DENVER – Nine-year-old Bake Grice, from Parker, Colorado, is like most 9-year-olds in that he likes to play video games and watch videos on YouTube.
But he sets himself apart by doing online reviews of Topps baseball cards on both YouTube and Instagram.
“I just started doing the videos, and the more I made them more entertaining, the more I went on,” he said.
His card reviews are called “Project 70,” and in them, he looks at the specialty cards being made for the Topps 70th anniversary, which put an artistic spin on the traditional collectibles.
“This is a lot of work for someone my age, because I’ve done at least 102 of these episodes, and that’s basically a whole month,” Blake said.
His Instagram page, the_daily_blakedown, has garnered more than 250 followers and led to praise from Topps, designers and artists.
He’s done so many videos, he caught the attention of one of the artists behind the 70th anniversary cards named DJ Skee. The far-from-shy 9-year-old gave the artist an idea from one that became reality.
“I gave him this idea of Mickey Mantle and Eminem – a companion card. And they both started with ‘M,’ so we thought, ‘Wow, perfect companion card,’” Blake said. “It took some trial and error, and it ended out with a great card.”
The card also includes an important Easter Egg Blake insisted on having.
“The puzzle piece is for my brother, because he has autism,” said Blake. “And I love my brother a lot, so I want to support him.”
Thousands of the special companion card were made and sold, with a portion of the proceeds benefiting children with autism.
Blake said he is hopeful that he can collaborate on more future card designs, but in the meantime, says he still has plenty of videos to record in order to make it through the Topps Project70® series.
“1,200 of them,” he said.
Jason Gruenauer at KMGH first reported this story.
