Transitional Season

 

Shifting from summer sports to fall sports with help from a huge stack of cards from each.

This time of year can always sneak up on a person. The Boys of Summer are winding down while the gridiron lines have been painted and are ready to go. Full-on hoopin' is just around the corner. Let's check out some cards from the fall sports and a few baseball ones from buckstorecards, with the typical several months time delay you're used to seeing around here.

Cooper Hjerpe starred locally (at Oregon State) and wound up drafted by the Cardinals, which means that they are actually some intentional Beavers cards in my collection. Hjerpe (pronounced JER-pee) is on his way back from suffering some major injuries in his pro career and could look to make a big league impact at some point.

Here's a Triple Threads card with that canvas-y feel of old Eagles favorite Brian Westbrook.

My Ducks collection gets another fairly low numbered card in this Luke Ridnour "Proof" from 2009-10 Studio.

A pair of Ducks football players team up here on a Playoff Contenders inserts from around 20 years ago.

Kramer Robertson only had a single plate appearance in the big leagues across two games and would end up hanging it up after that final season (2023).

Oregon has always been successful at placing quarterbacks in the pro ranks, although for a time many of them were journeymen like A.J. Feeley.

This might be my first and only Harry Giles Blazers card, but it's a good one!

Here's a numbered (to 100) Reuben Droughns card from Score Select, capturing his move from the Browns to the Giants.

Speaking of Cleveland Ducks, Dillon Gabriel started about half of his pro team's games in his rookie season but is caught in the middle of the drama where his team's position group also includes the son of Deion Sanders and a sex pest (to put it mildly.)

Demetrius Williams seems to have a ton of football cards for his era and the impact he made on the game, but I'm not complaining. Of course, these days he'd probably have more than three hundred thousand Wild Card so-called one-of-ones.

Although the orange clashes with the lime green here, it's always fun to end up with a shiny new Prizm Troy Franklin card.

This one fits Dolphin colors a bit better.

Panini Origins has long been a hobby exclusive, so any chance at snapping up a single or two of someone I collect from these sets is a nice deal.

The Eagles haul continues here with one of their best all-time running backs, LeSean McCoy.

I'm not really able to place the name Ed Reynolds anymore, but I thought the pink tint of this autographed Prizm card is interesting. Check the breast cancer awareness ribbons as well.

This is another four pack of lesser known Eagles guys on numbered cards (plus another McCoy.)

As is typical, I also ended up with another stack of St. Louis Blues cards. I chose this one from 1991 to scan. I mean, his name is Zombo after all.

Cards from Gavin

A handful of things from @breakdowncards includes a Ducks hoopster. 

It's been a crazy day in sports, so I'll just get right to the cards. Gavin from Baseball Card Breakdown and I arranged another in-person card exchange (not even the most recent one) back in late June. Along with managing to reduce my inventory a bit, I also picked up a few Cardinals and Ducks needs.

This grouping was all about the parallels. Aledmys Diaz is shown here on a entire set that I consider a parallel. Sure, this stuff is packaged separately, but the whole thing is a bizarro version of the regular Allen & Ginter set. That seems like a parallel to me. It's like a parallel Ginter universe.

'90s parallels can be tough to collect. Sometimes I feel like I will be picking out Score Gold Rush needs out of haystacks for the rest of my life. It was cool to get a copy of this one that features the former two sport star Brian Jordan.

Unless you're a fan of college baseball, it seems tough to really like the Elite Extra Edition brand, but Panini has seen fit to carry this thing on since taking over the Donruss trademarks. Still, this is a Cardinals auto and will happily find a way into my boxes o' goodies (not to be confused with my binders o' goodies) along with other Cardinals cards that are signed, numbered or contain some sort of chunk of something someone might have used in a game. Jess Todd only made a single appearance with St. Louis in a counting game, so it may be tough to find stuff with him in the Cardinals uniform.

There were also a number of really nice Ducks cards included. I've purposely held back the football stuff for my weekly football posts, so we'll just take a look at this fantastic low numbered rookie year card of the former star point guard Luke Ridnour. This was from before the Ducks crazy uniform designs found their way over to the basketball program. It also bears a Sonics logo, which makes me miss the former rival NBA team to the north.

Thanks again to Gavin. If you're into music at all (and how could you not be?!) you should definitely check out his new blog about the intersection of music and cards.

Nine from the Card Show

Look at me, posting stuff I actually bought. 

I managed to spend a little time at the monthly card show this past weekend, and I even managed to save some cards to set aside for scanning. I usually end up focusing more here on what other people send me, so I suppose it's nice to once in awhile show off a few things I picked out for myself. If I recall, these all ended up costing me around $1, except where noted.

This was probably my best pickup of the day. It's true that Panini's baseball cards are not very attractive, especially the prospect sets they've put together. Still, $2 for an on card autograph of one of the Cardinals top prospects sounds pretty good to me.

This ended up being a mistake, as I am pretty sure I already have one of these Daric Barton autographs already. Oh well.

I spent the bulk of my time at the show in front of a particular quarter box, and this "crystal" parallel of a very generic looking David Freese insert ended up going home with me. It's numbered to 299.

If I recall, this set was Upper Deck's first stab at an MLB set after they lost their license. I think it might have been a test run for their sneaky attempt at the 2010 MLB set that ultimately got them into a lot of trouble.

Royal Rookies seems to have been some sort of hideous disaster. To get a certified auto for a quarter is pretty much an automatic deal to me, though.

There were also a pair of serial numbered Waino cards, which is always good in my book.

Framed cards are the best, folks.

Finally, here's a cheap jersey card pickup of a really stoned looking Luke Ridnour, the former Oregon star point guard.

If only there was a card show every weekend.

All-Star Eve Trade Post

Hopefully, no one will be pitching though a cloud of "cognac".

Chunter of the Chipp 'n' Dale blog sent me a wonderful bunch of baseball and basketball cards that I'd like to show off as we get ready for tomorrow night's All-Star Game.

I've been coveting this insert card for a long time from last year's set, so I'm really happy to get a copy of my own. Topps really knocked it out of the park (GET IT?!) with these inserts, which really make me wish they'd take a quality-over-quantity approach with some of their inserts in the future.

These '89-style die cut minis, on the other hand, are not so great. It is great seeing cards of Lee Smith in a Cardinals uniform in 2014, though.

I'm sure there are plenty of disgruntled Dodgers fans who think they got robbed with Wainwright getting the starting nod tomorrow over Clayton Kershaw. I can't say I blame them, but I also find it nearly impossible to argue against Wainwright deserving it. After a number of near-misses in past seasons with major awards, Waino gets a little bit of the spotlight tomorrow to reward a stellar first half. As for Kershaw, well, it seems like it would help his cause a bit if his team... say... went ahead and won the pennant sometime. Interestingly enough, the last Cardinals starter to star the All-Star Game was Chris Carpenter in 2005. Before that, I believe you might have to go back to Bob Gibson if I'm not mistaken.

Well, now that I've managed to get that image out of my mind (although I'd be happy for Don Mattingly), let's look at a fantastic relic card of Erin fave Troy Tulowitzki. Tulo has been one of the best players in the game in the first half, so it was cool to see him named captain of one of the Home Run Derby teams. The only problem is that I seem to be growing really tired of the Home Run Derby. Maybe it's too much Chris Berman or maybe it really is just a tired event?

Chunter collects some basketball and he dug up a few jersey cards that were right up my alley. Jerryd Bayless didn't have the biggest run as a Blazer, but he's established himself as a solid combo guard and bench option in the league. D.J. Augustin has bounced around a bit, but he's also an established vet at this point.

This one is right up my alley, as we have both a (former) Blazer and a former Oregon Duck. Ridnour was a fantastic player in college and is about to enter his 12th season in the NBA, this time as a member of the newly rechristened Charlotte Hornets. I was a little confused about the color of Ridnour's jersey swatch, and when I read the back it turns out that while Webster's is supposedly from an NBA game, Ridnour's is from a Rookie Challenge. He was in his 5th season when this card came out, so that tells you that Upper Deck was probably sitting on piles of musty old barely "worn" Ridnour jerseys at this point. Still, it's a great card for my collection for multiple reasons.

Finally, here's a more clearly identified Rookie Challenge jersey, from current Blazer Wesley Matthews. Wes wasn't about to give up his #2 when the Blazers signed Steve Blake last week, never mind that Blake is joining the team for the third time and has worn that number for both of his previous terms with the team.