I had the opportunity to do a little bit of volunteer work over the Thanksgiving holiday by helping out an older friend from my days in Durham. The friend helps out around a community thrift store that donates its profits to charity. The shop had a big lot of sports cards, programs and score cards, and memorabilia that was donated and they needed a little help making heads and tails out of what they had in their store.
They had a few cool things that will help out the Thrift Store after they auction off the items, but they also had a few things that were inexpensive and cool for me as a baseball card collector. I ended up with a few junk wax era boxes. I will do a post on a few of them over the next few weeks, but for this week's #MyCardMonday I wanted to share out one cool card that I pulled out of a 1993 Flair box I bought from the store.
Here's my new card......
I was excited to pull this out of my box of cards. Edmonds has several rookie cards in 1993 products, but I always really liked this card. Way back in 1993 I did not open any packs, or boxes, of this product. Years later I ran into one somewhere because I have a ton of these cards floating around in my boxes. I also have a single copy of this Edmonds, but I bought that from a card shop in St. Louis after he was traded to the Cardinals.
I have never had the joy of pulling a cool Jim Edmonds rookie and being excited about the card. Yes, back in 1993 I pulled a few Edmonds rookie cards, but he was just some guy on the Angels. Very nice card and I am happy to give it a good home.
Something a little bit different for this week's #MyCardMonday. I spend a lot of my time on this blog talking about modern cards and modern players. Every once in awhile I will go out and pick up a nice vintage card, sometimes I scan it and throw it on here, other times I do not. I have actually been looking for a card of a vintage player, but had very little luck in finding much of this particular player. I understand that sometimes finding cards of older players can be difficult, especially given the fact that this player was active in the 1920s, 30s, and 40s. Add in the fact that my target was also a Negro League player and the task was made even more difficult.
Sure, card companies have made an attempt to include Negro League players in some of the modern products, but there are still loads of great players who have generally gone unnoticed including long time St. Louis Stars legend, and Baseball Hall of Famer, Willie Wells.
Wells spent the beginning of his career, from 1924 to 1931, with the St. Louis Stars. After the team was dissolved, he bounced around to various teams before spending the prime of his career with the Newark Eagles. He also spent time playing in Mexico where he was given the nickname "El Diablo" or "The Devil". By all accounts, Wells was an intense baseball player who had five star talent as a shortstop.
There are some great stories about Wells floating around, but none of them seem to have inspired a major card maker to put Wells into a product. I was a little dismayed to find that every card of Willie Wells is some sort of oddball. So, I finally settled on something that is "baseball-cardish" to add to my collection of Willie Wells. After all, as a native St. Louisan it's hard to have a card collection full of the finest baseball players from the Cardinals, a few Browns too, and not also put Willie Wells into that same category.
Here's what I picked up........
This is actually a Perez-Steele postcard from 1998. I know that a lot of collectors use these cards for autographs, but I was happy to see that they have actually included players from the Negro Leagues in several of their sets. There is a print run of roughly 10,000 of each card, so price and availability are of little concern with these cards. Dick Perez's artwork has long been around the game, modern collectors would know him best has the man who painted the Diamond Kings cards in the 1980s for Donruss, and I am happy to finally add a card of Willie Wells to my collection.
As I am typing this on Sunday, the Royals have not quite wrapped up the World Series, but they are a game away from their second World Championship. The Cardinals fan in me is a little indifferent towards the Royals taking home a World Series crown, but my Durham Bulls side is happy with the outcome since the team has two former members on the roster. I could go with Ben Zobrist for this week's #MyCardMonday, but I feel like the super-utility player has received plenty of love over the years from fans all over baseball due to his unique ability to play all over the field at a high level.
I am actually a little bit happier, not sure that is a thing, for former pitcher Wade Davis. He was sort of an after-thought in the Wil Myers-James Shields trade a few years ago, but he has excelled since the Royals have moved him into the bullpen. Last season he was used in a setup role for stopper Greg Holland, but this year has ended up with the job as the team's closer. Through the Division Series, Championship Series, and World Series games this year he has pitched 7 2/3 innings, without allowing a run, and striking out 13 batters.
So, let's get the card.....
Wade Davis was a pretty generous signer for card companies a few years back and this Triple Threads card is my absolute favorite. First, let's start with the fact that this is a bat card? When did Wade Davis ever take an at-bat? Surprisingly, he is hitting .250 for his career with 2 hits in 8 at bats. That's above both the Kozma Line (.150) and the Mendoza Line (.200). Pretty impressive.
The Triple Threads cards have almost always had a primarily horizontal design to their relic autograph cards, but Topps ditched that concept for one year in 2010 and went vertical. I have a bunch of these and have always found it to be one of my favorite Triple Threads designs. Just something different.
When I was growing up in St. Louis one of the most unique players on the Cardinals was Jose Oquendo. 'The Secret Weapon" was used all over the field by Cardinals manager Whitey Herzog. Later in his career Oquendo mainly played 2B, but early in his career he appeared all over the outfield and infield and even appeared as a catcher and a pitcher in a game or two. There are a few players currently in the Majors who remind me a little bit of Oquendo's unique ability to play all over the field.
The most obvious player that comes to many fans mind is former Durham Bull/Rays super utility player Ben Zobrist. Over the years I have always been a pretty big fan of Zo's and have been pretty active in trying to add some of his cards. This week though, I found an autographed card of another player who could be put into the super utility category.
During the 2015 season Harrison spent the lion's share of his time playing at third base for the Pirates, but also spent time at second base, and both corner outfield spots. His offensive numbers were down from 2014 when he made the National League All-Star team, but he was still a fun player, in my eyes, to watch.
Harrison had a limited number of autographs before the 2015 card calendar. Some of those options were frankly a little more pricey than I would go on the signature of a utility guy. Still a cool player, but not $30-$40 cool. This year however, Harrison has signed for several different products and the prices of his cards have slid into the $5-$10 range. This card cost me slightly more than $5 shipped which is a great price for an autograph out of a nice product like Supreme. Hey, it's even an on-card autograph.
Way back in the day I started to rearrange my cards. Yes, that's still happening. I am dragging along slowly, but surely. One day I will finish and do some sort of sort of celebratory post displaying the awesomeness of my reorganized collection. Here are three years of the collection neatly stacked in a closet, just 29 more to go.....
This weekend I spent time working on picking up a few Topps Tek cards from last week's release and I also organized my 2005 cards. There are a lot of 2005 cards in my collection, definitely some cool rookie cards that year, but there are a ton of sticker autographs. I am not sure if was the height of sticker autographs, but certainly has to be in the running. Anyway, after flipping through my 2005 boxes and pulling out all of my autographs I decided to pick out one of the cards I ran across for my weekly #MyCardMonday post.
Topps has always done a really good job of putting cool players, and others, into their Archives/Fan Favorite products. Plus in 2005 it was one of the few products that was loaded with on card autographs. As a Cardinals fan this was one of my favorite cards from that year. I did not pull it from a pack, but I managed to snag a copy at a local card shop in St. Louis. So, who is Walt Jocketty?
He is currently the Reds GM, but ran the Cardinals from 1994 through the end of the 2007 season. Along the way he traded for some pretty fair players: Mark McGwire, Jim Edmonds, Scott Rolen, Edgar Renteria, and Mark Mulder. Don't forget he also signed Chris Carpenter off the Blue Jays trash heap. Pretty important GM for the Cardinals who helped them win the 2006 World Series.
This card is short printed, there are only 90 of them, but you can still find them floating around different places. The card has a really dark background, with the green dugout and Jocketty wearing a blue sport coat, so he signed all of the cards on the bottom. Not the best look for an autograph placement, but this card is still one of my favorites.
The Durham Bulls season has now been over for almost a month, but I am going to give one of their players the space on #MyCardMonday for their great work playing in the Majors for the Tampa Rays. Here's a black parallel of Mikie Mahtook's 2014 Topps Heritage Minor League set from last year.
Mahtook's line in Durham this year was rather disappointing. Mikie spent most of the summer shuttling in between Durham and Tampa, at bats did not come at regular intervals, and his performance took a turn for the worst. However, the Rays have been finding at bats for Mahtook and his play, especially at the plate, has been on the upswing. For the month of September the Rays outfield prospect has hit .349/.397/.683 with 5 home runs, 1 triple, and 4 doubles. I am hoping to see a few of these out of him next summer.....
I did not spend a lot of time on cards this weekend, but did spend a few minutes Friday night sorting through a box of old Cardinals cards and autographs I had picked up long ago. There were a few really cool cards in the box that I had completely forgotten about over the past five or six years, but one really stood out from the rest of the cards. How did this card end up neglected in a box of cards featuring former Cardinals players like Brendan Ryan, Ryan Ludwick, and Andy Benes?
No idea, but it's been sleeved and placed in a box with some nicer Cardinals cards. If you are not familiar with Lonnie Smith I will give you a two minute run down on "Skates". He came up with the Phillies in the early 1980s and was used as an extra outfielder off the bench. He was actually an important bench player on the 1980 Phillies World Series team. The Cardinals traded for him before the 1982 season, and like all fast athletic outfielders, Whitey Herzog turned Lonnie Smith loose on the bases. During his three seasons as a Cardinal he stole 68, 43, and 50 bases. He played part of the 1985 season in St. Louis and stole 12 more. Lonnie Smith started the season on the DL and the team called up Triple A outfielder Vince Coleman to fill the void. Coleman went on to steal 110 bases, Lonnie got traded to the Royals.
His time as a Cardinal is how I best remember Lonnie Smith. He was not the biggest base stealing threat on the team, did not have a ton of power, and was not a great defender. The guy was still a winner and a fan favorite in St. Louis in the mid 80s when I first moved to St. Louis. I ran into Lonnie Smith again towards the end of his career when he ended up back in the National League with the Braves. I know baseball fans always remember the core group of pitchers with those 1990s Bobby Cox teams, but Lonnie Smith was an important player at the beginning of that run for the Braves.
His best year with Atlanta was in 1989 when he hit 21 home runs, a career high, and lead the National League in on-base percentage with a .415 mark. He put up a .384 mark in 1990 and a .377 mark in 1991. Lonnie ended his career with the Orioles in 1994 posting almost 1,500 hits and a slash line of .288/.371/.420. Combine that great on base percentage with 370 steals and it's easy to see why Topps put him in the All-Time Fan Favorites set back in 2005. Lonnie also ended his career with three World Series rings (1980 Phillies, 1982 Cardinals, 1985 Royals) and two League Championship rings (1991 and 1992 Braves) Great player.
I am going to take care of a couple of writing needs with this post:
I did not write up anything about the All-Star game this year
It's Sunday night headed into Monday Morning which means it's #MyCardMonday time
I wanted to write something nice about Carlos Martinez
I went to another baseball game yesterday, of the Durham Bulls variety and I swore I was not going to write up the game, but was tempted after Boog Powell made an incredible catch.
So much to write about and one post to do it. Here goes my best effort.
It's probably taken you a few seconds to read through that bulleted list of items I had running through my mind while considering what to write about, but let's get rid of the last bullet point first. I really want a Boog Powell, not the Orioles guy, card. However, he only has minor league cards and I have none of them. My son and I stopped by the Bulls shop hopping to find a 2015 set of Bulls cards. None there. Here's the catch, but Boog is not my choice for #MyCardMonday. Maybe next week, watch the video.....
Now that I have Boog checked off the list I have three more bullet points left to check off. I am going to spend them all on Carlos Martinez and his appearance on the All-Star team this year. I fear this is going to sound teachery. It's my day job and I have to write nice things about my students some days. I etched this point out in my mind, adding this paragraph to it, but feel like this sounds like a nice letter home about effort, meeting a goal, or something else positive that could catch my eye during the day. Students do great things all of the time and I try to take time to capture them in words at time. Teachery.
This week's #MyCardMonday is this awesome Carlos Martinez card:
I decided to pick a Carlos Martinez card this week. The Cardinals pitcher is headed to the All-Star game in Cincinnati after winning the Final Vote Contest held between a handful of other players. I felt a kindred spirit with my fellow Cardinals fans a few days ago when I spent part of my day tweeting out #VoteTsunami. Carlos posted out a short video in the morning encouraging fans to #VoteTsunami and had plenty of support from other teammates on the Cardinals who were hoping to push the young starting pitching onto the All-Star team.
I am not sure it really mattered to me if Carlos had made the All-Star game. Sure, it's a nice bonus and a great thing to add to the old piece of cardboard. All-Star game or not, this season has been a smashing success for Tsunami. When the season started there was a lot of doubt surrounding Carlos entering the Cardinals starting rotation. He was a pretty good relief pitcher for the club the past few years, but there was definitely a lot of inconsistency within his appearances. Fans questioned his focus and ability.
The trade of Shelby Miller, and his success with the Braves, certainly did not help the rumblings with Cardinals fans. There was a lot of doubt at the beginning of this season. Certain members of the St. Louis press corp really did not help matters and started calling for the end of the Carlos Martinez as a starting pitcher.
Interestingly after the above tweet, Martinez reeled off three consecutive scoreless starts in May against the Mets, Diamondbacks, and Dodgers. In fact, since May 17th Martinez is 7-1 and has dropped his ERA from 4.08 to 2.52. The Cardinals have only lost on of his starts since since May 17th too. That only loss occurred against the Twins and Martinez still pitched into the sixth inning of the game and only gave up one run.
It's been amazing to sit back and watch Carlos this year. As a Cardinals fan I have watched a 23 year old pitcher go from being an unknown commodity, who seemed to lack confidence, to a player who could potentially be the cornerstone of the Cardinals for some time. It's not an unusual thing to see in baseball, but it's surprising to see in such a short time during the course of a single season.
While there may be a few people who might owe Carlos an apology for the doubt at the beginning of the year, Mr. Strauss has not been able to man up yet, the overwhelming majority of Cardinals fans have been blown away by the growth and maturity shown by Carlos this season. Let's add in one more factor to the success experienced this season by Carlos.
Prior to this season Carlos Martinez changed his number to 18 and dedicated his season to his close personal friend Oscar Taveras. I am not here to offer an editorial on Oscar Taveras, but sometimes these types of motivating factors work for people, other times they do not. In keeping with his promise to dedicate his season to Taveras, Martinez tweeted out a picture of the two in announcing his winning of the Final Vote.
I am proud of everything that Carlos Martinez has accomplished this season. He has made huge leaps forward and I am excited to see what the future holds for Tsunami. I happy that he plays for my favorite team and also that I own several nice baseball cards of the rising star. (Scroll back up and look at baseball card). Have a great week.
I picked up the a copy of the new 2015 Stadium Club set last week and have not really stopped looking at the cards yet. There are tons of great looking pictures and cards in the set from all kinds of different eras of baseball. A bigger post on the set is coming later this week, but until then I decided to pick out one card to use for #MyCardMonday
There are several other cool Cardinals cards that I could have gone with, but I like this card because it is one of those that can be traced back to a specific moment in time. Here's what I see:
Matt Holliday hit a home run in Busch Stadium
Lance Lynn (31) is pitching for the Cardinals and has 5 wins
I have been thinking a lot about Albert Pujols lately, so I am going to give this week's #MyCardMonday to The Machine. If you have been paying attention for the last few weeks you would probably know that there is no hotter hitter in the Majors right now than Albert Pujols. He looks like he finally has his legs underneath him and he's hitting the ball like he did before he left St. Louis.
Besides his hot start Albert is also starting to close in on some cool milestones. Just a week or two ago I watched the Angels games with intent as he was passing some great players on the all-time home run list. It was cool to see a guy that I watched for years go past players on the all-time home run list Mickey Mantle. Albert is also closing in on 3,000 hits, but that is likely going to happen next year.
Sadly, I feel somedays like I am in the minority of baseball fans who still watch Albert. I tweet about Albert and I kind of get a meh response some nights. Maybe I need more Angels fans in my Twitter feed. Maybe. In the meantime, if you are interested in catching up on Albert I suggest you check out this great article written by Rick Hummel in Sunday's St. Louis Post Dispatch about the historical numbers he is now reaching in his career.
And now the card. I had to go with a rookie card.
This card is from the 2001 Topps Stars set. I see quite a few Albert Pujols rookies, but I don't see this one too often considering it is not a serial numbered card. That giant star thing in the background looks a little bit like the burst from the Rays jerseys. I am not so sure about that, but I do really like the dark blue coloring with the red outline around Albert. Very nice card and one of the more affordable Pujols rookies.
I am feeling a little bit of school pride this evening while I am sitting here awaiting the regional baseball game between NC State and TCU. I feel asleep last night while I was watching the game and missed a little bit of magic off the bat of Chance Shepard in the ninth inning against the Horned Frogs....
The two run home run put the Pack 9 in the drivers seat for the regional. They play TCU again tonight and possibly again tomorrow if the hosting Horned Frogs win the game this evening. TCU had to play a game this afternoon against Stony Brook, so the Pack are definitely at an advantage. Let's hope that they advance......
This year's Wolfpack team does not have some of the high end talent as they have had in recent years with players like Carlos Rodon, Trea Turner, and Brett Austin. There aren't any USA Baseball cards of the current Wolfpack players floating around, so my choice for #MyCardMonday is going to come from a former Wolfpack player. You have all seen my Rodon and Turner cards, so let's go with something different......
While Baseball-Reference lists almost 200 players from NC State appearing in an MLB or MiLB game, there have been very few players from the school who have been truly impactful. The names of the long term Wolfpack players in the Majors include guys like Greg Briley, Mike Caldwell, Roger Craig, and Chad Orvella.
Well, I passed all of those guy by for another former Wolfpacker. The one, the only, Dan Plesac. Currently he is "starring" on the MLB Network. I think this is the highlight of his broadcasting career.....
While his best player highlight was when he punched Dave Coggin in the middle of game......
As a player Plesac actually had a losing record, but ended his career with an ERA+ of 119. 13 of his 18 seasons actually had a high ERA+ than his career number including a four year run of 147, 176, 166, and 165 for Brewers between 1986 and 1989. His WAR for those 4 seasons was an even 10 which is really good for a relief pitcher. Plesac made the American League All-Star team three of those four years. In fact, JAWS rates Plesac in the top 100 relief pitchers of all-time ahead of notables like Huston Street, Rafael Soriano, Jason Isringhausen, and Ugueth Urbina.
So, after flipping through my cards I found the perfect Dan Plesac card for #MyCardMonday.
The card is NC State red, or really close to it, and on the back there is a shout out to the school.......
I had a few ideas for #MyCardMonday this week, but I was won over by a roster move by the Durham Bulls and the performance that followed on the field. Sunday morning on my way to the ACC Championship game I saw an interesting tweet cross my feed.......
I am not sure how much I have, or have not talked about, Shaffer in this space over the past three or four years. I am really intrigued by him as a player and was wondering at what point this season we would see the powerful third baseman make his first appearance in Durham. Well, yesterday was the day. We'll get into the specifics of his first day in a few minutes. First some housekeeping.
I first encountered Shaffer while he was in college playing for Clemson. The Charlotte native definitely stood out for the Tigers and enjoyed a great college career. I found a cool old video of him from Baseball America facing off against, then Duke pitcher, Marcus Stroman.
The Rays took Shaffer with the 25th pick in the first round of the 2012 MLB Amateur Draft. He has been through stops with the Rays A and AA teams before his promotion to the Durham Bulls on Sunday. During the past two and half years his home run totals have slowly started to tick upwards. From 4 in 2012, to 11 in 2013, and then up to 19 last year. So far this year he is already at 9 with just 40 games played. Two of which came yesterday in his first Triple A game with the Bulls.
Shaffer makes his home debut for the Bulls later today against the Rochester Red Wings. So, after a great debut the choice for #MyCardMonday is easy........
So, did you watch any baseball this weekend? I spent some time suffering through the Cardinals and Tigers series and checked in a little bit on my Durham Bulls, who had some problems with the Scranton Railriders. Not the best, but there was one bright spot early Sunday afternoon by former Cardinals pitcher Shelby Miller.
If you have not seen Shelby pitch this year he has improved greatly from his time in St. Louis. Lots of fastballs and first pitch strikes. I think he's been one of the biggest surprises in the game so far this year. Sunday's game finally got him some well deserved attention when he carried a no-hitter into the ninth inning and came within an out of the no-no.
He actually had something of a no hitter back in the day with the Cardinals when he gave up a lead off hit against the Rockies and then recorded 27 straight hitters for the complete game shutout.
Predictably the early success for Miller has agitated a few of the "Best Fans In Baseball" (As a Cardinals fan I hate that moniker) and allowed some internet trolling to take place especially with local St. Louis columnist Joe Strauss who works in St. Louis, but hates everything about the city....
At least most Cardinals fans could count the two hits collected by the Marlins, or at least read the box score.......
Anyway, I am happy to see Shelby find some success in Atlanta. He got a raw deal at times in St. Louis at times, especially during some of the playoff runs when he was delegated to the bullpen and forgotten about as a long reliever. Especially during the 2013 playoffs when he won 15 regular season games, but only appeared in one playoff game for one inning. The Cardinals season ended in the World Series, but Miller never started a game.
So, to celebrate a great outing and great start to the new season this week' #MyCardMonday goes to, not only one of the National League's best pitchers, but also one of it's best signers....Shelby Miller.
We are now a month into the baseball season and the year is looking good for both the Cardinals and the Durham Bulls. I use the #MyCardMonday posts to frequently highlight a player or card from those two teams and this week is going to be no different. I spent my Sunday afternoon flipping back and forth between the Durham Bulls/Pawtucket game and the Cardinals/Pirates game. It was fun to see both games, but after watching the games the choice for this week's #MyCardMonday was really a no brainer.
Carpenter seems to be on track for an MVP season with an OPS+ of 191 with 18 extra base hits in 23 games. Those 18 extra base hits include 14 doubles, 1 triple, and 3 home runs. Carpenter is currently on pace for a ridiculous 125 doubles this season which would smash the single season record held by 1930s Red Sox outfielder Earl Webb who hit 67 in 1931. There is even a Carpenter doubles tracker floating around on Twitter showing Carpenter's pace along with Earl Webb and Joe Medwick. Medwick holds the Cardinals team record with 64 two baggers in 1936.
I am not sure what the numbers on this graph stand for, I might be doubting it's accuracy, but it's going to be a fun race to follow throughout the season. Carpenter ended the 2013 season with 55 doubles, so he has certainly been in the neighborhood of the record in prior years. Maybe I need to make an accurate graph of the doubles race. Hmmm....
I am not have the smoothest of Mondays, so #MyCardMonday is making it onto my blog a little bit late this week. I didn't spend much time this weekend on cards, but did take about ten minutes out of my school work on Sunday to put away a few autographed Cardinals cards I had picked up over the past week. Don't worry I scanned them and will share them this week.
While I was in my box of Cardinals autographs I stumbled upon my 1996 Leaf Signatures Cardinals autographs. There were a bunch of good Cardinals players in that set. Guys like Tom Pagnozzi, John Mabry, and Brian Jordan. There were also a few veteran players in the Cardinals team set that you probably wouldn't associate with the team, but had ended up on the Cardinals during Tony LaRussa's first year as the manager. There was a Mike Gallego autograph, I think of him as an A's player, and Rick Honeycutt, Dodgers. There was also Gary Gaetti who is always a Twin in my book, but was the Cardinals third baseman in 1996, 1997, and part of 1998.
Gaetti is actually from a small town in Illinois, Centralia, that's not far from St Louis. The veteran third baseman had two pretty good years for the Cardinals before he was released by the team in 1998. When I moved to North Carolina I ran into Gaetti again as the first base coach for the Durham Bulls. I decided to add a Gaetti autograph to the collection. At the time this was his only certified autograph, but he's signed for several of the Topps Archives/Fan Favorites sets during the past decade.
He also happens to be one of the few players who has appeared for both my favorite Minor League team, the Durham Bulls, and my favorite Major League team, the Cardinals.
While baseball has started up this week my two favorite teams, the Cardinals and Durham Bulls, are actually celebrating their Opening Day games this week. Living 13 hours from St. Louis makes attending a Cardinals game a little bit tricky, but I am definitely going to the Bulls game Wednesday night. Which got me thinking about my favorite Opening Day moment involving the Bulls.
There is a clear winner involving B.J. Upton. Umm...Melvin. Which makes this cool card this week's #MyCardMonday
The Opening Day involving Upton took place in 2006. The Bulls were taking on the Toledo Mud Hens and were losing 4-1 in the 9th inning. The team loaded the bases for B.J. and the rest is history. I found the video clip on the Bulls MySpace page. It still exists. Sorry it's grainy.
Pretty simple choice for the #MyCardMonday pick this week. It was good to sit down and end my weekend by watching the Cardinals and Cubs play on Sunday Night Baseball. It's great to get that first win out of the way quickly and I was happy to see Adam Wainwright have a good outing. This week's card comes from the 2007 Topps Finest set. Wainwright does not have a ton of different autographs, almost all of them come from early in his career, but there is a good quantity of each autograph. Meaning it's not too difficult to find copies of these cards. This card has a nice write up on Wainwright's Game 7 strike out of Mets outfielder Carlos Beltran which put the Cardinals in the 2006 World Series.
We have reached spring break at work and I spent my weekend putting away a few cards. I was looking for something really cool and unique to throw on my blog this week for #MyCardMonday and found a neat old Pacific baseball card.
This is a Proof from the 2000 Crown Royale set. I am not sure how these got out on the secondary market, but I bought the card about five or six years ago on EBay for next to nothing. I am actually guessing that Pacific dumped these after they went out of business, but I cannot find anything for sure on when they were put out. The card is actually a thin piece of translucent material and measures a quarter inch larger, all the way around, then the standard baseball card.
This set was actually featured die-cut cards. The Ankiel in the set looks like this.....
The bottom of the proof is interesting since it is different than the front of the baseball card. Usually proofs are identical to the card that they are used to produce. I had thought that maybe Pacific made a proof for the front and the backs of the cards, but I cannot find anything that shows that to be the case. In fact if you flip the proof card over onto the back there is a reverse photo of Ankiel.
Notice Ankiel, a left-handed pitcher, is now a right-hander on the reverse side of the card. In some ways this card reminds me a bit of the Topps Acetate cards which have been put out as a parallel by Topps the past two years. Another curiosity about the proof is the card number shown on the front and back of the card. The card is label number 28 in the set, but the actual Ankiel card in the set was card 114 and was a short print.
Given that Pacific is long gone, and they left little behind, I am not sure if I will ever figure out some of my questions about this card, but in the meantime, it's a cool inexpensive card that features one of my favorite late 90s Cardinals stars.
As a baseball fan I am excited that we are getting close to the start of the season. We are just 34 days (from Monday) from the first game of the season between the Cardinals and the Cubs. As a Cardinals fan it seems like there are a lot of questions circling the team this spring. The Cardinals always seem to have all of the answers and inevitably end up playing important baseball games in October. One of the more intriguing stories at Cardinals Spring Training this year is pitcher Jaime Garcia.
When Garcia is right physically he is a really nice pitcher.....
The problem is that Garcia has not pitched a complete season since 2011. Since then there have been shoulder surgeries and thoracic outlet operations with very little pitching. Garcia is back with the Cardinals this spring trying to win a spot with the team. I am guessing that he will end up pitching in the minors on some sort of rehab assignment at the beginning of the year, but at some point he could very well help the Cardinals out with some starts during the season.
The early returns look good:
I would be excited to see the good healthy version of Garcia return to the Cardinals starting rotation and recently had to breakout my Garcia cards. The card above is probably my favorite Jaime card that I picked up a few years ago from former blogger DodgerBobble. He is still on Instagram and runs a great page with tons of autographs. Anyway, the card comes from the Museum product with a nice on card signature. Love the contrast between the blue ink and white background. I like the faded area around the bottom of the card which gives a nice spot for the signature.
I am going with a truly awesome card this week for #MyCardMonday. This might hurt a little bit if you're a Cardinals fan, but we all have a card like this in our collection. You know the routine: "We took this guy in the draft" or "Do you know who we could have drafted instead of this player". Seriously though, this card doesn't bother me too much.
Every Cardinals fan who followed the team closely in the 1990s knows the name Paul Coleman. After a bad 1988 season the team had a great draft slot in the 1989 amateur draft. Picking sixth in a draft that had plenty of good talent and lots of names behind the consensus first pick (Orioles) LSU pitcher Ben McDonald. The Braves took Tyler Houston, the Mariners took Roger Salkeld, Phillies Jeff Jackson, and the Rangers Donald Harris bringing the draft to the Cardinals pick.
And they took Coleman. After reading the back of his first baseball card I still get excited to see him make up to Busch Stadium. Maybe he will push Gilkey or Lankford for a job in a few years, right?
Built like Bo Jackson. Legend. 500 foot home runs. 21 strikeout game. 1000 yard season. Ozzie Smith. Vince Coleman. Cannot wait for this kid to get to the Majors.
About that. Coleman ended up spending five years in the Cardinals minor league system and only managed to play more than 100 games twice. His career Minor League line is .250/.308/.374 with 28 home runs, 84 doubles, and 169 RBIs. He made it as far as Double A with the Cardinals in 1993 before disappearing for the 1994 and 1995 seasons and reemerging for 94 games in an independent league in 1996. It sounds like he was hurt a lot and did not pan out. Further, it was a bad draft for the Cardinals.
In 56 rounds the Cardinals picked six players who reached the Majors. 20th round draft pick Bill Hurst, household name, had the highest career WAR of the group with a mark of 0.1. He pitched 2 innings for the 1996 Florida Marlins. You might also know Tripp "Homer" Cromer who was picked in the third round and hit 12 Major League Home Runs. Someone had a bad day at Busch Stadium during the 1989 MLB Draft.
So, here's the part that really hurts. I mentioned who was drafted before Paul Coleman in the draft. McDonald had a decent career for the Orioles and Brewers and Tyler Houston made it to the Majors as a serviceable catcher, but there were other teams that had misses there too. After Coleman, teams seemed to fair a little better. The White Sox picked Frank Thomas, Expos Charles Johnson, Brewers Cal Eldred, Red Sox Mo Vaughn, and the Twins picked Chuck Knoblauch. In later rounds Tim Salmon, Shane Reynolds (second mention this week), John Olerud, Denny Naegle, Jeff Bagwell, Ryan Klesko, J.T. Snow, and Trevor Hoffman all came off the board.
It's painful for Cardinals fans to remember the legend of Paul Coleman, but every team has had a big draft bust or a draft pick where they passed on someone to draft someone else that looks regrettable years later. See Tim Beckham instead of Buster Posey, Brett Lawrie, Lance Lynn, etc.
