Night Owl Cards

This is the time of year that I usually whine about work. It's cosmically unfair that my busiest time of the year happens at the exact same time that others are taking entire weeks off to frolic in warmer climes. But this the lot I chose in life. I decided not to be a college student for the rest of my life. I decided not to be a teacher. I decided to write sports for a living (Nick, if you value lots of time off, you may want to stick to education as a career pursuit). And sports says that March -- yes, spring break time -- is the busiest time of the year. I'm realizing that the older I get, the more I don't care whether I get time off in March. That's both a product of mellowing out and of ... heh, receiving more vacation time (one of the benefits of getting older). So in April -- another time period when education types take weeks off when I usually can't -- I will be taking a little time off, too. And then everyone can be jealous of me. But right now...

I am at the stage in collecting -- or more accurately I'm at that stage in life -- where a retail pack of 2013 whatever can't possibly compete with a simple repack of old cards. They're both the same price, as you know. A single rack pack of Topps Update and one of those Fairfield rack pack "guess what's inside" repacks run about $4.99 with the repack yielding a lot more cards. I guess you're paying for "new" with the other pack. But when I bought one of each last week I received so much more "card collectibility" out of the repack. Not a surprise. Not something I haven't said before. Not something others haven't said before. It was just so apparent , that's all. The most notable feature of the Update pack was that it was a Mariners' hot pack. Besides the emerald Aaron Harang card, there were these Seattlites: What to do with these cards? I suppose I'll send them off to Larry at Emerald City Diamon...

Before I hit you with the second Cardboard Appreciation tournament and the weekly polls that come with it, I thought I'd squeeze in one more poll before that. Here's the deal: I was watching that commercial that's playing during baseball games this season. I can't even tell you what they're trying to sell. Credit cards or drugs or something. It's that one where they show little kids playing baseball, imitating famous home run moments of the past. The usual stuff: Carlton Fisk in '75 and Kirk Gibson in '88. That made me think about something that I've thought about before. The Fisk home run in Game 6 of the 1975 World Series is pretty much the epic home run of that decade. (Sure, there was Reggie Jackson in '77, but he hit three of them in Game 6. The drama is in the quantity more than the timeliness). The Gibson home run in Game 1 of the '88 World Series is the epic home run of the '80s (Cardinals fans will argue Ozzie and Royals ...

The Minnesota Twins weren't exactly inspired by my previous Yankee-Killer post . In fact, I don't think even one of them read the thing. How are we going to wipe this great pinstriped evil off the face of the earth if you players won't even read the hand-written call to arms that I mail to each and every one of the Yankees' opponents? OK, I don't really do that. I'm almost too lazy to write this post, let alone letters to every player. Anyway, the Twins exhibited the typical "Toto-I-don't-think-we're-in-Kansas-anymore" behavior against the Yankees that I've seen WAY too many times in the postseason. They were pathetic. I'm counting on the Rangers to not be pathetic. I'm counting on them to ignore all the bullying and boorish tactics that the Yankees and their many obnoxious fans* have used over the years, and be professional and ignore it. Just kick ass. That's all I ask. In yet another bid to inspire, I've posted a c...

Well, there's this card here. That's reason enough isn't it? For a wonderful take on this card, and the subjects therein, click here . You'll leave with a new perspective and one hell of a sugar rush. But other than that, I think I'm zeroing in on a reason why I'm buying Heritage blasters when I've sworn off collecting the set. Here it is: I enjoy the cards a whole bunch, but since I'm not in a desperate search for cards I need and all of those short-prints, I can relax a little. It's kind of like when I stopped participating in fantasy baseball. I could just sit, back, relax and enjoy a ball game without worrying about the walk-to-strikeout ratio of Ubaldo Jimenez. It's freeing. Things are a lot more pleasant. That doesn't mean I've quit collecting sets. I'm still doing the Topps flagship thing, and when Allen & Ginter comes out, I'll be right there. But I think this approach works best with Heritage, because, zounds , what ...