I have a mammoth collection of baseball and basketball cards from the late 1980’s and early 1990’s. Every so often, I sift through my shoe boxes, looking at the faces, features and uniforms of the stars and no name players from childhood.

The varying idiosyncrasies of each card allow for an endless amount of themes in which to organize them.

Interestingly enough, this is a sickeningly therapeutic activity.

So, come aboard with this journey into musty shoe boxes, as I dig through paper gold.

The very first entry will be: Life Before Lasik

When a hitter is in on a hot streak, he will often state that he’s “seeing the ball well.”

Keen vision, naturally, is almost a prerequisite in a sport where you have to hit a ball coming in at speeds of upward of 100 mph. For those that weren’t blessed with 20/20, there was always the choice to wear glasses, essentially evening the playing ground.

However, with the technological waves pretty much splashing onto the deck of humanity these days, the eye of the Terminator wasn’t long for the fictitious world of Hollywood.

Soon, there was lasik eye surgery, which a number of baseball players like Greg Maddux and Jeff Bagwell underwent.

Eye glasses went the way of the waffle-iron Nike track shoes.

Still, there are some players such as Kyle Farnsworth and Fransisco Rodriguez that sport some fashionista glasses. But for the most part, it is pretty much a thing of the past.

Luckily, the shoe box was loaded with some four-eyed memories.

Take a gander (click to enlarge)