Going my own way

If there's been one good thing that has happened during the COVID-19 pandemic/lockdown/work from home period that has been the last 2 months is that my card collecting process has finally evolved to what it probably should have been a couple of years ago.

I've kind of gotten sick of pack ripping.  Sick of hunting for packs on big box store shelves, only to find them picked over and searched by assholes (yea, I used that word...apologies to those who are offended).

I went to Target Saturday morning, first time in almost a month.   Nothing has changed when it comes to visiting the store; I go and find the items I need, and then hit the card aisle last before checking out.  What I saw was kind of pitiful.

• All the clamor that has been Bowman over the past couple of weeks, no sign of it at all.
• It barely looked touched/restocked.  If it had been restocked, all there was for jumbo packs was Heritage, MVP hockey, and a bit of GQ
• Blasters were minimal as well; the only one that I touched was 18-19 OPC hockey, and I put it down right away because I thought I could do better with that $20

It also made me think.  I'm really happy with how my collection is progressing.  I've been completing sets at a good rate so far in 2020, and I'm hoping to have 3 more completed in June when some orders arrive.  I've also revisited a couple of sites that I slowed down on using for card shopping, one of them being Sportlots.

I hit up a reliable seller that I've used many times in the past for hockey card needs and decided to start picking up some OPC short prints for a pair of sets I'm working on.

Clint (Sportlots ID: ctcdork) has a great selection of cards at reasonable prices.  I decided to grab a bunch of SPs, starting with the 8 above from the 2009-10 OPC set.  My thought process has changed a bit on building these "older" OPC sets, I'm actually going after chunks of the SPs first before finishing up with the base cards.  I still need 313 cards for this set, but only 37 of them are SPs, and I'll probably keep buying them up before chasing more trades to finish up the set.

Because when I do it the other way, like I did with 2013-14 OPC...

I end up having to buy a bunch of SPs at the end, usually leaving me frustrated (or pissed, you choose the word you prefer) when I need a bunch of them and hate having to pay prices I don't want to pay.

It may sound like a backward way of thinking, but I kind of wish I had started with the more expensive cards from a vintage baseball set such as '59 Topps, because I spent a lot of time building up "numbers" of cards, and now have hit pretty much a screeching halt because I have nothing but high dollar cards left to go.

But that's all water under the bridge.  Saving money on packs right now is helping me focus more on trying to complete a boatload of sets I've been working on, and I go back to the immense joy I had when I finished my '64 Topps set, and I'm looking to get more of that in the coming weeks and months.

Venting over.  I'm going my own way...come along if you wish.

Enjoy the hobby and stay safe!!

Robert

Serial Saturday #37: More cheap cards

Somehow in the midst of all the craziness that's going on with the post office now, I was able to receive my latest bubble mailer of cards from Joe, whom I know as @cheapcardsales on Twitter.  The moniker is perfect for my type of buying, as Joe usually has some very good deals on cards, and his shipping rates are also very reasonable.

The 4 cards in this envelope that fit the Saturday theme are all #'d out of 99, bringing that mini collection up to 57 cards.

All 4 cards this week are color themed, starting with this bright purple Prizm from 2014 that features Derek Holland of the Texas Rangers.  Serial #'d 47/99 on the back and like anything Prizm related, the purple really scans well and looks good in hand.

Big Mac!  Haven't seen many parallels featuring Mark McGwire for cheap, and grabbing this green one from 2019 Topps Tribute was a no brainer for me.  Yes, I'm still keeping to the $2.50 max price for these cards.

This is the orange parallel from the 2019 Panini Rookies & Stars set featuring the Chargers Keenan Allen.  The scan really looks more red than orange but it still fits the bill, serial #'d 70/99.   I like the photo, as it appears that there's a couple of Ravens well behind Keenan.  Couldn't happen to a better team!

Another orange parallel, and what I believe is the first insert as part of the #'d/99 collection, Julio Jones is a star that I couldn't resist having in hand.  2nd straight card from the 2019 Panini Rookies and Stars set, the Rookies & Stars logo is the only part that is orange, and again scanned red.

I think I'm going to try and see if I can collect all the serial #'s 1 through 99 in this collection, a small homage to the Serial Numbered Insanity set I finished a few years back.  Why not?  What's another project added to all the others I have going.

Thank you for the cards Joe, I appreciate what you're doing in offering these up for cheap.

Enjoy the hobby and stay safe!

Robert

Wile E. Coyote never caught this Roadrunner

One of my favorite nicknames ever belonged to Yvan Cournoyer of the Montreal Canadiens.  The "Roadrunner" moniker paid homage to the speed he had on the ice, and as a kid that loved his Saturday morning cartoons, this nickname will always stand out in my mind.

When I saw this card on eBay last week for $3, it was a deal I couldn't pass up.  It still surprises me that you don't see a premium on Canadiens hockey cards the same way you do for older Yankee/Dodger cards in baseball.

Love the 71-72 OPC set, and I've enjoyed building it so far.  I'm 2 cards shy of the halfway point for the set, but with many big name stars and RC's still to go, it feels like it'll be years before this is done.

This eBay purchase had 3 other cards; there's a trio of big names coming up so stay tuned.

2nd year George Brett.  A bit pricey at $13, but it's the best I've seen so far at this price level.  A lot of the cards on COMC are either dinged up pretty bad, or overpriced, so I settled on this copy.  The '76 set is nearing its end, as this card along with...

The Hank Aaron card bring the want list down into the single digits.  Hank was $11, not bad in my opinion and the last card for the set that will cost more than $10.  With the half dozen cards I have coming from COMC, I need just 3 more cards to finish off the '76 Topps set.  Hopefully by the end of June I'll have that post up for everyone to see.

Last up I grabbed this '72 Topps Willie Mays card for $8.  If you look closely, you can clearly see two creases, one on the left hand side by his lower hand, the other on the right hand side about shoulder high.  The corners aren't the greatest also, but the back is clean and in good shape, so overall I'm happy with this for my set.  Still a long way to go to finish '72 Topps, but I'm just happy to knock off another big name card from the list.

Another reason for me to be happy is this month marks the first time in 2 years that I hit the 20 post mark for a calendar month.  Yes, a lot of it is fluff, but just getting posts written can be a challenge for me at times so seeing 20 posts in May with 2 days to go is a good sign.  The goal still is to hit the 2000 post mark by my birthday at the end of October (today's is post 1938) so I'm pretty confident that I can get there.

I've already been promised a cake....

Enjoy the hobby and stay safe!!

Robert

Pack Stash Week: 2019-20 Upper Deck Hockey

Well, I took two days off because I was pretty much exhausted on Tuesday after working outside busting up concrete in the front yard.  Wednesday was back to work for me, and by the time I finished catching up and doing a days work, I'd had enough of the computer.

So, today I grabbed a couple of packs of Upper Deck hockey from this year, and I'm going to call it a week as far as the pack ripping goes.  I can honestly say that I'm so psyched about finishing sets that buying singles towards them is much more fun than ripping packs at this time.

Plus, trading has picked up a little bit on the TCDB so there's going to be a lot of action for the foreseeable future on the blog.  So I'm going to cut the pack stash week short.

What interested me about the two packs that I busted is that each had 4 horizontal cards to go with 4 vertical cards. For those of you that were wondering if the name Petry looked familiar, yes Jeff Petry is the son of former Tigers pitcher Dan Petry.  

As always, I love the photography as Upper Deck usually does a great job catching players in some great action shots, or some unique photos such as the Johnny Gaudreau shot of him getting ready to high five his teammates after a goal.

The colors are sharp on a lot of these photos, especially the Tom Wilson card that has a Minnesota Wild player in the background.  Both packs featured one of the UD Canvas inserts, one vertical and one horizontal.

Trying to imagine which of the storm surge celebrations Andrei Svechnikov was part of.  Blake Wheeler is another one of the legion of Bruins players that they let get away over the past decade, and he'll hit career game 1000 next year barring injury or a shortened season (he needs 69 games).

What I like is some of the alternate jerseys that are featured on some of the photos, such as Nick Ritchie in the old school Anaheim Ducks jersey, back from when they were called the Mighty Ducks.  

Nothing in these 2 packs that are going to pay for retirement or fund future purchases, but nothing in here is dull either.  

I've already got enough new stuff in over the past week for a handful of posts, plus I found a pair of my major Rookie Card needs for a good price on ebay last week so I'm looking forward to showing them off next week.

Enjoy the hobby and stay safe!

Robert

Pack Stash Week: 2018 Panini Rookies & Stars

I hope that everyone is enjoying their Memorial Day weekend, it's been quite the soggy one down here in S. Florida as it hasn't stopped raining since Sunday morning.

After writing the first two lines, I realized it had stopped raining long enough for me to get some long needed yard work done.

Priorities.

Now, I decided to go after a jumbo pack today, the 40 card Panini Rookies and Stars set from 2018 is featured here.  There is one green parallel inside, along with a dozen rookie cards with potential star rookie cards of Saquon Barkley and Sam Darnold.

I was somewhat lazy again today, and scanned the cards 4 at a time, but at least I scanned them in the other that they came out of the pack.

Wonder what makes companies think that the Color Rush uniform pictures are a good choice for their photos.  I'd also like to see the Browns start to improve overall this year.  They are one of those teams that I root for as the underdogs; it's been that way since they came back into the league.

Looks like Mariota is going to need a change of scenery as his time in Tennessee appears to be up.  Same with Winston in Tampa.

Every time I see a card of Christian McCaffrey, I think of the joke he told during the "All or Nothing" series on Amazon when the Panthers were featured.   Fifty dollars is fifty dollars (those who watched it will know what I'm talking about).  If you're not watching All or Nothing, take a look.  My wife enjoys watching it as well, and we're almost done with this years installment that featured the Eagles.

There is a lot of money in the contracts of these 4 players.  Will love to see how the black hole translates to Vegas in 2020.  If I ever decided to collect a QB as a PC, it would be Brees.  Love him.

Had no idea Josh Normal is a Bill now.  They are pushing hard to compete in the AFC East now that the perception is the Patriots won't be the same team without Tom Brady.

Starting to get into the insert portion of the pack, the Dorance Armstrong Jr. is a green parallel, and Marvin Jones Jr. was coming off of his best pro season in 2017, just over 1100 yards and 18 yards per catch, which led the NFL.

I always loved the Crusade inserts with the Fleur-de-Lys on them.  Another Drew Brees card in the pack, on the appropriately named Star-Studded insert.  Andrew Luck is another player I have always liked, and I certainly don't blame him for getting out of football while he still has his health.

The last 12 cards are all RC's, and each group of 4 has one name player, starting with the Sam Darnold in this group of 4.  Da'ron Payne is the starting NT for the Skins and has 7 sacks and 9 tackles for loss in his 2 seasons so far.

Christian Kirk will likely be the #3 receiver for the Cardinals this year now that DeAndre Hopkins has moved to the desert.  Taven Bryan started half the games for the Jags in 2019 as a DT.  I'm learning a lot just by looking up these guys while writing this....

Sony Michel is a name everyone knows, averaging just under 1000 yards for his first 2 seasons combined.  Marquis Haynes was a 4th rounder in the 2017 draft for the Panthers, and is currently showing on the depth chart for the Panthers as the backup DE. Jaire Alexander is the starting LCB for the Packers, and has 3 picks in his first 2 seasons.

No big dollar cards, autos or relics, but some fun, and some trade bait.  We'll open some hockey tomorrow just to keep the variety.

Enjoy the hobby and stay safe!

Robert

Pack Stash Week: 2018 Bowman

Well, I figured this week was as good as any to post a few packs from the pack stash on the blog.  I figured I'd take it easy on myself and have some fun at the same time while in the middle of a 5-day mini vacation surrounding the long weekend.

I hunted through the box and decided on this pack....

2018 Bowman baseball.  10 cards, chance of some good rookies including Shohei Ohtani, so let's have a look.

I decided to be a little bit lazy on this break, scanning cards two at a time instead of 1.  Started with what could be a great pitcher vs. batter matchup, Noah Syndergaard and George Springer.  Hit up the baseball reference site and found that they've never faced each other in the regular season.  Thought at least there might be one PA as there is interleague play, but didn't see anything.  Maybe someday...

A lot of empty seats behind both Jonathan Schoop and Freddie Freeman.  I imagine these were taken during spring training.  I do like the look of the cards, the diamond encasing the logo and the oval with the position inside is just the right size for me.

Nomar Mazara is a player I don't know a lot about, so I looked him up, and he averages just under a hit per game during his 4 year career.  He was traded to the White Sox in the offseason for a A-level prospect.  Hunter Renfroe also spent his first 4 years with the same team, in this case the Padres, and was traded in the offseason.  Renfroe is now a Ray, seeing Tommy Pham as the big name going to Southern California.

Unlike the 1st player vs. pitcher scan above, these 2 have a more likely chance of having faced each other.  Advantage: Merrifield.  6 for 11 with a 2B and a solo HR.  Felix is now a Brave, and if healthy I believe will have a bounceback season in the Peach state.  I knew Merrifield was a good ball player, but didn't know he led the AL in hits (206), AB's (681) and triples (10) last year.  I also didn't realize he was so versatile, playing 2B, all 3 OF positions and 1B for the Royals.

Marcus Stroman is the 9th and final....what, wait a minute!!??  Only 9 cards in the pack!  Wasn't tampered with at all, bought it a couple years ago right off the shelf in Target.   Oops, not a good look there Topps, as you can plainly see on the first scan that the pack should have had 10 cards.

No matter, was more about the fun of ripping the pack rather than worrying about what or who was going to be inside.  All the cards were going to be trade bait anyhow.  Not like it's 2020 Bowman which people are selling for tons of money already.

Who said the hobby is struggling anyhow?

Enjoy the hobby and stay safe!!

Robert

Serial Saturday #36: Sorry Royals Fans

I almost titled this post "collateral damage" as that was my first thought when starting to write.  But my mind reflected back to a couple of recent trades with Royals fans (Matt and Josh, thank you both for the trades) and figured this would be a good way to show off one of their better players.

I snagged this card for $1.49 for my #'d/99 PC from the same eBay seller that I bought the '73 checklist that I showed off the other day.  The price tag was too good in my opinion to pass up.

I have a bit of difficulty just buying one card from a seller on eBay, and as a result this card is now in the collection.

Can't say for sure, but I think that this might have been still available because the seller spelled Salvador's last name incorrectly on the listing (Perrz).  This is a 2019 Bowman green parallel #'d 6/99 that had combined shipping with the checklist card, and in the end I was a happy collector.

This is #53 in the #'d/99 collection, which is turning out to be a very fun side project for me.  Maybe one day I'll decide to make it a little more interesting and see if I can get each of the serial #'s from 1 to 99 as part of the collection, a la the Serial Numbered Insanity set I did a few years ago.  The more I think about it, the more I like the idea....

Enjoy the hobby and stay safe!!

Robert

A few sets that aren't anywhere near complete

Early 80's hockey is easily one of my favorite eras, and I'll be glad for the day when I can say that I own all the OPC sets from 80-81 through 85-86.  My latest TCDB trade netted me some more cards from that era, courtesy of a repeat trader.

I believe that this is the 3rd trade I've completed with Kevin (TCDB ID: kdinthejaw), and I was fortunate enough to knock off a dozen cards from various want lists.

I don't know what it is about the 85-86 OPC set, but it is probably my favorite design, both front and back, of the front half of the 80's OPC releases.  Unlike yesterday's 4 card post, these 4 players played a lot of games in the NHL, with Sylvain Turgeon having the lowest number of games at 669.  These 4 cards finally put me over the 10% mark with 27 cards in hand out of the 264 card set.

Fortunate enough to get a lot of star power in this trade, as the 82-83 portion features Mark Messier and Paul Coffey, and Middleton gets a 2nd appearance here in the 84-85 set.

What's great for me having Canadian trade partners is they have cards that I'd never see down here in the deep south, such as the Felix Potvin 17-18 Upper Deck Canadian Tire release in the upper left corner of this last scan.

The 93-94 Ultra Mats Sundin is probably one of the final releases that featured him in a Nordiques jersey before he was traded to Toronto.  Kevin even snuck in a Mark Ingram card that I needed from '18 Prestige football as an added bonus.

Sadly, none of the three 80's hockey sets featured here are anywhere near complete; 2 of them are barely off the ground (82-83 and 85-86) while the 84-85 set is a little over half done.  There's probably a couple dozen sets ahead of them in line for completion before these will be tackled.

Thank you for the trade Kevin, the cards are really appreciated!!

Enjoy the hobby and stay safe!

Robert

Attack Mode

Apparently attack mode is what I'm in right now, as I've done nothing but focus on my set building the past few weeks.

Even my big box weakness, Target, has been out of my radar the past 2 weeks.   Maybe working from home has some advantages, as the only place I've gone in my car is to the grocery store.  Saved a lot of money during the week too, as I've not had to stop on the way to work to grab something to eat (a bad vice) or fill the car with gas, which I would have had to do twice so far this month.

That money has been put to cardboard pursuits, including a small order from a couple of sellers on Sportlots this week.

This small 4 card purchase is from seller 1stGOAL1, who helped me knock down my want list for 2013-14 OPC hockey.

Interesting little side bit, my wife comes in and asks me while I'm writing this post what I received today.  I show her the 4 cards and her first comment is "I've never heard of any of them".  The next couple of minutes we have a brief discussion how card companies can produce a card of a player as long as he's played at least one game in the NHL, and how David Ayres (EBUG for the Hurricanes this year) will likely have a popular RC in next year's OPC set.

I decided after that discussion to look up how many games each of these 4 played in the league.

Damien Brunner 132 games
Nicklas Jensen 31 games
Victor Bartley 121 games
Sean Collins 31 games

More than I thought, especially for Brunner and Bartley, but still nothing really earth shattering career wise.  All 4 have been out of the NHL for better than 4 years.

This set is down to 24 cards on the want list, with a few more on their way from another Sportlots seller.

It appears that the virus has changed my card collecting focus, probably for the good as I can honestly say I've never been this focused on putting sets to bed in all the time that I've been a blogger.

Enjoy the hobby and stay safe!!

Robert

588

588 might be the biggest number I've ever written a post about.  When I saw this card arrive in the mail today, and saw the card number on the back, I knew what this post was going to be.

588 could represent lots of things, such as

•  The number of days since I last picked up a card toward this set.
•  The number of similar cards I passed over on ebay, COMC and other sites just waiting for this particular one.
•  The number of times I've said that I was going to look for one of these cards, only to brush it off and keep waiting.

Well, a few days ago I decided to try and find the '73 Topps high number checklist on ebay, and I'd be damned if I didn't find one that I liked!!!

I've seen dozens of checklists marked and colored in various fashions.  Most of them were still not priced to my liking, many of them were $30+.   I was probably more patient than I've ever been chasing after any card in my entire time blogging (approaching 9 years now).

But I found this one last weekend, the boxes that are marked are for the most part clean, and the card was in even better shape than I imagined.   The price?  Even better.   Only $13.

There's only one card left go to for the set.  Card #615, the 3rd basemen rookie trio.

Ignore the checklist above, it's lying.  I don't have #615 yet....

Enjoy the hobby and stay safe!!

Robert

Out of the blue--north of the border

On the same day that I received cards from the Night Owl, I also received a pair of PWE's from fellow blogger and TCDB user Joseph.   "Crazie Joe" runs the Crazie Joe's Card Corner blog, and does a good job of posting every day, even after 4 + years on the blogging roll call.  Joe's envelopes hit my hockey wants perfectly, as they always do.

First up is the outliers.  4 cards that didn't match the other 19.  The Joe Sakic card is from 2002-03 UD Vintage, and as I always do, I check the set want list to see if it was needed there.  Nope.  In the Sakic PC it goes.  

Claude Giroux is a SP from the 18-19 set, which is doing quite well as I only need 93 cards to finish.  58 of them are SPs, so it will be a bit of a chore, but it'll get done eventually.

Finally, I was very surprised to see a couple of 81-82 OPC's come out of one of the envelopes.  Love the photo on the Bobby Clarke card, a little nick above the right eye shows the warrior that he was during his career.  One day I'll start to work seriously on this set; I currently just have 11 cards from this release.

The remainder of the cards were from the 07-08 OPC set, something that I've had on the go since it was released 13 years ago.   Still need a lot of cards to finish this set, over 200 to give you an idea of how I've procrastinated in putting this together.  I have a weak spot for the modern OPC sets, even though they do the same thing as Topps Heritage and release the last 100 cards in the set as SPs.

These cards were most welcome, and a total surprise for sure.  Thank you very much Joseph, they are much appreciated!!

Enjoy the hobby and stay safe!

Robert

Tubthumping

Sometimes the inspiration for a post comes from a comment on the blog.   Take a couple of quick pictures and voila!  Post is born.   Thank you to everyone's favorite Lost Collector AJ, I took to heart his comment on my raiding the stash post from this past Wednesday and decided to write a bit about "the tub".  It's just a plastic tub that I bought at Target several months ago for about 3 bucks, largely because my pack stash had been beginning to grow and I wanted somewhere a little larger to store the packs.

So there's the width of the tub, enough for 2 packs, and as you can see there's plenty of jumbo packs in there.  Why would I limit the pack size to just 8 or 10 cards?  Go big or stay home!

It holds about 5 packs across so there's plenty of room for all sorts of different packs.  I usually keep the tub at the bottom of my bookshelf for easy access for days like last Wednesday when I really wanted something to tear open.

Lots of fun inside, as you can see, as I don't limit myself to one or two sports.  There is even a Hoops Jumbo pack down below, along with 75 other packs inside.  Upper Deck Hockey, 3 different years of A&G, some Heritage, Opening Day, MVP hockey, Gallery baseball, Donruss Football, all kinds of fun just waiting to be had.

The original thought on this came about when I saw a few other bloggers over the years mention having pack stashes.  I've also seen some pretty good displays on twitter as well (a few featuring peg boards!), and thought with hurricanes potentially taking a day or 2 to subside here in the south, that a stash would be just the thing.

It kind of grew from there....

I've kind of slowed down adding to it recently, as I push towards finishing the sets I'm working on by buying singles.  Maybe as the pandemic begins to ease its hold on the world and new sets start to trickle onto shelves I'll get the bug again to buy more packs.  For now, fun is always at hand if needed.

Enjoy the hobby and stay safe!

Robert

Out of the blue--stateside

In the middle of a heavy rainfall late yesterday afternoon I popped out to the mailbox to ensure that any potential card packages inside didn't get wet.   I have just under a handful of trades on the go, and was hoping that I might get one or 2 of those in yesterday.

I actually got 3 PWE's from 2 fellow bloggers, neither of which I had any idea that they were coming.  Gotta love the surprises!!

The first one was from everyone's favorite Night Owl, Greg.  He had sent me an envelope not too long ago, so getting this was a very nice surprise.

A couple of mid 90's Leafs to add to the collection.  I do have the collection and a want list posted on the TCDB, but probably don't do a good enough job of advertising it to the masses.  The collection I have is just over 800 cards total, with a good mix of older cards along with the 90's and newer stuff.  Always looking for Leafs, so these are a welcome sight.

Moving on to the vintage portion, 1 each from the 70 and 71 sets came my way.  The Bobby Wine card taught me that I need to check my want lists that I have on the blog soon, as I have him marked as in hand on the TCDB, but had his card on the want list on the blog.  Need to fix that.

Joe Moeller's '71 Topps card is no doubt a duplicate in the vast sea of Dodgers cards there in Upstate New York, but is most certainly welcome here in the deep south.  I'm thinking that '71 may be the last of the 68-72 Topps run that I will complete, as I only have just over a third of the set in hand, and am in no hurry to work on it.  That desire may grow a bit next year, we'll see.

Now these '72s are beauties, not just because they are in nice shape, there's also

•  Joe Ferguson's card is his rookie card, and a great catchers shot even if it is posed
•  They are both in the high numbered card range (Ferguson is 616, Team Card is 522)

I have very little in the way of cards above the 400's in hand, so seeing these was extra special.  I'm a little farther along with the '72 set, but at just under 54% done, there's a long hill to climb.  No worries though...

Within a week's time, I went from needing 2 Nolan Ryan cards for the '78 set to needing none.  Immediately upon looking at the K leaders card I was struck that Niekro was the NL league leader.  I looked at the back and had to see the names he left in the dust:

1.  Niekro 262
2.  J.R. Richard 214
3.  Rogers 206
4.  Carlton 198
5.  Seaver 196

Now I know the knuckleball can be a tough pitch to hit, but Phil left those other strikeout artists in the dust during the '77 season!!

The Tommy Lasorda card is one that I know I saw on the Owl's blog a couple months back and had asked Greg if he had an extra copy lying around.   Voila!!

The '78 set want list is rapidly dropping, now down to just 48 cards to go.  When I started the year, I needed 79 cards, so I'd say progress is going rather well.  Maybe my ebay shopping in the next couple of weeks will net me the Molitor/Trammell RC, and then it'll be all down hill from there.

Greg, thank you for the PWE, the cards are really appreciated!!

Enjoy the hobby and stay safe!

Robert

Battery

When going through the last 5 cards of my recent eBay order from The Battersbox, the first thing that came to mind was the two cards below featuring one heckuva battery.

For most of the sets I'm working on now, I've progressed to the point where I'm picking up cards in the $1-$5 range, of which these two certainly fall into.  When scanning these I thought for a moment and wondered if Seaver ever pitched to Carter, hence the battery title of this post.

First thought, Carter played for the Mets in the 80's, I couldn't remember if Seaver did the same.  Sure enough, Seaver was in Shea in '83, but of the 5 catchers that played for the Mets that season, Carter wasn't one of them.  Carter didn't start his Mets career until '85.  The only other way they could have been a battery is in the All Star Game, and sure enough Seaver pitched in the 2nd inning of the '81 ASG, giving up a HR to Ken Singleton.  Carter was the starting catcher for the NL in the game, which the NL won 5-4.

These two cards dropped the want list for '78 down to 50 cards, which is even lower now.  You'll see why on tomorrow's post.

These three '72 Topps cards round out the envelope, no catchers here to support the pitching of Jim Lonborg.  I believe these 3 cards cost me just under $5 total, Nowhere near as close to finishing '72 as I am '78, but I've made nice progress so far this year, nearing the 54% completion mark.  Completion this year is out, possibly by the end of 2021 if all goes well.  A lot of high numbers that are pricey is something that will likely hold me back, similar to the '64 set I completed a few years back.

I've kind of taken to going after singles on eBay for the time being, as I can acquire them relatively quickly, compared to COMC which has been my other go to for singles.  The bigger change, especially mentally, is grasping that I pretty much have very few cards on my baseball want lists right now that I can buy cheaply.  This is OK, as I know that I'm moving towards putting together some sets that I'll appreciate for a long time to come.

Enjoy the hobby and stay safe!

Robert