Cards I Love Part 24 & 25 - Cards That I Owned For A Week.

These cards are not even in my collection anymore.  I am not sure they was in my collection for more than a week.  I do not regret getting rid of them for a second, but they were a pair of cards that I will always remember owning.  Even if it was just for a few days.

I bought a box of 2001 Topps Heritage cards from the Sports Card Dugout in Webster Groves right after it was released.  I took the box home, opened the packs of cards, and landed a copy of the Classic Renditions Barry Bonds autograph.

There are only 25 copies of the card.

Even crazier is the fact that I landed a Nomar Garciaparra red autograph in the same box. 

I do not own this card either.  Owned it for less than a week just like Bonds.  

The odds for the Bonds are 1:19,710

The odds for the Nomar are 1:545

Getting one of the cards is phenomenal, especially the Bonds.  Both in the same box is ridiculous.  I listed them both on Ebay.  I got almost $1,100 for the Bonds and $200-$300 for the Nomar.  I don't remember the exact amount.  The same guy bought both.  

Are there cards not in my collection that I love? 

Yes, even if they were only there for just a week.  These are the best combination of cards that I have ever pulled from the same box.  Every once in awhile I search these two cards out on Ebay.  I am not going to buy copies of them.  I'd be sleeping on the porch.  Just kind of an ongoing curiosity.  

Juan Gone. Something Different.

2013 Topps Archives Gallery of Heroes Albert Pujols

1999 Pacific Private Stock Set

I have started working on a new project already this week, so this post is not going to inspire anything new project wise, but this is one of my favorite late 90s set.  I found the cards about two weeks ago while working on organizing my cards and have not been able to set them down the past few days.  Critics of the Pacific cards will often cite the same boring format, similar styles and designs, and cheap card stock.  Love them, or hate them, the Private Stock set release was a unique release for Pacific because it ditched a lot of what traditionally made up a Pacific baseball card set.

1999 Pacific Private Stock Roger Clemens 

The design and style of the card is not too far of a stretch for Pacific and might be about the only thing that was somewhat normal about this set from the now defunct card brand.  All of the pictures are actually game action shots with the backgrounds blurred out with some sort of pixalated effect behind the player.  I believe that is an Office Max sign behind Roger Clemens, but it looks like an Office Max sign painted by Georges Seurat and you are standing a little too close to the picture (that's two Seurat references this month).  For me it was enough of a departure from the normal Pacific product, which I am a fan of, to catch me attention and peak my interest in this set.

The design of the back further added to the variance in the design from traditional baseball card sets.  Rather than doing stats, or a biographical section, Pacific posted a box score on the back of each card in the Private Stock set.  

It was always really cool to see what Pacific put on the back with the box scores.  Some of the cards, like this Clemens were really obvious and easy to pick out.  A 15 strikeout game is a no-brainer and probably took someone at Pacific a matter of seconds to pick that game out from a page of Clemens game logs.  I thought there would be players with ho-hum box scores on the back, like Bob went 1-4 with a single in a 4-3 loss against the Phillies, but there are not really any cards like that.  Even Brant Brown had a really good line on his card.

Of course the base set featured several different rookie cards and the majority of them had a small variation with a red rookie stamp up in the top left-hand corner of the card.  Most of the names of the rookies in the set are missable, but there are a few interesting cards.  Ryan Minor was a two-sports star in basketball and baseball, but did not really make it in either the NBA or MLB.  Other names are a little bit more recognizable and of course there was the one rookie card which Pacific decided to add a stamp onto in addition to the red rookie typing.

1999 Pacific Private Stock J.D. Drew 

Sometime after the 1997 amateur draft Scott Boras and J.D. Drew convinced the entire baseball world, that includes the baseball card world, that Drew was worth a small fortune because he was the next Mickey Mantle.  Complete with the #7 jersey number.  The Phillies drafted Drew and he did not sign.  The Cardinals drafted Drew in the 1998 amateur draft, signed him, and called him up in September.  Drew hit everything and people were sold.  Every card company had a J.D. Drew card.  Well, the really good ones came out in 1998, like the Fleer Update.  The 1999 Pacific Private Stock was a few months short.  Gold star for effort on the part of Pacific and cool little stamp on the right side of the card declaring this as some sort of exclusive card.

The really odd part about this set came from the actually physical ordering of the cards.  Every single Pacific set I have ever collected has always started with the Angels and worked it's way through the team alphabetically from Anaheim to Toronto.  However, the Private Stock set broke that long held tradition with Pacific baseball card sets.  Below are cards 7, 8, and 9 front and back.

The whole set is ordered more along the lines of a small Topps set with the players arranged randomly between the beginning and ending of the set.  Even the rookies are mixed in with the regular cards and not given a special place in the set which was very common at the time, especially with the Upper Deck sets.

If you cannot find anything redeeming about the cards above, there were also a mini-206 card inserted in every pack of Private Stock.  The cards have a 206 back and are the same size, but the design is just a copy of the regular base from Private Stock with an added white border.

1999 Pacific Private Stock PS-206 Nomar Garciaparra

I know there are a lot of minis fans out there and this is a really good full set of minis to try to put together.

My Top 50 On Cardboard- #27 Nomar Garciaparra

My Top 50 On Cardboard
#27
Nomar Garciaparra

1992 Topps Traded Nomar Garciaparra

My favorite, and maybe only tolerable, Red Sox of the past fifteen years.  Nomar Garciaparra was also a pretty fun player to watch and one of those players who you wouldn't mind seeing win something.  Unfortunately, the Red Sox traded him before they won they title in 2004.  Would have made that pill a little easier to swallow.  Anywho, Nomar's rookie card showed up in the 1992 Topps Traded set as a USA Baseball player.  This was a really cool, and slightly pricey card back in the day, but has lost much of its luster nowadays.  A really easy find on Ebay for a couple of bucks.  You can also check out the 1993 Stadium Club Murphy which has the added bonus of being sold in a set that comes in a giant plastic model of Jack Murphy Stadium.

Hobby Impact-
Nomar was part of the big three AL East shortstops in the late 90s with the other two being Derek Jeter and Miguel Tejada.  Garciaparra has always been second fiddle on that list to Jeter with baseball card collectors and it appears it is kind of permanently etched that way at this point.  Garciaparra is still plenty popular though.  In my opinion, he was the face of the Red Sox from late 90s through the early part of the 2000s.

 Even after he was traded, he remained a popular figure with Red Sox collectors.  Topps has put out several Nomar cards including autographs and relic cards since his retirement from baseball in 2009.   My key to find good Nomar cards goes like this: remember that Nomar played for the Cubs, Dodgers, and A's, now go find his Red Sox cards.  The Red Sox traded Nomar for a good reason and the later years of his career were not really reflective of the type of player he was for much of his time on the Red Sox.  Well, maybe 2006 with the Dodgers.

Nomar has plenty of cool cards out on the market largely due to the fact that he was a great player, a popular Red Sox, and just a cool player to watch.  Collectors have their choices with plenty of cool base cards, inserts, and short prints to nab.  If I had to add one Nomar card to my collection though, I would save my money up and buy one of his autographs.  Like this one:

2000 Topps Stadium Club Nomar Garciaparra Lone Star Signature Autograph

Nomar has a great signature which has changed very little over the past fifteen years and is a great add to any collection.  Many of his early Red Sox autographs are on-card signatures (Dodgers and Cubs tend to be stickers) and can be had for between $40 and $50.  A little bit more than the average autograph, but the popular Red Sox factor drives up the price a bit.

On The Field Impact-
As mentioned before, Garciaparra was apart of the big three shortstops in the AL East during the late 1990s.  The American League also had Alex Rodrgiuez at the time making the position quite deep.  Don't tweet me about Omar Vizquel.  For the time being I am just going to focus on Jeter and Garciaparra.  ARod was better than both Jeter and Nomar, and despite spending half his career at third base, ranks as a top 5 shortstop all-time on several different lists.  However, I really despise those who think that Jeter was really better than Garciaparra during the late 90s.  Lets look at some numbers.

Let's start by look at their WAR (Wins Above Replacement) for the years 1997-2000.  That would be Garicaparra's first season through Jeter's fourth World Series title.  According to the court of public opinion, I would guess that many would place Jeter ahead of Garciaparra, but math doesn't lie.

When you compare the years each player you can see that Jeter has two years where he is high than Garciaparra and vice versa.  However, the total number of WAR over this four year stretch is slanted in favor of Garciaparra with 30.6 Wins Above Replacement compared to 28.4 for Jeter.  Jeter also had a negative defensive WAR in two of the seasons during the four year stretch, meaning the Yankees had better defensive options at shortstop, while Nomar had none.

In fact, if you look at the 7 year-peak WAR used for the JAWS rating, Garciaparra is still higher than Jeter despite the fact that Nomar's seven seasons are diluted by injury shortened seasons.  It's one stat, but there are others we can compare too...

Let's take a look at one more.  Here are the two shortstop's OPS+ from the same four year stretch.

Garciaparra has a clear advantage in this stat too.  While Jeter is shown to be an above average player, though 1997 he's rather pedestrian, he is below Garciaparra in three of the years and be large amounts.  The one year that Nomar is not ahead of Jeter, they are just even.

Really the only thing Jeter has going for him in an argument against Nomar Garciaparra is longevity and his World Series rings.  Although it would probably pain Yankees fan to know that Garciaparra has a higher postseason batting average.  If Nomar had played twenty seasons and been manning shortstop in 2004 and 2007, maybe this season too, nobody outside of New York would even debate the better shortstop.

Garciaparra could be a Hall of Famer.  Still really popular as witnessed below.

Favorite Card-
My favorite part of watching Nomar play was watching him hit.  He could hold his own in the field, but he was a great hitter.  He was really busy while he was up at the plate and had the same busy routine before every pitch.  Here it is while he was in AA

 

The pre-pitch routine was cool, but the guy could hit.  I have always enjoyed the cards of Nomar batting more than the cards in the field, so I am going with this one as my favorite. 

2002 Upper Deck Vintage

This appears to be somewhere during the foot shuffle/stomp part of the pre-pitch routine.  Really good photograph by Upper Deck. 

30 Year Top 50: 1993 Stadium Club Murphy

#13- The legend of the Stadium Club Dome appeared in my countdown way back when I first started this project all the way back in September.  The Stadium Club Murphy set has some of the same attributes as the Stadium Club Dome, but has more highly valued rookie cards and an extremely, by 1993 standards, print run.

1993 Stadium Club Murphy Jason Varitek 

Let's start with the similarities between the Stadium Club Dome and Stadium Club Murphy.  First, both sets came in a cool plastic stadium shaped box.  The Stadium Club Dome was modeled after the SkyDome in Toronto since it was the host of the 1991 All-Star Game.  The Stadium Club Murphy came in a box shaped like Jack Murphy Stadium in San Diego, which hosted the 1992 All-Star Game.  The set also featured a mix of All-Stars, Draft Picks, and USA Baseball players.  

1993 Stadium Club Murphy Nomar Garciaparra

Strangely, Topps also attempted to play around with the dates of this set in similar fashion to the Stadium Club Dome.  The cards in the set are all marked as 1992 issues, but the set was released more than a month after the release of the 1993 Stadium Club set.  Obviously, the powers that be, Beckett most likely, stepped in and cried foul.  The set is now primarily recognized as a 1993 set.  However, some people recognize the copyright date and treat it like a 1992 release.  

1993 Stadium Club Murphy Derek Jeter

The dates of the set really matter on the last two cards pictured on the post belonging to Derek Jeter and Nomar Garciaparra.  Garciaparra also has a rookie card in the 1992 Topps Traded set and the Stadium Club Murphy card is usually thought of as a second year card.  Derek Jeter has several different rookie cards all in 1993 products.  So, back to the dates.  If Nomar Garciaparra's card above is his second year card then why does it frequently sell for almost the same price as his 1992 Topps Traded card?  If this Derek Jeter is just one of several rookie cards issued of the Yankees shortstop in 1993 then why do raw copies frequently sell for $40 more than is next best rookie card?  

Some of the answer has to be attributed to the limited print run of 8,000 sets.  That was a low number for the early 90s and the product was a hobby only release.  Many of these sets have found homes and are off the secondary market.  There are usually one or two floating around Ebay.  Singles can also be found floating around, but the pricing on them is very competitive.  It is not unusual for the Jeter card to cross $100.  

2001 Topps Heritage Box

I have had a bad relationship at times with high end wax boxes which I have gone into depth and detail before in my blog space.  So, last night I was chatting with someone who asked me about my best experience with opening wax.  I would actually say that the answer is two-fold.  I have a best annual experience opening wax and then an all-time best box.  The all-time best box is the subject of my blog tonight.

The walls of my man cave are two different colors.  One side of the room is tan and is decorated with loads of red Cardinals memorabilia and a few things NC State (my alma mater).  Th other half of the room is red and is decorated by black framed pictures, a series of game used bats from several players,  and two large book cases filled with all kinds of baseball books.  The point at which the two colors meet is a large double doored closet that houses my 250,000 card collection.

Inside the front corner of the closet I have a box of odds and ends.  A schedule from the 1982 Cardinals World Series team.  Tickets stubs from the last home game pitched by Darryl Kile, the first Albert Pujols home run hit in St. Louis, and the last game I attended at Busch Stadium II.  Lots of scorecards and programs and a few autographs.  Deep inside the box is the only picture I have ever taken of myself opening a box of cards.  Seriously.

I remember the release of Topps Heritage being a pretty big deal back in 2001.  I was an extremely young professional educator and I swung by the Sports Card Dugout in Webster Groves, Missouri after work (The store is still there-great shop) and picked up a box.  I probably should have picked up a PowerBall ticket.   I hurried back to my place a few blocks away and started opening the packs.  The first awesome card I pulled was a Nomar Garciaparra auto.  Odds 1:142, or 1 per case.  I was ecstatic.

However, I pulled something better a few packs later.  Something so big and odd defining that I had to take a picture.  I am pretty sure that between 1995 and 2012 I have opened a box of 90% or more of all major card release and this is the box I took a picture to remember.  The odds for this card were at more than 1:20,000.  (I hate pictures of young me and the man cave sucked in 2001)

If cannot tell what the card is on the left it is a Barry Bonds Topps Heritage Classic Renditions autograph.  There were only 25 made which does not sound impressive today, but at the time it was awesome.  I took my cards back into the store and showed the owner of the store.  In 2001 I was a card keeper, so this box not only yielded my best pull, but also helped me become a card mover.  I literally sat in the store for thirty-five to forty minutes debating the finer points of selling the card versus keeping the card.  Finally, I decided it was worth a shot.  I listed the card on Ebay along with the Nomar autograph.  The two cards together sold for almost $1300.  The Bonds alone was almost $1100.  Not a bad deal for a $90 box.