Baseball is Back!

 

Baseball cards are back as well, and they brought a few other sports with them. 

 

Let's hop in the wayback machine and check out some cards that Sportscards From The Dollar Store sent quite a few months ago -- last year, in fact. Yes, that means that I'm quite a bit behind in the blogging show-and-tell here, but I'm not going to explain myself or make any apologies for it. We're here to look forward, and forward we shall look!

Along with a really nice '78 O-Pee-Chee HOFer came a few Cardinals cards, including another one of those "so weird, it must be Panini!" cards that features a silver ink autograph on a leather swatch. If I'm not mistaken, this might be the one year (2019) that they brought typically high end Leather & Lumber brand to retail, which would also mean it was my first dip into the Panini Points realm.

Like many a pitcher with a rocket arm before him, Trevor Rosenthal seemed to burn hot quickly and then more or less disappear. Since departing St. Louis, where he was a full time closer, Rosenthal has logged big league innings for four other organizations but hasn't made it back to the big leagues since the cursed 2020 "season".

Well, I assume you all know all about Stan the Man's story, so let's just take a beat and enjoy a cool looking card. I'm sure that photo has to be colorized, but I don't care.

Moving on to tackle football, buckstorecards always finds me some really fun Oregon cards. Bonus points should be awarded for catching a Duck in Duck gear.

There's no gear here at all, and this weird Panini Day set seems to have a lot of unaccounted inserts in the TCDB files, which can be a bit frustrating. No, I don't really want to figure out my own checklist for this set. Panini can be a real nightmare when it comes to that stuff.

Haloti Ngata is a very large man, so it must have been difficult to fit him in the frame here,. They almost nailed it, but not quite.

I really like the design of this old Topps Finest Donovan McNabb relic. It has a honeycomb thing going on.

This one isn't bad, either. There's no honeycomb, but there's still a hexagonal jersey swatch.

On the other hand, I feel that this design is unspeakably awful. The glittery background almost reminds me of "snow" on an old TV set. This might have looked better with more of a television theme to it, but what do I know? They don't consult me on these things for some reason.

Here's a Turkey Red design that I don't recognize. Did they ever make tobacco cards that looked like this? (I mean, besides the sticker signature, of course.)

I'll always wonder what Joey Harrington's pro career would have looked like if he had started off with a better franchise that didn't rush him to the field because they didn't really have any other options. He was never a big numbers guy, but he was more of a leadership pro. In the right system, I wonder if he could have thrived.

It's the man of many nicknames, FredEx, The People's Champ, etc. (Most of these he gave to himself.) He only really had that one memorable play, but it was definitely a stunner.

Here's another "bonus points" Ducks card.

Here's the first of a pair of fancy looking Dion Jordan "material" cards. Jordan has a ton of cards, and almost all of them are with him wearing Dolphins gear. He didn't really get a chance to make an impact in the pros until he got to Seattle, though.

How long are these rookie photo shoots for the NFL? There are so, so many different cards out there and so many dorky poses that they have to make.

This counts as a little bit of a patch, doesn't it? I can see a little bit of color there that isn't white.

I wish the careers of De'Anthony Thomas and Patrick Mahomes had overlapped a bit more. I could see DAT getting utilized more as a gadget type player once Mahomes started getting more established.

Our last Duck of a very excellent group of Ducks cards is a "Gold Zone" Score parallel of Penei Sewell, numbered to just 50. You can still find some interesting cards in a lower end product.

There's even a basketball card in the mix. Al-Farouq Aminu was a consistent presence in the peak years of the Blazers "Dame Time" era.

Sports cards with no printed name or photo on the front are a bit weird. I can assure you that this is a Brian Elliott card, a longtime goaltender who was still active in the NHL as recently as last year.

I do love a good team photo, even a hockey one. This is apparently from a 1990-91 Kraft Singles set. I'm not sure if it was a regional thing or a wide release, aside from the copyright info on the back telling us it was a Canadian release of sorts.

Too Many Sports

Trying to avoid the end of year sports fatigue. New cards like these will help. 

 

A couple of blog announcements before I get into the good stuff from Too Many Verlanders: 

• If you missed out on the big college bowl contest this year, don't worry. There's still plenty of time to pick a winner of the dumb greasy white condiment bowl game. All you have to do is leave a comment on the original post with your predicted score. Even if you did enter the big contest, you can drop a guess there as well. Winner gets some sort of new pack next year.
• I am no longer active on Twitter for reasons that should be fairly obvious by now. I am on Bluesky, however. Let me know if you need an invite. I don't post tons and tons of content, but you will get a link to any new blog posts as soon as they drop (or as soon as dlvr.it decides to post them.)

 

So, where was I? Oh, yes. Sports. I am suffering from quite a bit of sports fatigue right now. The Eagles seem to be hell bent on pissing away their season. The Ducks made quite a run towards a potential playoff berth but couldn't figure out how to beat Washington... twice. The Blazers are probably going to end up tanking for the third season in a row with an awful head coach. (I can handle a bad Blazers team, but they've never been less fun to watch than under Chauncey Billups.) The Timbers just finished up their second straight playoff-less season in a league where it's increasingly difficult to miss said playoffs. The Cardinals finished the past season with their worst record since 1995, a year where I am quite certain I watched zero baseball games.

And yet, the cards keep rolling on in from great trade pals like Dennis from Too Many Verlanders. Dennis sent tons of great stuff, including cards of lesser known Eagles players like Nate Allen. He also included a bunch of oversized cards, a baseball pin and other great things I can't even fit into this space here. For the sake of brevity (and my sanity), I just chose the cards that I scanned for the TCDB site to show off here.

Fortunately, no current Eagles were harmed in the making of this blog post. I might have had something really grumpy to say about them if they were. To be fair, Miles Sanders would probably rather still be with this trainwreck of a Philly team than his current 2-win Carolina Panthers.

In happier times, there was Donovan McNabb. I did realize the other day that I've seen the Eagles play in 3 Super Bowls (winning 1, though they really should have won all 3.) That's more title opportunities than some teams I root for.

I love the "New Breed" font on this Matt Barkley jersey card. So futuristic!

There was another version of last night's Eagles/Seahawks game that would have had Marcus Mariota starting in place of an ill Jalen Hurts. (And not ill, like '80s cool.) I wonder what that would have looked like.

Hey, it's baseball! Dennis included a few of these Moments & Milestones cards with the package. I'll never have them all, but it's fun to accumulate them.

At some point I may invest in a new scanner. I've had my current one since early 2009 when it was purchased at a Circuit City (!) closing sale. And it still works just as well as it did on day one, but part of me always wants to see if I can solve the "foilboard looks terrible when scanned" conundrum. (It does also tend to wash out certain colors like red, but there's probably a setting or two I could tweak there.)

Clayton Whoson? Apparently he quarterbacked Northwestern, a bit of trivia I would have maybe known if the Oregon Ducks had joined the Big Ten sooner. Erin asked me the other day who all was in the Big 10 now, and I got through maybe half the list before I gave up. I might be able to recite that list from memory by this time next year, but I'm not going to guarantee it.

Here's another of those Moments & Milestones parallel-o-rama cards. This is a rarer black version that is numbered to just 25.

We end things here with Akili Smith, whose son (Akili Smith Jr.) is an Oregon QB recruit for 2025. Of course, with the transfer portal madness, he'll potentially follow in the footsteps of Bo Nix, Dillon Gabriel (Oklahoma transfer for 2024) and Dante Moore (UCLA transfer). Or maybe not? Sometimes these dudes just up and leave.

Thanks again to everyone who has sent me cards this year! I'll try to be less grumpy next time.

Good Luck Ducks, Week 13: The Last Civil War?

 

It's the Ducks final conference meeting with their Corvallis-based rivals. 

 

The 127th meeting between Oregon and Oregon State on the football field is their last scheduled game together. When Oregon finally bit the bullet and decided to join the Big Ten after seeing other schools seize their own opportunities, most local fans immediate thoughts were "welp, there goes the Civil War." And it's true: there will be no more last week, Black Friday or late November rivalry games between these two teams no matter what they end up working out in the future. There's persistent talk of Oregon trying to back out of or adjust their contract with Boise State that is supposed to run for the next three seasons in order to get that Beavers game on their non-conference schedule next year (which would happen in mid-September), but they're eventually going to face a long term scheduling issue to try to keep alive a rivalry that now spans multiple conferences.

Tonight's game is particularly notable, because the Ducks have managed to pass all of their tests following the regrettable loss to Washington with flying colors. The Huskies hung on at the end last week in Corvallis to remain undefeated. The possibilities are still there, with Oregon being the consensus pick for "best one loss team in the country" and a potential rematch with UW in the very last Pac-12 Championship game looming. A Ducks win tonight and a Huskies win in their last Pac-12 Apple Cup would set it all up. From there, it would be up to the voters to determine if an Oregon conference championship would be enough to propel them to a coveted top four playoff spot. Thanksgiving is over. There aren't many games left now.

Bo Nix was absolutely stunning last week against an overmatched Sun Devils defense. He threw for a school record six (!) touchdowns, all in the first half, before being treated to a lot of second half rest. Troy Franklin broke the school record for most receiving yards in a season, still with games left to play. These Ducks have reportedly been replaying the horror show that was last season's Civil War 4th quarter on loop to prepare for tonight's game. It's something as a fan that I would never want to revisit, but at least this year we know we're in for good clear weather and no obnoxious chainsaw sounds blasting through the PA. I certainly can't complain about the last real Civil War game being played in Eugene.

Notes and other things:

• I don't often talk about whatever random Ducks card I feel like attaching to these posts, but this one I just received from buckstorecards strike a particular interest. I do really like sports cards where you can pinpoint exactly what game the photo is from, and this one makes it clear that it's from the 2013 Fiesta Bowl win over Kansas State. That game was notable for being only the second ever game with a recorded 1 point conversion safety.
• Where Are They Headed? Well, it still seems that Oregon State is heading nowhere. There's been no indication that either of the last two standing Pac-12 members are wanting to join up with anyone else, with a potential long term plan being to lure members of other (lesser) conferences to head to them. I don't know how this would even work or what their schedules will look like going forward, but I wish them luck. I hate that this breakup is happening.
• Ducks Ranking This Week: 6. This should be the last week of no significant changes among the top six ranks. Many eyes will be on the Ohio State/Michigan game.
• Bo Nix Heisman Watch: I mean, 6 touchdown passes in a half while hardly breaking a sweat? What more could you ask for?!
• Game time is 5:30 PDT on FOX in Eugene. Go Ducks!

Good Luck Ducks, Week 3: Seawolves... Fever?

Oregon's final nonconference tune-up is against an unfamiliar FCS opponent. 

 

After the Ducks pulled off one of the biggest nonconference road wins in Pac-12 history last Saturday, many people probably looked at the schedule to see who was up next. It's... Stony Brook! I couldn't have told you a thing about the Seawolves football program before last week and I'm still fairly certain that I don't know much. Still, the home game against an FCS team comes at a good time in the schedule, after the Oregon put together a max effort performance to defeat the Buckeyes last week.

Injuries are something you always talk about in football. Oregon is going to have to learn to live without Justin Flowe, who was rumored to have broken his foot (or something like that) and is expected to miss the rest of the regular season. It would be fairly surprising to see Kayvon Thibodeaux return this week, considering the relatively low stakes of this game. And Cam McCormick, who had fought through injuries for years to finally return to the field this season for the first time since 2018 ended up tearing his Achilles on his first down catch last week. Tough stuff.

What do we make of the Stony Brook Seawolves? Since joining Division I, they've made the FCS playoffs four times, most recently in 2018. They've graduated five players to the NFL. They're 1-1 this season, with a loss at home to New Hampshire and a win last week at Colgate. They're located in New York. And... that's all I've got. This is a quality opponent in a lower division, but it doesn't feel like a trap game. Oregon should hopefully be able to win comfortably and work on a few things as they head into conference play next week. Let's cross our fingers that the injury bug stays away.

Series History: They have never faced each other.

Opponent Talk: The Stony Brook newspaper is expecting a blowout, but is looking forward to the payday.

Oregon's last matchup versus an FCS opponent was a 35-3 win over Montana in 2019. The Grizzlies are an elite FCS program, and most recently knocked off a Pac-12 opponent in Washington.

Game time is 4:30 PM PDT on the Pac-12 Network. Go Ducks!

A Four-Sport Blowout

I'm not worthy! 

One of the unfortunate things for me about the global health crisis we're still living through is that I've received a few extremely generous packages from regular trading partners that I just haven't been able to fully reciprocate just yet. I am still waiting until it's safe to go to the card shows. Of course, in the grand scheme of things, this pales in comparison to almost literally anything everyone has suffered through, but it still bugs me. This latest example of generosity is one I've been sitting on for quite awhile: a big envelope stuffed full of eye-popping cards from buckstorecards. As usual, there was a generous share of stuff from all of the major sports.

Vladimir Tarasenko has had difficulty staying on the ice since his Blues won their championship. He returned to action for his first game of the season (and only fifth since 2019.) Apparently he has some serious shoulder issues that are threatening his career. This card is actually sort of a half-acetate look to it.

Next up is baseball and an Ozzie Smith card from the always classy Triple Threads - 2020 Edition. I should probably make more of a point of finding some of the singles from these sets of the players I collect.

Here's a strange case of a player who never appeared in a game with the Blazers (or any NBA team for that matter), and was undrafted, yet spent enough time on the roster to get his own card. Morgunov had a lengthy pro career, playing for more than two decades in Russian leagues and others.

Nassir Little is starting to look like the next young Blazers player to start to make some gains on the court in his second year, a la Gary Trent in the latter portion of last season. It's really cool to this jersey swatch from last year's Court Kings set.

No one else sends me CFL cards besides buckstorecards. You can't really find CFL cards in the US, of course. I wouldn't have even known that Josh Huff was still playing football if it wasn't for this card. It's really cool.

Another Duck appears! Actually, it's no mere Duck, it's the NFL's offensive rookie of year, Justin Herbert... on a green parallel, no less. Herbert's cards are often expensive now, so I don't expect I'm always going to be successful in prying them away from other people.

It's back to baseball. This David Freese card from the very first Prizm set doesn't seem to be listed in TCDB. Is it "cracked ice" or something? I'll have to do some more research. (edit: It looks like it might be a National Convention exclusive with a 25 card print run? Wow!)

It's tough to tell the difference between Triple Threads and Museum Collection at times, although I feel like Museum Collection's design varies wildly from year to year (at least in baseball.)

Now that Jalen Hurts is apparently the Eagles #1 quarterback (until the draft, I guess?), it'll be interesting to see what happens. If he had a good group of veterans around him, I'd certainly think he has the talent to succeed, but it looks like the team is pretty much in full rebuild which doesn't bode well for a young, smaller QB.

The last one was too big to contain. I could have scanned this, but its hugeness wouldn't have translated. That fancy new card stand can barely hold it, even. It's basically an 8x10 signed photo with official Panini branding and all that.

Throughout the past year, I've tried to pay it forward as much as I can with some giveaways and PWEs. Hopefully we'll get back to a place where I can send out larger packages with better content on a regular basis soon.

Good Luck Ducks: Stay Safe and Healthy

 

Filling the void with help from @forgotaboutblay and more. 

In the original timeline, the Oregon Ducks would be facing off in their first game of the season against North Dakota State today. Instead of posting a scan of a cool Ducks card and writing a few words about the new season and the new quarterback and what have you, I'm just going to show off all the cards I was holding back for the season that won't be. I'm also going to show off a bunch of Ducks stuff I got more recently from Dennis of Too Many Verlanders

In fact, for these first four cards, I'm not entirely sure who sent them since they were sitting in an unmarked stack specifically for this series. Dennis and Doug (buckstorecards) are the primary outside contributors to my Ducks collection, so chances are these could have come from either of them.

It's raining autographs! See, I was hanging on to some good stuff here.

This is probably a good time to mention that I won't be watching any college football this season. I was all for canceling all sports in 2020, but I still have kept an eye or two on the teams I follow in other sports. College sports, however... I just can't watch young, presumably health unpaid athletes risk so much for so little. The decision to play shouldn't even be in their hands, honestly. The Pac-12 season is still a no go at this point, which makes not watching even easier for someone like me, but I'm going to continue to act as if the sport doesn't presently exist for the time being.

Next up is the stuff from Dennis. Arik Armstead's signature is pretty simple, you guys.

More Byron Marshall. Here he is on a nice looking blue parallel of his Prizm Draft card.

¡1 of 1 ALERT! I never expect anyone to drop a printing plate on me, but here it is! Something I've realized while accumulating Ducks cards is that Dion Jordan has a lot of football cards. This is from the 2013 Panini Black set. It's also signed, because what else are you going to do with a printing plate? Print more cards?!

The autographs just keep rolling in. This time Jordan's in a Ducks jersey instead of one of those pro ones, but Press Pass was careful to crop the logos out.

Here's one of the most recent Ducks cards that I own, and it's a doozy. Leaf is one of the more mysterious companies out there making cards, so as a result I don't own much of their stuff. They seem to specialize in prospect sets and creepy cards of 16 year old baseball kids. This is one of the nicest looking things that (current era) Leaf has done as far as I've seen, though.

LMJ is wondering where his ink is.

We'll end things here with Ifo, one of my all-time favorite Ducks.

The rest of Dennis's bubble mailer (non-Ducks edition) will be featured next time. In the meantime, if you want to make me slightly less sad about the state of college football (and the country in general), here's a link to my Ducks page in case you have something you are able to contribute.