Pins and Needles

One of the upsides of being on Twitter is sometimes the conversations go down rabbit trails of strange and weird and cool collectibles just by someone bringing up a random topic. Now, I can't recall how it is that Greg a/k/a @grogg came to send me some great player pins from 1990, but All Hail to him for that!

That song is from a Manchester Band called PINS -- an all-female band formed 6 years ago. The songs I've listed to have a very mod 1960s feel. There's a lot of that feel in the way they dress as well. If you'd like to hear something different from them, check out "Aggrophobe", which features Iggy Pop doing mostly spoken-word verses while singing the chorus together. It's a lot different than a lot of the songs I've listed to lately, and it's a nice change.

But, it is weird too.

So, the pins. 1990 featured some of the most diverse oddballs one can imagine. There were the collector-issued "Broder-type" cards, such as the "Blue Sox Sports Sports Promotions Action Superstars." You had your random unlicensed stuff, like the "1990 All-American Baseball Team." Those were fairly normal cards compared to others, though. A company called "Ace" put out a set of 108 MVP pins, defining the term MVP rather loosely to include luminaries such as Bill Doran, Gary Gaetti, Tom Herr, and Dennis Rasmussen with real MVPs such as Robin Yount, Kevin Mitchell, and Dale Murphy.

From there, things went even weirder. Good Humor Ice Cream issued a set of 26 "bats" (one for each team) that were the sticks on which your ice cream was frozen. Of course, you had your usual cola-sponsored or cookie-sponsored or fast-food-sponsored sets. MSA was back at its disc-creating best. And don't forget about all the random player-specific sets that the Star Company put out, including the 1990 version of Aaron Judge: Kevin Maas.

All in all, having a set called "Baseball Buttons" that was fully licensed was nothing out of the ordinary for 1990. It appears that the set was broken down colorwise by having the NL players with a blue button and the AL players with a red button. I'm not entirely sure where Trading Card Database got its numbering system for the set, though, as I personally do not see any numbers on the buttons. 

It's a truly weird set in many respects. The Los Angeles Dodgers were just two years -- basically one season -- removed from winning the World Series, but only three Dodgers made the 120-button set. On the other hand, the Brewers had seven buttons in the set.

It's like the Baseball Button people were the Anti-Topps. The designs on these leave a lot to be desired. Why do Ted Higuera and Dan Plesac have their name and a copyright line included on their photos while the other players do not? 

The photographer who took the photos of Yount and Gantner must have been new to the business as well -- you never take a photo where the sun is behind a person's face if you are intending to feature the face in the photo. That's photography 101. At a minimum, you need additional lighting in that case to light up their face. If you don't you end up with a dark photo that makes it difficult to tell Jim Gantner and Robin Yount apart without a label.

Still, I'm not complaining about these. Like I said, this set is like the anti-Topps -- featuring far more Brewers than it even should. This package helped bring my Yount collection total to 1,052 items, including ninety-seven from 1990 alone.

Many thanks go out to Greg -- he's a great guy, a good follow on Twitter, and he has great movie recommendations too. 

Something Strange This Way Comes

Hi there.

Yes. I've been gone for a couple of weeks, but I'm back now.

In the past couple of weeks, I have barely had time to be on Twitter. I have some cards to post, of course, and I have some other items to scan and post as well. 

More on that in a minute. 

But, something very strange has been going on here, and I'm not sure what -- if anything -- can be used to explain it. 

Why in the heck was my last post so popular in terms of views?

If you're familiar with the Blogger interface on your posts to see how many hits your posts get, you know that some strange things can happen there. Depending on how search engines catalog your pages, you might end up with dozens -- even hundreds -- of hits on a particular post. Prior to this year, my record number of hits for any one particular post came on the handwritten post contest idea that Gavin came up with last year. It was an incredible 1574 hits.

Then I decided to title a post, "Bowman's Coming, But I Need to Post Heritage." That was my most recent post before today. I had all kinds of stuff going on lately so I haven't been paying much attention to the blog or collecting generally, so I was a bit surprised when I looked at my post list today and saw this:

Six thousand hits? What in the actual hell is going on here?

I dug deeper. Most of my hits over the past several weeks have come from the US. No surprise there. But, proportionately speaking, my American hits are much lower than normal. 

Here's the Overall numbers:

But here's the numbers for the past week:

I've suddenly become huge in South Korea? Is it that Eric Thames is now a Brewer and suddenly everyone in South Korea is seeking out every morsel of Milwaukee Brewers writing on the Internet? 

I really don't have any good ideas why that is the case. It's just weird.

Maybe it has something to do with my Twitter activities. Maybe. I mean, Twitter is how I got a new addition to my Dan Plesac collection:

Back in March, Redskins fan Kenneth -- the man behind the Washington Redskins site Cardboard Hogs -- posted this Rediscover Topps card of Dan Plesac. I asked him if he would part with it, and he was glad to oblige. He even threw in another of the Dan Plesac MLB Network inserts from Topps Series 1 for me.

Y'all be sure to check out Kenneth's website and follow him on Twitter too. 

I mean you, my South Korean friends. Please follow Kenneth. 

Thanks to everyone for reading, and here's to my getting back to posting again!

2017 Topps Arrives

As I have found over the past several years, I'm better off buying into a case break to get my Brewers sets completed and get most, if not all, of the basic inserts crossed off my want lists. Rather than buying into a case break with one of those commercial breakers, though -- you know the ones, the guys who jump around when a swatch of fabric shows up and act like that swatch just rewrote War and Peace into a handy 200-page summary -- I prefer to break with "Crackin' Wax" and "Literal Quirk" over at Crackin' Wax. 

I do that because Chris is a collector, and he does the breaks for charity. I also like supporting the little guys where possible, so here is the advertisement for Chris's other project, Varsity Trading Cards. VTC looks like a great way for kids to get started as collectors by getting their own cards -- the whole process is described on Chris's website that I linked to. Let me tell you -- these cards look and feel good in hand. Here's a sample front, complete with a spot for the kids to get their friends' autographs, just in case:

The backs look good too:

So, in case your kids are playing baseball or softball or you are a coach wanting a custom card for you as a blogger and a coach, check Chris's website out. I mean, sure, you could get a Topps card, but does Topps really deserve more of your money? 😏

Okay, so, 2017 Topps. Yeah. As with every new year of the flagship, there is always debate about whether people like the design. It's okay. As was the case with last year's set, though, it is definitely a design undertaken with the mobile apps in mind. I think we will all see this a lot as long as Topps sees its apps as being more likely to generate significant revenue than physical cards -- we cardboard collectors will get whatever works best on a phone, and we'll need to live with it.

Here are the base cards:

A couple of head-scratching inclusions, particularly Chris Capuano and Will Middlebrooks. Capuano did not pitch after May thanks to injury, while Middlebrooks made 10 appearances in July of last year around the time that the Brewers were close to trading, and then traded, Aaron Hill. Capuano is probably done pitching, and Middlebrooks went to Texas to join the old Brewers Rest Home in Arlington.

Who would I have included instead? It's tough to say too much since series 2 is yet to come, but I'd have preferred Hernán Pérez, Domingo Santana, Carlos Torres, Chase Anderson, or Blaine Boyer over Middlebrooks. Capuano is fine -- he's a long-time MLB player who'd been with the team before, so sentimentality is okay here -- but even including him is a bit of a stretch. The true problem is that roster turnover at the bottom of the roster last season probably makes life difficult for Topps to find a usable photo for someone like Jhan Mariñez.

Jonathan Villar & Jhan Mariñez

I could be wrong about that, though.

Anyway, in an odd confluence of this case, the only parallels I got were one each of the foil and the gold parallel. The odder confluence is the fact that both parallels were of the same player:

It was an Orlando Arcia hot case, I guess. Arcia was in the major leagues long enough last year such that he will no longer have rookie eligibility this season. He struggled at the plate for his first month in the big leagues -- hitting .184/.259/.296 through September 2. He did a bit better the rest of the way out -- .252/.297/.417 over his final 108 plate appearances. Still, all small sample sizes. At just 21 years old when he was called up (he turned 22 on August 4 and celebrated after the team's off day that day with getting his first major league hit against Braden Shipley of the Arizona Diamondbacks -- a single to right field to drive in Hernán Pérez.

I hope he gets better with the bat as he develops. He has the glove to be a major asset at shortstop so long as he doesn't turn into Rey Ordoñez version 2.0.

When I say that I hope he develops, I mean it. Arcia is the Series 1 Brewers representative on the Topps 1987 redux. And my god are we going to get a ton of wood grain this year. What with this insert set -- which despite the 100-card insert in Series 1 will likely carry over the Series 2 (and the Brewers will get one more card in the insert featuring Ryan Braun...I'd be shocked if we get a second and pick up Jonathan Villar) -- and with Heritage using the 1968 woody design, it's going to look more and more like a forest in collecting this year.

The Topps "Salute" inserts look suspiciously like last year's Topps Bunt design to me in my mind's eye. Let's see -- am I right?

Eh, a little bit. it's that massive diagonal that threw me off. Frankly, I prefer the Bunt design. This "Salute" insert is a yawner. 

Another of the inserts this year is the "5 Tool" insert:

This is a fairly contrived insert as well. When scouts say a guy is a five-tool player, they usually mean that a guy hits for average, hits for power, has speed, has a good arm, and is a good fielder. Braun isn't exactly a five-tool player -- there is a reason he was moved to the outfield from third base almost immediately after getting to the big leagues (he is an indifferent fielder). And while I guess they are good hitters, I don't get how Syndergaard, Arrieta, and Bumgarner get included.

Three more cards. First up, the final "new" card. Since I collect Dan Plesac, I prevailed on Chris to throw me one of the Plesac MLB Network insert cards.

I don't count this as necessary for my Brewers team set, but since he does not have any logos on his tie, I'll include it in my player collection for him. Why not? It's my player collection after all. I make the rules.

The other two cards were buyback cards. 

The HacMan, Jeffrey Leonard, with a gold stamp on it. I don't mind it or anything, but if I wanted to rediscover 1989 Topps, I just have to flip open any one of the boxes in my closet and I'll find literally hundreds of the damn things. The best thing for Topps with these is that they could keep sticking in these Rediscover Topps cards into packs for the next five years without updating anything. I wouldn't be surprised to see that happen either. And, if it does, maybe I'll try to put together a "rediscovered" 1989 Topps Set. That would be fun on some perverse level.

My final buyback was better:

Diego Pablo (Gonzalez) Seguí. Diego came up with the Kansas City Athletics at the age of 24 in 1962. A Cuban by birth, Seguí started 171 of his 639 games as a major leaguer, and he holds the distinction of being the only player to play both for the Seattle Pilots in 1969 (12-6 record, 3.35 ERA, 12 saves and 2 complete games) and the Seattle Mariners -- at the age of 39 in 1977 (110-2/3 mediocre innings, 0-7 record, 5.69 ERA/4.54 FIP). 

As his SABR biography points out, Segui did not stop pitching in 1977 -- he went to Mexico and threw a perfect game in 1978. In fact, he pitched in Mexico (though without stats available) through 1985 at the age of 47! Maybe he was trying to hang around until his son David Seguí was old enough to play against him, but then gave up when David went to college first before being drafted by the Baltimore Orioles. David also had a long career -- playing to age 38 in an independent league -- but not as long as his dad did.

My thanks go out to Crackin' Wax and LQ for running the break, doing the sorting, and getting all these cards to me so quickly. Now, I just have to figure out which inserts I need!

Red, Red Foley

Can we all agree that this pub where the video is set is the world's worst pub in the history of mankind? It's too full of people, there's a random dude wandering around without a shirt, the bartender is slow because of being on crutches, you'll get your pocket picked, it's totally smoke-filled with everyone smoking like fiends, it's a world fully in black and white, and at the end of the night the only person you end up with is the random dude walking two dachshunds. 

That really doesn't have much to do with this blogpost other than the whole "red" thing. I was doing some searches on eBay recently for things that I've had stuck in my head lately -- in particular, Red Foley stickers. For whatever reason and despite seeing these available for sale from time to time, Red Foley stickers have evaded me. I probably should have bought these with my random Amazon credit instead of those stamps, but I didn't.

Anyway, I found a buy-it-now of a seller on eBay who must have loaded up on a bunch of Red Foley books from 1987, 1988, 1991, 1992, and 1993 because the seller has a ton of "mega lots" of Red Foley Stickers for a total of $8 with shipping. Mega lot? $8? Count me in.

So, what did I get?

Lots of Younts:

And, other than that weird one at the top with the big green circle impinging on the photo of Yount, I've got at least four of each of these. It is interesting to see the two stickers both numbered 103 -- from 1992 and 1993 -- appear to have been photos taken from the same at-bat. 

Another interesting sidelight that I just picked up on is the fact that it appears that Yount must have had a shoe deal with Pony. That's a brand that I had totally forgotten about before seeing these stickers. Also, I don't ever remember seeing this ad for the shoes:

I didn't see Robin in there, though.

The good thing about buying lots like this that I often get multiples of players that I collect as PCs. With my oh-so-strict rules I've created for myself (which I break regularly if I choose), I try to get one card/sticker for my PC and then another for my team collection. As I have gotten into this more, though, I've started establishing more lines -- things like, "for cards serial numbered under 100, I only will list PCs on my want list rather than trying to build team sets for each" and, "I don't care if super old stuff isn't serial numbered...if the oddball is tough to find, having one copy of it is enough."

The downside to this lot buying is getting tons of doubles, of course. Also, for whatever reason, none of the different years contained any Paul Molitor stickers. I'm guessing that the seller parted those out in a separate sale.

Anyway, here are the rest of the 1987s:

Next, 1988, featuring "generic sticker with generic font yelling team name in manner that one need not worry about licensing!":

Here's 1991, even though the Deer Sticker features a photo taken at least a couple of years earlier:

1992's book included Gary Sheffield in his high-top Nike spikes (obligatory E-5 not included):

And, finally, 1993 only had one other than Robin:

Buying lots on eBay can be frustrating at times, in large part because most lots end up comprised of 80 copies of one card followed by just one or two of others that should have been equally available and, then, the lot ends up missing some key cards or players. At the same time, though, when a lot like this comes up -- of something I had exactly zero previously -- I'll take all the extras in order to get a cheap kickstart on completing the team sets and PCs.

And can't we all use a good kickstart on our collections like that?