ManuPatch MVP

Just filling in some holes from earlier in the 2014 Topps sets.  It's been a good year, the sets have been completed, but there are some other holes in the sets to fill.  Mainly I am trying to track down some of the different insert sets, in particular I am looking for some of the Cardinals cards out of the World Series sets.  Here is my latest pick up from my list...

While Freese is no longer on the Cardinals this is a great card commemorating his World Series MVP award he won while playing for the team in 2011.  Freese has a great post season and single handedly won Game 6 of the World Series for the Cardinals.  If you are Nelson Cruz or Mark Lowe please look away. 

Snorting Bull Awards: Worst Card of the Year Part 2

WORST CARD OF THE YEAR PART 2 

There are some really nice high end products that come out every year.  Personally I do not touch them.  Yes, there is a chance that you could pull some really incredible once in a life time pull that will more than pay for the box.  On the other hand you could pull a $5 autograph and completely go backwards on the box of cards.

The highest of high end card products this year was the brand new Topps Dynasty product.  The boxes cost just a little more than $300, but you get an encapsulated autographed card in every box.  Each box has one pack.  Very high end sounding and check out these product fliers......

Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, and Ted Williams make this product all feel so high end.  So, how could you possibly get the worst card of the year out of this set?  I mean at worst you pull some low end autograph and are out a few hundred dollars, right?  I would love to say that the answer to these questions is yes, but unfortunately it's much worse than low end autographs.  My other Worst Card of the Year is appearing here because of credibility issues.  

Really it's sad to have to make a post like this, about a card like this, but Topps continues to have major issues with quality control.  Their latest example probably just further erodes collectors trust in the whole "game used" label that has been attached to hundreds of thousands relic cards over the past twenty years.  Several recent fraud scandals and over production had already eroded the value of relic cards greatly, but this latest example is just terrible.  Cue Sir Charles.....

Again the card is out of the high end Topps Dynasty product and features a "relic" piece from Red Sox and Yankees third baseman Wade Boggs.  There are a ton of his cards in this product and most of the relic pieces look like they could be a piece of a Red Sox or Yankees jersey.  Lots of navy, some red, and even a few pinstripes.  Then there is this gem.......

There were several long discussions about this card around the internet.  Twitter, Facebook, and Blowout Cards all had lively discussions about this card.  At first the conversation started out with a few collectors asking if they had missed some brief appearance by Boggs in Anaheim.  We all remember Steve Carlton as a Giant or Joe Namath on the Rams.  No, Boggs was not on the Angels, but he did make an appearance at the Pepsi Celebrity All-Star Softball Game during the 2010 All-Star Game Festivities in Anaheim.

The All-Star Game Logo used by the Angels that year.  Sadly this card sold on Ebay for more than $200 right after the product released.  I would have to question whether this card would have fetched that price if they buyer had known that the patch piece attached to the card was used in softball game.  Some collectors debating this card had speculated that perhaps the patch piece was actually from a Pujols, Hamilton, or Trout jersey which would still add value to the card.  However, the halo piece on the Boggs card is silver.  The regular Angels jerseys feature gold halos, like this.......

This card is not an error.  It's just a really cheaply made card that Topps should have felt really embarrassed to put out into packs of cards.  I am sure that Topps would pass the buck onto a third party vendor, or some garbage like that, if they were asked to comment on the card.  Really though, have you ever seen that website that Leaf assembles to show every patch they make in a print run of cards?  It looks like this....

Why can't Topps do something like this?  The quality control is very disappointing on the part of Topps and there is no excuse for a card like this Wade Boggs Dynasty card to ever see the light of day.  This card is everything that is wrong with bad modern trading cards: Indifference towards the collector.  Both of my Worst Cards of the Year winners show that Topps is either woefully incompetent with their editing work or they just do not care what ends up in the packs as long as it is shiny and bright.  

#MyCardMonday

I have used a few posts during the last month on Jordan Heyward, but the Cardinals also acquired relief pitcher Jordan Walden in their blockbuster trade with the Braves.  If you could rewind a few years back Walden was actually a pretty well thought of prospect and had a nice run of baseball cards issued by Topps.  What happened to Walden over the past three years?  Besides being traded to the Braves, and then to the Cardinals, the answer is absolutely nothing.  In 2011 Walden made the American League All-Star team with an ERA+ of 127 and a FIP of 2.79.  Last year pitching for the Braves Walden posted an ERA+ of 127 and a FIP of 2.79.  That's not a typo.  Same ERA+ and same FIP.

Almost every Jordan Walden certified autograph comes out of the 2011 of 2012 Topps catalog and they are really inexpensive.  He signed cards for Finest, Triple Threads, Museum, Chrome and they all sell for under $10.  I am not sure when or where I ended up with this nice looking dual jersey autograph out of the 2011 Topps Finest set, but it's sitting here in my box of autographed cards.

Another Trip To Big D's Sports Cards

It had been awhile since I had managed to make my way into my favorite local card shop, Big D's Sports Cards, in Raleigh.  I do not have school on Monday and little responsibility for the next five weeks I am tracked out of work, so it was a no brainer that I needed to hit up the card shop.  Jimmy had a couple of things waiting for me.  Some of the cards he had found and set aside for me, while a few of the cards I picked up in a trade with a local collector. 

So, first up is a small side project in my collection.  A few Michael Sam cards from different Topps base sets.  The one card would appear to be a variation, but I might be wrong on that.  I actually know almost nothing about football cards, but I like picking up a few things from Mizzou and NC State guys here and there.  Sam was the SEC Defensive Player of the Year last year and was drafted by the Rams in this year's rookie draft.  

I also picked up a pair of Hak Ju Lee autographs which were signed in person while he was a member of the Durham Bulls.  He should be back in Durham next year, but the Rays seem to be working pretty hard on trading away everyone this offseason.  He will probably end up on the Padres.  

I love the Bowman autograph on the right hand side.  That is kind of the quintessential Hak Ju Lee defensive pose.  Spend five minutes watching the Bulls take infield practice before the game and you will see that pose half a dozen different times.  On to more serious things.  

I have been trying to work on a few new player collections.  The statement above about the Michael Sam cards being a side project should have probably been typed in blue (for sarcasm).  I am really trying to develop a player collection away from baseball cards, but let's face it: I am not a football person.  

As a resident of central North Carolina it is hard to go wrong with collecting something basketball.  I like basketball and I graduated from one of those North Carolina basketball schools.  So, I am happy to add a second autograph to my collection of T.J. Warren cards.  This time he is wearing a Suns jersey and not NC State.  Well, he's at least holding a Suns jersey.  Roll Pirates Roll.  (Google Riverside Durham)  

While I was in the shop I also decided to pick up a copy of a Trea Turner autograph that looked really sweet.  It is from Leaf Valient and is a die cut autographed serial numbered out of 25.  Turner went to NC State and was drafted by the Padres 13th overall in the draft this summer.  He was in the Will Myers trade last week, but since he has not played for a full year he's in some sort of baseball purgatory.  This was too cool of a card to pass up.....

Last two cards for this post came in a trade from a local card collector who traded me a pair of Cardinals for an autograph of Red Sox prospect Henry Owens from his days as an amateur with the USA baseball program.  I thought I was only getting an Allen Craig.  Looks like I owe you a card on the next trade. 

The Edmonds patch card is a great throw in for a card for a card trade and I love the Allen Craig card.  The PinchMe phrase is in reference to his appearances off the bench for the Cardinals during their 2011 playoff run which resulted in the team's 10th World Championship.  Craig pinch hit playing in Busch and was the DH in Texas.  He started game 7 because of an injury to Matt Holliday and ended up hitting the go ahead home run.  

Snorting Bull Awards: Worst Set of the Year

WORST CARD SET OF THE YEAR

We are meeting here too often.  This is how awards get named after people, or in this case a set, and it's not really a good thing.  Mental note: If Topps releases this set again next year and it is truly garbage again my award for Worst Card Set of the Year will be renamed after this product.  Really there is no need for this sort of thing to happen.  We've discussed airbrushing in several different posts over the years and no matter how it is done, collectors can all agree that it is not a good thing for the set.

So, if you worked at Topps and you wanted to showcase the talent that was drafted in the amateur baseball draft how would you go about doing this?  There are several good examples, a few mediocre examples, and a ton of poor examples.  The poor examples are mainly recent.  Here's how I view some of the draft cards over the years:


The Good: 1992 Topps Stadium Club Dome

These are sort of a classic in many circles.  Manny Ramirez was at Duke Chapel.  Shawn Green was in his backyard.  Nothing wrong with these cards.  I like Shawn Green in a t-shirt and a hat from his high school a lot better than an airbrushed Blue Jays uni.


The Bad: Leaf Products 

Leaf is always pretty good about getting draftees to sign for their different products.  They take the logos off of stuff, but they are not adding stuff either.  Treat Turner autograph?  Yes, please.  Why did you take the NC State logo off of his cap?  Disappointing, but not a deal breaker.

The Ugly (and winner of Worst Card Set two years running) Bowman Draft

I am not sure if this picture was taken while Turner was in college or playing somewhere in the minors, but he was clearly not on the Padres at the time it was taken.  It brings up the first problem with the Bowman Draft set: Quality.  

The SD logo on the hat is goofy and the jersey is off too.  I understand that almost every Topps set these days has some airbrushing, we all have bad days, but Bowman Draft just takes it to a different level.  Is there a card in the set which Topps does not airbrush?  I am not sure that there is. 

This Trea Turner is not quite as bad as the base card in the Bowman Draft set, but it still is not great.  This looks a lot like a USA Baseball photo.  The helmet is not quite right for NC State.  The earflaps on their helmets are a little bit less padded.  Almost a dead ringer for the USA Baseball helmets though and that dirt spot on the front of his jersey has a strange shape, but it's in the same spot as the number on is US National team jersey.  Pretty hard to get those dirt spots to cooperate with your airbrushing.  Even when Topps tries really really hard it is hard to make a quality product when you have to airbrush every single card.  

I had also thought about picking up a copy of the Luke Weaver card who was the Cardinals first round draft pick out of Florida State.  I saw the pitcher a few times the last couple of years with both FSU and USA Baseball.  His rookie card in Bowman Draft is inexcusably sloppy which is my second adjective I would use to describe this product.  

The Cardinals logo on his jersey is pretty bad, the hat is okay, but if you are going to go ahead and airbrush those two items on his jersey what is preventing you from fixing his maroon socks, belt, and undershirt showing on the card.  Seriously just airbrush the whole thing.  If I had been airbrushing him I would have put him smack dab in the middle of Busch Stadium.  What stopping you?  

Finally there is this awesome number Topps pulled on Casey Gillaspie cards which illustrates a total lack of consistency within the Bowman Draft product.  Gillaspie was the Rays first round pick out of Wichita State.  If you have never seen Wichita State play they have unique uniforms and they are probably pretty difficult to airbrush.  Topps actually waited until he reached the minors to take a photo of the power hitter first baseman.........

This insert card is not too bad.  The color scheme and design certainly fit with the Rays.  The helmet might be slightly off, but not bad.  What I do not understand is how you can create a decent photograph for one card and then completely miss on another card of the same player.  Here is Gillaspie's regular base card in the Bowman Draft set.....

I am not sure where this picture was taken, but the hat logo is terrible and the jersey logo is not much better.  I just do not understand why, if you are going to use airbrushing, you would not choose a card that is easy to work into something that looks good.  

I know that for many collectors the Bowman Draft product is the end of the calendar year and in many ways a celebration of the card year.  One final Bowman product and the first look at a few young stars before the new card year starts.   However, until Topps does something to change the quality and consistency in the product and clean up the sloppiness the Bowman Draft product will not be a serious set of baseball cards.  

It appears that other collectors are also down on this product too.  The set has not been out for very long and the set is already selling for just a little more than $5. 

Topps needs to seriously pull the plug on this product and do a complete revamp of what they are doing in this set.  I am not sure that Topps can ever really admit that they do something wrong, they are the only licensed card company in the game, but this would be a great set to either discontinue or go out on a limb and do something creative with.  In the meantime, I am prepared to rename the award for Worst Card Set of the Year to the Bowman Draft Worst Card Set of the Year Award.  As sure as the night is dark and water is wet, Topps will release this product again next year with all of the same flaws it has had the past several years running.

Friday Five: Thank You Charlie!

I had walked my students outside to their busses yesterday afternoon when I paused a minute to check the news and saw this tweet staring back at me on my iPhone.  I stopped for a minute on the sidewalk and soaked it in.  Earlier this offseason I had hoped that Montoyo would have a chance to move up to the Rays as the team's manager.  After watching Charlie navigate the Bulls for the past 8 seasons I know he would have done a great job.  For awhile I guess, as Bulls fans, we were in limbo about Charlie.  A few Cubs fans on my Twitter feed had speculated that Charlie could end up with the Cubs in some capacity.  After pausing for a minute and reading a few of the comments below the tweet I decided to be happy for Charlie.

Baseball fans in the Triangle are losing a great baseball manager in Montoyo, but after spending his entire managing and coaching career in the minors it is great to see him get his day in the sun working for the Rays as their third base coach.  I thought Charlie would make a great manager and know he will also make a great third base coach.  I've seen Charlie make that run out of the first base dug out down the third base line dozens of times each of the past eight summers.  He does a great job of talking, coaching, and working with the players throughout the game.  I have no doubt that he will be successful at the Major League level.

Montoyo leaves the Bulls after eight sevens which resulted in 7 division crowns, a pair of Governors Cups, and a Triple A National Championship.  He also leaves as the Durham Bulls all-time most winningest manager after passing the legendary Bill Evers by last summer.

I took a little bit of relaxation time this morning and combed through the managerial record of Charlie Montoyo and ranked, in my opinion, his five best performances as a manager.

5.  2007 Durham Bulls 

80-63 International League South Division Champions, Governors Cup Appearance  

The first season Montoyo spent as the Bulls manager resulted in an International League South Division Title and a trip to the Governor's Cup Championship against the Richmond Braves.  Ultimately the Bulls lost the Cup that year, but Montoyo did a great job of turning around a team that had struggled on and off the field the season before.  More than 30 players appeared on the Bulls that season who eventually appeared on a Major League roster at some point in their career.  The highlight of the season was an appearance by top Rays prospect Evan Longoria for a 31 game cup of coffee on his way up to Durham.  The roster also featured Jonny Gomes, Joel Guzman, Chris Richard, Justin Ruggiano, Shawn Riggans, Ben Zobrist, Andy Sonnanstine, Jeff Niemann, Jason Hammel, and J.P. Howell.  Montoyo had actually managed many of the players the year before while he was working for the Rays Double A team in Montgomery as their manager.

4. 2014 Durham Bulls

75-69 International League South Division Champions, Governors Cup Appearance 

I cannot possibly do a good enough job of explaining what a wonderful job Montoyo did this last season with the Durham Bulls.  I watched the team all the way to the Governors Cup and was truly amazed the entire way.  The Bulls dispatched with the rest of the International League Southern Division the way that their fans have come all too accustomed to seeing.  The Bulls won their division by 9 games, defeated the Columbus Clippers in the first round of the playoffs, and took the Pawtucket Paw Sox all the way to a final fifth game of the Governors Cup Series before yielding the cup to the Red Sox Triple A team.  What was so impressive about 2014?  While I can point out dozens of talented prospected on other Durham Bulls teams during Montoyo's eight year run as the Bulls manager, this summer's squad lacked a big name.  Kevin Kiermaier appeared for 34 games, but was gone by the half way in the season.  Mikie Mahtook seems like a nice player, but I am not sure he is a top tier prospect.  Stud pitching prospects Enny Romero and Alex Colome struggled with consistency.  Mike Montgomery threw a no-hitter and was unhittable at the beginning of the year before struggling down the stretch with an ERA of 6.86 in July and 5.91 in August.  Veteran players like Vince Belnome and Wilson Betimet failed to provide the Bulls any spark on offense.    Even Snorting Bull favorite Hak Ju Lee only hit .203 and found a seat on the bench frequently towards the end of the year.  There were so many reasons why this team should not have won, but Montoyo willed them into the playoffs and within a game of taking home the International League Championship.

3.  2013 Durham Bulls

87-57 International League South Division Champions, Governors Cup Champions 

The 2013 Durham Bulls were a great team.  They had talented players, but they worked really well together.  I would have loved to see how many games they could have won with a full season of players like Will Myers and Chris Archer.  Hak Ju Lee was hitting .422 through his first 45 Triple A at-bats before he blew out a knee.  Motoyo got great performances out of prospects like Jake Odorizzi, Alex Colome, Tim Beckham, and Kevin Keirmeir, but also got a lot of some key veterans like Leslie Anderson, Jason Bourgeois, Shelley Duncan, Rich Thompson, J.D. Martin, and Matt Buschmann.  Plenty of other players like Cole Figueroa, Merrill Kelly, and Brandon Guyer mixed in too.  The team won the South Division by 10 games, swept the Indianapolis Indians in the first round of the playoffs, and defeated the Pawtucket Red Sox to win the Governors Cup.  The team ultimately lost in the Triple A Championship to the Omaha Storm Chasers, but still were a great success in large part due to the managing of Charlie Montoyo.

2. 2006 Montgomery Biscuits 

77-62 South Division Runner-Up, Southern League Champions 

It's hard to ignore Montoyo's work with the Montgomery Biscuits before he jumped up to manage the Durham Bulls.  The year before taking the reigns with the Bulls, Montoyo managed roughly a dozen of the players who appeared on the 2007 Durham Bulls, his first as the team's manager, to a Southern League Championship with the Rays Double A team.  That team included Longoria, Ruggiano, Reid Briganc, Elliot Johnson, Jeff Niemann, and Mitch Talbot.  All of those players were a huge part of his success during his first season in Durham, which really began the year before in Double A.  The 2006 season was Charlie's fourth at the helm of the Rays Double A team and his first winning season at that level of managing in the minors.

1.  2009 Durham Bulls 

79-65 International League South Division Champions, Governors Cup Champions, Triple A National Champions 

The crowning gem of Montoyo's time as the Bulls manager was the 2009 Triple A National Championship team.  The team had young prospects, veteran's playing out the end of their careers, pitching, hitting, defense.  Everything.  Let's start with the prospects.  The team featured Desmond Jennings, John Jaso, Reid Brignac, Sean Rodriguez, Matt Joyce,  Jeremy Hellickson, Wade Davis, and an appearance by David Price early in the season.  There were some veterans too.  Jason Isringhausen, Akinori Iwamura, Shawn Riga's, Chad Bradford, and Jorge Julio also spent time in Durham that season.  Unlike many seasons, where the Bulls easily win their division, they spent the summer in a fight with the Gwinnett Braves winning the division by two games.  The team won their first round playoff matchup and advanced to the Governors Cup against the Scranton Yankees.  The Bulls swept the Yankees and made up for the previous season when the team had been drubbed badly in the deciding game of the Governors Cup against the same team.  In the Triple A championship game the Bulls ran into a talented team in the Memphis Redbirds who featured future Cardinals World Series winners in Jon Jay, Allen Craig, and David Freese.  The game went into extra innings and the Bulls won a wild pitch.  

It was a great run for Charlie Montoyo as the Bulls manager and I hope you enjoyed my take on his five best performances as a manager.  It was a tough list to make and it's difficult when you make a list of teams and have to leave out three other talented Durham Bulls teams which also won their divisions and made it into the playoffs.  I know I can safely say I speak for baseball fans all over the Triangle and many Rays fans too when I say: Thank you Charlie.  

Friday Five: Top 5 Durham Bulls First Baseman

This is the Saturday edition of my normal Friday blog post.  I am going to post two of these today.  This post was planned since last week, but my real job took up a lot of time the last few nights and prevented me from finishing this post.  The second Friday Five post is in reaction to some baseball news from yesterday.  

5.  Rusty Staub 

Staub appeared for Durham in 1962 as a minor leaguer in the Astros organization.  The Bulls were apart of the Carolina league that season and Staub's performance that season paced the Bulls to a league title over the Kinston Eagles (Pirates) and their star pitcher Steve Blass.  In his only full minor league season "Le Grand Orange" posted a .293/.429/.483 line with 23 home runs and 93 RBIs.  Staub was one of the top offensive performers in the league that season and ranks as one of the best offensive performances in the history of the Durham Bulls.  On a side note,  Rusty Staub missed out on leading the Carolina League in home runs and RBIs to one Bert Barth, St. Louis native,  who hit 33 home runs and drove in 136 playing for the Rocky Mount Leafs.  He also pitched in the minor leagues too.   I am going to have to track down more info on Bert Barth and I promise he gets a post in the near future.  

4.  Greg Luzinski 

Luzinski was apart of the 1969 Raleigh-Durham Phillies team (they also played one season around this time as the Triangles).  The team placed second that season, to those dreaded Rocky Mount Leafs, in the Carolina League's Eastern Division finishing with a record of 79-62.  Luzinski lead the Carolina league that season in home runs, RBIs, and finished third in slugging and OPS posting a line of .289/.371/.394 with 31 home runs, and 92 RBIs.  "The Bull" ended up splitting his career between the Phillies and White Sox where he hit over 300 Major League home runs, drove in more than 1000 runs, and almost reached 2000 hits.  

3.  Kevin Witt 

Kevin Witt won the International League MVP the first full season that I lived in Durham.  The big first baseman had some incredible power in his bat which never really worked out in the Majors.  He was still a great player in the more than half a dozen Minor League stops during the late 90s through the mid 2000s.  His 2006 season with the Durham Bulls was his last year playing for a minor league team in the US.  Witt posted a .291/.360/.577 line with 36 home runs and 99 RBIs.  Witt lead the International League in both home runs and RBIs, as well as slugging percentage.   The Bulls had a lot of talent on that team including Delmon Young, Jame Shields, Edwin Jackson, Ben Zobrist, B.J. Upton, Darnell McDonald, Elijah Dukes, and newly minted Rays manager Kevin Cash.  Still all the talent could not get the Bulls above .500 that season.  After Witt's MVP season he had a short lived career playing baseball in Japan with Rakuten.  

2.  Steve Cox

Cox spent two seasons in Durham with the Bulls and his 1999 season was one of the best offensive seasons in team history.  Cox posted a .341/..415/.588 line with 25 home runs, 127 RBIs, and 49 doubles.  Cox lead the International League in batting and RBIs, but missed out on the home runs leg of the triple crown finishing fifth.  I would like to say that the doubles in an International League record, as I cannot find a total higher than that, but some of the older stats in the IL are a little murky in places.  Cox ended up spending a few decent seasons with the Devil Rays before his career lost traction.  He spent part of a season in Japan and ended up back with the Rays briefly in 2005 and even made a return appearance (for 19 games) as a Durham Bull 

1. Dan Johnson

Dan Johnson spent three years as a Durham Bull.  His second stint with the Bulls, in 2010, he was basically an unstoppable force at the plate.  I attended several games that season where Johnson just simply schooled the other teams pitching staff in every way possible.  You've heard the old say about how the "baseball must look like a beach ball to that player right now"?  Johnson turned the right now into most of a season.  In 98 games in Durham that season Johnson hit 30 home runs, 19 doubles, with 95 RBIs while posting a .303/.430/.624 line.  Johnson basically missed a third of the season, but still lead the league in home runs, walks, slugging, and finished second in RBIs to Brandon Moss who played 38 more games than Johnson.  It was one of the most impressive seasons I have ever seen.  His Major League career has not been the best, but he still owns one of the biggest hits in Rays history.