Function Vs. Design

I picked up this card from 2014 Topps Tribute at a card show over the weekend for a couple of bucks and I chose it not only for its low price. It's a great example of the problems you get when you create autograph cards horizontally. You end up with either a small signature [which no one wants] or having the signer find another solution. Jason Grilli's long signature wouldn't fit straight across the smaller signature area and so he went diagonal on us. The design just doesn't allow for the card to function as an autograph card.


And who is that other pitcher featured anyway? The card offers no information. I assume he was a Pirates picture as the card is a Tribute Traditions autograph but I was stumped. I mean, I follow baseball and love vintage cards but I'm drawing a blank here. Although I had trouble finding the exact photo used on the card online that turns out to be Babe Adams, definitely the second most famous "Babe" in baseball history. He was the only player that was on both the 1909 and 1925 Pirates World Championship seasons and was renowned for his ball control averaging 1.29 walks per nine innings.   

Comments

mike said…
I like the initial design of the cards, using the old photos to provide a backdrop. In the direct case of the Grilli card, I really thing the card would have created a more effective appear if Jason would have appeared on the right rather than the left. He's doing what we call in the photo editing business as "throwing off the page", which not only makes him "appear" smaller in size, but also performing an action without the visual aspect of flow. That's my biggest beef with the card. And that he's in full color, and the BW photo seems to cut the card in thirds. I do like the auto, it's at least on card and gives a different appeal than all the left to right work we see everyday.
Fuji said…
It's not perfect, but things could have been a lot worse. At least Grilli actually signed the card and not a sticker... plus he was able to keep his whole signature on the card.

Overall... I really like these autographs, but Mike is right. Topps should have put him on the right side, so he's throwing across the card.