Final Years as a Dodger

Below are Steve's five Topps/OPC releases as a Dodger. I felt that Topps did a good job of selecting images with the exception of his 1982 base card.

1979 Topps #50 (front)

Sadly, this card is a double print. It seems that only slightly fewer of these were produced than Steve's 1987 Topps cards. I think the catcher is the Giants Marc Hill.

1979 Topps #50 (back)



1979 O-Pee-Chee #21 (front)

The O-Pee-Chee logo had a lot more style than the Topps logo in 1979.

1979 O-Pee-Chee #21 (back)

1980 Topps #290 (front)

This is another one of my favorite cards. It's probably because of the use of Primary Colors (Red and Yellow) that balance nicely against the Blue Dodgers jersey.

1980 Topps #290 (back)

1981 Topps # 530 (front)

This image was taken around the same time as Steve's 1982 Topps In Action Card.

1981 Topps # 530 (back)

1982 Topps # 179 (front)

This is my least favorite Topps card of Steve as a Dodger. Things I don't like about this card include: the Hockey Stick on the left side of the card, the pink and purple color pattern on the hockey stick, the fact that Steve's wearing a helmet that covers his ears and the fact that the card's image always seems a bit blurry to me.

1982 Topps # 179 (back)

As a kid, I was alway disappointed that Topps didn't produce World Series Cards from the 1981 World Series in their 1982 set as they had done with most of their sets during the past two decades.

1982 Topps In Action # 180 (front)

1982 Topps In Action # 180 (back)

1983 Topps # 610 (front)

1983 Topps # 610 (back)

They're Great!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Probably like a lot of kids, I thought that the cards that Kellogg's produced were cool due to the high-tech 3-D graphics (at least for the late 1970's & early 1980's) that Xograph was able to produce for Kellogg's. In my opinion, the initial popularity of Sportflics in the mid 1980's was a result of attracting the customer base Kellogg's had built up.

Below are Steve Garvey's Kellogg's cards that were released intermittedly from 1975-1982.

1975 Kellogg's #17 (front)

Kellogg's cards over time had a tendency to curl and/or crack.


1975 Kellogg's #17 (back)

With the exception of 1981, all the Kellogg's cards are smaller in size than their Topps counterparts. Needless to say, that didn't stop them from loading up the back with interesting content.


1976 Kellogg's #54 (front)

Here's Steve in his signature batting pose. The same pose is used on many of his cards (i.e. 75 Topps, 78 Topps, 80 Topps, 82 Topps, 76 Kellogg's, 80 Kellogg's...etc)

1976 Kellogg's #54 (back)

Another well-designed card back.

1977 Kellogg's #14 (front)

When Steve wasn't practicing his batting stance, Kellogg's tended to photograph him bent on one knee with a baseball bat (i.e. see his 75, 77 and 81 cards)

1977 Kellogg's #14 (back)

I mentioned previously that Steve's batboy history is well-documented on his trading cards. The same goes for Steve's football career at Michigan State and the fact the he played in the "Game of the Century" in 1966 against Notre Dame.

1980 Kellogg's #31 (front)

After a two year break so that Kellogg's could produce cards of other deserving Dodgers, (i.e. Ron Cey, Don Sutton, Reggie Smith, Davey Lopes...etc), Kellogg's produced another card of Steve. This one reminds me of 1976 Kellogg's.

1980 Kellogg's #31 (back)

I remember getting this card as a kid because Raisin Bran was a favorite ceral of mine. I'm not 100% sure but I think that during some years Kellogg's cards were only available in one type of Kellogg's cereals (i.e. Raisin Bran, Frosted Flakes).

1981 Kellogg's #10 (front)

This is the only Kellogg's card that had the same dimensions as Topps Baseball cards. My guess is that Xograph went this route due to Fleer and Donruss entering the card market in 1981.

1981 Kellogg's #10 (back)

1982 Kellogg's #47 (front)

This was Kellogg's last Steve Garvey card as they didn't produce one for him in 1983 (Fernando Valenzuela and Pedro Guerrero had Dodger cards instead).

1982 Kellogg's #47 (back)