DAHoF Reader Card Creations

A couple of weeks ago I got this very nice email from a reader:

Hello. My name is XXXXXXXX and I’m from the Shenandoah Valley in Virginia.

I discovered your work recently as I began to work on creating baseball cards for my son’s baseball team. My son XXX is 10 years old and has been playing baseball for three years now. He loves to play catcher and I love to watch him play. While I’m not a full time photog, I do work on the side and as a result I never attend a game without taking my gear with me.

Last year I happened on the idea of making baseball cards of the players using my photos. I gave these out to the kids at the end of the season and you would have thought that they had won the lottery; I’ve received lots of nice compliments about my work over the years, but NOTHING compared to seeing the glow and pride on their faces when they saw themselves printed out in a baseball card.

With that experience in mind, I’ve decided to make baseball cards again for this season to give to the kids. I searched the web for other baseball card ideas and that’s when I happened upon your website and found some of the templates that you have so kindly offered to share. I have used some of these so far and have attached them to this email to show you how well they have worked. (I’m at work and didn’t have access to the high-resolution files when I sent this email.) I’ve also attached a baseball card styled after an Upper Deck hockey trading card, but I don’t know what year style that this design is. I created this template from scratch last night and modeled it using a layers configuration that is typical in your own PSD files. I really like how you use Adjustment Fill Layers and Masks on your template designs. This makes customizing the cards to team colors much easier when making baseball player cards from other teams.

I thank you for your generosity and sincerely appreciate your willingness to share your PSD files.

I thank you for your time, and I sincerely look forward to hearing from you. Since I’ve discovered your blog, I visit often and enjoy reading your posts.

After we exchanged some emails and I got permission to show off these custom cards. I think they really look nice, especially the Panini/Donruss Legends version. Most of all, I appreciate the kind words. Let me know if you are interested in getting one of these templates, I can put you in touch with the creator.

1984 Topps Vertical	UpperDeck Hockey	2013 SABL Horizontal
2013 SABL template	Panini/Donruss Legends	2011 Topps Horizontal

1982 Mike Schmidt Topps redux

The Mike Schmidt Project continues on...

I have had several requests to share the Photoshop templates used to make these cards.

Here are links to files I have used in this project so far:

1971  1972  1973  1974  1975  1976  1977  1978  1979  1980  1981  1982

2013 Topps Dick Allen - White Sox

Topps unveiled the new design for their 2013 baseball cards on Friday. 

Of course that meant that I had another card to add to the Dick Allen legacy card project.

Download my 2013 Topps template here

On this Day... Dale Murphy debut

On this day in 1990, the was some new excitement in Philadelphia when the great Dale Murphy, a two time NL MVP put on the Phillies uniform for the first time. One day earlier the Atlanta Braves traded their long time leader to a Phils club looking to make a move in the standings. At the time the club was 11 games behind the Pirates in the NL East.

Unfortunately, things didn't turn out as planned. After a couple of days it was clear the best days for the 34 year old former All Star had long since past. To put it kindly, he struggled. In 57 games he only hit 7 home runs and the club finished 18 games out.

The next season (1991), Murphy was respectable as he hit .252 with 18 home runs and 81 RBI in 153 games. But that was it...

Prior to the 1992 season the club announced a plan to give him more days off to help his sore left knee. Unfortunately, Murphy went on the disabled list two weeks into the season. He returned in early May, only to shut it down again ten days later. He would miss the rest of the season, except for one last Phillies at-bat on the season's final day. He led off the game, grounded out to second and was replaced by current Phillies GM Ruben Amaro Jr.

Murphy came to 1993 Spring Training with the Phillies needing only two more home runs to reach 400, but didn't make the club. That team would go on capture the hearts of Phillies fans and win the 1993 NL pennant.

The best thing about the Murphy trade is that the Phillies actually got the better end of the deal... Not because of Murphy. The Braves included a young pitcher named Tommy Greene. He would win 13 games in 1991 while throwing a no-hitter and in 1993, would win 16 games and the Game six clincher of the NLCS against the Braves.

1990 Donruss Template here.

Phoenix Script font here.

1951 Topps Dick Allen Red Backs

I've reached the end of the line for the Dick Allen Topps Legacy card Project. I've uploaded each card from start to finish on a special TUMBLR page -- you can view the entire project here.

From the Topps Wikipedia page:

In 1951, Topps produced its first baseball cards in two different sets known today as Red Backs and Blue Backs. Each set contained 52 cards, like a deck of playing cards, and in fact the cards could be used to play a game that would simulate the events of a baseball game. Also like playing cards, the cards had rounded corners and were blank on one side, which was colored either red or blue (hence the names given to these sets). The other side featured the portrait of a player within a baseball diamond in the center, and in opposite corners a picture of a baseball together with the event for that card, such as "fly out" or "single".

Instead of just choosing one team to finish my project, here is a different 1951 Topps Red Back for each of the six teams he played on during his career.

1951 Topps Red/Blue back template here

On this day... Juan and Von lead off back to back

On this day in 1984 at Veterans Stadium... Phils rookie second baseman Juan Samuel leads off the game against the Expos by taking a Bill Gullickson pitch over the wall. Samuel's home run is immediately followed by another deep blast off the bat of center fielder Von Hayes. This is the first time in franchise history the Phillies have opened a game with back-to-back home runs.

This home run was the second of 14 career lead off home runs Samuel would hit during his playing days in Philadelphia.

The Phillies walk off with the win 6-4 after Len Matuszek takes Jeff Reardon deep in the bottom of the ninth inning.

1984 Topps template here

Fonts: Kimberley and Motor Oil

Parade of Ridiculousness: CANDY-CORN Cal

"Someone said it looked like Halloween candy corn...
Take a picture. You won't see them again."

~ Baltimore Orioles manager Buck Showalter 

August 13th, 2010 after his team donned the "all orange" in Tampa

The 1970s were a strange and wonderful time.

The original Oriole all-orange alternate uniforms debuted on September 16th 1971, the night Frank Robinson hit his 501st home run and Brooks Robinson hit a grand slam. This was appropriate because the fancy new threads were actually sold to the club from the Brooks Robinson Sporting Goods Company.

The unis were only used in three games, twice in 1971 and once more in 1972. Our friends at the Fleer Sticker Project have already collected and documented with a comprehensive set of images so I don't have to.

I started thinking: How fair is this? If Boog Powell, Brooks Robinson, Frank Robinson, Jim Palmer, Bobby Grich, Pat Dobson, Earl Weaver and rest of the Oriole dynasty all had to wear those mono-orange uniforms... it only seems fair that Cal Ripken Jr. should have to wear them too.

After numerous requests and the overwhelming guilt I feel when promises I make remain undelivered, I will start posting some of the card templates I have created. Here is a link to the re-tooled 1971 Topps card I used for this post.

Disclaimer: Going forward, I will share template files when it makes sense. They will be posted as PSD files. A basic understanding of photoshop and layers is required. I will make the layers as simple as I can, but I am not going to be able to help provide tech support. In some cases, you will also need to download a new font to achieve the correct look. In this case, the font used at the top of the card is called MAXIMUS -- it is not a standard font preloaded on most computers. I downloaded it from a very useful website called: DAFONT.COM