A Post-Election Day PWE Roundup

Counting those ballots with @dvdgao @BucsHere and more! 

 

Let's just say we're going on two days now of being on the edge of our seats. In the mean time, let's check out a few small envelopes that came in back in August, which both seems like yesterday and far away at the same time.

Fellow Cards fan David hit me back with an eclectic mix of cards (and some cool Cardinal stationary) after he snagged a spot in my last free group break here. I'd like to squeeze at least one more of those in before the end of the year, considering that we're still in a mostly "stuck at home" situation and certain card supplies have come down to slightly more reasonable prices of late. Melancon was another set need (i.e. non-Cardinals need.)

Every once in awhile a Bowman Draft card will surprise me, and you can count this card among them. This is primarily because I have no idea who Nick Dunn is. This is kind of cool, because Topps (and, sure, Panini) tends to put the same five prospects in all of their products, which is super annoying. There are a lot of baseball players out there!

Upper Deck had put out it's Victory set for a few years at this point as what I understand to be another budget priced offering that sort of continued on when Collector's Choice was ended. This final set from 2003 decided to be printed in the TCG/CCG style for some reason. I think there might have been a game here as well, but it wasn't very obvious. This is one of the apparently short-printed subset cards.

Here's a Chrome refractor of the former Cardinals closer celebrating with the hopefully not former Cardinals catcher. Great card, though.

Prizm's version of refractors are officially called Prizms, which is confusing because the set is (sometimes) called Prizm. So technically, this is a Prizm Prizm. That never caught on, though, so most people call them Silver now... which is not any less confusing considering the cards are, by default, silver in appearance. I hate Panini.

Next up are a couple of really nice parallels from Kevin of The Diamond King. I've never been a big fan of pink cards, but the Pink Fireworks design is just crazy enough that it sort of works.

Although the fireworks are nothing to sneeze at, I was really blown away with this numbered-to-25 orange Matt Carpenter card from the 2017 Topps Gallery set. The art is actually... impressive?! Using the old Bowman design here probably helps it a bit.

The last but certainly not least power packed envelope came from The Bucs Stop Here. This one came chockful of set needs, including last year's Allen & Ginter offering.

Giraffe Calf! It rhymes, and it's cute! I have been really fascinated with baby animals that look almost exactly like miniature versions of their parent animals lately for some weird reason. (See also: elephants.) I've also spent a fair amount of my Saturday mornings this year watching BBC America, which turns into an all-day animal show extravaganza.

Trevor Bauer is surely some kind of wonder.

My big priority set for the year has unfortunately fallen by the wayside a bit, but it's still nice to document a few more pickups from the 2020 Turkey Red project. I haven't looked into whether or not this is continuing into the soon-to-be-released Update set, but I lost a lot of steam when Series 2 blasters became scarce. Stupid LouBob.

These Cardinal Turkey Reds are heading straight to the team binders, though. Actually, Ozzie has his own binder. He gets special treatment apparently.

Allen & Ginter is Coming, Eventually...

Cards from the venerable retro themed set courtesy of @nightowlcards have me contemplating what I want to keep collecting. 

Every year, part of me hopes that the Allen & Ginter set is canceled, just to let me breathe a little and save some books. Don't get me wrong -- I still really like the cards for the most part. But here in 2020, with the likelihood of me finding cards on shelves anywhere hovering somewhere around zero, I'm not sure I have it in me this year. I did find that the set, usually a summer staple, was delayed until mid-September. I'm not sure if that's going to change anything for me in terms of finding cards or being excited to buy the cards (online, I guess?)

Everyone's favorite avian blogger Night Owl did send me a really nice stash of Ginter cards from past releases that will be quickly heading to my binders as soon as I find some time to do some sorting. Here's an array of non-baseball minis, featuring that weird sport(?) that was on ESPN2 a lot when most major sports were shut down, plus a dog, a pirate and some other important looking people.

I did not know that Max Kepler was German until I saw this card. Admittedly, I don't really follow the Twins much, but I have heard that they are good now.

 

Birds! There's even an owl from the Owl.

Even though I feel like 2018 Allen & Ginter was everywhere, moreso than other recent years, I somehow didn't have even a single copy of this card. This is headed to my Cardinals binders in the 'B' section.

Another Twin by was of Night Owl's team, the Dodgers. It's weird that the Dodgers seemed to struggle to find a place for Maeda in their rotation. I guess that's the curse of being loaded with high priced players year after year.

Three PWEs and a Song

Some folks like @dvdgao stuck a stamp on an envelope and sent cards my way. 

It's a Monday night and I just watched live sports I have a rooting interest in for the first time in four months. (Portland Timbers, and yes, if it was up to me there wouldn't be any of this sports stuff happening for the rest of 2020.) Let's check out some plain white envelopes.

First up is Ryan from "O" No!!! Another Orioles Blog, who sent over some set fillers from the most recent Allen & Ginter set. I haven't seen (or don't remember?) what the 2020 design looks like, so I'm hoping that it was cancelled. Considering the current state of baseball cards right now, it's probably coming out next week and all boxes will sell out after 20 seconds. Things are nuts right now.

We're about to head into year 15 of the Allen & Ginter line. Topps continues to design really excellent cards here. This doesn't really track with what they do with some of their other brands, but it's nice to see that they know how to do something right.

Cardinals fan David sent along some more non-Cardinals stuff, hitting a few needs from some earlier Topps Heritage sets.

Mookie Betts cards, let alone insert cards, don't exactly grow on trees. I was happy to add this New Age Performers card from the 2018 set to my collection.

Lastly from David, it's a couple of New York team cards from the 2016 set.

Our third featured player is gcrl from cards as i see them. Someone remembered that I like the Cardinals, sending some cards of star players and obscurities like Anthony Garcia. Generally speaking, I like both equally.

Fleer Legacy was a short lived set (maybe one and done), but there are some interesting cards in it.

I know there were a lot of Topps Bunt (non-digital edition) defenders out there, but I was absolutely not a fan. Blue tint filter? Great. Still, the team collection needs what it needs.

In addition to the needed Cardinals cards was a healthy stack of 2003 Topps set needs. I picked just two of those cards to scan today -- both Mariners! -- including Garciaparra the lesser.

If you haven't checked out the YouTube series Dorktown on the history of the Seattle Mariners, you're missing out. It's fascinating. I've been watching it during my work-from-home lunches. I don't think Shin-Soo Choo (or Michael Garciaparra for that matter) ever get a mention, but there's a lot of interesting nuggets that are discussed.



This is the brand new music video from one of my favorite bands out there. It even features a notorious clown. Enjoy the rest of your week!

Thumbs Up to Cards

A PWE from @dvdgao hits up some set needs and team needs. 

Fellow Cardinals fan David recently sent me a nice envelope full of cards that hit up several of my want lists. I've been trying to significantly boost the number of envelopes I typically send, so it's always nice when I get one back -- especially from a Cards fan.

Here's a great opportunity for my semi-regular plug for The Junior Junkie. This continues to be my favorite* blog out there, which is surprising considering I've never been a big time Griffey fan. There's certainly more effort put into his weekly posts that I've cumulatively put into my entire year's worth of content, and they're always an entertaining read if you collect cards.

Any time I get a chance to knock off a Heritage insert, it's a big win.

I guess Adalberto really didn't want to be called Raul Mondesi Jr. I'm still missing a bunch of 2019 Heritage, of course.

Cardinals fans always tend to send the best Cardinals cards. It's probably because we always have the most dupes, right? I missed out on a recent Bowman's Best box break, but I opted to pick up some of the base cards instead (much cheaper.) This Goldschmidt refractor is a really nice addition to that small group.

High Tek Yadi! That's... all I've got.

*I mean, besides your blog, of course.

The Card Community Sends Cards

Cards from @CommunityGum to pass the time, because there's a lot of time right now. 

I know whenever I see Jon from Community Gum's name on an envelope, it's time to drop everything and tear into some exciting baseball cards. This time was no exception. Another vast assortment of Cardinals cards and set needs were among the many cool cards I got to thumb through. Andrew Miller and a couple of friends represented the tough-to-find 2019 Walgreen's-exclusive yellow Topps card crowd, and there was certainly more to look at.

This black bordered mini of the Wizard? Not too shabby. Ozzie certainly seems impressed.

There was not one, but...

Two! Two low numbered Scott Rolen inserts from a long forgotten mid-'00s Donruss set. Ah ah ah!

Harrison Bader makes an appearance on a dazzling don't-call-it-an-X-Fractor Prizm parallel. (Seriously, what do they call this, then?)

I call this one the swirly-dirly parallel. Yes, that's its official name!

No scan will tell you how wonderful the Topps retro/throwback parallels are. You just have to see (and feel) them for yourself. I want all of these, seriously.

I recognize this one as one of those Trading Card History inserts from back in 2008, except in Chrome and Bronze form. Nice!

This one may be headed to my Blazers binders, but I was absolutely thrilled that Jon tapped into my 2010-11 Donruss basketball needs. I haven't touched that want list in years, and it desperately needed some attention.

Remember basketball? I miss basketball.

But I miss baseball most of all, especially this time of the year. I even miss Mike Trout, the big lug. Jon also sent a nice stack of 2019 Ginter needs, and with all of this extra time inside I probably should give my sets and collections even more attention. Just don't let me start collecting anything else!

Fancy Foil Stamping

Foil-stamped fun and more from @marcbrubaker to help put the wraps on 2019. 

Topps seems to issue endless editions of its annual factory set during the summer, and one of them commemorates the All-Star game with a special stamp. I don't really know how long they've been doing this for, but I am pretty sure I've seen these before. Usually I'll end up with some sort of random parallel of some relief pitcher that I collect, maybe through a trade, or maybe through a repack box. If you're a player collector or even a team collector, buying this kind of stuff can get to be pretty spendy even if the set itself didn't cost all that much.

This is why it was terrific news that Marc Brubaker happened to come upon one of these sets and broke it up, contacting greedy team collectors like myself.

We're all probably sick to death of 2019 Topps flagship cards at this point, so I'll keep this pretty brief. I picked my top three faves of the set to scan here. The Busch Stadium wide shot reminds me of my incredibly fun first (?!) trip to St. Louis this past summer, although the ever present construction crane is missing from the backdrop in the photo. I'm going to miss Marcell Ozuna a little bit, because he seemed like a fun (but kind of weird) player. I always enjoy a baseball high five, though.

I also got to see Adam Wainwright start twice in person this year! I was pretty convinced that this was going to be his last season, but he had a pretty decent year all things considered and is back for 2020. He had pretty solid outings in both starts (at Seattle on July 3rd, and at home against the Cubs on July 30th) but didn't get credited with a so-called win in either start. The Cards won both games, however, so that's all that matters.

Marc sent other cards, including this flashy Chrome insert. I like these cards, but I'm not sure why they chose a photo of Yadi where he's clearly just witnessed something lousy. The hands are up on the head... it's probably out number 3, guys.

Also included with this generous package was a stack of 2019 Allen & Ginter needs. I have been playing and brushing up on a lot of '80s video games lately, so all I can think of is Capcom's 1942 series when I see this card. That's probably not great, is it.

There were plenty of Heritage needs to be found as well. I don't really give my set building pursuits anything close to equal time on this blog, but I had to make sure these were represented as there were a lot of them. I find it fascinating that Nixon was in charge when Earth Day was launched. I certainly wasn't aware of it until 1990, which would have been the 20th anniversary.

Finally, here's a nicely posed Kolten Wong spring training photo, complete with Delivery Dudes ad in the background. I don't think we have these Dudes around here, but I have long felt that there are entirely too many delivery companies in operation. How is anyone making money off of this?