Three Shiny Bulls and One Flying Squirrel

I have been on a roll the last few days picking up some odds and ends that I missed throughout the earlier portions of the 2016 baseball card calendar.  Cards that I saw a few months back that either cost too much at the time on Ebay, or I could not line up a trade... Somthing happened to make me skip these cards.  I was certainly interested.

Kind of a good feeling to cross these off the list.

The four cards are in this post were all picked up in a Facebook trade.  I was originally interested in two of the cards, which feature former Durham Bulls players, but managed to kind of back into two other cards which sealed the trade.  The two main cards in my half of the trade were.....

A 2016 Topps Chrome Richie Shaffer autograph.  He has actually been shuffled between Tampa and Durham this past year.  I am hoping that he sticks around with the Rays next year, but their infield is rather crowded at the moment.  Perhaps he's trade bait, but I have thoroughly enjoyed watching him play in Durham the past two years.

Two quick observations on the Shaffer card:

• The card is one of those colored variations that pops up in the Chrome set every year.  I know there are collectors who try to chase down all of the different colors.  I feel like the longer I collect cards the less I care about all the variation stuff.  The important thing here is that I found a copy of Richie Shaffer's Topps Chrome autograph.  

• Is that a PokeBall on the end of his bat?  

Next up is my favorite Durham Bulls player from the last two years, pitcher Blake Snell....

I like the card, I like the autograph, but why is there smoke behind his head?  This card sort of looks like it was taken while Snell was on the Durham Bulls and airbrushed into a Rays uni.  The little Ray on his back sleeve looks rather sloppy for a real Rays uni.  

Next.  

Not an autograph, but still a former Durham Bulls player.  Rickard spent part of last season with the Bulls before he was left unprotected by the Rays this offseason.  The Orioles picked him up in the Rule 5 Draft and he spent the year playing in the Bigs.  His stay in Durham only lasted a little over a month, but he batted .360/.437/.472 during the stint.  Not too shabby.  

Last one.  

Last summer I spent a little bit of time traveling around to a few different ballparks in my neck of the woods.  One the trips was up to Richmond, Virginia to check out a game at The Diamond.  I actually spent a few years as a kid living in Richmond and many of my first baseball games were watching the Braves Triple A team.  Now the team in Richmond is the Flying Squirrels and they are the Double A affiliate of the Giants.  I spent part of last season following the team's box scores and the what not, one of their better players was outfielder Mac Williamson.  

Mac Williamson also has a local connection to North Carolina.  He is from Wake Forest, a town just north of Raleigh, and played college baseball at Wake Forest, a college in Winston-Salem which is about an hour and half away from the town of Wake Forest.  The card was kind of a throw-in, but I am still really happy to have this card.