Random Cardinals from Josh, Part II

[Part I]
I won a little contest at Royals and Randoms, just for doling out an opinion. The randomizer fell my way, and here's the rest of what showed up in the mail.

1990 Fleer - Stickers - Cardinals

Another sticker to start this post off, doomed to never be peeled or stuck.

1990 Fleer
#15 Mark McGwire
#257 Terry Pendleton

McGwire represents a part of my collection I have trouble explaining concisely - Cardinals in other uniforms.

1995 Collector's Choice - You Make The Play #38 Ozzie Smith

It's hard to tell from the cropping, but these are curved and thin like playing cards. There's apparently some sort of baseball sim game that goes along with it, hence the "Groundout" on the card.

2002 Stadium Club #94 Placido Polanco

This guy seems to be ageless. I guess I didn't realize he was only 26 when the Cardinals traded him away for Scott Rolen. I really didn't expect he'd play another full 10 years or more.

2004 Donruss - Leather and Lumber #135 Jim Edmonds

Jim Edmonds fits into this subset well; he's definitely a guy known for both powerful offense and acrobatic defense, though some detractors say part of the reason for his outfield diving catches was that he wasn't very good at reading the ball off the bat. Either way, he caught most of 'em, I was happy with him in CF.

2008 Upper Deck Masterpieces #83 Ozzie Smith

This is a great set looking set, and I also like it because it had players like Ozzie a full 12 years after he retired.

That's it for the package. Thanks to Josh at Royals and Randoms again for the prize!

Random Cardinals from Josh, Part I

I won a little contest at Royals and Randoms, just for doling out an opinion. The randomizer fell my way, and here's what showed up in the mail.

1983 Topps #734 Steve Braun

 The oldest card of the bunch, nearly as old as me. I must admit I don't think I've heard of Steve Braun though.

1987 Sportflics #173 John Tudor

I'm not sure why I even scan Sportflics cards. They never look nice like they do in person.

1991 Classic Game
#29 Joe Magrane
#173 Todd Zeile

Now we're getting to the guys I remember.

1991 Fleer - Team Stickers - Cardinals 

I wish I wasn't so hung up on keeping my cards in good condition so I could stick these stickers on things.

1995 Flair #410 Brian Jordan

 This is my first 1995 Flair card, I think, unless there are some in my unsorted boxes.

2005 Turkey Red #39 Preston Wilson

I like all of the Turkey Red sets, so I've got most of the Cardinals (and former/future Cardinals) on my wantlist. This knocks one more of them off, which is always appreciated.

More next time...

Baseball Cards from Bo, Part III

[Part I]
[Part II]


Bo from Baseball Cards Come to Life contacted me about a trade, and he even did all the work picking cards from both my wantlist and tradelist to set up the swap. Here's the rest of my haul.

1989 Fleer
#5 Jose Canseco
#245 Todd Stottlemyre
#457 Willie McGee
#462 Steve Peters
#463 Ozzie Smith

Jose Canseco was one of my favorites as a kid, so I still collect his cards when the opportunity comes up. I now only need 1 card, Curt Flood, to complete the 1989 Fleer Cardinals. And Todd Stottlemyre, as I've stated many times, is a distant cousin. I got a few more of him in this deal too.

1988 Donruss #658 Todd Stottlemyre

1989 Donruss #620 Todd Stottlemyre

1989 Score #453 Todd Stottlemyre

1989 Topps #722 Todd Stottlemyre

1989 Upper Deck #362 Todd Stottlemyre

1993 Topps #23 Todd Stottlemyre

1993 Topps - Gold
#7 Pete Incaviglia
#29 Dwayne Henry
#43 Ruben Amaro
#77 Junior Felix
#89 Eric Anthony
#103 Jody Reed

I learned a valuable lesson with these Topps Golds. Keep your wantlist up to date! Apparently I started adding 1993 Topps Gold to my wantlist, but got bored after 103 and just stopped. Who knows how many more I might have gotten in this trade or others if that had been corrected.

All in all, I got a lot of neat stuff in this trade. A big thanks to Bo, and as I always implore you when I make a trade, go follow Baseball Cards Come to Life.

Baseball Cards from Bo, Part II

[Part I]

Bo from Baseball Cards Come to Life contacted me about a trade, and he even did all the work picking cards from both my wantlist and tradelist to set up the swap. Here's another part of my haul.

1984 Fleer
#323 David Green
#332 Jamie Quirk
#336 Ozzie Smith

Here are 3 of the 17 Cardinals I didn't have from 1984 Fleer. I don't really know Jamie Quirk, and I was only somewhat familiar with the name David Green, but I definitely know the gentleman on the right.

1990 Fleer #260 Ozzie Smith

Another Ozzie! The cool thing about Hall Of Famers from the overproduction era is that there are lots of cards available.

1993 Hostess #21 Benito Santiago

I sent off several of my 1993 Hostess duplicates, and got this one in return, leaving me 7 left to go in the set.

1990 Donruss

In part I, I mentioned Bo and I worked out this trade while madding was sending me a prize. So here's yet another part of this trade that got duplicated by madding. Maybe I can put together 2 full 1990 Donruss sets, though I have no idea why I'd do such a thing. I bet I would be the only guy ever to do so if I did.

Since the 1990 Donruss isn't as exciting as it originally was, the best part of this trade is left for the 3rd and final post of this trade.

Baseball Cards from Bo, Part I

Bo from Baseball Cards Come to Life contacted me about a trade, and he even did all the work picking cards from both my wantlist and tradelist to set up the swap. Here's the first part of my haul.

1990 Bowman
#187 Frank DiPino
#189 Howard Hilton
#192 Ray Lankford
#193 Todd Zeile
#196 Milt Thompson
#198 Vince Coleman

So a funny thing happened, I negotiated this trade while madding was putting together a prize package he obviously pulled mostly from my wantlist, so you may have just seen some of these cards.

1990 Kmart
#10 Doc Gooden
#17 Don Mattingly
#20 Cal Ripken
#21 Jose Canseco
#23 Rickey Henderson
#26 Bret Saberhagen
#27 Jeff Ballard
#31  Fred McGriff
#32 Mark McGwire

1990 Kmart
#33 Tony LaRussa and Roger Craig

Bo knocked out 10 of the 28 I still need for the K-mart set. It's a little cheesey, but I like it. This set sort of borders on oddball, but it does have the familiar little Topps logo there. Of course it doesn't hurt that the set is entirely stars.

1998 Score Rookie and Traded
#RT207 Jeff Suppan

Sometimes I browse Zistle.com for random Cardinal players, and tick the wantlist icon on any of their cards I don't have. I'm sure that's the reason this Suppan showed up on my list. I never even knew he was a Diamondback.

That's all for this round; I'm out of tag space!

A Fantastic Trade, Part II

I always enjoyed using Roman Numerals, except VI sorts lexicographically after IX, which just messes everything up.

In case you missed Part I, go check it out.

It's always good to find a new trading partner, and I recently got an email from Fantastic Catch with an offer of a bunch of cards from my wantlists, and I was able to send him some stuff for his player PCs and set needs.  Of course as a fellow Cardinal fan, he sent so many he triggered my obsessive need to use up my all of my available tag space , so here's part 2 what I got in my 2-piece box:

2011 Opening Day - Superstar Celebrations #SC-21 Matt Holliday

Opening Day is a set I really like, and I've bought enough I've decided to collect the inserts too. I'm working on 2012 too, but I won't put up my wantlist until I've finished buying packs. From this 2011 set I also got:
SC-5 Ubaldo Jimenez
SC-17 Prince Fielder

2011 Opening Day - Mascots #M-23 Rangers Captain

And also:
M-6 Gapper (Reds)
M-24 Toronto Blue Jays
M-25 Screech (Nationals)

2011 Opening Day - Spot the Error #2 Jason Heyward

He also sent a good pile of base cards from my list, with no Cardinals, oddly enough:
3 Jon Lester
13 Carl Crawford
25 Johan Santana
35 Vladimir Guerrero
38 Mike Stanton
43 Jered Weaver
44 Omar Infante
54 Ian Stewart
57 Zack Greinke
61 Jason Bay
71 Jon Niese
91 Andres Torres
92 Nick Markakis
101 Brian Wilson
112 Andre Ethier
120 Roy Halladay
138 Chris Young
156 Ryan Zimmerman
165 Carlos Zambrano
170 Logan Morrison
192 Dustin Pedroia
194 Delmon Young
212 Vernon Wells

I guess I had a lot less of that set than I realized.

2011 Lineage #12 Elvis Andrus

There was just a single 2011 Lineage card, but this is another set I'm working to complete. A lot of people kind of trash-talked it last year, but I liked it; I'm not sure why.

2010 Topps Update - Vintage Legends #VLC-30 George Sisler

2010 Topps Update #TR128 Chris Carpenter

2010 Update was what really brought me back into collecting, and I have a ton of extra base cards, so it's nice to a few inserts, since I definitely won't be buying any more packs of it.

2008 Upper Deck First Edition Update - Star Quest Common #SQ-32 Albert Pujols

Good old UDFEU for short.

Thanks again for the trade, and go check out Fantastic Catch if you're not following it yet.

A Fantastic Trade, Part I

Again with the pun title?

It's always good to find a new trading partner, and I recently got an email from Fantastic Catch with an offer of a bunch of cards from my wantlists, and I was able to send him some stuff for his player PCs and set needs. Of course as a fellow Cardinal fan, he sent so many he triggered my obsessive need to use up my all of my available tag space, so here's part 1 what I got in my 2-piece box:

2010 Upper Deck #460 Colby Rasmus

2010 Upper Deck #464 Joe Thurston

2010 Upper Deck #466 Yadier Molina

2010 Upper Deck #468 Brad Thompson

2010 Upper Deck #469 Denys Reyes

2010 Upper Deck - Season Biography #SB-79 

I've now got 7 of the 17 Cardinals from 2010 Upper Deck. I like this set because it manages to get some interesting photography despite no MLB logos allowed.

2011 Heritage - News Flashbacks #NF-9

2011 Heritage - Baseball Flashbacks #BF-10

I also got 2 more Heritage inserts toward my set, and 3 base cards:
137 Babe and Mgr. Huggins
217 Don Mattingly
256 Ruben Tejada

1999 Upper Deck - Textbook Excellence #T21 Mark McGwire

And a nice Mark McGwire insert to finish off this half. More tomorrow!

Big Pile, part 4

[Part 1]
[Part 2]
[Part 3]
Josh at Royals and Randoms had a draft-style contest called Big Pile way back in late 2011, and I misplaced the envelope until this week.

2011 Topps #212 Pedro Feliz

You don't see a lot of guys wearing #77 on cards.

2007 Fleer Ultra #152 Adam Wainwright

Fun fact: Adam Wainwright is on my fantasy baseball team this year, and threw a Complete Game Shutout this week. We have both CG and SHO as categories, and 1 will usually win it for you for the week. I forgot to put him in, and left him on the bench. D'oh!

2006 Bowman #183 Mark Mulder

The Dan Haren-Mark Mulder trade was really unwise in retrospect. It made me nervous at the time, but I thought we'd get a few solid years of All-Star pitching. Of course, I'd be a heck of a GM with the benefit of hindsight in all trades.

2006 Bowman #44 Chris Carpenter

Come back, Chris!

2001 Bowman Heritage #17 Jim Edmonds

I like the Black and White look of this card, and all things Heritage, so I had to draft this Edmonds.

2009 O-Pee-Chee #579 David Freese

As he's the reigning World Series (and NLCS) MVP, I'll consider this the best card of the bunch. Hopefully he's got a lot of his career story left to write, though.

That's it for the Big Pile. A big thanks to Josh for giving away 360 or so cards to 12 lucky readers.