The first sets were printed in 1984. They were distributed as complete sets to dealers and were full 792 card parallels printed on a different stock with glossy fronts and white backs. I read that Topps had a facility in Ireland where they made these, not sure why they couldn't have printed them in the good old USA.
I recently saw a guy on Facebook who had bought a set to crack and keep his team's set and was offering the single cards for sale. I asked about the Giants knowing I didn't have any 84 Tiffanys in the Giants binder so I asked and fortunately he had the entire team set. I picked them up for a reasonable price and got them this week.
Here is the Frank Robinson regular and Tiffany card side by side:
The Tiffany is on the right and you can tell by the scan that it is glossier, I do think it is more apparent to the naked eye.
The differences in the back are much more evident with that sharp white stock.
I realized after I had picked these up that Atlee Hammaker was on the ERA Leaders card so I still need that one to complete the 1984 Tiffany team set. This also made me wonder how long these sets were made and how many I still needed.
First off, here is the team set (minus the ERA Leaders):
Doing a little research and Topps put out these sets from 1984-1991 for both the flagship and traded sets. Not all the print runs weren't all reported but rumors are the 1984 set had a print run of 10,000. I have a pretty solid list of Giants cards during this era, my want list is not too lengthy but I have quite a few needs during this run, even after crossing off most of the 84 set:
- 1984 Topps Tiffany #137 ERA Leaders Atlee Hammaker/Rick Honeycutt
- 1984 Topps Traded Tiffany - full team set
- 1985 Topps Tiffany full team set
- 1985 Topps Traded Tiffany - full team set
- 1986 Topps Tiffany full team set
- 1986 Topps Traded Tiffany - full team set
- 1987 Topps Traded Tiffany #129T Matt Williams
- 1989 Topps Traded Tiffany - full team set
I've gotten some Tiffanys for PC guys but haven't ever really felt like it was worth it for team sets. I do have a Traded one that I got in a stack that was miscategorized as base traded. It's near impossible to tell the difference on the Tradeds because both have white stock.
ReplyDeleteThe white card stock looks awesome. I think I own one Tiffany team set (1989 A's). I'd definitely pick up more if the price was right.
ReplyDeleteI remember the 84 Tiffany Strawberry used to be a $100 card back in the day. Those white backs are so nice looking.
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