Birds of a Feather

They flock together. Just ask @forgotaboutblay -

Mega Michigan fan (and Detroit Tigers, don't forget!) Dennis of Too Many Manninghams/Verlanders may have outdone himself this time. In this latest (let's just pretend it's recent) package was a nearly constant parade of autographed cards, something I'm still trying to adjust to now that it's been a couple of months. There were quite a few Ducks alums in the batch, and these usually get held over for a future "Good Luck Ducks" post. Since we're getting closer to year-end, I thought I'd do a blowout on these and show off all the scans that I made so I can start fresh next season. (I did hold out one card from this stellar package for the Rose Bowl.)

Josh Huff was a great all-purpose player (i.e. he was really fast) in his time with the Ducks, and it was cool to see him suit up for my pro team of choice. He got into some legal trouble in recent years, but is still playing professionally... just not in the NFL any longer.

Jeremiah Johnson is always going to remind me of the late '00s college football video game franchises that sadly no longer exist. He played second fiddle to Jonathan Stewart for quite awhile, but he was really good in his way. Since people are actually seriously talking about opening up compensation for college athletes now, I suppose we could eventually see licensed college sports video games become a thing again... maybe?

LaMichael James! I just wish the 49ers didn't instinctively make me feel like throwing up my dinner.

I don't remember James wearing #17 at any point, especially considering that it's more of a wide receiver number. Is this some other guy?

This is a very intricately designed card. It's actually hollow in the middle, apparently. I should probably have more of these, even if (non-college) football isn't really my thing.

I don't really want to talk about what's happened with Mariota and his pro team at this point, so let's check out this really cool die cut insert that features him as a Duck. I was never a huge fan of the feathers on the helmet (uniforms are one of the only places where I turn into a traditionalist), but this card makes them look good. This is a sneaky candidate for my favorite card of the package, despite the fact that it's one of the few that isn't numbered, signed or embedded with some piece of a thing.

Rolls Royce! I wish there was an NFL Red Zone type channel that catered specifically to players from my college of choice, because I just don't care that much about the actual games. (I say this, and yet I'll probably watch my share of playoff games anyway.)

And with this Jack Clark Starting Lineup card, we are officially done with football (for this post, anyway.) Is everyone okay with that? Do you even think this is a baseball card blog anymore?

Here's one for the more-bang-for-the-buck Panini Leather & Lumber set. They sold blasters of this stuff which only contained something like 10 cards for the normal $19.99 price. For this reason, I am going to covet the base cards I need, like this one of Matt Carpenter.

I hadn't seen any gold minis from the 2016 Gypsy Queen set before, but there's always a first time for anything. With Marcell Ozuna's imminent departure, the Cards could certainly use a guy like Piscotty again.

Shiny Waino?! Is it really Christmas? (No, it --was-- October.) This is great, though.

Finally, we swing back to that same Panini Leather & Lumber set, with what Panini came up with as a suitable replacement for those old Upper Deck Sweet Swatch autographs that always used to fade into oblivion. Hopefully Panini got these guys to sign these chunks of baseballs with better pens... or maybe these aren't really baseball chunks at all. In any case, these look really cool (despite the lack of licensing and tiny photo) and I hope to track down more like this soon.