We Have Been Assimilated.

Many of my fellow bloggers probably got the same email that I had today.  It's from Anuj Agarwal at FeedSpot.com.  The subject reads: "<insert blog name here> featured in FeedSpot Top 100 Sports Card Blogs".  The message goes on to congratulate "The Collective Mind Team" (clever...) "as your blog <blog name here> has been selected by our panelist (only one?) as one of the Top 100 Sports Card Blogs on the web. "  And it gives a link to the list ~ bloggers.feedspot.com/sports_card_blogs

Mr. Agarwal goes on to suggest adding your website link (the blog IS our website) and other social media handles for better visibility (on their list) and "get discovered by brands for collaboration".  (It would be nice if it was card companies who would send test product, but I don't think that happens any more.  Other than that, I'm not interested in commerce on here.)

So with all due respect to the FeedSpot organization, I won't be using their services.  There is a lot of positive feedback on their site from business and corporate customers, and that's fine.  It appears a lot of their audience is Influencers from all different areas of life.  I have no aspirations of becoming an influencer.  I've considered a YouTube channel, but I probably wouldn't post to it even as much as I do here, which isn't nearly what I did at my peak pre-2020.  "Influencers" in this hobby is a bit of a derogatory term to me, as it refers to those who came into the hobby during COVID and don't know enough about actual collecting to be credible with most of us.

Best of luck to FeedSpot.  I just hope this doesn't lead to a lot more spam comments on our blogs.  

I couldn't find anything about how they made up the list, but there were several familiar names on it.  The rankings, however, were way off.  Another way I could tell that they're not familiar with the hobby is that the description of my site said you could "Explore Card collection sorted into sports categories like Baseball, Football, Hockey, Vintage and Miscellaneous."  I'm guessing that's an AI generated blurb, since it ignores the "Wants" on each of my list tabs, which is where those categories come from. 

Anyway, to the rankings.  I'll just highlight some of the stars that we know and where they fell.  There are also a lot of card sites of breakers, dealers, and auction houses. 

1. Upper Deck Blog - Standard manufacturer blog is #1?  Not a strong start.

2. Sports Collectors Daily - OK, it's a general news site.  Will let it go.

3. Beckett - Is this still 1992?  No disrespect, but in the blog circles I know, this is not a high pick.

4 & 5. Cardboard Connection - This is one of many that appear twice.  Not sure why.

6. Panini - See #1.

7. Dave & Adams - Seller blogs?  Good for what they are, but for blogs in general, too high for my taste. 

11. Sports Collectors Digest - Widely read magazine.  OK fine.

16. Nachos Grande - Finally we get to one of the actual high level bloggers.  I'd say Top 5.

21. White Sox Cards - Some familar names now.  Lets roll through them to get to the others that should be way higher....All of these should be consolidated at the top.

22. Cards On Cards

27. Topps Archives

33. Cards That Never Were

35. When Topps Had Baseballs

39. Dime Boxes - There's one.  Unfortunately, Nick has shut 'er down, but this one is Top 5 of All time.

40. Chronicles Of Fuji - And right behind Nick, Mark is about 37 points too far down!

41. Shlabotnik Report - Joe's blog is one of those that gets blocked at work for some reason.  Maybe just because it's on WordPress.

42. Johnny's Trading Spot 

49. Too Many Verlanders

54. Sports Cards From The Dollar Store - Crossing the halfway point on the list...

56. Cardboard History - Billy needs to be up around the Top 10.

57. Sports Card Collectors

58. Waiting 'Til Next Year - P-Town Tom was one of my favorite trading partners while he was active.  Blog is sporadic now, but is in the wrong end of 2/3 of the list.

59. Tim Wallach

62. Padrographs

65. Diamond Jesters

67. Captain Kirk 42

69. The Collective Mind - Yours Truly - I am content with this spot, but if I posted regularly, I might complain.

79. Night Owl - Here's the biggest faux pas of the whole thing.  The Blogger King at 79?  What are we doing, people?

85. Baseball Card Breakdown - Gavin should be right behind Greg (NO) at the top of this list.

86. Sports Cards Uncensored - Gellman has slowed this one to a crawl, but it was always good for in-depth analysis, no matter which side you were on.

90. Sports Card Investor - Well, they got that one right. 😃