General Forum

I’m not so lucky.  

Thanks Spaz, I wasn’t aware.  I will have to go through them again and re-sort and record.  

Although, I did notice cards with the much lighter backs are listed as OPC (slightly different fine print in the back).

spazmatastic wrote:

In case you missed the discussions, 1991 Topps MLB cards have 4 different backs. The Dark Logo on back cards are easy to separate from the regular cards. Both of those versions also have a glow-back version that's most easily spotted with a blacklight or other UV light and the glow-backs aren't listed on here yet.

Make that 5 versions of the back then. I forgot that the '91 OPC's didn't have the OPC logo on the front of the cards. They were only discernable by the back having french text as well as english and the OPC copyright line.

Found this link about the glow-backs.

https://www.beckett.com/forums/thread-1578571.html

Interesting article much of which has already been discussed here in previous Forums.  I still haven't gotten a black light but a "must get" as my eyes are not as good as Spaz's.

But I do hope we don't start adding VAR for the darkness or lightness of printing backs as this article seems to think that the Canseco is a VAR.  When I look through my 1991 Topps cards, almost every card of which I have doubles+ has deeper or lighter print on the back. Of the Canseco one, I probably have three different shades from bold to light. This can also be said of the 1991 Donruss where some cards with the same # have a deeper blue or green than others. Different printing presses were used therefore different shades of the printing were created. PLEASE, PLEASE don't create these as VAR.  We have enough collector imagined VAR or ERR listed here already.  Don't open the door for more!!

Ink differences won't become VARs. The 1991 Topps did have a very different back logo (regular "watermark-type vs. the dark logo) because of a different set up - it's not just because more ink was used on the backs.

As for the glow versus non-glow - I have witnessed the difference, but still don't know how we'd ever truly catalog them. Is anyone else noting the difference?

Has anyone looked at ebay recently with these glow backs? People are crazy.

The Canseco back scans in that link ARE different and they are already listed here. The Dark Logo version was an intentional parallel to the 1991 set. As for slight variations in color, these are how the glow-back cards were discovered. Not all cards with a lighter or darker color are glow-backs. There are many slight color differences in the 1991 set on back and the front and they shouldn't all be listed as VAR or a parallel, but I still think the Glow Back cards should be listed for the regular and Dark Logo cards. That's mostly just because there are people out there still searching for them and the cause wasn't just a different printing facility. It was an entirely different ink.

I agree with you about the '91 Donruss cards. I've noticed that in the past too. Also, I was going through 1991 Traks Racing cards last night and many of them have slight color differences. It was especially noticable in blues and greens also. Some reds and oranges looked lighter as well. I don't consider any of them a VAR or a parallel.

My main concern for this site and the Glow-Backs is how they could be scanned and added here. Without being able to use pics under some type of UV light, a scan won't really show any difference.

Dan, Is there any documentation from Topps regarding "glow backs"?