Quite Possibly A Perfect Card

I spent the majority of my childhood and early adult years living around the St. Louis area.  I still love the Cardinals and still really enjoy following all of the sports teams from the area.  I mean the Cardinals are the clear number one, but I still dig the Rams and Blues.  I still watch Mizzou games.  I moved to North Carolina in my late twenties and have enjoyed the sports scene in the Raleigh-Durham area.  It's a college heavy town, especially for basketball, but there is still plenty of good baseball, college football, pro football in Charlotte along with a heavy mixture of Skins fans, soccer, lacrosse, and even a hockey team with a Stanley Cup banner.

Every once in awhile the North Carolina and Missouri worlds of my life collide.  Last year Mizzou played, and won, a basketball game at NC State.  The Blues tangle with the Hurricanes, the Rams play the Panthers and the Redskins, and I get to see my fair share of former Cardinals players floating around in the minors attending Bulls games.

There are also a fair number of pro baseball players from North Carolina who have connections to St. Louis.  Cardinals outfielder Enos Slaughter is from Roxboro (The Rox), Cardinals pitcher Seth Maness went to East Carolina, former Cardinals/Rockies/Rays outfielder Quinton McCracken played football at Duke,  and former Cardinals second baseman Mike Tyson is from Rocky Mount.  I could spend hours talking about the connections.  New players, old players, good players, bad players, mediocre players........

My newest connection is one of the best baseball players to ever come out of Greensboro.  Rick Farrell played 18 years in the Majors from 1929 through 1945.  He had two stops in St. Louis, both with the Browns, but his best years were spent as a Red Sox.  The 7 time All-Star posted a career .281/.378/.363 line and was elected to the Hall of Fame by the Veterans Committee in 1984.

Topps included Ferrell in their 2013 Gypsy Queen product as a St Louis Browns player.  The set included a base card of Ferrell along with a cool coin card.  Here is the front and the back of the Farrell coin card which I picked up last week:

I love the coin cards, but have never found one out of Gypsy Queen that I really like enough to add to my collection.  First, they are limited to a print run of just 5 copies which makes them pretty pricey.  Earlier coin card sets, such as the Topps Gallery versions, featured no serial numbers and were much more affordable.  This card has been on my Ebay watch list for months, but was sitting at $50.  I made an offer or two, but never budged the seller.  Finally another copy of the card appeared and I managed to talk down the price.  I love that Ferrell is in a Browns uni on the card, but the North Carolina quarter is an added bonus.  A great connection between my childhood home and current home and a great and welcome addition to my collection.