Contest Winnings, Part II

A good friend of mine likes to say - jokingly, I think - that second place is the first loser. When Daniel of It's like having my own Card Shop, opened up a contest to help Pack War reach 100 followers, I joined in, and the Randomizer put me in 6th for 4 prizes. But, since 2 people won the top 4 prizes, he was kind enough to throw some cards to the 5th and 6th position to still have 4 people as winners. Consequently, I got some cool stuff for being the 5th loser.

Part I

The cards in this portion of my prize cover the years I wasn't collecting, which means it's quite probable any card will be a card I didn't have.

2002 Fleer Tradition
Glossy #462 Bill Ortega #057/200

Hmm. Bill Ortega. Doesn't ring a bell. According to baseball-reference he had 5 ABs in 5 games in 2001, likely as a PH, but no further MLB stats. Such is the risk with prospect cards. This one's a glossy parallel of the base set, and numbered to just 200.

2002 Fleer Ultra #251 Bud Smith

Here we have the 4th most popular Smith to play for the Cardinals, after Ozzie, Lee, and Lonnie, but probably ahead of Bryn. Bud Smith caused an uproar when the Cardinals assigned him recently-retired Willie McGee's number 51, and they actually switched him to 52 mid-season because of it. People get a little number-retirement-happy here, and there's still a movement to retire #51 for Willie.

2006 Upper Deck
Star Attractions #SA-AR Anthony Reyes

Anthony Reyes wasn't a big star at the time this set was printed, so I'm curious about the Star Attraction title. Maybe it was speculative, like Mr. Ortega up top. This one turned out a little better though, as Reyes played a few years for the Cardinals.

2007 Topps
Own The Game #OTG22 Chris Carpenter

I can't quite tell what patch is on Chris Carpenter's hat here. It could be from the 2006 All Star Game, but I think it's from game 3 the World Series, which he won 5-0.

2008 Upper Deck Documentary
All Star Game #ASG-RL Ryan Ludwick

2010 T206
Mini Old Mill Back
#150 Ryan Ludwick

Finally, for today, here are 2 Ryan Ludwick inserts. For some reason there was no controversy around him getting Lee Smith's number, likely because 7 other players had it in between. We love handing out #47 for some reason, though John Mabry may have a claim to it now that he's coaching for us after 3(!) playing stints. I can't help but root for former Cardinals like Ryan Ludwick, even though he played for division rivals Pittsburgh and now Cincinnati. And everyone loves minis, right?

College Bowl Game Contest Win, Part 12

For the 2012-2013 College Football season, I entered the College Football Pick 'Em contest hosted by madding of Cards on Cards. I've won several of his contests over the years, and he always dumps a ton of Cardinals on me when I do. Yet, I think this time he may have outdone himself. I may have to work hard to get them all posted before the 2013-14 College Football season starts August 29, and I start posting my Power Rankings again.
[ 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 ]

2008 Allen and Ginter
#287 Chris Carpenter
#326 Adam Kennedy

2008 Allen and Ginter
#44 Adam Wainwright
United States #US29 Chris Carpenter

Has anyone heard if 2013 Allen and Ginter is out yet? That United States insert is needlessly thick. At first I thought maybe it was a relic, but no, it's just a very thick slide of cardboard. I'm guessing this set contained each state's most famous native ballplayer.

2008 Topps
#244 Adam Wainwright
#272 Anthony Reyes
#285 Tony La Russa
#353 Brendan Ryan

2008 Topps is a set I have a decent chunk of, by virtue of finding a lot of cheap packs at one point. Consequently, I'm chasing its completion in my mind, though I haven't gone so far as to put the missing cards on my want list yet.

2008 Upper Deck Masterpieces
#83 Ozzie Smith
#85 Chris Carpenter

I could come up with any number of excuses for putting the Ozzie in the wrong orientation, but you know the real reason. I wasn't paying attention. And I'm not going to go de-sleeve and re-scan it. Carpenter knocked a card off my want list, so I just have a few Cardinals to go in this set.

2007 Topps Co-Signers #67 Anthony Reyes

I feel like I've heard of Co-Signers many times, but this is the first card of it I own. That's probably because I'm not a huge autograph seeker, except those I acquire from an in-person meeting, and autographed inserts were the big gimmick of this set.

This Break is so 2007, Part V

When CaptKirk42 of the aptly named CaptKirk42's Trading Cards Blog opened up a break of 5 boxes of 2007 baseball cards, I jumped right in to claim the Cardinals and my 2 random teams. It was slow to fill so each slot wound up with 3 random teams, which also caused me to pick up the Dodgers as well in hopes of a Nomar Garciaparra card or two. In all I got the Athletics, Braves, Cardinals, [Devil] Rays, Dodgers,  Mariners,  Royals, and Twins.
[ I | II | III | IV ]


I might be a sucker, I might be behind the times, I might just dig in my heels when people disagree with me, but so help me, I like both Heritage and Turkey Red.

2007 Heritage
#27 Dan Haren
#41 Anthony Reyes SP
#65 Chris Narveson
#106 Scott Rolen
#199 Ronnie Belliard
#287 Chris Carpenter
#337 Jason Isringhausen
#476 Albert Pujols
#492 Brad Penny SP

I landed 2 SPs among the Cardinals, although one was Brad Penny, who pitched 9 games and hit one Grand Slam for us in 2010.

2007 Heritage
#216 2006 Cardinals
#289 Justin Verlander/Jeff Weaver

World Series winners usually get some bonus cards in the following year's set, such as this Verlander/Weaver card.

2007 Heritage
#103 Carl Crawford SP
#339 Jarrod Washburn SP
#357 Eric Stults SP
#419 Scott Kazmir SP

Here are the other SPs I received. I like having all of the SPs in the highest numbers like 2011-2013 Heritage, because then I feel like 1-425 can be seen as the base set. Also, I know when I flip through the cards by number which ones are SPs. To track these down, I had to go to some shady user-generated content sites, so hopefully they're correct.

2007 Heritage
Flashbacks #FB7 Eddie Yost
New Age Performers #NP11 Chipper Jones

These inserts don't seem to fit the set as well as other years of Heritage. But a Chipper's always a good thing.

2007 Heritage - A-Rod Road to 500 #71

Finally, my randomly assigned Seattle pays off again. This set was inserted across Topps products, so it'd be a bear to put together through pack buying.

That's it for the break. It was a lot of fun going through my giant box of cards, covering 5 different products and 8 teams. And, of course, I now own 5 more partial team sets of the Cardinals, so my wantlist has only increased.

Number 5 Type Collection's Cardinals Giveaway, Part 5

[Part 1]
[Part 2]
[Part 3]
[Part 4]
Matt at Number 5 Type Collection gave me way too many Cardinals in a recent contest. Here's the final part, part 5:

2008 Upper Deck #656 Anthony Reyes

2008 Upper Deck #658 Adam Kennedy

If I remember correctly, Adam was a hot SS prospect when we still had Ozzie. This was my first realization that the players I loved would eventually retire or be pushed out by younger guys. I think my fantasy baseball drafting style shows I'm still coming to grips with this. Anyway, we moved him to 2B, then moved him to Anaheim for Jim Edmonds. He then won a World Series in 2002 with David Eckstein, Scott Spiezio, and Troy Glaus, then joined the Cardinals for 2007 after Eckstein and Spiezio won another ring here.

2008 Upper Deck #66 Yadier Molina

2008 Upper Deck #64 Jason Isringhausen

2008 Upper Deck First Edition #52 Jason Isringhausen

I really like parallels and...whatever you'd call sets like Topps Opening Day. Parallel Sets? So having both of these Isringhausens is a good fit for my collecting style.

2009 O-Pee-Chee - Black Mini Parallel #493 Yadier Molina

2009 O-Pee-Chee - Black Parallel #579 David Freese

Did I mention I like parallels? And in case you missed it, that Molina is a mini.

2009 O-Pee-Chee Box Bottom Albert Pujols and Adrian Gonzalez

Does anyone have any great solution for how to store something like this? It's basically the size of two cards next to each other. I could trim it as intended, but that'd be too easy. Anyway, this is the semi-mystery card promised in the contest post, the O-Pee-Chee box bottom. I'm glad this one has the Albert card on it like the example shown. Also that'd make a sweet 3D card.

That was a pretty awesome prize. I was impressed how many were actually spare #5s from his collection. I owe a big thanks to Matt at Number 5 Type Collection. If you're not a regular reader, go give his blog a look.