Season's Greetings

An interesting little tidbit popped up this off season, when the Twins picked up Kyle Garlick off waivers from the Braves. Garlick is in his age 29 season, he was a 28th round pick of the Dodgers in 2015. He spent 5 full seasons in the minors, then managed a big cup of coffee with the Dodgers in 2019 (30 games). He was traded to the Phillies for reliever Tyler Gilbert before the 2020 season.

 The Phillies had even less for him to do, spending all but 13 games at the dreaded "alternate site" during the 2020 season.  Garlick has shown some decent minor league power over the years, hitting just over 20 homers a season over from 2016 to 2019. The Braves scooped him up, then the Twins took a flier on him in February.

He's been the team's biggest surprise of the spring, hitting 5 homers and driving in 13 runs. With Eddie Rosario off to Cleveland, and Alex Kirilloff getting the Kris Bryant treatment, that made room for more Garlick in the lineup. He made the team's opening day roster, and will likely platoon in Left field with Jake Cave. 

I suspect he's just keeping the spot warm for a prospect, but it's a fun story to see a guy win a job in Spring training. Looking forward to the 2021 Season to get going tomorrow!

Any Spring Training surprises for your team?

Thanks for reading!

Shiny Happy People II

It was a good round yesterday, and since I hadn't purchased many new cards lately, I figured I would go for round two of Chrome vs. Optic.

There were a couple things new to me since last time, This insert was not in the last in any form. I think the pic might be *gasp* photoshopped.

The retail specific Pink refractors - Johnny Cueto is one of my favorite current players.

And the purple prizms from Optic - I have a confession. There are some players that I collect under the radar. They aren't really advertised by me as player collections, but I will always set them aside and keep them out of the trade pile. Ian Happ was one of last year's top prospects that I added to that category, a "super secret PC" guy.

Javy Baez is another super secret PC guy, don't worry, they aren't all Cubs!

Polanco and Frazier are repeats from the purple parallels earlier in this pack.

besides having the MLB license, the other unique to Topps element are horizontal cards.

Donruss carries on the tradition of Rated Rookies and Diamond Kings.

The two standard prizms/refractors from these packs... 

Another new insert for these packs - Hunter is another super secret PC Guy!

The only "hit" from either day - this Rio Ruiz autograph is numbered to /150.

So, who won the pack wars, Optic or Chrome? Pretend that Optic hasn't been disqualified for not having a license.