The Word of the Day...

...is "unfortunate."

From time to time, I like to show off some cards from my collection that I love dearly but others would label "unfortunate."

This one applies to the picture on the card rather than the card itself:

Okay, there is evidence that a staple once went through the card and that's unfortunate, but that isn't what makes this card memorable.

The 1958 Topps design called for a solid-colored background. To achieve this effect, Topps needed to trim away all of the image around the player photo. While this made for some great-looking cards that popped from the background, sometimes it would have been helpful to leave a little more in the original image. Take poor Red Wilson above, whose picture looked like it showed him swinging his bat. Sadly, the bat was cropped out, which makes Red look a little like he lost part of his right his arm in an (ahem...) "unfortunate" combine accident.

"Unfortunate," indeed...