Bowl Pick 'Em Contest Winnings, Part I

College football will be here again before we know it, so I've got to get my prize from last season's Bowl Pick 'Em contest at Cards on Cards posted! My prize for a second place tie was a very generously sized box of cards, so I felt a bit overwhelmed even sorting through them. I finally sorted them out by player, and, as usual, I'll plan to post them all eventually, but I might quit halfway through, we'll see.

2013 Topps Update - Blue Parallel #US4 Matt Adams
2015 Gypsy Queen - Mini #197 Matt Adams

It's hard to believe this is Matt Adams's 5th season in the majors. He still seems like one of the new kids on the team.

1993 Pinnacle #599 Rene Arocha
1993 Topps Stadium Club #712 Rene Arocha
1994 Fleer - Rookie Sensations #1 Rene Arocha
1995 Fleer Ultra #221 Rene Arocha

I was too young to really be aware of it at the time, but Rene Arocha was apparently the first player to defect from the Cuban national team. There was a great article about it in the New York Times a few months ago, you can read here.

1996 Donruss #92 David Bell
1996 Leaf #70 David Bell

Both of these cards are from the same year, yet Donruss claims David Bell wore #25, while Leaf clearly shows 27. He first wore 25 when he came over from Cleveland near the trading deadline, and switched to 27 later that same year, about 2 full seasons before Mark McGwire arrived. Yet, now that he's the Cardinals hitting coach, he's wearing 25 again, because Jhonny Peralta has 27.

2015 Gypsy Queen #27 John Lackey
2015 Topps Opening Day #29 John Lackey

I started out just grabbing guys from the beginning of the alphabet (I'm always sorting), but to cram as many cards as possible in while still tagging each set, I'm doing my best to stick players together who both have cards in common sets, like John Lackey and Matt Adams, who both had a 2015 Gypsy Queen in the package.