Placing It In Context: Everyone’s familiar with the basketball card sets from the early 90s. How can they not be? They were so overproduced that many people would like to unload the cards for free. Some people use them as protective packaging for other cards when shipping. But on the other hand, every collector owes it to themselves to have a set of 1991-92 Hoops as a reminder for what a basketball card set could be if they didn’t print just over a million sets! Simple, effective design with a nice action photo, white border and team logo. Very organized structure, alphabetized by team and player’s last name with interesting subsets that don’t stray very far from the main design. The 590 cards in the set don’t feel too much because of the organization. It was also the first time that Series II packs only contained Series II cards. Definitely a relief for collector’s endlessly searching for earlier cards that ended up being short prints and not printed during the second series. There’s even a couple limited production cards like the James Naismith and Gold USA basketball card to add an additional collecting challenge. We all know there’s too many of these cards, but you need to have at least one set for yourself!
The Card: This particular Billy Owens rookie card represents any overlooked card in this set. What could be interesting about #548 in the mass produced 1991-92 Hoops set? So much… It is part of an “NBA Draft” subset of rookies. A reminder that companies didn’t have to make an insert set for every little topic that comes to mind. And the card actually informs you about the NBA Draft! A reminder that Billy Owens, the third pick in the draft was actually selected by Sacramento who then traded him to the Warriors for Mitch Richmond and Les Jepsen. Exactly what a sports card should do, capture a small moment of basketball history! Also note the interesting comparison to Derrick Coleman. If only we could return to this simpler time in collecting, structured sets and subsets…organized and informative….without the mass production that hurt their value.
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