sold!

or should i say purchased!  i recently saw an auction for a signed 1988 score steve garvey card.  what really caught my eye was that the auction title referred to it as a 'final tribute'.  as i have mentioned a number of times, score was the only card manufacturer to give the garv a card in 1988, and they did so complete with his full career stats on the back.  i was intrigued enough to check out the auction, and saw that it was being offered by rod of padrographs.  i bid on it and won it and rod sent it.

it's a nicer auto than the one that garvey signed for me through the mail over three years ago.  unfortunately, i missed out on some other items rod was offering, but he was sure to send along some extra dodger goodies, such as this sspc card of davey lopes

unfortunately, i don't believe that ron cey or bill russell were represented in the package.  rod did include a double play card that i didn't previously own - a 1993 score tim teufel card

with barry bonds making an appearance.

rod was also sure to send some twinkies, although not of the hostess or soon-to-be revived hostess-ish variety. no, he included a number of twins cards including the m&m boys - justin morneau

and joe mauer

these guys might not be together for too much longer as morneau could be moved at the deadline. 

big thanks to rod for the garvey and the bonus cards!

2013 panini triple play has chicken legs and turkey necks, but it also has blue bordered stickers

i picked up a rack pack of 2013 panini triple play on thursday while i was out and about.  the first card i saw did not disappoint, as it was this blue bordered clayton kershaw sticker

good karma!  now, the first thing i noticed was that the illustration is different from last year's release.  it's more cartoon-y. here's matt kemp's base card (the only other dodger i found in my pack)

which looks more like the art in 2012 panini triple play.

in addition to the blue stickers, there are red stickers, like this ichiro

another insert set are the 'all stars' like this miguel cabrera

plus the eye blacks are back, although now they feature specific players (i pulled verlander, not kershaw)

and then there are tattoos.  i found joe mauer's tats, not matt kemp's.

hello, topher.

it would be interesting if panini made replicas of actual player tattoos.  i'm sure somebody wants matt kemp's grandparents on their chest, too.

as for the base, well, there are cosby kids

chicken legs

turkey necks

big ol' fat necks

pretty blue eyes

and paul giamatti masquerading as a giant

fun stuff to open, but not for me to collect.  let me know if you want any.

2 x 3 = 55 x 2 and more

i recently completed a trade with jeff at 2x3 heroes.  here is some of what he sent my way.  

1986 topps orel hershiser

and 2010 topps national chicle russell martin

two guys who wore number 55 for the dodgers.  hence the title of the post.  this next guy wore number 6 during his lone year in dodger blue, much to my chagrin.  it's aaron miles and his 2012 topps heritage card

the first topps heritage cards i saw in 2012 were posted on night owl's blog.  i immediately questioned why topps was showing the non-league leader in the center of the league leader cards.  here's the national league leader board, with third place albert pujols getting what was, in 1963, the leader's spot

and, here's the era leaders card, on which cliff lee gets the glory despite having an era 0.12 runs higher than the actual league leader clayton kershaw

note to topps - in 2013, the leader gets the big picture on topp

so, for kershaw, we should see a big picture on the era leader card and a small photo on the strikeout leader card.  unless topps wants to goof up again and give us a big kershaw pic on the strikeout card.

here are a couple of new-to-me dee gordon cards that jeff sent - 2012 bowman

and 2012 topps wal-mart blue border exclusive thingy

there were also a couple of 'available to you regardless of where you shop' gold bordered cards in the package, too.  here's a 2012 topps kenley jansen

and a 2012 topps joe mauer

thanks for the trade jeff!

pictures of men lurking and from foreign lands

here are a few more cards sent to me by dennis at pictures of men.  these first two were the only ones i specifically requested (other than random dodgers, of course).  here's a 2011 topps update sp card of roberto alomar.

he's turning two with omar vizquel hanging out in the background.  and then, we have joe mauer lurking in the foreground of the frank thomas diamond sparkle parallel from the same set

as you might be aware, dennis is a blue jays fan who lives north of the border, but south of me (just slightly).  so, it is no surprise that he included some o-pee-chee goodness in his package.  here's that perennial vedette de la ln, steve garvey

yes, he was quite a premier-but in his day.  i like how o-pee-chee just replaced 'topps' in the little baseball on the front of the 1981 cards, but i really liked that they used their little kids logo on the 1982 cards.  here's garvey au jeu from that set.

they had used that logo previously in 1979.  by the time 1985 rolled around, they were using just stylized text as seen on garvey's card from that year.

i'll end with a card featuring another member of the infield.  this is ron cey's 1983 donruss action all-stars card

i should have used this card in yesterday's post to show cey going to the earflap helmet in 1982 after he was beaned in the 1981 world series.  oh well, it works well here, too as i once again thank dennis for the fantastic package of cards.

thanks dennis!

if it's taken me this long, there's no use waiting any longer

every once in a while, i will take a gander through my scanned folder.  a lot of times, i scan cards for a specific post, like the cards for the 'evolution of the 1978 topps dodgers' posts, or a 'double dipper' post.  sometimes i will scan cards as they come in or if they catch my eye, and then i wait for the right post idea to come along.  well, i'm done waiting with these four cards.

the following four cards have been taking up space in my scanned folder for almost 4 years - not quite the entire time i've been running this blog.  yes, yesterday was the 4th anniversary of garvey cey russell lopes.  so, as i embark on year number 5, here are some cards that have been stuck in purgatory for most of years 1 through 4.

2008 ud piece of history russell martin, joe mauer, brian mccann relic

i did not think that martin would decline so quickly.

2003 ud sp legendary cuts walter alston relic

shiny!  this guy was the manager of the dodgers when i was born and when i attended my first dodger game.  it's nice that the card companies didn't ignore managers like alston. although i am somewhat pleased that there haven't been a whole lot of john mcgraw cards.

2008 topps moments and milestones gary sheffield

sheff was one of the greatest offensive players the dodgers have ever had.  it's too bad that they couldn't harness his offensive prowess for good instead of evil.  kind of like sinestro.

finally, here's a 1999 upper deck angel pena card

pena must have felt a bit like ed goodson in the mid-1970's.  there wasn't a whole lot to do when you are steve garvey's backup, just as there wasn't much for pena to do at the big league level when mike piazza is reigning supreme behind the plate.  but, with piazza gone for good heading  into the  1999 season, pena got a shot at some playing time.  although the dodgers had todd hundley as their primary backstop, pena got into 43 games and hit 4 homers.  he appeared in a total of 71 games for the dodgers over three seasons (1998, 1999, and 2001) as the dodgers passed the catcher's torch from hundley to paul loduca.

so, there you have it - 4 cards and 4 years.  but i'm not done yet.

twinkie, twinkie little star

rod from padrographs sent me a package recently filled with twinkie goodness.  unfortunately, not the hostess kind with cream filling, but cards of minnesota ballplayers are ok too.  here's a looksie:

2011 topps joe mauer insert of some sort.

i like the persian rug background.  it really ties the card together.  as we all know, joe struggled mightily in 2011 due to various injuries.  i'm hoping he bounces back in 2012.
here's another mauer - this one from 2011 topps gypsy queen

that's a nice framed parallel.  anyway, mauer's time missed meant that the twin faithful were subjected to the offensive mis-firings of drew butera, seen here on a 2010 bowman chrome card.

this is one of the reasons they signed ryan doumit and invited pretty much every available catcher to spring training this year.
rod also included some allenn & ginter, including former twin jim thome

and now former twin jason kubel

i found the kubel card interesting because the twins always seemed to play up kubel as a dakota boy.  i did not realize that, while he was born in south dakota, he played high school ball in california. 
here's a nice card of an idaho farmboy, harmon killebrew, on a 2011 topps heritage then and now insert

bautista only has about 420 home runs before he catches up to the killer.

finally, here's a 2011 topps lineage tsuyoshi nishioka.

it may be difficult to believe, but his 2011 season may well have been a bigger disappointment than that of mauer or justin morneau.  now he has jamey carroll to compete with for a job. 

thanks for the cards rod!

in which i make the case that one is better than two

i was surprised to see not one but two danny valencia cards in topps' series 2 release.  one has him in the home whites

and the other in the away grays.

each card has a different number in the set, so i knew it wasn't a variation. they are numbered only a couple cards apart which is weird. the first one has the rookie cup, so i figured maybe one of the cards was a checklist or something.  nope.  here's the back of the first one 

now here's the second valencia card back

they both have the full stat display.  aside from the number, the inset photo and the text writeup, the backs are the same.  it seems silly for topps to have produced two cards for the twins' third baseman when just one would do.  in the 2011 topps twins team set, there was only one valencia card

and even though they used the photo from what would be valencia's second card in series 2, they managed to get the rookie cup on it.  makes sense to me.  are there any other players that got two cards thanks to a rookie cup?
speaking of series 2, topps updated the tsuyoshi nishioka card, and although i like seeing ron gardenhire on a card, i can't complain about a double play turn

with alexi casilla lurking and jose bautista sliding in.

another nice update from the team set is joe mauer's card

same photo; it just looks better in landscape.  topps got that one right.