NOW That Will Leave A Mark

Didja ever order a Topps NOW card and the guy gets traded before the thing arrives? NOW that really stings, Topps!

It's a nice curtain call for Dozier, though I think it's a bittersweet final image.

In more promising prospects, Topps issued a set of cards for the AL and NL All-Star rosters, which included Jose Berrios. He pitched 1 inning, allowed no hits and one walk. Since the AL won the game, Berrios was credited with a Hold.

Last but not least, local kid Joe Mauer made headlines by passing Kirby Puckett on the career Doubles list. He has more than any other Minnesota Twin, and is 3rd all-time for the Washington Senators / Twins franchise, behind Joe Judge (421) and Sam Rice (479). His next milestone? He currently has 992 career runs scored. Barring injury he should be able to reach 1,000 by the end of the season.

No Doz

BUMMER.

No cards of the prospects yet, so you get "Four"sythe.

DANG.

Fogo de Ciao

It's never easy to lose a fan favorite in a trade. Eduardo Escobar, in the final year of his contract, leading all of baseball in doubles, versatile in the field, was a valuable trade piece for a Twins team well out of the playoff picture. The Twins get three Class-A prospects in return from Arizona, but what do they lose?

Escobar had no problem making himself the clubhouse glue, whether he was playing the role of AAAA bench guy, then fill in utility guy, then first man off the bench, and the last three seasons as the everyday Shortstop. His obsession with Fogo de Chao eventually led to his own dugout drink, #cagejuice, which is essentially water he liberated from the restaurant in the weeks following the team's trip to Puerto Rico, where he met with Nicholas Cage. Twins fans will miss Eddie's #Fogopower and his leadership on and off the field. I hope the Twins try to sign him again in the off-season.

The Twins also parted ways with lights-out reliever Ryan Pressly. He was originally a Rule V draftee from the Red Sox org., and after a year stashed at the back of the bullpen, he was sent to the minors. Similar to Escobar, Pressly worked very hard to move his way up the ladder to eventually become an anchor of the Twins bullpen. I was surprised to find this was the only Pressly card I owned, but middle relievers have a tough time making it onto cardboard. The Astros gave up two AA prospects, a pitcher and a Center Fielder, to get the hard throwing righty. Pressly's still under his first MLB contract, giving the Astros control for a full season beyond this one.

So the question is - Who is next? Brian Dozier, another Free Agent, has drawn interest from many clubs, most recently Cleveland and San Francisco. Gibson has been mentioned in lots of rumors, from New York to Milwaukee and several others. It would take an aggressive offer to get him. The new guys in the Twins' bullpen are likely all available, Duke, Rodney, Addison Reed might not raise eyebrows, but could help out contenders looking to shorten the games down the stretch.

Which Twin do you wish your team would trade for?

NOW The Twins Finally Have A Little Spring In Their Step

The Twins are winners of 5 straight and are nipping at Cleveland's heels for first place in the AL Central. It took them quite some time to heat up, just like the weather in MN, and just like the shipment from Topps with the Twins' 2018 Spring Training Team set.

The two rookies included were Zack Granite and Felix Jorge, both of whom are currently in the minors. Granite is on the DL at the moment with a bum shoulder, as are veterans Ervin Santana and Miguel Sano.

The Twins' shiny new Relief Corps has been hot and cold, though Addison Reed has been the most consistent of the bunch. Berrios is appropriately shown working out, as he's taken on the mantle of the hardest working man in the off-season, with crazy workouts of pushing cars on the beaches of Puerto Rico popping up on social media all winter long. 

The set features the first appearance of Logan Morrison in a Twins' uniform, and he's just now starting to swing the bat well after a horrendous April. Topps sent an extra copy of Zack Granite for some reason...

The backs of the cards are all identical below the player's name and the card number.

Since I am a sucker, I opted to buy the "autograph" edition and I was pleasantly surprised to pull a Brian Dozier card.

I like the photo selection, and even though they didn't include my dude Kennys Vargas, I think they did a good job of player selection.

NOW With Clever Nicknames

Players Weekend was quite some time ago now - it feels even longer given the exciting finish to the 2017 season. The Twins were north of the border in Toronto, and they were struggling to keep pace with the Blue Jays bats. They did manage to have some impressive highlights.

But the appeal of Player's Weekend was the customization and flair that the players were allowed for once. Too bad the photo of Rosario crops out his socks, they were something else.

That certainly stands out! 

Joe Mauer disappointed by opting for the nickname "Mauer," so I won't bother showing the back of that one. Next year, maybe Joe could consider "Well Played" for his jersey. "Baudido" roughly translates to Bandit. The curious can read about the rest of the Twins nicknames here. My favorite was Miguel Sano's "Boqueton" which means Big Mouth. Bartolo Colon opted for a tribute to his late mother instead of "Big Sexy," I think he made the right choice.

The Players' Weekend (ok, I think I've covered all the possible iteration Players, Player's, and Players') was also a big series for Byron Buxton, who's absolutely crushed Blue Jay pitching in his young career. The ball was jumping off his bat on the Saturday game, when he hit 3 homers.

Around the same time as these cards, another Topps NOW gem arrived. Byron's been busy! I can't tell you how long it would take me to circle the bases, but I can pretty much promise you that 14 seconds would not be enough. Buxton absolutely burns up the basepaths, I don't think I've ever seen a baseball player run so fast before.

The Breakdown Abides

As a follow up to an earlier trade, I sent Gavin from Baseball Card Breakdown some of my duplicate Kirby Pucketts for his player collection, and he fired back with a great lineup of Twins, and of course tossed in this custom Great Dude of History. The Dude of course was featured in Minnesota filmmakers' Joel and Ethan Coen's "The Big Lebowski."

I've seen stranger things than this custom yearbook photo, but not many with as well-groomed a pushbroom as Mr. Clarke

On to the cards! Mauer dutifully covers up the uninspired Minnesota State Flag, which is just the state seal on a field of blue.  The "Hometown" parallel is a great addition to Mauer Mountain.

Two new 2017 Doziers, including a shiny sepia Chrome refractor!

Gavin is a fine connoisseur of shiny cardboard and his mailer was jam packed with refractors and parallels.

These last four were also serial numbered, to boot! Thanks Gavin! Let's trade again soon.

A Gold Label Card Show Day

What a day! Headed out to the monthly show and found some awesome deals.

First of all, this show was the first time that I found multiple dime boxes - usually I am lucky to find one vendor selling cards for .10, but this time there were three different vendors, selling everything from the late 70s to the new 2017 Topps releases.

A great variety in the dime boxes!

All of these for just .90 - been a long time since I could find Diamond Kings for such a low price.

There were lots of other deals to be found on Twins cards - The team card is numbered to /65. I was pleasantly surprised to find when I got home that I didn't already have the two patch Kennys Vargas card.

Same powder blue patch for Killebrew, Hrbek, and Tony O.... It's possible that these all came from different uniforms, but who knows? Jacques Jones gets lost in the shuffle sometimes, but he was awesome back in the day.

Now we come to the big news - after today's haul, I'm down to just 12 cards remaining in the 1956 Topps set build! The 6 above were just a dollar apiece!

A pair of Braves, a Moose, and the original Big Red Machine.

Here was the biggest score of the day! Have to share the back too:

The last dozen cards have some pretty big names, lots of Yankees... I'm going to be patient and save up to get those last cards checked off the list.

A really exciting show for me, found more than I thought possible!

P.S. - Twins' Opening Day is in just . . .

2 Days!

Now Look What You've Done

Remember those Topps Now tears I talked about? Let's get those out of the way, shall we? Big Bart was the first time I went after a Topps Now Card. I ordered it direct from Topps, and I think a lot of people stopped there as it was by far the biggest seller of the year.  

But not me! I decided that I was going all in on Topps Now - which for me meant going after all the cards I personally wanted the most - I ordered Ichiro direct from Topps as well, the others I had to find on eBay. I couldn't let a sweet bat flip pass me by!

Here's the back of the Ichiro card, one of the few times the cards had something other than text on the back.

I am sucker. Plain and simple - but you know what? I don't regret any of these. Now that I figured out that I could get these cheaper if I ordered on eBay the same day they were released, I felt like I could justify the expense. At least a little bit. These are all great photos! I bet that at least two of these end up on regular issue cards in 2017, which makes me think I might regret paying for these in 2016...

This one was stupid. I got it because it was stupid, like why would they make this into a card? Sorry to those bloggers out there that hate this card.

And of course I had to chase the hometown Twins.

Max Kepler had several highlights in his rookie season, Sano had a bunch too. It was a lucky guess by Topps to release a card after Sano's 4th game in a row hitting a home run, and then not having the Gary Sanchez effect, in which the streak kept going and the cards kept coming - probably a bittersweet victory for Yankees collectors.

Mauer actually had two walk off wins in 2016, but apparently Topps didn't think a Walk Off Walk was exciting enough for its own card...

Dozier might not be in a Twins uniform by Opening Day 2017, but he sure made a ton of great memories in 2016. Buxton is just getting started - and this wasn't even his best catch of 2016!

I am about 99% sure I won't chase these cards as hard in 2017, it just adds up to a lot of money, even if you're getting the bulk price on eBay. I still think it's a fun idea, and I still think Topps missed out on a few moments, and had some boring photo selections at times.

Goin' Prospectin'

Got a message from John Hazen a little while back, seeing if I was interested in some Bowman from the late 2000s, including a rookie card of a certain 40+ HR hitting middle infielder . . .

Why yes, yes I am.

These guys all made it to at least a cup of coffee in the bigs, Mulvey being one part of the Johan Santana trade with the Mets.

Some from 2008 - Steve Tolleson's dad Wayne was a major leaguer for several years.

Tobias Streich is a West Virginia University grad, and of course Hicks was the Twins' first rounder in 2008, and was traded for John Ryan Murphy before the 2016 season. The jury is still out on who "won" that trade...
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thanks John, the return package should be coming soon!