Acetate Fever!

There have been a lot of different acetate cards put out during this past year.  For me, as a collector, I started out with a few of the acetate cards out of the Topps sets.  Really nice cards and one of my favorite parts of the Topps sets from last year....

I felt like these were kind of a constant last year.  Topps issued a series of cards and I spent a few weeks chasing down a bunch of these cards.  I would find most of the cards I was looking for and the next series of Topps would drop.  The cycle just kept repeating.  As much time and money as I spent finding acetate cards out of the Topps sets this year, there are still a few I would like to add to my collection.  I found one of them last week and finalized a trade for the card this afternoon.  Pretty exciting. 

Besides the acetate parallels in the base Topps set, there were also plenty of cool autographs in the acetate based Topps Tek set.  Sure, the Ron Gant card was a bit of bummer, but there are plenty of cool cards in this sets return.....

I think this might be my favorite autograph I have added out of the set so far, but I still have two of these cards I have yet to post.  Love the look of these cards and have considered working on a project to assemble the base set of these cards.  Topps did a great job of reviving this cool late 90s/early 2000s acetate baseball card set.  

Two acetate baseball card obsessions in a year is pretty good.  What else could there possibly be that would fit into my collection?  

Have you seen the new USA Baseball cards that Panini put out recently?  

I live about ten minutes away from the USA Baseball Complex in Cary, North Carolina and always make time to check out a few of their games every year.  I really enjoy watching the college team the best, but still check in on the other teams here and there.  This past summer I attended one their games against Chinese Taipei and did a write up about some of the players I saw during the game.  

When Panini dropped the USA Baseball set I naturally checked in to see if I could find some autographs of the players who stuck out in my mind during the summer when I saw this sweet Justin Garza card:

That's an autograph over an acetate strip with a jersey relic.  Acetate!  Again!  More!  How cool is that.  I really liked watching Justin Garza pitch last summer and have some big hopes for him as a Major League pitcher.  He's only 5'11, which makes him on the small side for a pitcher, but he has a great arm.  I had a couple more players on the USA team I would love to add, but I am going to be patient with this set since the cards seem to trend downward over time.  The cards also seem to trickle out on the marketplace which makes the first couple of cards a little bit pricier than they should be.  Still, I am excited at the prospects of adding more acetate cards to my collection.

A Night Out At USA Baseball

A lot of the games that I attend in person are Durham Bulls games, but I have decided to do a little bit better job at showing off some of the great baseball that is around central North Carolina.  We may not have a Major League team, but there are plenty of minor league and amateur baseball games around here.  Tonight I took a short 10 minute excursion up NC55 to the USA Baseball training complex to watch the College National Team battle a college team from the Chinese Taipei.  The USA Baseball Stadium is small, but a really nice complex.  

Here's a look at the field.  Not a huge crowd, but definitely some die hard baseball fans were in attendance.  There is a scout section behind home plate which was pretty full too.  The College All-Star team consists of a group of very good college players.  There are a few that I would love to add to the roster, but I am sure there is a reason that they are elsewhere.  Here's a look at this year's squad.....

The starting pitcher for tonight's game was Thomas Eshelman from Cal State Fullerton.  Eshelman was the College Freshman pitcher of the year in 2013 for the Titans and also made the Baseball America All American Team.  Eshelman is a big guy, but seems to rely a lot on control.  USA Baseball does not have a stadium radar gun, but there are so many scouts around the stadium you can just kind of listen and figure out how hard they are throwing.  Eshelman seemed to live in the low 90s.  Taipei had one big inning against the right-handed pitcher who exited the game with a 3-3 tie.  Here is Eshelman warming up in the first.....

The next pitcher into the game was more impressive than Eshelman.  In fact, it was Eshelman's teammate from Cal State Fullerton Justin Garza.  He's short (5'11) and only weighs 170 pounds, but he has an arm.  He reminds me a lot of Marcus Stroman who I saw pitch at Duke.  Garza may be short, but he has an arm.  

Garza seemed to be sitting in the mid 90s and had some sort of second pitch which he flipped up from time to time.  Hitters seemed completely off while Garza was in the game.  Several sites have him projected as a first rounder.  Seems like a legit talent.  He threw a no-hitter last year at Fullerton....

I also spent a little bit of time checking out shortstop Alex Bregman who should be another first round draft pick next year.  I would guess he'd be in the top half of the first round.  The LSU shortstop is extremely polished in the field and has a good bat for a middle infielder too.  He made a great play in the field tonight, but I did not get any pictures or video clips of him.  Another night.  Here's a clip of him hitting a home run against Houston in the NCAA regionals last year.  

Last player I will share tonight is Tate Matheny who is the son of Cardinals manager Mike Matheny.  If you know me away from this blog you are probably aware of the fact that I am slightly hard on the Cardinals manager.  I went into this game with a clear mind and paid a little extra attention to this Missouri State All American.  Matheny was playing centerfield tonight and was batting fourth in the lineup.  Here's his first at-bat which resulted in an RBI single.  

Matheny did a great job of going the other way with that ball and getting the run home from third.  I have one more video of a Matheny at-bat, but he flies out.  

Matheny also made a great play in the field during the game.  A Taipei batter hit a ball towards the right-center gap.  Matheny had a bad read on the ball and actually broke in at first.  He ran back and to his right, reached up over his shoulder, and made a leaping catch to take away a double or triple.  

Overall it was a great night to take in a game at the USA Baseball complex.  The game ended in a 5-5 tie (Ann Coulter would be irked) in extra innings.  The two teams play a few more games this week.  I might have to go back and check out Louisville pitcher Kyle Funkhouser.