These scans have dust on them.

Sometimes I tell myself I am super organized, sometimes I put files in folder to keep them straight, and then totally forget about them for months. This is the case here with a package from oldest friend of the blog, Mr. Buckstorecards. As always a nice stack of cards with too many to scan them all, but a few highlights made it to the scanner, starting with a straight black patch of David Krejci and a very rare brand for me, Ray Bourque from The Cup.

Football Frankenset - November 2020

 

#67 - 1993 Playoff Contenders - Bernie Kosar
A rare mid-season short term stop, Kosar played in 4 regular season games with the Cowboys, and finished the year with a Super Bowl ring.

Sportlots: 9 from 3

The post-season review of my One of Rockies spreadsheet showed that I have been ignoring the project a little bit, the remedy was a visit to sportlots. I was a little surprised, but very happy to see some of the on-line only Topps products listed, including these two from 2019 Total with catcher Drew Butera who has surprisingly spent parts of 3 season with the Rockies despite hitting .167 and Tim Melville who was a pretty good story going from Independent leagues to a short term cult hero.

BaseballCardStore - The Return.......

 The first order from BaseballCardStore.ca was so good, I went back for more. 

Starting with something a little different, Kipper for the Sharks goalie collection and Craig Billington sporting one of my favorite mask designs in recent memory.

10 Reasons to dislike the DH in Cardboard form

The 2020 baseball season was weird and short and weird. Among the weirdest was the universal DH. I miss pitchers batting. I miss double switches and I miss pinch hitters and I miss pitchers facing just one batter. In honor of the pitcher batting and hopes of seeing it again, here are my top 10 reasons to embrace the traditional 9 hole hitter.

10. Closers Batting
Above we have 1,201 career saves and 9 career hits. When was the last time you saw a guy with over 300 career saves sliding into a base? Very rarely does it happen, and very really do it go well, but it's still intresting.

9. Old School Pitchers Hitting
How great are these three cards with the flapless helmets.

8. Warm-up Jackets
These seem to have been out of fashion for a while, but how cool is a warm up jacket with your name and number on the back.

7. Hitting Dingers
Chicks dig the longball, from the classic Tim Hudson card, to German Marquez hitting a home run off a position player, to Jon Gray hitting one 467 ft.

6. Bartolo Colon
Speaking of dingers, Topps sure loved the legend of Bartolo Colon, and really who didn't?

5. Pre-Interleague A.L. Pitchers hitting
Mostly pre-season, although the wonderful weirdness of baseball with Roger Clemens getting his first career hit in his first career at bat in his 13th season in a game in which the Red Sox moved their DH to field, moving the pitcher into the line-up.

4. Pitchers hitting walk-off bombs
April 25th, 1986, Craig Lefferts enters a tie game in the 11th, gives up a run the top of the 12th, then hits a walk-off bomb in the bottom of the 12th, and yes, there is video of it, and it is glorious.

3. Jim Abbott
Born without a right hand Abbott still managed 2 career hits and 3 RBI. Also very weird is the amount of cards of him batting even though he never had a regular season plate appearance with the Yankees or Angels.

2. Pitchers Looking Ridiculous
Honestly, do you want cards of fat old guys that don't even own a glove, or stuff like this. You would miss horrible hitting pitchers, you know you would.

1. Pitcher Plays at the Plate
Maybe the most famous baseball card photo, Thurman Munson and A's pitcher Chuck Dobson along with an obsolute gem that might be a double rarity, a pitcher running, and a catcher collision at the plate.

There it is, maybe more on the way, but this should really be enough to convince any baseball fan.

Sept 2020 Trade Roundup

Clearing a couple trade out of the scan folders, starting with Steve Kline and either the batboy or a very small middle infielder, just a weird card from the old want-list and bonus points for an Expos appearance.

Football Frankenset - Kickoff Weekend 2020

No better time to post a Frankenset post than after wrapping up Week one of the 2020 season.

#16 - 1996 Pinnacle Summit - Emmitt Smith

This card went from an obvious "Silence of the Lambs" reference, to something dumb about The 'Rona.

Check out my Everything Else (2020)

That's right, not enough Rockies cards for their own post, so they get lumped in with the randoms. Going for quality over quantity, I will file this under quality 1997 Pinnacle Museum Collection Artist's Proof absolute beauty of a dufex.

Check out My Bruins 2020 (+1)

The second part of the first COMC package of the year, you wouldn't think it would take almost 30 years to complete a 6 card set, but here we are, in 2020, finally finishing off the 1991 Score Bobby Orr insert set. Also coming along was this weird Upper Deck insert of a young Saint Robert wearing number 30 for some reason.

Check Out My Washington Football Team Cards

My first COMC package of 2020, almost a years worth of cards, which turned out to be a relatively small amount. Starting with 2 more 2018 Spectra Alex Smith cards giving me 7 out of 12 in hand, with a couple more on the way.

RLC Custom Card Project: Lenny Harris

The Player: Not a house-hold name, but a damn impressive career, 18 seasons in the majors, a World Series title with the Marlins in 2003 and more pinch hits, 212, and pinch hit at-bats, 804, in his career than anyone to ever play the game. Also the record holder for most pinch hit appearances in a season with 95 in 2001 as a Met. He only spent part of one season with Colorado as he was traded to the D-Backs at the end of August, but still managed 20 pinch hits, the third best single season total in team history.

The Card: 1986 is a sneaky classic design in my books, nothing special, but a nice clean design and the team color on black gives a sharp look.

BaseballCardStore - Baseball Pick-ups

The last of the baseballcardstore.ca order, the baseball cards, starting with a couple of the better photo selection for the Rockies from the last couple years.

BaseballCardStore - Hockey Pick-ups

Part 2 of the baseballcardstore.ca order, of course a Canadian site would have hockey cards. Some things they not have less of and I have more of, shiny Bruins goalies! A Select Tuukka, a very shiny Lord Byron and a Gold Medallion of the Lach Ness Monster. 

BaseballCardStore - Review and Football pick-ups.

I finally tried out the new "virtual dime box" site that I have seen around lately, baseballcardstore.ca. 10 cents a card and base out of Canada so cheap shipping, why not? I managed to scrounge through and picked of 85 cards, including a couple trade baits, and I have to say, I really like the site, no photos or scans of a lot of cards isn't ideal, but not a deal breaker, and the fact you can pay for and set aside a few cards and get them shipped later with another order is huge. Shipping was fast and everything was extremely well packaged. 10/10, would order from again.

July 2020 Trade Round-up

A couple trades to clear out the scan folder, starting with a couple Frankenset near-misses from 1995 Pinnacle, Ricky Proehl in the Cardinals throwbacks from 1994 and Dan McGwire from his one game stint with the Dolphins.

RLC Custom Card Project: Tom Martin

The Player: Tom Martin is a prime example of middle reliever getting no cardboard love, Martin pitched in 376 career MLB games over 11 seasons, but only received solo cards in two sets, 1998 Topps & 2004 Topps Total. He spent his last two MLB seasons with the Rockies, pitching in 94 games with a 2-0 record, a 5.07 ERA and no saves.

The Card: 1953 is one of the most re-used Topps designs, from 2002 Heritage, 2016 Archives, Living Set, etc. with it;s second appearance in the RLC project, with a little personal touch using a purple triangle and the hat logo. Still a pretty classic design, and another old set that would look pretty good with in game, action photos.

The Project: The Project: Rockies Legacy Collection custom project to make digital cards of Rockies players who never had one issued.

Budget = Destroyed

This has by far been the slowest year since I got back into collecting, maybe the lack of live sports, maybe some burn out or a combination of several things, but I have not been excited about anything this year, other than maybe Heritage which I am slowly still building. The good thing has been my card allowance has been building to a point I could dump it on a couple bigger purchases. Speaking of bigger purchases, the above count for the most and third most I have ever spend on an individual card (1977 Mexican Eddie Brown sneaking in between).

Football Frankenset - June 2020

#52 - 2008 Upper Deck - Terrell Owens

"Getcha Popcorn Ready" Bonus points for the throwback uni.

Pack Break: 2013 BBM Legendary Foreigners 2 Deep Impact

A very rare pack break as I haven't been super interested in any new product (and I totally blew my card budget, more on that in a week or so). Something popped up that I consider an insta-buy, and as a bonus it was from a seller I have ordered from in past who usually has others things in his store, like oddball Japanese baseball packs. I will never turn down reasonably priced BBM packs, especially from this set which I have a few cards on my wantlist.

3, 3, 3 Trades in One!

Three trades mashed together to clear out the scan folder, starting with some 1984 Topps from old twitter friend and now TCDB friend JennyMiller521, Bilardello for the catcher binder and Mike Morgan for a project I am working on.

The World Burns & I'm Just Sitting Here Sorting Cards

A previously mentioned flurry of trades from TCDB, starting with the above. I don't usually bother with insert sets, but I will collect any card with this photo on it.

A Very Clutch Trade

Lots of trade requests coming in on TCDB, it is as is people have extra time on their hands for some reason. Anyway, starting off with some 2020 Gypsy Queen. I skipped my almost annual Gypsy Queen boxes on favor of Heritage this year, but I will still pick up some here and there, including Chance Sisco for the catcher binder and a couple young Rockies.

Mail Still Coming in, Slowly.

Sometimes I just can't help myself. I know I have a backlog of packages on the way, and I know things are moving painfully slow, but I just can stop. This one being an order from Sportlots, I have been looking for the above two cards for a long time, so when I found them, I jumped, no matter how long it was going to take (The seller was Canadian so it only took two weeks). These sneak into the "One of Every Rockies" collection on a weird rule I have, minor league cards don't count, unless the team name is Rockies. 

Mike Farmer the first Rockies replacement player from the 1995 strike to make the majors, and you could say he had a largely forgettable 7 games in the big. I can't say that though, I still remember his second career start, pitching 7 innings of 2 run ball, and set to earn his first career win against Greg Maddux of all people, then watching the Rockies bullpen blow a 5-2 lead in the ninth and ultimately lose it in the 10th. A quality start, no decision is not quite up there with beating Greg Maddux. 

Terry Jones on the other hand, I have no memory of his 12 games with Colorado.

Football Frankenset - May 2020

#3 - 2015 Upper Deck CFL - Weston Dressler

The Saskatchewan Roughriders version of the CFL's bizarre Signature Jersey experiment from 2014 and 2015. Mini wheat sheathes on the helmet, shoulders and numbers make this a weird one that thankfully didn't last very long.

Merging Maildays

Two smaller recent packages one from an online store and on from a trade, starting with the above 1994 Collector's Choice Gold parallel, one of the harder Brad Edwards cards to find. This is actually the second one I have bought, but the first either got lost in the mail or I got ripped off.

Falling in Love w/ Heritage (aka my 1st 2020s)

There are many constants in my collecting and by extension this blog, with one of them being my dislike for Heritage. Sure, I have Heritage in my collection, the large checklist usually makes for a few cards that sneak on my wantlist, but never too many. This year is different, this is the year I have been waiting for since I got back into collection. This blog actually started as a way to document the variations in 1971 Topps. 

Trading with Canadians 2020.2

A tcdb trade from before things got weird, highlight by, yes, a 1990 Pro Set card. For all the Pro Set I opened and traded for, I never have a Ray Bourque "corrected" variation, until now. A much as this set epitomizes "junk wax", it has really grown on me over the years, including all the little errors and quirks in the set.

Trading with Canadians 2020

  The Rockies collection has been largely ignored in favor of the Football Frankenset and the start of the One of Every Bruins project, but this trade scratches the baseball itch before 2020 gets in full swing. Starting with a oddly yellow tinted Vinny Castilla, which is something that I have been on other acetate cards but not very often, along with the Big Cat in a warm-up jacket and a zero-year Rudy Seanez from a non-Topps OPC design.

Picking up Singles

A couple singles from everyone's favorite auction site starting with a very weird pick-up, 2004 Upper Deck Ultimate Collection has 84 cards in the set, and one of them is a goalie who played in 14 career games 30 years previous. Dave Reece did record two shutouts in those games, but he is most famous for his last NHL game in which he gave up 11 goals including 10 points to Darryl Sittler. So 3 nearly 3 decades later, Dave Reece gets his rookie card.

Team Collector Dilemma (Read the Fine Print)

One card mail-day from late night browsing for cheap cards for Canadian sellers on everyone's favorite online auction site lead to this. Joe Colborne never did play a regular season NHL game for the the Bruins, but being a 16th overall pick did get him a few cards. I thought this Manu-Patch auto was slightly better than a sticker auto, but upon receiving and scanning something caught my eye.

So despite a Bruins Jersey, a Bruins hat, and printed Bruins Logo and a Manu-Patch of a Bruins logo, this little added text sneaks in there to as the ultimate frustration for a team collector. What to do now? Try and ignore that cursed little all-caps blurb "TRADE TO MAPLE LEAFS" and call it a Bruins card? That won't happen, it's there. I know it's there. I will whisper to me in the night "I am not a Bruins card". So Joe Colborne, from "needed" to "in-transit" to "have", back to "needed". The team collectors dilemma.

15 from 4 w/ Frankenset Goodness

15 Cards from 4 Sportlots packages starting with 3 for the "One of Every Bruins" project that is not a high priority but seems to be growing, tough guy Colton Orr, short term stop Sergei Gonchar in a Winnie the Pooh uni and Alexei Zhamnov with a short term stop / sunset card.

First Trade (and post) of 2020

A couple things to get out of the way, happy 2020 to everyone and in absence of a big post I just want to thank everyone who reads, trades and sends cards, not everything gets posted here, but everything is appreciated, thanks to all.

One to the cards, starting with my love of re-printed cards, there is something I just don't like about putting old cards into team binders, so when I can add modern cards of old players I am a happy camper. These are both beauties (the Leach I actually have the vintage card) from 2001 Archives.