You can tell the story of baseball through baseball cards pretty easily. From the 1869 Peck & Snyder Cincinnati Redlegs advertising card that announced the dawn of pro baseball, through the tobacco years as the game grew toward respectability, past the post-War boom, into the mod-70s and on toward the era of free agency, those little pieces of cardboard reveal little bits of our own history.
Even the newest cards being released will fill in some sort of blank about the current season.
Despite the onset of technology, the cardboard lives on. Baseball players of today grew up in the boom era of the modern card industry, when everyone wanted a Ken Griffey Jr. Many were avid collectors.
Some still are.
This Week in Baseball recently aired a lengthy feature on cards that included a trip to the Topps factory (see 2011 Heritage roll off the press), a look back at some iconic cards, some memories from current players and a segment with super collector Dmitri Young, who shows off some of his valuable collection of rookie cards–all among the best in existence.
Take a look courtesy of MLB Productions.
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