2007 Chachi #1 Jimmy Rollins

One of the most enjoyable aspects of my baseball card collecting hobby is the ability to sit down with a binder of a complete set and flip the pages. I've spent countless hours flipping through my Topps sets and reminiscing over where or when a certain card was acquired or what was happening in my life when a certain card or set first entered my collection. After a particularly bad day at work or a rough week, it is extremely relaxing and satisfying to look through a good set.

With that in mind, I wanted to spotlight a few blogs I've been faithfully following: first Matt R.'s Project Baseball 1976 blog and in a later post, the Dean Family's 1980 Topps blog. Reading these blogs is like flipping through my 1976 and 1980 Topps sets, but with all the background information you could ever want on the player and card featured.

I've read each of Matt's well-researched posts and I'd gladly leave the comment, "Wow. I did not know that" for each post if I knew it wouldn't get redundant and a little annoying after a while. I especially appreciate when he passes along information he's found on where the player is now, or he'll provide a link to a recent interview with the player featured.

He's up to card #176 at this point, which means there's still time to follow along and look forward to Matt's commentary on the other 484 cards in the set - especially the Kurt Bevacqua bubble gum champ card. And if you happen to have card #525 (the Billy Williams card), that's the last card he needs to complete his '76 set.

(I borrowed the 1976 Topps design as a template for my 2007 Chachi set, and this Jimmy Rollins card is the first card of the set.)