Merry Christmas!!

What else would you watch during the holidays? Elf? Please.

As a wise Peanuts character once sang, Christmas time is here. For me, that means time to break from school, college applications, and even (gasp!) the internet, for a brief while, to celebrate the season. This in mind, here's what's going on as far as my collecting goes:

I'm still looking for cards to complete sets. I'm short 9 cards for my Nolan Ryan insert set, a couple hundred for my 2012 Panini Triple Play set, and perhaps 400 or so for my 2003 Topps set. If any blog readers and traders would like to help me put these away, I would love to have some assistance!

Festive!

Which leads me to my next item. My Trade Bait page has always been a bit spare, so I've been doing some re-stocking. Right now I have an under-construction sign up, but I have been taking in some new cards. So look for some new trade bait and "Up-for-grabs" posts in the future.

I don't own any Chipper ornaments, but it sure would be nice to...

Last, I need some real help for my Player Collections. I credit you bloggers for getting me to the point where I am nearly out of space to hold all of my Chipper Jones, Dale Murphy, etc. cards. For those of you who collect a number of players, how do you store your PC cards, coins, and other memorabilia? Right now, I have all the cards stored in a plastic cassette tape case. It works and fits okay, but I know it really isn't ideal. I'll leave you with that question.

Thanks for reading, and Merry Christmas!

Contest Going On!

GCRL of blog garvey cey russell lopes is giving away a 1952 Topps card in his Steve Garvey birthday contest! Check it out!

Trade with the Card Raven and Listia Winnings!

Did you buy a lottery ticket this week? I didn't, but next time I might be able to if my state lawmakers get their way. Honestly, I've viewed lotteries as a sort of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory-style Golden Ticket chase, for grown-ups. Anyway, rather than buying candy bars, I've spent the early holidays applying for college scholarships, and bidding for cards on Listia. Merry Christmas to you. Here are some of my recent wins.

To begin, here's a nice Dale Murphy relic. Bobby Cox was enshrined in the Hall of Fame by the Veterans Committee a couple of weeks ago; that's the only chance for Murphy to get in now, and it's an outside shot too. If it weren't for those darn knee injuries, it might have been different.

Speaking of injuries, CBS Sports is now plugging for sketch cards of bizzaro injuries. I think my favorite was Glenallen Hill, who I will now always imagine crashing into a glass table while dreaming about being covered with spiders.

I snagged a card of a young Chipper Jones (in his Bolles Bulldogs high school jersey) and Rondell White, apparently on a spring training field with a makeshift Green Monster (?) in the back.

A couple more Chipper Jones cards in a lot I won...it seems like SI for Kids used to do more baseball card tie-ins a few years ago than they do now. Also, it would be an interesting blog contest idea for someone to collect that Funny Photos set and re-caption all the cards. Just a thought.

And a couple of Panini Triple Play wantlist needs. I still need a ton of cards from this set, if you would like to help me out there.

We're now to the Card Raven's package. For my part, these 2012 Topps minis were gold. Braves cards plus 1987 Topps = gold, in my opinion.

May not be gold, but they do glitter. And (at most) two years after these cards were made, none of these players sit on the Braves roster.

This was one of those 2011 Topps Lineage cloth cards. My guess is Chipper was either batting in some Spring Training game here, judging by the absent seats. 

A Tommy Hanson black border from 2011 Ginter. The bearded redhead was nontendered by the Angels after posting an ERA over 5, making the Hanson-for-Jordan Walden trade last year look pretty decent in retrospect.

Let's play a little, Where are they now? with these guys. Sammons, at last check had had knee problems (like Dale Murphy) and was a catching prospect (like Dale Murphy), so he became a catching coordinator for the Marlins farm system (unlike Dale Murphy). Lillibridge just got picked up, along with Kevin Kouzmanoff (remember him?) off the scrap bin by the Rangers  a week ago.

I'll take numbered cards, especially from sets I don't have any cards from.

This was a 2010 Topps Turkey Red insert. I really don't think Nate McLouth could be called a "Prominent Ballplayer" anymore, as he is on the back of this card. Also, I've never heard any player called a "Prominent Ballplayer" by anything but baseball cards.

Blue and Gold parallels are great too. As a military brat, I'll say these are in honor of the Navy Midshipman, who beat the Army Black Knights Saturday for an unprecedented 12th straight rivalry win. To put the streak in a little perspective, the 12-year span of victories over Army is more than half of all the Navy players' lives.

I'll close out with one of the finest closers the Braves have had in recent history. I've been playing a copy of an old MLB Playstation game the past few weeks, rosters current as of 2001, and I had Smoltz come out to relieve the other day, and I believe he won it. I really hope to see Smoltz in the Hall in 2015.

Thanks to Card Raven and my Listia friends for the cards!

Overheard in the Target Card Aisle...

*

Enter little girl and who I would presume to be her father into the card aisle, gaming section. I'm on the other end, eavesdropping but otherwise minding my own business.

Little Girl: "Remember when I used to like Pokemon cards?"

Dad: [Looks disinterested]

Little Girl: "Do you remember-have I told you what a brony is?"

Dad: ...

Little Girl: "It's a man, especially a grown man, who likes that show [My Little Pony, clearly]."

Dad: [Looks disinterested]

Little Girl: "It's scary."

CUT

*photo stolen from Things Are Funner Here ---> funnerhere.com

Cards from Baseball Dad!

 

Awhile back I claimed a card in Jack of All Tribe Baseball's card giveaway. In addition to my claimed card (an Astros Toy's-R-Us parallel) Jack generously threw in a bunch of set needs. And here they be:

 First, a bunch of cards off my 2012 Panini Triple Play set. I'm still working on this-find my wantlist here.

Also some cards for my 2003 Topps set. Here's an Aaron Boone Reds card. Do any bloggers collect autograph signing cards like these?

Nice submarine delivery, Chad. Nice turtleneck too, by the way.

Here we get into some overlap with my David Eckstein PC. If anyone has a copy of this card, I'd take one for the PC and keep this one in the set.

You don't see this pose very often on a card...if this shot was taken at Coors field though, It couldn't have been a rare occurrence.

 Jerry looks too young to be a manager-kids these days...

 

And a trio of Braves to finish it off. I don't know how I could not like that throwback uniform Smoltzie is wearing. Interestingly, it doesn't look like Bobby Cox has had any cards since 2010, according to the venerable Trading Card Database. Just wait till Bobby's eligible for the Hall of Fame next year; Panini will be churning out unlicensed cards of him like there's no tomorrow.

So there you have it. Thanks so much to Jack, and I look forward to sending you many Indian cards in the future!

Cards from the Tim Wallach Collector!

I think one of the things I've enjoyed most about reading card blogs is discovering the player collectors who collect that obscure 1990s player, rather than your standard Albert Pujols, Derek Jeter, or Chipper Jones (as I do). Give me the Tino Martinez or Tim Wallach collector any day, and I'll take your Chili Davis cards.

It's our Wallach blogger who sent me some nice Brave cards recently, after I passed on some cards of the Expo to him a few months ago. He's on a mission. A mission to....

Couldn't resist

I wasn't expecting anything back, so I was pleasantly surprised at seeing these:

 

A couple of Braves greats, including Babe Ruth. A few years ago Topps had fun with Ruth as a Brave, including this dandy of a card:

 

Also in the package were a couple of Murph cards I needed for the PC- a 1981 Fleer and 1988 Topps Big Dale Murphy. Does anyone have many of the Topps Big cards? I was struggling to find a sleeve large enough to hold Dale without smothering him.

One of the many Diamond Duos inserts and a Braves team card from 2011 Topps Heritage. Tommy Hanson had a rougher year in his first season with the Angels, going 4-3 with an ERA of over 5.

This Target Red is actually a Checklist-2012 Topps Checklist #579. From the green out-of-focus logo on the dugout wall, we see that Uggla was playing in a game on Peachtree TV.

Warren's in his windup on this 2012 card of a 1950s-1960s player in a 1987 Topps design. Well then.

And last, a bootleg unlicensed Post Cereal card of Dave Justice, complete with facsimile signature to make it fully semi-official.

Thanks to my friend at the Tim Wallach blog, and good luck collecting!

Trade with a Phillies Fan!

Back when I made this trade with Josh of blog Pence, Nix, and Pierre, Ryne Sandberg was still the Phillies first-base coach, and the Phils had an outside shot at the East. (The Brave-beating Dodgers were in the NL West cellar at that time, which is saying something.) Seems long ago now that the Red Sox have bearded their way to a 3rd World Series title in a decade, spawning awful Nike shirts and gladdening the hearts of Bostonians, and making my August Fenway visit feel approximately 4.3 times cooler.

Guess who Andruw Jones is playing for now? Yankees? Rangers? No and no. Jones in fact spent 2012 with the Tohoku Rakuten Golden Eagles of Japan, along with another former Brave, Takashi Saito.

 This card is a nice one, though the serial numbers slightly resemble a Wal-Mart receipt.

 Klesko power-swinging his way through the glitter!

Tim Hudson has filed for free agency, along with Brian McCann, Eric O'Flaherty, and Paul Maholm. It would be nice to have a strong Huddy for the next year or two, but the Braves have a track record of not being overly attached to players (like Andruw Jones, for example) past their primes. I expect Hudson to sign elsewhere, but I wouldn't be shocked to see him return. The latter would certainly be nice, but the Braves' cupboard is full of pitchers for the 2014 rotation.

 Gold parallels of backup infielders? Yes.

Remember how Andruw Jones plays for Tohoku Rakuten? They have been playing for the World Nippon Series against the Yomiyuri Giants (who you may have heard of). Best I can tell, the series has gone to six games, and Andruw has become the fourth player to hit a home run both in the Nippon Series and the World Series. (Hideki Matsui would be the only other one you might guess, followed by Johnny Logan and Roy White.)

Couldn't resist sneaking in a Listia win. 762 credits won me this 2005 Donruss Elite Dale Murphy, which is numbered 0526/1500. How much is a credit? I feel like Harry Caray on Saturday Night Live trying to implement hot dogs as our national currency, "20 hot dogs would equal roughly a nickel..."

Some 2008 UD Documentary. This set has gone mostly-forgotten, except as the object of ridicule, on the blogs. It's not a bad design, though. Did anyone ever try to collect all these? It would make a good blog feature...

This was a nice add. Andrelton was awarded his first Gold Glove Monday night, and I dare say he deserved it. Maybe a 5.4 WAR sounds impressive only to me. It's good to know Simmons has a few years before he's arb-eligible in 2016.

Last, a Kimbrel second-year Heritage. Classy.

Thanks to Josh for the trade! Till next post...

2012 Panini Triple Play Wantlist

I've made some updates to my 2012 Triple Play Wantlist, and some changes to the formatting as well. Because of this, Blogger isn't letting me post this to a sticky page, so I'm posting this up and linking to it instead. If you have any doubles or extras of this set, drop me a line! I've still got aways to go on completing this sucker! 

Base Set Wantlist 

1 Ian Kennedy, 6 Dan Uggla, 8 Brian Matusz, 9 Matt Wieters, 13 Alfonso Soriano, 15-16, 18 Paul Konerko, 19 Brandon Phillips, 20 Joey Votto, 21 Mat Latos, 24 Grady Sizemore, 26 Todd Helton, 32 Brett Wallace, 34 Alex Gordon, 37 Albert Pujols, 40 Clayton Kershaw, 46 Rickie Weeks, 49 Francisco Liriano, 50 Joe Mauer, 52 David Wright, 53 Ike Davis, 56 Curtis Granderson, 57 Derek Jeter, 58 Jemile Weeks, 60 Yoennis Cespedes, 61 Chase Utley, 64 Andrew McCutchen, 67 Carlos Quentin, 68 Chase Headley, 71 Buster Posey, 72 Tim Lincecum, 73 Dustin Ackley, 74 Felix Hernandez, 76 Carlos Beltran, 81 Evan Longoria, 82 Ian Kinsler

Puzzle Cards Checklist

91-99 Justin Upton

100, 102-108 Starlin Castro

109-110, 112-117 Carlos Lee

118-121, 123-126 Albert Pujols

127-135 Jose Reyes

136-142, 144 Alex Rodriguez

145-146, 148-153 Yoennis Cespedes

154-162 Roy Halladay

163-164, 166-171 Andrew McCutchen

172-180 Orlando Hudson

181-182, 184-188 Buster Posey

190-198 Ichiro

199-207 Matt Holliday

210, 212-216 Evan Longoria

217-225 Josh Hamilton

226-234 Jose Bautista

Focus Checklist

235 Ian Kennedy, 236 Brian McCann, 237 Adam Jones, 238 Dustin Pedroia, 239 Matt Garza, 240 John Danks, 241 Joey Votto, 242 Asdrubal Cabrera, 245 Brett Wallace, 246 Eric Hosmer, 247 Jered Waver, 248 Matt Kemp, 249 Giancarlo Stanton, 251 Justin Morneau, 252 Johan Santana, 253 Derek Jeter, 255 Ryan Howard, 256 Joel Hanrahan, 257 Chase Headley, 258 Tim Lincecum, 259 Felix Hernandez, 261 B.J. Upton, 262 Yu Darvish, 263 Ricky Romero, 264 Steven Strasburg

Baseball 101 Checklist

265 Batters Box, 266 Diamond, 267 Double Play, 268 Home Run, 270 Scoring Runs, 271 Stealing, 272 Tag Play

Hall of Fame Checklist

           

273 Cal Ripken Jr., 274 George Brett, 275 Nolan Ryan, 276 Wade Boggs, 277 Willie Stargell, 278 Bob Feller, 279 Tony Gwynn, 280 Reggie Jackson, 281 Al Kaline, 282 Willie McCovey,

283 Paul Molitor, 284 Joe Morgan

When I Was A Kid Checklist

           

285 Albert Pujols, 286 Derek Jeter, 287 Tim Lincecum, 289 Matt Kemp, 290 Roy Halladay, 291 Justin Verlander, 292 Jacoby Ellsbury, 293 Ichiro

Stickers Checklist

3 Happy Baseball, 4 Catchers Mask, 5 Line Drive, 6 Diving Catch, 8 Manager Arguing, 9 Crash Through Brick Wall, 10 Beanball, 11 Slugger, 14 Albert Pujols, 18 Brian Matusz, 19 Adrian Gonzalez, 20 Paul Konerko, 21 Brandon Phillips, 23 Troy Tulowitzki, 24 Justin Verlander, 25 Alex Gordon, 26 Clayton Kershaw, 28 Joe Mauer, 29 David Wright, 30 Ryan Zimmerman

Real Feel Checklist

295 Real Feel Base, 296 Real Feel Bat, 297 Real Feel Pants, 298 Real Feel Glove, 299 Real Feel Batting Glove, 300 Real Feel Jersey

#CollegeLife

I've mentioned before that I'm in the labyrinthine process of applying and being accepted to (six different) colleges. One thing about this stage is that I get a lot of mail. Today, I received no less than 10 pieces of mail, one of which was a Listia win, and the other 9 of which were various college propaganda. This was a recent mail item that I couldn't resist a blog about, trade post backlog be darned. Here we go.*

DIVE IN 

COLLEGE FOR A WEEKEND (CFAW FOR SHORT, OBVS)

LIBERTY UNIVERSITY NOV 7-10

CLASSES? PSH. WHO SAID THAT WAS PART OF #COLLEGELIFEATLIBERTY? BY THE WAY EVERYBODY, TWEET AT US WITH #COLLEGELIFEATLIBERTY AT LEAST ONCE PER HOUR DURING YOUR VISIT! LET'S GET THIS TRENDING ON TWITTER PEOPLE!

NOT SURE WHAT CLASS TO SIT IN ON? OR JUST TOO BORING? COME AND CHILL IN INNER TUBES ON THE GRASS! THIS IS A COMPLETELY NORMAL AND FORMATIVE PART OF YOUR COLLEGE YEARS

DIDN'T BRING AN INNER TUBE? GEEZ SOMEBODY DIDN'T READ THEIR CFAW INFO PACKET WE MAILED YOU, LIKE TWO WEEKS AGO. STILL WANT AN INNER TUBE? I DON'T KNOW, GO SNEAK UP AND STEAL THAT OTHER GUY'S

HE'S NOT EVEN EXPECTING IT GO STEAL THAT TUBE LIKE A NINJA

SEE YOU'RE ALREADY BEING PREPARED FOR THE REAL WORLD, IT'S ALL "GO STEAL THE OTHER GUY'S INNER TUBE BEFORE SHE DOES." #COMPETITIONATCFAW #FREEMARKET #CAPITALISM

TOLD YOU COLLEGE TEACHES YOU LIFE SKILLS

SO THERE'S ONLY ONE QUESTION LEFT

...

...

...

ARE YOU READY TO DIVE IN?

CFAW 2013

*Bit of a disclaimer: This is in no way a slam on Liberty University or CFAW themselves, which I'm sure are both terrific programs. Consider this post a venting of sorts of the stress borne by a student who has to complete a bogged-down Common Application in less than two weeks.