One More Post from eBay

As many of you know, I decided to start a second blog to indulge myself in a bit of cataloging and, at the same time, in a bit of history and oddball love. My new blog, "Collecting the 1980s: Remembering the Oddballs from the Best Decade in Cards," focuses on the fun, offbeat, and forgotten cards from the 1980s. Of course I call it the best decade in cards because that is when I was a kid and cards are always best when you're a kid. I'd sure appreciate it if you would stop over there and read some of those posts and comment.

All that said, I'm trying not to neglect this blog more than I have already. I mean, my purchases are still focused on the Brewers as are my (dwindling) trades with other people. But y'all know how it is sometimes -- you need a little bit of extra spice in your life. That change or twist to keep things exciting and interesting. That's what the new blog is, really -- a new twist for me to keep writing about things I enjoy while paying little attention to new issues other than to note them for future checklists. 

So, I still surf on eBay looking for deals. Sometimes, it is just for a Topps Now card -- to pay $5.99 for a card that Topps would charge me $9.99 to get. I'm not super excited about that "deal" -- I mean, it's still one card for $6 -- but it's better than a $10 card. Other times, I can find the random lots that have cards I need. Today's post is one of those times. 

Powered by the prog-rock timeline at Strawberry Bricks, let's dig in.

Strawberry Bricks calls itself "a record guide to music of the progressive era of rock music." As is the case with a lot of genres of music, the timeline for prog rock starts with the Beatles -- here, Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. It is incredible to think about all the different genres of rock music that the Beatles influenced. Everything from the prog rock of Pink Floyd and Yes to the grunge sound of Nirvana (Kurt Cobain was heavily influenced by the Beatles) to the blatant worshipfulness of 90s Britpop from Oasis is descended directly from the Beatles. And that is just a quick run.

This song, "A Day In The Life," has been called the 28th greatest song of all time by Rolling Stone and, then, in a list of just Beatles songs, it was called the best song by Rolling Stone. I'm not sure how that is squared other than different writers at different times looking at different things. 

 

One of the impetuses for buying this lot were the Prince Fielder cards that I needed for my Fielder collection. Other than the one of him signing autographs -- which I think goes into my team set -- all of these were needed for the Prince book. As you might be able to see, the 2009 Upper Deck A Piece of History parallels are both serial numbered -- the blue one is 184/299 and the gold one is 48/50 -- and so is the 2009 Upper Deck Icons Future Foundations, which is numbered 750/999. 

Last year, I posted some Braves cards accompanied by jazz. One of the songs I included was "Blue Rondo à la Turk" by Dave Brubeck. The Nice, a London band from 1967 formed by Keith Emerson (later of Emerson, Lake & Palmer), performed this prog-rock cover of the song and titled it simply "Rondo." 

Emerson is the keyboardist here -- as he always has been in his other bands prior to his death on March 11, 2016 -- but rather than using all kinds of different types of keyboards as he did later in ELP, he focused almost exclusively on using a Hammond organ. No less a music luminary than John Peel was an early champion of The Nice and infamously referred to ELP as "a waste of talent and electricity."

I'm hoping that these three guys don't end up as wastes of talent and electricity. There are troubling signs for each, however.

Gilbert Lara -- a die-cut card from the 2014 Elite Extra Edition set serial numbered to 200 -- does not turn 20 years old until October 20 of this year. He moved up to full-season Wisconsin this year and has struggled -- 7 BB and 73 Ks in 210 plate appearances, slash of .189/.219/.269 is not good even when you are 2 years younger than the average age in the league. Fangraphs has Lara rated as a 40 Future Value player and notes that "the quality of his at-bats is resoundingly poor, he looks tense and uncomfortable in the box, gets visibly frustrated when he struggles, and hasn't tapped into his considerable raw power in games, even in the hitter-friendly Pioneer League." Not good.

Nathan Kirby was drafted in the second round in 2015 out of the University of Virginia. Prior to that college season, he was seen as a potential top-10 talent. Injuries (strained lat) cost him much of that 2015 season, and he slid into the second round where the Brewers selected him #40 overall. He went to Single-A Wisconsin, threw 12-2/3 innings, and was promptly sidelined by a torn ulnar collateral ligament leading directly to Tommy John surgery. This year, he came back in spring training only to suffer from ulnar neuritis -- leading to ulnar nerve transposition surgery which will keep him out to at least the end of this month. He'll be 24 next year and really needs to do something as a pro pitcher next year.

Braden Webb was an oddball of sorts himself. He graduated high school in 2014 and had Tommy John surgery even before he graduated. Despite being old for his high school class -- he turned 19 prior to graduating high school -- he sat out and stayed out of college entirely in 2015 before enrolling for one season with the South Carolina Gamecocks. Due to his age, he was draft eligible after that season, and the Brewers picked him in the third round of the 2016 draft. As was the case for Webb in college, he is struggling with his control at Single-A Wisconsin this year -- walking 5 men every 9 innings. 

One thing you can count on from prog rock are super long, overly indulgent (at times) songs which seem to go on and on and on. Often, that is not a bad thing. This is especially true when the men (and in prog rock, it is almost entirely men) who are playing are virtuoso in their playing ability. 

This song, "Bare Wires Suite," is by John Mayall's Bluesbreakers and comprised the entire first side of the album called Bare Wires. Embedded within this suite are seven individual songs: "Bare Wires," "Where Did I Belong," "I Started Walking," "Open Up A New Door," "Fire," "I Know Now," and "Look In The Mirror." Unlike some of the other prog rock here, there is a bluesy feel to this song. You can hear the blues chord changes flying by in each of the songs by listening to the bass line, the rhythm guitar, and, at times, the keyboards. Any jazz band member will tell you that the bass line is literally the most important sound within that jazz ensemble -- along with the drums -- because it sets tempo and key. Everything else from there is icing on the cake.

Before this season began, I expressed some concern that Arcia had the potential to turn into Rey Ordoñez 2.0 due to the significant questions about his ability to hit at the major league level. All indications from scouts were that Arcia would be a plus-plus fielder -- and that has definitely been the case. As it stands currently, he leads the NL in total zone runs, range factor per nine innings, double plays turned, assists, and putouts at short. Yes, he's committed 11 errors, but that happens when you get to a ton of balls.

The question was going to be his bat. This concern was highlighted after his .219/.273/.358 slash line last year (an OPS+ of just 66). Thankfully, he has improved significantly this year. He hit a low-water mark on May 17 with an 0-for-4 performance against the Padres that left his slash line at .208/.261/.352 (eerily similar to 2016). Since that game and over the past 7 weeks, Arcia has hit .356/.388/.494 with four homers and four steals. 

Sure, he's not walking a ton (10 walks in 170 plate appearances) and his contact hasn't been great (30 Ks) but he has been hitting 8th for much of that time, meaning that walks generally do not come into play with the pitcher hitting behind him. That burst has put him just about right at being an average NL hitter. With his glove, that makes him a very valuable player. 

And all of this has been done before he turns 23 years old on August 4. If he can stay at being a league average hitter for his whole career and fields as well as he has, he could quite literally end up being more Ozzie Smith 2.0 (career OPS+: 87) than Rey Ordoñez. I'm not making him a PC yet -- I'm still feeling a bit burned by Jean Segura's hacktastic ways -- but he will be soon enough if his development continues.

Before the band added Phil Collins and lost Peter Gabriel, Genesis was very much a prog rock band instead of singing pop songs like "Sussudio." The song "The Silent Sun" was Genesis's first-ever single from its first album, From Genesis to Revelation, and it was released in 1968. The album was not released until March of 1969 even though the single was released on February 22, 1968. 

If you listen to this short song -- it's only a little over 2 minutes long -- you will hear nothing that sounds either like anything Genesis or Peter Gabriel released in the 1980s. It's very much a piece of its time in the late 1960s.

And finally: lots of Ryan Braun. The fact that much of this lot is Braun-focused is appropriate since it seems nearly every set by every card issuer these days includes Braun and maybe Arcia and that's about it. Somehow, I'd missed that Topps issued Gold Label again last year -- it must have been an online exclusive or something -- so this lot helped me by getting me the parallel/variations of the "Class 2 and Class 3." There's also a 2008 Upper Deck Baseball Heroes Silver parallel serial numbered to 399 in there as well along with one of what is Panini's best set every year -- Diamond Kings from 2017. I'd still prefer hatless players from Panini rather than no-logo, but at least there isn't a fake autograph on it.

All of these cards fit well into my collection either for team sets or for my player collections. The great thing about this purchase was that I got a total of 38 different Brewers cards, including a couple of relics, a few autographs, and several serial numbered cards, for just $7.12 total with shipping included. Basically, that's less than 50 cents a card. For what I got, that seems like a good deal to me.

Thanks for stopping by and let me know if you want to trade.

Breakdown a Trade Post

As I mentioned in my post about the "Big Fun Game" and my winning a 1953 Topps card of Hoyt Wilhelm, I planned almost immediately to trade the Wilhelm card away to a Hoyt collector. That Hoyt collector was Gavin from Baseball Card Breakdown, who reached out to me almost immediately after the game went final and asked whether I had planned to keep the Wilhelm.

I told him the truth -- "absolutely not" and mentioned that I knew he collected so I told him I'd send it to him. In return, he was kind enough to send me a great package of cards, including one that is really tough to find. Let's get into the cards. As usual, I can't just make it about cards, so let's dig into some of Gavin's favorite bands for some music.

The band Mercury Rev had a couple of albums that hit the Heatseekers Albums chart here in the US, and they had one album that was certified gold in the UK (1998's Deserter's Songs). This song, "Dark Is Rising," is very orchestral sounding -- very grand and grandiose at the same time. 

I think I need to listen to this band more. I vaguely recall a song or two of theirs from the mid-1990s time period. I was intrigued, though, when I read this description of the band from The Guardian's Music Blog: "a rarity in indie rock: a band who have continually evolved their sound, pushing at the boundaries of what rock music actually means over 25 years, borrowing from jazz, funk, doo-wop, techno, folk, and more along the way." 

I'll start with a somewhat elusive card set: the 2007 Topps Co-Signers set. This is such a strange set. When I'm looking for cards -- whether online or in person at shows -- I rarely see these and never think to look for them. So, getting one out of the blue was excellent. 

However, unlike Mercury Rev, I'm not all that intrigued by this card. It just looks like a mistake in coloration to have Hall all in red -- or it's an unappreciated gimmick. Hard pass on this, except for the ones I have to get.

On to something more familiar: The Toadies and their song, "Possum Kingdom." This is from the golden years of 1990s alternative -- 1994-1995, of course. I feel lucky, in a way, that I took a year off from school during that time (after graduating college and before starting law school) and that I could enjoy the music that was out that year. 

As one of the recent commenters on YouTube said, "I wanna go back to the 90s, wear a short sleeved shirt over a long sleeved one, grow my hair to my shoulders, listen to music like this, and watch Mallrats." 

Mid-1990s music was really good. Of course, I will also agree wholeheartedly with the fact that there is good music getting put out all the time. I find stuff from the 1970s that I haven't heard either in ages or ever that blows me away. I find stuff from last year that I haven't heard yet, and it really hits me in all the right places. 

I really love music.

Being busy drinking beer, chasing women, smoking too many cigarettes, sleeping in late on weekends, and spending money on beer, women, and music meant that I did not make time in the 1990s for baseball card collecting. Perhaps if I had been less interested in any one of those things, I might have made time for my collection. Probably not, though.

If I had, I would have loved grabbing these Action Packed cards that were issued in 1993 as a continuation of the first series from 1992. It does seem a bit strange to see Cecil Cooper in a set along with Honus Wagner, Mel Ott, and Walter Johnson, but it does not seem strange to see him in a checklist next to Ron Cey and Dave Parker. 

I like it.

Here's a nice couple of songs from a band called Three Mile Pilot. Three Mile Pilot is a San Diego band who did this show on a public radio station called KEXP in Seattle. In a nice little coincidence in light of the fact that Gavin likes this band, the DJ at the beginning even mentions that 3MP would be playing Portland the next night.

I wonder if Gavin went to that show.

This show is about 25 minutes long. To me, the lead singer sounds like a West Coast version of New Orleans legend Alex McMurtry. He has that rougher hewn voice -- reaching for notes, pushing his tone up to meet the pitch he is going for after starting perhaps a half-step (that's a music term) lower. In some respects, it turns what starts almost as a minor chord into a tonic/major chord. Or, I may just have forgotten all my music education from 23+ years ago.

That's possible too.

Matt LaPorta was supposed to be a stud -- the next one off the Brewers mid-2000s conveyer belt of advanced hitters to follow Ryan Braun. LaPorta was a Gator, and the Brewers drafted him after his senior year. LaPorta is now a mortgage loan officer in Tampa with SunTrust Bank. He left baseball thanks to two hip surgeries that gave him tons of pain to even walk. 

I wish him well, except for his whole Gator thing.

Whenever a song's YouTube introduction reads: "The story is a common one. The son of a Portuguese fisherman rediscovers punk rock and rock & roll and moves to Tijuana in order to find musicians whose instincts haven't been replaced by the sedate notion of what it takes to be successful in the world of professional music making."

Of course. That happens all the time. 

I feel like Rocket from the Crypt made a few appearances in Athens while I was in law school there. I have nothing to back that feeling up other than knowing that their band name sounds familiar, but the song "On a Rope" does not.

This Ryan Braun Bowman from 2016 is similar. It's a parallel, maybe. Or maybe not. I can't tell sometimes with Bowman what is a parallel and what isn't. In fact, it's becoming more and more difficult to discern between base and parallels these days. At least it feels like it is to me. 

At least Braun's bulging eye look isn't as prominent on this card as on others.

I loved this song in 1995/1996. I could sing all the lyrics without any problem, and I actively sought this song out. In fact, as I type this, I'm rocking back and forth in my chair almost involuntarily. 

This song was Hum's biggest hit, reaching #11 on the Modern Rock charts in 1995 and #28 on the Mainstream charts. See -- there it is again...the fact that 1995 has yet another great song.

If you have never heard of Hum, they are from Champaign, Illinois -- where the University of Illinois is located. According to Hum's Wikipedia page, the band has reunited and broken up regularly since 2000 -- coming back together for one-off shows in various places around the country including in Chicago and Atlanta.

A song this good deserves an excellent card, as does the last card of the post. This is a Topps Heritage Color Swap variation from the 2015 set. To tell you how difficult these are to find is easy: there is not a single one for sale on eBay at the present time and, in fact, there aren't even any recent sales for the card.

Gavin, thank you so much for the great trade. I hope that the cards I sent to you were enough to match this great package.

Then *poof* he was gone

For Brewers fans who troll around on eBay looking for items -- and especially for Robin Yount collectors -- a usual stop used to always be wfbookmen's page. Thanks to WF, I have added numerous Robin Yount relics and autographs to my collection -- sometimes at high prices, sometimes at cheap prices. From time to time, he might be a little slow in shipping for unknown reasons, but most of the time he's a solid eBay seller.

I'd stopped buying from him for a while to focus on picking up more team sets rather than the individual player cards. Plus, I'd often have to stop myself from bidding on far too many items. Then, I got one of his emails saying he had a bunch of stuff on sale with short deadlines for purchase. So, I looked at the stuff and, back at the end of January, I bought a whole raft of items from him (which I'm going to show below). It was a weird sale -- I was able to pick up many of the items by putting in a last minute opening bid on each, which usually doesn't happen.

But a weirder thing happened. Shortly after I left feedback, I went back to see what else he might have for sale, and a strange sight appeared:

Say what? Just like Kaiser Soze -- though hopefully without the international terrorist/bad guy overtones -- it seems like it was just *poof* gone. I hope he is okay -- as you can see, he's been a seller for over 19 years. Perhaps it was just a reaction to the continually increasing eBay fees.

At any rate, thanks to the big sale, I got a bunch of nice items. 

First off, we have two media guides from the Brewers early days. I eventually would like to get a complete run of the media guides in good shape like these two -- as opposed to the well-worn versions of my youth, which were my bedtime reading as a kid as if I would be tested on what Robin Yount's middle name is...which, oddly enough, is listed as "R." but many sources (including the late Bob Lemke) say that his real middle name was Rachel...leading me to believe that I too would use just the R and that his parents really wanted a girl when he was born -- but I digress.

Anyway, I don't have many of them currently, but I do like them. The 1973 one featuring Del Crandall and George Scott is particularly nice.

Another group of items that were available featured some of those Topps buyback cards with those wonderful foil stamps to "update" them. 

As you can see, other than the 1976 Topps Team card for the Brewers (with Hank Aaron placed in the center of the standing players), the rest all fit neatly into player collections -- Moore, Money, Cooper, and Oglivie are all core players from the Brewers teams of my childhood. I don't think I paid more than $1 for any one of these cards. These were, in fact, the items that were lingering without bids late on, so I snapped them up for the $0.99 open.

Something WF always seemed to have were the "higher end" sets like Triple Threads. He also seemed to have all the cool inserts and box toppers. I snapped up a couple of these as well:

I especially like the 2010 Heritage team stamps box topper with Braun and Fielder. I wish that Topps had done actual stamps for the new generation, as opposed to printing them on the box topper. Still, it's a pretty cool item to add to my Braun collection. I'm not sure that I'll find two more for both the Fielder and the team collections, though. I think this is the only one I've found (though I haven't looked all that hard).

Going deeper into the oddball side of things, this time around there were two team-issued photos and a couple of large oddballs for sale. 

In order:

The top one is probably from about 1978 or 1979 or maybe 1980. But, I think it's earlier because by 1980 Gorman Thomas was already on his way to covering up with the full beard look that would make him fit in well with Jayson Werth and Charlie Blackmon these days -- the halfway-to-homeless look.  

The next one has to be from 1983 (or it was a reprint from 1982) since it lists Harvey Kuenn as being "Manager." Harvey was the manager from May of 1982 through the end of 1983. Harry Dalton decided to fire Harvey at the end of the 1983 season after what appeared to be a disappointing finish -- losing 18 of 24 games in September of 1983 featuring a 10-game losing streak to blow the division title. Considering that Rene Lachemann came in the next year and led the team to a 67-94 record (featuring Paul Molitor missing most of the season due to Tommy John surgery), perhaps the chinks in the armor were simply displaying themselves a bit earlier.

The next item is a Cecil Cooper Mr. Z's pizza 5 x 7 photo. I have one of these already, but I kept this one unopened. 

Finally, there is the Jeff Cirillo black & white 5x7 photo issued by The Ohio Casualty Group. I really am confused by these because I'm just not sure if this is a giveaway or if Ohio Casualty just sponsored the team-issued set. I know that OCG issued a set of similarly sized photos featuring Braves and Brewers in 1999 for what was supposed to be County Stadium's final season (before the "Big Blue" crane collapse). But I don't know much more than that.

For the final items, well, it would not be a purchase from WFBookmen without some Robin Yount stuff infiltrating it.

The top item is one of those "Diamondmark" bookmarks issued in the early 1990s, when everyone was putting baseball players on everything. Skipping down, we have two serial numbered items -- one of Yount by himself serial numbered to 399 and one with Paul Molitor serial numbered to 1999.

The second item is an unused ticket stub from the 2010 game featuring a Robin Yount bobblehead for the team's 40th anniversary. It's incredible how many times the Brewers seem to feature that 1982 team and its players on bobbleheads, ticket stubs, and other stadium giveaways. This year, for instance, there is a Robin bobblehead being issued to commemorate his ride into County Stadium on his motorbike -- which was immortalized by Gavin on a Cardsphere Heroes card in 2015:

I will use any excuse I can to show that photo. 

At any rate, I'm hopeful that wfbookmen's exile from eBay will end eventually, or that he will surface on another auction site. My Yount collection hopes so too.

That New Cardboard Smell

Atlanta weather in the winter is about as bipolar as it gets. Now, in the summer, it's very consistent -- between 85 and 95, a bit humid, sometimes some thunderstorms. But in the winter, well, it's all over the place. In December alone, it was 75 degrees on Christmas Day but then, on New Year's Eve, it was a high of 45 degrees. Today, it might not even break 32.

All of this has conspired to give me one heck of a cold. I could only wish that I could smell the cardboard of the cards that Tim from I Love the Smell of Cardboard in the Morning. Tim sent me a packed mailer before Christmas, and it's taken me this long just to get it all scanned and sorted.  Let's break them down by player.

Ryan Braun

It's sort of funny that the Topps Ticket to Stardom set from 2009 called Braun a "Seasoned Veteran" considering that, in 2009, Braun had a grand total of 264 appearances in the major leagues. Of course, in those first two seasons, he hit 71 HRs, won the Rookie of the Year award, was named an All-Star, won a Silver Slugger Award, and led the NL in Slugging as a Rookie with a .634 SLG. 

Since then, of course, he's had his ups and downs but seems to have rebounded to the point where teams are considering trading for him -- I've heard everyone from the Dodgers, the Giants and the Phillies to the Orioles and Blue Jays being possible landing spots. 

While everyone in the national media seems to believe that Braun being traded is a fait accompli, there is a significant portion of the Brewers fanbase that believes that Braun has shown that he could still be a part of the next winning Brewers team. Now, that could be homerism, certainly. The team could be worse this year than last. We'll see.

Prince Fielder

Big Prince. Fielder had to retire after his second spinal fusion surgery. What was going on for him was that he had a herniated disk which led to pressure on his spinal cord. That pressure led to weakness in his left arm, causing him to be unable to swing a bat properly. Prince is lucky. As Kevin Mitchell detailed in his appearance on The Hall of Very Good Podcast, he was suffering from the same issue without it being diagnosed -- leading to him dropping down to 145 pounds and being paralyzed for a while. Seriously.

Prince is still owed about $104 million by the Tigers and Rangers through the 2020 season so money is not an issue. Aren't the guaranteed contracts in baseball great? I mean that seriously. The contracts are great for the players. Contrast that with the NFL, where far less money and far fewer years are ever guaranteed in what is a far more difficult, far less certain, far more violent sport in which to play. 

Ben Sheets

That Prime Patches Quad Relic Autograph 😍  😻  🙌  🙅

I just noticed that I can now add emojis to my blog. My life is now complete. 🎷 ⚾ ⚾ ⚾

Yovani Gallardo

Yovani just was traded to the Mariners by the Orioles. Mariners GM Jerry Dipoto was quoted as saying that, "after examining the free agent and trade market, Yovani is the best fit for our club as we move forward this offseason." Was their analysis of the free agent market limited to the California Penal League?

Seriously, Gallardo had a bad, bad season last year in Baltimore, and it should not have been a surprised. His strikeout rate has declined every year since 2013 at the same time that the league's strikeout rate has increased. Gallardo also hit the DL last year for shoulder problems. It does beg the question of what analysis that Dipoto and his staff did. Wishcasting?

Carlos Gomez

Lots of Golden Gomez here, with the highlight being the 1983 wannabe Gomez from 2015 Topps Archives being a parallel serial numbered to 50.  

Talk about a guy with a good agent and all the promise in the world: Gomez was absolutely terrible in Houston -- a terribleness that it always appeared he had in him, seeing as his idea of patience at the plate is to wait to start eating until after his dinner companions take their first bite. He got released by Houston, which slashing at .221/.277/.342 over the course of 126 games pretty much deserves. He gets signed by Texas and his 33 games there convince the Rangers to sign him for one year at a raise of $2.5 million a year -- to $11.5 million.

It is very telling that his most similar comparable player for his career (and #3 through age 30) is Corey Patterson. Patterson struggled to identify pitches he could hit, he did not walk much, he had good speed on the bases and was a good defensive player. Patterson also crashed out of the major leagues after the 2011 season at the age of 31 (though he spent 2012 essentially serving as Gomez's backup by being the starting CF for the Nashville Sounds in the Brewers organization). 

It should be an interesting year for Gomez.

For the rest of this post, I'm going to show off a few parallels and inserts that Tim sent:

Look at all the pretty colors! That Wes Helms Gold Refractor is actually a damn good looking card in hand, as is the sepia refractor for Aramis Ramirez. 

On the other hand, that "bubbles" thing going on for Nick Ramirez...not so much. Speaking of Nick Ramirez, it appears that his career is stalling out in Double-A. He's spent three seasons there, and he has not exactly lit the world on fire -- .229/.323/.402 in nearly 1400 Double-A at bats is an established level of play. I have my doubts that anything will come of his career at this point, but we will see. I mean, he turns 28 this year on August 1. 

There is one last card that I do need to show off:

I still like Luc, and this card being numbered out of ten floored me. I'd forgotten about that parallel for A&G in 2015 -- probably lost amidst the mist of parallels that Topps has put out generally. It happens.

Many thanks to Tim for the great cards -- and I hope that he enjoyed my Secret Santa envelope to him.