Trade with Michael of Sports Syzygy

I recently completed a trade with Michael of the Boston-centric Sports Syzygy blog.  Michael hooked me up with a nice pile of Orioles cards that fit well into my collections and it's a shame I can't show them all here.  

Mike Figga played a bulk of his MLB career as an Oriole (41 of 46 games).  He spent all of his minor league career as a Yankee and had a few (bathroom cup sized) cups of coffee with them in the majors.  He was selected off of waivers halfway thru the 1999 season by the Orioles and played out the rest of the season with them hitting his only ML homer.

This is definitely my favorite Iron Man card from the package because it's Gypsy Queen and it's a framed paper card.

There was a good selection of Roberto Alomar cards in the package too and this is the most unique of them all.  Apparently the picture taken on this card was done during Carlos Baerga's celebrity softball game.  I can honestly say this is the only card that I have of MLB players playing softball.

There were also another big chunk of cards of Dwight Evans in the package.  I could figure out why unitl I remembered that he played all of his career except for his last in Boston.  He had a decent season for the birds and retired after the season.

Another favorite from the package is a Platinum Team paralell of Arthur Rhodes from Score.  I don't know if Arthur will get another shot to play MLB again but he definitely had a great career.  It would be cool to see him pitch in Baltimore to finish out his career though.

Last but not least, a Zach Britton insert from Series 1.  It seems like a million years ago when series 1 came out!  I've been hearing encouraging news about Zach that he's finally throwing again without pain in his shoulder.  Not that the Orioles need starting pitching right now but inevitably they will towards the end of the year.  I hope Britton's rehab goes well and ends up back in Baltimore before the season is done.

So, thanks Michael for the awesome package of cards and I hope we can trade again some time.

Card Show Report: The Hits

I didn't buy a whole bunch of "hits" at this show but that's ok.  The 2 I got were pretty cool regardless.  We'll just say quality over quantity.

I was a big fan of David when he was with the Orioles in '09 and '10.  I'm still a fan even though he's playing for the Dbacks.  Not that I have anything against the team, I just don't get a lot of exposure to them since they are in the NL West.  Anyways, I actually saw Hernandez pitch recently while I was eating my dinner.  I was kicked back in the recliner watching one of those boring Spring Training games.

I bought this card at the first table of the day.  As I bought my disastrous Bowman Sterling pack I thought to myself: "Wouldn't it be my luck that I would pull a double of this card or an autograph I already had".  I was really hoping for a Dylan Bundy autograph or even pulling a double of the Britton above would have been better than what I pulled.  Do you think I have a case of buyer's remorse? 

2012 Spring Training TTM #1

I've been impatiently waiting for my first TTM to come back from Spring Training for about a week now and I finally got it.  Ironically this was the last one I sent on the 27th of February.  1 week turnaround!  Thanks Zach!

The only thing that would make this card a little better would be if he signed it in blue and a little lower on his legs so the auto doesn't blend with the black jersey.

Trade with Derek of Tomahawk Chopping

I recieved a nice little package in the mail the other day from Derek over at Tomahawk Chopping.  Derek and I have traded several times, and this one is just as good as any.  He always seems to come up with some great stuff for me.

Here's my favorite insert card from 2012 series 1.  I think Topps nailed it with the gold stamped medallion.  I've seen this picture of Cal before and I'm 99% sure that it's actually his 3000th hit swing.

I have a love it/hate it relationship with Topps Finest.  I've never opened a pack of Finest but I generally think the cards look great.  It's hard for me to justify collecting the Orioles team sets though because they are usually only 2 or 3 cards.  It's not a Finest Problem, it's an OCD Ryan problem.  Instead of going for team sets, I'm just going to pick up cards of my player collections and be done with it.

I'm finding out in my search for earlier Topps Gold cards that they are tough to find.  I've nearly completed O's team sets from 09, 08 and 07.  Golds from 2003, and 2004 are tougher to find for some reason.  I understand the scarcity of 2001 since that was the first year that Topps resurrected them from the dead and were serial numbered.  

The Golds from the last couple of years have been much easier to come by.  I've essentially completed 2010 except for Corey Patterson, Mike Gonzalez, and Jake Arrieta from the Update set.  Apparently, these 3 along with some other players were shortprinted by an extreme amount.  I'm talking less than 50 and maybe as low as 25 are known to exist.  This 2011 "Rookie Debut" of Zach Britton is one of the last few I need  other than Adams, Guerrero, Hardy, and gregg from the Update series.

Thanks again Derek for the trade.  I look forward to our next one.

Trade with Brian of Play at the Plate

I was contacted by Brain from PATP a few weeks ago asking for my address and saying that he had a nice stack of Orioles ready to send me.  Of course I sent my address along and started to wonder what he might be sending.  I had been saving a stack of Rangers for him so I dropped those in the mail as soon as I could.  A few days went by and these awesome cards ended up at my house.

I can't complain with 2 Oriole HOFers, especially high-end parallels.  Marquee is out of my price range but I have picked up a bunch of O's from trades and shows for bargain bin prices.  I can honestly say I've never busted a pack that is more expensive than 5 bucks other than Jumbo packs of Topps flagship.

I think Brian mentioned he had the Orioles in a group break randomly assigned to him.  I think that's where the Sepia Markakis and the Heritage Chrome Jones came from.  Lucky pulls for him me!

The Orange parallel Britton and the Orange Jones above came out of the retail Chrome value packs.  I almost pulled the trigger on buying both on COMC but I'm glad I didn't since I was able to trade for them.  Now all I need is Derrek Lee and Nick Markakis to finish up the team set.  I also scanned the regular Chrome version of Britton just cuz I think it's his best looking rookie card of the year.  For some reason, the horizontal picture just does it for me!

Thanks Brian for the great cards!  I've already started a new Rangers stack with your name on it for our next trade.

Trade with Dustin of Coot Veal and the Vealtones

Dustin, from the awesomely named Coot Veal and the Vealtones blog sent me an email a little while back about a Miguel Cabrera GU that he was interested in and offered to send me some cards in return. We have traded in the past so I was happy to make the trade.  Lets look at some of the cards:

The Montanez and Ponson card finished up their respective team sets.  I'm surprised that it took me so long to get my hands on he Bowman Ponson card.  I'm still way far away from finishing up the Documentary Orioles though.  If anybody has any let me know!

This is the Refractor version of Josh's Bowman Platinum from last year.  I now have the trifecta (base, refractor, and gold refractor).  Josh's stock seems to be dropping in the Orioles system because he can't seem to make the best of his opportunities when he gets them in the majors.  Maybe he'll get his strikeouts under control and can reestablish himself as a prospect.

I'm real happy to have this black bordered Koji in my collection now.  The cool part is that if you turn the card over, it is the blank back parallel.  While it's not exceedingly rare, it's still cool in my book!

Here's the Zach Britton portion of the trade.  Both cards are new to me so I'm happy to have them.

From one promising young lefty to a (once) promising young lefty.  When I returned to the hobby in 1998 Matt Riley was the #1 Orioles prospect in the O's farm system.  He had a great fastball and a good curveball and was destined for stardom.  Sure he had attitude problems and a maybe was a bit lazy but he had potential.  Then he got hurt. Pretty much after that, he was done in Baltimore after that.  I guess I jumped on this autograph card because he was the first real prospect that I paid close attention to and fiended after his cards (as much as a 15 year-old kid could!).  I guess this card just brings me back and that is why most of us collect card in the first place: nostalgia.

Thanks Dustin for taking me down memory lane and sending such an awesome package!

Post Season TTM's!

I sent these 2 TTMs out later in the season and got them back after I got back from the honeymoon.  I guess these guys opened all of their fan mail after they had gone home for the winter.  

Unfortunately for me I tried a new way to send out TTM's and it didn't turn out as well as I had hoped. You can't really tell from the scan but the autograph smudged in the middle of his last name.  You can see it rubbed off in the envelope and reapplied to the card on the white portion near the bottom.  This is what I get for sending Chrome cards through the mail expecting that every player has a Staedler pen to autograph cards.  Lesson learned.  Nonetheless, I am very pleased to get Zach's autograph for my collection

I had the opportunity to get Nolan's autograph at Fanfest last winter and decided to get him on an 8x10.  I ultimately wanted to get a regular card signed sooner or later at the ballpark or TTM.  I wasn't able to get him while I was in Atlanta because he either rode the team bus or snuck in through the Braves team entrance with Nick the Stick.  I thought I would try my luck through the mail and perseverance pays.  Both of these cards look great signed.  If I had to pick a favorite of the 2 it would have to be the Topps Heritage because of the All-Star rookie logo.

In case Nolan or Zach reads this, Thanks for signing my cards and sending them back to me!

Trade with Chris of Maddux, Glavine, and Smoltz

Here comes another trade that landed in my mailbox during my hiatus.  Chris from Maddux, Glavine, and Smoltz and I had been talking about a trade for a while and finally hammered out the deal.  I got some great looking cards in exchange for what I sent him:

Imagine the smile on my face when I pulled this card out of the package!  I now have the trifecta (base, GU, and Auto) of Nick now.  I'm really happy to have added this on-card autograph of my favorite active player to my collection.

Topps Chrome came out during a hectic time in my life this year.  I did get a hobby box and a few rack packs but didn't really jump onto ebay looking for singles.  This blue on the border reminds me of the coming winter months where all we have to wish for is some warm weather.

Here's a nice card that I didn't have.  I think this gold parallel came into my possession at the right time because of Nick winning his first gold glove.  I think Nick winning it was long overdue.  I'm really happy that the voting is done by outfield position and not just lumping all the outfielders into one pool.

I'll close with a couple of cards of the future of the Orioles rotation, Zach Britton.  Zach had a pretty good rookie season.  I look forward to seeing him improve this year and not fall on his face like Matusz did.

Thanks Chris for the nice package of cards.  I look forward to doing another trade with you soon.

A Couple 2011 Topps Lineage rack packs

On my way home from work I decided to pick up some of the newly released Topps Lineage. I had fully intended to pick up a blaster box of this product but saw the rack packs hanging there. I will say that I am no pack searcher but I was able to see that Cal Ripken was on the front of the first pack and Markakis was on the front of the next one!   How could I resist my 2 favorite players basically put on a silver platter for me? Why does Topps make these wrappers sooo easy to see through?

Anyways, I did get other cards out of the pack including this Zach Britton Rookies insert and his regular base card!  I did have some major Orioles-jo in these packs (at least in my opinion!).

I got 2 mini '75s which are pretty cool.  These 2 sluggers surprisingly haven't battered Orioles pitchers as the rest of the league has this year.

I got 2 Platinum Diamond parallels that I don't have much to say about either player:

And I was able to pull a Mini 1975 relic card:

Carlos Lee!  My lucky Astros mojo pack breaking streak continues!  It's not like these relics are too hard to pull since they are 1:10 rack packs.  I'm happy with it though.

I did enjoy this break and I could see a blaster in my near future.  The design of the cards might be a rejected Topps flagship design or leftover from Topps Total but the player selection is pretty solid.  It was refreshing to see Albert Belle on a card again and to see a new pose of George Sisler.  The card backs are a little disappointing but I don't think it would be appropriate to see just lines of stats on the back since it looks so close to regular Topps cards.  Overall, I like the set for what it is: a smaller Topps set with some new ideas and NO SHORTPRINTS!  I might build this one but we'll see.

Card Show Wrap Up: Part 1

I went to the Chantilly card show last weekend and I am just getting around to posting up the results of what I was able to pick up. I'm going to show my top 10 favorite cards over 2 posts (the second post will be tomorrow). Without further ado:

10. 2008 Bowman Sterling Prospects Zach Britton. I've been looking for this card for a while now and I found it in none other than a bargain bin for a quarter. That's right Bowman Sterling for a quarter. It makes me wonder why "collectors" will pay so much for a "box" of cards and end up selling the base cards for peanuts. I personally will never pay more than 5 dollars for a pack of cards no matter what.

I feel bad for Zach though. He was demoted to double-A which he was none too happy about. I was expecting this sort of move by the Oriole front office at some point during the year to stave off his free agency another year (like the Rays did with Longoria and Royals with Hosmer and Moustakas this year.) The Orioles officially say that it was performance related (he has been getting knocked around the park lately) but O's fans are smarter than that. The O's front office wasn't going to bring him to the big leagues until late April/ early May just for the reason of keeping him under team control for another season. I think McPhail was just waiting for Zach to have a bad outing and use that as an excuse for a demotion. The mid-summer circus has truly arrived in Baltimore and won't be pulling out until the end of September.

9. 1967 Topps #1: THE CHAMPS. I did pay a little more for this card but it is totally worth it. This card really is a classic combo card. Not like the garbage of Jose Reyes and Hanley Ramirez standing around in the outfield with their hands down the front of their All-Star warm up jerseys.
8. 1954 Bowman Dick Kryhoski. I like 1954 Bowman better than the 55 version. Period. It just seems more classy than the woodgrain TVs.

7. 2010 Bowman Chrome 18-U USA National Team Manny Machado. This is one of my Top 10 Most Wanted Orioles cards. I haven't figured out a replacement for this one on the list yet.

I'm trying to get in on the ground floor with this guy before he really turns into the mega-prospect all the scouts think he'll be. I picked up a few other of his cards at the show and you might see him later on in this countdown.

6. 2001 Upper Deck SPX Brian Roberts Rookie Card. I have other Rookie cards of Brian but not as nice as this one. It has a low serial # which is cool but not like it matters. It was a little pricier but I'm happy with the purchase.

There are 2 schools of thought on Brian right now. There are a lot of people saying he is done and others say he still has some fuel in the tank. I'd like to say that I think he still has some good years left in him. Injuries have totally messed up his last 2 seasons but when he gets fully healthy(and stops sliding head first into 1st base) he will be fine.

Stay tuned tomorrow for the conclusion of my card show report.