Junk Wax Journeys: 1991 Donruss Baseball Cards

Card companies today provide collectors with a number of “chase cards” for each set produced. We have autographs, relics, short prints, photo variations, cards with missing logos, cards with throwback uniforms, cards with players wearing no hats, and even cards with fronts that feel like the back and backs that feel like the front. No, seriously, we do. There is no shortage of non-base cards floating around in this day and age.

Well, back in my day, we didn’t have that luxury. And yes, when I typed that phrase, I pushed my glasses up on my nose, leaned back in my recliner, and asked one of my kids to turn their radio down. But that is the absolute truth. In 1989, I would sit on my bedroom floor, sorting my Topps base set that didn’t include any of the fancy frills above – all while watching the 35 channels we got on TV, and recording songs onto a cassette tape from the one radio station we could pick up in my area.

The closest we got to chase cards before 1990 were the hot rookies and the 1989 Fleer Billy Ripken card, which is more an error than a variation. And to be honest, as a kid, I didn’t even know that was going on until after the chase was almost over. I lived in Donruss territory and finding Fleer was rare. It almost felt like a treat.

On a side note, when it came to error cards, those were born out of quality control issues and we usually didn’t know about them until the higher valued version showed up in Beckett. Then we would all scour our shoeboxes to see if we had the error or the corrected version. A true chase card is where you buy a product to specifically find that card.

All of that changed with the move Upper Deck made in 1990 with their “Find the Reggie” promotion. Upper Deck inserted 2,500 Reggie Jackson autographs into the 1990 High Series, sending collectors on a frantic chase for one of the signed cards from the Heroes insert set. I can’t even properly do the math on the odds of pulling a card numbered to 2,500 back in a 1990 baseball card release. Let’s just say that you would have probably had a better chance at meeting Reggie and getting him to sign a card than pulling one from that set.

When Upper Deck introduced this chase card, naturally, the other companies had to figure out ways to try and compete. Enter 1991 Donruss and The Elite Series. Donruss was coming off what I thought at the time was one of their worst releases ever. The red ketchup set of 1990 was really tough on the eyes and was a clear departure from the Donruss releases of the previous several years. My feelings have softened a little over the years about 1990 Donruss, as it wasn’t the design that put me off, but the never-ending red.

Fortunately, in 1991, Donruss came back with a similar design base for the set but they got rid of the blaring red and made the borders a much softer blue for Series 1 and green for Series 2. They added other colorful lines and marks to liven up the set even more. If someone asked you to tell them what living in the early ’90s felt like and you could only do it with one picture, the 1991 Donruss Bo Jackson would probably sum it up perfectly. The design was classic ’90s and Bo was The Man during those days.

But more important than the border color improvement in 1991, Donruss released the new, rare, Elite Series insert cards.

The Elite Series is a beautiful, marbled, star-studded set with eight total players on the checklist and all cards were numbered to 10,000. Names include Barry Bonds, George Brett, Jose Canseco, Andre Dawson, Doug Drabek, Cecil Fielder, Rickey Henderson and Matt Williams.

There are two additional players that had autographed versions but the labels are a little different. “The Signature Series” featuring Ryne Sandberg (/5,000) and The Legends Series with Nolan Ryan (/7,500).

While cards numbered to 10,000, 7,500, and even 5,000 wouldn’t even move the needle in today’s market, that was certainly not the case during the Junk Wax Era.

I have done the math before, based on educated guesses that these cards fell on average of 1:4 cases, and the numbers are staggering. If you add up all the Elite, Signature, and Legends cards, that is a total of 92,500 inserts in the set. There were 15 cards per pack, 36 packs per box, and 20 boxes per case.

If you buy four cases of 1991 Donruss, you are sitting on 43,200 cards. So, ultimately, you have a realistic chance of finding one Elite Series insert in every 43,200 cards. So, yeah, cards numbered to 10,000 were extremely rare when Elite was introduced.

If you need even more proof of just how rare that is, consider this for a moment. I started opening 1991 Donruss when it was released in 1991. Decades later, I am still opening 1991 Donruss when I can find it at a reasonable price of aroud $10 today. I may pay a little more if I have to have the box shipped but I am picking it up if it isn’t an outrageous asking price.

I have never gotten an Elite Series insert from a pack. I have seen one pulled and I own a few that I purchased directly from a shop or online seller. But that’s it.

The one I witnessed in person came way back in 1991 and it was pulled by one of my best friends in high school, David. He pulled an Andre Dawson that was booking for about $120 at the time in this very publication. Finding a card in 1990 or 1991 that was booking for triple digits was almost unheard of.

The 1989 Upper Deck Griffey and the 1986 Donruss Jose Canseco were the two best pulls you could find during the late ’80s-early and ’90s and these new inserts were more valuable than both of those cards. There was a new trend in sports cards with the release of “The Reggie” and “The Elite Series” and you can see how far we have come since then.

Just because I haven’t found one doesn’t mean I have given up looking. In fact, I just opened my fifth box this year and while I came up empty yet again, it was still a fun rip. I put together the Willie Stargell puzzle with my daughter, which may have been the best part. Unfortunately, the wax has stuck to the puzzle pieces over the years so I’ll have to do some peeling to get it looking good. But she was thrilled.

Any time you can find a box of sports cards for less than $10 and guarantee yourself a shot at Hall of Famers and former Super-stars, it is worth the money. When you toss in the chance at pulling an Elite, the excitement ratchets up even further.

Unless you lived through these years, I can’t fully explain to you how big it was to pull Jose Canseco from a pack of cards. He was larger than life and everybody had him picked as the greatest player to ever play the game by the time his career was over.

I was always a sucker for the MVP cards. The designs changed from time to time but that big, bold MVP at the top of the card let you know that you were holding a superstar in your hands.

Though Frank Thomas was not a Rated Rookie in 1991, he didn’t make it into the 1990 Donruss set so this is his first card from the manufacturer. This would clearly be the best “rookie” in the set based on this being his first appearance. But seeing as how he has several 1990 cards, it’s not a Frank Thomas RC.

Donruss was usually on top of the rookie game as they even featured Griffey in 1989 when Topps didn’t (until the late-season Traded set). But missing on Big Frank was a Big Miss back in 1990. He didn’t even make their annual “The Rookies” set. He was in 1990 Topps, Leaf, Score and Bowman, as well as in Fleer Update, however.

I long for the feeling of finding one of those beautiful Elite Series inserts hiding in a pack of wax. I had a similar experience last year when I finally pulled my first pack-fresh 1989 Upper Deck Ken Griffey Jr. But that is also another story for another time. For today, I will continue to push through 1991 Donruss boxes and continue my search. My obsession with the set benefits from the fact that the design was better than both 1990 and 1992, in my opinion, and they are still very reasonably priced.

There is a happy ending to this story, as well. David, my friend from high school, moved away after we graduated and I hadn’t seen him in over 20 years. We recently reconnected on social media and he asked for my address out of the blue. A couple of weeks later, a package showed up, and I was very excited to open it. Inside that small bubble mailer was the same Andre Dawson that he pulled from that pack of 1991 Donruss when we were hanging out that day.

He knew how much cards still meant to me and knew how big that card was when he pulled it. I will never forget this gesture. Thank you, David!