double plays for the weekend

it's saturday, and the twins and indians will be playing two today.  that has nothing to do with anything here, other than i was going to do a play on words with ernie banks' famous double header exclamation and title this post "let's turn two".  i chose not to do that, but i will show some new to the blog double play cards that i found in the recesses of my collection or picked up recently from various sources.

1998 ud spx finite nomar garciaparra 

nomah has another double play card in this set that i am tracking down.  i do have his 1999 fleer sports illustrated card, though

here's astros top prospect fletcher thompson on his 1995 ud minors card

fletch was such an astros' top prospect that at the time this card was released, he was no longer in the houston organization - playing independent ball before being signed by the brewers later in the season.  he never did make it to the majors.

1995 upper deck special edition barry larkin

when i think of hall of famers that played during my fandom, larkin does not readily come to mind.  i was surprised when larkin was elected on the third ballot when alan trammell had been on the ballot for a decade without coming close to election.  not to say larkin doesn't deserve it and trammell does - the voters may have got it right - but the disparity between larkin's vote totals and those for trammell does not compute in my mind.

1996 upper deck jose valentin

a brewer turns two against the cubs

1998 donruss jeff blauser

and a cub turns two against the mariners.  sorry, at first glance i thought that was a brewer sliding in, and i was going for a tit for tat thing, but amaral was a mariner.

1998 pacific invincible chuck knoblauch gems of the diamond insert

knobby was supposed to enter the twins hall of fame this year, but his induction was canceled due to some legal troubles for the former rookie of the year.

2013 topps howie kendrick silver slate blue sparkle parallel

i found a few of these parallels on the cheap.  anybody want a jp howell?

1995 upper deck sp vinny castilla

hello bip!

1995 upper deck sp championship series vinny castilla

it just doesn't look right to see castilla playing shortstop, but that's what he did until walt weiss joined the rockies.

1995 upper deck sp championship series ray durham die cut parallel

i like the view from the third base side - this post was getting a bit monotonous.

hey hey - the jack brickhouse memorial patch

the cubs had already lost one of their announcers, harry caray, prior to the 1998 season when jack brickhouse fell ill.  he had retired after the 1981 season, but was still around the cubs quite a bit.  his trademark call - 'hey hey' - was and still is a big part of the cubs' lexicon.

in august of 1998, brickhouse died of cardiac arrest, and the cubs added a 'hey hey' patch to their left sleeves (the harry caray memorial patch was on their right) for the remainder of the season.  there aren't a lot of cards showing the patch as it was late in the season when it was added to the uniforms, but you can see part of it on this 1998 pacific home run history card

it's there above the cub logo.  this is what it looks like.

it's there again on mark grace's 1999 fleer sports illustrated card

the best view of the patch, although not entirely accurate, comes via this 1999 topps gallery kerry wood card

the harry caray patch doesn't belong there, but i still have this card in my memorials binder as the jack brickhouse patch entry.

oh my omar!

so, the double play cards are slowing to a trickle.  i hope to have them all posted by sometime next week as there are a few stragglers i need to corral and scan.  i will start mixing in more non-dp posts so if you've been missing the double dippers or the evolution of the 1978 topps dodgers posts, your nightmare is almost over.

before that, however, we have some double play cards of one of the masters to celebrate.  omar vizquel has a lot of double play cards, but actually fewer than i would have thought.  for some reason, he is shown batting quite a bit on his cards.  the following are all from his heyday in cleveland, and they are awesome.

especially this, his 1996 upper deck card

my, that's purty.

here's his 1995 leaf card

1997 pinnacle

1997 topps stadium club

1998 leaf (hello big daddy)

1999 fleer sports illustrated

1999 fleer ultra (derek bell initiated 'operation break up double play', apparently)

2000 skybox metal

2002 fleer ultra

2003 donruss

2004 fleer ultra

and another nice one, 2005 fleer ultra

he was definitely one of the greats.

another double play dump

let's start another day of double play cards with 1997 topps stadium club and gary disarcina

and keith lockhart

and jody reed

here's a 1997 upper deck collector's choice fernando vina card

with tim salmon barreling in.  although, if you're vina, once you've survived an albert belle attack, i'm guessing tim salmon isn't too frightening.

here are some fleer sports illustrated double play turns - this one is from 1998 fleer si world series fever, and it features a levitating barry larkin

with a sliding steve finley in san diego.  these next two are from 1999 fleer sports illustrated, and they feature a tumbling derek jeter

and an upended tony womack

looks like ken caminiti did his job.

bret boone stares down vinny castilla on his 1999 topps chrome card

while mike caruso sails over somebody who is obscured by the text on his 2000 fleer ultra card

here are two different versions of the 2001 topps adam kennedy card - i like this card a lot, but not as much as i like kennedy's 2012 topps update card.  here's the gold version

and here's the chrome version

part of the allure of this card is that there aren't a lot of cards with fp santangelo as a dodger on them

moving on to 2001 upper deck, here's neifi perez

and eric young

too bad this one is from his cubs days - it's a nice one.

group breakin' 2 - world series boogaloo

i recently participated in ryan's second group break (that would be ryan of 'o' no not another oriole blog) and brought home some nice dodgers.  the break included 1998 fleer sports illustrated world series fever, from which i scored this card of the 1988 world series mvp, orel hershiser

it's too bad they didn't have a card for the trio of mvp's from 1981.

this next card is not new to my collection, or the blog, but it needs to be shown again, for obvious reasons

a magnificent moment, to be sure.

i drew the pirates as my second team.  a few months ago, that would have been ok since there was that pirates treasure room blog.  he's gone awol (and left me hanging trade-wise), and i don't think billy suter is trading anymore and i am not sure about the real dfg either.  anyway, i got a few nice buccos, including a card of another walk-off series homer, courtesy of bill mazeroski

way to beat them yankees, bill!

i also got some cards from 1999 fleer sports illustrated, including this one of a bespectacled raul mondesi

and this one of a dazed and confused chan ho park

i do not believe either bazooka or gatorade had to pay for product placement on that card.

1999 topps stars was also featured in the break, which means i was destined to get some cards of kevin brown

and gary sheffield

and i did!

i was happy to see 2002 upper deck victory included in the break.  victory was pretty much upper deck's version of topps total.  that means that instead of a set just featuring shawn green, kevin brown, gary sheffield, and eric karros, i got cards featuring the likes of james baldwin

this is significant, because topps did not include baldwin in their 2001 traded set, and by the time 2002 rolled around, they were able to feature him as a mariner in the flagship set.  i think the only other card featuring baldwin as a dodger (in my collection, anyway) is a 2001 bowman heritage card, and it's in black and white.  baldwin spent the last half of the 2001 season in los angeles, and was 3-6 in 12 starts. welcome to the blog, mr. baldwin.  maybe in a couple of years, there will be more james baldwin dodger cards, as his son is currently in the dodgers' minor league system.

another card of note i received is this 2002 ud victory darren dreifort gold parallel

because we can't expect to have a set without some frills, can we?

thanks for hosting the break ryan!

cutting (trade) bait

so, the twins cut bait on their japanese import, tsuyoshi nishioka, on the same day (9/28) that i received this card in the mail from daniel at it's like having my own card shop

it's a 2012 topps short print with an anonymous (matt tolbert?) twin lurking and giving nishi the rabbit ears.  it kind of reminds me of billy ashley's 1993 upper deck card, without eric karros' fabulous hair.  i saw it listed as trade bait on daniel's site and arranged to trade for it.  nishioka was pretty much awful in his time with the twins, but i really wanted him to do well.  even when he was called up this season, i was hoping against hope that he would perform well.  he didn't, and on friday he asked the twins to release him from his contract.  he left upwards of $3 million on the table, too.  sayonara, nishi.

daniel also included some dodger cards for my enjoyment, like this 1988 score bob welch card.

with the yellow borders, it's as if score knew he was really a member of the oakland a's.

here's a 1999 fleer sports illustrated card of a trio of dodger rookies - angel pena, jeff kubenka, and paul loduca

of the three, kubenka was the one who saw the least amount of big league action (12 games over the 1998 and 1999 seasons).  however, of the three, kubenka is the one with the better career batting average.  like roy gleason, kubenka has an average of 1.000, having singled in his only big league at bat.

speaking of rookies, here is an 'official pinnacle rookie card' of paul konerko.

 that would be a 1998 score card, by the way.  here's a translucent 1998 skybox ex-2001 konerko card

nowhere on the card does it say 'official rookie card'.  and it is better for it.

finally, a 2012 topps heritage card of former dodger nathan eovaldi

i forget about heritage.  when people ask me what i need, i usually say bowman since i don't buy bowman product.  i also don't buy heritage any more, although that might change in two years.  we'll see.

thanks for the trade daniel!