You See Your Gypsy (Queen), from Crackin' Wax

By now, I'm sure most of you have heard that Prince Rogers Nelson has passed away at the age of just 57 years old. He played his final shows here in Atlanta at the Fox Theatre just last week, and I didn't even realize he was playing in town until I'd heard he'd canceled the shows due to some health issues. Heck, I didn't even realize that he was 57 years old already.

Prince guarded his music very closely. Unlike most artists, whose music is fairly freely available either on YouTube or Spotify, Prince is difficult to find. Most videos on YouTube either have no music -- just images -- or some awful cover or worse. 

I have to admit -- after Purple Rain, I paid attention sometimes to Prince, but I really didn't listen to him. I remember loving songs like "1999" and "Little Red Corvette" when I was about 11 or 12 years old. Then, a couple of years later I bought Purple Rain in one of those Columbia House album grabs. You remember them -- "Get 10 albums for the price of 1" was BMG's gig, and Columbia House required more purchases after.

Interesting side note: 3 million of the 13 million copies of Hootie & The Blowfish's Cracked Rear View were purchased through Columbia House.  Seriously. Humorously enough, Columbia House has re-emerged as to sell hipsters vinyl as a subscription service -- and it's "Coming Soon!"

Something that is now out is Gypsy Queen. I am not going to pull a Night Owl and tease a song title without giving you the song. So, here's Stevie Nicks in her pomp:

To see my Gypsy (Queen), I decided to sign up for another Crackin' Wax Charity Case Break with Topher & Literal Quirk (though LQ was out or ill that evening, unfortunately). Christopher always keeps the break moving, answers questions, banters with those present and chatting on YouTube, and otherwise tries his best to make watching someone open up 12 boxes of cards interesting.

If you're interested, here is the break.

Since the fearsome twosome are both originally from Wisconsin and are still Upper Midwesterners, it is fun for me to hear their accents as they go through the boxes. They sound a lot like the people I grew up around.

Anyway, enough unconnected chatter. Here are a few of the base cards:

The Yount is actually a short print, so there was only one of that card in the entire case and, therefore, I still need to get one of them to complete my team set.

Meanwhile, for the normal Brewer cards, I got either 6 or 7 of each.

I have to admit that I actually really like the design this year. The red lettering pops off the card and is a clean look. The borders aren't obnoxious either. They aren't too dark, and they aren't too boring. And, the player names are reasonably easy to read as well. I'll admit it -- I'm a fan of this set. 

Now, I'm not going to go crazy and try to collect a complete set or anything, mind you. But these cards are just artsy enough to appeal on that level and they look different from previous incarnations.

Good job, Topps.

My Brewers slot also netted me some minis, including two that are serial numbered parallels.

The Segura is serial numbered to 50. Domingo Santana -- who is showing good patience at the plate this year while giving the Brewers a true right fielder and, further, being only 23 years old -- is a purple mini parallel numbered to 250. The Braun is just the regular version.

I have to admit that I am a bit miffed about Topps's decision not to have any Brewers autographs in this year's set. The only Brewers' hits available are a "Laces Around the League" Ryan Braun (serial numbered to just 5), and a Ryan Braun "MVP Minis Autograph" (serial numbered to 25 with a 1/1 black parallel). 

Thankfully, the folks at Crackin' Wax recognized that, so while I put a $20 down payment for the case break in, I actually got a partial refund to reflect the truer, more accurate value of my slot.

I like it when people do the right thing -- though, to be fair, it would have been fine if my refund had gone to charity.

Many thanks go out to Topher for running the break -- and y'all be sure to follow him on Twitter as well!

Even though it will probably gone quickly, here's the best song to sum up losing Prince -- another Minnesota icon:

#SuperTrader Post: Cards JayP's Mother Didn't Throw Out

A fairly new blogger around the card world is Diamondbacks fan Jay P., the proprietor of Cards My Mother Didn't Throw Out. Jay P. has quickly integrated into the trading world, as evidenced by the fact that he joined in the SuperTrader group that JayBarkerFan put together.  

Even before joining that group, Jay P had sent me a trade package. So, this is the second time in 2016 that I get to feature a few cards from Jay P. But, since I used up the Arizona music angle the last time, well, y'all are stuck with my writing and seeing where it leads today.

Let's go to the cards and see where the stream of consciousness leads.

Turner Ward was a hotshot prospect in the Indians system after he was traded there by the Yankees along with Joel (Mule) Skinner for Mel Hall. Ward then went to Toronto for 1991 in another trade (with Tom Candiotti in exchange for Denis Boucher, Glenallen Hill, Mark Whiten, and that ever popular trade ingredient called cash). He stayed in Milwaukee for three seasons and really did not impress -- .233/.328/.362 in 655 plate appearances -- so the Brewers released him. 

Ward went to Pittsburgh for parts of three seasons thereafter before getting released two-thirds of the way through 1999. He hooked on with the D-Backs -- creating a tie between CMMDTO and Off Hiatus -- for 85 plate appearances over two seasons. He finished his career with 17 plate appearances for the Phillies in 2001. 

Thereafter, Ward eventually went into coaching. He got to return to where he grew up and attended college -- Mobile, Alabama -- to manage for a couple of seasons in 2011 and 2012 with the Mobile BayBears. He moved up to the majors to be a hitting instructor with the Diamondbacks for three seasons. He's now the Dodgers hitting instructor.

I wonder why so many less-than-great hitters end up as hitting coaches. Shouldn't a team want Barry Bonds rather than Turner Ward?

I see Jesse Orosco with the sun shining on him from the Pinnacle logo, and, for whatever reason, the first thing that came to mind was "The Old Man" since he stayed in the major leagues until he was 46 years old in 2003.  

So, enjoy Charlton Heston reading Ernest Hemingway's "The Old Man and the Sea." All 2 hours and 22 minutes of it.

Heston's voice is compelling. The video version, though, is not.

Jimmy Dean sausages are very tasty sausages. 

When I think of Jimmy Dean, though, I don't necessarily think of sausages. You see, Jimmy Dean was a real country music singer and variety show host in the early 1960s. He founded the Jimmy Dean Foods in the late 1960s, and he turned it into a very successful company before selling it to Sara Lee in 1984 for $80 million.

That's a really nice return on investment for a guy who sang one of those great story songs of the early 1960s about a giant of a miner named Big Bad John.

When I think of Gold Rush, I think of college. Yup -- another Nashville story. About three or four blocks from Vanderbilt's campus, there is a bar/restaurant called The Gold Rush. I know for a fact that I stepped foot in that bar perhaps once or twice during my entire time in Nashville. I really didn't drink that much in college, in large part due to the fact that I needed to keep my money for other pursuits -- frivolous things like food and books.

Anyway, it's not a bad place -- it is just a dive bar where people go to eat a little bit, smoke cigarettes, and watch a scuzzy rock show. If I lived near Vanderbilt today, I'd probably frequent the place (other than the smoking part, it sounds like my kind of bar, to be honest). In college -- wow, no chance.

Not a bad looking card generally. It's odd how the state of the baseball card world was all about those holograms for Upper Deck. As soon as the "chrome" technology came about, though, the hologram was set aside in the same way that that "Sportflics" 3D "technology" went away after the mid-to-late 1980s.

Even stranger is the fact that it appears that Upper Deck whiffed on its first attempt to register its use of the hologram logos that it used on the back of the cards. You remember those home plates, stars, diamonds, and racing flags? Well, their attorneys and Upper Deck tried to go a bit cheap and register those logos all at once under one trademark application. The application was denied for trying to register "an idea or concept, rather than a single mark." I can only imagine that Upper Deck "asked" its lawyers to file a number of other applications at a reduced rate (read as: file it right this time and we won't sue you to get our wasted money back for your first effort) going forward.

All three of these guys were traded by Milwaukee over the past eight months. The Gomez trade really restocked the farm system. The Ramirez trade brought over Yhonathan Barrios, who is now on the 15-day disabled list thanks to an unspecified shoulder injury. 

The Segura trade -- with the Diamondbacks -- was a real head scratcher among people who employ advanced statistical analysis from the Arizona side of the equation. Thankfully, there are still Dave Stewart-types in baseball who think advanced statistical analysis is something people have to "believe in" like Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny. Without folks like old Dave, who will focus on results caused by an overly high BABIP for half a season in 2013 and ignore the reality from 2014 and 2015? 

To be clear, I hope Segura does well for Arizona. Just not as well as Orlando Arcia does for Milwaukee.

And finally, there was this Pacific 2000 "Diamond Leaders" card of Jeff Cirillo, Jeromy Burnitz, Marquis Grissom, and Hideo Nomo. 

Since these guys were the team leaders in 1999, I think of Prince. Of course.

JayP, thanks again for the great cards. Hopefully my rambling did not dissuade you from sending more cards my way!