A Rare Mailday

Mail days have sort of become a rare thing around here.  As we go into full househunting mode, my buying has been scaled back almost to zero.  After all, there are more than enough cards to pack up here when the big move comes as it is.  But I was treated to a pleasant surprise by one of my team collector buddies, who sent along a nice array of Pirates goodies.  

This is easily the biggest single addition to my collection so far this year, and the package was jam packed full of serial numbered cards and inserts.  Better yet, every single card was brand new to me.

Panini's entry into into the prospect game is never quite as well received as the Bowman sets, but I've always been a fan of Elite Extra Edition.  Elite was one of my favorite releases when Donrss was still around, though the Extra Edition was a bit misleading for quite a few years when the standard Elite was MIA.

 It's been almost a year since I've been to a card show, and it's definitely having an impact on my collection.  My 2015 binder is super thin, and aside from the base sets I only have a scattering of parallels here and there.  I've always sworn that one of these days I will complete an entire team set of Topps Gold cards.  And since I'm now at exactly 1 2015 Gold after this package, my bet is that if that ever does happen it won't be with 2015.

 I always love a good oddball card, and this Drabek takes the cake.  It screams Desert Storm.

 My team collector buddies have also been passing along some Marlins cards my way, which have quickly grown to needing their own box.  I have no idea why Jeff Conine has a tennis racked.  But I'm glad he does.

 Getting a package in the mail is always a bit of a reality check for me.  I have north of 16,000 different Pirate cards.  As the mess surrounding me will attest, it's a crapload of cards.  So I'm always taken back a little bit when I see how many cards - parallels, oddballs, and even sometimes entire sets - that I had no idea even existed.  This Pro Sigs card?  Never seen it before.

 Same goes for these two Cutch parallels.  Even though they aren't particularly low numbered, finding almost any McCutchen cards is mission impossible around here.  Add in the fact that these blue framed parallels look awesome and it's just icing on the cake.

While I'm sure it will still be a good while before the mail is regularly flowing into my collection again, it's always great to add a wave of new cards.  Now the cataloging, sorting, and adding to binders?  That part is a little less fun.

Hidden Gems

Minor league team sets are always some of my favorite items to add to my collection.  The sets typically have 25-30+ cards in them, and while the top prospects are usually given top billing on the top of the team bags or snap cases, they usually hold all kinds of treasures inside.

 After all, where else in the baseball card universe can you get such gems as this Gary Green?  Nothing like middle aged men in tight pants stretching it out.

 Or crustaches.  Lots and lots of crustaches.

 And former big leaguers.

 Oh, and current big leaguers.

Wait, what?

 I picked up the 2006 and 2007 Lynchburg team sets.  The Hillcats were the Pirates A-ball affiliate for over a decade.  But the late 00's were some really, really, really lean years for the Pirates farm system.  So I wasn't expecting much out of the lot.  One set had a Nyjer Morgan card on top.  Not exactly setting up anything too spectacular.

So I was pretty surprised to see, at the very end of the team set, nestled in with the athletic trainer and pitching coach, local favorite Neil Walker.  Right after him, a pre(first)-breakout Steve Pearce.  A Ken Griffey San Bernardino card they are not, but they were a nice surprise in a couple team sets that were made almost entirely of guys who never reached AA.

The Poop On the Deck

One lesson I've been trying to take to heart in my sports watching is to enjoy players while you can.  Whether by trade, free agency, or retirement, all of our favorites are bound to more on to other things, often sooner than later.

At best, my emotions for the Pirates organization as a whole has been rocky in recent years due almost entirely to things that have nothing to do with the guys on the field.  But for the better part of the past decade, Neil Walker has been a player whose career I followed and actively rooted for.

He grew up not 15 minutes from Kate, and has been a fixture at Pirate events almost since he was drafted, even if the Bucs actively tried to keep him away at times.  And while the game has changed in so many ways, it reminded me of the early 20th century baseball - a local kid playing for the local team.

I'd by lying if I didn't say I had hoped to have at least one more season to watch Neil Walker in Pittsburgh.  And while I can honestly say I hate this trade from a baseball perspective, trading for a middling starter in one of the most loaded pitching free agent classes in recent history...the reality is that I guy I genuinely enjoyed watching, cheering for, and meeting on numerous occasions plays for a different team.  And as rational and adult as I can claim to be, that just flat out stinks.

The journey from first round pick to struggling minor leaguer to emergency callup learning a new position on the fly to a top 10 player at that position in the major leagues isn't your run of the mill career arc.  I hope there's a lot ahead for Neil wherever his career may take him, and plenty of appearances in Pittsburgh after his career ends.

Playoff Beards

I have to admit I've never totally gotten the concept of the playoff beard.  As someone who has had a tuft of hair thick enough that birds could have been living in it without my knowledge for the past five years, I've always been a little off-put by the beard bandwagoners who feel they can only justify their facial hair for a playoff run.  The beard, after all, deserves year round celebration.

My beard has been a state of shambles lately.  I went clean shaven for my interview for the new job a few weeks back.  Don't get me wrong - I'm not one who struggles with facial hair.  Thanks to my Italian roots, I look like that scene in Tim Allen's The Santa Clause where he shaves his beard at night, and wakes up in the morning with a full beard.  But still, when I have, at points, looked like a less aged member of ZZ Top, my current state of facial scruff is a sad call from my glorious full beardedness.

And in all honesty, I would gleefully take the chance to watch the Pirates sad attempts at beard growing in October in some alternate universe.  Instead, I'll live vicariously through my cardboard.  This card came in the day before the wild card game.  Aside from its awesome die-cut-ness, I appreciated the full bearded Neil Walker.  The Pittsburgh Kid was rocking a beard for a good chunk of last year from what I recall.  It's not a playoff beard, but at least it's a nice beard.

Budgets? Who Needs Budgets?!?!

I almost stayed within budget.  Almost.  It ended up being a pretty crazy three days at the Robert Morris show, and I'll try to get a few posts up over the course of the week.  Originally I had only planned on attending Friday and Saturday, hoping to spend a little time at home (aka not on my feet on a hard concrete floor).  But the best laid plans are set to fail.  As I was getting ready to head out the door Saturday, a deal caught my eye that was enough in and of itself to pull me back for a third day.

Over the last few years, I have been progressively less impressed with the show on the whole.  Last year, Modern era cards were nearly impossible to find, and there wasn't a single dealer stocking cards from the latest releases.  It wasn't radically better this year - I picked up a few Gypsy Queen minis, but still need entire team sets from 2015 Bowman and GQ - but there were a good number of dealers offering cards from cards that didn't predate the Carter administration.  I jumped in, filling holes in my collection at any turn possible.  There weren't any new Jack Wilsons to be found, but there was some 90's gold to be found in quarter boxes.

 The haul from the show was the best I've had in terms of quantity and range.  I have probably about 1,000 new cards to sort through between my various team collections and odds and ends, covering everything from serial numbered, autos, and a nice stack of minor league team sets.  But the best part?  It was unquestionably the chance to catch with some collecting acquaintances.

 It was a great chance to catch up with folks I've met over the years.  Some I expected to be there, and a couple others were chance encounters.  But collecting is just so much more enjoyable when you have somebody to share your experiences with.  Kate is more supportive of my hobby than I could ever ask for, but she just can't get the excitement over adding a Bob Veale autograph to my collection the way a fellow longtime season ticket holder can.

 It's that sense of collecting community that I enjoy the most, and I probably spent as much time just standing around and shooting the breeze with dealers and buddies as I did actually digging through boxes this year.  One meetup that sadly fell through was finally getting to meet up with Matt of Bob Walk the Plank infamy.  Matt and I lived within walking distance of each other at one point long before either of us started blogging and collect pretty much the same things, so it's a shame our paths have never crossed.  But sadly he had a full plate during the weekend, and the meetup will have to wait until my next visit to Morgantown.

The big event of the weekend was Tom Barrasso's first US autograph signing since his playing days.  Barrasso has a reputation for being one of the least friendly human beings this side of the Gulag.  And while I ultimately decided not to spring for his autograph, I heard from a few people that he was actually quite pleasant.  I'm guessing the obscene amounts of cash he made over the weekend may have helped.

 The best part about a show this size is that you literally never know what you will find.  The state and zip code parallels from Hometown Heroes have been incredibly tough to track down for me.  And obviously Andrew McCutchen would presumably be the most expensive.  I nearly pulled the trigger on this card on COMC for about $2.50 earlier last week.  And of course there was a copy, sitting in a quarter box on Friday.  Yes, please.

 As a team collector, I love the out of town dealers who roll in with massive rows of quarter boxes are always the best.  I ended up adding about 60 Topps parallels from the past two years, all at roughly a quarter a piece.  When living in Ohio a few dealers always had tons of Wal Mart and Target parallels, but those areas of my collection have been nearly nonexistent since moving back to PA.  I don't think I quite completed the team sets, but I must be darn close.

 I was actually surprised how much trouble I had finding blowout game used and autographs at the show.  Large shows are usually a great place for high quality $1/$2 autographs.  But aside from the Bay and Woodley in this post, which I picked up for about $3 each, there was very little in the way of lower end hits.  It seemed a little strange to me, but I guess it just depends on who sets up and what they bring.

 The score of the day Friday was definitely this Clemente Kellogg's 3-D for a quarter.  It's pretty badly cracked.  But it's Clemente.  For a quarter.

 After being basically MIA at least year's show and the National, I was able to score some decent McCutchen cards this year at what I considered good prices.  This Prizm insert is /99, and was an easy add to my pile for $2.

 It was interesting that my pacing and buying was radically different across the three days.  All these cards in this post came from dealers on Friday.  I was on a buying flurry, spending about $20 with three different dealers and scoring a bunch of nice lower-mid range cards.

 Saturday was a little slower on the card front, and had a lot of standing and chatting.  And Sunday was more or less dominated by memorabilia, and while the additions weren't as jaw dropping as last year, I can't wait to create space for my newest additions.

 Overall the show was a huge win.  I'll be slowly posting over the next few days as I get everything scanned and organized.

A Great Start to the Weekend

Nothing tops coming home and and finding cards waiting in your mailbox.  My trading has nearly ground to a half in recent months, and my buying has largely been via COMC and in person at shows and flea markets.  Trips to the mailbox have been a little less exciting.

But it looks like we're starting the weekend off right, with not one but two packages waiting for me today.  Shane from Shoebox Legends and I both had some stacks sitting around that could use a warm, loving home.

 Shane sent me a great assortment of cards, and a good majority of them were new to me.

 Maybe it's just for me, but some of the most "common" parallels are always the hardest to track down for me.  The Diamond Sparkle parallels are still my favorite of the various foil variations Topps has done in recent years.  Slowly but surely, I'm closing in on the team set.  Very, very slowly apparently.

And while I'm pretty sure it wasn't intentional, Shane even managed to send me a couple new PC cards with his protective fillers.  I've been stockpiling a small collection of League Leader cards.  It's not a full blown mini collection (yet), but any time I see one of the big stat caterogies - homers, batting average, era, strikeouts - it's been working its way into a small pile that will probably get its own binder.  What can I say, while I consider myself pretty in touch with the new stat metrics, I'm still a sucker for counting stats.

And I had no idea Mike Sweeney was the Royals captain.  Then again, it's the Royals.

 

But hopefully this stack of cardboard goodness is just a precursor to the weekend.

 There's a (kinda) local mall show this weekend.  Ok, in reality it's about an hour away...not really that local.  And I really should be saving up my budget for the big Robert Morris show in May.  But...well, hi, my name is Mark and I'm an addict.  But the mall is in the direction we'll be headed tomorrow, so I can totally justify a stop.

 Kate and I are headed to my parent's tomorrow to make some Easter candy.  Every year my grandma made chocolate covered fondant eggs.  They're lightyears better than anything you'll find at the store.  And on Easter day, everybody got an egg when they went to visit.  Since I was grandma's favorite, she would usually let me pick which flavor I wanted ahead of time.  But they were all good.  

 I would bite off the smallest bites I could manage, trying to make the egg last as long as I could.  They were that good.  And grandma only made enough for everybody to have one, which always made picking my flavor that much harder.

Grandma passed the family recipe to my mom.  It's been three years since she died, and probably 5 or 6 since she was well enough to make the eggs.  So this will be the first years we've made the eggs since she died.  It's not meant to be nearly as sentimental as it sounds.  These are chocolate coated goodness, and I'm really looking forward to seeing if we can make them anything close to grandma's.

And, hypothetically, speaking, I may be looking forward to not being limited to one egg!

 There should also be some flea market shopping in store for me this weekend.  I'm planning to make a trip Sunday morning to the flea market up the street that I discovered last weekend.  Kate is hanging out with a high school friend that day, so I'll be free to dig through dimeboxes to my heart's content.

The last card of this post that came in the mail today was an ebay purchase.  One of the things I like about Donruss has been the number of parallels and numbered cards that you hit in a box.  This Neil Walker is the gold parallel /49, though it didn't show up very well in the scan.

I won the card for a whopping $1.04 with free shipping.  I was a little surprised when I ripped open the bubble mailer to find this card inside.  The seller paid $2.25 for shipping the card in a bubble mailer, even it sold for less than half that.  I appreciate the gesture, but I would have been perfectly find with a PWE.  I kind of feel bad the poor guy took a loss on selling the card, especially on a card I already felt like I won dirt cheap.  But at least I'll leave him nice feedback.

 

Working in my Studio

I had some free time after dinner tonight (with the grill making its first appearance of the year!).  Kate is off at a calligraphy class she's taking at the local community college, and I decided to get in touch with my artistic side a bit as well.

I've always been a bit frustrated by art.  I loved it as a kid, but just never could get things on paper quite the way they looked in my head.  Maybe my expectations were just a bit too high.  My dad went to art school, and has a knack to put together some great stuff without so much as a reference.  One of my best friends is a professional artist, and we basically held him hostage for a few days before the wedding during which he did some amazing stuff to decorate the wedding venue.  And my grandmother picked up painting later in life (thanks, Bob Ross) and surprisingly had a great eye for landscapes.  Me?  I guess I just didn't have the patience.

But luckily the same can't be said for my computer skills.  Don't get me wrong - I don't consider slapping some custom cards together to be any true art.  It's more of an amusing hobby.  But it is fun to see what I can create sometimes.

1993 Studio is, in my eyes, the pinnacle of what was a really unique concept.  The cards had a lot going on, but in a way that fit together perfectly.  And with how much uniforms have changed over the past 22 years, I figured it was worth revisiting what the set would look like today.

 I absolutely love the faux throwbacks the Rays wore the past couple seasons.  Joe Maddon has moved on to the future strikeout machine in Chicago, but I figured it was worth throwing together a card for old time's sake.  If only I can figure out how to replicate the holo-foil effect for the signature.

The Pirates on the other hand have seen relatively little change in their primary color scheme.  But the black home and road alternate is definitely the club's most unique look.  Somewhere in the space-time continuum, 1993 is wondering why this pajama top is currently a major league jersey.  But the look has admittedly grown on me over the last couple years.

I'm wondering how one of these would look if I remove the facsimile signature and get it signed for real.  But maybe that will be a project for later this week.

Back in Black

I swear it was unintentional, but with today's black and white themed posts, I'm finally back blogging full steam.  At least for now.

Wedding week was pretty much a lost cause - without a smart phone (yes, I'm quite possibly the only 25 year old sporting a flip phone) I didn't even have a chance to check email or facebook, let alone browse ebay.

Still, I was able to sneak in a couple purchases before things got crazy.  Consider it a wedding gift from me to me.

I long ago gave up any hope of completing entire team sets of the Topps Black parallels.  From any year.  Ever.  They're just too tough to chase, and I'm never willing to shell out the big bucks at release to try to fight off set collectors, player collectors, and team collectors.  I love the look of the cards and pick them up when I can.  But there are perhaps two dozen total in my collection.

As I mentioned in the post earlier today, I haven't really felt attached to any specific player since Jack Wilson left the Burgh.  But if I had to pick a guy, Neil Walker would probably be at the top of the short list.  He's a Pittsburgh native, former first round pick, and perhaps most importantly was drafted and developed by the Bucs.  I just hate having early-year cards from a guy in another uni, which has been the biggest reason I never took any major steps towards a Jeff Locke collection.

I have a decent array of Walker cards, but on the whole my collection from the last few years has been sadly lacking.  There have just been too many high end products released that I have no interest in chasing, or cards that are more than I want to pay.  And as you all know by now, I do love the 90's.

But this Walker was just too sweet to pass on, especially when I was able to win it for .99+shipping.

I've noticed a lot of the Pirate photos from recent seasons have been at Wrigley.  I know we play the Cubs quite a bit, but I wonder if there's a larger connection.  I honestly have no clue, since the process Topps uses to get their photos nowadays is equally mysterious.

Either way, this is a sweet shot of Neil turning two, prominently featuring the Chuck Tanner patch on the sleeve from 2011.  The colors really pop with the yellow near the text and the ivy backdrop.

My only complaint?  I wish Topps would have replaced the Pirate logo in the lower corner with the simple Pirates P that the team has been using as their primary logo for the past few seasons.  But with a new logo coming in a couple months, hopefully we'll have something less dated to look at.

Topps Team Set Countdown, 50-46

Installment three of the countdown, and now we're well beyond the terrible sets.  What separates 48 from 47?  Not all that much.  But each set has its perks and drawbacks.

And away we go.

50) 1992 Topps

The '92 set featured some unique photography that largely still hasn't been replicated in style.  I love the dugout shots.  But when you get into the live action shots, the set gets pretty weak.  The photos aren't as crisp as they could be, and the sizing and cropping is terrible.  Add in a less than spectacular design, and the dugout photos and horizontal photography are really what save the set.

49) 2009 Topps

The 2009 set largely gets lost in the sea of late 00's white bordered sets.  There are some nice photos, but the player selection was unspectacular.  The Pirate roster certainly wasn't all that spectacular, but the checklist omitted quite a few players who played significant roles on the team.  Luckily the Heritage release from that season picked up the slack where Flagship left off.

48) 1969 Topps

There's no purple.  That alone moves this set up the rankings.  But the photography makes some nice strides for the time, including some warm-up jacket photos and some more interesting posted shots.  Of course Topps manages to backtrack again in '70.

47) 2011 Topps

The Topps sets from the last 5 years or so really do run together.  They're all fairly similar aesthetically, and the photography has shifted towards using an image service rather than unique photography.

The 2011 set just feels very mechanical to me.  The circular logo at the bottom feels like a cog, and though I appreciate the minimalist text, the baseball logo feels like distracting overkill.

46) 1957 Topps

Our oldest entrant to date, the '57 set isn't a bad set.  But it does pale in comparison to its more colorful counterparts.  The design highlights the photography.  Which would be great if the photos were at all interesting.  This set won't hold its weight on nostalgia alone.