Some cool Ken Caminiti cards, Pt. 1

Here's a look at a few cards in my collection that stand out to me.

Ken Caminiti's baseball career coincided with lots of developments in the baseball card world.

His early major league days came during the so-called "junk wax era" because cards of the late 1980s and early 1990s were generally mass produced (and typically not very valuable).

Out of the age of stale gum and overprinted cardboard came developments that are still in use today: higher-end releases, serial-numbered inserts, flashy, shiny, chromium card stock, and autographs and game-used items featured on cards.

Here's a look at a few cards of Ken's in my collection that stand out to me.

1998 Donruss Crusade

These cards are so pretty in hand.

By 1998, Donruss parent company Pinnacle was struggling -- it filed for Chapter 11 protection in July, and its brands were later sold to Playoff.

The financial trouble overshadowed and disrupted a brilliant insert set in Donruss Crusade, which was included in packs across various brands. The cards are shiny and intricate.

Ken's green Crusade is numbered to 250, while his purple is numbered to 100. A red version only had 25 copies made (some of his Crusade cards, including unreleased versions, were also backdoored during the bankruptcy).

1999 Upper Deck Ultimate Victory Ultimate Collection

Upper Deck was at the forefront of so many hobby innovations and released so many quirky cards during the 1990s, and this wavy Ultimate Collection parallel from 1999 Upper Deck Ultimate Victory is busy but a lot of fun. Only 100 of these cards were made.

1999 Topps MVP Promotion

This card might not look like much, but it's a rare one.

The card front features a gold foil stamp, while the back shows official sweepstakes rules -- if your player won Topps MVP of the Week, you could send in the card to redeem a complete set of MVP of the Week cards.

Topps inserted MVP promotion cards in every 504 packs of Series 2, and there were MVP cards of every player -- more than 200 cards x 504 packs per card = you'd have to open 110,000 hobby packs of Topps, on average, in order to find this card.

And yet, after searching for this card for five years, I was able to buy a copy of it online for under $10 earlier this year.