Congratulations to the Junior Junkie!

I think anyone who knows of T.J. -- the Junior Junkie -- knows that he and his wife recently had a child. 

Brand new #Griffey fan! #walletcard @UpperDeckSports pic.twitter.com/gMzLjjogRM

— The Junior Junkie (@Teejnola) March 23, 2016

To celebrate and in recognition of the fact that time will not be easy to find over the next few months, T.J. sent out a bunch of packages around the blogosphere -- including one to me. Now, I'm a little disappointed that I did not receive one of his badass personal blogger cards on the 1987 Topps design. You know, this one:

For a while in the 1980s, I thought about trying to collect the entire 1987 Topps set in autographed form -- mainly because I like the woodgrain a lot.  I know many disagree, but tough luck -- it's what I liked. 

You know, like this O-Pee-Chee version of Robin Yount that T.J. sent my way.

I have since thought better of that, mainly because there are way too many cards to try to get signed.  So, I would have loved to have gotten one of these. Maybe next time.

Still, it was pretty awesome to get one of those packages from T.J. So, let me help him out a little bit with some ideas for making his child a true Griffey fan.

1.  Nike Air Griffey Max 1 Preschool Shoes from Kids Foot Locker

Sweet looking kicks that keep your child looking stylish and, at the same time, giving props to the first Seattle Mariner in the Hall of Fame.



To go with those badass Nikes, let's go with some Bowman Chrome parallels. We have a Green Axford, a Blue Khrush Davis, and a straight refractor of Johnny Hellweg. None of these guys are with the Brewers any more, as Axford and Davis both are now members of the Oakland Athletics and Hellweg -- who came to Milwaukee as part of the Greinke trade to the Angels -- was released last fall and signed with the Padres.

2. The Requisite Seattle Mariners Onesie

Every baby needs onesies. They are low maintenance, generally, and they are much easier for parents than regular clothes when it comes to changing diapers and getting the little one dressed. Now, I don't have any children, but I was 11 years old when my younger brother was born. So, I have changed my share of diapers and helped little ones get dressed -- and onesies are so much easier than anything else around for the "up to age 2" crowd.





I view these cards as a collecting equivalent of the onesie. They look good in the card sheets, though they don't blow anyone away as being the height of fashion. But a Brewers collector has to have them, just as any parent really has to have the onesie for their kids.

3. Griffey Money?



No, really. A "Junior" dollar that you can buy on Amazon from "Kev's Toys" in Florida for the low price of $11.99 plus $4.49 shipping. I mean, sure, your overall transaction has you paying $16.48 for $1 of value, but you can use the Griffey money to teach kids how to save money. 

"See, son, this is what we call 'a money grab'."



Topps is guilty of engaging in conduct that can charitably be called a money grab. Whether it is endless parallels in every dadgum product that gets put out these days -- like these two Gypsy Queen parallels of Yovani Gallardo from last year -- or their affixing foil stamps to old cards, all of this really does feel like a money grab.

But, yes, I need them and yes, I'll take them and yes, actually, I appreciate these greatly -- especially the silver mini parallel numbered to 199!

4. Moby MLB Edition Wrap Baby Carrier

T.J. will be missing a great opportunity to have his wife represent the Mariners if he doesn't buy this awesome Seattle Mariners teal baby carrier from Bed Bath & Beyond. Only $50!



Every one of these cards is sort of like that baby carrier to me. You won't know you need them till someone points them out to you. Granted, I feel like that baby carrier might be a bit overpriced at $50, so that's why the Prince Fielder Topps Tribute card shows up here -- I have yet to feel like the high-end sets are anything but overpriced hype. 

Sure, some like Tribute, Triple Threads, and Museum Collection -- the ones with base cards included -- tend to be pretty nice cards generally. But, in those products, the base cards always seem like letdowns or afterthoughts to someone trying to buy cards for "value" rather than for "collecting."

5.  Salvino's Baby Bammers Griffey Bear

Another item available from Amazon, but this one is available for just $10.95 with free shipping if you have Amazon Prime! It even comes with an Edgar Martinez bear!

Now, this is something for the real hardcore Mariners fan. It's from 17 years ago, and even then it was really only a knockoff of the real Beanie Babies. I'm not even sure what a Baby Bammer is. I always thought that that term would describe this:

Anyway, the best card to put with this hardcore item for a Mariners fan is to have an item only a hardcore Brewer fan could really appreciate.

An autographed 1974 Topps card of Brewers all-time wins leader, Jim Slaton. As I have mentioned in the past, the Brewers' history with pitchers is not exactly a good one. Slaton has the most wins in franchise history with 117, and he is the only pitcher in club history to throw more than 2000 innings in a Brewers' uniform with 2025-1/3 innings. 

If Slaton had pitched only for Milwaukee, that total would be good enough to put him 427th all-time in innings pitched, 1/3 of an inning behind Johan Santana and Vern Kennedy. Slaton pitched another 658-1/3 innings with other teams, so he's actually 197th all time. That should tell you that the Brewers either don't keep pitchers around generally, or they don't keep the ones they do keep around healthy (see Ted Higuera, for example, or Ben Sheets).

Still, to add a clearly authentic autograph of a guy who is a player collection for me is just awesome.

Thanks, T.J., for the cards and congratulations again on the addition to your family!

Now Is the Time: A Handwritten Post

You can thank Gavin at Baseball Card Breakdown for the illegibility that follows.

Or, should we not believe the hype?

#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!

Cards from #SuperTrader Play at the Plate

I'm a bit behind on seemingly just about everything these days in collecting. I have packages that arrived over two weeks ago that I have not posted. I have at least two packages to put together that I should have gotten to several weeks ago. It's not a fun feeling.  Of course, I feel like I'm always behind when it comes to sending out packages thanks to the generosity so many people have shown toward me. 

Today, I'll be highlighting an envelope I received from veteran Rangers blogger Brian at Play At The Plate. Brian is one of the members of the SuperTrader group, and it had been way too long since he and I had swapped cards. 

Just as my "nom de plume" is either Tony L. or "Off Hiatus", Brian is the Play at the Plate Dude or, on Twitter, @patpdude. So, let's look at the cards that Brian sent my way through the lens of nicknames!

Jenks 

Starting things off unimaginatively, this Phillies website says that Geoff Jenkins's nickname is either "Jenks" or "Brett Favre." I've talked about how he may have been more popular in Milwaukee than he perhaps should have been due to his uncanny likeness, so I'm happy to see that I'm not the only one to think that. I needed this Fleer Authentix card for my PC.  

Also, while I know it's been done before, an insert set with actual ticket stubs (not reprints) that go along with a particularly impressive/important day in a player's career would be quite cool, I think.

Uncle Phil

 

I'm guessing that Prince Fielder got this nickname thanks to his own resemblance of James Avery, who played Uncle Phil on "The Fresh Prince of Bel Air." Do you see it?

Maybe...other than the whole bald-head thing. James Avery died a little over two years ago at the age of 68. So if there ever is a Fresh Prince reboot starring Will Smith's son Jayden, perhaps Prince will take up the reigns as Uncle Phil.

Yankee Super Prospect

Jackson Melian was an incredibly overhyped prospect when he was a part of the Yankees Minor League system in the late 1990s. Before playing a single game and at the age of 17, he was rated the #40 prospect in baseball (all rankings by Baseball America). 

In fairness, he did play acceptably in the Gulf Coast League in 1997 at age 17 (.263/.323/.376), but his ranking then dropped to #98. He moved up to the Southern League in 1998 and hit .255/.322/.353 with a poor stolen base rate (15 steals in 27 attempts). That year saw his stock rise according to BA, with Melian moving up to #72. He moved to Tampa for his age 19 season in the Florida State League, and he showed a more patient batting eye there -- .283/.358/.413. Despite that, he stayed as the #72 prospect. 

The Yankees then shipped him to the Cincinnati Reds for Denny Neagle in what the New York Times called "sticker price" as the Reds gave up Drew Henson, Melian, Ed Yarnell, and Brian Reith. As soon as Melian was traded, he dropped off the prospect charts, never to be seen again there.

Oddly, the folks at Fleer gave Melian a Brewers-logoed card showing him in a Reds uniform -- likely from 2002 spring training. He only played 56 games in the Milwaukee system at Double-A Huntsville in 2002. I had no idea that that was even the case.

The Brewers traded him to the Cubs for a minor-league catcher. Melian never reached the majors, though he played in the Winter League in his home country of Venezuela as recently as 2015.

Junior

I just gave Weeks this nickname today. He doesn't have one listed for him anywhere that I can find. But, perhaps in an effort to sound younger than his 33 years (and, ostensibly, because he had a son that he and his wife named Rickie so he wanted to "keep [the name] alive"), he added the "Junior" to his name this past offseason.  

It's good that there aren't any other famous people nicknamed "Junior," right?

The Professor

This is another made-up nickname, but it fits for reasons I'll describe below. I feel like I've talked about Khalid Ballouli before here, but I guess not. Now I will.

Ballouli was the Brewers 6th round pick in 2002 out of Texas A&M. He pitched in five seasons in the minor leagues for the Brewers but never got higher than Double-A -- and for good reason. His results simply did not show that he should advance. Ballouli continued working on his degree at A&M in the meantime, and he graduated from there the same year he was released by the Brewers -- 2006. He earned his master's degree in 2008 and his Ph.D in 2011 -- all from A&M. 

Currently, and as the link above shows, he is an Assistant Professor in Sport and Entertainment Management at the University of South Carolina. He teaches "Sport and Entertainment Marketing," "Sport Media in Live Entertainment and Sport," and "Research Methods and Applied Statistics." I have to admit that his field of study is really interesting to me, though I've never taken a single business class in my life. Maybe that's why it's interesting.

The Kid


The highlight of the envelope from Brian came with the inclusion of the "Ultimate Star Materials" relic card of Robin Yount. I needed it for my Robin Yount collection, so that was an excellent addition.

But, I have to take issue a bit with Baseball Reference saying that Yount's nickname was "The Kid." Yes, he was called that from time to time. But those of us in Milwaukee in the late 1970s/early 1980s really did not call him that. To us, he was "Rockin' Robin," complete with that 1958 song from Bobby Day of the same name.

None of that Michael Jackson remake for us. We want that old-school stuff.

Brian/PATPDude, thank you very much for the great cards, for #SuperTrading, and especially for the Yount Relic!