Night Owl Cards

There was a story out of Oklahoma City yesterday that the Dodgers are moving their Triple A affiliate from Albuquerque to Oklahoma City for next season. The Dodgers have been affiliated with Albuquerque for the last six seasons, and before that, the city and the Dodgers were together from 1972-2000. I grew up thinking that Albuquerque had been the top affiliate for the Dodgers for forever (although most of those great '70s Dodgers actually played Triple A games in Spokane, which was L.A.'s top affiliate throughout the '60s through 1971). Even though I've never been to Albuquerque, I don't like that the team is moving from there. The word is that Dodger management wants a better place to evaluate talent. Albuquerque, with its high altitude ways, has always been known for inflated batting stats, and that often doesn't translate to the majors. Of course that was an issue the first time the Dodgers were in Albuquerque (see Greg Brock/Mike Marshall), which ...

Someone apparently thinks all I do is post trades. We all know that's not true. But so what if it was? Would that be so bad? A celebration of what makes the card blog world go round? So that is why I've decided to make this week "trade post week." That's right. A whole week of nothing but trades. That's supposedly what I do all the time anyway, so let's get it right. Hah. Faked you out. I'm not doing that. I couldn't do that. I'd get bored. But showing off trades once in a while? That I can do. And that is what I will do this time. Why I just happen to have this one package here. It's from Ryan of "O" No Another Orioles Blog . I found myself with a Nick Markakis Archives relic a few weeks ago, and I'm here to tell you that this is actual proof that you can still get good stuff for relic cards. I know nobody likes them anymore. But don't tell our brains that. Ryan sent me Dodgers goodies direct from 2013, ...

Remember when I said a couple of days ago about being glad to have a card show to go to so I wouldn't have to scurry all over town in a fruitless attempt to find 2013 Topps? Remember when I said a card show meant I didn't care that 2013 Topps was released this week? Funny how things can change with two days to play with and a Twitter account. I didn't expect to look for any 2013 Topps until Friday. Card show buzzes last at least a few days. I haven't even had a chance to organize the stuff I got from there. Plenty of time to wait out all of the crazy "look at the INSANE PATCH I pulled" chatter in the coming days. But then I started noticing something. The people finding 2013 Topps -- a day or two or three before today's release date -- were from everywhere. It wasn't just a pocket of collectors in New Jersey here and in California there. It was everywhere. A collector in Arkansas. Someone in Arizona. Another person in New York. Another perso...