Everybody's All-American
Posted by Jonathan @ RGB Cards | Posted in ken griffey jr. , oddball
During my last eBay buying frenzy, I picked up a strange little set for 99 cents. Card No. 1 featured Ken Griffey, which is why I got the set. I figured I could put that card in the bottom right-hand slot of a binder page of my Griffey, then put the other nine in a page behind. While I realise this might offend some of your sensibilities, frankly, I'm not losing any sleep over this.
I scanned the whole set it while scanning in my Griffey cards (news flash! - I'm now done scanning in all of my PC cards!). So here, I present to you, the 1989 All-American Promo Cards set. A giant among card manufacturers, to be sure.
A couple of things - first, AAPC's attempts to hide MLB logos makes Upper Deck's attempt 21 years later look positively professional. I don't think AAPC even tried, or cared. Secondly, the choice of players seems strange - Griffey was in his rookie season, and appears to be the reason for the set since he has two of the ten cards. If you can figure out rhyme or reason behind the other eight players, please let me know. Jim Abbott was also included as a rookie. However, the back of his card lists "1988 Pitching Record" then says "No Major League Stats". However, the back of Griffey's cards say "1988 Batting Record" then list his numbers for the San Bernardino Spirit. Plus, they got the number of runs wrong.
That's a set I haven't seen before, at least as far as I remember. I love how you can slap the word "promo" on a set and distribute it without worrying about licensing or anything.
I'm betting that this set was printed later in 1989, maybe even 1990 (but before the manufacturer could get hands on updated statistics, since that's the pre-internet years). Clark and Mitchell were fairly big names in '89 thanks to the Giants pennant run. Everyone else was a big name that year too, though I'm surprised there's no Canseco or McGwire cards (Canseco was coming off his 40-40 season and the A's were headed for another World Series).
The stats were probably pulled from a book or trading cards, and Jim Abbott had no professional experience before hitting the majors.
I'm guessing you're right that AAPC didn't care about licensing. Many other manufacturers around that time didn't care either, and I see several unlicensed "promo" or "preview" cards from this era at every card show I visit.
These cards aren't too bad looking (they usually were attractive) and while theoretically worthless there will always be someone interested in them.
Congrats on finishing your scanning, I know that takes forever!
Yeah, there's absolutely no date anywhere on the back of the cards (not even a copyright notice), so I had to do a little detective work (thanks to Baseball Reference) to figure out the year all the stats were from.
I originally thought this set came from the West Coast, and was rushed out to capitalise on Griffeymania (he got two cards out of the ten). That would certainly explain why the first five cards in the set were all West Coast players. But you're right - McGwire and Canseco are conspicuous in their absence, and there were no bigger names than the Bash Brothers in 1989.
Maybe the person who put out the set was a rabid Giants fan who abhorred all things Oakland. That would explain having Mitchell and Clark in the checklist, and not McGwire and Canseco. ;)
That is an interesting set! If you are interested in breaking it up I would love the Jim Abbott card. LMK
Sorry this set is going to stay complete. They're all going to go into the binder.