Using MySQL sort varchar column numerically with cast as unsigned when the column can begin or end with letters

Question

I\'ve ran into something I\'m not really sure how to handle here. I\'m building a database to store information on sports cards, and I\'m having a bit of an issue with some

Answer 1

For your sample data, you can use the length() trick:

order by year desc, cardset asc, subset asc,
         length(cardNum),
         cardNum asc;

You don't provide much sample data. This would be a general solution if, within a "subset", all the card numbers have the same form (and no leading zeros on the numeric portion).