Blog Bat Around, Part II: The Brewers

As I mentioned yesterday, I decided to take part in the Torren' Up Cards Blog Bat Around in two parts. Yesterday, I put together my "non-Brewers" list. As I was thinking about my post last night after reading it and some others, I realized that I had some pretty glaring omissions from both my autograph team and my honorable mentions. 

First, I definitely messed up on my starting pitcher. It's not that Bert Blyleven is not worthy of being listed there. Neither, for that matter, would Don Sutton have been improper to list. But, I failed to recall one of the items that I got in the midst of my war with Wes back in 2015: a Warren Spahn autographed ball:

As good as Blyleven and Sutton are, they are not as good as Warren Spahn. That was a major omission on my part.

Second, while he would not supplant Tom Kelly for the managerial position, I neglected to mention my JSA-certified Eddie Mathews manager card from 1974 in the honorable mention section:

In addition, I should have added Ted Simmons to the catcher honorable mention since my autograph of him is on a St. Louis Cardinals card. Similarly, I have a couple of Rob Deer autographs of him on the San Francisco Giants, so he should have been an honorable mention in the outfield. Also, I know I have a Johnny Logan autograph here, so he should be a shortstop honorable mention.

Finally, in going through the various programs I have accumulated over the years, a few of them have autographs too. I don't remember them all, so I'm not going to say who I missed. But I missed those guys. I know I have Tommy John in a program next to Bowie Kuhn and Bud Selig, for instance.

Okay, enough errata. On to the Brewers Autograph team!

Catcher: B.J. Surhoff

Surhoff getting drafted overall in the 1985 draft was a big deal in Milwaukee, as you would expect. The Brewers were terrible in 1984 -- some of which can be blamed on Paul Molitor having Tommy John Surgery and the rest of which can be blamed on the core of the 1982 team all getting old and injured at the same time. For whatever reason, the Brewers drafted Surhoff as a catcher -- probably due to that being a position of need in the organization -- over Will Clark, Barry Larkin, Barry Bonds, and Rafael Palmeiro, among others. Also going in that first round were Bobby Witt, Pete Incaviglia, Chris Gwynn, Tommy Greene, Willie Fraser, Brian McRae, Gregg Jefferies, and Joey Cora. 

At least the Brewers weren't the White Sox. They drafted Kurt Brown, a high school catcher who never made it past Triple-A.

Surhoff edges out Jonathan Lucroy here because I got the Surhoff in person, and the Lucroy was just a Topps certified autograph. That matters to me. 

Honorable Mention: Dave Nilsson, Bill Schroeder, Ned Yost, Rick Dempsey, Johnny Estrada, Rick Cerone, Charlie Moore, Jonathan Lucroy

Guy I wish I had an Autograph for: Ted Simmons as a Brewer

First Base: Cecil Cooper

The Brewers and Red Sox made a fair number of trades with one another in the early 1970s. Perhaps the Red Sox thought that they could create a farm-club set up in the way that the Yankees of the early 1960s did with the Kansas City A's. In any event, the Red Sox had Yastrzemski at first base and put Cooper at DH. Then the Sox sent the soon to be 27-year-old Cooper to Milwaukee in exchange for 33-year-old George Scott after the 1976 season. Scott turned in a very good season in 1977 but then at age 34 fell off the table in 1978. Cooper was just getting started.

For a long time in the early 1980s, Cooper was a difficult autograph to get. He just wanted to get home after games and did not want to hang out signing autographs. Eventually, in the midst of his last year in Milwaukee in 1987 -- when the team kept him on the roster without ever playing him after mid-July -- he did a signing at Mayfair Mall. Nearly every Cooper autograph I have was from that day.

Honorable Mention: Greg Brock, Lyle Overbay, John Jaha, Billy Jo Robidoux, Antone Williamson, Kevin Barker, Matt Clark.

Guys I wish I had an autograph for: Prince Fielder (tons of relics, no autos), George Scott, Johnny Briggs

Second Base: Jim Gantner

As the local boy on the team after the 1983 season finally saw Jerry Augustine's albatross-like contract come off the books, Gantner was the guy that a lot of kids related to. They didn't idolize him, certainly, since Gantner was just a good player and not a great like Robin Yount or Paul Molitor. Gantner took his role seriously, though, and signed autographs after practically every game I ever attended and tried to get autographs. 

This slot came down to Gantner and Rickie Weeks. My nostalgia won out.

Honorable Mention: Rickie Weeks, Ron Belliard, Juan Castillo, Fernando Viña, Hernan Iribarren

Guys I wish I had an autograph for: Pedro Garcia, Willie Randolph, Scooter Gennett

Shortstop: Robin Yount

The only questions with Yount were (a) which autograph I'd use and (b) at what position he would appear in this team. I chose shortstop because he was better in 1982 as MVP than he was in 1989 as MVP in centerfield, and I felt like having Gorman Thomas on the team. 

This autograph is on one of the team-issued photo sets from the early 1980s. I got it at a signing that Yount and Molitor did together at a shoe store in 1983. I remember Molitor's first wife Linda hovering over both of them as they signed autographs. The line was incredibly long, so to increase the number of people who could get autographs, the store had Yount sign these to hand out instead.

As a position for the Brewers, shortstop has been a position of bright, short-lived stars. A lot of guys have been the next big star at short for Milwaukee, and most of those guys were pushed out the door or fell on their face, unfortunately.

Honorable Mention: Jean Segura, Ernest Riles, Orlando Arcia, Fred Stanley, Ed Romero, Rob Picciolo, Bill Spiers, Pat Listach

Guys I wish I had an autograph for: J.J. Hardy, Craig Counsell

Third Base: Jeff Cirillo

This is the first autograph on this team that I did not obtain myself in person. I got this Cirillo from Matt Prigge, a fellow Brewers collector and the purveyor of the Summer of '74 Blog. Cirillo was one of the few bright lights in the morass that was the late 1990s Sal Bando-assembled Brewers. Sal Bando lost a lot of my respect for him during that time. I've heard that he got therapy because he lost my respect, though that's just a rumor.

I put Cirillo in here rather than Paul Molitor because Molitor could literally have slotted in at half the positions on this team and reached his pinnacle at DH rather than playing a position.

Honorable Mention: Dale Sveum, Randy Ready, Roy Howell, Bill Hall, Kevin Seitzer, Don Money

Guys I Wish I had an Autograph for: Tommy Harper, Sal Bando, Aramis Ramirez

Left Field: Ryan Braun

Braun is reviled around the league thanks to his steroid use and, more terribly, his lying about it and halfway ruining a guy's life after the protocols for handling his test samples (that came out positive) were not followed. That said, Braun is a good player. He's into the point of his career where injuries are keeping him off the field for 20-30 games a season. Yet, he's reaching major milestones now, having just surpassed 1,000 RBI for his career.

He'll never make the Hall of Fame, nor do I think he should based on where his numbers project to finish. Yet he will be one of the best players in Brewers history for a long time to come.

Honorable Mention:  Ben Oglivie, Glenn Braggs, Mike Felder, Drew Anderson, Kevin Mench, Carlos Lee, Geoff Jenkins, Jim Paciorek, Greg Vaughn

Guys I wish I had an autograph for: Johnny Briggs, Danny Walton

Center Field: Gorman Thomas

I never got Gorman Thomas's autograph in person. He was a baseball gym rat and loved being in the locker room around other baseball guys, according to Daniel Okrent's Nine Innings. For autograph hounds in the 1980s, that meant we never saw him. He arrived 4 or 5 hours before the game and then hung out in the locker room after the game drinking beer. So, he avoided all of us little kids. So, that means I end up having to get his signature through later cards like this Panini Hometown Heroes set.

Honorable Mention: Lewis Brinson, Logan Schafer, Rick Manning, Scott Podsednik, David Hulse, Michael Reed, Carlos Gomez

Guys I wish I had an autograph for: Mike Cameron, Brady Clark, Marquis Grissom, Darryl Hamilton, Von Joshua, Davey May

Right Field: Corey Hart

Going by statistics, Hart is outshined by Jeromy Burnitz for the right field slot. To me, there is something that is attractive about the fact that Hart came up in the Brewers system and was a key cog in Milwaukee's winning in the late 2000s and early 2010s. That's as opposed to Burnitz, who piled up big stats in the steroid era on legitimately terrible teams. Winning matters.

Honorable Mention: Dion James, Mark Brouhard, Matt Mieske, Brett Phillips, Marshall Edwards, Rob Deer, Jeromy Burnitz

Guys I wish I had an autograph for: Sixto Lezcano, Nori Aoki, Domingo Santana

Designated/Pinch Hitter: Paul Molitor

Molitor has to be included on this team, of course. Molitor was the guy I most liked as a player as a kid. During his fifteen years in Milwaukee, Molitor did not pitch or catch, but he played in games everywhere else: 131 games at first, 400 games at second, 792 games at third, 57 games at short, 4 games in left, 42 in center, and 4 games in right -- along with 418 games as a DH, 22 games as a pinch hitter, and 4 games as a pinch runner. After leaving Milwaukee, he only played DH and first. Of course, he left at the age of 36.

I'm just glad that he did not sign a pro baseball contract directly out of high school. I would have hated Paul Molitor as a St. Louis Cardinal.

Honorable Mention: Larry Hisle

Guys I wish I had an Autograph for: Dave Parker, Dick Davis, Julio Franco, Hank Aaron

Starting Pitching

While the team that Kenny called for had just one starter, I decided to include four starters. The Brewers do not have a history of strong starters, but I have a lot of autographs so four it is.

SP1: Ted Higuera

The biggest shame about Ted Higuera's career is that he did not get into US baseball early enough. He made his debut in Milwaukee in 1985 at the age of 27 despite pitching with his hometown Juarez team starting in 1979. If only the scouting system were a little better, perhaps Ted could have been in the bullpen for the 1982 team at the age of 24 to help out when Rollie Fingers went down.

Oh, who am I kidding, though? Harry Dalton would have flipped him to the Astros instead of Frank DiPino probably.

One thing I always liked about Higuera's autograph is the fact that he did not anglicize his autograph. His real name is Teodoro Valenzuela Higuera (yes, his mother's maiden name was Valenzuela) so his autograph was always "Teo Higuera" rather than "Ted".

SP2: Yovani Gallardo

I was disappointed when Gallardo did not pitch well enough this spring to make the Brewers. That disappointment was completely selfish, because I was hoping to add a few more new cards to my Gallardo collection. Instead, he ended up in the Reds bullpen as batting practice fodder for hitters wanting to improve their statistics before the Reds dropped him like he's hot. Shortly after, the Rangers signed him to a minor league deal.

The Brewers pretty much sucked the life out of Gallardo's arm toward the greater good of winning divisional championships and the wild card. His stats have been in decline for several years now. It's tough to believe that he is only 32 years old, having turned 32 in February. 

SP3: Mike Caldwell

Mr. F**king Warmth. So named sarcastically for his surly overall demeanor by his teammates, Mike Caldwell actually was usually pretty nice to me. Caldwell was the workhorse of those late 1970s and early 1980s Brewers teams. There was never an "ace" for those teams, but Caldwell was as close as it got. He owned the Yankees, and his 1978 was a masterpiece of pitching -- as he threw nearly 300 innings and completed twenty-three games of his 34 starts AND had 6 shutouts AND even added a save for good measure. 

His falling off the map ability-wise in 1983 and 1984, getting really old really fast, helped accelerate the team's decline into the abyss in 1984. 

SP4: Ben Sheets

Sheets had pinpoint control matched with great swing-and-miss stuff. He holds the Brewers team record for most strikeouts in a game with 18, racked up against the Atlanta Braves in 2004. His curve just dropped off the table and befuddled hitters. The ever obnoxious Chris Berman even compared the curve to Bert Blyleven's -- the gold standard of curveballs. So many of those strikeouts were on curves that bounced. So those balls looked tantalizing enough to hit but were nowhere near hittable. 

His pitching is just fun to watch, if you can find some YouTube videos to do it.

Honorable Mention: Ray Peters, Tim Leary, Chris Bosio, Mike Birkbeck, Bill Wegman, Juan Nieves, Jaime Cocanower, Pete Vuckovich, Chris Capuano, Ben Hendrickson, Nick Neugebauer, Johnny Hellweg, Chuck Porter, Steve Woodard, Mike Fiers, Ricky Bones, Jimmy Nelson, Taylor Jungmann, Danny Darwin, Jim Slaton, Moose Haas, Tom Candiotti

Guys I wish I had an autographs for: Lew Krausse, Marty Pattin, Jim Colborn, Bill Travers, Scott Karl, Cal Eldred, Jaime Navarro, Zack Greinke, Kyle Davies, Junior Guerra, Brent Suter, Hideo Nomo, Doug Davis, C.C. Sabathia, Gene Brabender

Right Handed Reliever: Mark Clear

Watching Mark Clear pitch during his time in Milwaukee was mesmerizing. He was so thin -- just look at him in that photo! -- and having his stirrups showing the way he did emphasized how tall he was too. And, when it comes to good curveballs, Clear is right up there. He couldn't always get it over the plate, but man did it break. 

Clear is nowhere near the best righty reliever in Brewers history. He just as easily could have been listed under closers here too. But he was one of the most enjoyable middle/late inning relievers to watch thanks to that curve.

Honorable Mention: Jorge Lopez, Pete Ladd, Carlos Villanueva, Jose Capellan, Bill Castro, Bob Gibson (the white one), Chris Demaria, Tom Tellmann

Guys I wish I had an autograph for: Chuck Crim, Eduardo Rodriguez, Jeremy Jeffress, Todd Coffey, David Weathers, Danny Frisella

Left Handed Reliever: Dan Plesac

I'm cheating again here to get Plesac into this team. Plesac is still the Brewers all-time leader in saves with 133, and he is also the all-time pitching appearances leader for the team with 365. He finished 269 games and even started 14, so he pitched more in non-save situations than in save situations. That's my excuse -- he was never a pure closer.

After being drafted out of N.C. State in 1983, Plesac came up at the age of 24 in 1986, so he was 10 years older than me. He was another Midwest kid, which is probably why I gravitated toward him. He won 10 games and saved 14 in his first season in the major leagues before taking over as closer through 1990 and making the All-Star team three times. He lost the closer job in 1990 thanks to a spike in his walk rate from 2.5/9 innings up to 4.0/9 innings. He left Milwaukee after the 1992 season and became a LOOGY, finally retiring at the age of 41 in 2003.

Honorable Mention: Jerry Augustine, Rick Waits, Josh Hader, Will Smith, Graeme Lloyd, Mike Potts, Wei Chung Wang, Ray Searage, John Morris

Guys I wish I had an autograph for: Mitch Stetter, Bob McClure, Jesse Orosco, Valerio de Los Santos

Closer: Rollie Fingers

When life gives you a Hall of Famer, you do not look that gift horse in the mouth. You employ the Hall of Famer. I know Rollie gets a lot of love in Milwaukee and rightfully so. But, to me, he's not a Brewer. He's an Oakland A, having spent 9 years of his career there. Plus, I'm not sure I've forgiven him for screwing up his elbow in 1982 so that the team had to use Pete Ladd as the closer in the World Series.

Even so, Rollie was the Cy Young and MVP as a closer. It's tough to top that. 

Honorable Mention: Dan Plesac, Mike Fetters, Corey Knebel, Doug Jones

Guys I wish I had an autograph for: Bob Wickman, Dan Kolb, Trevor Hoffman, Ken Sanders, Doug Henry, John Axford, Francisco Rodriguez, Francisco Cordero, Curt Leskanic

Front Office/Managers:

The Dalton Gang changed the franchise in the mid-1970s, and Harry Dalton and George Bamberger are inextricably linked as a result. Dalton is the only GM for which I have an autograph.

Honorable Mention: Managers: Buck Rodgers, Tom Trebelhorn

Coaches: Dave Garcia, Herm Starrette, Andy Etchebarren, Tony Muser

Guys I wish I had an autograph for: Doug Melvin, Frank Lane, Marvin Milkes, David Stearns, Davey Lopes, Phil Garner, Ron Roenicke, Ned Yost as Manager, Harvey Kuenn as Manager, Del Crandall, Dave Bristol, Joe Schultz, Alex Grammas, Jerry Royster, Jim Lefebvre, Cal McLish, Rod Carew, Rich Dauer, Robin Yount as a coach, Don Baylor, Frank Howard

All in all, this isn't a bad team. It's been just as fun for me to see who I would like to get some autographs from as well. 

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. 

Johnny's Trading Spot #SuperTrader Debut

As many of you know, the man whose force of will helped create the SuperTraders group last year -- Wes a/k/a Jaybarkerfan -- decided to leave his creation behind and focus entirely on getting every Josh Willingham card ever. Just call him, "Willinghammer Rising!"

As a result, the man who loves looking at shadows for Sunday silliness -- Johnny of Johnny's Trading Spot -- took over as the Braves SuperTrader. To introduce himself to the group, he sent out Priority Mailers. Well, at least that's what I got. 

To honor John's favorite silliness, let's look at the inserts and parallels he sent to me accompanied by songs only the Shadow will know. Or, rather, songs about shadows. I don't think I've heard of any of these songs before, so I'm hearing them for the first time too.

"Prakriti" by The Shadows

So, have you ever wondered what Candlebox or maybe *shudder* Nickelback would sound like if they sang in Nepali? I'm pretty sure this is it. The Shadows are known as Nepal's first hard rock band, and they hail from Narayangarh, Chitwan, Nepal. 

I haven't the foggiest idea what they are saying. Apparently, though, they are known and are popular due to their lyrics discussing social issues. 

Let's start this post with first basemen. The top card is from the 1994 Upper Deck Major League Baseball 125th Anniversary set, and it's the special foil stamped parallel of Cecil Cooper. I have not seen too many of these cards -- read as: no others that I can recall -- so this was a pretty awesome card to get.

On the bottom, it's a Prince Fielder Upper Deck insert from 2006 and a Topps Attax code card from 2010. Ah yes, 2005/2006...those halcyon days when the Brewers had prospects that were forcing their way quickly into the major leagues -- and I hope those days return soon. Prince was one of the first to get there and made his presence known in a big way. 

"In the Shadows" by The Rasmus

Here's an alternative rock band that somehow escaped my notice in 2003. The band is called The Rasmus. The song isn't too bad -- it's pretty generic alt-rock from a band from Finland, though, so maybe I missed it by the fact I was busy in 2003 getting indoctrinated into Manchester United soccer (that's the year I really became a fan).

That said, with the name of this band, it's almost like my random word search forced me into covering current events here, what with all the kerfuffle about Colby Rasmus's neckbeard making its way into baseball Twitter today. 

Personally, I don't see the big deal.

Going the other direction here, we have the perpetually clean-shaven Teddy Higuera. The Studio card is one of those promo cards. Next to it, of course, we have a Score Gold Rush card -- which were too numerous to presage fully Topps's conversion to the serial numbered gold parallel standard several years later. But, that gold background is only okay -- it's a little too tough to know whether Higuera is pitching on Tatooine or in Cleveland for my taste.

Finally, we have a sticker-back from 1989. For player collectors, these sticker backs are great and completely frustrating for the same reason: how many variations of each back are there? I mean, I know Higuera has at least 4 or 5 variations of which stickers are on the other side. My problem is that I have no idea how many total there are. This is good for my Yount collection though -- increased possibility of adding to it based on the variation.

"Apache" by The Shadows

I think this song appeared in every Western film from 1960 through about 1985, or at least a variation of it. The Shadows are revered by fans of what I would call "proper" country & western music (as opposed to the "Contemporary Country" stuff that is on the radio today) -- the band's rockabilly sensibilities shine through. It feels like tumbleweeds should roll through when this song is playing.

The band also served the backing band for English rock legend Sir Cliff Richard. Richard is huge in England, but he's barely received any notice here in the United States. The Shadows' collaboration with Richard ended in 2009's Golden Anniversary tour in the UK.

Speaking of gold...and silver and metallic and rainbow foils, here are some mid-1990s (and one early 2000s) parallels all gilded up and ready for review. When card companies figured out a way to stick foil everywhere on cards, suddenly everyone everywhere did it.

I'm thinking that there are a couple of innovations coming in the near future to cards. First, I'm waiting for the first high-end GIF cards -- maybe a minute long GIF that has a small solar panel on it to charge a microbattery (you know, like the ones Evan Musk is developing). Second, a similar microbattery card will be produced with the player's voice to tell stories. If it's a super high-end card, perhaps it will include wifi access to update the stories.

Not sure I'd buy either of these creations, but I could see it happen.

"Shadows" by Sabrina Carpenter

Sabrina Carpenter is someone I've never heard of, but that's because I don't have kids to make me watch Disney movies or listen to Radio Disney. She is a 17-year-old actress/singer whose voice sounds similar to many of the other former Disney stars. 

To be quite honest, this song surprised me in how easily it got stuck in my head. It's a well-crafted pop song -- the background music doesn't detract from her voice, and she has what seems like an excellent voice. Of course, who knows how much studio help her voice gets, but it sounds like she can really sing.

To go with a song that surprised me greatly -- I was guessing that I almost certainly wouldn't like it -- here are four very random cards. Jeromy Burnitz is in the midst of a silver Pacific Revolution. It's a card my cat Gus loves, because he loves to chase reflected light spots around the room.

Then, we have two Cal Eldreds -- a Virtual Reality parallel, and a Team 2000 insert. That Team 2000 insert reminds me: I had the 2000 Edition of Baseball Prospectus out recently and read the Brewers section. This section may have colored my view of the Sal-Bando-led Brewers somewhat. Here's what it said about Eldred:

The second poor decision was Phil Garner's sacrifice of Cal Eldred. . . . It's hard to remember how good Eldred was, but when he came up he was a better pitcher than Alex Fernandez. There was every reason to expect Eldred would grow into a staff ace, the kind of guy who makes the job of building a solid rotation almost easy. But Garner couldn't wait for it to happen. Everyone rushed to call him a genius in 1992, so he had to keep putting up a good front. Eldred's career was sacrificed in the seventh and eighth innings of his starts during meaningless 1993 and 1994 seasons, where the only goal was satisfying Phil Garner's sense of self-worth.

Harsh. But true. The whole chapter on the Brewers is a horrible reminder of the days that were the second half of the 1990s in Milwaukee baseball.

"Shadows" by Lindsey Sterling

I am not sure how dubstep and the violin work together, but Lindsey Stirling sort of makes it work. She was a quarterfinalist on season 5 of America's Got Talent, but Piers Morgan and Sharon Osbourne shot down her hopes and dreams by saying that she simply wasn't good enough to dance and play violin at the same time and that it would not fill a theater in Vegas. 

She also teamed with the Atlanta Music Project in 2013 to spread music appreciation to children who might not otherwise have the chance. I'm not sure how well that went, but hey, she's trying.

This cluster of four cards will finish off this post. On top is just a really well-done card. I like the black and white background with Dave Nilsson in the foreground in color. It just works. 

The middle cards -- a Skybox of Nilsson and one of the Gold Label variants (I think it's a Type 2 or Row 2 or whatever the hell weird nomenclature those used) of Jeromy Burnitz. That uniform of him throwing, though, looks fake to me.

Finally, we close with a Robin. I finally got my hands on a Leaf base-set checklist with Robin on it. Seriously, it took me nearly three years of collecting to get this card. I have no idea why it took that long.

Thanks to John, though, that search is over. As always, my deepest thanks go out to John for the cards and to all of you for reading.

Another Trade Post from Not Another Baseball Card Blog

Before I introduce some cool cards I received from Mike at Not Another Baseball Card Blog, I heard some very sad news today. Hobby legend Bob Lemke passed away today. 

For those of you who do not know that name, Mr. Lemke was the Editor for the final version of which I am aware of the bible of cards, the 2011 Standard Catalog of Baseball Cards. He also edited the Standard Catalog of Vintage Baseball Cards, which was published in October of 2011 and the Standard Catalog of Minor League Cards, which does not appear to have been updated since It came out in 2000. For many years, he worked for Krausse Publications in Iola, Wisconsin -- the publishers of Sports Collectors Digest and Baseball Cards Magazine -- and his Wisconsin background showed itself regularly in the custom cards he made available through his information-packed blog. His knowledge about all things in our hobby and his proselytizing for the hobby will be missed.

After that somber note, the only appropriate way to respond is to be reverential. Mike from NABCB sent me a number of Canadian cards that I needed for my various team sets and player collections along with some Pacific Legends -- for which I think I now have a complete Milwaukee Braves set.

Let's start with the Pacific Legends



The Pacific Legends set is a concept that I feel like should be brought back by someone other than Topps to highlight the stars of the 1970s and 1980s. I don't trust Topps to do it -- we'd probably end up with 12 variations of Dave Collins and Dale Berra on the Yankees and then one card of Lloyd Moseby to represent the Blue Jays.

But doesn't that sound like a good idea? 

If you look at the list of players who were featured in the original sets, it is a hodgepodge of players from all through baseball history and of varying abilities. It's got everyone from Ty Cobb and Eddie Mathews to Ed Kranepool and Gary Peters. 

I feel like a set of nostalgia like this could do well. I mean, we don't need another set with Paul Molitor and Robin Yount in it, but would you say no if Molitor and Yount and Brett and Gossage were joined by Chris Chambliss, Steve Balboni, Willie Mays Aikens, Lonnie Smith, Vince Coleman, Joe Charbonneau, Mel Hall, Greg Walker, Mickey Rivers, Oddibe McDowell, Jody Davis, Eric Davis, George Bell, Charlie Lea, and Bob Welch?

Archives started out like this, but Topps gave up on that concept quickly and started adding more current players/rookies to drive sales. It's too bad.

Why in the world would I put up two Fleer 1990 cards -- especially a checklist? Because these two cards were the final two Fleer Canadian cards that I needed to complete my team set. I happened across an eBay seller who had two team sets at a reasonable price, so I bought them. It was easier than having to turn over literally every single 1990 Fleer card I ever see to check for "PTD IN CANADA" on the back. Mike happened to have these last two cards that did not come in the team set, and so he sent them to me.

Proving that guys that make the major leagues are special -- especially if they are from a small town -- George Canale was honored in May of 2016 by Cave Spring High School by having his jersey retired. Canale is a Virginia Tech legend, having set the Tech record for career homers (76) and RBI for the Hokies during his three seasons there (1984-1986). Canale retired after the 1999 season and owns a batting cage facility in the Roanoke, Virginia area.



See, here are two guys who should be in that 80s Legends set. Ted Higuera won 20 games in his second season in the majors -- completing 15 games in the process and finishing second in the Cy Yount Award voting behind Roger Clemens's 24-4 season. Funny thing: according to WAR on Baseball-Reference, Higuera was 0.5 wins better than Clemens even though Roger was a unanimous winner.

B.J. Surhoff had a long career in the majors -- 19 years, in fact -- and finished his career with 2326 hits. Perhaps if he had gotten more playing time in Atlanta in 2000-2002 and not been a catcher for much of his early career he would have had a better start offensively and gotten to those major milestones. 



And finally, we have almost certainly the least interesting O-Pee-Chee cards to have ever come out -- the 1990 versions. Keeping the Topps logos on the front and being different only by the occasional "Now With" notation on the front along with the bilingual backs, 1990 O-Pee-Chee really just mailed it in. 

I will say, though, that Jerry Reuss and perhaps Bill Krueger also should have places in that 1980s Legends series I'm advocating for. 

Krueger is an interesting case -- almost certainly he stayed in the major leagues as long as he did because he threw left-handed. He didn't make it to the majors until he was 25, but he stayed until he was 37. In that time, he played for Oakland, the Dodgers, the Brewers, the Mariners, the Twins, Montreal, Detroit, San Diego, and back to Seattle and split his time almost evenly between starting and relieving. He was both more accomplished and more nondescript than I had ever recalled.

And that is saying something.

Perhaps Chris Bosio should be in the 90s Legends version instead. 

Mike, thank you very much for plugging up some gaps in my Canadian baseball card collections -- it is much appreciated.