Saturday is NOT Card Show Day

I myself first realized that this was not a card show day when I arrived at the strip mall that hosts the monthly show and no one else was there... Oh well, always nice to take in the lovely weather. So, instead of showing more of my 1959 Topps set build (didn't add any new cards today), here are the other cards I added from the last couple shows.

Jerry Kindall knows a thing or two about Minnesota winter weather - he was a St. Paul kid and a University of MN standout. He hit for the cycle in the College World Series in 1956 and after his MLB career returned as the coach of the Golden Gophers in the 1970s. He was the first person to win the College World Series as a player and then win again as a manager.

Hey, Let's Add Two Cubs!

I don't like to show the price tags for the most part, but for this card is was an integral part of the story. I have said it enough times now that I'm not a big fan of the 1953 Topps set. I don't have any cards on my want list because I don't have any intention of adding any more to my collection. But here we are, talking about another new card added from the set. I am fairly certain I will not be able to afford a copy of Hoyt's 1952 Topps card, so when I found a copy of his 1953 card for just $10, I had to add it. If it was closer to the book value, I think I would have passed on it.

There you go - less tacky this way.

1952 Topps Horizontal cards, on the other hand, will always be on the list for me! This card has two good corners and two missing corners, which made the Hall of Famer an affordable addition!

Some more random finds included this Doc Gooden Leaf Rookie Card. The Gooden box bottom from the 1985 Donruss card is one of my favorite cards of the 80s, so it was fun to add this card as well.

Along with the French translation on the back, the Leaf card also has a "Rookie Of The Year" stamp over the stat block. When I first saw this, I thought someone added this after the fact, but looking at some other examples on COMC, it looks like it appears on all of them.

The rest of the haul included some more recent releases, There was a decent deal to be had buying all of these together from the same vendor.

The same vendor also had some relic and autographs for sale, and I picked up a pair of Adrian Beltre cards, who just has to wait a few more years before he can be inducted into the Hall of Fame.

This looks like a bat relic, but the disclaimer on the back doesn't use the word bat at all, and is keen to point out that this "game-used memorabilia" is not from any specific game, season, or event.... It could be from an Adrian Beltre bat, but I guess we'll never know for sure! 

The Highly Subjective and Completely Arbitrary Future?

Beltre, Mauer, David Wright and Victor Martinez have all retired - Ichiro possibly has played his final MLB game as well. Bartolo Colon wants to keep playing, but he is one of the few players left from my school days. It means a new chapter in my cheering life, as I can no longer see myself clearly in the same area code as the professional athlete. But this blog is just entering its 5th season, still full of potential.

The Topps All-Star Rookie blog Series will be back in 2019, with a quick detour about the lost years of 1979 - 1986. No Cups or trophies were to be found on the cards, but the card company still named a roster of young talent annually. Of course, the Cup made a triumphant return in 1987, with the 1962 inspired wood grain set.

Player Collections will keep on keeping on - especially trying to "finish" the Kennys Vargas MLB collection, and getting started on the new kid in town, Starting Pitcher Fernando Romero. There will be  mini-collection posts too - did I really start a mini-collection of players on the phone?

There will be oddballs! Like, what even is that last one? Cat League Baseball?

I'll be working on the 1959 Set as well, and maybe maybe I'll finish it during its 60th anniversary.

Looking forward to the 2019 issues from Topps and Panini, too -I'll be sharing thoughts on those and much much more.

A Card Show Connection (GCRL IRL)

Jim from cards as i see them e-mailed me ahead of the show and asked if I was going (he had heard that the vintage guy was in town as well). We exchanged some small talk about the playoffs, and some small stacks of cardboard! This Miguel Sano card looks even better in hand - I think I like it even more than the autograph I bought at the show from Gold Label!

Jim found this set and picked it up for the Garvey inside, I was the lucky recipient of Bert and the Killer.

Some all-time great PC guys!

Horizontal heroes as well!

Sal Butera's son Drew also played for the Twins - Drew is still chugging along, backing up Salvador Perez in KC. Nice gig if you can get it!

A pretty sweet Joe Mauer from Topps Tribute! As always, great stuff from Jim. Thanks again, and great to see you at the show!

It's Like Trading With a Card Shop

Daniel from It's Like Having My Own Card Shop posted on Twitter that he had just busted a box 1991 Topps Archives (the 1953 set reprinted), but the collation was predictably terrible. I had a bunch of doubles myself from a similar attempt I made on that set a few years back, so I reached out to him and sent over what I had, along with some Diamondbacks. Here's the return package!

A bevy of Beltres!

An even bigger bombardment of Bondses!

Some horizontal heroes!

This card is numbered to 75 - it's amazing to me that all three guys are still in the league, 10 seasons later. Mauer's the only guy still with his original team, but all three are still contributing at the highest level.

Thanks Daniel, this was a really fun blind trade!

Face to Face

I've been buying some cards regularly (about once a month or so) from a seller on Facebook, and it's been working out pretty well for me. I was skeptical at first, but now I've purchased cards from this same seller 5 or 6 times now and the cards have always arrived, and the prices are competitive with what I find for Twins at my local card shops and card shows. I can probably get better deals if I hustled for these same cards on eBay, but to be honest, I'm paying as much for the leg work as anything else.

This seller will contact me and send a bunch of photos. I pick out the cards that I like, we negotiate a fair price, and that's all. By finding a short stack of Twins for me, I generally can get a good deal by buying several at once. No drama if a card is not for me, I just politely decline and we move on.

This Pinto card was tossed in as an extra this time around, even though he was up front about when he was shipping, he still felt that it took longer than usual to get the cards to me.

I also asked about Ichiro and Beltre cards, as I was looking to add a few more to my collection.

A game used base!

I think it is right to be a little wary of these. Playoff went so far as to show a photo of the actual base, as well as a blurb about the game in which the base appeared. The game was at Dodger Stadium, Ichiro went 1-4 with his 20th double of his rookie season. He was hit by a pitch as well, and scored a run. That means he spent a little time at every base in the game. The Mariners won 9-2.

Allen & Ginter & Bubba.

\Matt from Bubba's Banging Batch of Baseball Bits and I made a trade via PWE last week, and my return was some great Allen & Ginter cards from this year's release.

These are all parallels from the base set, of course, which has an all off-white background.

Very happy to add some more Byron Buxton cards to the fold, he's starting to have another big month. The card on the right is the foil parallel.

 A mini-Killer!

Matt did not draw any ire from me with this Willie Eyre signed card.

Thanks again for the trade!

A PC PWE ASAP

Scott, a fan of Florida baseball, followed up a great bubble mailer with an impressively stuffed PWE.

My junk wax want lists only go up to 1996 at the moment, but Scott found some great stuff to send that reached beyond the lists. I wonder who the hand model is for the Pedro pitch grips?

Larry Walker might never get a fair hearing as a Hall of Famer, but he's easily one of my favorites from the 1990s.

Some horizontal heroes

Here's a MEME - More Eddie Murray, Everybody!

Can't go wrong with Kirby Puckett.

The greatest leadoff hitter of all-time, and a guy who might have been the best leadoff hitter in the 90s not named Rickey or Raines.

Thanks again Scott! 

COM(P)C

I've taken to hitting up COMC every few months or so and scraping the bottom of the barrel for some affordable cards from all over the map - in the past I focused on Twins, and this time I extended it to all Player Collection guys:

We still start with a Minnesota Twin, in this case Fan Favorite Kent Hrbek. Yesterday was the 25th anniversary of Kent's audition for the WWF, Braves fans avert your eyes:

sorrynotsorry

Moving along... Here's another guy I collect, the future Hall of Famer Adrian Beltre.

Beltre's first homer was against the Rangers!

Another Lock for Cooperstown, the Pride of Peoria, IL, Jim Thome!

I've always thought that Eddie Murray was the #1 Bad-Ass of the 80s.

Big Bart wasn't always so big, and did you recall his stint on the South Side? Rickey remembers when Rickey played in San Diego, even if he couldn't remember playing with John Olerud (*that's a fun, if not entirely true, story) .

Pedro's been all over both leagues.

And we finish where we started -  with two franchise Center Fielders for the Twins. Nothing on this post cost me more than a buck, most of them were under 50 cents!