I Buy Weird Stuff

Maybe I have too much time on my hands, maybe I am just drawn to weirdness. Juan Rincon never did get a Rockies card for his 28 games with Colorado across the 2009 and 2010 seasons, other than this Venezuelan card that I know nothing about other than it was on eBay, and I bought it. The listing has it as a 2018 card, but I am sure I saw one before this year. The back has no stats or year so I really have no idea how to catalog this. It does look and feel like a card card, although I am not sure if the position "P" is supposed to be "distressed" looking or just a print error.

Sportlots

A quick little Sportlots mail-day that is severely lacking a witty title. As with most Sportlots orders there was one card I really wanted, then the rest just filled it out to make shipping worthwhile. The main card was the above Tim Cheveldae, a good Saskatchewan boy and former Saskatoon Blade, I didn't remember him being with the Bruins, probably because he only played two games for them. I know nothing about this release other than it has a playing card back and I assume it's the hockey version of the Showdown MLB and NFL releases. 

One Card Mailday (Topps Now Edition)

I have a love-hate relationship with Topps Now, I love the "moment in time" cards, but the price always throws me off, $10 plus shipping to Canada or processing through COMC is a lot for me, so I was mostly limited to picking them on the secondary market. I probably would have done the same with this one, but it came out the same time as the Player's Weekend set, so it shared shipping with that order, and surprisingly the Spring Training code from the Mike Trout came that came out in the spring still worked.

RLC Custom Card Project: Matt Nokes

The Player: Maybe not a household name, but a player that put together a pretty solid career, probably best know for hitting 32 home runs as a rookie with the Tigers in 1987, playing in his only All-Star game and being awarded the American League Silver Slugger at Catcher that year. Also played 5 years for the Yankees, catching Jim Abbott's no-hitter in 1993. 1995 would be his last year in the majors, starting with Baltimore and finishing with the Rockies, playing in 10 games with one start.

The Card: 1978 Topps has been a set that I fought with for a while, never really figuring out the font. Eventually Topps would do the work for me with the "On Demand Inspired by '78" set, the first time the Rockies were using in this design. 

PWE from TCDB

A rare PWE trade, only 4 cards, but some stuff I am pretty happy to get. Starting with this 2015 Update J.T. Realmuto. This is his first base Topps cards, but no Rookie Card logo. COMC lists this as his rookie card, but he did have a Panini/Donruss card in 2014 with a RC logo, weird that Topps would acknowledge the Panini rookie and leave the logo off this, makes for an interesting card.

Gearing up for Hockey with a Trade

Baseball is in the pennant race and NFL is only days away, so it's easy to forget hockey season is creeping up. The most recent trade reminded of this, (and that I need to get my skates sharpened and buy a new roll of stick tape). Some new Cam Neelys with an All-Star sticker featuring a Reggie Lemelin cameo and a Stadium Club with my favorite Bruins alternate jerseys from the NHL's 75th season.

Cards from SCFTDS

We all know and love him, Sportscards From The Dollar Store, one of the more prolific traders around, and lucky for me a fellow Canadian that we can send packages back and forth without crazy shipping costs. His most recent package arrived full of good stuff as usual, here are a few of the highlights. Starting with some Pro Debut, I don't usually collect minor league stuff, but I really should. Who could pass up Hartford Yard Goats and Albuquerque Isotopes?

RLC Custom Card Project: Robbie Beckett

The Player: Not a household name by any means, but older collectors might remember the Padres first round pick in 1991 from 1991 Score or from a couple Bowman Cards. He would make his MLB debut in 1996 for the Rockies, pitching in five games, then would pitch in two more in 1997 making up his entire Majoe League career. 7 career games, 7 career innings and an ERA of 11.57.

The Card: Probably my favorite parallel, from probably my favorite modern set. I already had a 2011 Gypsy Queen template, so this one was pretty easy. I am trying to to repeat design to much in this project, but I really liked how this turned out so here it is.

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

Free Neely (or What I did with my ebay bucks)

Well, almost free, using my $1.21 ebay bucks, this came to 4 cents. Nice insert from his playing days with a Flair Showcase / Bowman Mojo kind of tractor tire refractor thing going on. A couple things to love about this card other than the shiny, is the serial number to 10000, nothing screams mid 90's like that, and the back has Mikael Renberg, who although I strongly disliked the Flyers, was a player I always kind of liked, and scored a lot of goalies for me on the Bruins in some NHL video that I forgot the year of.

The Most Expensive Checklist I Will Ever Own (aka the Joy of a completed team set)

I don't even know when I started this project. In my mind I can track it back to at least 5 moves ago, so that is right around 2001. I have been chipping away, adding cards, and after I picked up my personal white whale in Eddie Brown, the end was near. When everything fell together for this card it was too hard to pass up.

It was listed for a ridiculous $299.99 from big-time PSA seller 4 Sharp Corners, then reduced down to $90.99, still a little high, but everyones favorite online auction site had a 20% off everything discount, good for a savings of  $18.20. Figure that in with $6.00 shipping to Canada, made an expensive card, but something that fit in the budget.

The next step is to get the complete team set all in PSA slabs, but that is a long way off, but should get closer fairly soon.