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A TCDB Surprise Card from mpdillard25!

Barry Larkin Collection 87: 1989 Donruss - #257 - variation 2

Barry Larkin
Year:  1989
Brand:  Donruss
Card number:  257 (variation 2)



The year 1989 wasn't exactly a banner year for card design.  Of the major card companies, there were the following Larkin cards (all previously profiled in my Barry Larkin Collection series):
1989 Topps - Arguably the best of the '89 Larkin cards - but that's probably more because of my childhood bias (late 1980s Topps were my first baseball cards).
1989 Bowman - In my opinion, the worst of the bunch, though this '89 Donruss card isn't much better!
1989 Fleer - You know, I had to do a double take at the Bowman card after looking at this Fleer monstrosity.  Eeesh.
1989 Score - Probably my second favorite '89 Larkin card, though I actually think I like the design of the 1989 Score set better, nostalgia wins out.

Now, I still have at least two more 1989 cards to highlight - Upper Deck (the people's favorite set of '89 I'm guessing) and at least one Classic card from '89.  Even so, there's simply not much exciting out there in the 1989 sets...and it's easy to see why Upper Deck became so popular, so quickly.  They put a set out that was much, much more polished than any of the others (not to mention that nifty little anti-counterfeiting hologram).

As for the 1989 Donruss card, it wouldn't be so bad if the purple border didn't clash with Larkin's uniform so terribly.  I also would have rather had the Reds' running man logo in the top corner instead of the rather boring red "C".  Now despite all my complaints, this particular card isn't my least favorite Larkin - I can think of at least one worse card right away that I've already profiled!

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