A Trade Fit for a King

I may have messed with royalty with my latest trade. I worked out a deal with The Diamond King and, shockingly, still haven't sent my end of the deal yet. I really hate doing these kinds of posts but I am so far behind that I am hoping my posting this will motivate me to actually get the return package in the mail. The smaller trades I've been pretty on top of lately, but I've struggled lately to get the bigger packages out the door. I keep telling myself that if I just take some time off from work I will get all of this done, but...

Oh, sorry. Hi. You don't want to hear my excuses. You just want to see the cards. I received some shockingly nice vintage from The King, including this late period Lou Brock card. I really need to work on my older Cardinals wants (pre-1980) but... there's that whole time crunch thing.

Even better? Check out this Gibby card. I love it. Gibson had already amassed more than 200 victories by the time this card came out. This is a good one.

Cody Haerther was a 6th round pick in 2002, but he failed to crack the majors. He finally reached the AAA club in 2008. Someone at Topps must have decided that Haerther was about to have a big break in 2005 because I received not one but two "first year" cards of his from that season.

Here's a goldie. There are tons of goldies in this year's Update set, in case you didn't know. And I like goldies. You can send them to me, if you'd like.

Here's one of those fancy pants Chrome cards from the Heritage line. Or perhaps this was a Heritage card in the Chrome set. How would I even know?

It's a new card for the Ozzie binder. That's right: I have a binder full of Ozzies.

Shelby Miller was relegated to backup mop-up guy duty (and emergency starter?) in the playoffs this year. He may get a shot at the rotation next year, especially if Jaime Garcia isn't fully recovered from his recent injury woes.

This was the impetus of the trade, a certified autograph of the Cards' current starting second baseman. Descalso has a nice arm but a questionable glove and isn't the most gifted at the plate. Still, I am comfortable with him as long he's buried somewhere very deep in the lineup.
 

I also received a very nice stack of Portland Trail Blazers cards, including this pretty sweet team card from my want list. You can barely see him, but there's a flash of the old Bullets jerseys in the photo on the right. The current Washington Wizards jerseys were modeled after that look.

I guess Upper Deck has been in the "predictor" game for quite awhile. I have a feeling "Uncle Cliffy" scored 35 points in a game that year at some point, though I don't feel like looking it up. He was quite an offensive force in the '90s.

This is just ridiculous. There's a lot going on here. Martell is an ex-Blazer I root for. He's dealt with some nagging injuries over the years and failure to meet up to lofty draft expectations, but he's still young. (And doesn't that sound like every Blazers player drafted in the last 5-10 years or so?)