World Champion One-Card Mailday

One thing I will say about only having one real card company is that the value of some of the relics has returned.  It is not real easy to pull relics out of most Topps products (other than the expensive stuff).  The World Champion relics in particular are tough pulls.  I try to get at least one of the relics from each of the Red Sox sets.  The 2005 set was pretty easy.  By 2008 the relics were pretty expensive.  And this is my first from 2014.  Felix Doubront was once one of my favorite players.  This was particularly true during the 2012 season.  Doubront slipped a bit in 2013, but he turned in a pretty good performance in the World Series.  He pitched 4.2 innings in two games and picked up the win in Game 4.  He struck out three, walked one, and gave up just one run.  Doubront was one of two cards that I wanted the most.  The other being Jarrod Saltalamacchia.  This knocks off another Top 10 Want.

Here is a quick rundown of the relics I have for each World Champion set:
2005: Orlando Cabrera, Doug Mientkiewicz, David Ortiz
2008: Jason Varitek
2014: Felix Doubront

My First Moncada and a Bunch of Packages in One Day

Lots of stuff to show off here.  My local retailer finally got Donruss in stock, but it has been pretty difficult to pull Red Sox so far.  And I had a number of new packages coming in.  Let's get started here:

1.  Mookie Betts.  So far, out of more than 100 pack-pulled Donruss cards, this Betts is the only Red Sox card.  I have pulled duplicates of the Studio insert of Michael Conforto, but only one base Red Sox card.  That is simply ridiculous.

2.  Dustin Pedroia.

3.  Dustin Pedroia.

4.  Clay Buchholz.

5.  Adrian Gonzalez.

6.  Adrian Gonzalez.

7.  Chet Nichols.  Yes it's a buyback.  But I like buybacks.

8.  David Ortiz.

9.  David Ortiz.

10.  Yoan Moncada.  Yes, this is where things get interesting.  Moncada is Boston's top prospect after signing a huge deal coming over from Cuba.  He may make it to the Majors next season.

11.  Wade Boggs.  This is one of the Berger's Best reprints.  It would be nice if Topps would stop making reprints over and over again.

12.  David Ortiz.  Albert Pujols appears on this card as well, but it is a Big Papi card.

13.  Henry Owens.  Owens will likely start the season in the minors but could give Boston three (possibly four) left-handers in the Red Sox rotation (David Price, Eduardo Rodriguez, and possibly Roenis Elias).

14.  Rusney Castillo.

15.  Xander Bogaerts.  Bogaerts and Betts are two players I feel are somewhat underrepresented in my collection.  I would like to see both players above 100 by the end of the season.

16.  Xander Bogaerts.

17.  Mookie Betts.

18.  Mookie Betts.  This is quite the look on Mookie's face.  Very serious.

19.  Xander Bogaerts.

20.  Mookie Betts.

21.  Mookie Betts.  They are well on their way.

22.  Jonathan Van Every.  Van Every played parts of three seasons with the Red Sox as an outfielder, but oddly pitched in two games over that time period as well.

23.  Jimy Williams.  The Red Sox manager from 1997 through part of 2001 was very successful, leading the team to the postseason twice.

24.  Tony Fossas.

25.  Mike Napoli.  This card celebrates the best beard in the Majors.

26.  Hanley Ramirez.  I love this insert set.  This is my first card from it but celebrating the players' debuts is a fun concept.  I am most excited about the Josh Reddick card.

27.  Vicente Padilla.  My favorite Padilla moment was when he called Mark Teixeira a woman.  Just a creepy guy.  He is the baseball version of Danny Trejo.

28.  Terry Francona.  Easily the manager I have the most cards of.  I have nearly 30 cards of Francona.  Of course it helps that he is one of the most successful Red Sox managers of all time.

29.  Josh Beckett.  A rare bat card of a pitcher here.

30.  Mo Vaughn.  This is a Top 10 hit.  This is the last regular Diamond Kings insert I needed.

31.  Jacoby Ellsbury.

32.  Craig Breslow.  I have four autos of Breslow now.

33.  Dernell Stenson.  Stenson was unfortunately murdered before he could make an impact in the Majors.  I always felt that Boston held him back for far too long.  He spent four seasons languishing in Pawtucket without a Major League callup.  He finally made it to the Majors after being traded to the Reds.  And was murdered the next Spring.

34.  Josh Beckett.

35.  David Pauley.  Pauley was acquired along with Jay Payton and Ramon Vazquez for Dave Roberts.  He made a couple of brief stints with the Red Sox.

36.  Kyle Weiland.  Weiland was rushed to the Red Sox in 2011, struggled, and then was shipped to Houston along with Jed Lowrie for Mark Melancon in a trade that did not work out well for Boston.

37.  Tommy Hottovy.

38.  Shane Victorino.

39.  Hanley Ramirez.

40.  Daniel Nava.

41.  Cody Ross.  Ross had a very good season for the Red Sox in 2012 but had very few cards issued for that stint.  Even more annoying, only one card was not photoshopped.

42.  Ryan Kalish.  Kalish had some nice action shots and looked fairly promising.  Unfortunately injuries wrecked his potential.

43.  Kevin Youkilis.  This is a nice action shot of Youkilis.

44.  Hanley Ramirez.

45.  Troy O'Leary.

46.  Dusty Brown.  Brown, like Van Every, played in just 14 games for Boston over two seasons, but, like Van Every, also pitched an inning in a blowout loss.

47.  Josh Beckett.

48.  Hanley Ramirez.  Ramirez is a player that is increasing quickly in my collection.

49.  Pablo Sandoval.

50.  Jamie Brown.  Brown pitched in just four games for Boston in 2004.  I have 10 cards of him.  Andrew Miller pitched in 157 games for the Red Sox over four seasons.  I have 0 cards of him, nor was there one made of him with the Red Sox.  Sometimes these things make no sense.

51.  Bryan Barnowski.  And Barnowski never played for the Red Sox.  I have three cards of him.  It is strange.

MLB Showdown, Conlon, and More

Keeping up with player selection being my current primary goal, I found a store with a ton of MLB Showdown and Conlon cards.  I had several holes in my collection from these two sets, both of which had a large number of lesser-known players.  Of course I picked up some other stuff as well.

1.  Frank Malzone.  This is the All Star card from the 1959 Topps set, a team set I am working on completing.  Malzone was one of the few bright spots for the Red Sox in the late 1950's and won three Gold Glove Awards.

2.  Pablo Sandoval.  Hopefully Sandoval will have a much better 2016.  His bat has come alive in Spring Training.

3.  Hanley Ramirez.

4.  Mookie Betts.

5.  Jay Payton.  Payton was one of three players acquired from the Padres for Dave Roberts.  Payton was expected to be the right-handed part of a platoon in 2005, taking over for Gabe Kapler, but he complained about his lack of playing time and was traded for Chad Bradford.

6.  Doug Mirabelli.  Mirabelli was part of the best catching tandem in the early to mid 2000's with Jason Varitek.

7.  David Wells.  It always surprised me that Wells came to Boston.  He had frequently made his disdain for Fenway Park pretty clear.

8.  Bronson Arroyo.  I was a little surprised I had so few cards of Arroyo.  He was a big part of the 2004 World Champions and had a good year in 2005.

9.  Matt Clement.  Until he was hit in the head with a line drive, Clement was having a successful season and was named an All Star in 2005.

10.  Matt Mantei.  This was the primary card that lead me to this store.  Mantei was one of several corpses of relievers Boston tried to revive for their bullpen in 2005 (John Halama, Mike Stanton, Mike Remlinger, etc.).  The Ice Man had previously been one of the best relievers in the game, but was ineffective for Boston in 2005.  This is only my third Mantei card.  He shared a Topps Total card with Blaine Neal.

11.  Johnny Damon.

12.  Rickey Henderson.  The greatest leadoff hitter in history spent only one season in Boston.  He was well past his prime.  It would have been interesting to see what he could have done during his prime.

13.  Sun-Woo Kim.  I always liked Sunny Kim.  He was one of the few Korean imports that Duquette signed that actually made it to the Majors.  I was not thrilled when he was traded away.

14.  Johnny Damon.

15.  Hideo Nomo.  Like Rickey Henderson, Nomo is one of my favorite players who played a single season with the Red Sox.  He was another player I liked quite a bit as a kid.

16.  Derek Lowe.  Lowe is one of just a handful of players to save 40 games in one season and win 20 games in another.

17.  Carl Everett.

18.  David Cone.

19.  Troy O'Leary.  Surprisingly he lead the Red Sox in home runs in 1999.

20.  Pedro Martinez.

21.  Jose Offerman.  After a decent season in 1999, Offerman was a wasted contract for a few years.

22.  Trot Nixon.  Nixon is one of my favorite underrated players from the Red Sox.  His seasons from 2000 through 2003 were surprisingly good.

23.  Tim Wakefield.

24.  John Valentin.

25.  Mike Stanley.

26.  Pat Rapp.  Rapp was one of two starting pitchers that were dreadful for the Red Sox in 1999.  Lack of pitching was the primary reason they did not make it far in the postseason.

27.  Mark Portugal.  Portugal was the other primary pitching problem.

28.  Trot Nixon.

29.  Butch Huskey.  Huskey spent just the second half of the 1999 season with the Red Sox after being acquired at the trading deadline.

30.  Rod Beck.  Just look at that glorious mullet.  Beck was awesome, it was a sad day when he died.

31.  Mike Stanley/Trot Nixon.

32.  Jose Offerman.

33.  John Wasdin.  Wasdin was acquired from the A's for Jose Canseco in 1997 and gave up so many home runs, he was given the nickname "Way Back" Wasdin.

34.  Bret Saberhagen.

35.  Darren Lewis.

36.  Damon Buford.

37.  Troy O'Leary.

38.  Tim Wakefield.

39.  Butch Henry.  Henry was part of a bad 1997 bullpen.  He had some moments, but was largely a disappointment.

40.  Tom Gordon.  He still holds the team's single season saves record.

41.  Rudy Pemberton.  Pemberton parlayed a terrific September in 1996 into a starting job in 1997, but then promptly came back down to Earth.

42.  John Valentin.

43.  Aaron Sele.

44.  Rudy Pemberton.

45.  Bill Selby.  Selby spent a brief amount of time with Boston in 1996, but managed to hit three home runs.  Unfortunately he did not make it back to the Majors until 2000 with the Indians.

46.  Tim Naehring.

47.  Tony Fossas.

48.  Andre Dawson.

49.  Lefty Grove.

50.  Asby Asbjornson.  This is what I love about Conlon.  A bunch of players who played very little or shown in unusual uniforms.  This is Asbjornson's first card despite playing in the 1920's.

51.  Fabian Gaffke.  Also getting his first card in 1992 Conlon is Fabian Gaffke who was a top prospect in the 1930's who missed.

52.  Wes Ferrell/Rick Ferrell.  One of just a few pairs of brothers who played for Boston at the same time.  The Conigliaros are the other ones that come to mind.

53.  Bill Wambsganss.  Wambsganss was a pretty decent second-baseman for the Indians who turned a triple play at one point.  He was a decent player for a bad Red Sox team in 1924.

54.  Pinky Higgins.  He holds the record with 12 consecutive hits, but as a manager, was partially responsible for Boston not integrating until 1959.

55.  Bill Carrigan.  A decent catcher, Carrigan also managed the Red Sox for two World Series championships.

56.  Jack Russell.  Russell was a talented pitcher, cursed to be on some historically bad Red Sox teams, leading to a couple of seasons when he lost 18 and then 20 games.

57.  Tris Speaker.

58.  Hugh Duffy.  This is another example of what is so great about Conlon.  Despite discussing Hugh Duffy's triple crown, he is depicted as manager of the Red Sox.  He was a manager when Ted Williams was a rookie.

59.  Harry Hooper.  One of the more anonymous Hall of Famers, Hooper was a big part of the Red Sox teams of the 1910's that won four World Series championships.

60.  Howard Ehmke.  Like Wambsganss, Ehmke was one of just a few bright spots for the Red Sox in the 1920's.

61.  Ernie Shore.  This card celebrates Shore's no-hitter that was started by Babe Ruth.  Ruth walked the first batter, complained about the call and punched the umpire then was promptly thrown out.  Shore relieved Ruth.  The first batter was thrown out trying to steal, and Shore set down the next 26 batters in a row.  Very close to a perfect game.

62.  Dutch Leonard.  Leonard holds the all-time single season record for best ERA in a season with an astounding 0.96 in 1914.

Just Commons Order and a Top 10 Hit

I decided my wantlist was not getting any smaller lately, so I decided to place an order with Just Commons to see if I could knock off a bunch of stuff.  In fact, my wantlist has actually been getting bigger lately.  I have been spending a lot of time adding stuff on to it, such as Stadium Club base cards and Pacific base cards.  

Well, here is the Just Commons order:

Stadium Club was one of my primary goals recently, mostly due to amazing photography that the brand is known for.  There are a few such examples in the above scan.  The Mo Vaughn card shows how awkward of a fielder Vaughn was.  He did not get a ton of errors, but his shortstops typically did.  He was just not that great at picking the throws and his range was basically non-existent.  The Jeff Frye card on the other hand is a terrific action shot of him sliding into home.  It is definitely my favorite shot from this entire order.

The next scan includes nine needed 1994 Pacific cards.  What I have always loved about Pacific has been the brand's player selection.  Unfortunately there are not really any impressive examples here.  All of these players were fairly common in 1994 brands.

Here we have some more Pacific and then some random stuff.  The Blake Swihart in the bottom left is my favorite here.  This is one of the 1989 Bowman is Back inserts.

Some more randomness here.  The Xander Bogaerts completes my mini refractor Top 5 insert set.  Jon Lester was one of the two All Stars in 2014 for Boston.  That is a very interesting cap.

1997 Ultra is probably my favorite Ultra set.  It had some nice photography and the Gold Medallion inserts included different photos.  The MIke Stanley is a terrific action shot of a play at the plate that likely did not go Boston's way.

And here we have some more random cards, followed by two vintage cards at the end.  Dick Radatz was one of the best relievers in the game in the 1960's.  He was starting a downward slide when this card was released.  He was traded early in the 1966 season.  Willard Nixon was one of the better Red Sox starters in the mid 1950's.

And some more vintage here.  The first card celebrates Rico Petrocelli's two home runs in Game 6 of the 1967 World Series against the Cardinals.  Yaz and Reggie Smith also homered in that game.  There is also a card of Pumpsie Green, Boston's first black player here.

The last card did not come from the Just Commons order, but it was one of the Top 10 Most Wanted.  This is Herb Pennock's Hall of Fame plaque which appears to depict Pennock wearing a Red Sox cap.

4 Small Packages in One Scan

Rather than doing one small post for each of the four packages I received in the mail all in one day, I decided to throw them all together.

Behold:

The first four cards all came from one trade.  I gave up a bunch of 2016 Heritage singles.

1.  Fred Lynn.  This card is one of many celebrating Lynn's rookie year, which was one of the greatest of all time.  Lynn was, of course, the first player to win the Rookie of the Year and the MVP in the same season.

2.  Jarrod Saltalamacchia.  This is one of the retail-only parallels from 2014 Topps.  I had Matt Thornton previously.

3.  Jim Rice.  Rice was almost as good as Lynn in 1975.  Boy, that Red Sox outfield in the 70's (Dwight Evans, Lynn, and Rice) would have been incredible to see.

4.  Jackie Bradley Jr.  This year's outfield could be terrific defensively though.  Bradley will be in center, Mookie Betts in right, and Rusney Castillo in left.

Up next is a card that was on my Top 10.  It was pretty low on the list, but it was still on there.

5.  Alexi Ogando.  Technically I had the base version of this on my list, but I am going to count this.  I only had one card of Ogando previously in my Red Sox collection.  He made it into 64 games in 2015 and was generally unimpressive.  But, this is my first autograph of Ogando, and only my second card.

Next is a two-card trade for a couple of former highly regarded pitching prospects.

6.  Dustin Richardson.  Richardson made it into 26 games with Boston in 2010 as a lefty option in the bullpen.  After the season, he was traded to Florida for Andrew Miller, a trade that worked out well for Boston, but poorly for Florida as Richardson never pitched in the Majors again.

7.  Daniel Bard.  Bard was so good for a couple of seasons and it is really sad that he completely fell apart.  He has not pitched in the Majors since a bad two-game stint in 2013.  He can not find the strike zone any more and has bounced from organization to organization.

Finally, a quick Ebay buy.

8.  Babe Ruth.  This was a card that was only available in Topps factory sets.  This card commemorates Ruth's three World Championships with Boston.

My Most Wanted has Been Caught

Eagle-eyed readers may have noticed that my Top 10 Most Wanted has had a little bit of a shake-up at the top.  That is because the #1 card on the Top 10 was added to my collection:

This card has been #1 on that list since I acquired the only Red Sox card of James Loney ever made (2012 Topps Update SSP) and then shortly later an Oil Can Boyd card some time back in 2013.  This card has spent more than two and a half years as the #1 card on my Most Wanted list, longer than either of the other two.

As I have mentioned before on this blog when talking about this card, this is just an incredibly cool-looking card of a player who was not with the team for very long.  It is a die-cut card of J.T. Snow, who only played in 38 games for Boston in 2006, and is just my fourth card of Snow in my Red Sox collection.  There was a Jason Varitek card from the same set, which I picked up right away as it was during a time when picking up Varitek cards was my highest priority.

Snow had been acquired by the Red Sox as something of a stop-gap option at first in case Kevin Youkilis did not work out.  Ultimately, Youkilis turned into a terrific first-baseman and Snow was superfluous.  It helped that Snow only hit .205/.340/.205 with no power whatsoever.  He was released in June.

I am thrilled with this pickup.  Now, there is a new #1 on my Top 10 Most Wanted.

My Top 10 Wanted Cards

I have seen several other bloggers list their Top 10 Wants along the side of their blogs, so I figured why not? I will put this on the side as well and will update whenever one gets marked off.

1. 2012 Topps Update #US-5B James Loney 

This is very likely to be the only Red Sox card ever of James Loney and it is a super short-printed card, making its value very high for a less-than-impressive player.

2. 2009 SP Legendary Cuts #145 Oil Can Boyd 

Boyd was always more infamous than famous, but somehow he ended up getting a card in Legendary Cuts.  This one is also short-printed and difficult to find.

3. 2006 Flair Showcase Hot Gloves #14 J.T. Snow

I loved these inserts and for a long time I had no idea that Snow was pictured with the Red Sox in this one.  I have the Varitek and even a printing plate for the Varitek.  This one has eluded me however.  It's definitely a cool card for a player who spent a very short time with the Red Sox.

4. 1995 Collector's Choice #572 Rheal Cormier 

These extended cards were available through a mail-in offer, you had to pull the card that permitted you to order a certain number of cards.  I have all of the cards you could mail in to get the extended cards, but not until well after the deal was available.  So I missed out.

5. 1992 Topps Gold #127 Carlos Quintana (Not the Winners card, I have that one)

At one point I tried to get all of the Carlos Quintana cards in existence.  I made several attempts to get this one, but I kept getting the Winners card.

6. 1994 Score Rookie/Traded Changing Places #CP5 Otis Nixon

Similar to the Quintana card above, I kept getting sent the base card.  There is an insert out there, I am sure of it.

7. 2008 Bowman Chrome Prospects #BCP137 Yamaico Navarro

He did not last long as a Red Sox, and this is the only base card available of him, but I do not have it, so I want it.

8. 1985 Donruss #40 Charlie Mitchell

I have always loved the Rated Rookies subsets in Donruss from 1984 through 1993.  This is the only Red Sox Rated Rookies card I do not own.

9. 2010 Topps Attax #30 Mike Cameron 

One thing that you will find out about me is that I love getting non-base cards of players that do not have a lot of them.  This card of Mike Cameron qualifies.

10. 2012 Topps Allen & Ginter #46 Jarrod Saltalamacchia

This one just eludes me for some crazy reason.  Every time I work out a trade for 2012 A&G cards, the other party never seems to have this one.