08 Timelines Timeless Teams Stadiums

Ok, so I really love this set now. Odd because I hated the stuff in '04. Why did I hate that set? Check out all the Braves in the checklist. Steve and David hated the set too. Why the heck did Upper Deck do that? Anyway, they've made up for their egregious omissions with the Timelines set.

The main reason I love the cards is because of the stadium scenes on the back. They just look fantastic. So here's all the ones I have. Why not show them off? I hope to eventually complete my stadium set, I'll be happy to receive any that aren't posted here in card or scan form.

NL East

Braves
Marlins
Mets
Nationals Phillies

AL East

Blue Jays
Orioles
Rays
Red Sox
Yankees


NL Central

Astros Brewers
Cardinals
Cubs
Pirates
Reds
AL Central

Indians
Royals
Tigers
Twins
White Sox


NL West

Diamondbacks Dodgers Giants
Padres
Rockies

AL West

A's
Angels
Mariners
Rangers

Trade from David Part 2

Part one of this trade was posted on the 13th. Yes, I'm way behind in everything. Let's knock out the second package from David in that video mailer, shall we? It's actually better than the first one.

2008 Topps Shea Stadium

I don't know what this is from, but it rules. There's no card number on the back so I'm honestly stumped. Paging JayBee... You are wanted at the white courtesy phone...

2007 Turkey Red John Smoltz jersey

Dang, these cards are sweeeeet. I have no idea when the Braves ever wore black jerseys, but it's best not to think too hard about such things. Card collecting is more fun when you maintain the suspension of disbelief.

A Mess O' Mickey Mantles

Four of 'em from the Turkey Red Set. I think one of them is even a short print, but I'm too lazy to check.

2008 Moments & Milestones Greg Maddux

I still like this set. I'm glad it's dying a horrible death in 2009, but it was fun while it lasted.

2007 Topps Frenchy McLowOPS

Ok internet detectives!!! Game. In Turner Field. 2006 most likely, maybe 2005. Francoeur in Right Field. Braves scored 1 in the fifth, opponent scored at least 1 in the 7th. WHAT GAME IS THIS PHOTO FROM???

2008 Chipper Jones 50th Anniversary Star Rookie

I'm looking forward to seeing this design again in 2008 Heritage.

2006 Opening Day Chipper Jones Funny Photos

I didn't know this card even existed... My Chipper collection just went up by 1.

The rest:

2008 Topps Bobby Cox
2007 Turkey Red Chipper Jones
2008 Artifacts Jeff Francoeur
2008 Spectrum John Smoltz
2008 UD First Edition Kevin Millwood
2008 UD First Edition Greg Maddux
2008 UD First Edition Tom Glavine

Excellent stuff, David... let's trade again sometime.

Card Show part 6 - The '53s

Ok, time to wrap up the card show. These are the first and the last cards I bought at the show. When I prepared to go to the show I thought about printing out my want lists. I ultimately decided to just bring my '53 Topps list because I didn't want to spend several hours looking through box after box for commons at the first card show I'd been to in ages. The '53s I wanted though, especially now that I've all but abandoned eBay due to their new PayPal policy. 1953 Topps cards are hard to find in hobby shops and when you do find them, they are usually pricey. I wanted to find some affordable cards to fill out my collection and I was successful. Here's what I found:

#119 Johnny Sain

This was the first card I picked out from Uncle Nutzy. When I was looking at his stuff I drooled over the Satchel Paige in the case, went through his '53 Topps binder to see what he had and ended up pulling some cards out of the bargain bin. This Sain was the first one that I had to have. It's a card of a prominant ex-Brave and any Yankee is fairly difficult to get. It ain't perfect as you can see a water stain on the right side of the card but otherwise it's in good shape.

Well, except for the M R written on the back for some reason. But other than that it's a good looking card. No creases, corners are mostly square. Not too shabby. I find it amusing that one half of "Spahn and Sain and pray for rain" has a cartoon of a game played in a blinding rainstorm.

1953 Topps World On Wheels
#89 '53 Chevy Bel Air

Ha, threw you a curveball, didn't I? I just said I bought some 1953 Topps cards, I didn't specify they all had to be baseball. This set has fascinated me for a while now, I would see lots of listings for them while searching "1953 Topps" in eBay. I never actually broke down and bid on any since I was looking to spend money on cards for my baseball set, but I still really liked them nonetheless. They've got a really clean design, are colorful and flat out look great. There are 160 cards in the original set, and twenty more in a "High series" that was actually the entire set reprinted with 20 extra cards a year ot two later. It's a fascinating set full of old cars, but the high series is super scarce. The '53 Chevy is an insanely cool looking car, and I had to get it (although Topps really should have gotten a red one).

The backs are similar to the baseball set in that they have the same red and black ink and feature a trivia cartoon. The features on this 'brand new' Chevy Bel Air incluse power steering, a new and improved automatic transmission and a phototube that switches headlights from high to low beams automatically! The Card Museum Guy had a ton of these in his bargain box and I picked out three for a buck each. I got on his mailing list so the next time he comes into town I'll pick up a few more.

#113 Jerry Priddy

Priddy was a Yankee phenom at second base that came up through the system with Phil Rizzuto but he never became the star many thought he would be. Bill James examined his career in Whatever Happened to the Hall of Fame and compares him to Bill Mazeroski. Jerry ended up in prison after his playing days were over for supposedly threatening to blow up a riverboat. I agree with Scooter on that one... why the hell would an ex-baseball player blow up a riverboat??

World on Wheels #66 Jaguar XK

Oddly enough the back of this card has a cartoon of a ferry boat, the "Brinkerhoff", on the back. I don't know what a boat has to do with the World on Wheels and I know for a fact Jerry didn't try to blow it up. Isn't this a slick looking car?? Wouldn't you like to have one of them? Perhaps you'd like a more modern version instead.

#98 Cal Abrams

This card has been a pain in my ass for YEARS. Cal had an 8 year career in the bigs and his biggest moment was when Richie Ashburn threw him out at the plate in the ninth to preserve a tie in the game that decided the 1950 NL Pennant. He served in World War Two, was elected to the Jewish American Sports Hall of Fame and was buried in his Brooklyn Dodger uniform. A good player with a colorful history, but the card is not especially scarce or hard to find. So why have I lost several eBay auctions for this card over the years?? I must have bid on this card over a dozen times and every single time I'd lose by a quarter. I had become convinced I'd get the Mantle long before I tracked down Cal at one point. But, here it was... in the bargain box for 2 bucks. You don't know how good it feels to slip that card into my '53 Topps binder.

World on Wheels #30 Alfa Romeo

I left the coolest card for last. This sucker looks like a spaceship. My uncle had a souped up Alfa when I was a little kid and I always feel nostalgic for them. Not a racing car of course, a small blue convertable. It ended up rusting in the pasture behind my granparents' house after my uncle burned out the engine and I would play on the thing occasionally. Alfa Romeo also has the coolest freaking logo for a car company. I wish I had swiped the logo on my uncle's car when I had the chance now. The cartoon on the back is ridiculous. On the card of a high powered racing car, Topps put a cartoon of a buffalo cart on the back. What the hell, Topps?

That ends the card show purchases, although you'll see a couple more packs on A Pack A Day, a few more autographs on Auto-Matic and I'm going to show off that 20 vintage basketball cards grab bag somewhere, I'm just not sure yet. I hope you enjoyed the rundown of the show, go out and check one out for yourself the next time one's in town!

Blog Bat Around

Gellman did a spectacular job on the inaugural Blogger Bat Around. So far there are thirty-two blogs participating! If you haven't already, check 'em out. There's a lot of good reading in there.

Sports Cards Uncensored Bat Around

5 Packs of Heritage High Series

I was not expecting to find this at the card shop yesterday. I went in specifically to get a monster box to try to organize my doubles for trade and to pick up a pack of Timelines for a post I'm working on. So I walk in and a box of blue packs are staring me in the face. Dammit. I don't have the money for a box. I wasn't expecting this for at least a couple of weeks and it really took me by surprise. I ponied up for 6 packs and went on my merry way. The first pack I ripped can be found here. I did pretty well actually, with a Jermaine Dye jersey and what I think is a short print. I haven't seen an official Short Print list, but the indispensable ToppsHeritage.com has both a checklist and a short print list up on his site. If that's correct there are no Braves in the short prints, hooray!

Here's the lowdown on the set. It's a 220 card update to the main set, numbered 501-720. There are 35 short prints and 35 black back variations. There are three insert sets: 10 Flashbacks, 10 Then & Now and 15 Rookie Performers. There are also 100 more Chrome cards numbered C201 to C300. These can be found in regular, refractor and black border refractor versions. There are also autographed Real One cards and Clubhouse collection relic cards. Box Toppers are the same as the fist set, 3 card advertising panels in every box and a foil stamped buy back card in every other box. Other than the smaller set size and the two Topps cards per pack, the setup is pretty close to the original Heritage set. The checklist is filled with rookies and not-quite-star players though, dont' expect any Howards orA-Rods or Pujols in this set.

Here's 5 hobby packs, I guess retail packs will be out in a couple of weeks. I'm crossing my fingers for T205 mini cards in the Target packs again. Topps Update & Highlights cards will be marked in blue in these rips so you can easily ignore them.

Pack 1:
516 Salomon Torres
552 Jose Castillo
561 Mike Aviles RC
581 Gabe Kapler
665 Texas Rangers
612 Jeff Baker RC
UH100 Jay Bruce
UH11 Matt Holliday All Star

Aaaaand we're off. This was a good Milwaukee pack with Salomon Torres and Gabe Kapler. The Giants damn near ruined Solomon in 1993, I'm glad to see his career's back on track. Gabe Kapler is another good story from this year. For some reason Mike Aviles is in the Rookie Stars design and Jeff Baker is not. I'm not sure why Topps didn't just use that design for all rookies this year, unless they are saying that those other rookies suck. I'd go after Eisner with a baseball bat if I were you Jeff. Admittedly, Aviles had the better season, he just won a Topps Rookie Cup. One thing that gnawed at the back of my brain about the Heritage, um, Low Numbers set was that some teams didn't get Team cards. I guess Topps had it planned out the whole time to put some of them in the high series. the card has a checklist on the back and looking it over there is NOT much to speak of in this set other than the rookies. From cards 679-720 the biggest name I see is Kenny Rogers. The checklist also shows the Rookie Performers inset set. Since I have nothing better to do, here it is:

RP1 Clayton Kershaw
RP2 Mike Aviles
RP3 Armondo Galarraga
RP4 Joey Votto
RP5 Kosuke Fukudome
RP6 Chris Davis
RP7 Jeff Samardzija
RP8 Carlos Gonzalez
RP9 Max Scherzer
RP10 Evan Longoria
RP11 Johnny Cueto
RP12 Hiroki Kuroda
RP13 John Bowker
RP14 Justin Masterson
RP15 Jay Bruce

I was about to mention I've pulled my fourth Jay Bruce U&H card, but no one wants to hear about them, do they? Let us speak of them no more.

Pack 2:
684 Jo-Jo Reyes
568 Damion Easley
521 Angel Pagan
679 Erick Aybar
629 Dennis Sarfate
592 Mike Hampton Black Back
UH45 Eric Hurley RC UH227 Carlos Quentin All Star

Ahhh crap. I thought we were done with the back backs after I didn't get one in the first two packs. At least it's Hampy. So is this a parallel or what? I guess I'll have to do some research this weekend on the short prints and black backs. Other than the two Braves there is absolutely nothign exciting about the rest of this pack. EXCEPT... Dennis Sarfate's cartoon. Best Cartoon In The Set. This cartoon will be incorporated into the ambiance of the blog eventually.

Pack 3:
647 Matt Macri RC
578 Carlos Gonzalez RC
611 Max Ramirez RC
613 Houston Astros
TN3 Then & Now Larry Sherry & Mike Lowell
C235 Vicente Padilla Chrome #1862/1959
UH75 Matt Treanor UH105 Dan Giese

Three rookies, one team, a Then & Now and a Chrome. Interesting mix there. I've never seen two inserts inside a pack of Heritage ever before. Not that I can remember, anyway. Max Ramirez doesn't get a Rookie Stars card this time while Macri and Gonzalez make fun of him. Topps is just cruel sometimes. Adding to the strangeness is the fact that teh Rookie Stars are scattered all over the checklist instead of being put all together like in the low series. Second Checklist pops up here, this time of cards 501-560. A couple of names really pop out on this checklist: Cliff Lee and Mike Mussina. I also spy Jair Jurrjens which makes me happy and a Curtis Granderson which will make the gals at Dinged Corners happy. I'm 0-for-3 on short prints according to ToppsHeritage.com's list. They are supposed to be in every third pack so I'm getting scrooged. Alo one in three packs are Chrome cards. Lord help the poor sap who decided to build that set back in February. He gets to chase 'em in three sets now, Heritage, Chrome and High Series. No 2008 stats on the back, but Padilla's card does mention his double digit wins in '08. The Then & Now card is pretty neat, it features the 1959 and 2007 World Series MVPs. Maybe we'll see Maz and Hamels on a card next year?

Pack 4:
656 Pablo Sandoval RC
604 Fernando Tatis
564 Chris Burke
658 Arizona Diamondbacks
643 Jeff Mathis
594 Joe Mather RC
UH201 Travis Denker UH192 Craig Hansen

YES! Checklist trifecta! Zona has the checklist for cards 621-678 on the back. Eeecch. This set has NO ONE in it. Joe Crede is the best on this list and Moose is the King of the Set. Yeah, ok, fine. Rookies. Longoria, Bruce, Cueto, Flopudome. Whateva. I sure hope that SP checklist is wrong 'cause I suck at pulling short prints right now.

Pack 5:
510 Joe Saunders
720 Ivan Ochoa RC
678 Alex Romero RC
545 Justin Masterson RC
672 Taylor Teagarden RC Black Back
C212 Ryan Ludwick Chrome #1393/1956
UH143 CHIPPER JONES 400th Home Run UH57 Ramon Castro

Four rookies, one trick card #720 that looks like it should be a short print but isn't, a Chrome and a Chipper. Not a bad pack although I still don't know what's up with those damn black backs. Ludwick came out of nowhere to hit 37 bombs this year and the Braves are reportedly giving him a look over to man left field next year. The rumor is that the Braves would trade Kelly Johnson for him, but if the Peavy deal truly is dead I wouldn't be surprised if Escobar goes to the Cardinals. He seems to be in Bobby's doghouse and the Braves have their eye on bringing back Rafael Furcal as well. I don't know who the hell is going to pitch if we don't get Peavy though, but interesting stuff is happening at least in the Hot Stove. I don't have much to say about the rest of these guys other that Teagarden's cartoon is unique in that it continues the story in the text to its left. It actually doesn't make sense without reading the story, something I haven't noticed on any other card in this set. I said I wasn't going to discuss the U&H cards, but......

Chipper.

ChipperChipperChipperChipperChipper.

Chipper.

That is all.

Totals from 6 packs:
28 Base cards
1 Short print (?) - Seth McClung
2 Black back parallels - Mike Hampton, Taylor Teagarden
2 Chrome - Ryan Ludwick, Vicente Padilla
1 Then & Now - Larry Sherry & Mike Lowell
1 Clubhouse Collection Jersey - Jermaine Dye

So... it's Heritage. Looks like Heritage, smells like Heritage, tastes like Heritage but with a little bitter foil aftertaste that rubbed off from the Topps cards. If you've never opened a pack of Heritage in your life and were interested in trying a pack, RUN! RUN FAR AWAY!! RUN AND HIDE! YOU DON'T WANT THIS!!! If you've already got a binder full of the stuff and two monster boxes filled with the 2001-2007 Heritage sets then yeah, you'll buy it. If you have the binder full of Heritage and just bought two boxes of Updates & Highlights to finish that set, you'll still buy it anyway and will mutter curses under your breath when opening every pack. Dennis Sarfate's cartoon sums up how I would like to express my feelings about the Updates & Highlights cards to Topps.

Someone out there will understand.

Card Show part 5 - The Cheapos

When I last left off, I had given up on the rest of the dealers out there and beelined back to the vintage guys up front to pick up a few more oldies. But first, I had to take a perfunctory look at those dime boxes up front. I hastily looked through a couple of boxes and yawned. I looked through a couple more and was intrigued. I looked through a couple more and a pile started to aggregate. Then I found the R.G. Laughlin cards and built a set. At that point I looked through the pile, picked out 6 dollars worth to make an even Hamilton, paid the nice lady and headed for Vintage. There are way too many to list individually, so I've grouped them into piles that are mostly alike to discuss. Click on the image to get a better look at the cards.

14 1971-1978 Fleer World Series

These are the ones with the black backs that Fleer released throughout the '70s. The original set came out in 1970 and features blue ink on the pack and some different artwork on many of the cards. As usual, if you want to know more about these cards, FleerFan has THE definitive article on these sets.

I love the hell out of this set and one day I might try to complete it. Here's 14 cards to that end, featuring 6 Hall of Famers: Cy Young, Christy Mathewson, Grover Cleveland Alexander, Walter Johnson, Lou Gehrig and Mickey Cochrane. Two Braves series in the mix too, '57 and '58.

Football and Basketball

A small handful of cards here, I wasn't really looking for non-baseball stuff but these snuck in my pile. The coolest is a 1970 Xograph card of Bill Brown. Xograph created the 3D technology seen in the old Kelloggs baseball cards of the '70s and '80s. I'm not sure if the football set was from Kelloggs or not, I'm not familiar enough with vintage football. The '82 Topps Montana LEagers card was non-pass-uppable even though it's beat and I probably have it already. I will never ever pass on '70 Topps Basketball cards and I wish I had found more than just this lone1975 Indana Pacers ABA team card. George McGinnis was a helluva player. The other three are local heroes. A 1993 Classic plastic Garrison Hearst in the Bulldog red jersey, an '89-90 Fleer card of 'Nique and... um, that other guy. FINE. I bought a Michael Vick card. I do not regret it. I miss those legs, man. The head, not so much. God, what a waste. I'll always have the Rams playoff game though. The feds can't take that away from me.

'70s Topps Mania!

Sadly some '70s card were left behind, but I got all the good ones. In order:
76 Dave Concepcion
76 Ron Cey
76 Rusty Staub Traded
76 Bobby Bonds Record Breaker
76 Cecil Cooper
73 Claude Osteen
74 Dwight Evans
76 Fergie Jenkins Traded
76 Joe Torre

'80s Topps Mania! And a couple of '70s too

You thought I was done with the old Topps didn't you? Nope. These are just as good as the last pile.
81 Carl Yastrzemski
81 Steve Carlton
81 Mike Schmidt Record Breaker
81 Eddie Murray
80 Dave Stieb rookie card
80 Willie Stargell
77 Catfish Hunter
79 Andre Dawson
84 Darryl Strawberry rookie card

Holy Crap! Old Inserts!

These were the most surprising things in the box as far as I was concerned. The 1968 Topps Game card of Frank Howard was the oldest thing I got out of the dime box. Dig that old skool senators cap! The Baseball Scartch off Game was an insert into packs of 1971 Topps. Topps put scratch off cards in to packs in both '70 and '71, this is identified as a '71 card from the red interior border around the scratch off boxes. (1970 cards are white inside) Sorry David, there's no way you can do a scratch off tournament with these things. The boxes just won't scratch anymore, there are three trashed boxes inside this one that someone took a coin to. I actually tried it on one back in the mid '80s and it woudn't scratch for nothing even twenty years ago. Don't look at me like that, it was a double and it wasn't anyone good anyway.

Fleer and Donruss Are Lots of Funforuss

Lame title, great cards. All Hall of Famers here, except for Hustle McGamblepants. Well, and Raines, but the voters can't keep him out forever.
82 Donruss Phillies Finest Schmidt & Rose
81 Donruss Tim Raines rookie card
81 Fleer Mike Schmidt
82 Fleer Tom Seaver
85 Donruss Wade Boggs
82 Fleer Yankee Powerhouse Jackson & Winfield

Random stuff that couldn't fit anywhere else

A couple vintage, an insert that looks like vintage, another insert that blends vintage and futuristic and an error card, maybe. First up, 1972 Topps American League ERA Leaders. Jim Palmer is the star on the card, but MVP Vida Blue and Wilber Wood are great pitchers in their own right. Next, a 1982 rookie of Mike Marshall, Ron Roenicke and Steve Sax. These three combined for 33 seasons in the majors with each playing at least 8 seasons. How many tri-rookie cards had success like that? The 1990 Upper Deck Jeff Innis card had "ERROR" on the top loader so I'm guessing it's the scarce version with David West's picture on it. Can anyone confirm? I don't want to go digging through my set. You may think that's a 1984 Rickey Henderson card, but you're WRONG. It's a Special Commemorative Anniversary Edition card inserted into packs of 1994 Donruss. I desperately wanted this set back in '94, but they were tought to pull out of packs and the inserts were more expensive than the originals. Now they're in dime boxes! BWAHAHAHA! Finally, a supercoolawesome '92 Upper Deck insert of Dave Winfield with the Padres then, and the Blue Jays now.

And at Long Last, the Braves

You knew I'd pick out some Braves, didn't you? To be honest, I probably have all of these cards already, but I gotta have my Braves. In order:
2004 Ultra Chipper Jones
1989 Score Superstar Greg Maddux
1990 Upper Deck Dave Justice rookie card (marked $3.75 on the top loader, heh)
1990 ProCards Ryan Klesko minor league
1990 Dubuque John Smoltz
2003 Leaf Limited Andruw Jones #513/999
1995 Score Dave Justice Hall of Gold

Nice haul, eh? In addition to all this I got not one, but TWO autographed cards. out of the dime box. No, seriously. One can be seen here, I'll have the other posted by next week. I also got that 1980 R.G Laughlin Famous Firsts complete set out of the boxes, but as I said before they will get their own post sometime in the future.

Ok, only one more post and the card show will be a wrap. The Grand Finale: 1953 Topps.

Blog Bat Around Post

I'm going to admit right off the bat, this post is going to suck. When I agreed to to do the Bat Around I thought I'd be able to rip out a post no problem, but once I saw the question my mind locked up. I'm just not up for writing a heartfelt well written origin story, ok? It doesn't help that there are a bunch of excellent posts out there already. So ya know what? I'm gonna mail it in. I've got card show purchases to post, High Numbers to rip, packages to address, trades to scan, my wedding to arrange, my wife to murder and Guilder to frame for it. I'm swamped. I gotta post something though, so let's just do it Q&A style, shall we?

Most of us classify ourselves as some type of collector in this industry.

I AM THE GREAT AND TERRIBLE SMAUG.

HOARDER OF CARDS.

EATER OF SNEAKSY LITTLE HOBBITS WHO MESS WITH MY BRAVES CARDS.

MORTAL MEN VIEW MY TOPPS COLLECTION AND TREMBLE.

NOW IF YOU'LL EXCUSE ME, I NEED TO SO SACK GONDOR. THE MINAS TIRITH TARGET HAS BLASTERS OF STADIUM CLUB.

Player collector,

Yes.

team collector,

Yep.

set collector,

Absolutely.

auto collector,

Mmm-hmm.

first world,

Of course.

second world,

Sure, why not.

among thousands of other labels.

Yep, them too.

As you have navigated the hobby, what are the biggest challenges you face as that type of collector or label of hobby enthusiast?

Too many cards, not enough money, really not enough time, stacks of cards toppling and crushing me underneath, losing consciousness from lack of oxygen as the weight of the 1990 Donruss cards flatten my lungs. Typical stuff.

What have been your biggest successes

Buying oddball stuff cheap before they really took off value wise.

failures?

Buying everything else and watching as their value went straight into the toilet.

What would you like to see the manufacturers focus on to make your type of collector flourish in the hobby?

Just make quality cards for every price range in the spectrum. Don't mail in the inexpensive sets. Don't ignore the low end collector. Don't base your success or failure on a gimmick wholly unrelated to the cards themselves. Don't pull a GM and put all your eggs in the basket labeled "Let's Catch Some Whales" and fold when the market dries up for $300 packs. Actually the collector will flourish regardless. These suggestions will help the manufacturers flourish.

Feel free to provide blog examples, scans, poems, haikus, bar napkin messages, medical prescriptions, etc as complements to your posts.

The industry sucks
But I still love to collect
Bring back Topps Total.

If you feel your type has been covered on another blog, tell us how you do things the same or differently.

I think I'm the only bloodthirsty evil dragon card hoarder blog out there, actually. Well, there's Stale Gum, but Chris is more the Great Old One type.

If you don't identify yourself as a type, explain why, or explain how you think of yourself.

I AM LEGION. Of types. I'm complex. A complex card hoarding evil dragon collector thingy. Metaphorically, of course.

You do not have to answer any or all of the questions asked here.

NOW YOU TELL ME

2008 Topps Heritage High Number Series is Live

It arrived at the local card shop yesterday. I'm typing up a pack rip over at A Pack A Day now, I'll have a five pack rip up here later this evening.

UPDATE: Ok, the pack's up. Stay tuned if you want to see some more this evening.

Cards from Cardboard Icons

Ben from Cardboard Icons looked over my Heritage Want List and and sent me quite a few SP's and inserts off my list. I've got a lot of stuff heading his way as well, but his stuff got here before mine even went out. Here's a taste of the goodies Ben sent:

2008 Heritage

News Flashbacks 4 Dalai Lama

My mom just got a dog and named her Dalai. Now she can call her dog in the park and people will think it's Dolly, but really she's making a subtle protest supporting Tibet. My mom is a little weird. Of course when she told me the name I immediately thought of this. I'm a little weird too.

Then & Now 8 Minnie Minoso and Ichiro

Two future Hall of Famers. One of them should have been in years ago, but the Hall of Fame is completely full of $#!%.

New Age Performers 4 Prince Fielder

One day, Prince Fielder is going to hit a game winning home run in a crucial game against the Braves and from that moment forward I will always head Frank Zappa's "The Evil Prince" in my head whenever I hear Prince's name. Actually I'm kinda rooting for that to happen. I love Zappa.

2007 Heritage

129 Jerry Owens
355 Matt Diaz
478 Chase Utley All Star

I'm pretty sure all these are short prints. Matt Diaz might complete my Braves team set, but I'll have to double check.

Then & Now 6 Johnny Podres and Aaron Harang

This card makes no sense. The stat is K's per 9 innings,but the leaders in those categories were Sam Jones and Jake Peavy. Podres and Harang were #4 and #6 respectively.

FlashBacks 7 Eddie Yost

Not much must have happened in 1958 for Topps to commemorate Yost's 100th home run. The Walking Man is a cool nickname though.

New Age Performers 1 Ryan Howard
New Age Performers 2 Alex Rodriguez
New Age Performers 5 Trevor Hoffman
New Age Performers 13 Ivan Rodriguez

Howard's about to blow! RUUUUUUUUUN

2006 Heritage

Then & Now 3 Mickey Mantle and Jason Giambi
Then & Now 6 Stan Musial and Derrek Lee

Considering this set is based on one of the cleanest designs for a trading card set ever, the color choices on the inserts are really strange.

Flashback FM-SM Stan Musial
Flashback FM-WF Whitey Ford

I really wish I could read the signs behind Whitey.

New Age Performers NAP-DL Derrek Lee
New Age Performers NAP-I Ichiro
New Age Performers NAP-VG Vladimir Guerrero

See what I mean about the colors in this set? Linda Blair Green surrounded by a red and blue border. Insanity.

That just filled a bunch of holes in my collection. Thanks, Ben!

Card Show part 4 - The Braves

When I left off, I had just spent an excessive amount of time trying to pick out a dollar's worth of cards out of a dime box only to have the dealer try to give me one of those dime cards for free. I pointed out his mistake, paid my dollar and let him keep his dime. If I was a numismatist, I'd go to the coin show instead. I had been scrounging around the tables for over an hour at this point and I came to this conclusion: There was nothing else in this building that coupld possible be any better than what Uncle Whosit and the Card Museum Guy had to offer. It was time to shut it down and make my final purchases. First though, we have to rewind a bit and go back to Card Museum Guy.

As I said before, Card Museum Guy had some absolutely gorgeous cards in a shiny brass display and a row of cases. T206s, Goudeys, Mantles, Williams, Mays, Aarons, Clementes, Probably even some Ruths and Gehrigs in there too, just wonderful stuff all completely out of my league. There was a box in my league however and that's where I snagged all the cards in this post.

The Bargain Box

The three most beautiful words in the English language to a collector with an addiction. This was a hard core bargain box too, everything from Tobacco cards to vintage gum cards, Topps from 1951-1979, vintage football, vintage basketball, a huge pile of non-sport (foreshadowing...) and even one lonely Hockey card from the late '60s. You know how most bargain boxes are full of nickel cards and it is right in front of the dealer and he watches you like a hawk the whole time you are shuffling through 1991 Mike Greenwells? This sucker was loaded, was at least 10 yards away from both people working the booth and had 50 dollar vintage cards in it. Not joking. Card Museum Guy was so flush with inventory he could afford to leave a box of cards that would make most people's collections look like garbage sitting ignored miles away from the cash register when a particularly sneaky and speedy devious character could run off with an instant collection and be dodging tackles from the nice ladies selling the tickets up front before the old guy even noticed. I however, am an honorable junkie and paid for my cards. After much contemplation I chose these four to fill out my Braves collection:

1951 Topps Red Back Tommy Holmes - Hartford Variation

1951 Topps cards are tough. They're a weird size, they are goofy looking, most of them were played with so they ended up trashed and Topps has branded the 1952 set as "The First Modern Set EVAH" so they are not that popular. They are not as neglected as the 1948 Topps set, but they are still damn hard to find. I only had 3 of the 7 in the team set before this one here and one of those was the Spahn. When I saw Holmes here for $4.50, it was an insta-buy. This one here is the "Now managing Hartford" variation and not the more scarce "Boston" version.I'm not worried about variations in this set right now, I just want to find Gordon, Sain and Jethroe and finish it off. I've got over half the set now though!

1965 Topps Embossed Lee Maye

This is quite possibly the ugliest insert set ever. You think Topps overuses foil now? Just look at these atrocities. The whole front is gold foil. A border is printed on top of the foil in blue for American League Teams (which isn't too bad) and red for the National League (which looks awful). Mercifully, the player's name is printed in white. The back of the card is completely blank except for a small ornate frame at the bottom surrounding the card number and the Topps copyright. The player's image is actually stamped into the foil. You can see Lee up there because the card is beat up and the wear on the foil makes the image more visible. I think Topps was going for a Hall of Fame Plaque kind of motif here but it turned out awful. These cards were in every pack though so they are pretty common nowadays. I probably overpaid on this one at a buck since it's in rough condition, but it was the last Brave I needed for this insert set and the only other place I know to find it is on eBay for a buck plus shipping, so I did pretty good on this one.

1962 Topps Stamps Milwaukee Braves Logo

They just get weirder and weirder don't they... In 1961 and '62 Topps inserted panels of two stamps into their packs. In 1961 the stamps were monochrome and looked like old timey postage stamps. In 1962 they did it more simply with color photos with a solid color background. They also added team logos to the set. This is the Milwaukee Braves logo with just a smidge of the Pittsburgh stamp below. I haven't found a whole lot of these and this stamp will keep Roy McMillan's stamp compony in my binder.

1949 Leaf Bob Elliott

Ok, back to the '49 Leaf card. In 1948 Bowman and Leaf jumped back into the card market. Bowman ended up more popular and Leaf dropped right back out until 1960. This set is tough. It was printed over a two year period and cards can be found with a 1948 or 1949 copyright on the back. The color is fairly crude, but no worse than the '49 Bowmans. The real pain with this set is that it is a 98 card set skip numbered from 1-198. This was probably designed to get kids to buy more bubblegum, but seeing how half the set is seriously short printed, who knows, maybe Leaf just forgot the print the rest of them. And when I say short printed I mean SHORT PRINTED. The prices are out of date, but my '02 price guide has the common cards listed at $25 in near mint, the short prints are $450. For a guy like Eddie Joost or Peanuts Lowry. With all the Brave short prints in the set I didn't even bother to leave a space in my binder for Leaf cards. Bob is now living with the Goudeys in a space reserved for a short printed '41 card. You know how I said '49 Leaf cards are tough? '41 Goudey cards are freaking impossible. One more thing about this card. Bob Elliott won the MVP award in 1947. Two years later Leaf couldn't even get his name right. That's why you didn't hear from them for another 11 years after this...

There you have it, 4 vintage slightly strange Braves cards all for the low, low price of $16. If Wal-Mart held card shows inside them, I'd never buy another blaster again. A funny thing happened while I was shuffling through these old cards. The dealer across the row came over and talked to Card Museum Guy. He was the guy with all those boxes filled with toploaders that didn't seem to have a price associated with them. Museum Guy commented that there was a feeding frenzy over there a little while ago. The guy told him that people were pulling cards out of his 10 cent boxes like crazy. Some guy just pulled out a Sammy Sosa rookie! He didn't care though because he was making sales and he bought the whole lot in Tennessee for one hundredth of a cent each. So he didn't even bother to sort them all out since he had so many and was just selling them all ten for a buck. "What's the margin on that, eh?" he said.

That... is a damn good margin. I also knew a deal when I heard one, picked over or no.

Up Next: THE DIME BOX.

Book from TribeCards = COTW

Here's another oddball from David at TribeCards. Remember Collect-a-Books? Little card-sized booklets of a player that were sold in 8-card boxes for about 3 bucks? You don't? Well, neither did I, at least not the baseball version. I had all of the basketball and football sets and was irritated that there wasn't a baseball set. Yep, David found something I'd never heard of before... Good Job David. This particular set came out in 1991 and was published under the Line Drive brand which also did minor league cards if I'm not mistaken. This booklet of Dave Justice is #33 out of 36 books.

Here's the front, looks like a plain ol' card doesn't it? Ah but wait...

Witchcraft!!! It opens up! Page two is another full photo of Dave and would make a decent looking card in its own right. Page three has another large photo and some personal highlights. Highlights for Dave include being born, gaining weight and going to college.

Ah here's the good stuff... A little story about Dave's rise through the minors, getting a chance when Nick Esasky went all goofy and subsequent rise to phenom. the Line Drive logo signifies the end of the narrative.

Ahh, stats. Gotta have stats. These are full career stats too. Remember, Dave was in his 3rd year in 1991. Page 7 has a photo of him checking out a girl in the stands while some kids look on cluelessly, a quote from Dave and a Did You Know question. Dave talks about how he was happy to win the Rookie of the Year award. Then the card asks if you knew that Dave won the Rookie of the Year award. Of course we did, you dummy! Dave just told us!

Last pake, or page 8 or the back of the card. Take your pick. Here we have a cartoon of Dave in full headdress leading the Supreme Court and some career highlights. Oddly enough, winning the Rookie of the Year wasn't a career highlight for Dave. Getting drafted? Yep. Going to the Appalachian League All Star Game? Yep. Hitting 12 homers in Triple-A? Yep. Having a phenomenal rookie season and running the face of the franchise out of town? Nope.

There you have it, another oddball from Dave. And there's more to come! SPECIAL BONUS! Since I've been wrapped up in Card Show posts all week I'm promoting this card to Card of the Week since otherwise I won't get to it until next week. Hooray! I've got that out of the way!

Topps Basketball Poetry - #5 John Williamson

Today we have a Limerick dedicated to John Williamson's short shorts courtesy of reader Alec J.

There once was a man with pants that were short,

They helped with his skills upon the court.

Then one day came a man probably unrelated to Chris Pronger,

He said, "Your shorts! AAAAAH! Please make them longer!"

But John just couldn't give up their support.

Thank goodness there are no NBA teams based in Nantucket or I'd have to cancel the poetry reading. I do regret not having ripped an Artis Gilmore card, as I would love to see some of the rhymes for afro.

Card Show part 3 - The Pricey

When I last left off I had just purchased two cards from Uncle Whozit (not the Indian Gum card, two that you will be seeing soon) and I left the outer ring of dealers to start in on the tables in the middle. The very first dealer there had almost the whole front row taken up with cases filled with vintage cards. Absolutely amazing stuff, this really was like a card museum. Tobacco cards, bubble gum cards from the '30s, Topps from the '50s and '60s, all sorts of oddball stuff. I wish I could have taken some pictures to show it all off. Absolutely astounding. All of it was waaaay out of my price range too, so I just eyeballed the goodies and moved down the row. Eventually the cases ran out and some stacks of old oddball stuff was laid out on the table, along with some magazines and programs and... a bargain box!! Full of vintage stuff from the '70s and older! JACKPOT! I spent the second most amount of money at this table picking out some excellent old Braves cards (and a few others which you'll find out about later). This dealer had the distinction of selling me the most expensive card I bought at the show. This beauty right here:

1949 Leaf Bob Elliot

That's right, under ten bucks for the third '49 Leaf card in my collection and the first Brave from that set. I'm guessing some of you are thinking "The most expensive thing he bought was only ten bucks??" and others are thinking "Wow, a '49 leaf card for under ten bucks!". I am a merciless scrounger and when you're that cheap you have to know how to pick out the deals. This same card was prices at $35 at the very same booth and there wasn't that big a difference in condition. This fills a nice biug hole in my Braves binder and I picked up three other Braves oddballs from the same dealer, but that's for another post.

After leaving this booth, things got ugly. The next dealer around the corner had a bunch of expensive stuff and a box of vintage unpriced commons. I freaking hate boxes of unpriced stuff! If you're too lazy to price the cards beforehand then sell them all for one price and be done with it! Slap $2 each or 3 or a dollar or something on the box. I have no interest in picking out the cards I want, stand there while you thumb through a goddamn book and then wait for you to give me a price for the whole lot that is 3 times what I wanted to spend. Now I have to play games taking out cards and messing with an irate dealer because I'm wasting his time because I want to give him my money. There was good stuff in that box too including a '56 Willie Mays with a pinhole in it for fifteen bucks (because he just priced that one). I didn't even bother, I just walked. Again I'll say to aspiring card dealers out there: PRICE YOUR STUFF!

The next table had all the 5 dollar junk wax. I regretted passing up the box of Topps Big at the time, but now that I'm home I don't miss it much. It would still be unopened to be honest with all the other stuff I have to deal with. the next two dealers I'd bought from before. Blue Gray Sports cards from Marietta has a table set up next. The owner is a great guy and he's been open forever. I've bought some stuff from him many times, but I didn't get anything from him at the show. I can go to his store any time (well, any Friday or Saturday afternoon at least) and I wanted to see stuff from dealers from out of state. I'll probably drop by the shop in December to make up for passing him by.

The next dealer I recognized from a Braves Fan Fest at Turner Field a few years ago. This was back when they had a card show up in the Lexus Level (Now the Golden Moon Casino Level) and I bought a Hank Aaron booklet, an old Braves ticket stub and a couple of cards from the guy. I flipped through a binder he had and there was that same Aaron booklet for 50 cents. There was other stuff in that booklet now - autographs! Really really awful ones! Ones like THIS. I'll be posting all the horrible autographs I bought from him on Auto-Matic For the People over the next few days, but I almost didn't get any of them. The autos were almost all uniformly lame, and thus awesome, and they were cheap as hell but I didn't just want to get just that. I needed one good card I couldn't pass up to justify the purchase. Buying horrible autographs on index cards is just strange, but getting a cool card and picking up the bad sigs on the side is acceptable in my mind. You never realized card shows were so complicated did you!

So now I had to find a card. There were a bunch of boxes onthe side of the table full of cards in top loaders. The guy wanted to blow some out on the last day, so everything (well, almost) was 2/3rds off. Lots of stars, lots of Braves but nothing jumped out at me. I had all the braves, nothing special in there. There was an '07 Goudey Carlton Fisk Heads Up Short print card that was cool, but I thought I already had it. I haven't actually checked to see if I did, because I really don't want to know if I passed up on a short print I needed. At the end of the boxes there was a section of vintage stars that looked cool. I found one I wanted, asked if these were 66% off too and the answer was no, they had already been discounted. Which was true, so no biggie. I got a card from that stack of vintage. This card right here:

1975 Topps Jim Rice Rookie

A buck fiddy. For a Jim Rice rookie card. That some kid jumped on to slide down the hall back in the day. It's also cut a little weirdly now that I look at it. However, it's a Jim Rice rookie, I'll bet my shorts that Jim is voted into the Hall of Fame this go-round, and it was a Good Excuse to fork out money to get those dreadful autos. I'm guessing that you're confused again. How is a card bought for $1.50 pricey, exactly? Well, the categories I used to break up these posts are sort of squidgy. You see, the Bob Elliot card could easily fit into the Vintage Braves category and some of my '53 Topps cards coupld fit into the Wierdness category and there were even a couple of autographs in the El Cheapo category. For purposes of this execise, Non-Bargain cards are either the most expensive one I got or stuff that I didn't really plan on buying and probably wouldn't buy if I went through the show a second time, but are cool anyway. An abused Jim Rice rookie fits the bill.

I got the Rice, picked out five abysmal autographs, paid the man three dollars and went merrily on my way. Well not so merrily, because the pickings got slim again. The dealer facing the bad auto guy was already packing up by the time I got to him. Not muche there as I remember interested me anyway, but it was still a bummer to see people getting ready to leave after I'd only been there an hour. The rest of the row was deserted too, so I went to the back row. The first guy had some basketball packs and a ton or relics and autos and stuff. It was funny in retrospect how I COMPLE