Bowl Pick 'Em Contest Winnings, Part XL

College football will be here again before we know it IS HERE IS OVER, 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 XVIII XIX XX
XXI XXII XXIII XXIV XXV XXVI XXVII XXVIII XXIX XXX
XXXI XXXII XXXIII XXXIV XXXV XXXVI XXXVII XXXVIII XXXIX

40's a good round number to end on. Not that I had a choice. I made it all the way through!

2004 Topps #203 Bo Hart
2009 Topps - Ring of Honor #RH12 David Eckstein
2013 Panini Hometown Heroes #8 David Eckstein
2013 Panini Prizm Perennial Draft Picks #45 Mike O'Neill
2013 Topps Opening Day - Mascots #M-4 Fredbird
2013 Topps Pro Debut #128 Stephen Piscotty
2013 Topps Pro Debut #161 Mike O'Neill
2014 Topps Opening Day - Mascots #M-6 Fredbird

This aren't necessarily my favorite 8 cards in the prize package, but they're a good representation of what it had. Some guys I've bafflingly never posted before (Bo Hart), some sets I never had cards from (Panini Hometown Heroes, Panini Prism Perennial Draft Picks, and Topps Pro Debut), some draft picks that never quite made it (Mike O'Neill, who is now playing independent ball), some that did (Stephen Piscotty), and some fun cards (Fredbird).

I must say thanks once more to Cards on Cards for the Bowl Pick 'Em Contest each year. In case you've lost track, this came from 2015-2016's contest, not the 2016-2017 one in which I totally took a freefall in the last 5-6 games. I've got a whole bunch of other cards that have been piling up to post while I pushed myself to get through these, so I'll be happy to start knocking those out soon.

Bowl Pick 'Em Contest Winnings, Part XXXV

College football will be here again before we know it IS HERE IS OVER, 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 XVIII XIX XX
XXI XXII XXIII XXIV XXV XXVI XXVII XXVIII XXIX XXX
XXXI XXXII XXXIII XXXIV

Let's sort some cards!

1998 Bowman's Best #146 Braden Looper
1998 Fleer Tradition #397 Kent Mercker
1998 Fleer Tradition #415 Braden Looper
1998 Fleer Tradition #541 Cliff Politte
1998 Topps #485 Braden Looper/Cliff Politte/Brian Rose
2009 Topps #612 Joel Pineiro

I've apparently never posted a Cliff Politte card, and now here I have 2. He only played one year with the Cardinals, and started just 8 games. I sometimes amaze myself at how much more time I must have had for baseball in those days. I could easily lose track of a guy like that now, but I can easily remember him on the team. Braden Looper is another one I remember from his first stint with the Cardinals, which was only 4 appearances. He came back after some time in Florida and New York, though.

1997 Topps #477 Braden Looper/John Patterson
2009 Upper Deck #880 Joel Pineiro
2014 Munnatawket Allen and Ginter #34 Matt Carpenter

That Matt Carpenter isn't just your average Allen and Ginter mini (which are also good cards, for the record). It's from a custom set made by a friend of Nachos Grande, in the 2008 Ginter style, but with an ad for Munnatawket bats on the reverse. I've seen these on a few blogs in the past, but usually as part of the full set. This set might be harder to chase than something from the 60s, so I'll probably just be content with my anachronistic Matt Carpenter card, appearing to feature him 3 years before his MLB debut and 1 year before he was drafted.

Turkey For Me, Turkey For You

Here it is, nearly Easter, and I've got Adam Sandler's Thanksgiving Song stuck in my head. No, my family doesn't have some weird holiday-swapping tradition; I traded some Turkey Red cards with a fellow fan of the set, JediJeff of 2x3 Heroes.

2010 Topps - Turkey Red
#TR2 Miguel Tejada
#TR15 Hank Greenberg
#TR19 Cal Ripken, Jr.
#TR21 Johnny Bench
#TR25 Ernie Banks
#TR31 Mel Ott
#TR51 Torii Hunter
#TR66 Nelson Cruz
#TR69 Brooks Robinson

I bought a lot of 2010 Update, but not much of Series 1 and 2, so I'm still rather far from completing the 100 cards from those series. After these are added into my collection, I believe I will still need 74 more. However, for the 50 from Update, numbered 101-150, I only need 17 more.

2010 Topps - Turkey Red
#TR73 Chad Billingsley
#TR75 B.J. Upton
#TR79 Raul Ibanez
#TR86 Billy Butler
#TR88 Eddie Mathews
#TR95 Ty Cobb
#TR135 Orlando Cepeda
#TR144 Cy Young
2009 Topps - Turkey Red
#TR6 Ian Kinsler

Jeff threw in a few extras for me, including the 2009 Turkey Red card. I was surprised to find I didn't actually have any of those yet. Maybe that'll spur me on to collect that year's set too.

1992 Fleer Ultra #570 Donovan Osbourne
1992 Triple Play #118 Jose Oquendo
1993 Pinnacle #174 Geronimo Pena
2009 Topps Updates and Highlights #UH327 Julio Lugo

Speaking of extras, here are some Cardinals Jeff was nice enough to add into the package. And, I've still got a few more of these to scan and post for next time.

Donuts from Johnny's Trading Spot

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.

In a lot of the photos, I wouldn't have even noticed the donut right away. Luckily the ones featuring a donut only on the back side were flipped appropriately when they arrived.

1998 Fleer Tradition #169 Ray Lankford
1998 Fleer Tradition #234 Bobby Higginson
1998 Fleer Ultra #267 FP Santangelo
1999 Skybox Thunder - Rant #191 Bobby Higginson
1999 Skybox Metal Universe #87 Bobby Higginson
2000 Upper Deck Victory #122 Todd Hollandsworth
2003 Topps #175 Terrence Long
2006 Upper Deck #192 Jeff Conine
2009 Topps #331 Luke Scott

1996 Fleer Ultra #463 Hal Morris
1997 Donruss #29 Rondell White

I've got more to scan and post. I like to sort things logically, so I split them up by year. These are the latest cards from the package, and I've got about another 20 years backwards to cover.

Trade With Reader Ryan

Without realizing it at the time, I put the kibosh on Ryan's trade offer with Too Many Grandersons when I filled out his 2010 Update set. You can still see my faux pas in the comments.  Luckily, he didn't hold that against me, and contacted me too make a trade.  He wanted a bunch of my spare Heritage and 2010 Update, and saw I had some Series 1 on my want list.  To even it out, he also sent a bunch of Gypsy Queen and Lineage base cards.  I sent him an entire 300ct box, and he sent a huge envelope with 6 or 7 team bags full of cards, so I'll just cover the highlights here.

All the 2011 Heritage were base cards, so here's the only one with a playoff team

The 2011 Topps were also all base cards, so again, here's one from a playoff team.

The only Cardinal of the 2011 Lineage base cards. I really like this set. I foresee a few blaster purchases.

Two 2011 Gypsy Queen SPs, to represent the dozens of base cards.

Four 2011 Gypsy Queen Wall Climbers

Two 2011 Gypsy Queen Future Stars

2011 Gypsy Queen Sticky Fingers Pudge

Two 2011 Gypsy Queen Minis of two Cardinal greats. But wait, didn't I already have the Schoendienst Mini, and its Green Border couterpart?

The Red Schoendienst is the Red Back Mini.  At this point I feel like I should go for the whole 2011 GQ "Rainbow" of Red.

2009 Upper Deck A Piece of History

2008 Upper Deck Masterpieces

Two David Freese Rookie Cards, the hero of Game 4.  2009 Topps and 2009 Topps 206.

And now, I see that I've let my Want List and Trade List get woefully out of date.  I've got lots of unsorted cards lying around.  I'm working on getting them entered into Zistle.com, and hopefully exporting the resulting want and trade lists to a nice format.  I'm starting with any and all 2011 cards, and hopefully I'll be able to get them all in before the first 2012s come out.  Then I'll try to keep up with 2012 while working back through 2010 and beyond.