Random Cards A Century Apart

I have been on vacation for the past week, and have enjoyed sitting around sorting out some cards and watching baseball.  I have sorted out a few thousand cards, but that's for a later post. 

I have also enjoyed checking out the baseball playoffs.  One of the best perks of my job is the fact that I get the first two to three weeks of October off.  Always nice. 

On to cards. 

While I have been sorting out all these cards, I have run across more than a few cards that I wish I had taken the time to post when I bought/traded for them.  In looking at the stack I pulled out on Tuesday, I decided that there were two cards that were clearly better than the rest of the stack, or so they seem that way for the moment. 

First card. 

I posted my first card of George "Possum" Whitted way back in August.  The Durham native primarily played for the Phillies, Pirates, and Cardinals from 1912 until 1922, so his cards are quite old and often quite expensive.  Possum also managed and played for the Durham Bulls for six years during the late 1920s and early 1930s.  

This card is from the long running Exhibits cards, which are more or less postcards with baseball players.  There are still a lot of people who like collecting them.  Personally, I have never done much with them, but I am not really in line to drop a few hundred dollars on a Cracker Jacks or Famous & Barr card of him.  Let's try one out.  

The card years on the Exhibits tend to be over multiple years.  This card is listed as a 1921 in many places, but other sites have it as a 1921-1924.  Either way, it's almost a century old, and still in relatively good condition.  The corners are soft and the dings and scratches are on the card, not on the top loader.  

I like the simplicity and the fact that this card has an actual photo of Possum.  My first card was a drawing.  

Next.  

I still do not buy directly from Topps, but I spent one day of my summer looking for different cards they have sold on their website that I have missed out on.  More of those for a later date, but know that I am not going to let the whole Aledmys thing go yet. 

Since I did not buy it from Topps, some guy on Ebay got my money instead.  Although he paid Topps for the card, so really Topps still made a bunch of money off of this card even though I bought it from someone else. 

Some other reasons why this card is here:

Who wouldn't want an Expos card? 

Have I ever told you about how St. Louis people obsess over what high school they went to?  Max Scherzer and I went to different high schools, but in the same school district.  Also a decade apart from each other.   

Max Scherzer went to Mizzou.  I did not, but I still like their sports teams. 

Max Scherzer is good. 

Max Scherzer is wearing an Expos uniform. 

After getting the Possum Whitted card, I specifically thought about how great these two random cards would look in a post together. 

My work here is done.  Off to watch baseball for the rest of the day. 

Black and Old Gold Scherzer

I don't have a collection of Max Scherzer cards and I am not going to start one anytime soon.  Still, I have been on the lookout for one of his cards for a few months now.  Different things have gotten in the way during that time.  Me not paying attention to the end of Ebay auctions, getting sniped at the end of Ebay auctions, and me not willing to spend $79.99 on a Buy It Now for a Max Scherzer card.  

The card I have been on the lookout for features Scherzer during his time at the University of Missouri.  I went to another public university in Missouri, but I grew up rooting for the Tigers.  I went to basketball and football games, had siblings attend the school, and many friends from high school.  

I was living in North Carolina the majority of the time that Scherzer was at Mizzou, but I did get to see him play with play with the USA Baseball College Team.  

I have always thought it would be cool to have seen Scherzer actually pitch a game for the Tigers.  There is no going back at this point, so I have dabbled in Scherzer cards at times when I have had a chance to add a copy of him wearing the black and old gold.  I think my first Scherzer card in a Mizzou uniform was out of the 2007 Donruss Elite set, I will post it on another day.  

So, here is my second....

I love the picture of Scherzer in the Mizzou uniform obviously.  The design of the card is really simple, but I like the fact that it draws your eye towards the signature and the picture.  Yes, the signature is a sticker autograph which is always something I try to avoid, but in this case I am making past it just fine.  

A Trip To Big D's Sportcards

It was a quiet afternoon on the homestead yesterday, so I decided a trip to my local card shop, Big D's Sports Cards, would make the day a little better.  Jimmy had set aside a cool autograph of former NC State player Julius Hodge.  For those not familiar with Julius, he played at State from 2001-2005.  He was an All-ACC selection several times and was the conference player of the year during the 2003-2004 season.  His two most famous moments at State were aggravating Chris Paul to the point where he punched him in nuts and wrecking everyone's NCAA tournament bracket in 2005 when he made a great play to knock out UConn.  (apologizes for the video quality).

Hodge lasted two years in the NBA playing for the Nuggets, Lakers, and Bucks.  He has since played a long career overseas dominating the Australian Basketball League and Twitter.  Here's my autograph:

Of course you can't go into a card shop and just walk away with an autograph, unless it's an awesome autograph, so I stayed and shopped for awhile and picked up a few nice cards for the collection.  Here's what else I picked up yesterday:

My 2014 Topps set is coming along nicely and Jimmy had a few really nice pieces I decided to add to my growing collection from last month's new Topps set.  I already have three of the class rings (Stan, Rickey Henderson, and Randy Johnson), but decided to add a fourth with this Miguel Cabrera ring.  I'm a pretty big fan of the Tigers slugger and enjoy picking up his cards, even if they have him in a Marlins jersey.  I also picked up an autograph and jersey card from the 2014 Topps set:

Both cards are kind of a roll of the dice for the coming season.  Just two players I have a good feeling about.  Davidson was traded from the Diamondbacks to the White Sox where he will be the team's starting third baseman this season.  He had a "cup of coffee" with the DBacks last year, and while the numbers are not great, there not terrible and I like some of what I see with the former first round pick.  Mainly, half of his hits were extra base hits, 9 of them, with less than 100 at-bats.  In the minors he had an OBP over .350 and had roughly half of his hits come in the form of extra base hits.  Not saying the average is every going to be great, but get on base and show some pop, can't go wrong.  Rondon?  See Tigers bullpen.  He's big and throws really hard.  Rondon is great in the International League, just waiting for him to show up in the American League.  

 

I also picked up two minis from the 2014 Topps set.  Both of these cards seem extra cool given that both were active and very good players at the time the 1989 Topps set was released.  The Raines card would be even cooler if Topps had put down his name as Rock Raines, which was on the original 1989 Topps card.  Speeding things up:

 

A Gold Parallel of Matt Holliday's 2014 Topps card.  I already have the red version.  

Three Shelby Miller cards.....

 

and a Max Scherzer Topps Heritage Chrome card.  A great haul and great day at Big D's.  

Facebook Trades

I am spending a little time this morning typing up some of my trades from the past two weeks.  I am glad everyone is enjoying my countdown posts, but I need to put up some cards coming into my collection too.  This morning I am writing up two trades that I made with one awesome Facebook collector.  My cards this morning came from Brian who is in several Facebook trade groups and has lots of good stuff on his page.  A few weeks ago he traded me a Sweet Spot Miguel Cabrera autograph.         Last week, I picked up five different autographs from him:

First up is a childhood favorite Vince Coleman.  Coleman was a big cog on the mid and late 90s Cardinals teams.  He played on the for six years and stole almost 550 bases.  Coleman's first three years in the league all produced 100 steal seasons.  Vince does have a few autographs including a 2003 Fan Favorites, a Tristar Obak, and an Upper Goudy.  Of course, he also has this one which I was previously missing:

2008 TriStar SignaCuts Vince Coleman Autograph 

Next up is my first Mark Trumbo autograph.  I have picked up a few Trumbo cards since seeing him at the All-Star Game Home Run Derby this year, but no autographs.  I was really impressed with his raw power and figure this would be a good add.  Trumbo's cards have picked up some steam this year and should be a solid add considering he will probably spend the next couple of years hitting behind Mike Trout.  Plus, this is a beautiful card.  

2012 Topps Museum Collection

I also picked up an early Max Scherzer autograph in the trade.  I saw Scherzer pitch earlier this summer against the Angels and was very impressed.  I've always kind of watched him since we are from the same corner of St. Louis County and he pitched at Mizzou.  Scherzer was a high draft pick and I think he finally starting to live up to some of the hype.  Fight Justin Verlander for the league lead in strikeouts is a nice accomplishment.  Anyway, I have only sticker autographs of Scherzer, so this was a good add for my collection.  

2005 Upper Deck USA Baseball Max Scherzer Autograph/Jersey

Last two autographs I will put together.  I picked up a Starlin Castro autograph from this year's Topps Heritage set.  I love the 1963 Topps set and have picked up a lot of the cards from this year's set.  There are a lot of cool autographs in there too.  Last card for this morning is a Paul O'Neill from the 2012 Topps Tier One set.  I enjoyed watching O'Neill as a Red way back in the day and still liked him on the Yankees.   O'Neill was a really good productive player.  He made a few All-Star games in his career and will never make the Hall of Fame, but he won a lot of rings.  

2012 Topps Heritage Starlin Castro Autograph

2012 Topps Tier One Paul O'Neill Autograph