Not Just Any Team Set

I have been on a roll with finding some tough Durham Bulls team sets and cards during the past year.  My best find up to this point was the first half of the 1997 BellSouth Bulls to Braves set, which celebrated the team's long-running affiliation with the Atlanta Braves.  The cards have proved nearly impossible to find over the years as single cards, and I had never seen them together in any sort of a set before them last fall.  

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I was able to find another really tough team set two weeks ago.  I had been looking for a team-issued Durham Bulls from 2001, but could not even find evidence that such a set existed until 2015 when the set was finally added to the Trading Card Database.  To this day, there are only pictures of a few cards from the set. 

First edit date on Trading Card Database was May of 2015.  

Even though the set first appeared on TCDB in 2015, it has not shown up on Ebay until this year.  

There are always a lot of Major League players who appear in Triple-A baseball card sets, but this set feels like it's above average in terms of quantity.  Here are the cards, starting with the team checklist.  

The front of the card has the team logo.  The back of the card has the team checklist.  

Out of the players with cards in the set, only Norm Hutchins did not appears in the Majors.  The set has a few players with World Series rings, including a World Series MVP.  Also included is a guy who is now a pharmacist, a one-time billionaire who is now bankrupt, a future Durham Bulls manager, and an International League Hall of Famer.  

Here is the basic design of the cards using Brent Abernathy.  

I like that the team put the "Acquired" information on the back of the card.  Feels a little bit like the old Donruss cards.  Plus with Minor Leaguers, you know half of them were traded for Major Leaguers.  Always fun to see some of those names, like Steve Trachsel.  

Here are the rest of the player, coach, and manager cards.  Also Wool E. Bull, the mascot.  

I am not going to talk about every player.  

Two notable names in this group of cards.  

Pat Borders was at the end of his career at this point.  He was nearly 40 years old.  Borders was on the two Blue Jays World Series winners in the early 1990s and won the World Series MVP in 1992 against the Braves.  He played until 2005, retiring at the age of 42.  

Lee Gardner was in Triple-A for 8 years, 5 of those seasons were with the Durham Bulls.  He is in the International League Hall of Fame and I believe he is the Durham Bulls all-time saves leader.  

Two more notable players in this group.  Huff won two World Series with the Giants.  Toby Hall was in the Majors for a few years but was a really good Minor League player.  He was in Durham for roughly 3 years and is considered one of the best catchers to have come through town.  Strictly talking about Minor League numbers with Hall.  

Jared Sandberg is Ryne's nephew and he managed the Bulls for four years.  In his last two years as the manager of the Bulls the team won the International League Championship.  

Now, this is a good group.  

First, we got Jason Tyner.  Jason Tyner was a fan favorite in Tampa.  Scrappy player.  He ended up getting his own bobblehead day with the Rays.  The problem is that he was demoted back down to the Bulls before it was given out.  

Is it too late to get your money back? 

Matt White owned a couple billion dollars worth of Goshen Stone at one point.  Goshen stone is used for swimming pools, kitchen counters, and landscaping.  It currently costs $75 to $150 per ton.  

How did this happen?  

White had an elderly aunt who lived in Massachusetts and needed $50,000 to get into a nursing home.  She sold White some land she owned in a rural part of the state.  White wanted to build a house on the property, but after checking with a builder, the land was too hard.  He called a surveyor who found 24 million tons of Goshen rock on the property.  Rather than settling for part of 2 billion dollars by selling the land to a company that could process the rock, Matt White tried to start his own company.  The company went bankrupt.  He was forced to sell the land for a fraction of its value.  

Ron Wright played in one Major League for the Seattle Mariners in 2005.  He retired and went back to college.  Wright studied pharmacology and now works as a pharmacist in Portacello, Idaho.  

Bill Evers is the second-winningest manager in team history.  For a long time, he held the record but was passed by current Blue Jays manager Charlie Montoyo.  

I have wanted to write about Mako Oliveras for a while.  I have several of his cards, low-key really important player and coach.  

Last group of cards.  

Joe Coleman was a pitching coach forever, including for the Cardinals while Joe Torre was managing the team.  Mickey Callaway was the Mets manager and the pitching coach for the Indians and Angels.  He is currently unemployed for good reason. 

Wool E. Bull.  What would he say about this card?  

2018 Durham Bulls Team Set Part 2

Part 1 of the Durham Bulls team set for 2018 can be found here.  Here's the second half of the set....

Feels like there were a whole bunch of former Mariners players on this year's squad.  Andrew Moore was one of them.  He spent some time up with the Mariners last year, but was not very good with them.  He did pitch really well with Tacoma though and they are in a really hard part of the Pacific Coast League for pitchers.  Pitched decently with the Bulls this year.  I think there is some hope with him.  

Russell is a North Carolina native and a graduate of the light blue ACC school.  Seems like 

Russell is a North Carolina native and a graduate of the light blue ACC school.  Seems like a solid defender, but I am not sure he is ever going to hit in professional baseball.  The Rays have a ton of versatile infielder types too.  Maybe somewhere else.  

Schultz went to High Point University which is not far from Durham.  He misses a lot of bats, but he has been in the Minors for a long time, a few in Durham.  Not sure why a guy with as many strikeouts as Schultz keeps ending up in the Minors.  The Rays used him as a relief pitcher this year, started last season, still misses a lot of bats.  

Forrest Snow is another former Mariner.  He's 29 and in Triple A.  Solid starter this year in Triple A, but I am not sure what sort of future he has in the Majors. 

Velazquez spent a chunk of the year in Durham.  Seems like a solid player, in that mix of really versatile infielders that the Rays have on their 40 man roster.  Velazquez ended up in the Majors for awhile the Rays.  Definitely a future in the Majors.  

Snyder has been around for awhile.  Good older player to have around.  He has been in the Majors a few times and has been a very good player in Triple A.  Seems like a good guy.  

Justin Williams ended the season with the Cardinals Triple A team after being traded away for Tommy Pham.  He actually won a Triple A National Championship ring after the Memphis Redbirds defeated the Bulls.  It was the third time the two teams have played in the Triple A National Championship Game.  The Bulls had won the last two.  

Did I mention there were a lot of former Mariners players on the Bulls this year?  Meet Ryan Weber.  

Hunter wood became one of the "Openers" for the Rays.  Good pitcher.  Does not make all of those prospect lists, but seems to have a Major League arm and a good idea of what he is trying to do.  I very much enjoy watching him pitch.  He has a few other cards out there, might pick up a few of them this offseason.  

Kean is Kolten's brother.  Similar player, but the Rays have a ton of middle infielders and Kean is not better than most of them.  I think he's trade bait.  Definitely a Major League player, just not in Tampa.  

Rick Knapp has been around a long time as a coach.  Read the biography on the back of the card.  Sandberg has been the Bulls' manager for a few years now, really grown as a manager.  He's only 40, so he should get a shot at coaching or managing at that level at some point.  

Dement is a career Minor League guy.  Played for awhile, has coached for awhile.  There are tons of coaches like this, invaluable to the organization for the sake of consistency.  

Ben Johnson was actually a Cardinals draft pick, even has some Bowman autographs in a Cardinals uniform, as well as a long time Padres farm hand.  I am not sure how long he has been coaching, but he seemed to do a good job this year.  

Last card.  Best card?  

Everyone loves the Bull.  

A Venerable Old Card Part 15

The vast majority of cards that I have featured in this weekly segment of my blog have been from the 1980s up to the mid 1990s.  This week I am going to go with a card that is a little bit newer.  By newer, I am mean 19 years old.  I really wanted to go with a Durham Bulls card this week, so picking a card inside of 20 years was a necessary evil.  It's been a while since I have done a Bulls card in this segment, so this week's card is.....

Both of the players on this 1997 Topps card were actually on the Durham Bulls at some point during their Minor League career.  Bowers was on the squad for four years between 2000 and 2003.  Bowers started a few games for the Bulls, but spent the majority of his time pitching out of the bullpen.  Sandberg is the real interesting player on this card.  

Sandberg was on the Bulls during the same time frame as Bowers, but he also spent time with the Devil Rays during that time.  Sandberg was a pretty popular prospect.  Not sure how much of that hype was based on talent and how much was based on his last name.  He ended up also spending the 2004 season with the Bulls after he was sent down.  Jared Sandberg drifted through the Minors for a few years before ended up back in the Rays system as a manager.  

Currently he is working his eighth season in the Rays organization after having worked for the team at every level.  Last season was his first with the Bulls and he finished the season 74-70.  This year has not gone as well for the Bulls, currently 10 games under .500, but I am hopeful that the team can bounce back at some point this year.  

A quick look at the back of the card.....

While early Sandberg cards were optimistic about his playing career, it clearly did not work out for him.  Two years into his managing career in Durham I am hopeful that his managing career will turn out to be successful.

Collecting the Durham Bulls: Jared Sandberg

I worked on a bunch of these posts last spring just to show off the cards of some of the Durham Bulls players on last year's roster.  I am going to do something similar this spring, but we still have to go through the whole Spring Training thing and see how the roster shakes out.  Sure we can probably make some pretty good guesses on a few of the roster spots, but we are going to hope the best for everyone.  I know the Rays still only 25 spots on their roster.

We did get one part of the 2015 Durham Bulls clarified this morning...

Jared Sandberg named new manager of the #DurhamBulls. Full story: http://t.co/NQqKJrQJXa pic.twitter.com/RAUQEbgorg
— Durham Bulls (@DurhamBulls) January 21, 2015

The Sandberg hiring has been rumored for the last week or so, but seems like a really good move.  He's been managing in the Rays organization for awhile and has been very successful.  The former Rays and Bulls player has managed a total of 6 seasons posting a .547 winning percentage and helped Hudson Valley and Bowling Green to playoff appearances in 2012 and 2013.  I have a feeling we are in good shape with Sandberg who is pretty excited about the opportunity to manage his former team.

I will be using all of my size 14 shoes to follow in the footsteps of Evers and Montoyo to lead @DurhamBulls #honored
— Jared Sandberg (@jlsofoly) January 21, 2015

Here's my take on the Sandberg's cards:

Sandberg was a pretty well thought of prospect for the expansion Devil Rays.  The name Sandberg, he's Ryne's nephew, at least got him a little notoriety.  He was drafted by the team in 1996 and his first baseball card appearance came in the 1997 Topps set.  

I am a big fan of the 1997 Topps set and I love these cards they put in of the Rays and Diamondbacks players.  The wallpaper turns a lot of people off, but it was a good 1990s baseball card design.  Lots of cool backdrops.  Both of the players featured on this card, Sandberg and Cedric Bowers, both played several seasons for the Durham Bulls.  If you are looking for something a little tamer in early Sandberg cards,  I really like his 1998 Bowman card too.  That hat is incredible.  

Sandberg had a good run of Bowman cards that started with this 1998 Bowman card, but he also appeared in the 1999, 2000, 2001, and 2002 Bowman products.  The 2002 appearances were in Bowman Heritage and Bowman Draft, but he was still there.  Appearing in Bowman sets also means that if you really want to chase down some Jared Sandberg baseball cards there are all sorts of refractors, diffractors, and serial numbered parallels.  

If I had to chase down one Sandberg card I would personally try to pick up a copy of one of his Bowman autographs.  He had a signature in the 1998 and 1999 sets.  Neither is terribly expensive, nor difficult to find.  

Both of his Bowman autographs came long before the dawn of the sticker autograph and are both really well done cards.  Speaking of sticker autographs, he also does have autographs in the 2004 Upper Deck USA Baseball set, but they are on a silver sticker on top of a white baseball card.  

The late 90s and early 2000s were great years for me as a collector and honestly I am excited to track down a few Jared Sandberg cards.  It's fan to look at old cards from an era of cardboard that you have enjoyed, but best of all Sandberg cards are really reasonable and easy to find which will make the dive into his cards both fun and inexpensive.