45 To Go

I am excited about my latest pick up for the Red Man Tobacco set I am attempting to assemble. As you can imagine, there are quite a few Hall of Famers on the checklist and are also the more expensive. Last week, I was able to acquire a copy of the Larry Doby card, who is my first Hall of Famer on the American League side of the checklist.  

Here is the front of the card.  

No tab, which is fine.  I am not being picky about the tabs. The surface of the card is clean, but three of the corners are soft with wear.  It's also a baseball card that is more than 70 years old.  Not sure how picky I should be about things like corner wear.  I am going to live with this one for the time being. Really happy with a clean surface.  

The card back is decent shape outside of some red spots. Not sure if that's marker or something else. 

Overall, very happy with my first American League Hall of Famer.  

A Giant Update Part 12

I am getting so much closer. I had hoped to finish off my 1964 Topps Giants set on this post, but there will be at least one more after this one. Before this post, I was down to 14 cards to complete the set, with only one Hall of Fame player left to find. I also already have all the short-prints. Maybe at some other point in my life, I would have already finished this set. Between kids, work, and garage doors, there has not been much time to find new baseball cards.  

Here are the five new Topps Giants cards.

First up is Senators shortstop, Ed Brinkman.  

Brinkman was a really good defender, but was not much for hitting. He played more than 1,800 games in the Majors, but only had 1,300 hits. In 1965, Brinkman set an American League record for fewest hits in a season while playing in more than 150 games. He ended the year with just 82 hits and a .185 batting average.  

That's bad.  

The back naturally sticks to his defensive skills.  

I like that the card mentions his time as a member of the Raleigh Capitols. 

Next up, Mets infielder Ron Hunt.  

Did he cut himself shaving? That's a pretty wicked looking something underneath his nose.  

All this stuff on the back is impressive, but Ron Hunt is actually from St. Louis. He went to the same high school as Jerry Reuss, just a few years earlier.  

Next. 

Jim Fregosi was a favorite on the first Angels teams in the early 1960s. I knew him best as the manager of the Phillies when I was in middle school and high school. 

This is kind of a lame write up, considering that the Angels were in their third season when this card was produced.  I need to go back and look at my 1999 Devil Rays cards to see if they acknowledge Randy Winn's triples record for their franchise at the time. It's still 9th all-time in franchise history, but all of those higher triple total seasons belong to Carl Crawford.  

Next up is Ken Johnson.  

Before Edwin Jackson, there was Ken Johnson. He seemingly played on a different team almost every year in the 1950s and 1960s. Not really, but it was close. He played 13 seasons with 8 different teams. Considering the number of teams in the league during the 1950s and 1960s, that's a large number.  

The back of the card is interesting.

After reading about his no-hitter loss, I actually went and read a little bit more about his career. He actually seems like a decent pitcher who was on the wrong teams at the wrong times throughout his career.  

For example, he ended up on the Reds in 1961 and was given a rotation spot during the second half of the season. He went 6-2 with an ERA of 3 and helped them make the World Series versus the Yankees. If you are into sabermetrics, he had several 3 and 4 WAR seasons, just screwed over playing on bad teams. 

Last card is Leon Wagner.  

Leon Wagner was a really good player during the 1960s. His career got off to a slow start, otherwise he might have been a little more of a recognizable name. Wagner played college football and then ended up working at an auto manufacturing plant in Detroit while playing sandlot baseball.

The Giants signed Leon Wagner, but he drafted into the Army for the Korean War. 

Leon Wagner returned to the Giants, but was blocked by Willie Mays, Felipe Alou, and others. 

The Giants traded him to the Cardinals, but he was blocked by Stan Musial, Curt Flood, and Joe Cunningham.  

The Cardinals traded him to the Toronto Maple Leafs, the baseball team in the International League.  

The Maple Leafs traded him to the Angels where he finally got to play as a regular at the age of 27.  

Back of the card.  

Once Leon Wagner started playing, he was really good.  He made a few All-Star Games, hit 30 home runs a few times, and received MVP votes in several different season. It's too bad the Giants or Cardinals did not have an open outfield spot while he was a little younger.  

Updated checklist.

I am getting closer.  

1 Gary Peters
2 Ken Johnson
3 Sandy Koufax SP
4 Bob Bailey
5 Milt Pappas
6 Ron Hunt
7 Whitey Ford
8 Roy McMillan
9 Rocky Colavito
10 Jim Bunning
11 Roberto Clemente
12 Al Kaline
13 Nellie Fox
14 Tony Gonzalez
15 Jim Gentile
16 Dean Chance
17 Dick Ellsworth
18 Jim Fregosi
19 Dick Groat
20 Chuck Hinton
21 Elston Howard
22 Dick Farrell
23 Albie Pearson
24 Frank Howard
25 Mickey Mantle
26 Joe Torre
27 Ed Brinkman
28 Bob Friend SP
29 Frank Robinson
30 Bill Freehan
31 Warren Spahn
32 Camilo Pascual
33 Pete Ward
34 Jim Maloney
35 Dave Wickersham
36 Johnny Callison
37 Juan Marichal
38 Harmon Killebrew
39 Luis Aparicio
40 Dick Radatz
41 Bob Gibson
42 Dick Stuart SP
43 Tommy Davis
44 Tony Oliva
45 Wayne Causey SP
46 Max Alvis
47 Galen Cisco SP
48 Carl Yastrzemski
49 Hank Aaron
50 Brooks Robinson
51 Willie Mays SP
52 Billy Williams
53 Juan Pizarro
54 Leon Wagner
55 Orlando Cepeda
56 Vada Pinson
57 Ken Boyer
58 Ron Santo
59 Johnny Romano
60 Bill Skowron SP

A Giant Project: Update #3

I worked hard on my 1964 Topps Giants set during the past two weeks.  I am posting five new cards tonight, which includes three Hall of Famers and a great of the era.  Really happy with how well this project is going.  

Here are the new cards, saving the better cards for later in the post.  

I did not know much about Max Alvis outside of seeing the occasional card of him in common boxes at card shows.  First, he went to the University of Texas and was a two sport star at the school with the football and baseball teams.  More impressive was the fact that he played both fullback and linebacker on the football team.  A two-way player and he started at both positions.  Alvis choose to play baseball.  He was a good young player with the Indians, but ended up getting spinal meningitis during the 1964 season.  

He stuck around for a few more seasons, but was never the same player.  Alvis made the 1967 American League All-Star team.  He was not having a particularly good season, but the Indians traded Rocky Colavito and Alvis was the most popular player remaining on the team.  

Next.  

Boyer is not a Hall of Famer, but is definitely a great from the 1960s.  Boyer probably has a much better case than most people would think.  Boyer's uniform number, 14, is the retired by the Cardinals.  The only non-Hall of Famer with a retired number with the Cardinals.  Boyer was the National League MVP in 1964 and helped the Cardinals get to the World Series against the Yankees.  Boyer hit a Game 4 Grand Slam, which was the turning point in the Series, and added another in Game 7 that put the game out of reach.  

I am not sure where Topps got the 10 number from on the back of the card.  Boyer appeared in seven All-Star games at this point in his career.  I guess they could be including Minor League All-Star games too, although Boyer was not in the Minors very long.  He rose quickly and also spent time with the Army during the Korean War.  

This is the part of the post that I am most excited about.  There are a lot of Hall Famers on the 1964 Topps Giants checklist and I have quite a few of them left to find.  Some are going to be harder than others.   Bunning was an easy Hall of Famer to find and not very expensive.  The right corner, near his forearm, has a slight scratch, but it's only on the surface.  

I like the back of Bunning's card.  Some of the newspaper headlines on the back of the cards feel like a bit of a stretch.  Max Alvis has a fancy headline about leading a last place team in home runs and then meanders into him playing in the Pacific Coast League.  Bunning has a perfect game on the back of his card.  If I recall the details correctly, the perfect game was thrown on Father's Day and Jim Bunning had a Philip Rivers amount of children.  

They also mention the fact that Bunning threw a no-hitter for the Tigers.  Solid work here pairing an accomplishment with another good accomplishment.  Nice that Topps stayed on topic here.  Sometimes they drift.....

Another Hall of Famer, a little bit better than Jim Bunning.  Just my opinion.  This is a nice portrait style photo on the front of the card, but I really like the back of Marichal's card.  

The super-high leg kick was Marichal's claim to fame while he was playing.   The Topps Giants cards do not have action photographs on the fronts of the cards.  They really missed out here.  If I ran a card company in the 1960s, every Juan Marichal card would have a picture of his leg kick.  I also like that Topps gives him a headline for his no-hitter against the Astros in 1963, but it goes downhill after the picture and headline.  

Remember at the bottom of Jim Bunning when I mentioned drifting card backs?  

I am a little puzzled why they spent half of the back talking about where he played in the Minor Leagues. It's Juan Marichal.  Won a lot of games, struck out a lot of batters, crazy leg kick?   Do we need to know about how he pitched in Tacoma or the Eastern League?  Could we have squeezed another sentence out of 25 wins or 248 strikeouts? Talk about the leg kick.    

Last card of the post.  

This is a big one off the checklist.

I will let the card do the talking.  

A little wear along the left edge on the front of the card, but otherwise this is in really good shape.  Not nearly as painful as I had imagined it was going to be.  

Updated checklist.  19 out of the 60 cards.  

1 Gary Peters
2 Ken Johnson
3 Sandy Koufax SP
4 Bob Bailey
5 Milt Pappas
6 Ron Hunt
7 Whitey Ford
8 Roy McMillan
9 Rocky Colavito
10 Jim Bunning
11 Roberto Clemente
12 Al Kaline
13 Nellie Fox
14 Tony Gonzalez
15 Jim Gentile
16 Dean Chance
17 Dick Ellsworth
18 Jim Fregosi
19 Dick Groat
20 Chuck Hinton
21 Elston Howard
22 Dick Farrell
23 Albie Pearson
24 Frank Howard
25 Mickey Mantle
26 Joe Torre
27 Ed Brinkman
28 Bob Friend SP
29 Frank Robinson
30 Bill Freehan
31 Warren Spahn
32 Camilo Pascual
33 Pete Ward
34 Jim Maloney
35 Dave Wickersham
36 Johnny Callison
37 Juan Marichal
38 Harmon Killebrew
39 Luis Aparicio
40 Dick Radatz
41 Bob Gibson
42 Dick Stuart SP
43 Tommy Davis
44 Tony Oliva
45 Wayne Causey SP
46 Max Alvis
47 Galen Cisco SP
48 Carl Yastrzemski
49 Hank Aaron
50 Brooks Robinson
51 Willie Mays SP
52 Billy Williams
53 Juan Pizarro
54 Leon Wagner
55 Orlando Cepeda
56 Vada Pinson
57 Ken Boyer
58 Ron Santo
59 Johnny Romano
60 Bill Skowron SP

Just 10,000 COPIES!!!!

You haven't had to waste time going to a retail store over the summer to know that the card aisle is completely picked over at the moment.  Maybe you have been and seen the empty shelves and stacks of unsold MLB Sticker Albums with your own eyes.  Maybe you've seen photos of the empty card aisle on Twitter or in card groups on Facebook.  Maybe you've seen people selling their $20 Topps Series 2 blasters online for $50.  

It's pretty crazy out there.  

Meanwhile, I have been sitting here collecting other things besides 2020 Topps cards over the summer.  I just haven't made good time or progress with posting the cards that I have added, which stinks because I am doing a really good job with one of my beginning of the year goals.  

My three collecting goals were:

1. No New Sets From Packs  

2. More Cardinals and Durham Bulls single cards 

3. More Posts About Sorting Cards 

I will save my full performance review for the end of the year, but I am doing incredible on the Durham Bulls part of goal 2.  I know, if you read my blog you're probably thinking that you've seen plenty of Rays players on this page who used to play in Durham a year or two ago.  That's every other post.  

Right?  

I have not only done well with find the Michael Brosseau and Kirby Yates cards this summer, I have also loaded up on all sorts of fifty-cent and quarter cards of older Durham Bulls players.  The kind of players you don't have to go look up on Baseball Reference or ESPN because they're not weird three outcome super utility players on the Rays.  

I have a few new cards to share today that mostly fit my title, "ONLY 10,000 COPIES".  

Be excited.   

Do you remember the first serial numbered cards in your collection?  I am not exactly sure which was my first, but I do remember the 1994 Leaf Limited cards being amongst the first in my collection.  They were so exclusive that even the boxes the packs were in had a serial numbered.  I bought a pack or two of these, but you weren't guaranteed a serial numbered card in each pack. 

I ended up with a few of them, almost all Cardinals.  Not pulled from a pack.  

Just 10,000 copies!  

The Cardinals were terrible in 1994.  I could wait until someone else pulled one and get the Cardinals cards when they ended up in the $0.50 box at my local card shop.

So, one of my summer Durham Bulls pick-ups was a copy of the 1994 Leaf Limited David Justice card.  He played for the Bulls during the 1986 season.  Good looking card.  

The back of the card.  

Just 10,000 copies.  

Serious, these were awesome cards in 1994.  Way cooler than any Luis Robert card that you could pull out of Topps Series 2.  Although, Luis Robert is a really good player.  David Justice was too.  Luis Robert is just 294 home runs behind him.  

What's better than one card numbered to 10,000?  

If you were thinking, "Two cards numbered to 10,000", you are correct.  I will even stick with David Justice.  

Look at the top of the card.  It says 23 KT.  This card quite possibly cost me my entire paycheck, or the equivalent of two hot dogs on dollar hot dog night at the Durham Bulls Athletic Park.  This card is from the 1992 Bleachers David Justice set, which featured three cards of Justice each numbered to 10,000.  One Justice card showed him in a Braves uniform, another as a member of the Greensville Braves, and this one on the Durham Bulls.  

That jersey is pretty sweet.  That's got to be a throwback jersey of some kind.  

Back of the card.  

Just 10,000 copies.  

Three things stand out on the back of this card.

1. That dog next to the word "BATS".  Why is that there?  

2. "World's Largest Manufacturer of Genuine 23 Kt Gold Border Cards".  Sounds so fancy.  Wonder why this company did not make more of a splash.  I bet these sets sold fast on QVC or Home Shopping Network.  

3. Love the faux signature at the bottom of the card with the inscription "Durham".  The other cards in the set have something similar.  If you are going to make cards that feel exclusive, they should get an inscription that feels more exclusive.  Give me "Bull City" or "City of Medicine" or "Research Triangle Park" or "Vinegar > Tomato".  

We've made it through two David Justice cards and a Gregg Jefferies that I barely acknowledged.  Can we get a third David Justice card?  

Last card of the post.  

Just 10,000 copies.  Make that 6,000 copies.  

This is from the 1999 Flair Showcase set.  Really nice looking set, which has a bunch of serial numbered parallels.  I believe that this was one of the easier ones to find.  Not sure of the exact odds, but I think you got two or three of these in a box.  Also not hard to find, and not very pricy either.  I am sure are there are some other good former Durham Bulls in this set that deserve a spot in the collection.  

That's it for today.  Hope everyone has had a great weekend.  

Set Appreciation Post #1 - 1986 Topps Mini Leaders

I have taken all the extra time at home to do a lot of sorting.

Part of the sorting has involved finishing off several sets.  I thought it would be fun to write about some of those sets, along with other sets that I have never had a chance to write about.  I have to start somewhere.  Why not here?

I posted a mid 1980s Topps Mini Leader card a few weeks back on my weekly Monday Cardinals post.  The product line started in 1986, running through 1990.  I really liked these sets, so I went on a bit of a hunt through my boxes to see what I had, and what holes I needed to fill in order to complete the sets.

My 1986 Mini Leaders set is finished.  Here's a look. 

Basic Design 

The 1986 Topps Mini Leaders set has an independent design from the Topps base set.  Some years the two sets were similar, but the first year the two were completely separate.  Really simple design, but I like the cloudy edges and simple print along the bottom of the card.  

The card backs for the Mini Leaders sets are all generally the same.  They have a short list of stat categories with the players rankings on the back.  Generally, the players featured in the set have finished in the top 5 of some important category. 

Well, most of the stats are important.  There is one stat in the 1986 Mini Leaders set that is somewhat ridiculous, but that is for later in the post.  

A quick note before I move on in the post.  I used a new scanning app for these cards.  They all fade on one edge of the back of the card.  Not sure why, but I am guessing I did something wrong with the lighting.  

Favorite former Durham Bulls player: Brett Butler 

I only had one choice in this set, so I have to go with Brett Butler.  He was with the Bulls during the 1980 season.  He had a spectacular season in Durham batting .366/.513/.513 with 36 stolen bases in just 66 games.  

The back of the card....

I wish that Topps had listed the categories printed on the bottom of the card in a similar fashion as the two at top.  I think it would have made for a cleaner look.  Perhaps if they had made the white box that reads "Major League Leaders" on the left side a tad smaller, they could have fit the other stat categories onto the card back easier.

Favorite Cardinals Card 

This would be a Vince Coleman rookie card.  Obviously not the one that I really wanted back in 1986, but this card had grown on my over the years.  I like seeing an action shot of Coleman.  Looks like a practice swing before stepping in the batter's box.  Is he yawning?   Still not as nice as the portrait photo on his card in the base set, but again a very nice card.  

Runs, steals, and triples.  This card back is Whitey Herzog approved.  I also love seeing the actual total number of steals that Coleman had in 1985.  That is the sort of number that we may never see again in our lives.  Coleman is in all four versions of this set, and I think each of the cards lists him as a League Leader in steals, runs, and triples.

Favorite Non-Cardinals Card 

This is a cool action picture.  Wonder what happened to his batting helmet?  

Who Would Lead The League In That Now? 

Let's look at the card of a pitcher from the set.  I randomly picked out Bert Blyleven.

When I first started flipping back through these cards the other week, there was on pitching stat that really stood out.  If Topps brought this set back, they would most definitely have a problem finding many players to include.  

Take a look.  Which of these stats never happen anymore?  

Look at that Complete Games and Shutouts stat line.  Who even led the Majors in that stat last year?  How many complete games and shutouts?  Bonus if you know the answer before you read any further down the post.  The answer is below.  

Those 24 complete games and 5 shutouts would never happen anymore.  Just scrolling around and looking at a few modern players, Justin Verlander has pitched in a total of 26 complete games in his career after pitching 2 last year.  In other words, it took him 14 years to pass Bert Blyleven's total from just 1985.     

Last season, Lucas Giolito and Shane Bieber led the Majors in complete games with 3.  Giolio, Bieber, and Sandy Alcantara were the leaders in shutouts with 2.  Not very impressive totals.  

The Dumbest Baseball Card Stat Ever 

Sorry to single you out here Lance Parrish.  You were a good catcher.  

Here is the dumbest stat that ever appeared on a baseball card.  The game-winning RBI stat.  

I am not anti-RBI.  I know there are people who put the stat in the same category as wins, but I am not willing to go that far.  There are is skill in getting runners across the plate.  I leave it at that. 

Why do I think it's a dumb stat?  I went and found an example that involves Lance Parrish.  He only finished third in the stat, so it took me a whole five box scores from the 1985 Tigers to find a good example.  

The game took place on April 14th against the Royals.  The Tigers scored two early runs, tacked on three more in the seventh, before the Royals scratch across a run in the 9th.  

In the third inning, the Tigers first three batters got hits, including an Alan Trammell single that put Detroit ahead 1-0.

After a Kirk Gibson flyout, Parrish grounds out to Royals shortstop Onix Concepcion, and Lou Whitaker, who was on third base, scored the second Tigers run of the inning.  That became a game-winning RBI for Parrish after the Royals scored a run off of reigning American League Cy Young Award Winner Willie Hernandez in the ninth.  

A ground out in the third inning of this game was one of Lance Parrish's 16 game inning RBIs.  The Tigers were already winning.  They never trailed the entire game.  There are plenty of other examples out there too.  

Yes, game-winning RBIs appear in other Mini Leaders set.  No, I won't complain in any other set appreciation posts about this stat being showcased in this product again.  

High Tek, Low Tech

Topps put out their annual High Tek product a few weeks ago.  There is not a ton there in the way of Cardinals and Durham Bulls cards.  I picked up one former Durham Bulls cards last week, with a second one on the way.  This is the Brandon Lowe autograph......

I won this Brandon Lowe autograph in an Ebay auction.  More on the Cardinals cards in a minute, but I also ended up with a Carlos Carrasco autograph since nobody else was bidding on the card. 

Notice that the Carrasco and Lowe have the same pattern on the background.  Feels a little lazy considering that Topps usually has all sorts of different patterns on these cards.  Sort of the whole theme of the set. 

I saw Carrasco as a Phillies and Indians prospect when he was coming up through the Minors.  Not sure that most people remember him being in the Cliff Lee trade. 

The Cardinals checklist is not promising in this set.  There is Rick Ankiel, but after that there are people like Paul DeJong.  Likely going to take a hard pass on getting any Cardinals here. 

Picked up one other Durham Bulls card last week in a trade.  I actually sent another collector a bunch of cards to help with completing a set, this was the card I got in return. 

A little more low tech than the Lowe and Carrasco cards above.  Back of the card. 

I love that the Durham Bulls appear both in the stat line, and in the highlight above the stat line with the blurb about Lolich throwing a no-hitter in the Carolina League.  I have never been able to find out much about the no-no other than it happened.  Regardless, happy to have a new Lolich card in the collection. 

It's Not That I Am Against Sets......

There have been a whole bunch of 2019 sets that have been released this year starting with Topps Series 1 way back in January or February.

I think I have a Stadium Club set put together.  Otherwise, I just have a bunch of random 2019 cards from a whole bunch of different sets.  Way back at the beginning of the year I thought I would try to put together a couple of small sets.  Have I done that?  

No.  

It's not that I am against sets, it's just that the majority that Topps is putting out at this point do not really hold my interest.  Rather mediocre.  

What to do?  

I am going to try to put together a pair of small Upper Deck insert sets from the early 1990s.  One from the 1992 Upper Deck Minor League set, and the other from the 1993 Upper Deck base set. Different years, different products, but I have always felt like these two insert sets are clones of each other.  

Minor League set first....

This is from the Top Prospects Holograms set.  There are 9 cards, but I only have two of them.  One being the Dmitri Young shown above as a member of the Springfield Cardinals.  The other belongs to Chipper Jones, which is a Durham Bulls card.  The other 7 cards in the set shouldn't be too hard to find.

I already have the red cards. 

TP1 Midre Cummings

TP2 Cliff Floyd

TP3 Chipper Jones

TP4 Mike Kelly

TP5 David McCarty

TP6 Frank Rodriguez

TP7 Brien Taylor

TP8 Rondell White

TP9 Dmitri Young

North Carolina native Brien Taylor card seems like he might be the hardest card left to find.  There is not one on COMC at the moment, so I will have to find one from some place different, I do not always like buying single cards like this off of Ebay.  Might have to go do a SportsLots order, something.    

On to the 1993 Upper Deck set.  If you collected at the time, I bet you can guess the insert set....

This is from the Then & Now set.  There is an older player of the picture in color with the hologram showing a new picture.  There are 18 cards in all.  There are actually a few cards in this set that I am not big on, but the rest of the cards more than make up for it.  

These are the cards I do not like.....

The retired players in the set have a goofy picture of the player wearing an Upper Deck shirt of some sort in the hologram picture rather than an older image.  Why doesn't this Reggie Jackson have a picture of him on the Angels, or his last season with the A's?  Would have made for a better set, but it's only a few cards that fit into this category.  

I am missing roughly half the set.  I already have the red cards. 

TN1 Wade Boggs

TN2 George Brett

TN3 Rickey Henderson

TN4 Cal Ripken, Jr.

TN5 Nolan Ryan

TN6 Ryne Sandberg

TN7 Ozzie Smith

TN8 Darryl Strawberry

TN9 Dave Winfield

TN10 Dennis Eckersley

TN11 Tony Gwynn

TN12 Howard Johnson

TN13 Don Mattingly

TN14 Eddie Murray

TN15 Robin Yount

TN16 Reggie Jackson

TN17 Mickey Mantle

TN18 Willie Mays

I think I can have these two small sets put together by the end of September.  Go team.