12 Days of Christmas (Day 12): Top 1 List (the RESULTS of YOUR Votes - Best Set, Best Blog, Best Card, etc.)!!

Welcome to my latest theme week:  12 Days of Christmas!  Each day, I'll be counting down by one - and with it, a new list that encompasses the day's number.  

For today, we are ending my 12 Days of Christmas spectacular with our best post of the year - at least according to all of you.  That's right, it's time to unveil the results of my recent End-of-Year Awards voting survey!

Best Topps Set of 2021:

Results (with total vote percentage in parenthesis):

2nd Place (tie):  Topps Flagship / Topps Heritage (17.6% each)

1st Place:  Topps Stadium Club (29.4%)

Stadium Club ran away with this vote!  I should probably note that I didn't actually cast a ballot in any of my questions (that didn't seem right to me) but that doesn't mean I can't weigh in on the community choices.  For our first award, I do think the community got it right - Stadium Club is a known commodity that is consistent from year-to-year (and in this case, consistently good is key)!

Best Bowman Set of 2021:

3rd Place:  Bowman Chrome (17.6%)

1st Place (tie):  Bowman's Best / No Bowman Product Deserves an Award (29.4%)

Bowman's Best or bust this year, I guess!   I tend to side with the "No Bowman Product Deserves an Award" crowd but that does seem a little against the holiday spirit of giving so I have no issues with Bowman's Best winning.  

Best Panini Set of 2021:

3rd Place:  No Panini Set is Deserves an Award (17.6%)

2nd Place:  Panini Diamond Kings (23.5%)

1st Place:  Panini Chronicles (29.4%)

Wow, if the results of the last two polls don't make Topps stand up and take notice (since they will be losing their license shortly), I don't know what will.  Panini Chronicles as the winner here surprised me - I would have bet on either Diamond Kings or Donruss winning out.  

Best On Demand Set/Concept of 2021:

1st Place:  Topps Project70 (47.1%)

With nearly half of the votes, Project70 won this category handedly.  I didn't dabble in Project70 at all so I can't really speak to the set's strengths (or weaknesses).  Still, this was a clear victory for Project70 so maybe I missed out a bit by ignoring the set all year long?!

Next, I asked about the best card of the year but there wasn't a single bit of overlap between all of the write-in submissions.  Since I don't want 10+ cards tied for first here, we'll consider this category a wash.  The same thing happened with Best Blog Post of the year.  Obviously, I needed a better way to ask questions that aren't so open ended...maybe next year (if I do a similar poll) I'll plan ahead a bit better!

Moving on to the Blogging Awards!

Favorite Blogs to Read in 2021:

Lots of great names mentioned here - kind of a "who's who" of blogging if you ask me!  Here are all the nominees:

• A Cracked Bat
• A Pack To Be Named Later
• A Penny Sleeve for Your Thoughts
• Baseball Card Breakdown
• Baseball Cards Come To Life
• Card Hemorrhage
• Cards As I See Them
• Cards Over Coffee
• Chronicles Of Fuji
• Collecting Cutch
• Diamond Jesters
• Dime Boxes
• JohnGY's Beat
• Johnny's Trading Spot
• Junior Junkie
• Nachos Grande
• Night Owl
• Nine Pockets
• SABR baseball cards
• Sport Card Collectors
• Sportscards From the Dollar Store
• The Collector
• The Topps Archives
• The View From the Third Floor
• Too Many Verlanders
• When Topps Had (Base)Balls
• Wrigley Wax

Congratulations to all of you who made the list!  There are a few other blogs that I'd personally add to this list but overall I'd say we've got a strong list of blogs up above.  If you read each of those every day, you'll be a well-rounded card collector for sure!

Favorite Blog Series:

Winner:  Collecting Cutch's "Save Second Base"  

An event full of pretty women and good intentions (saving lives, creating awareness).  I'd agree that that is a hard combination to beat!  

Favorite "Under the Radar Blog"

If a blog was nominated by someone for Favorite Blogs to Read, then I took it off the list of "Under the Radar" blogs.  Therefore, our list of blogs you really ought to check out are:

• Adventures Of A Baseball Card Collector
• Japanese Baseball Cards
• Scribbled Ink
• The Best Bubble

Best Blog of 2021:  

Winner:  Night Owl Cards

With a whopping 50% of the vote, congratulations to Greg over at Night Owl Cards.  Greg has been blogging for a long, long time (I consider him, myself, and a few others as the "OG" baseball card bloggers that started back around 2008).  Greg is a wonderful writer who expertly mixes quality research, entertaining anecdotes, and his love of the Dodgers into a quality read day-in and day-out. I think Greg's won just about every "Best Blog Award" that I've seen since 2008 but there's a reason for that - his work is truly excellent.  If, somehow, you haven't read his blog before please add him to your daily reading list!

Now, although Night Owl Cards definitely ran away with 50% of the vote here, it is worth noting that the other 50% of the vote for "Best Blog" went to other blogs out there - and so even if you didn't win please realize that your contributions are appreciated...and in many cases, ended up garnering you a vote!  That being said, this entire vote was meant to be a fun celebration of our little community here at the end of yet another year.  Let's congratulate all of our winners as well as the various nominees - after all, the better the blogging community is as a whole, the more we all win!  

Merry Christmas Eve, everyone!