Let the cataloging begin

Perhaps the biggest problem that's been facing my collection over the past few years is how to properly catalog it.

I like to believe I have a fairly good memory about what I have and don't have, but as my binders have grown fatter, my margin of error has gotten bigger. And while I don't necessarily feel that cataloging has ever been a dire need or anything, I've always thought it'd be useful to have a list to check everything against rather than having to pull out a binder every time I'm not 100 percent sure about something. Perhaps most importantly, cataloging seems like a lot of fun - if I could ever find a sensible way to do it.

I was a religious user of Zistle back in the day (remember that place?) - I thought it was incredibly user-friendly and was devastated when they had to shutter their doors. I have spreadsheets for my mini-collections and a few of my larger player collections, but plugging text into a box feels more utilitarian than fun sometimes. The monster that's loomed in the distance for a while now has been the almighty Trading Card Database.

I've mentioned a few times before how I've tried to use TCDB in the past and just couldn't get the hang of it - I love the idea of having photos & detailed descriptions of my cards available on the web, but found the process of navigating the site damn near impossible.

Over the last week or so, I decided to give TCDB one more go - and I'm happy to report that, while I still find the site a little clunky, I think I'm starting to get the hang of the place.

It definitely seems more catered to the set collector than the player collector (of which, of course, I am the latter), but I've started to realize how fun TCDB can be. I love the statistical component of it - it's scary to realize that what I consider to be a fairly formidable 125-card collection of Shohei Ohtani amounts to a hair over ONE PERCENT of his total catalog.

Scary, yes - but that's not the type of cataloging fun you're gonna get out of a spreadsheet.

I suppose now's a good time to mention that the cards in this post came from a healthy number of PWEs I've received from longtime friend-of-the-blog Jim (aka gcrl) of "cards as i see them" over the past few months.

Jim threw a couple Dime Box Dozen suspects my way with this pair of longtime needs. The function's been down for maintenance since I've started putting my cards up, but I'm also interested to see how some of my collections stack up against other TCDB users.

I'm probably way down on the list with bigger names like Carlton Fisk, but I can't imagine many people have more Paul Quantrill than I do - just another perk of collecting obscure guys, I guess.

One bonus of using TCDB that I hadn't considered is that it'll help me set up an accessible want list.

I have a tab on the blog of more recent stuff I need, but without stumbling upon the gap in my binders a while ago, how else was I gonna know I didn't have this painfully common '92 Stadium Club George Brett?

Not surprisingly, it became a Dime Box Dozen need - and also not surprisingly, Jim once again took it down pretty quickly.

Cataloging my player collections is going to be the main focus for me in the near future, but I hope to get my mini-collections going at some point too.

(I can always trust Jim to send me some weird regional oddball like that Lombardozzi I'd never seen before, and probably never would have without him.)

TCDB has also made me question other people's sanity - do some collectors really chase eight different copyright back variations from '91 Fleer?!

I'm all for collecting who and what you wanna collect - look no further than the 837 different player collections I have, including each and every one of these four dudes - but you have to draw the line somewhere.

Corey Kluber and Scooter Gennett were kinda big deals at one point, which is why I started collecting them - Kluber's still hanging on with the Rays, and I'm honestly not sure what cliff Gennett fell off of.

A couple more Dime Box Dozens from Jim, these of the Flagship variety - the 1% of Ohtanis I own is probably gonna look like a lot next to the colossal amount of Jeters I don't have.

More player collection randomness that'll find its way into the catalog at some point - that Turner reminds me that I've still never opened a pack of Topps Finest.

Closing things out is (what else?) another Dime Box Dozen need from Jim, this time of a particularly stern-looking Eddie Murray from '85 Donruss.

I fully and completely understand that cataloging my collection is gonna be a massive undertaking, and one that I'm not going into with any hopes of truly completing (which mirrors how I collect as a whole). I'm also not quite sure what I'm going to do about incoming cards - what comes first, the bindering or the cataloging? These are questions I'm sure I'll figure out down the line, but for now it's a joy to finally be able say to those four elusive words...

Let the cataloging begin!