Bowl Pick 'Em Contest Winnings, Part XVIII

College football will be here again before we know it IS HERE, 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.

Part I II III IV V VI VII VIII IX X XI XII XIII XIV XV XVI XVII

1970 Topps #503 Dal Maxvill
1973 Topps #269 Tim McCarver
1975 Topps
#296 Alan Foster
#610 Ron Hunt
#649 Jack Heidemann
1980 Topps #563 Will McEnaney
2013 Panini Cooperstown
#6 Rogers Hornsby
#35 Joe Medwick
#39 Dizzy Dean

I've got some old cards and old players today, with Panini's 2013 Cooperstown set rounding out the post. I've met Dal Maxvill and Ron Hunt at autograph signings, and now I realize I really need to track down a Tim McCarver signing sometime. The older cards are pretty great, regardless of the slightly rough condition on some of them.

#246 St. Louis Cardinals

This team, presumably actually the 1974 team, finished second in the NL East, long before anyone uttered the word Wildcard in baseball, so missed the playoffs. 1975 was even worse, with a 4th place finish.

Diamond Giveaway Winnings, Part I

Here's a nice orderly view of 18 of the cards I won in the 2011 Topps Diamond Giveaway, ordered from oldest to newest. There's no overarching theme to these, except that they are the leftovers after picking 7 for my next post.

1958 Topps #222 Bud Daley
1958 Topps #422 Norm Zauchin
1964 Topps #323 John Buzhardt
1972 Topps #57 Bob Oliver
1973 Topps #129 Terry Forster
1975 Topps #644 Bill Fahey
1976 Topps #221 Jim Todd
1976 Topps #576 Maximino Leon
1976 Topps #647 Ramon Hernandez

These were mostly guys I haven't even heard of, despite being a baseball history nerd. But, cards older than me are always cool to get. Also, these are apparently the first 1976 Topps cards in my collection.

1978 Topps #280 Buddy Bell
1978 Topps #590 Bobby Murcer
1979 Topps #139 Luis Pujols
1979 Topps #683 Dan Meyer
1981 Topps #229 Rollie Fingers
1983 Topps #305 Larry Bowa
1983 Topps #533 Luis Salazar
1984 Topps #434 Harold Baines
1984 Topps #454 Joe Beckwith

This group definitely had more guys I know. I learned of Buddy Bell originally because the announcers would incessantly talk about the 3 generations of the Bell family in baseball when David Bell was on the Cardinals. Rollie Fingers is well known of course, and his signature facial hair is featured on this card. The Larry Bowa may be headed TTM to try to get a signature for a big Cubs-fan friend of mine, who idolized Bowa as a kid. Harold Baines, of course, played for many years, and in multiple stints with the White Sox and Orioles. I'll bet he's one of the few guys to have his number retired by a team, then play for them again 12 years later.

A Contest win from The Diamond King

I won a contest at The Diamond King over a month ago.  He was kind enough to offer up some Beat Up Vintage for merely answering a question on his blog. 

1979 Topps

#411 Sisler/Cobb

#415 Brock/Brock - I love that he gets featured twice on 1 card

#430 Dave Parker

1974 Topps

2 Hank Aaron 54-57

4 Hank Aaron 62-65

He sent 2 of each of these!

1973 Topps #400 Gaylord Perry

1972 Topps #37 Carl Yastrzemski

1971 Topps

#180 Al Kaline

#525 Ernie Banks

These were looking pretty rough, so I didn't even pull them out of the sleeve.

1955 Bowman #216 Preacher Roe

Man is this one beat up, but I don't care; it's 56 years old!

1993 Topps - Gold #119 Pedro Munoz

1994 Topps - Black Gold #42 Sammy Sosa

I'm a fan of the Topps Gold and Black Gold, especially from 1992, so these are great additions.

Next up, some Nomars!

2002 Fleer Genuine #93

1999 Upper Deck MVP - Swing Time #S6

1999 Upper Deck HoloGrFX - Starview #S6

1998 Studio #60

I really liked Studio, in fact I have the whole set of 8x10s from 1997

The Vintage was the real prize in the contest, with the Gold and Nomars thrown in since they are some of my favorites.  I really enjoy the 70s cards (and 50s!) because I started collecting in the 90s and don't have a lot of older stuff.  Even though I was a big Nomar fan, my collecting waned around 1999-2000, so those cards nicely fill in some gaps too.

A big thanks to the Diamond King!  And go check out his blog!