Far Out Raks

On to that grooviest of years in our Rak Pak odyssey: 1972:  While the baseball cards forty (!) years ago looked like a black light would be required for viewing, the rak packaging was decidedly pedestrian again:

The header is unchanged, except for the product code, from the prior two years.  Topps just loved continuity with their graphics as it cut down on costs.  1972 was the first full year of Topps new, corporate ownership structure and one of the first casualties was the baseball card inserts that had been standard issue since 1961.  Not that the inserts appeared in any of the 1970's raks but a turn toward even more fiscal restraint was occurring at Topps HQ. Football would also follow suit in the header continuity department, although the psychedelic flair exhibited on the baseball cards was long gone.  Having said that, it's a nice, clean design:

The hockey rak?  Yup, just like last year's model:

As for basketball, with no scans showing up on teh internets, I reached out to noted scanologist John Moran and he replied that he had only seen a couple and had no examples in his digital domain.  If he doesn't have a scan, it must be a scarce item.  Anyone out there got a scan?

I plan to keep posting on raks sporadically until we hit 1980.  There's so many fakes out there I want to show  as many examples as I can here.  Anything I can do to help reduce bidding on the absolutely ridiculous number of outright counterfeit or fake items on Ebay is time well spent in my book.