The 1987 Fleer baseball card set was released at the start of the 1987 MLB season. It was the second release from Fleer after acquiring the license from Topps the previous year. The set includes cards of players from all 26 major league teams at the time. Some of the top rookies and players featured in the ’87 Fleer set include Mark McGwire, Ozzie Smith, Wade Boggs, and Roger Clemens.
The base card design for 1987 Fleer was similar to the previous year. It featured a color photo of the player in action on the field in the foreground with their team logo and information in the background. One noticeable difference from ’86 was the addition of foil stamping and embossing on certain elements of the design like the Fleer logo. The 1987 set included 330 total cards consisting of 329 base cards and one checklist card.
Some noteworthy rookies featured in the ’87 Fleer set were Mark McGwire of the Oakland A’s, Tony Fernandez of the Toronto Blue Jays, and Trenidad Hubbard of the Milwaukee Brewers. McGwire’s rookie card in particular has gone on to become one of the most iconic and valuable rookie cards of all time due to his record-setting home run feats later in his career. Fernandez had a solid 17-year career and was a 3-time All-Star. Unfortunately, Hubbard only played parts of 3 seasons in the bigs and his card is essentially only valuable for being a rare low-print rookie.
Stars of the era like Wade Boggs of the Boston Red Sox, Ozzie Smith of the St. Louis Cardinals, and Roger Clemens of the Boston Red Sox are all represented with quality action photos on their ’87 Fleer cards. Boggs and Smith have very memorable cards due their visual appeal and the status the players achieved. Boggs actually has two cards in the set due to being traded from the Red Sox to the New York Yankees during the season. Meanwhile, Clemens’ card stands out for depicting the pitcher in the middle of his powerful wind-up at the peak of his early career dominance.
Some other notable veterans and all-stars that received highlight cards include Rickey Henderson, Kirby Puckett, Cal Ripken Jr., Joe Carter, Tim Raines, and Brett Butler. Raines’ card is particularly impressive with its vibrant multi-colored Montreal Expos uniform design in the background. Two other cards of mention are those of Oakland A’s ace starter Bob Welch and Chicago Cubs ace closer Lee Smith. Both pitchers had eventual Hall of Fame caliber careers, though neither reached Cooperstown.
In addition to the standard player cards, the ’87 Fleer set included a few special insert cards. The most coveted of these are the mini cards that feature superstars like Henderson, Smith, Boggs, Raines, and McGwire on a smaller card size. They were extremely rare pulls making them very valuable to collectors today if in high grade. Other inserts included Traded cards highlighting midseason player transactions as well as Career Highlights cards focusing on past accomplishments. There was also a Mike Schmidt Career Retrospective highlighting the Phillies’ star third baseman that spanned his whole career up to that point.
The 1987 Fleer baseball card set is considered the true successor to Topps as the ” Flagship” MLB card company following Fleer’s acquisition of the license. It offered collectors high quality images, big star rookie cards, and special inserts not seen before from a mainstream baseball card manufacturer. Even with competition from Score and Donruss emerging at the time, the ’87 Fleer set remains one of the most iconic and collectible of the entire modern era of sports cards due to the memorable careers many of the featured players went on to have. Condition graded examples of stars like McGwire, Boggs, Smith, and Raines have grown steeply in value and attract premium prices when they hit the hobby marketplace decades later. The 1987 Fleer baseball card release is still highly regarded by collectors today as a true golden era set that captured the sport at one of its most exciting junctures.
