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.

College Bowl Game Contest Win, Part 11

For the 2012-2013 College Football season, I entered the College Football Pick 'Em contest hosted by madding of Cards on Cards. I've won several of his contests over the years, and he always dumps a ton of Cardinals on me when I do. Yet, I think this time he may have outdone himself. I may have to work hard to get them all posted before the 2013-14 College Football season starts August 29, and I start posting my Power Rankings again.
[ 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 ]

2008 Heritage
#223 St. Louis Cardinals

2008 Heritage
#345 Chris Carpenter
#504 Todd Wellemeyer
#507 Skip Schumaker
#558 Adam Kennedy
#603 Joel Pineiro
#630 Ryan Ludwick
#669 Aaron Miles

The single horizontal card and prime number of other cards strikes again. I'm a big fan of Heritage, so these cards are great for me. I'm hoping to eventually complete all the Cardinals from all of the years, and who knows, maybe the full sets eventually.

2008 Stadium Club #130 Brian Barton

A random Brian Barton appears!

2008 Upper Deck First Edition Update
#472 Skip Schumaker

This is the second Upper Deck First Edition Update card I have. That's quite a set name. It looks like this is a set akin to Topps Opening Day for Topps flagship; it looks like Upper Deck but without the foil. Don't let Topps get any idea though, or I'll be chasing the 110 card Opening Day Update set every year too.

College Bowl Game Contest Win, Part 6

For the 2012-2013 College Football season, I entered the College Football Pick 'Em contest hosted by madding of Cards on Cards. I've won several of his contests over the years, and he always dumps a ton of Cardinals on me when I do. Yet, I think this time he may have outdone himself. I may have to work hard to get them all posted before the 2013-14 College Football season starts August 29, and I start posting my Power Rankings again.
[ Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 ]

2010 Heritage
#11 Adam Wainwright
#91 Colby Rasmus
#118 Yadier Molina
#127 Joel Pineiro
#139 Tony La Russa
#178 Matt Holliday
#295 Rick Ankiel
#358 Skip Schumaker

Matt Holliday is the odd man out in this heritage collection, like Jon Jay in 2012, wearing his blue hat and road grays. And, a quick note about Rick Ankiel. I don't ever remember seeing him with a beard, but as you'll see in coming posts, he shows up on multiple cards like that. Maybe that's an issue with the Topps monopoly, and they just went and photographed him on one day. Somehow he managed 45 games played by June 8 this year, despite a week off after his release by the Astros, but then got released by the Mets at that point and hasn't caught on elsewhere yet.

2010 Heritage
#47 NL Wins Leaders
#347 St. Louis Cardinals
#404 Rogers Hornsby

I didn't realize the Cardinals had the top 2 NL wins leaders in 2009. Unfortunately it didn't help in our 3 game sweep by the Dodgers in the NLDS.

2010 Topps T206 #1 Matt Holliday

When I shave my head, I like to pretend I look like Matt Holliday. Unfortunately I'm a little heavier and a lot shorter, and look a little more like post-baseball John Kruk.

2010 Topps Chrome
#99 Chris Carpenter
#161 Yadier Molina

I'm keeping these chrome cards small so you can't see how badly they scan. I owe that much to the best battery the Cardinals have had in recent years.

A Trade Post is in Order, Part II

[Part I]

Thanks to my obsessive need to scan and post every insert card I receive, I got an email from The Angels, In Order about the Tyler Chatwood in this contest win post.

Here's the next part of my trade.

2008 Upper Deck Documentary
#854 Chris Duncan

 The back of this card talks about Braden Looper, and doesn't even mention Chris Duncan. This is an odd, 4000+ card set.

2008 Upper Deck First Edition
#50 Adam Wainwright
#51 Joel Pineiro
#57 Rick Ankiel

2007 Upper Deck Future Stars
#88 Chris Carpenter
#89 Chris Duncan

 I've mentioned before I'm not sure why this is called Future Stars with Carpenter well-established by 2007. And Chris Duncan? He's been in local sports radio for a few years now.

2011 Opening Day - Mascots
#M-8 Dinger

Now we're on to the wantlist stuff. In 2011 I bought a lot of Opening Day since it's cheap, and I've decided to collect the set and the inserts. Here's the Rockies' slightly-too-cute mascot.

2011 Opening Day - Superstar Celebrations
#SC-5 Ubaldo Jiminez
#SC-11 Jimmy Rollins
#SC-17 Prince Fielder
#SC-9 Nick Markakis

Seeing these cards together gets me antsy for the end-of-season pennant races and the playoffs. When these celebrations seem to happen more often due to the heightened sense of urgency to win.

There's just one more chunk of this trade to go.

March Radness Win, Part III

[Part I]
[Part II]

I "won" a prize, in that I managed to have the worst bracket of all in Cards on Cards March Radness contest. I legitimately tried to win, in fact I didn't even realize there was this consolation prize until the contest was over, because I stopped scoreboard watching about 2 rounds into the tournament because I did so poorly to start off. The good thing about winning cards from a fellow Cardinals fan is that he can't resist dumping a whole bunch of his Cardinal duplicates on me, which I'm more than happy to take.

First up in this batch of cards is the Series I 2008 Upper Deck Cardinals I needed.

2008 Upper Deck (Series I)
#61 Adam Wainwright
#62 Joel Pineiro
#63 Brad Thompson
#65 Troy Percival
#67 Albert Pujols
#68 David Eckstein
#69 Jim Edmonds
#70 Rick Ankiel

Together with the 8 cards from part II, and the 4 from a previous contest win, I have all of the Cardinals from this set, and never bought a pack.

2011 Gypsy Queen
#38 Walter Johnson
#117 Dallas Braden

That's 2 more off the wantlist, leaving me just 125 left to go for Gypsy Queen. It would seem I tend to get a little over ambitious with the wantlists sometimes, desiring a whole set after getting a few packs.

1988 Donruss Wax Pack

Ah, the mystery of an unopened pack. I'm not going to open this yet. Maybe I'll wait for the 30th anniversary in 2018. More likely, I'll break down and open it when I finally sort through my 1988 Donruss cards, because I'm a weak, weak man.