had not come to grips with the fact that the Yankees cannot be in the World Series every year so they omitted, that one year only, what would have been a great W.S. subset. Also unfortunate that Angels and Braves were mostly hatless due to team/city name changes. Still, the set is so clean and crisp, IMHO, that it ranks numero uno for me.

Least favorite. 1978 Topps. Hate most everything about it. Too many cards, and the design looks like it came from a kid who realized his homework assignment was due in 30 minutes and he had to come up with something. Script team names and a little baseball with abbreviated position. There’s simple, and then there’s lazy.