General Forum

I agree with you about that being the best year...it's amazing how many long running brands had my favorite designs in their history that year...aside from Ultra, it's also my favorite design for Collector's Choice, Finest, Flair, Fleer, Metal, SP and Upper Deck. It's my second favorite for Skybox and Bowman's Best. And then to top it off you have the 50th anniversary celebration and the sort of one year only Topps Stars which is a fantastic set. The only major sets not in my top 2 favorites are Topps and Hoops, and if Hoops had used the series 1 design for series 2 it would have been contending for that too. 

The only brands I have not quantified a favorite yet is the E series. (Emotion, E-XL, EX-2000, etc) and SPx. 

switzr1 wrote:

Billy, we were typing at the same time, and we both picked a 1996-97 basketball set.  I believe this has happened before.  Best year for cards for any single sport during the modern (post-1980) era, in my opinion.  It's not easy for me to say Finest is better than Ultra.  Just personal preference.  Ultra is fantastic too.

Well, I'll break the trend,   ** 1955 TOPPS ALL AMERICAN ** football. Very tuff set to build in nrmt condition, only a 100 cards, and the errors are even harder to find. I'm constantly upgrading condition as I see cards for t/s.

My user name should say it all. Down to 54 more cards to complete the base set (8 cards are not considered as part of the set for they are so rare)

T206 reason 1- so many HOFers in this set, 2- over 100 years old and some are very affordable 3- you can make sub sets out of the base set, like teams, players with different backs, Southern Laegue, HOF ect. 4- even if in bad condition they are still collectable to the average collector 

The first cards I collected was 1969 Topps baseball so that one is very near and dear to my heart (only five left to complete the set--not counting variations). But my favorite has to be the 1972 Topps baseball set. Those cards are so bold and distinctive, definitely a product of those times.