Finally Getting Around to Updating the Sports Card Blogroll

It's been more than two years since I last updated the Sports Card Blogroll, and boy am I depressed. I knew I should have taken more time to do some house cleaning. Before, being able to do this once a month, was all right. But two years??? Wow, a lot of good sites have been inactive.

Long story short, since I've been back on a "semi-regular" basis, I have added six sites to the blogroll. I'm still trying to dig older emails to see if I've missed any. The bad news is that there have been 89 blogs that have not been active within the last six months (and this humble, little blog was almost one of them). A handful hadn't been touched in two years. TWO YEARS!!! So I've finally done some housecleaning around the SCBR. It is as up-to-date as I can get it. What once had an list of 297 blogs on the main roster, there are now 209.

So, for posterity, the following blogs have been removed from the Sports Card Blogroll. If you're site is among them, thank you very much for adding your voices to what was a great community:

• "O" No!!! Another Orioles Blog
• 14,000 Phillies
• 1964 Topps
• 1979 Topps
• 1982 Topps Blog
• 1993 Topps
• 6,000,000 Cards and Counting...
• ALL TRIBE BASEBALL
• All-American Baseball Cards
• Andrews baseball cards
• Atlanta Sports Cards Blog
• Bad Wax Customs
• Baseball By The Letters
• Baseball Card Bust
• BASEBALL CARD COMEBACK FUN!
• Baseball Card Value
• Baseball Cards Rule
• baseballcardman
• Basketball Card World
• Battlin' Bucs
• Bob Lemke's Blog
• Bring Back UD MLB, NBA, NFL Cards
• Can't Hit The Curve
• Cards from the Quarry
• CheckOutMyCards.com Blog
• Democratic Roadkill
• Diamond Cuts and Wax Stains
• drewscards
• Drop The Gloves!
• Ed The Collector
• Emerald City Diamond Gems (see update)
• Enough Already
• Funner Here.
• Funny Baseball Cards
• garvey cey russell lopes (see update)
• Hockey Card Geek
• Hockey Card Heaven
• Hot Corner Cards
• In The Ballpark
• Indianaland Sports Cards
• J. B. Trading Co. Baseball Card Blog
• Keys to the Batter's Box
• Life and Baseball Cards
• Maple Leaf Sports Calgary's Blog
• OFF THE WALL
• Old Foul Cardboard
• One Man's Junk (Wax)
• Orange and Black Wax
• Play at the Plate
• Poor Old Baseball Cards
• Rating the Rookies
• RBI Collecting - Ryan's Baseball Item Collecting
• really bad baseball cards
• Rectangle Men
• Ride of the Ancient Mariner
• Ryan's Pitch
• SpokeWorthy
• Sports Card Magazine
• Sportscard Mask-a-Rade
• Stale Gum (I will talk about this in a minute)
• Tall Boys - 1964-65 Topps Hockey
• Texas Rangers Cards
• The 1991 Score Blog
• The Baseball Card Blog
• The Baseball Card Hub
• The Baseball Card Store | Hairline Crease
• The Card Chop
• The Cardboard and Me
• The Cardboard Examiner
• The Cardboard Way
• The Common (Card) Man
• The Diabetic Card Geek
• The Golden Age of Baseball Cards
• THE PURSUIT OF 80's(ness)
• THE REAL DFG
• The Sexy Geek's House of Swag
• The Skillz Report
• The Sports Bookie - Bob D'Angelo
• The Topps Baseball Fanatic
• The Trading Card Want List
• The Underdog Card Collector
• This Way to the Clubhouse...
• Topps Redemptions Update
• Two Packs A Day
• Vic's Dugout
• View from the Skybox
• Voice of the Collector (Same with this one)
• Wax Heaven 2.0
• Yankees and Jays

Although these sites are no longer active, there are two blogs that have been inducted into the SCBR Hall of Fame.

The first blog inductee into the SCBR HOF is Stale Gum, which was written and hosted by Chris Harris. He was around long before many of us joined the Hobby Blogging Community, writing his take on the state of the Hobby for many years. His views weren't always positive, but there were a lot of collectors who shared his sentiments. Others (myself included) did not necessarily agree with most of his opinions, but you can't fault him for his passion for the Hobby of sports card collecting. He has since taken his musings to Twitter, where he has been an active presence and has no love lost for the bane and sole reason for his existence, the Topps Company.

The other newest inductee into the HOF is Rob, also known as the Voice of the Collector. He started in 1997 as well, just as the Hobby Blogging Community was just in its infancy. He had a unique take on the Hobby as he was one of the handful that started to rebel against the "Number One Source of the Hobby." It was this blog, along with the still going Sports Card Uncensored, and at the time Wax Heaven, that really started to get under the skin of those who ran Beckett and its Sports Card Magazines. Nowadays, Rob, who has worked with Cardboard Connection and their radio show, along with Leaf Trading Cards as a writer, works with GTS Distribution as its Marketing Manager and oversees the content that goes on the GTS website. He also hosts a web show called Go GTS Live. So his voice, although no longer active with the Blogging Community, is still strong in other media.

Removing all of these sites has been a sad endeavor. For a long time, blogging about the Hobby was a strong way to communicate our feelings and opinions about sports cards, as well as show off our collections, and make trades with others. Although there are still a lot of long-time blogging veterans still cranking out educational and inspiring posts, that number has drastically been reduced. I have always called for new voices to dive into the blogging pool, and there have been many that I have not yet discovered.

If you or someone you know has a blog about the Hobby that you would like to be added to the Sports Card Blogroll, or you had one and you are making plans to return to the Hobby Blogging Community, please feel free to contact me a bdj610@hotmail.com or follow me at Twitter @bdj610 and send me a message.

Sincerely,,

JayBee Anama

UPDATE: THURSDAY, AUGUST 17, 2017, 11:15 PM .

It occurs to me that there was one more site listed above that should have been inducted into the Blogroll Hall of Fame. I already made the announcement on Twitter, so I thought I'd do it here as well.

A third site was added to the Hall of Fame this evening: garveyceyrusselllopes, written by gcrl. Over the years, gcrl wrote about his love of the Dodgers growing up, including the infielders that he grew up watching: Steve Garvey, Ron Cey, Bill Russell, and Davey Lopes. He joined the Hobby Blogging Community as it started to grow in 2008 and was one of the first card blogs dedicated to the Dodgers. Although this blog's run has ended, gcrl made his return to blogging with a new site called cardsasiseethem.

This brings the total of HOF blogs to ten. jba

UPDATE: TUESDAY, AUGUST 22, 2017, 12:15 PM .

After even more careful review of the sites that were removed from the active blogroll, there is one more (and I promise...for now) blog that should have been inducted into the Blogroll Hall of Fame. It's a blog that has not seen any action in just under three years, but it was worthy of consideration and should have been enshrined two years ago.

So it is with great pleasure that Emerald City Diamond Gems, written by Mariner1, into the Sports Card Blogroll Hall of Fame. A Mariners (and Dale Murphy) collector, Mariner1 introduced us to a unique perspective in card collecting in the Pacific Northwest, sharing his love of both the Mariners and their baseball cards. He started in 2010, and his Retro Mariner Sunday posts introduced us to many of the players who suited up for the M's in the early years of the franchise's existence. He decided to call it a blogging career at the end of 2014 and he has been missed. Mariner1 also contributed to two other Hobby Blogs: Ride of the Ancient Mariner, and 1979 Topps.

This brings the total of HOF blogs to eleven. jba