Team Set Holes

As you have come to expect from me, I like to break my card show purchases into a number of posts so that I get a good week's worth of posts from my day at the show. This card show was no different, either.

This one is my final post from that last show. Basically, it's random Brewer cards that I needed for my team set collections.

Let's start with the most recent ones -- Aramis Ramirez and Mark Reynolds from the Update set.

Escobar played every single game for the Kansas City Royals this year. He was in the Greinke trade with Lorenzo Cain.

Now, for the fun stuff -- Hostess! That Bando card looks like the photo is from the Old Comiskey Park and was taken in front of the old exploding scoreboard.

Those two were from 1978, while this next Bando is from 1977. Along with the Fosse, it shows that Topps wasn't the only company to employ airbrushers back in the 1970s to put guys on different teams. All three of these cards were a quarter each.

This 1979 Dick Davis card was a condition upgrade. Davis reportedly was a major cocaine user in the early 1980s, according to Lonnie Smith's testimony during the 1985 Pittsburgh Drug Trials.

Before I bought this copy of the 1983 RBI Leaders from the 1984 Topps set, I already have at least two copies of it. It's just that one of them is autographed and both of the other two are in my Cooper player collection.

These next four were all great finds from the first dealer table at which I stopped. Three of the four are from the higher numbers in the 1972 set, so they did cost a little bit more (50 cents or $1) than a basic common, but all of them are in good shape and were needed for my team collection.

As was the case with the Cooper RBI leader, I have this card already. It's just in the Ted Simmons player collection.

I used to have this card somewhere. I think it was in the 1984 Donruss set I sold in 1989. No matter. Found another one for a quarter.

Randomly, two former Brewers prospects in the 2008 Donruss Elite Extra Edition were in the quarter box. I guess it was because they are former prospects. Gindl was DFA'ed in September by Milwaukee, while Adams got to the Single-A Midwest League before getting blown up for an ERA near 6 in 2009.

In one "star" box, I found three 1984 O-Pee-Chee cards of three former Brewers now in the Hall of Fame. For a quarter a piece, I made sure that I got two Molitors for myself as well.

Finally, I picked up this chrome-y reprint of the 1976 Topps Hank Aaron card from 1999. I may not collect him as a player collection, but his appearances in both my Brewers and Braves team sets mean that I have to chase all of his cards for one copy.

As it was, I was slightly underwhelmed by the show this month. I spent more money this month on fewer cards. Certainly, that was because I loaded up on some more expensive vintage cards, but the dime boxes just weren't as productive this time around. So, I had to turn to the quarter boxes which means higher prices and fewer cards.

I may just need to shake things up and attend one of the other shows. Or, I may just need to take a few months off from the show.  We'll see how things progress, as I have some big changes in my life coming up.

Texas Rangers Cards

A few weeks back, Spiff from Texas Rangers Cards left a comment on my blog saying that he had some Brewers that he wanted to send my way. Always being up for a blind trade, I said in response that I'd be happy to give those Brewers a good home.

A week or so later, a package came containing several cards that I needed for my player and/or team collections.

Let's start with the Topps Update that Spiff sent my way:

We get two K-Rods and a Lucroy. Sadly, Topps was too busy chasing "prospects" and including Juan Francisco -- who didn't make it to Opening Day with the club -- to include Francisco Rodriguez in either of the first two series in any way.  So, as a result, K-Rod gets the two angles on his pitching motion look.

As for Lucroy, I defy anyone to explain to me how or why Yadier Molina and his 110 games played got the Gold Glove over him. It's not like Molina had a better year with the bat either.

More catchers -- Johnny Estrada, whose final full season in the major leagues came in his 120-game stint with the Brewers in 2007, and Jason Kendall, who replaced Estrada in 2008 and 2009. Thank God Jonathan Lucroy hit the majors in 2010. Neither of these guys were helping at all at the plate.

Here, we get two recent relievers. First, it's John Axford, who's cut off the mullet and trimmed back the fu-manchu mustache significantly as of late for Movember. Then, it's Brandon Kintzler, who was excellent in 2013 but was not as excellent in 2014 thanks to losing 2 strikeouts per 9 innings.

Strangely enough, I needed this Rob Deer 1989 Bowman Is Too Big card for my Brewers team set.

Nick Bucci is a Canadian from Sarnia, Ontario, whom the Brewers drafted in 2008 out of high school. He made it as high as Double-A Huntsville as an 18-year-old for 4 innings in 2009 before the Brewers tried to find a level he could master. He was released in 2013, a year after he and his 2011 Pan American Games-winning teammates were inducted into the Canadian Baseball Hall of Fame. He was inducted in the same Canadian Baseball HOF class as Brewers GM Doug Melvin.

Mat Gamel -- the guy the Indians really wanted for CC Sabathia. Not pictured: Michael Brantley, the guy whom the Indians still have from the CC Sabathia trade.

Another card that, oddly enough, I needed. I needed this one for my player collection, though.

BJ Surhoff, Catcher.  Fielding a ground ball at third base.

More Score 1991. For a guy who was on the team for just one year, there sure seems to be a lot of Dave Parker as a Brewer cards.

Two more cards I needed for my team collection. I think that the Kuenn finishes off the "Brewers only" portion. Kuenn looks a bit like my grandfather did in about 1984 in that photo.

Finally, a Cooper 1988 Topps card. I've gone through all my major release cards through 1989, and I'm embarrassed to report that I need a lot of cards from that time. I guess I really didn't collect all the way through high school.

Spiff, thanks a ton for these cards and the others you sent to me. I will be putting a Rangers package together for you soon!

It's 1978...or 1981...and it's the Best Infield in Baseball

Whenever I hear the names Garvey, Lopes, Russell, and Cey, my thoughts go immediately to one of two years: 1978 and 1981. Both of those years featured World Series between the Los Angeles Dodgers and the New York Yankees. But 1978 is what first stoked my dislike for the New York Yankees and Reggie Jackson in particular because of this play:

To this day, I cannot understand why the double play was not given due to Reggie Jackson's interference in that play. Well, I also can't understand why Bill Russell did not tag Thurman Munson at second base rather than throw the ball to first after he dropped the line drive, but still -- how was interference not given?

In 1981, the Dodgers won the World Series against the Yankees, and I was very happy... except for one thing: Steve Garvey taking credit for being Steve Yeager. Yeager was the co-World Series MVP with Ron Cey and Pedro Guerrero, yet there's Garvey at the MVP ceremony:

In any case, the Dodgers of my childhood were actually among my favorite teams because they were able to overcome the Yankees. The backbone of those teams was the fantastic infield quartet of Garvey, Cey, Russell, and Lopes. 

That same quartet is the base for a fantastic blog these days, named appropriately enough "Garvey Cey Russell Lopes." Jim and I agreed to a blind trade (God, I hope I've sent him a package!) a few weeks ago, and he sent me some great items.

The first card out of the box was this Cecil Cooper card -- a 3x5 photo at that. It took me a second to realize that Jim or someone before him had split up the "Career Batting Average Leaders" folio from the 1983 Topps Foldouts set. I always liked that set because every single folio features Ben Oglivie on its front.

Jim also sent me some of my first cards from the 2014 Topps Update series -- particularly this Carlos Gomez card that went directly into my player collection for him...

...and my very first -- and to date only 2014 Topps Sticker. And this one is my main man Robin. I have to admit -- I'd rather that the stickers not include any retired players, but that's my bias.

Moving forward from Yount we have a Rickie Weeks gold parallel from Bowman picturing Rickie in a throwback uniform of sorts (Negro Leagues?). I have the regular, and now I have gold.

This Nilsson card is a little annoying due to the lazy inset photo being a reiteration of Nilsson's imitation of a slack-jawed yokel. 

A Princely rookie sensation from Fleer.

See -- you can be repetitive but still be interesting. I rather like the little drawn outline of Jenkins's batting stance in the corner of the card. It may be a little too much information to have his number there as well, but at least this was a bit more interesting than a blue-man version of Jenkins.

I am not a fan of the color orange. I went to Vanderbilt for college and Georgia for law school. At each school, our main rivals wear orange. For Vanderbilt, it's all about that jail-jumpsuit-orange at the University of Tennessee being one of the ugliest colors in the history of mankind. For Georgia, it's the fact that both Florida (f--k you Gators for ruining my Halloween weekend) and Auburn (dear God please let us beat them so I don't have to apologize for or to my wife) wear blue and orange.

It's not looking any better on these Chrome parallels, to be honest.

And now, a confession.

So, when I first got back into collecting, I was on eBay looking for a Braun rookie card. I came across one of these Blue Sapphire reprints that had been graded reasonably highly and decided to buy it -- but I was thinking that it was (a) actually signed by Braun (it's not) and (b) actually the original and not the reprint. 

I entirely overpaid for the card as a result.

Commence self-flagellation sequence in 5, 4, 3...

Okay...no beating myself up. I have a raw card of that Sapphire reprint now, and I'm happy about it. Now I just need the original version.

These next cards fall into that same category with the Nilsson above. I needed them for player collections, but the blue face look is not flattering.

For some reason, the blue names with gold foil makes it worse.

Lately, I've gotten a lot more cards from the late 1990s. I've started really liking the Fleer Ultra from that time frame. This red script name is a bit too busy for me, but it's at least something outside of ordinary.

More orange parallel. Yes, I need it. 

As these last two cards show, there is nothing new in the world these days. Jean Segura's determined face while running the bases and leaning in to turn the corner around second and third is a blatant rip-off of Jeff Cirillo's baserunning in the late 1990s.

God, Segura. Try something original for once, would you? 

The rest of these cards do not fall into player collections, and so they are provided with little attempt at being funny, snarky, or entertaining. I'm not saying that any of the above writing was funny or entertaining (though the snark-level was pretty high in places). I'm just saying that I'm not going to try to comment. 

 mean, hell, like Harry Doyle said:

So, here those cards are.

I miss team photo cards, though I could do without the superimposed wall.

One final card, and it comes with a question.

This card is labeled as an "Aramis Ramirez" Superstar Celebration. It has a Carlos Gomez cameo. How many of you guys who are player collectors would put it into a Carlos Gomez collection?

I mean, on the Nyjer Morgan 2011 Topps card, both Fielder and Braun appear. Should I include a copy of that card in their player collections?

I'd love to hear your thoughts.

Jim, thank you very much for these cards -- I greatly appreciate all of them and I really hope that I sent you something in return already. If I haven't or if you don't get something soon, please let me know!