Thursday, August 27, 2015

Do You "Bunt"?


Apparently, I do.   

I never really saw the point of collecting "virtual" cards. Especially since I've been making virtual cards for this blog for the past 4 years or so. But curiosity finally got the best of me and I had to check out Topps Bunt. To my surprise, I came across this Harmon Killebrew Topps Bunt Card using the same design I used for the 1971 Topps All Star Cards That Never Were.


 Admittedly, the design was not entirely mine. I lifted it from the World Series cards from that set. 


 Nonetheless, I'm kinda stoked that they used a design that I had a hand in creating. 

And I am not the only blogger who's CTNW designs were used by Topps Bunt. Over at The Baseball Card Blog, the writers created a 1965 Topps All Star set. Their design was also incorporated into Topps Bunt.  Here is their design. Basically they made an All Star designation for the regular issue 1965 cards. This is The Baseball Card Blog's version of a 1965 Topps Brooks Robinson All Star card: 


And this is the Topps Bunt version:


On these cards, Topps Bunt utilized the design element that we had also used to create our Cards That Never Were. But on this card of Yogi Berra, the entire card was identical to the one created by Uncle Doc's Closet. Here is the one by Topps Bunt:


And here is the Uncle Doc version:


Did some Topps intern not realize that this was a fake card? Or did he know it was fake and just didn't care? In reality, the design belongs to Topps in the first place and they probably actually paid for the rights to use Berra's image.

I can't speak for the other bloggers, but I am not the least bit upset, offended or otherwise outraged by the Topps Bunt versions of these cards. Quite the opposite. I'm hoping that they use more of our designs. The whole reason I made most of these cards is because I thought Topps should have made them themselves. With the recent addition of Archives, Heritage and now Bunt cards, Topps will have more chances to create the cards they missed the first time around.

6 comments:

  1. Wow, that's pretty interesting!
    Yeah, I'd be flattered if Topps snagged a CTNW from me and made it a real card.. or a digital card, at least. That's much better than some random lowlife making a physical copy of such a card to sell on eBay.

    I really wish they'd have an annual CTNW insert set in Archives.. they're really dropping the ball there.

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  2. I'm with you guys. This is very kool. I must say I'm impressed that Topps has embraced custom cards instead of making a stink about them. Like with SNY, I'd be flattered if they used any of my stuff.

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  3. Agreed cool. But it would be nice to get some kind of recognition. I almost had the official "cease and desist" from the Australian Baseball League a couple of years ago with my custom cards until I showed that I wasn't using/"stealing" any of the commercial photos but simply using my own shots, and that I wasn't selling my cards to other people. I have since noticed that the majority of the Australian Baseball League teams have used my card designs/images at some point on social meadia.

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  4. The set they made us really cool and I really hope that Topps saw some of the customs that bloggers do. Topps really needs to listen to the voice of the collector and quit making so many parallels, SPs, manufactured relics that count as 'hits', buybacks (especially the ones in this years A&G set that weren't even 10 years old). If they would just give us a main set that features the whole 25 man roster of every team and maybe a few insert sets, 1 or 2 parallel sets and make some stuff that is low to mid- range collectors would buy for once. And it would be really cool if they took the cluster that is called Archives and turn it into a 'Cards that never Were' set that would be the best thing ever. Use some customs that bloggers have made and maybe even mention something about it in the preview for the set. Just quit giving is the same crap year after year. Sorry to get on a soapbox. Great work on all of your customs John. Glad Topps took notice of some of them.

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  5. I use the Bunt app. Not to the point that I spend money on stuff, but I log in every day to get my credits and bust a virtual pack of cards or two.

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  6. I'm not sure how I feel about this.

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