TWiB: 2nd Best, My 2¢, and a Soaring Eagle

I knew going into yesterday that my Christmas was going to be much different than any previous year.  But thanks to a family Zoom and a delicious prime rib dinner, it turned out much better than anticipated.  Hopefully all of you enjoyed the day too.

Outside of some very generous blogger care packages, I didn't receive any baseball cards this year from my friends or family, but I do have a pretty cool collectible I'm excited to show off on Monday.

In the meantime... let's take a look at This Week in Blogging.

#1:  Let's Get Trivial

What's your favorite thing about reading card blogs?  Seeing cool cards?  Discovering a new set?  How about learning a new fact?

1975 Topps #397

Well if you answered "yes" to the latter, you're in luck... because I'm passing on some baseball knowledge I learned this morning over on The Shlabotnik Report.  In his latest edition of 1970's, A to Z... he wrote about Bill Freehan and how he was an all-star in eleven out of his fifteen seasons with the Detroit Tigers.

Now the bulk of Freehan's career was played before I was around... so I can't really comment on his career.  But being an 11x MLB All-Star sounds pretty impressive to me.

In fact with the exception of Pete Rose, Miguel Cabrera, and a bunch of guys from the PED Era... he holds the record for being named to the most all-star games without being inducted into Cooperstown.

How close did Freehan come to being inducted?  Not close.  He only received 0.5% of the votes back in 1982.  Now his only hope lies with the Eras Committees.

Can't show off a Freehan card without sharing a link to one of his biggest fans:  John Sharp.

#2:  Second Place Trophy

A famous fictional stock car racer once said... "If you ain't first, you're last", but don't tell Dime Box Nick that.  He wrote an awesome Christmas Eve post that honored some of the most famous second-place finishers in MLB history.

1974 Topps #1

1984 Fleer #412

It featured guys like Hank Aaron (#2 All-Time MLB Home Run Leader) and Carl Yastrzemski (#2 Games Played).

2015 Donruss Gwynn Tribute #4

Then I remembered that Tony Gwynn's eight batting titles are the 2nd most in MLB history... right behind Ty Cobb.

2001 UD Hall of Famers Class of '36 #C5

Gwynn isn't alone.  He shares the second place trophy with Honus Wagner.

I'm not the biggest advocate for participation trophies, but for this post... I'll make an exception.

#3:  My Two Cents

Retail flipping has been on a lot of collector's minds lately and earlier this week Matt over at Cards Over Coffee wrote a great piece on the issue.  I encourage you to just click here and read the post yourself, but if you're looking for a quick summary... he talks about his father adopting the new mentality of buying retail and flipping it.

Now I'm sure I'm going to catch heat for my opinion, but I'll share it anyways.

I actually don't blame his dad.  If he doesn't profit off of it, someone else will.  I totally agree that it sucks to find barren retail shelves.  But in the world we live in, people need to make a living and selling cards is better than selling drugs.

I think the problem actually falls on the shoulders of the card companies and retail outlets.  Maybe card companies should offer up the boxes on their websites, but limit the number of boxes collectors can purchase to allow everyone an equal opportunity instead of giving priority to select customers.

As for retail outlets, I'd have no problem with them keeping the boxes behind the counter and limiting them to one box per customer.  Or how about announcing the specific days that new products arrive that way everyone available on those days has a shot of grabbing at least one box.

My main issue with the flippers is the shadiness behind the whole thing.  Like I have a couple of friends who know people at Target who let them know when new product comes in.  In my mind... that's wrong.

As for me... you probably know that I'm not a flipper.  But if I'm walking around Target and I see Prizm Basketball or Prizm Football... I'd buy up every single box they have.  So how can I possibly blame Matt's father?

#4:  Before the Era of Vick

1986 McDonald's Eagles #12

On Tuesday... Elliptical Man showed off some cards from Chris The Collector.  One of them was a card of Randall Cunningham.

Cunningham was a stud back in the late 80's and early 90's.  If you're ever bored, I'd encourage you to check out his highlight videos on YouTube.

1986 McDonald's Eagles #91

Back in June, I purchased a 1986 McDonald's Philadelphia Eagles set for $7.99 (+ $.74 tax) on eBay.  The set also contains an early card of hall of famer, Reggie White.  Although neither of these cards are considered rookie cards, they're still cool and cheap cards.

Well that wraps up another issue of This Week in Blogging.  There were a few other items I was planning to cover, but after I rambled on and on about flipping retail... it ended up hitting the cutting room floor.

One of these posts has inspired a new eBay search and if I ever end up buying it... I'll be sure to give that blogger full credit.

Until then...

What are you thoughts on retail cards, participation trophies, and Freehan's chances of eventually making it into Cooperstown?

Happy Saturday and sayonara!

More My Style

Another holiday box break... with much more satisfying results than the 2020 Topps Chrome box break over the weekend.  I thought SumoMenkoMan did a great job by comparing that break to a $5 slot pull: high risk, high reward.  Well I guess that means today's break is more like penny slots... which is more my style.

The Product:  1993 Upper Deck All-Time Heroes of Baseball

After Whitey Ford passed away back in October, I started searching for some affordable cards of his when I stumbled across this cool card featuring him, Mickey Mantle, and Billy Martin:

I loved the look of the design, which I discovered is based on the 1912 T-202 Hassan Triple Folders.  At first I thought about purchasing a set... which seems to sell in the $20 to $30 range on eBay.  Then it hit me.  Why not buy a box and build this set the old-school way?  Two months later this box was sitting in front of me waiting to be busted open.

The Price: $21.99 + Free Shipping + $2.03 Tax - $3.87 Gift Card = $20.15

Believe it or not... the purchase of that box of Black Chrome was totally out-of-character.  This box is a more my style.  I researched the current market rate, set a price I wanted to pay, and waited for one to fall into that price range.  One eventually popped up and I immediately clicked the Buy It Now button.  After applying the last few dollars I had on an old gift card, the final price was less than what I'd have to pay for a blaster at Target.

Depending on whether or not you're into products like these... some people might prefer the blaster.  Not me though.  This is more my style.

The Contents:  Forty-Five Minutes of Pleasure

Compared to the box of Topps Black Chrome... this box was way more satisfying.

It contained 24 packs with each pack containing twelve cards.  Here's a closer look at the bottom of the box:

It looks like this was a collaboration between Upper Deck and B.A.T., which stands for Baseball Assistance Team.  Here's what some internet research revealed on the organization:

In 1993... inserts were starting to be a staple in our hobby and this product was no exception.  There is one insert set to chase and a quick peek at the side panel reveals the odds of pulling one of these cards:

The inserts are T-202 reprints which were seeded into 1:5 packs... which translates into four or five per box.  I pulled five.  Here's what one of them looks like:

Although the cards are similar to the regular base cards on the front, they are easy to spot, because they are unnumbered on the back:

The Set:  165 Cards

The set is broken down into two parts:  player cards & combination cards.

The checklist contains 130 player cards featuring hall of famers and fan favorites ranging from Hank Aaron to Richie Zisk.

The original T202 Hassan Triple Folders didn't have individual player cards like this Dave Dravecky, but Upper Deck did a nice job of sticking to the original design by leaving off statistics and delivering interesting stories about the athletes on the backs.

My only complaint about the card design is the huge B.A.T. logo that was included on one flap of every card.  I would have preferred another mini player card like the originals.

What did the originals look like?  Well the combination cards which make up the final 35 cards in the set are very similar in design:

Like the combination cards, each of the originals featured two to four players on a single card.  The card fronts would feature a painting of a group of players with two player cards on each side.

Based on what I've seen with the originals, people would sometimes separate the panels into three separate cards.  You could do that with these too, but I doubt many people have.

Like I mentioned at the start of this post, my goal was to build a hand collated set by busting packs.

The Set Build:  Terrible Collation

 

You would think that a single box with twenty-four packs containing twelve cards each would easily produce a complete 165 card set with over one hundred cards to spare.  Unfortunately collation was terrible.

I ended up falling twenty-one cards short of a complete set, but Upper Deck did make sure to provide me five extra Glenn Beckerts, four spare Dizzy Deans, and a ton of other guys with at least two duplicates each.

Honestly... it kind of reminded me of the whole Mother's Cookies stadium giveaway sets where they'd include 90% of the set with six or seven duplicates of one guy to trade with other fans who attended the game.

I realize this set isn't your typical Junk Wax Era product, but if you happen to have extras of this stuff laying around and/or you are building this set yourself... let me know.  If not... I'll just place a Sportlots order and try to wrap it up there.

Like I said... I have plenty of extras that I'll be shipping out to people in care packages.  If you're looking for any specific players or teams, leave a comment down below.  Here's a link to the checklist.

The Fine Print: Not Your Average Baseball Card

In case it wasn't obvious... these aren't your standard size baseball cards.  I realize some collectors aren't fans of oddball sized cards... which is exactly what these are.  They are narrower than your standard trading card (2.25") and much longer (5.25").

But don't worry... according to the advertisement included as a box topper, they fit perfectly in Ultra Pro six pocket pages.  Unfortunately... I haven't figured out a way to store the set I'm building, but it'll probably involve a 400ct. box and some foam pads.

Whether or not this is your kind of box break, I'd love to hear your opinions on this set down in the comment section below.

Happy Christmas Eve and sayonara!

Sports Card Trifecta #34: Steve Carlton

Steve Carlton was one of my favorite players growing up... and I'm pretty sure I rooted for him before Rickey Henderson... which would make him my first favorite baseball player.

It just so happened that he was one of the best pitchers in the league right about the same time I started analyzing baseball statistics back in the late 70's/early 80's.  I was that kid who'd sit down with my American League Red Book and National League Green Book and memorize league leaders.  And that's right around the time Carlton was leading the NL in wins and strikeouts, while winning his 3rd and 4th Cy Young Awards.

You might be wondering why East Bay guys like Mike Norris or Steve McCatty weren't my favorite players since they were both great pitchers who came close to bringing home Cy Young Awards during that time period.  Well it's pretty simple.  They were right-handed... while Carlton was a lefty like myself.

A few weeks ago I put together a Sports Card Trifecta for Freddie Freeman... and realized that I hadn't built one for Lefty.  I had the recipe and all of the ingredients... I just dropped the ball.

Well in honor of his 76th birthday, it's time to finally cross this one off the list.  Here ya go...

Rookie Card:  1965 Topps #477

I landed this card in a trade with Starting Nine back in 2012... while working on my Steve Carlton project where I collected all of his Topps flagship cards from his playing years.

Autographed Card:  1999 UD Century Legends Epic Signatures #SC

If I'm building a Sports Card Trifecta of a baseball player and I own an autograph of him from this set, chances are I'm going to use it.  Carlton has sort of a weird grin on his face... but I love the blue Sharpie on the B&W background.

Memorabilia Card:  2009 Goodwin Champions Memorabilia #GCM-SC

As much as I enjoy collecting memorabilia cards... I've gotta admit there aren't any sitting in my Steve Carlton PC that really stand out.  Ultimately... I went with this Goodwin Champions card.  The orange sky is kinda cool.  I guess.

Bonus Vintage:  1975 Topps #185

What happens when you combine a hall of fame pitcher, a classic card design, and a well cropped action shot?  You get a completely different type of Sports Card Trifecta.

Well that wraps up today's post.  Here's your question of the day...

When it comes to athletes... who were some of your childhood favorites?

I'll respond to my own question with two more Cy Young Award winning southpaws...

1978 Topps #135

1981 Topps Traded #850

Happy birthday Lefty!  Happy Tuesday and sayonara!