when junk wax is the furthest from it, part two (of two)

Welcome back to my two part feature on non-junk wax. In my previous post, I talked about a small boxed set called the Origins of Baseball. If you missed it, you can view it here.

Today, I'll feature a pretty much similar box set but this time based off of a source material:

1994 Upper Deck based on Ken Burns' Baseball.

This is an 80 card set that highlights some of the most popular topics within the enormous nine-part, 22 hour documentary. I watched the entire thing and loved every minute of it. Remember when I mentioned geeking out over reading those cards last post? Yeah, this documentary was about ten times geekier.

Let's take a look at some of the favorites in the set.

Here are two guys that definitely don't get enough respect in the card world: Fred Merkle and Addie Joss. Merkle being known namely for his error, costing his team the pennant. Joss is a Hall of Famer but had a very short career for someone in said Hall. A fantastic pitcher by any standard, he threw a perfect game in 1908. He contracted meningitis and died in 1911, only 9 years after his major league debut.

Women in baseball are also under-represented. The Ted Williams set had a small subset devoted to some of the women superstars. They had their own leagues but were never allowed to play alongside men and they still aren't.

I chose this because there just simply aren't enough Joe Jackson cards. A shame really because he was a bonafide star player and should be alongside his brethren in the Hall of Fame. Obviously the Black Sox scandal got him banned for life but like Pete Rose, I feel both these men should be exception due to their career numbers.

Don Larsen. A middle of the road pitcher by the numbers but on that fateful day in 1956, he was certainly in the groove, pitching the first and only perfect game in a World Series contest. I like the six shots shown on this card, showing him in obviously, rare form.

Simply put, I love this card. It's a fantastic picture of a moment we all know but from an entirely different angle. Usually we get that classic shot of Bill rounding third in full celebration but this is post hit but pre-home run. Easily my favorite in the set and it's easy to see why. I looked closely at the picture but I can't find the ball in the air. I love the scoreboard in the background showing the score. A classic moment for sure.


This set is chock full of great cards of great players. Some others are Moses Fleetwood Walker (the first African-American player), Rube Wadell, Lou Gehrig in his Minor League uniform, Lefty Grove, Josh Gibson, Carl Hubbell and Annabel Lee (who once pitched a perfect game and whose nephew is Bill "Spaceman" Lee). Those are just some of the names in this great set, each with a short bio on the back, describing why they're famous and stuff from the documentary.