Off We Go

My first TCDB trade was with a familiar face, so to speak. 

 

I wanted to thank everyone for their feedback on my topic about trading on TCDB, both on Twitter and through the blog. I've barely scratched the surface as far as what all I need to enter into the database for wants and haves, but I'm already three trades deep. The first cards arrived this afternoon from Mr. Haverkamp, who is a friend of the blog and frequent contest entrant.

I picked up a couple of Mickey Mantle cards to fill out some set needs. Mantle went from overexposed with his Topps deal to underutilized with his Panini deal. I wonder how long that Panini contract runs for, because I don't know if they're going to continue to make baseball cards in any capacity beyond this year.

This is my first Roman Emperors mini from the 2007 Allen & Ginter set. I wasn't even aware of Allen & Ginter until this blog started in 2008, so I have quite a few needs from the first two revival sets.

A couple of the old Fleer/Laughlin World Series cards were thrown in as a bonus. These weren't officially on my want list but they were definitely needed. I think there's at least a few different printings of this set. These ones are from the 1971 "black back" version.

I probably won't post about every TCDB trade I complete (I admire those of you who can find the time to do that), but I plan to keep at it as long as it makes sense to. I'm still going to be trading through the blog as well. If you do use the site, you can check out my profile here.

Short, Parallel and Vintage

A pile of returns from the last Spring Cleaning entry. 

 

I had a lot of fun getting rid of cards last year in my prolonged "Spring Cleaning" event. I'm hoping to have something going again this year more along the lines of free group breaks that I've done in the past, although if I keep buying cards I'm going to end up having to do another spring cleaning by the time spring actually arrives.

The last person to sign up for the event was reader Randy, to whom I sent a box of cards from assorted Minnesota sports teams for his family to peruse. For whatever reason, there was a huge run on Twins cards last year, but I managed to scrape a few up to go along with some Timberwolves and Vikings. Randy responded in kind with a big, generous package of Cardinals goodies and set needs. I'll show off a few here, but realize that these aren't completely representative of everything I added to my collection.

For as much as people complained about the glut of cards in the '90s, it did bring forth a new era of surprisingly difficult parallels to collect. This one from the 1999 SkyBox Thunder set is a purple foil "Rant" parallel. I think there are also "Rave" parallels, because SkyBox liked a little crazy in their Thunder.

Speaking of crazy, what about a card made entirely of metal? I should keep a stack of these by my door at all times to ward off potential intruders. I can throw them like shuriken.

Not strictly limited to the '90s (or more recent), in the package were also number of vintage cards, including some big names like these!

As mentioned, there were also a bunch of set needs. We're not just talking about base cards, folks.

Even these aren't just base cards. They're star players appear on those pesky short printed cards that Heritage loves to throw at you. As much as it's easy to complain about 75 to 100 short printed cards in each Heritage set, at least they don't throw at you the escalating rarity tier like the cards they were originally inspired by. It would be maddening if each group of 100 or so cards was more rare than the next. If anyone doesn't understand how annoying this is, just go back and try to complete a full set of 2008 Upper Deck Timeline. I dare you!

To contrast with the above 2019 Heritage cards are these originals from the 1970 set. None of these are high numbers, however.

Lastly, here's a couple of famous historic people from the second Allen & Ginter revival set.

Thanks again to Randy and everyone who sent me cards in last year's huge Spring Cleaning campaign.

A PWE, In Order

A few cards from a longtime fellow blogger to pass the time. 

I've been trying to increase the flow of envelopes, small as they can be, full of cards to keep myself and hopefully others occupied with hobby-related things. It was nice, of course, to recently receive some cards in the popular PWE format from The Angels, In Order. There were a few Cardinals needs and a few set needs. Let's take a look.

I don't know how I missed out on this card when this set was first released, but it apparently wasn't the only base card I needed. I now just need card #217 from the 2018 Donruss set, which was one that Yadier Molina shared with Carlos Correa and Francisco Lindor. I also need countless numbers of parallels, of course, because Panini.

Despite not being heavily respected across the league and even internally, Dakota Hudson made it into the official record as a bona fide NL pitching leader. Cool!

Ah, those pesky retail exclusives. I nabbed another one! This is the black set from 2013 Heritage.

In the department of set needs were the first couple of 2007 Bowman Heritage acquisitions for me in quite awhile. I have no idea who Chuck Lofgren is. It sounds like the name of some sort of not-quite-famous actor.

The Mick! We don't see him in Topps products anymore, but I guess we were probably overexposed in the late '00s.

We end things with a sketch card of the newly crowned champ Ryan Zimmerman. I hated the way the NLCS went down as it reminded me an awful lot of the 2004 World Series, with the Cardinals suddenly completely punchless and useless after being anything but previously. It was cool to see the veteran Zimmerman get to win a ring, I suppose.

Ginter Goodies from The Collective Mind

Want lists: reduced! 

Back in September, GCA from The Collective Mind set me a ton of Allen & Ginter extras to knock down some of my want lists a few notches. I am still working on putting together another stack of cards to send back for this one, but in the meantime I thought I'd show off some of the goods.

It was quite a sad shock to hear about the passing of Roy Halladay. It seems like there's been a lot of lives taken way too young when it comes to MLB lately. Halladay was one of my favorite players not connected to the Cardinals, and I still have vivid memories of his pitcher's duel with Chris Carpenter in the 2011 playoffs. And that's not to mention the day I heard about the no-hitter Doc had going in the playoffs the season before, which prompted me to pop into a sports bar out in the suburbs to see it through to the end.

The early days of the Allen & Ginter revival featured a lot of smiling posed shots like this.

Cap Anson, the original hipster.

I'm not sure I'd consider the Astrodome a field, exactly, but I do really like this insert set dedicated to defunct stadiums.

A tip o' the cap to Carlos Beltran, who is hanging it up after a long, tremendous career.

A tip o' the cap to Gandhi... okay, sometimes these things just don't transition well. Beltran was a fantastic player, but Gandhi was a little bit more important in the grand scheme of things.

The Pastime's Pastimes inserts were so jarring at the time because they used an all black background in a set that traditionally favors lots of white. I guess this was just the precursor to the interesting looking but wholly unnecessary Allen & Ginter X product.

Klosterman is a writer who lives in Portland now. Have you moved to Portland yet?

This tree looks like a giant mushroom.

Apparently someone tried to create a machine to play chess a la Deep Blue, only more than 200 years earlier. Of course, the whole thing was a scam, but the actual story that was passed down seems highly dubious as well.

Thanks again to GCA! You can check out my Ginter and other set want lists here.

Trading with Reader Doug

Before we get to this year's Ginter offerings, here's a few blasts from the past.

Reader Doug exchanged a trade offer earlier this summer and, as is my usual M.O., I took entirely way too long to supply my end of the goods. Fortunately, that's finally behind us and I can show off my take without too much embarrassment.

Behold: The Modern Douchebag. This was an all-Ginter catch for me, and I received a number of inserts including a few of those fun Ascent of Man that got all of the fatcats at FOX News all in a huff.

Speaking of huff (?), here's beach volleyball studlady Kerri Walsh Jennings. Along with Walsh, there was a healthy stack of other 2007 Ginter singles that helped finally get me to a point where I need fewer base cards than I actually own. Not too shabby for a set that I've never bought any sort of box of.

I'm just gonna say it: these art cards are ugly. For the most part, I am a fan of Dick Perez's work with the classic Diamond Kings cards and even (some of) the Turkey Red cards that he did. The design here is just not doing these any favors. If I recall, the 2006 set is plagued with similar looking inserts. On the flipside, the newer Ginter sets are so overloaded with inserts now that I kind of miss the days that there were very few of these sorts of things to chase.

Token Cardinal Alert! Token Cardinal Alert! Thanks again to Doug for the trade!

Trade You, Trade Me

Stats on the Back has a trade-a-thon going on right now. Name what you want, send him what he needs and reap the benefits of someone downsizing their collection. Hey, I'd do it, too, if I had any focus to speak of.

I mostly grabbed Turkey Red and Allen & Ginter, especially from older sets that are a lot harder to find/collect. A few of the cards were also needed for my Cardinals binder, including - surprisingly - this Jim Edmonds card from the 2006 set. Unfortunately, that means I still need a second cop for the set that I could theoretically put together someday.

St. Louis looks like a pretty smoggy place.

Mark Mulder's name is often invoked as a reminder of a blockbuster prospects-for-established stars trade gone wrong. I don't really refute this, but I still am in the (minority) camp of people that feel like it was hard to see Mulder's demise coming.

There were also a few Heritage cards to be had. Mo Vaughn really fills up a baseball card, doesn't he?

Finally, we go all the way back to the inaugural Allen & Ginter set, revival edition. Here's a German Emperor. You can tell he's an emperor because of the mustache.

Hootie Hoo

The baseball season is off and running, and along with it goes my nightly routine of updating the blog and watching Cardinals baseball. With a change in my work schedule this year, I'll actually be able to catch the majority of west coast weeknight games live for once, but most other games will be committed to VHS cassette tape for later viewing. Yes, my VCR still works like a charm after 15 years of service, and I'm officially the guy everyone gives strange looks to when I carry a package of blank tapes with me through the checkout line. (Those things are expensive now!) Someday I'll get the DVR - remember, I didn't even have a scanner when I started this thing - but for now it's just going to be this way.

Anyway, I'm not sure where I was going with this rambling nonsense, so I'll discard the awkward segue way and let you know that Night Owl Cards has once again delivered a fun trade package containing many Cards on Cards-inspired favorites.

One of the big shames (okay, maybe not so big) of Adam Wainwright's season being wrecked is all of the great looking cards he's featured on in 2011. This photo was from the 2010 Civil Rights game, which was unfortunately lost to the hated Cincinnati Reds.

Many trade packages of late have included a DK card or two, and this one was no exception. It also makes me feel guilty that I don't have my player collection list up for virtually anyone. I got pretty far with my Edmonds list by using the Zistle site, but I never found that the site was able to do what I wanted it to, which was to store several individual player collections that are easily distinguishable from each other so that it was clear to potential traders what cards I already had. Maybe I'm just not doing it right?

There's no light at the end of the tunnel for the seemingly endless groups of minis that I could collect, but that does not discourage me at all from taking them in.

Finally, here's a card with a local connection. Remember all of those Dan and Dave commercials? No? That's okay. You shouldn't watch television anyway (unless it's Cardinals baseball.) Dan O'Brien was a World and Olympic Decathalon Champion. I used to play Bruce Jenner's Olympic Decathalon on the Apple ][e. See? We're not so dissimilar.

Ginter Madness

Everyone is posting about their precious shiny new Allen & Ginter stuff right now. Everyone! So I may have lured you here under false pretenses, but it will probably be another week or two before I'll be able to buy any of the new stuff. Here's a 2007 pack I bought at a card show awhile back instead.

221 - Tony Gwynn Jr. (The former Brewer is now the Padres center fielder. I'm guessing we'll see him in Portland at some point.)

258 - A.J. Pierzynski

263 - Jim Edmonds (Nice! Apparently this is an SP. I guess they didn't follow the SP card numbering scheme of the 2008 set back then.)

334 - Gustavo Molina Mini (Ahh... poor guy. I'm sure he is constantly reminded that he is not related to the Catching Molina Brothers, yet he is clearly a Molina who catches for a living. He hasn't quite reached the level attained by those brothers.)

- Checklist Two of Two

265 - Roy Halladay (Would you give up your entire farm system for this guy? It'd have to be pretty tempting.)

195 - Mike Piazza (Future Hall of Famer here.)

If you don't end up egging my house... blog... whatever for misleading you, then maybe I'll post another (not 2009) A&G pack here soon while I bide my time before I can afford more cards.