black as night

proving that it sometimes pays to comment, night owl sent me some cards after i gave an opinion on one of his 'name the design' posts.  these cards included this 2010 topps jon garland walmart black parallel which is not a night card.

the package also included this 1993 topps dave hansen gold card

and, lookie here!  another parallel card, although this 1997 score showcase series artist's proof ismael valdes card is not your typical black, gold, red, blue, green, pink, or camo parallel!

that card looks like it should have been made by pacific in 1993 or so.

moving on to the hologram portion of the post, here is a 1996 upper deck spx mike piazza card

this one is marked as a 'tribute' which is odd since he had only 3 full seasons under his belt when the card was released.  by the way, what is piazza thinking in blaming vin scully for some sort of falling out with the fans?  i never stopped cheering for piazza - i think the vast majority of fans realized that the fox group was wrong and didn't blame piazza for wanting a ton of money.  i guess he really is a met.

this here is a 2010 topps chrome clayton kershaw card (obviously)

and this is a 2012 topps sticker james loney...sticker.

i have to admit that i didn't know what this thing was, though.

i picked up some singles of 2010 topps pro debut, but didn't realize that they had made another set in 2011.  welcome to the blog, scott schebler.  see you again in a few years, hopefully.

i will end this post with a 2000 pacific omega adrian beltre card

not as garish as many other pacific cards, and i miss having beltre at third for the dodgers.  it would have been nice to avoid the revolving door at the hot corner that existed prior to his arrival and that has returned since he left.  which gets me to thinking that i need to do the evolution of the third baseman series of posts.  stay tuned.

thanks greg!

cards i got from carl crawford cards for sending a non-carl crawford card with carl crawford on it

is it ironic that carl crawford is a foreground lurker on this 2011 topps update elliot johnson 1/1 printing plate card that i picked up for paul at carl crawford cards?

who cares?  all that matters is that he got his card and i got mine, this very pretty 2009 topps 206 jackie robinson relic card

paul dangled this out there for the person who could pry the johnson plate away from an ebay seller.  i took the bait.  paul also sent a few dodgers along for the ride, including a 1960 topps jim gilliam card

complete with pen swirls - the kind you make when you're trying to get the pen juices flowing - and this 1996 upper deck spx eric karros card

hologram goodness!  as usual, there were also a couple of packs of junk wax.  1988 donruss, to be exact.  still, there were a couple of cool cards in the pack, like this atlee hammaker card

featuring a picture of the grand-slam allowing all-star sitting in dodger stadium, and this franklin stubbs card

just because he's a dodger.

there was also a pack of 1988 topps uk minis, and i pulled this charlie hough card

man, if brits and the irish couldn't get excited about seeing a guy like charlie hough on a card, i don't know what would get them interested in baseball.

thanks paul!  i'll keep an eye out for some more headhunting requests...