The Origins Of A Cardboard Addict: Griffey

It was 1997 and I was about to sit down and watch the comedy, Cosby on CBS for the very first time. I never had seen the original series The Cosby Show at that time so this was my first glance at Bill Cosby other than those Jello Pudding commercials.

You know these,

*gets up from computer desk chair to dance like Cosby in the theme song*

The show features Bill Cosby as Hilton Lucas who was a grumpy airline exec forced into early retirement. He has to face the facts he is in his next stage of life with his wife by his side who isn't used to having him around so much. You combine those with his daughter who moves back home, their foster son Griffin, 11 year old Jurnee and a neighbor and you have a comedic show.

My recollection of the show isn't that great, but I remember laughing out loud many times especially an episode where Hilton plays for a softball team that wasn't quite what it seemed. I wouldn't mind finding that one again and watching it.

I may not remember a lot about the show, but I do remember watching it when I discovered something that carried over to this day, Griffey Jr. You see, when I say I sat down and watch TV, it usually meant cards were involved. I always sat, sorted and watched. Multitasking at its finest and something I still do some of today. Unless my wife wants to watch a show, then I find it rude to sit, sort, ignore and watch. That would probably put you on the couch for the night.

One night while watching Cosby, I was doing my normal sorting when I discovered I had a pile of this one player that was bigger than the rest. I had just gotten into baseball the previous year and upped my collecting from there of the sport. What I never did before, other than pull out my Yankees and rookie cards, was look specifically at players to collect.

I sorted all my cards by player at the time but for some reason this one players stack stood out to me above the rest. I reached over, grabbed it and saw that the name Ken Griffey Jr. It was a name I had recognized, mostly because I had seen it plastered on pretty much everything from food items to magazines to TV, but not someone I had actually followed until that very moment. I don't know why really other than having a bigger pile of his cards compared to other players, but Griffey collecting started then.

As I began to find out more about the player, the more I liked him and the more I began to add to that stack. .I know it's not the origin you probably had hoped for, but it's really how it happened. Just a quick decision.

I had many fun cards over the time in 1997 that I began to mark as my favorites of Griffey. Every baseball pack I opened that year, I only looked for the Griffeys. I wrote them all down and kept track of which ones I had, which odds I pulled it at and how many packs it took me to get it. If only I had that time today to be so organized and even as knowledgeable as I was then.

Here were some of my favorites at the time,

1997 Sp base. The shiny had me.

I can-pulled this from Pinnacle inside. I can't remember how many cans it took because I opened a ton of them back then. I didn't show the back of the card because it has Andruw Jones which has nothing to do with Griffey.

Hot Commodities I packed pulled as well. I was really excited about this one even though it was an easier pull then some.

I actually traded with a childhood friend back then to get this one. I think I gave up some Smoltz cards to do so as he was a Braves fan. It was a win-win for both of us.

Another card I pack pulled. I had some great success with Griffeys at one point in my life. Now I can't even pull a base card.

This is the one I remember the most pulling myself. My father and I bought a Topps Chrome box that year and we had to sneak up a few packs at a time into my bedroom to make sure my mother didn't catch us. If she found out we had bought a box, she would have flipped. Probably been as flipped as I was to had found this as these weren't easy pulls.

Still one of my favorite base card sets all time. Right up there with Spx ones from 96-98.

 

And Flair Showcase that added some Flair to my Griffey Jr collection. Such great looking base cards. We don't even have inserts that look this nice today and base cards don't even touch this.

My Griffey collecting was growing really strong between 1997-2000 before I went into my dark age of collecting. I will post about that at some point on here. Coincidentally enough, the show Cosby as well went into it's dark ages in 2000 when the show was starting to disappear behind Everybody Loves Raymond and King Of Queens who were CBS's comedy front runners and Cosby started losing it's viewers to them.

It's a little upsetting how Bill's career turned out when all of the accusations came flying out, definitely not like Hall Of Fame Griffey who survived the PED era clean, but I will always remember the laughs that he gave me and the faces he could make that everyone tried to mock.

Do I have accusations against Cosby for my hobby dark age? No. Do I blame him for my love of Jello Pudding and Pudding Pops at the time? Absolutely. 

*finishes typing and gets up again from computer desk chair to dance like Cosby in the theme song*