Nonsense Newsletter No 112: Defending Jalen Hurts, Resolutions for the New Year, Some Series 1 baseball info and More!
In this week’s year-ending edition of the Nonsense Newsletter, John Dudley (a Washington fan) makes the case for Jalen Hurts love. I fulfill my last-week-of-December- journalistic obligations and pen a column about resolutions for 2024. Meanwhile, the Quick Hits section may be the best of the entire year! So, before the bottles pop, the ball drops and we ring in a new year, kick back and enjoy the final edition of 2023!
By John Dudley
Lamar Jackson is the runaway favorite for MVP and I’m largely alright with that. What bothers me though is that another quarterback with roughly the same stats and record has been deemed a bust or a disappointment this year. Multiple highly-touted quarterbacks have been disappointing, but I’m talking about Jalen Hurts who I’ll argue has been reasonably solid.
Let me be clear up front, I have exactly one Jalen Hurts card that is worth about $2. I have zero interest in pumping him up (well maybe a $2 interest). I’m also one of the few remaining Washington fans so it pains me to write positive things about an Eagles player. If anything, I should be on the Jalen Hurts sucks bandwagon. Unfortunately, I just don’t get it. I’m just not sure why Jackson is being lauded where Hurts is being panned and I’m going on a quest for answers. I should note that the card market hasn’t been as harsh to Hurts as the media as his cards are only down 5% in the last year. Given the state of the market, that’s respectable.
By John McTaggart
In the world of newsletter writers, wrapping up a calendar year without penning a column about resolutions for the upcoming calendar year would be, well, just wrong.
Sure, some folks may choose to do the so-called “Year In Review” piece, and that’s all fine-and-dandy, but looking back is not my jam.
So, forward we trudge.
Plus, I would likely lose the keys to this Nonsense Newsletter car, as well as all my credibility with the masses who actually read this column each week if I chose not to write something like this.
So, with that said, let’s talk about hobby resolutions for 2024!
First and foremost, I want to connect to more actual people in the hobby.
The way the technology is set up, the way the trends in the hobby are going, it’s super-easy nowadays to turn this entire thing into one giant electronic transaction.
In fact, most people do it this way — which is unfortunate.
I’m vowing to do less of that in 2024.
Quick Hits
Hobby News- Topps finally released some information about Topps 2024 Series 1 but still is withholding images for the time being. It looks pretty standard, but the bigger announcements are the continuation of the seasonal/holiday parallels with an Easter/Spring theme. I’m not going to lie, I’m excited about the rabbit parallels. The other odd choice was that the extremely popular image variation parallels are being replaced this year with variations that remove all design elements from the regular card in favor of presenting just the photo. The early reception to this change is largely negative, but I’d at least wait to see a few before bashing them.
Vintage- Who doesn’t want to say they own some 1952 Topps baseball cards? The answer: no one. So, here’s a pretty cool guide to getting into the woods that is ’52 Topps. Heck, who knows, maybe you’ll win the lotto, or learn you have a multi-milionaire Uncle who left you his fortune! That would be cool! Then you could finish the entire set, Mantle and all!
Hobby News- The Dodgers did their best 1990s Evil Empire Yankees impersonation by snagging the two gems amongst available players this offseason in Ohtani and Yamamato. Topps Now has featured a variety of cards celebrating the signings, but my favorite features both players and should be available for a few hours after the newsletter comes out. You can snag one here if you act fast.
Hobby News- 2023 might be almost over, but the 2024 sets will be trickling out for a while longer. One of the most anticipated is Stadium Club which is now slated for the end of January after being delayed. The release of last year’s sets in the new calendar year is a growing trend and one that I’m convinced saps the momentum and hype around the products. Stadium Club isn’t going to be overlooked, but it will hardly get the reception it might have during the season when there was a dearth of products.
The Sports Card Nonsense newsletters reflect the opinions of only the authors and contributors. They are for informational purposes only and are not a recommendation for purchases or of an investment strategy or to buy or sell any assets.