They Still Come With Great Trade Packages

 Jeff from Wish They Still Came With Bubblegum has been trading with me for some time now and he always sends great stuff.

 ALOU!

 Lil Alou times two!

 The great Kenny Lofton, speed, plate discipline, and defense.

 The great card front of Kenny Lofton.

 Masterpiece is right - a quartet of Twins of all stripes and refractors.

 Manny is being Manny in Kingston.

 These were both new to me Kirbys!

 I think that might be my only Bowman Best card from the rebirth of that brand. A pretty awesome Sano parallel, too!

 Vikings!

The future!

 "They're sending these cards to England? I wonder if it's Happy Hour over there right now?"

Had to share the back of the UK Topps Card -good stuff.

Thanks Jeff! Another awesome package. I will try to put something together to send back your way soon.

Pushing the Envelope

 If you're wondering how many cards you can fit in a single plain white envelope, Jeff from Wish They Still Came With Bubblegum is the guy to ask.

 The Kenny Lofton PC gets a boost! The Hammer Team insert is so stupid, I love it!

 This card looks really sharp in person - the scan doesn't really capture it.

 A Quartet of Vikings - no more home playoff games in the cold, the new stadium opens next year.

 Some oddballs - the Revco Puckett is new to me!

Sweeet. A 7-11 Slurpee Disc.

Jeff! Thanks for the jam packed envelope!

Generous Jeff!

Jeff from Wish They Still Came With Bubblegum sent along another PWE this week - I have been slowly gathering forces to return everyone's generousity - I've got some trade stacks going, I just need to organize and package them - they will hopefully be out the door early next week, though probably not in time for that big birthday coming up,,,

Let's take a look at the cardboard!

 A Classic! I do love collecting two Sport Stars, and guys playing the "Wtong" sport on their card is the best... Steve Nash traces his roots to Canada, where there's no shortage of love for Hockey.

 Sometimes you just have to roll with the villains. Bonds is one of my favorite villains. I also defended Pete Rose today... NO NOT FOR THAT. For steamrolling Ray Fosse. He was kind of a jerk already, bu being a jerk is maybe what made him such a great player. Certainly won't win him many points in a man of the year contest.

 A couple of the Twins' young arms. Trevor may be stuck in the bullpen this season, where he was effective, but man, if he can start? Let him start instead of Nolasco or Milone.... Sheeesh! Tyler Jay was the shiny new draft pick for the Twins out of Illinois. He was reliever, but they are going to give him a chance to start. Less college innings on his arm is a good thing!

Hrbek, Blyleven, Brunansky, and . . . can you name the fourth Twin? First correct comment will win... Something! Which I will send... next week! To the Winner! Well, that went quickly! It's Athletics' Front Office Maestro Billy Beane! Congrats to Laurens for the correct answer.

Onwards and upwards!

 Jeff from Wish They Still Came with Bubble Gum sent this along just as I was moving out of the old place - this was the last piece of mail I received... single tear.

 Topps Sterling is no joke. These cards are super thick. It's like a big hunk of leather with a photo silkscreened onto it.

 Still working the kinks out of photos at the new place - this was the best image I got after way too many tries. I'm gonna set up a lightbox or something so I can do this better. I really dig the Jimmy Dean Lofton Rookie card.

 Good old Dave at the Dome! I might be closing in on a team set of Kraft Singles... I don't know...

Some vintage for good measure. There's a book out recently about Gene Mauch - he's one of those guys who was around the game forever. He never won a World Series as a Manager, but he led some pretty impressive runs into the playoffs. Probably one of the more underrated tacticians in baseball.

Thanks Jeff! Great stuff!

I'm Glad They Still Come With PWEs

Jeff from Wish They Still Came With Bubble Gum sent over this fantastic Plain White Envelope with some great stuff!

 We got Bat Rack guys - Sweeney looks like he's in the boiler room or something. If Ichiro saw that, he'd cringe!

 TC is a home run derby champ at Target Field - they set up just outside the infield and he launches softballs into the second deck and off the batter's eye. He hit a bit better at the Dome, but so did Mauer...

 A couple sweet minor league cards of 90s greats. I don't know if either guy will be a Hall of Famer, but both had tremendous careers.

 Glove Stories is a pretty cool recurring insert in Gypsy Queen - I'm a fan.

BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOF.

Thanks Jeff, this was a great PWE! I sent over some Heritage Minors on Monday, you should see them in the next couple days!

A PWE from Wish They Still Came With Bubblegum

 Jeff and I have a nice round trip going with PWEs - here's the latest from the author of Wish They Still Came With Bubblegum

 Diamond Kings is a great set - if they had logos, they'd really give Stadium Club a run for its money. As it is, they are pretty darn cool.

 That's a cool die-cut of Paul Molitor.

Cheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeese!

 The Colts card is secretly a Twins card as well.

 Free Secret - I collect Barry Sanders cards sometimes.

 Despite being a Vikings fan growing up, I looked forward to seeing Barry Sanders play at least 3 times - The Annual Thanksgiving Day Game plus two games against the Vikes. I always pulled for the Lions after Minnesota was eliminated from the playoffs (or from making the playoffs).

Awesome! Jeff, I've got something headed your way in return!

Chewing Gum Facts

Jeff from Wish They Still Came With Bubblegum have an ongoing PWE trade happening - it's a good time. Jeff's latest arrived on Saturday.

Sweet 62! Stickers and "The Ignitor" too!



Kenny! Lofton may never make the Hall of Fame, but I think he's one of the best Leadoff guys of his generation.

 



I think this patch is a throwback powder blue number donned first by the Twins in the 70s.

Jeff - Thanks again for a great PWE!


I leave you with some Chewing Gum Facts:

The world’s oldest piece of chewing gum is 9000 years old!

The average person chews over 300 sticks of gum each year!

In the beginning, chewing gums were made only by hand! Today almost all gum is made by machine.

Most chewing gum is purchased between Halloween and Christmas.

Chewing gum while peeling onions will keep you from crying.

Humans are the only animals on earth that chew gum.

Many dentists now widely recommend chewing sugar free gum to their patients.

PWE from Wish They Still Came With Bubble Gum

Well, what do we have here? Jeff from Wish They Still Came With Bubble Gum dropped a PWE on me that contained this awesome Twins Hot Pack!

 The 1957s - you can tell Kennys and Arcia were in the same place, you can see the same ads in both pictures.. The colors on the lettering are a bit off to me... the blue would be easier to read if it was a bit darker, but that's nothing new for 1957 topps...

 I mentioned on Jeff's Archives post that I really liked the Koufax - I get a kick out of the kid photobombing Sandy - I bet that kid has no idea he's on a baseball card! That's a rainbow foil Dozier, btw.

the 1983 Twins - It's kind of perfect that Danny Santana is wearing the powder blue throwback uni. The inset photos for Suzuki and Hughes are the same as the main photo on their 2015 Topps Heritage cards, but it's all good. It works!

Thanks very much Jeff, these were pretty cool!

Long Lasting Flavor

Jeff from Wish They Still Came With Bubblegum and I just completed our first trade! Jeff has been reading the blog and checking the want lists, that is for sure!

 Ya know what? I don't care how often Topps re-uses this image - it's awesome.

 Greatest Hitter of All-Time*

Some fun Opening Day inserts - these were both new to me!

Before Kennys Vargas (Lil Papi), There was Big Papi.

Thanks very much Jeff, these were awesome!