Last Pack of '01 Archives

They don't make this stuff like they used to.

I was just trying to clear some space off my desk when I discovered that I still had one last pack of 2001 Topps Archives (Series 2) to post here. So here it goes.

397 - Cecil Cooper (1988)

433 - Norm Cash / Elston Howard / Al Kaline / Jim Piersall AL Batting Leaders (1962) - Lots of floating heads here, but only one flat top floating head. The best kind!

437 - Johnny Bench / Dick Allen RBI Leaders (1973) - Allen's sideburns are coming dangerously close to touching his mustache. You can't come back from that.

435 - Nolan Ryan / Tom Seaver Strikeout Leaders (1977) - I could probably get behind the concept of a whole set of reprinted League Leaders cards. Who says I'm not easy to please?

287 - George Foster - So pissed.

257 - Dave Parker (1974) - This is one of the later designs that you'll find in this set.

276 - Jim Palmer (1966) - In the history of Topps cards, I wonder how many players have made this pose.

261 - Jim Bouton (1962) - The Ball Four guy!

The Diamond King Delivers

Cards. On Cards. With Numbers.

Last month I received a pile of cards from The Diamond King. He believes in card collecting projects, something I find rather admirable, and his latest one is called SCAM. The cleverly coined acronym basically means '90s PED users, and there was a fairly big named one who wore the Birds on the Bat. I'll come back to that later, however.

A bunch of the cards in the package were serial numbered Cardinals goodies, including this mid-oughts Donruss Jim Edmonds card. Like many cards from 1995 to roughly 2005, it didn't scan well. Someday, card companies will produce cards with scanners in mind... sure.

This card isn't technically serial numbered, but the back of this Gregg Jefferies insert claims that it is a mere 1 of 10,000. So limited!

Matt Lemanczyk, a former 10th round pick, is virtually unknown to me outside of baseball cards. Apparently he was quite the speedster in the minors, but his B-Ref.com page doesn't list any stats beyond 2005.

Chrome parallels seemed to be rather hard to come by in this year's version of Topps Heritage, but there were several of them in this package. This is the slightly more rare refractor version.

And this is the basic version. This year, the basic chrome parallels were numbered to just 999 instead of the year that the main set was aping (i.e. /999 instead of /1964). That probably doesn't make these cards worth a ton more than they otherwise would have, but I found it interesting.

Ludwick has had horrendous luck throughout his career with injuries. It seems that he's a free agent now, so it will be interesting to see if he can catch on with another team after spending most of last year hurt/ineffective.

The world needs more Larry Walker Cardinals cards.

There were other gems besides the serial-numbered cards, including this Matt Holliday 2013 Topps Heritage black retail parallel.

I know very little about TCMA cards, and have very few of them as well. I'm always excited when I see them, because I rarely consider the alternatives to Topps cards prior to the '80s.

He looks so weird in a non-Cardinals uni.

Speaking of weird, I generally just don't go for the unlicensed stuff. Panini Prizm looks like a perfectly reasonable Chrome-ish product, but I can't bring myself to care about it. Fortunately, generous people willing to trade with me sometimes send stuff like this, which is nice.

Finally, the King unloaded a bunch of Big Mac cards on me. He probably had lots of doubles leftover from the SCAM project thing.

Unfortunately, that isn't Cooperstown calling for Mr. McGwire. It's just a telemarketer.

That's some awfully sparkly tape.

Well, he did lead the league in something. I guess that can't really be taken away, no matter what he took to do what he did.

Good Luck Ducks, Week 13: Cats and Ducks Living Together

After the running game sputtered for the second consecutive week, it's safe to say that Byron Marshall's run as top dog of the conference's running backs is as over as his team's national title hopes. While the final score was considerably more favorable to Oregon than the previous week, one can imagine that the Ducks will shake things up a bit in the backfield for their final two conference games.

What has changed is Oregon's overall prospects, in that they are no longer as bleak as they seemed following the crushing loss to the school with the "zany" tree mascot. Stanford lost to USC, putting Oregon back in the Pac-12 North driver's seat. This week, the Ducks face Arizona and elite running back Ka'Deem Carey. Arizona will be fighting mad this week and back on their home turf following last year's shutout, so this won't be the proverbial cake walk.

While Marcus Mariota is still very limited in his mobility, last week saw his arm as precise as ever, as he delivered laser after laser to his receivers while generally staying near the pocket. This is probably a better sign for his NFL prospects than it is for the Ducks. I think this game has all of the makings of a classic first half nailbiter turned second half slaughter. Don't go out to the mailbox to check your mail in the third quarter or you'll probably miss the Ducks putting up 21 points somehow.

Oregon's last visit to the "Zona Zoo" at "Bear Down" Field was never close.

Game time is 12:30 PST in Tucson with national coverage on ABC or ESPN2 depending on your region or the whim of the TV fairies. Or Obama. Go Ducks!

Airbrushed Fridays: 1976 Topps Traded #127T

Airbrushed Fridays gets a new format to keep things fresh.

Who is he? Larvell Blanks was a utility infielder who spent 9 big league seasons with three different teams, including a repeat tour in Atlanta.

How did he get here? Blanks was traded twice in the same day, first as part of a five-player deal between the Indians and Braves that in part netted Atlanta someone named Ozzie Osborn. The White Sox then flipped him to Cleveland for Jack Brohamer.

Repeat offender? No

Other versions of this card or photo: 1978 Topps #61

Airbrushed Score: 9

Comments: Well, this has the beginnings of a magic hat. Is that a baseball lurking beneath and slightly to the left of the 'C'?

The Future

Time to plant all of my young baseball cards in the ground and watch them grow into money trees.

A little while back, just before Wacha Wacha Wacha fever was breaking out, I had the good fortune to participate in a group break put on by Sportscards From The Dollar Store. I'm always excited about minor league cards for whatever reason, and right now is a very juicy time to be a fan of Cardinals minor leaguers. Don't worry, I have already started squirreling away cards from simpler times for when the inevitable hype deflates and leaves everyone disappointed.

Piscotty still reminds me of a certain Italian snack and less of an actual player, but the reports on him have been good so far. This was also one of the few 2013 Topps Pro Debut cards that didn't have a red frame which rendered it virtually indistinguishable from any old Cardinals card from this year.

I was lucky enough to get in early on the Wacha thing. I was blown away by what he was doing in spring training, but tempered my expectations. Some amazing things happened late in September and early in October, and then my expectations were actually outpaced by the superlatives being tossed around by aging announcers and baseball pundits. He's going to be really good. He might even be really good now. I'm not going to be shocked if he's not the best pitcher on the staff, though.

By the way, everyone in this break lucked out when it turned out that every card in the Topps Chrome box was a refractor. A Wacha refractor is a good refractor to have right now. (I should sell, sell, sell, shouldn't I?)

That being said, I am all for acquiring as many Wacha cards as possible. It's fun!

And here's Kolten Wong not getting picked off to end a World Series game.

Up For Grabs Cardinalpalooza: Willie McGee

Previously on the Cardinalpalooza: Red Schoendienst | Enos Slaughter | Bruce Sutter | Albert Pujols | Ray Lankford | Mark McGwire | J.D. Drew | Colby Rasmus | Yadier Molina | Allen Craig | Stan Musial | Rick Ankiel | David Freese | Keith Hernandez | Steve Carlton

Willie Dean McGee was one of the centerpieces of the Runnin' Redbirds. McGee's speed and tablesetting was as integral to the success of the Cardinals offensive engine as Ozzie Smith's defensive wizardry was to saving runs. And even though McGee won the MVP in 1985 based largely on his ability to get on base and his base thievery, it was his 1987 season that always sticks in my mind. He was dropped to 5th in the batting order and sacrificed some of his on-base abilities that year while driving in a remarkable 105 runs. Not bad for a guy who had 79 HRs in 18 seasons.

Willie remains one of the most popular Cardinals of all-time to never have his uniform number retired, even though he spent the better part of the '90s in other uniforms. I don't recall other players who have been issued his #51 (though not exactly the most popular of numbers), so it's safe to assume it's unofficially retired.

Well over a decade before renting players at the trade deadline became a common practice, McGee was a participant in one of the weirder statistical anomalies in all of baseball when he won the NL batting title as a member of the (AL) Oakland Athletics. The Cardinals traded him to Oakland at the deadline when he was hitting .335 and he had enough plate appearances to qualify for the batting crown. No one caught up to him.

Like Ray Lankford, McGee returned to the Cardinals at the tail end of his career, during the Tony La Russa era. La Russa feuded with Ozzie Smith, a Cardinal legend that he inherited, but apparently must have been on good terms with some of the other Cardinals stars of earlier days.

The list:

1983 Fleer #15
1983 Topps #49
1983 Topps Stickers #147 [2 available]
1984 Topps #310 [6 available]
1985 Donruss #475
1985 Topps #757 [4 available]
1986 Donruss #109
1986 Donruss (Diamond Kings) #3
1986 Fleer Baseball's Best Sluggers vs. Pitchers #22
1986 Fleer Star Stickers #74
1986 O-Pee-Chee #117
1986 Topps #580 [7 available]
1986 Topps (All-Star) #707 [6 available]
1986 Topps Box Bottom #L
1986 Topps Glossy All-Star Send-In #9
1986 Topps Mini League Leaders #71
1986 Topps Quaker Chewy Granola Bars #1
1987 Donruss #84 [5 available]
1987 Fleer #304
1987 Fleer League Leaders #29 [3 available]
1987 O-Pee-Chee #357 [2 available]
1987 Topps #440 [8 available]
1988 Donruss #307 [9 available]
1988 Donruss All-Stars #44
1988 Fleer #42 [2 available]
1988 Fleer Star Stickers #118 [2 available]
1988 Score #40 [8 available]
1988 Topps #160 [5 available]
1988 Topps Mini League Leaders #71 [4 available]
1988 Topps Stickers (w/ Steve Bedrosian Super Star #31) #55
1988 Topps U.K. Minis #46 [7 available]
1989 Donruss #161 [10 available]
1989 Fleer #457 [3 available]
1989 Panini #189
1989 Score #88 [3 available]
1989 Topps #640 [7 available]
1989 Topps Stickers (w/ Rafael Santana #313 and Bob Knepper Super Star #63) #36
1989 Topps Stickers (w/ Rafael Santana #313 and Mark Davis Super Star #64) #36
1990 Bowman #194
1990 Donruss #632 [5 available]
1990 Fleer #253 [6 available]
1990 Score #374 [5 available]
1990 Topps #285 [8 available]
1990 Upper Deck #505 [2 available]
1991 Donruss Highlights #BC-22
1991 Panini #1 [2 available]
1997 Upper Deck Collector's Choice #199 [2 available]
1998 Upper Deck #202
1999 Upper Deck #187

A Late Night Trade Post

No selfies here.

It feels weird to talk about baseball right now. A few smaller free agent deals have been worked out. Some bigger names have moved to (presumably) greener pastures. Tim Hudson is going to be a Giant? I didn't see that one coming. I don't have a lot to say about the Cardinals right now or baseball as a whole, but here's a few nice cards from Night Owl Cards to pass the time.

I watched a phoned-in interview with Ozzie Smith today on MLB Network and began to wonder how many times he's been asked the same questions in his lifetime. And what about his post-playing days? The further a great player is distanced from those days, the more his accomplishments are reduced to the few common highlight plays that are busted out whenever he's discussed or (in this case) is part of an audio-only interview. He did a lot more than the "Go Crazy Folks" home run, the backflips and that crazy play where he almost ran into his teammate going back for the ball. And things are much, much worse for players that didn't play in the basic cable era.

When this year's MVP vote was announced, I had mentally prepared a long rant about why I thought it was ridiculous that McCutchen won. I reconsidered and decided not to write the post, but I haven't changed the way I feel about it. The short of it is, I think he's a great player, but probably not one of the greatest in the game right now. His season was not that impressive. Top ten for sure, but I see nothing astounding in either his traditional counting stats or the more advanced ones. He had an all-around good season, though not as good as his 2012 season. He's a likable player that played for a team that made the playoffs for the first time in more than 30 years, a team that people generally like to root for superficially. Now, the reason I didn't write the post is that I didn't want people to think I was just sticking up for my guy, Yadier Molina. In the truest definition of the term "most valuable player", Molina is tough to beat. Traditionally, however, this has been an offensive award handed out to players on good teams, and Molina's season at the plate also didn't cut the mustard. I don't know who I would have voted for if I had to do it, but I do know that McCutchen wouldn't have been in my top 3. (It might've been Goldschmidt, I guess?)

Serial numbered Albert Pujols cards are always going to be a special thing to me, so long as they are from the Cardinals era - obviously. The Cards could have really used a performance like this in this year's World Series.

I usually save the "hit" or "hits" for last in any given trade post, but this is by far the best card I received in all. I have no idea where this came from exactly, but it appears to be some sort of Sega/Topps Japanese collaboration that also might be a game. All I know is that I need more of these.

I can only guess that Dodgers fan Night Owl got ahold of this because someone sent it to him thinking he'd need it because Skip is a current Dodger. (I could also be way off base.) Most team collectors don't collect this way, unless someone was a true franchise icon and ended up on another team due to extenuating circumstances... or at the very least, didn't play for the rival team. Regardless, Schumaker is out of LA after a single season (and two relief appearances as a pitcher). Walt Jocketty is making him the latest ex-Card to move to Cincinnati, on a surprising two-year deal.