Steve Carlton: box of 440 baseball cards

The box of 440 Steve Carlton cards I recently purchased.

Some of the highlights of the box: 1986 Fleer mini, and the oddly scarce 1987 Action SuperStars card, featuring Carlton with the Giants.

And the not-so-rare: Steve Carlton's 1986 Topps card.

As I mentioned in my blog post from a week ago, I collect Steve Carlton baseball cards. I’ve got just about every card that was issued during Carlton’s career, and many of the cards that have been issued since he retired from baseball in 1988. So, why do I keep buying more Steve Carlton cards? Well, that’s a good question. How much time do we have? Seriously, though: I do like upgrading my collection when I can, and it’s oddly satisfying to get more of something. Do I really need any more 1986 Topps Steve Carlton cards? Well, no, but it sure is fun to get more! Fortunately, this doesn’t carry over into other shopping habits in my life. 

About a month ago, I bought 440 Steve Carlton cards for $50 on eBay. There was nothing truly rare or amazing in here, just more cards from the 1980’s. But they’re all in good shape, and I couldn’t pass them up for about 11 cents a card. And I did find some very cool things, like Carlton’s 1985 Topps Woolworth’s All-Time Record Holders card. That was a 44-card set that featured Hall of Famers like Hank Aaron, Ty Cobb, Willie Mays, and Frank Robinson, along with more obscure players like Johnny Frederick, who set the record for most pinch-hit home runs in a season with 6 in 1932. There was also a 1986 Fleer mini, which features a different photo on the front than Carlton’s full-size 1986 Fleer card.

One of the highlights of this box of wonders from the 1980’s was that it included two cards of Carlton from the 1987 Action SuperStars set. It’s one of the few cards that shows Carlton with the San Francisco Giants. Carlton was with the Giants from July 4^th to August 7, 1986, after getting released by the Phillies. Carlton made six starts for the Giants during that month and won only one game. But it was with the Giants that Carlton got his 4,000^th strikeout. I had Carlton’s Action SuperStars card as a kid—no idea what card store I found it in—but in tracking down Carlton’s cards as an adult, it’s one of the hardest ones to find. I don’t think it’s an especially valuable card, but it’s rare to find it. The internet tells me that the Action SuperStars set was unlicensed, so maybe they got into trouble with MLB and had to pull them off the market. So, I was psyched to get two more Action SuperStars cards.

Other fun oddities were the 1985 Fleer Limited Edition, the 1984 Topps Ralston Purina, and the 1986 Fleer Future Hall of Famer. And of course, there were many of Carlton’s 1980’s base cards from Topps, Fleer, and Donruss. The only base card from those three manufacturers that wasn’t included was Carlton’s 1984 Donruss card, which speaks to the relative scarcity of 1984 Donruss cards. Carlton was on a lot of cards during the 1980’s—he was on 8 different 1984 Topps cards!

I feel like I got my money’s worth out of this box of Steve Carlton cards, so I was happy with it.