Editing Baseball card (section)

====The Topps monopoly====
{{Main|Topps}}
Topps' purchase of Bowman led to a stranglehold on player contracts. Since Topps had no competition and there was no easy way for others to break into the national market, the company had a de facto monopoly. However, several regional sets featuring players from local teams, both major league and minor league, were issued by various companies.

Over the years, there was also a great deal of resistance from other companies. In 1967, Topps faced an attempt to undermine its position from the [[Major League Baseball Players Association]], the League's nascent [[trade union|players' union]]. Struggling to raise funds, the MLBPA discovered that it could generate significant income by pooling the publicity rights of its members and offering companies a group [[license]] to use their images on various products. After initially putting players on [[Coca-Cola]] [[bottlecap]]s, the union concluded that the Topps contracts did not pay players adequately for their rights.

Fleer even filed a complaint with the [[Federal Trade Commission]] alleging that Topps was engaged in unfair competition through its aggregation of exclusive contracts. A hearing examiner ruled against Topps in 1965, but the Commission reversed this decision on appeal. The Commission concluded that because the contracts only covered the sale of cards with gum, competition was still possible by selling cards with other small, low-cost products. However, Fleer chose not to pursue such options and instead sold its remaining player contracts to Topps for $395,000 in 1966.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.sportscollectorsdigest.com/article/irv_lerner |title=Philly Phavorite: Irv Lerner |publisher=Sports Collectors Digest |work=F+W Media, Inc. |date=December 3, 2008 |first=George |last=Vrechek |access-date=May 23, 2010 |archive-date=July 16, 2011 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110716121544/http://www.sportscollectorsdigest.com/article/irv_lerner |url-status=dead }}</ref>

Soon after, MLBPA executive director [[Marvin Miller]] then approached Joel Shorin, the president of Topps, about renegotiating these contracts. At this time, Topps had every [[Major League Baseball|major league]] player under contract, generally for five years plus renewal options, so Shorin declined. After continued discussions went nowhere, before the 1968 season, the union asked its members to stop signing renewals on these contracts, and offered Fleer the exclusive rights to market cards. Although Fleer declined the proposal, by the end of 1973, Topps had agreed to double its payments to each player from $125 to $250, and also to begin paying players a percentage of Topps' overall sales.<ref>{{Cite court |litigants=Fleer Corporation v. Topps Chewing Gum, Inc. and Major League Baseball Players Association |vol=658 |reporter=F.2d |opinion=139 |pinpoint=19–21, 57 |court=United States Court of Appeals, Third Circuit. |date=1981 |url= http://openjurist.org/658/f2d/139/united-states-court-of-appeals-third-circuit}}</ref> The figure for individual player contracts has since increased to $500. Since then, Topps used individual player contracts as the basis for its baseball cards.