Card Connections: Topps 2003- Where My Baseball Fan-dom Begins

I remember sitting on the living room floor in Virginia at my Grandma's house. Next to the shorter couch on the side of the room furthest from the TV. It was Easter morning 2003. Which, now that I think about it, was a little unusual. As far as I can remember, that year, and maybe the next year (where I have a vague memory of being at an uncle's house) were the only years Easter wasn't celebrated at our own home. Anyways, I remember sitting on the floor, looking down into my Easter basket, and seeing two packs of baseball cards.

Now, I had played tee-ball for a few years, and I was in my first year of kid-pitch as a third grader (I skipped coach and machine pitch), and needless to say, I was awful my first year. If we're being completely honest, I was still very much a football guy that year. My Oakland Raiders were just coming off a disappointing Super Bowl loss to Tampa Bay, but I had every reason to believe next year would be better (Only it wasn't. And for the next decade-plus, it has downright sucked to be a Raider fan. But I still am. And I AM SO FREAKIN' PUMPED ABOUT THIS 2016 TEAM!  Oh wait, this is a baseball blog...right...my bad). Needless to say, baseball wasn't really my favorite sport at the time.

Having been a football fan for a few years by this point, and having gotten into football card collecting by this time, I already knew of the magic feeling that you get from opening a pack of cards. It's the anticipation of not knowing who you're going to get. As you tear away the wrapper, you hope for a card of your favorite team, or a favorite player. And then you had to wonder what was worse, getting a card of someone you didn't like, or getting your third duplicate of the same card.The point being, for all card collectors, regardless of the sport, the feeling of opening up a brand new pack is the same eager anticipatory feeling. And even now, when I open a pack (which admittedly, I do a lot less often because my buying style has changed to online buying), I get that same feeling, and it's like being a kid all over again.

As I picked up those two packs of cards from the Easter basket, I got that familiar feeling of excitement, but at the same time, I had no idea what I was hoping for. My Little League team was the A's, but that was pretty much all I knew. I guess I'll hope for an A's card in here. Well, I didn't get one, but in a way, I got so much more. Cliff Lee draft pick card, Vinny Castilla, Denny Hocking, Jorge Posada, Cole Hamels draft pick card, Dave Roberts, Michael Young gold border, Chipper Jones, Gary Matthews Jr., Ruddy Lugo rookie card. Just like that, I was introduced to the world of baseball. And, for those that know me well, I never looked back.

The Topps 2003 set featured 720 cards, from 1-721. The 2003 set was in the middle of Topps' phase where they "retired" card #7 in honor of the late Mickey Mantle. They also produced the Updates and Highlights set again (I love those mini-sets. as it provides traded cards and midseason call-up cards). I just saw online today, actually that the 2003 Update card of Robinson Cano (rookie card) was selling for $63.  Some of the biggest prospect cards that year included Hanley Ramirez and Kevin Youkilis (both with Boston), Hamels and Lee (what are the odds I got both of them on that fateful Easter morning?), and Alexis Rios. The Updates series also included the rookie card of future Hall-of-Famer and current Tigers' star Miguel Cabrera, while he was still in the Marlins organization.

This blog post is not so much about the history of this card set, but rather it's personal and sentimental value to me. With that being said, I should say that I do not have this entire set, although I very easily could go by the complete box set today and be done with it. That's what I tend to do now, because you can get all the cards at once, without worrying about paying $4 for a 7 card pack, in which you'll already have 5 of those cards. But for the Topps 2003 set, since it was the one that got me introduced into the wonderful world of baseball, I decided that I would go about it the hard (but arguably more fun) way of piecing the set together one card at a time. So, with my 2003 set about 1/5 complete, here are a look at some of my favorite cards I have already acquired.


Card #400: Derek Jeter  

Considered one of the key cards from this set, it features Jeter receiving the throw at second as the Mets' Jeromy Burnitz slides in. Jeter is in his late 20s by now, approaching the middle stages of his career. This card is a personal favorite of mine because it is the first card I ever had of my all-time favorite player.

Card #538: Jorge Julio   

Julio was the absolute definition of a guy who wouldn't be a closer anywhere else, but the Orioles were so bad in the early 2000s that he got the job anyways. The only reason I include him in this list is because I have many memories of watching Orioles' games at my grandma's house and seeing him pitch. He wasn't very good, but he was a main figure in my childhood baseball-viewing experience, so I included him in this list.

Card #431: Scott Strickland  

Another card of a player who was never fantastic by any means, I just really always had an unexplained fascination with this card. I think it's the colors of the Mets' uniforms with the blue border of the card. Something about that was just aesthetically pleasing to look at.

Card #113: Tomokazu Ohka   

The main reason I included this card is that it was just fun to say Ohka's name. But also, I always secretly kinda liked the Expos, even though they were garbage. When the Expos moved to Washington before the 2005 season, I officially adopted them as my National League team.

Card #32: Deivi Cruz   

I don't really have a reason for liking this one. I just always thought it was a cool action shot.

Card #556: John Smoltz   

At the moment, Smoltz is my only HOF pitcher from this set. Plus, how about those retro Braves uniforms?

Ok, last two card's I'll share today.

Card #390: Ken Griffey Jr.   

I had to include the Hall-of-Famer with the sweetest swing ever. (Side note: It's not as good as Griffey's but wouldn't you say Cano has a pretty sweet swing too?)

And lastly...

Card #180: Barry Zito   

Derek Jeter may have been my favorite player, but Zito was probably my first favorite player, and my favorite pitcher. I loved that "Big 3" rotation of Zito, Tim Hudson, and Mark Mulder the A's had from 2003-2004(ish). In fact, when I played travel ball, I wore #75 as a tribute to Zito.

So there you have it, my favorite baseball card set of all time. What's your favorite set? What set got you into collecting? I'd love to hear about it in the comment section!