Zistle Trade #30

Today's Zistle trade was just a small handful of cards that filled some random needs in my collection. In return, I sent a few Reds, all from 2011.

1989 Topps #224 Tony La Russa
1991 Topps #58 Mel Stottlemyre Jr.
1991 Topps #171 Tony La Russa
2012 Topps Archives #24 Lance Berkman
2012 Topps Update #US44 Jeremy Hermida
2012 Topps Update #US68 Fernando Rodney

Tony La Russa was my favorite non-Cardinals manager as a kid, so I was thrilled when he came to St. Louis. Even when a lot of the local fans turned on him, I was a supporter. Of course, winning 2 World Series helped get him back on everyone's good side, and he left his managerial career on top.

Zistle Trade #29, Part I

Will I post all my Zistle trades before they shut down? Maybe!

1983 Fleer Main Set #3 Steve Braun
1983 Fleer Main Set #19 Mike Ramsey
1989 Bowman Main Set #435 Tony Pena
1990 Donruss #676 Cal Ripken, Jr.
1990 Fleer Main Set #276 Rich Gedman
1991 Topps Main Set #58 Mel Stottlemyre Jr.

This trade had a bunch of Cardinals, along with the Ripken All-Star card, one of the very few from 1990 Donruss I didn't have yet. I also knocked another Stottlemyre off my list, Mel, Jr., son of Mel and brother of Todd. And there were just enough players in this trade I had to split this one into two posts.

Christmas Cards, a Few Months Late

I seem to always be trying to catch up, so here's some cards that arrived sometime in December, from ATBATT's 3rd Annual Operation PWE. There's something about an envelope of mostly different players and sets that just brings joy to opening the mail.

1991 Topps #343 Jose Oquendo
1992 Pinnacle #381 Andres Galarraga
2015 Topps #220 Shelby Miller
2015 Topps #336 Matt Carpenter
2015 Topps - Archetypes #A-11 Mark McGwire
2016 Topps Heritage #89 Trevor Rosenthal

I'm bad at staying on top of acquiring the Cardinals inserts when new sets come out. That Mark McGwire is a card I definitely should have already had, but didn't. As always, I'm surprised when I don't already have junk-era cards I receive, because it seems like I have so many cards from those years. But both the Oquendo and Galarraga fill holes in my collection.

1988 Topps UK Minis #72 Ozzie Smith
2016 Topps #254 Matt Holliday

I like these UK Minis, and I actually have a couple copies of the Ozzie card now. All the more reason to chase down the Vince Coleman and Willie McGee cards from that set. Then there's Matt Holliday, who just won't seem right in a Yankees uniform this year.

Thanks to Stealing Home for the PWE!

Zistle Trade #23

This Zistle trade was mostly from the junk wax era, but I haven't quite filled all those gaps in my collection, so there's a smattering of them on my want list. Oddly enough, my trading partner wanted some "junk" in return, so I figured, why not. I'm too lazy to look it up now, but I think it was mostly 89 or 91 Donruss.

1988 Topps #642 Bob Dernier
1990 Score #233 Ken Hill
1991 Fleer #633 Bernard Gilkey
1991 Fleer #636 Felix Jose
1991 Fleer #640 Jose Oquendo
1991 Fleer #645 Lee Smith
1991 Topps #112 Frank DiPino
1992 Fleer #589 Gerald Perry
1992 Score #544 Bernard Gilkey

One of these things is not like the others, and that is Bobby Dernier. The others are all Cardinals, and actually mostly guys I remember playing for the team during my childhood, except for Frank DiPino. As for Bobby, I added that to my list awhile back because he was the favorite player of a good friend of mine when he was growing up. I was looking through my collection for a card of his to perhaps try to get autographed through the mail, but I didn't have any, and thus I added a few I should be able to get cheaply to my want list. Now I just need to track down an address for Mr. Dernier, or figure out who he's working for.

1992 Donruss #427 Bobby Bonilla
1992 Donruss #442 John Smoltz
1992 Donruss #564 Deion Sanders
1992 Donruss #610 Bobby Bonilla

I recently purchased a 1992 Donruss Series 1 set, which actually quashed the first trade this particular trader proposed to me. He did it the day after I bought the set, before I thought to remove the series 1 cards from my want list. Luckily my oversight didn't frustrate him, and we worked out a deal removing those cards. Here are the series 2 cards I still needed. If you're not a Cardinals fan, you may have forgotten that Smoltz and Bonilla both finished their careers in St. Louis. It wasn't very long for either one, but I still consider them players I collect. I've waffled about whether I should start collecting Deion Sanders cards. He'd go well with my other two-sport-star collection target, Bo Jackson. He was also a part of the very first baseball game I ever attended. I'll probably complete this base set eventually anyway, so I went ahead and added it to my wantlist, and now I have it.

eBay Wins #199

I now interrupt my slow progression through the years by set to bring you an actual eBay lot that I didn't break apart for later posting. It was only 1 card, and the seller sent a second just to be kind, so I closed the gap by one card in my quest to average below a penny per card. Just 1,847 to go.

1987 Topps #662 Frank DiPino
1991 Topps #593 Mike Walker

Frank DiPino played for the Cardinals from 1989-92. I don't really have any firsthand memories of him. 1992 was the first year I started watching baseball, and he only appeared in 9 games for St. Louis, all in September.

The Walker card is the one I actually bought. The seller didn't list it as such, but it is apparently an error version. The error is very small; his 1990 stats are missing one of his minor league stops on the way to Cleveland. There is a corrected version, though.

eBay Bargain Tracker
Total Cards Bought	3389
Total Spent	$52.36
Per Card	1.545 cents
Change	-0.001 cents

Junior Junkie's Generosity, Part VI

Part I II III IV V

I hope you like Mark McGwire cards, because I've got another post full of them. Actually, I hope you don't like Mark McGwire cards, so you'll send them all to me.

1991 Topps #270 Mark McGwire
1992 Studio #226 Mark McGwire
1993 Duracell #9 Mark McGwire
1993 Donruss Triple Play #87 Mark McGwire (x3)
1993 Pinnacle #58 Mark McGwire (x2)
1993 Topps Stadium Club #595 Mark McGwire

I actually got 4 Triple Play cards, but 18 cards scan much nicer than 19. And, I figured you got the gist of it after 3 of them.

1993 Studio #141 Mark McGwire
1993 Upper Deck #566 Mark McGwire (x3)
1993 Upper Deck #493 Mark McGwire
1994 Pinnacle #300 Mark McGwire
1994 Topps Stadium Club #358 Mark McGwire
1994 Donruss Triple Play #5 Mark McGwire
1994 Upper Deck #67 Mark McGwire

Either the photos on the Pinnacle and Triple Play cards were taken at the same time, or this was one of Big Mac's daily drills. Even if it was, he's got the exact same jacket, and the sun's at about the same angle based on the shadow of his hat bill. I vote for two photos of the same practice.

Junior Junkie's Generosity, Part II

Part I

Next up from Junior Junkie: More Bo Jackson.

1990 Stadium News #BJ Bo Jackson
1991 Topps #600 Bo Jackson
1991 Upper Deck #545 Bo Jackson
1991 Upper Deck #744 Bo Jackson
1992 Donruss #470 Bo Jackson
1992 Score #361 Bo Jackson

That first card has no copyright notice on it, but 1989 Stats, so I assumed it was a 1990. A reverse Google image search led me to find that the set is called Stadium News, which I should have assumed, and I found several other cards from the set in Zistle.

1992 Topps #290 Bo Jackson
1992 Triple Play #164 Bo Jackson
1992 Upper Deck #555 Bo Jackson
1993 Leaf #316 Bo Jackson
1993 Topps #400 Bo Jackson
1994 Sportflics 2000 Rookie/Traded #150 Bo Jackson

These cards have brought me to a decision. I must find a black White Sox jersey T-shirt with Jackson #8 on it.

Zistle Trade #17

Zistle has allowed me to whittle down my want list bit by bit, while helping others do the same with my doubles. I've got a lot of overproduction-era Cardinals still missing from my collection, so every now and then someone finds me and can knock off quite a few of them. This particular trader just wanted a Joe Carter card in return, and as a Blue Jays fan, had a few Todd Stottlemyre cards for me, too.

1985 Topps #683 Whitey Herzog
1990 Fleer #243 Cris Carpenter
1990 Fleer #251 Ken Hill
1990 Fleer #252 Joe Magrane
1990 Fleer #253 Willie McGee
1990 Fleer #261 Scott Terry
1990 Fleer #263 Denny Walling
1990 Fleer #264 Todd Worrell
1990 Topps #6 Vince Coleman RB

These were the last of the 1990 Fleer Cardinals I needed, so that's one more team set off my list.

1990 Topps #591 Todd Stottlemyre
1991 Topps #348 Todd Stottlemyre
1992 Topps #607 Todd Stottlemyre

As I've mentioned before, Todd Stottlemyre and his father, Mel, are distant cousins of mine, which is why I started collecting his cards in earnest. Now since I've widened my collecting net to anyone who has suited up for the Cardinals, I've got two reasons to collect his cards, so I'm glad to have 3 more off my list. The sender wrote a note saying he figured he'd have more Stottlemyre cards I needed, which caused me to check my list and see my want list was far from containing every card of his I don't have, so I've rectified that now. Thus, the net result of this trade for me was my want list increased by several dozen cards. Hooray progress?

Donuts from Johnny's Trading Spot, Part III

Several weeks ago, I read a post at Johnny's Trading Spot titled Instant mini collections up for grabs. "Up for Grabs" always gets my attention, so I threw my name into the mix. They were supposed to be randomly assigned, but through a lucky draw and one trade, each of the winners wound up with exactly what they originally wanted most. For me, that was cards with batting donuts.

Part I II

It's a busy week for me. So, let's just see some more donuts, featuring 3 Cardinals this time, though all in other uniforms.

1991 Topps
#139 Jeff Treadway
#604 Billy Hatcher
#726 Phil Stephenson
#781 Darryl Hamilton
1991 Fleer #75 Joe Oliver
1991 Upper Deck
#3 D. J. Dozier
#291 Joey Cora
#340 Larry Sheets
#502 Bob Boone

Bob Boone doesn't look nearly old enough on this 1991 card to be the father of Bret Boone, on the 1992 card below.

1991 Upper Deck
#560 Chris Gwynn
#675 Hensley Meulens
#754 Tony Fernandez
1992 Upper Deck
#121 Hal Morris
#327 Kevin Seitzer
#771 Bret Boone
#737 Dan Gladden
1992 Topps
#333 Pat Tabler
#647 Marquis Grissom

1991 Donruss
#80 Kevin Reimer
#109 Ken Oberkfell
#253 Glenn Braggs
#255 Kevin Mitchell
#445 Kirk Gibson
#530 John Olerud
1992 Donruss #759 Dave Anderson
1992 Triple Play #24 Reggie Jefferson
1992 Fleer Ultra #279 Thomas Howard

Ken Oberkfell and Thomas Howard are the two Cardinals in this bunch, along with Royce Clayton below. The Howard card has a sneaky donut on it, on the bat of the player on deck.

1992 Leaf #272 Royce Clayton

Tis The Season Winnings, Part IV

Sometimes, I procrastinate posting and sorting some cards. Normally I don't pay too much attention to how long a particular item has been sitting on my desk, but given that this one was the Tis the Season contest from 2013, I've probably had it in my possession for a little over a year now. But, even with the long delay, I still want to throw Jeff at 2 by 3 Heroes some referral traffic while I show off my prize.
Part I II III

Today I've got some more of the miscellaneous Cardinals, Red Sox, and Yankees from the prize package.

1990 Donruss #82 Milt Thompson
1990 Leaf #499 Greg Harris
1991 Topps - All Stars #16 Ozzie Smith
1992 Fleer #44 Phil Plantier
1992 Donruss #628 Greg Cadaret
1992 Donruss Rookies #34 Mike Draper

The Topps Glossy All Stars are definitely cards I should have in my collection, so this Ozzie along with yesterday's Vince Coleman were good additions. Guys like Phil Plantier are the reason I always look up players before assuming they weren't Cardinals. He apparently played for the Cardinals in the second half of 1997, coming over in the trade for Fernando Valenzuela. He played in the outfield in 32 games, and yet I had no memory of him.

1990 Topps #206 Nick Esasky
1990 Topps #409 Tom Brunansky
1990 Upper Deck #191 Don Mattingly
1990 Upper Deck #782 Billy Jo Robidoux
1992 Fleer Ultra #12 Tom Brunansky
1992 Fleer Ultra #15 Roger Clemens

Not only did I get two different Tom Brunansky cards, but as Red Sox and Yankees go, Clemens and Mattingly are two all time greats. A few years ago, I figured Mattingly would continue climbing up the Hall of Fame balloting and eventually make it in, but he's finally officially off the ballot. I suspect Clemens will eventually make it, once the fervor over PEDs dies down a bit, which may already be starting to happen now that Andy Pettitte is getting his number retired with the Yankees.

eBay Wins #147

With the football seasons winding down, I'll be back to posting a lot more baseball cards. Today I'll continue my epic eBay penny card journey with 1991 Topps.

1991 Topps
#81 Cito Gaston
#178 Dave Valle
#232 Jose DeJesus
#308 Tom Pagnozzi
#326 Ken Patterson
#496 Marty Barrett
#620 Ozzie Guillen
#728 Scott Sanderson
#776 Brent Mayne

Bear with me here for a moment. These are the newest cards I considered "old" as a kid. I started collecting in 1992, and until I really got into it, and figured out to check the stats on the back to figure out the year of the card, everything that wasn't 1992 was just from "the before times". I'd see random cards my friends had, or cards on display at a card shop, and it didn't really matter if they were from 1981 or 1991, I just knew they were all "old". Once I figured out these were 1991, my simplistic but math oriented kid mind was blown that these could have been found in packs on the shelves of our grocery store, if I had started collecting just a few months earlier.

Before this bunch, I had just 27 unique cards from 1991 Topps. Now I have a still-paltry 36, a little over 4.5% of the set.

eBay Bargain Tracker
Total Cards Bought	3232
Total Spent	$50.82
Per Card	1.572 cents
Change	-0.002 cents

Giant Pile of Prizes from Jaybarkerfan's Junk, Part 7

Sometimes when I win a contest, I set the prize aside until I have time to fully rummage through all of it. In this case I won a contest back in late September, and I think the "Small Flat Rate Box" arrived by early October. I opened it immediately, but it's been sitting on my desk, too daunting of task to sort, since then. I finally felt the need to dive into it, and give jaybarkerfan his proper thank you post.

Part 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6

I'm finally at the end of the box. It's been quite fun digging through all the cards from different sets.

1979 Topps #666 Rich Dauer
1980 Topps #224 Willie Montanez
1986 Donruss #240 Mike Moore
1989 Donruss All Stars #3 Paul Molitor
1991 Topps #339 Larry Walker
1993 Stadium Club #299 Larry Walker

My collection doesn't include very many cards from before the mid-80s, so those top 3 cards are definitely in the first box (I sort them chronologically). At the bottom, we have Hall of Famer Paul Molitor - his second card in the box - and 2 cards of former Cardinal Larry Walker.

1980 Topps #244 Cardinals Team Checklist

No, this isn't a giant card, I just thought I'd zoom in a bit. I'm assuming this photo was taken in Spring Training, because that stadium overhang doesn't look like anything I know in St. Louis. 1979-1980 wasn't the strongest time in Cardinals history, and in fact the best player on this card is probably Keith Hernandez, possibly after Ken Boyer.

2008 Heritage (High Numbers)
#502 Jamey Wright
#517 Brian Burres
Black Back #549 Jeremy Sower

I don't know how rare the black-back cards are, or what the print run of the high number set is, but the Jeremy Sowers card is both, so presumably rarer than a run of the mill 2008 Heritage card.

2008 Heritage (High Numbers)
#537 Toronto Blue Jays (Checklist)

Unlike the 1980 card above, this checklist isn't only for Toronto Blue Jays. If it was, there'd only be a few cards on it, or Topps would have had to mix regular and high number cards onto the checklist.

1988 Donruss Pack (x2)
1989 Topps Pack
1985 Fleer Stickers Pack
1986 Fleer Stickers Pack
1989 Baseball's Greatest Grossouts Pack

To top the prize off, it even included a few unopened packs. For now I'm going to wait to open these, though this is the 25th anniversary of 1989 Topps, and everyone loves arbitrary milestones. But no, I'll wait. That's gotta be some stale gum by now.

That's it! That's the whole box. A big Thank You again to jaybarkerfan (Jay Barker Fan? I never know the right spacing and capitalization in the blogging world) for the awesome prize.

182 Packs Giveaway, Part III

When I claimed the Cardinals - and Mark McGwire and Todd Stottlemyre - in the pack-per-day giveaway held at TribeCards, I had no idea just how many cards I'd wind up with, and how many different players. So that I can tag all of the sets and Cardinal players, I've broken this up into a series of who knows how many posts. Thanks for all the cards, David.
[Part I]
[Part II]

1991 Topps
#262 Tim Jones
#734 Bryn Smith

Here are Tim Jones and Bryn Smith sporting a look the cardinals have brought back this year, red caps on the road.

1990 Score
#235 Scott Terry
#347 John Costello
#537 Greg Mathews
#556 Ken Dayley

More road shots except for Scott Terry. These cards kind of remind me of the blue and red parallels modern Topps has.

1991 Studio
#65 Storm Davis
#106 Mark McGwire

Storm Davis arrived via the randomizer, and here's the final McGwire I received.

1991 Studio
#232 Pedro Guerrero
#237 Lee Smith
#240 Todd Zeile

Now here are 3 guys I remember well from when I first started watching baseball. I'd have traded you any other 1B, Closer, or 3B for these cards back then.

1995 Topps
#167 Bret Wagner
CyberStats #173 Todd Zeile

Bret Wagner - never heard of him. I enjoy how baseball-reference.com let's me immediately find out what happened to these unknown draft picks, though. Bret made it up to AA, then got traded to Oakland, but stayed at AA. The Todd Zeile card is a parallel set with a dumb name but an interesting concept. Topps jumped at the rare chance to simulate the rest of the 1994 Season after the strike, and put out the projected stats onto cards. Todd would have hit over 50% more doubles than he did in the real season (38 vs 25), but just under 37% more home runs (26 vs 19). I wonder why that is.

That's it for today, and there are still plenty more to go.

eBay Wins #60

This round of eBay wins featured 1990 and 1991 Topps. What a difference a few years can make.

1990 Topps
#12 Joe Girardi
#120 John Franco
#222 Kurt Stillwell
#233 Ken Hill
#260 Eric Davis
#350 Bret Saberhagen

I remember Girardi finishing as a Cardinal, but I didn't realize just how little he actually played until I looked it up on baseball-reference.com. Apparently it was a mere 16 games for 26 plate appearances, meaning he likely entered as a double-switch replacement a few times.Even so, he was with the team for the whole year, and provided a veteran presence for the Cardinals. I only remember Ken Hill's second stint with the Cardinals, and not much about it.

1990 Topps
#433 Steve Olin
#493 Jason Grimsley
#608 Eric Anthony
#714 Marquis Grissom

When the Expos left Montreal, I went out and got the hat colored like Marquis Grissom's helmet here. I figured they would be hard to find once the team was gone. Little did I know how big the throwback trend would become. Even so, I'm glad I've got the hat.

1991 Topps
#271 Omar Olivares
#279 Jose Gonzalez
#596 Ronnie Walden

These are the first 1991 Topps cards I've shown on my blog. My most vivid memory of Omar Olivares was opening day, when he showed up wearing 00, and the announcers said it was because they were his initials.

eBay Bargain Tracker
Total Cards Bought	2107
Total Spent	$39.54
Per Card	1.877 cents