Ginter Bits and More from Bubba

I really shouldn't post about more cards from Matt of Bubba's Bangin' Batch of Baseball Bits on a night featuring yet another World Series game -- especially Game 7 -- but I have the time to post tonight.  Poor Matt -- my posts about the cards he's sent me are always getting overlooked. Still, at least this time it is baseball cards and not soccer card. I'm sure that will make people happier.

If you've read Matt's blog, you know that he happened upon an eBay listing of a case of Allen & Ginter Black from which the autographs had pretty much been removed (other than a great surprise -- you should read it!). Thankfully, he was nice enough to share some of his largesse with me, along with some other great cards.

Let's ring those cards in with a nominally appropriate song:

It's a nominally appropriate song only, because it truly is a sad song. There are a few songs in my life that I immediately associate with a particular person or time, and this is one of them. In 2002, I had been dating a woman for about a year and things just fell apart between us. She pretty much moved on without telling me -- nice of her to do that, no? -- I had a weekend where I pretty much just stayed in and felt sorry for myself. I listened to this song repeatedly. It was pathetic yet cathartic. 

Baseball cards have much more of a cathartic, nostalgic feel to me. Yeah, I get upset about stuff that Topps does, mainly because we are so reliant on Topps, but in the end I really enjoy collecting. It's brought me back to being a better fan of baseball, too -- I know much more now about the American League than I did before because all I cared about was NL-only fantasy baseball.

So, speaking of nostalgic and nominal appropriateness, here are the four A&G Black cards Bubba sent my way:



I'd appreciate the Molitor more if it weren't the same damn photo we have been seeing over and over again in Archives and any number of other products for the past 5 years. Sucks that Topps relies so heavily on Getty -- and then so heavily on the photos they have already purchased, in order to save money. Otherwise, though, I like A&G black -- it's a good-looking card.

Bubba did not stop with the Black, though, so let's see what else we've got. With music? Yes, of course. You do know whose blog you're reading, right?

Sorry Cleveland fans -- I really do hope the Cubs win tonight. I've probably jinxed them by saying that -- hell, a stiff breeze seemingly can jinx the Cubs, after all -- so it's all Pearl Jam today, featuring Cubs fan Eddie Vedder.

Yellow Ledbetter is a song that Vedder often just makes up as he goes. There are no set lyrics to it. Sometimes, Topps has that same feel -- especially when it comes to inserts and parallels. This is an Allen & Ginter back mini parallel of Jimmy Nelson from this years set. It's nice and all, but the parallels featuring different backs are pretty damn pointless. Who displays a card with its back showing just to show off the variation? No one I know.

This song was written by Vedder when he was a teenager. He wrote it about his own mother's plight with his stepfather, Peter Mueller. As his Wikipedia page points out correctly (and as you can hear for yourself on this Youtube upload of the 1994 Pearl Jam show from the Fox Theater in Atlanta, which was recorded for posterity), Vedder says that the song is "dedicated to the bastard that married my Momma." The song takes on a bizarre, surreal feel when Sugarland sings it, though.

While I wouldn't say that Hank Aaron deserves that introduction, he definitely deserves the chorus -- you really can't find a better man in many respects. Aaron backs up his big name by doing a lot of charitable work and caring greatly for those less fortunate.

"Given to Fly" is one of those songs that you hear and you feel better. In talking about the song, Vedder said that his conception for the song was it feeling like a cardboard children's book -- "it's a fable, that's all." The song revolves around a riff that Mike McCready said he came up with while being stuck in his condo on a snowy day in Seattle.

The great thing: Vedder dedicated the song at Wrigley in August to Joe Maddon.

Sure, it's not Ginter, but I'll take a 7-year-old relic of Rickie Weeks that I don't have any day (or any age relic, or any Rickie Weeks card I don't have, or any Brewers card I don't have, of course).  The photo of Miller Park's roof looming made me think of this song -- that, and the fact that the lack of a solid background makes Rickie look like he's just floating in space here.

It's hard to believe that this song was released 14 years ago now. Man, time sometimes feels like it goes by quickly. This song musically feels like an Irish drinking song to me -- like you should be swaying back and forth with a Guinness in your hand. Lyrically, it's much more existential and focuses on internal security. 

It should come as no surprise that this song was written by Vedder just before the first show that Pearl Jam did after the Roskilde tragedy in 2000. If you're not familiar, Pearl Jam was at the Roskilde Festival in Denmark. People fell down on one spot as the crowd rushed to the stage. They couldn't get up, and then crowd surfers ended up falling on top of them. This caused nine people to be crushed to death. In fact, Pearl Jam wrote a song on their "Riot Act" album called "Love Boat Captain" in which the lyrics reference "nine friends we'll never know."

Pearl Jam refused for many years after to do any festivals, and now only does a few.

But, "I Am Mine" is about being secure, being able to reassure yourself that things will be okay -- that you can get past the obstacles in life. 

Many of you won't like me saying this, but you have to admit that Ryan Braun has gotten past some big obstacles -- mostly self-inflicted -- that have happened in his life and really turned in a top-notch season this past year. Lots of people hoped he was done, and in 2014 he looked done -- slash line of .266/.324/.453. This year, though, he looked back to himself -- .305/.365/.538. That's a solid season, and for a guy making the money he is making, that is earning his pay. Sure, he may never be the 150-game-a-year guy he used to be, but I'll take 135 games like this past year any day (30 HR, 91 RBI, 16 SB). 

Matt, thanks again for the great cards, and enjoy the last game of the 2016 baseball season tonight.

Bubba's Bangin' Batch of . . . Bale?

I figure that baseball fans will barely notice that I post this, what with it being in the midst of Game 2 of the World Series and all. The only baseball fan who'll notice is Night Owl, and he'll ignore it as soon as he sees what Matt from Bubba's Bangin' Batch of Baseball Bits sent to me. 

Matt shipped a great package of cards my way, but only about half of the cards are baseball cards. Guess what? I'm not going to talk about them tonight. Nope. Instead, I'm going to highlight the pack of Donruss football, er, soccer cards that Bubba sent my way. While I do it, how about I act like a British tabloid and also post photos of each player's "WAG"? Indeed, it's an excuse to put up photos of attractive women, so why not? Maybe that will get this post some readership.

Let's start with this Mario Götze card. Götze burst on the scene in 2010 with Borussia Dortmund in 2009, getting his senior debut with the club at the age of just 17. The precocious midfielder received his first call-up to Die Mannschaft (that's the German Men's National Team, in case you couldn't figure it out) at the tender age of 18. By the time he was 21, he'd completed a move to the giant of German fußball, Bayern Munich. Just a month after his 22nd birthday, he scored the winning goal in extra time to lead the Germans over the Argentinians in the World Cup Final. Oh, and he has been dating German model Ann-Kathrin Brömmel since 2012.

Well done, Mario. Well done.

But all was not as rosy as it seemed. Under coach Pep Guardiola in 2015-16, Götze found himself getting less and less playing time and getting left on the bench. He was able to engineer a move back to Dortmund this past summer. Here's hoping that will put a smile on Mario's and Ann-Kathrin's faces.

Hulk is the appropriately provided nickname for Givanildo Vieira de Sousa, a Brazilian footballer who is pictured with Zenit St. Petersburg on this card. Supposedly, he got his nickname because of his likeness to Lou Ferrigno. I personally don't see it. 

Hulk is married to Iran Souza. This weird story on "Fabwags.com" notes that Brazilian women "like big butts on their man and . . . Iran . . . is proud to be married to one of the current 'sex symbols' of Brazil." The story quotes her as saying, "He is physically privileged, and I can not deny." 

Who knew it goes both ways in Brazil?

Now, I'm not going to go through all of the cards Matt sent because that would get a little tedious (there are 10 different players on 9 cards, after all), but we cannot get past Gerard Piqué. Piqué is still only 29 years old -- it sure feels like he's been around for much longer -- and has been with FC Barcelona for much of his professional career. 

He started in the youth ranks at Barcelona at the age of 10 in 1997 and stayed there until 2004. He left Barça in 2004, though, and played a youth for a year with Manchester United in England. I watched a couple of Piqué's games during his time with United (he only played in 12 senior games, to be fair). He went on loan to Real Zaragoza in 2006 on a loan which required that he appear in at least 20 games for them. He came back to United for the 2006-2007 season, and even scored two goals in the Champions League for the Red Devils (against Roma and Dynamo Kyiv). 

But, he longed to go back home, and with Nemanja Vidic and Rio Ferdinand ahead of him, it apparently made sense to sell him back to Barça for £5 million.

Wyclef Jean apparently helped Gerard Piqué notice that Shakira's hips don't lie. Actually, the two met when Piqué appeared in the video for the official song of "Waka Waka (This Time for Africa)" which I just learned was by Shakira and not Fozzy Bear. Shakira is actually 10 years older to the day than Piqué, and the couple have two sons.

Luiz should have been sent off last Sunday against Manchester United for planting his studs into Marouane Fellaini's leg. As former referees' chief Keith Hackett said, referee Martin Atkinson "lacked the courage" to make the right decision and send Luiz off with a straight red card. 

Based on Atkinson's history in those games, it did not surprise me.

Gareth Bale started his career in the Southampton youth academy. Southampton has had an incredible run of producing top class football players -- Bale, Theo Walcott, Calum Chambers, Adam Lallana, Luke Shaw, and Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain, to name just a few from the past decade. 

Bale made his way in 2007 at the age of 18 to Tottenham Hotspur. With Spurs, he had a terrible run to start his career. He suffered ankle ligament damage in a game in early December of 2007. At the time, he was playing left back for the club, so he got injured making a tackle -- something he doesn't do very much of these days as an attacking midfielder for Real Madrid. 

As he got into his early 20s, though, he started moving up the field and, by 2012, he changed his number to 11 to reflect the fact that he was no longer a defender. He kept signing contract extensions with Tottenham, indicating his interest in staying. But then, Real Madrid came in on September 1, 2013, and made a "Godfather" offer -- a then-record £85.1 million fee (since topped by Paul Pogba's fee this past summer). Spurs owner Daniel Levy snapped it up, and Bale moved to Real. 

He has since led Wales as far as it ever got into any competitive tournament, reaching the semifinals before losing 2-0 to Portugal.

Bale and his high-school sweetheart, Emma Rhys-Jones, got engaged, finally, on July 17, 2016. I say finally because they already have two daughters. They tend to stay out of the spotlight to try to give their daughters as normal a life as is possible.

Atlético Madrid forward Antoine Griezmann was one of the revelations of the Euro 2016 tournament -- at least to folks who were not paying attention to anyone but Barcelona and Real Madrid. Griezmann is just 5'7" tall, and his big break in soccer came thanks to getting invited to come train in Spain with Real Sociedad. 

He played for Sociedad until the end of the 2013/14 season, at which time the capital's less-fancied team came calling. In the time since moving to Atlético and as of October 26, Griezmann has appeared in 81 games for the club and has score 50 goals. His rise has been so meteoric that he was surprisingly named the best player in La Liga just a couple of days ago. Yes, better than Lionel Messi.

Griezmann really became the face of the French team in the wake of the Paris terror attacks in November of 2015. He was on the pitch at the Stade de France, playing against Germany in the friendly match that was abandoned after suicide bombers blew themselves up outside the stadium. Luckily, those bastards didn't get into the stadium.

Even luckier for Griezmann is the fact that his older sister, Maud, is still alive. She was at the Eagles of Death Metal show at the Bataclan music hall. Maud and her boyfriend clung to one another on the bloody floor motionlessly in silence. If they had moved, they would be dead. Indeed, the person next to Maude was shot and killed. 

Griezmann met his significant other, Erika Choperena, in 2011. Erika is a Spanish fashion blogger, so she makes sure that Antoine is dressed spiffily every time they are at a formal event. The couple welcomed their first child, daughter Mia, in April of 2016.

Thanks, Matt, for these soccer cards and the excuse to put up these photos of these attractive women. And, for the excuse to talk about some of the great stories that exist in world football outside of the English Premier League.

The Card Show Contests: Congrats to Matt Stupienski & Fuji!

As you may recall, two weeks ago I put up back-to-back contests.  The first contest was for a $10 shopping spree at my local card show (by proxy, of course). To enter, people had to talk about their favorite card show purchase/find.  The second contest was for those folks who had not been to a card show to comment as to what they'd want to purchase.

Well, it turns out that most of us have been to card shows.  In fact, only one person who commented on the second contest post had ever not been to a card show -- and that person, who gets his own $10 shopping spree, is Matt Stupienski of Bubba's Bangin' Batch of Baseball Bits.

Matt -- please drop me an email with your new address and let me know if there is something specific you'd like for me to search for here in Atlanta.  To give you an idea of what I can usually find, here's a list of vendors from the last show at this link.

The other winner came through Random.org:

List Randomizer

There were 28 items in your list. Here they are in random order:

1. Fuji
2. Sports Card Collectors
3. Matthew Scott
4. Brad's Blog
5. Night Owl
6. Bo Rosny
7. Mark Hoyle
8. Jon @ Penny Sleeve Thoughts
9. Dimebox Nick
10. Angus (Dawg Day)
11. Jeff Jones
12. JediJeff
13. The Chop Keeper
14. P-Town Tom
15. Brian (Highly Subjective)
16. Defgav
17. Adam Kanigher
18. Need More Cardboard
19. Nachos Grande
20. Billy Kingsley
21. Garvey Cey Russell Lopes
22. The Lost Collector
23. ARPSmith
24. Spastik Mooss
25. Lonestarr (Twitch Collects Cards)
26. John Hazen
27. Julie Owens (A Cracked Bat)
28. Commishbob

Timestamp: 2015-11-01 19:58:52 UTC, IP: 107.205.77.135

You have randomized this list 19 times.

I randomized the list 19 times because, well, that's Robin Yount's now-retired number. Congratulations and another $10 spree go out to Fuji of The Chronicles of Fuji.  The great thing was that Fuji's post was definitely one of my favorites posts -- and it highlighted a few awesome cards and items, such as a $10 1981 Donruss set, a $48 1982 Topps Wax box, and a 1956 Topps Jackie Robinson card. 

Fuji, please check out this link as well to give me an idea of what you'd like for me to look for!

In many respects, I blew it with my answer for my favorite/best card show find.  While I definitely love the oddball Hank Aaron disc, I totally should have picked one of these two cards:

Both of these cards are in stellar condition and together cost a total of $50 from the same seller.  That Johnston Cookies Warren Spahn is one of my favorite oddballs ever, and I totally blew it when I didn't put that in over the Hank Aaron disc.

Finally, since I don't want all the great posts that were linked for the contest to go unread or missed, here are the links with a short description for each:

1.  Defgav's purchase of a Mike Schmidt Rookie Card to complete his 1973 Topps Set

2.  Andrew's best ever pack pull: a 3/5 Ken Griffey Jr. bat/patch/glove auto relic from 2014 Panini Classics

3.  The Sports Card Collectors Blog's $1 1997 Leaf Signature 8x10 autographs

4.  Dimebox Nick's purchase of a 1972 Roberto Clemente for just $5 in 2012

5.  New Blogger Jon from "A Penny Sleeve for your Thoughts" picked up a ton of great vintage at a show in Nashville

6.  Adam's great purchase of some 1955 Bowmans last September

7.  Bo at Baseball Cards Come to Life! bought an entire dime box filled with some great cards in May

8.  Commishbob's finding his first "White Whale" at a card show: the Orioles 1967 Rookies

9.  The Chop Keeper's reminiscing about his first ever card show in 1991

10.  Jim from Garvey Cey Russell Lopes and his great 1955 Topps Sandy Koufax card

11.  Brian from Highly Subjective & Completely Arbitrary couldn't pick just one card

12.  Night Owl found a 1953 Topps Pee Wee Reese in a discount box

13. P-Town Tom picked up a 1966 Topps Roberto Clemente with a lucky dice roll

14. Angus from Dawg Day Cards wanted and got a 1986 Topps Bernie Kosar

15.  Julie from A Cracked Bat talked about her favorite card show seller and Yogi Berra

16. JediJeff from 2x3 Heroes wrote about one of the coolest miscuts ever (and a couple others too!)

Thank you to everyone who entered, and congratulations to the winners!

Trivial Pursuits: Trade with Bubba's Bangin' Batch of Baseball Bits

I have mentioned before here that I play trivia on a website called Learned League that is known for having a bunch of very smart trivia players on it. The LL website has normal leagues complete with promotion and relegation among levels ranging from E up to A that run for a six-week period. After the six-week regular ends, the next six weeks are populated by special competitions called mini leagues that run for three-week periods.  

This fall, two of the three mini leagues were totally in my wheelhouse of trivia.  The first was college football.  I did not do as well as I would have liked, finishing fourth in my group despite having the second-most correct answers in the group. Still, it was great fun and totally enjoyable.  If you'd like to try your hand at the questions, go here and click through the questions on the right hand side.

The second one has been just as enjoyable -- perhaps more so for me. It is '80s Music. As anyone who has read my blog knows, I love music and often use music for topics to write about with the cards I get. Add in the fact that I graduated high school in 1990 and pretty much listened more to music than any other activity available to me during the 1980s, and you would guess that I am doing pretty well on the questions.

So, I thought I'd combine the trivia from the Mini League with the cards that I received recently from Bubba's Bangin' Batch of Baseball Bits, the excellent Allen & Ginter-focused blog owned and operated by Matt Stupienski. If you have any questions about any of the Ginter insert sets, Matt is the man to ask.  He's also the man when it comes to sending me some great cards...setting a high bar for me for my return package.  What did he send?

I'm glad you asked.  But first, answer this question, from match day 1:

What song, which sat atop both Swedish and German charts on this day in 1987, had a video directed by Simon West (Con Air), which featured (as a bartender!) Clive Clarke, famed member of Top of the Pops' dance troupe, Zoo? Click here.

I promise, that is the only time I won't put up the video here.

Everyone back?  Good.

That was a cruel way to start out our trivia game.  It was not cruel of Matt, however, to send me a couple of great cards from this year's 10th anniversary Allen & Ginter online special set:

Topps sold this set online only -- a move which I didn't even notice until the boxes had sold out. The black A&G cards look very sharp to me -- I love the black borders and the black background makes the art look a ton better than the white background, which seems to bleach out the color.  So, putting the cards online and selling them there only like these A&G X cards are like the bastard child of Topps minis and Turkey Red was just annoying.  

Sort of like getting Rickrolled on your first trivia question with "Never Gonna Give You Up".

Question 2: 

In November 1987, a cover of a Tommy James and the Shondells song was replaced at the top of the Billboard Hot 100 by a cover of a different Tommy James and the Shondells song.Name both cover artists, whose versions were later lampooned on Weird Al Yankovic's Even Worse (as "I Think I'm a Clone Now" and "Alimony", respectively). Two answers required.

Here's the Weird Al video for "I think I'm a Clone Now".

It's a fitting song for these mini parallels:

From here on in my collecting life, I'm going to start humming that song whenever I start hitting this mini parallels. We have 2011 well represented, along with one each from 2010 and 2012.  All of these were needed for the various player collections.

Your answers from above? The artists were Tiffany for her cover of "I Think We're Alone Now" and Billy Idol for his cover of Mony Mony:

Next Question:

What R.E.M. song, which featured a wah-wah-pedal guitar solo and two modulations, did singer Michael Stipe refer to as a "fruitloop song" while guitarist Peter Buck called it "the stupidest song we've ever written"? (It quickly became the band's biggest hit of the 1980s.)

Accompanying the question was this photo:

Being someone who spent three-plus years of my life in Athens and loving every minute of being in that city even today, I had to get this one right.

Criticizing parallels as overdone is a common thread for me, to be fair. In large part, it's because Topps overdoes the parallels.  But many times, those cards end up looking pretty good.  This is especially true of some of the Gold parallels:

Perhaps it is because I bought a case of the 2013 Topps Series 2 and broke it last year, but that Segura card looks about 800 times better than its white bordered base card equivalent. On the other hand, the Braun Bowman does not look at all better than its black bordered base card equivalent.  

So, which song did Michael Stipe call the "Fruitloop song"?

There are several live concert versions of this song available on YouTube, which raises the question: if they hate the song so damn much, why do they still play it live?

Now face North!

Two more questions.  Here's the second to last one:

Pictured here are stills from the videos for all four singles from what 1989 album?

What could possible go with this nostalgia fest? How about a couple of inserts from the 2008 Topps insert set called Trading Card History?

Yes, that's it.

I couldn't imagine either Ryan Braun or Prince Fielder listening to the album that is the subject of this question. Braun's more of a hip-hop guy -- his Miami roots showing, I'd guess...his at-bat music last year was one of two song: "Dreams and Nightmares" by Meek Mill and "A Dream" by Jay Z.  

Fielder has broader tastes -- using "Moments in Love" by Art of Noise, "Man of the Year" by Schoolboy Q, "Down for My Niggaz" by C-Murder featuring Snoop Dogg and Magic, and "Requiem: Lacrimosa" by notorious gangster rapper Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart.

But neither of them are repping "Deadbeat Club," or "Channel Z" or "Roam" or "Love Shack" from the B-52s big hit in 1989, Cosmic Thing.  I love "Deadbeat Club" because it name checks a few great Athens places like the since-departed Allen's and its 25-cent beers. "Love Shack" brings up the Atlanta Highway too.  Basically, it's one big paean to Athens. 

Final question

Five-word phrases regarding Milli Vanilli:

• "Girl You Know It's True"
• [What telephonically themed Billboard chart-topper?]
• "Blame It on the Rain"
• Best New Artist Grammy rescission
• Fraud-related lawsuits by the dozens

Let's be clear. I don't equate this fantastic card with the frauds that were Milli Vanilli. But this card goes with a great story about Milli Vanilli:

This 2015 Allen & Ginter card has the 10th Anniversary Issue foil on it. It didn't make a big first impression on me until I turned the card over...and lo and behold, there it was -- the card is serial numbered as #4 of 10 total.  That is awesome.

Okay, now Milli Vanilli.  I told my story in the past about buying the "you sing the hits of Milli Vanilli."  I really remember "Blame it on the Rain" because we sang it with thick hick accents. I also remember "Girl You Know It's True" because we sang the bass lines repetitively during the song.  But, we also sang the song that the question sought:

Matt, thank you very much for the great cards. I just hope I haven't besmirched your good name by including a Milli Vanilli reference here!