Way Overdue Trade Post

I want to say a quick thank you to several traders that I've gotten packages from over the last month before I put the cards away that are sitting on my desk.

 These 2 new to me Cal Ripken cards were sent to me by Jeff from My Sports Obsession.  I love the orange Jersey on the 1992 Donruss/McDonalds MVP card and the redemption card from 1995.  I'm not sure if they were a hobby shop giveaway or a ballpark giveaway but it's a cool card nonetheless!

Jeff also paid close attention to my Player collections pages and sent me the Reimold from this years Heritage and a Finest from 2010 to fill 2 holes.  Thanks for the great cards Jeff!

The second package I'd like to say thank for comes from Paul from Carl Crawford Cards.  I won the contest he was running to celebrate the life of Virgil Trucks.  I never got around to writing Mr. Trucks and I missed out on getting his autograph.  Now I can mark that regret off of the list!  Paul gave away 3 of these autographs in his contest and I was lucky enough to get one.

These 2 relic cards also came from Paul.  I sent him a couple 1978 Topps cards he needed for his set and he reciprocated the trade by sending a HOF bat chip and a minor league jersey of former O's top prospect Zach Britton.  I still have hopes that Zach will become a good minor league pitcher he just needs more experience.  He's currently in the rotation but we'll see how long that lasts with the imminent return of Wei-Yin Chen.  Thanks for the autograph and the relic cards Paul!

The last trade I need to get to is from Andrew Q of Need More Cardboard.  I had to have this retail exclusive White Framed Paper parallel from this year's Gypsy Queen that he pulled from a value pack.  I mean come on, it's a Cal Ripken card I didn't have.  You don't think I'm going to let it slide by do you!  It's a great looking card!  While not a huge fan of retro/reprint sets, I do think that Gypsy Queen is a nice product because Topps actually has to create a new design each year and not rest on it's laurels from 50 years ago.  Plus it does have some decent insert sets like Glove Stories and Sliding Stars.  Nobody wants and insert card reporting the news from 50 years ago (News Flashbacks from Heritage)!

Thanks to these 3 wonderful traders and I'm sorry that it took awhile to get this posted!

Card Show Report: CSA October 2012

     I went to a card show this past weekend.  It's the one I normally attend at the Dulles Expo Center in Chantilly, Virginia.  It happens 3 times a year so luckily there is enough time for me to save up enough money to make going there worthwhile.  I usually go on Saturday or Friday afternoon but I had prior commitments this time that prevented me from going either of those 2 days.  I had to go on Sunday once before  and the crowd was not as large but everything seemed to be picked over.  This time was no different.  The crowd was small, dealers started packing up at noon, and everything seemed to be picked clean. I did get some good deals but I'll try my hardest to make it on Friday or Saturday next time.
     I had a plan that I formulated in the car that I was going to try to knock out a bunch of sets that were on my wantlist, pick up a bunch of Orioles cards for my team sets, and buy some much needed boxes and 9-pocket pages.  Once I walked thru the doors, I think I forgot why I was there.  I got some cards from my set wantlists, almost totally struck out on my team sets, but thankfully restocked my supply of storage boxes and binder sheets.  One and a half out of three isn't too bad.
     The show wasn't a total loss though.  I picked up a bunch of cards for sets I'm beginning to build like 2011 Allen & Ginter, 1980 and 1979 Topps.  I knocked some wantlists down to next to nothing including 2012 Topps series 2, 2012 Allen & Ginter, and 2012 Bowman Chrome Prospects.
     I also picked up a bunch of great cards out of the bargain bins including those starter sets.  I didn't see any nickel bins but there were plenty of dime bins.  Here's a few that I picked out of the dime bins:

Yeah, a 1982 Donruss Jim Palmer does not belong in the dime bin.  It belongs in my Palmer binder!  Can't beat this one for a dime!

Not minis but great rookie cards of awesome players.  Pudge and the Big Hurt will end up in Cooperstown one day and Kid K's career has been great so far.  If he keeps it up, he might soon be mentioned in the same breath as Koufax, Drysdale, Valenzuela, and Hershiser.  Each of these cards set me back a dime!

Whoever put this in the discount bin must have known I was coming to take a look see.  Davis has really grown on me during this past season.  He mashed 30 home runs and they all seemed to come in bunches.  Unfortunately for Birdland, he didn't hit any in the playoffs.  Instead he spent most of his time flailing at pitches in the dirt.  If he ever learns some plate discipline, he could hit over 40 bombs!  I still need a ton of Topps Chrome Orioles from 2012 including baseb card, regular refractors, Xfractors, Purple, and Orange.  Even if you have just one of them, please contact me.

Not everything came from the dime boxes but I did get great deals on these cards

I paid a buck for this sweet Nick Markakis from 2009 Topps Heritage Chrome.  I really think that if Nick wasn't out with a broken thumb (thanks a lot F.F. Sabathia), our playoff outcome could have been better.  Nick is the best pure hitter on the team and he's the most clutch out of anyone on the roster.  I'm pretty sure he could have come up with that key hit we needed.   That's baseball though, there's always next year.

There's no way I could resist this classy looking relic card of Jonesy.  It's numbered 28/35 which is pretty cool (right below his forearm).  I can't afford buying expensive boxes  like the ones that relics like this pop out of, so I let the suckers bust those boxes and capitalize buy buying the singles as they desperately try to recoup their loses.  I win every time because I only paid 6 bucks for this card.

I bought this card from the same dealer that sold me the Markakis Chrome above.  He had just traded a guy for it while I was walking up to his table so I got this card for 3 bucks.  WIN AGAIN!

I'm going to close here with another Ripken game used card.  I picked this one up for a measly 4 bucks!  I'm going to focus on the darkside of Cal's face.  I think that's the side of his face that likes the Yankees.  He sure had plenty of praise for the pinstripers during the TBS broadcasts of the ALDS and not much to say about the O's.  I understand that he's just doing his job but I think it not only broke my heart to hear him praise Arod and Jeter but it probably hurt a lot of Orioles fan's perception of him.  He probably felt he had to compensate because people that aren't normally baseball fan is a Yankee fan come playoff time (well except they don't show up to the park!) and he didn't want to sound like a "homer" .  He ended up over-compensating and .angering his fanbase instead.  It's OK to piss of the Evil Empire, Cal!  You're still my favorite all-time player though.  I'm sure he could win some of that fanbase back by doing some MASN broadcasts next year.  (GET ON IT MASN, SERIOUSLY!!!).

So, overall I had a decent time.  I think the crowd was small because football is in full swing and the O's and Nats had just lost on Friday night.  While not the best CSA show I've been to, but I still got some great cards!

Group Break Loot from Nachos Grande

I've seen everybody else posting their hauls from Nachos Grande's group break of 2 boxes of 2012 Topps Mini and 1 box of 2000 Fleer Impact, so I figured I mind as well post mine too.  These cards have been sitting on my desk for over a week now and I never put these cards away until they are scanned and posted.

The highlight of my chosen team, the Orioles was this gold border of Adam Jones. I got a nice pile of Orioles base minis that helped fill in my team set. Jones has seemingly cooled off from his torrid first half of the season but is still in the middle of most of the O's rallies lately.  He's also been keeping the shaving cream manufacturers in business because every time the Orioles Hero du Jour does a live interview on postgame, he's the one responsible for the pie in the face sneak attacks.

My random team was the Brewers.  I was pretty surprised that they weren't taken and I got 'em.  I was even more surprised to see that I snagged a relic card.  I love the Gold swatch!  For anybody that knows, what's the deal with the gold jerseys?  Are they only worn on certain days or occasions?

I also ended up with a Prince Fielder golden Moments insert.  I don't have that much to say about Prince other than his name is annoying, though I wouldn't say that to his face.  All of the Brewers I obtained in this group break are for trade including all of the base cards, the Fleer Impact cards, and the Axford relic.

Thanks for holding the group break Chris!

Box Break: 2012 Allen & Ginter

As late as 6 months ago, I would have never thought that this post would make it on this blog.  Like I said before, this is a gift hobby box to myself as I recently finished moving to a new house and painting just about every visible surface inside of it.  I'm new to the A&G universe since I have just come down with the fever in the past couple of months.
I think the base card design is pretty good this year. It's different from past years but not too different.  It sticks to what Ginter does best: looks classy.  I think that Topps put too many bells and whistles on last year's issue and that hurt most everybody's impressions of the set.
So enough about what I think about the cards lets see what I got:

Here's the box topper.  It's a plain jane Johnny Bench N43 card.  How the heck am I supposed to store this thing?

My first hit of the box was this Jordan Zimmerman autograph card.  Since he's been pretty good this year I'm pretty happy with pulling his 'graph!

I don't have a ton of things to say about my first relic card of the box other than it's for trade.

Here's the rarer minis that I pulled.  I've always admired George Washington as a Military Hero.  He got his butt whipped in many, many battles during the War for Independence, but he men kept fighting for him.  I think that's why he's in this set, not for winning battles but being well enough liked that his men respected and fought to the end for him.

Here's my big mojo hit of the break.  It's a pretty neat one too.  I remember when this happened a few years.  This relic is actually from a specific event unlike the normal disclaimer that is on the back of relic cards these days.

So I'm building the set.  You can check out my wantlist for what I need along with some of the other sets in working on right now.  Also,I bought a few lots on ebay so those are mixed in with the trade list below:

SPs: 301 Chambers, 302 Werth, 306 R Howard, 309 Karolyi, 314 Buffer, 317 Heyward 319 Wainwright, 320 Papelbon(2), 325 Robinson, 333 K. Johnson, 334 Beltre, 336 G. Gonzalez, 339 Cash, 344 Dominguez, 348 Headley
Regular Back Minis: 31 J. Robinson, 72 Soria, 102 Street, 116 Beachy, 121 Wright, 123 Lind,  209 Crisp, 231 Helton, 240 Lombardozzi, 246 T. Hunter, 259 W. Davis, 266 C. Ruiz, 304 Farnsworth, 329 Butler, 337 Holliday, 350 Kendrick 315 Betances, 349 Espinosa, 350 Kendrick(2)
A&G Back Minis: 48 Walden, 66 Y. Molina, 97 Scherzer, 115 Santana, 132 D. Hudson, 228 Fowler, 307 J. Peralta
Black Border Minis: 97 Scherzer, 145 Storen
Worlds' Tallest Buildings: WTB2, 7, 8
Baseball Highlights Sketches: 2 Seaver, 8 Jeter, 23 J. Robinson
Murder in Willow Cove: Marcie Guttman, Lennie Guttman, Sigmund Buttle, Andy Modell
Musical Masters: MM16 Gustav Mahler
N43 Box Loader: N43-9 Johnny Bench

Card Show Report: The Hits

I didn't buy a whole bunch of "hits" at this show but that's ok.  The 2 I got were pretty cool regardless.  We'll just say quality over quantity.

I was a big fan of David when he was with the Orioles in '09 and '10.  I'm still a fan even though he's playing for the Dbacks.  Not that I have anything against the team, I just don't get a lot of exposure to them since they are in the NL West.  Anyways, I actually saw Hernandez pitch recently while I was eating my dinner.  I was kicked back in the recliner watching one of those boring Spring Training games.

I bought this card at the first table of the day.  As I bought my disastrous Bowman Sterling pack I thought to myself: "Wouldn't it be my luck that I would pull a double of this card or an autograph I already had".  I was really hoping for a Dylan Bundy autograph or even pulling a double of the Britton above would have been better than what I pulled.  Do you think I have a case of buyer's remorse? 

Trade with David of "e rayhahn, rayhahn"

Wow, it's been a week since my last post.  I've been playing a lot of Xbox lately since Mass Effect 3 came out.  That doesn't mean I've been completely ignoring my card collection though.  Things have been slow this early spring since series 1 came out. There have been 4 new products come out since then (Opening Day, Heritage, Stickers, and Tribute), and I haven't even bought a pack of either one.  Neither of these sets has really inspired me to go out and buy any.  I'm interested in the Orioles from the sets but that's about it.  I haven't bought any packs since the beginning of February.  That's probably a new record since I returned to the hobby (for the 4th time) in late 2009.  Another reason things have been slow around here is because my Spring Training TTM's have just been a big disappointment.  I sent to some longshots but also to a bunch of safer bets.  I've only gotten 2 back this spring.  I might be seriously reconsidering if Spring Training TTMing is worth the time and effort next year.  I'm still holding out hope that a couple more will come back with the exhibition schedule wrapping up next week..

Luckily for me though, to break me out of my cardboard doldrums David from "e rayhahn, rayhahn" contacted me about a week ago about some Twins relics I had on my trade list.  Of course, I was happy to trade with David again since the first one was awesome.  Here's what he sent me in return:

My scanner hates this card but it really looks pretty cool in person.  I was wondering what had happened to Mr. Rodriguez until Kevin from Orioles Card "O" the Day made a post just yesterday about him.  Not all players who make the majors particularly belong there.

This is a nice relic card from 2007 Topps Heritage.   All of the Clubhouse Collection cards I've seen from Topps Heritage releases look pretty classy with a nice vintage touch.
On a side note Mr. Tejada reportedly still wants to play ball this year but only with a contending team.  At this point in his career, and as bad as he played for the Giants last year, beggars can't be choosers.

Here's a nice jersey card of Brian Roberts from 2007 Upper Deck.  This relic design is probably my favorite of Upper Deck's flagship sets.  This one goes great with my Melvin Mora and Erik Bedard cards from the same set.  It looks like I got a bit of a seam on this swatch too so that's a bonus!  

I'll close with this awesome Boog Powell card.  I don't have too many of his cards (heck, there aren't that many anyways) but this is one of my favorites.  The 70's were a great time for the Orioles franchise.  One of these days we'll have a team that can play to a .500 record or better.

Thanks David for the awesome cards!

My Final 2012 Topps series 1 Purchase

I think this is my last purchase of series 1 for this year.  I've nearly got the whole set and I only ended up with one card I needed for the set out of the 72 in the hanger box.  I've got 10 of the Golden Giveaway Code cards that I'm going to stash away for now.  Well, at least until series 2 comes out and the Markakis gold 1/1 becomes available for redemption.  It's a complete longshot to redeem that one card but you gotta increase your chances any way you can!

I know I've spent less on series 1 this year than I did the last 2 years.  I've bought 1 hobby box, 2 hanger packs, 1 jumbo rack pack, and 3 retail packs.  So overall I've spent about 85 or 90 bucks on series 1.  Not too bad I don't guess.

Overall, I've noticed many of the bloggers have spent less on Series 1 this year and have said so in their respective posts.  If you have spent less this year than years past, leave a comment below stating why you have chosen to spend less.  Is it the design, too many inserts, too little cash or another factor?

So onto the cards I got from my last hanger:

I think the Gold Standard cards are the best inserts from series one because of the gold stamped medallion.  I'll admit they aren't perfect because of the blank space under the medallion but I'm willing to forgive that fact.

I can't seem to get away from Yankees cards lately.  I think the Gold Parallels have grown on me a little bit as I like them more now than I did when the product first dropped so long ago. 

Here's my 2 Target exclusive red borders. I wish they were a little more red though.  They look more maroon to me.

 I was pleasantly surprised to pull a relic from a hanger pack because they are a 1:18 packs pull.  See what I mean about the Yankees cards though?  This is my second Cano relic from the same Target in less than a year (I got a mini framed GQ relic last spring).  Does Robinson's mother shop at my Target?

All of these cards are for trade.  If you see something you can't live without, gimme a shout.

Box Break: 2011 Topps Update

Alright, there's no need to bore you to death with a review of this years Topps Update.  Everybody's seen the design since last fall and we're all familiar with the inserts.  I just want to show the cards I got in case anybody is interested in trading for them.  Here's what I got out of my Hobby box, Hanger box, and Jumbo Rack Packs:

A couple of Cognac shiny legends.  Note the Morgan,  I actually pulled the regular, non-liquor shortprint from my series 2 box bust.

The rightful home run king got pulled from a later retail purchase after I scanned the other 2.

My vintage legend shortprint.  I'm not a Strawberry fan.

My vintage legend shiny shortprint. Not a bad looking card I suppose.

The Hope Diamond shiny.  I'm not really a fan of adding a parallel from past releases into packs.  What if Topps came out with a new parallel for 2009 Topps that was inserted into 2012 Topps Tribute.  Where does the madness end?

Here's my promised big jersey hit.  Clifton Pfifer Lee. Woo!

I was pleasantly surprised to pull a silk card.  These are more rare than the Black or Hope Diamond parallel.

Also, here's the list of the regular subset insert cards that were not worthy of pictorial representation:


Cognac Parallels: 5 Votto, 16 Ramirez, 39 Kennedy, 40 J. Upton, 43 Ryan, 72 Jurrjens, 74 Clippard, 90 Y. Molina, 119 Bay, 127 Volstad, 166 J. Johnson, 171 G Jones, 174 Oswalt, 186 Pavano, 203 Gee, 220 Helton, 226 J. Guillen, 227 McLouth, 232 Moyer, 234 Montero, 245 Walker, 273 D. Lee, 277 Hoffman, 287 Cousins, 297 Jaramillo, 301 S. Smith, 304 Thome, 305 Loney, 312 G Sanchez, 328 Price, 403 F. Hernandez, 445 Talbot, 455 Morrison, 612 Tigers, 651 K. Morales, US4 McCann, US6 Fielder, US31 Granderson, US58 Lincecum, US128 M. Rivera, US131 Keppinger, US146 Walden, US211 Moseley, US229 A.Cabrera, US238 C. Beltran, US242 Holliday, US302 Torres, US306 Phillips, US309 Konerko, US319 Patterson

Diamond Anniversary: US15 Heilman, US43 Quentin, US49 Weeks, US61 Masset, US72 Rasmus, US85 Halladay, US86 Furcal, US101 Downs, US140 Kershaw, US146 Walden, 176 Nady, US230 M. Cabrera, 281 Melancon, US302 Torres

Gold Borders #d to 2011: US3 Beavan, US23 Ruffin, US59 Kemp, US88 O. Cabrera, US95 Overbay, US108 U. Jimenez, US130 Robertson, US134 Bourn, US143 Kimbrel, US145 Colon, US154 C. Lee, US195 Votto, US204 B. Wilson, US268 Y. Molina, US275 Cuddyer, US292 Adams, US294 Jackson, US297 d'Arnaud

Red Bordered: US39 Sanchez, US126 A. Gonzalez

Blue Bordered: US128 M. Rivera, US242 Holliday

Kimball Champions: 106 G. Carter, 107 Uggla, 116 Mize, 120 F. Robinson, 124 F. Thomas, 129 Sisler, 130 A. Gonzalez, 137 J. Morgan, 138 Hornsby141 Dawson(2), 142 R. Howard, 143 Drabek, 145 Hosmer, 149 Cy Young

Diamond Duos: DD1 Hernandez/Pineda, DD-6 Anderson/Cahill, DD-11 Dunn/Konerko, DD-20 Aaron/Bautista, DD-21 Price/Shields, DD-28 Phillips/Kendrick

Topps 60: 104 A-Rod, 105 Hornsby, 110 Fisk, 113 McCovey, 118 Morgan, 121 Reese, 122 Alomar, 124 Henderson, 127 Snider, 128 Thomas, 130 Gehrig, 136 Blyleven(2), 137 Garvey, 138 Maris, 139 Uggla

ToppsTown: TTU-23 Rollins(2), 37 Scherzer, 46 Beltre, 49 Cain(2)

Trade with Beardy from The Mojo Beard

A short while back Beardy posted a box break of 2007 UD Masterpieces. One of his featured hits was this Cal Ripken Captured on Canvas GU jersey card. Since he already had one, he made it available for trade. I quickly sent an email, and before I knew it we were talking trade! I sent him a pretty good size stack of some of my extra Orioles inserts, parallels and refractors and in return I got the Ripken GU:

A shiny new Markakis Blue Refractor I didn't have:

And a GU bat card of a Hall of Famer:

I wish that my collection was as vast as his to have doubles like this laying around! Thanks for the great cards Mr. Beardman!