It's like throwing darts blindfolded

I admit it.  When I took down my Blue Jays want list, it made it difficult for people to figure out what I needed.  If you don't have something to reference, how do you know what to send?

I'm sure that people know I love the Jays, but when they endeavor to send me a package like A.J. from The Lost Collector did recently, it has to be like throwing darts blindfolded.

Unless you're Phil Taylor, it's quite difficult to hit a dartboard when you can't see it.  A.J. did quite well though...

He sent out some Finest

Need em all

How about some 80's??

Always I before E when spelling Stieb

A power hitter and a pitcher with a power slider.

Need em both...

You really don't hear the word vintage associated with the Blue Jays, but these two cards are as close as you're going to get...

Need em both...

Finally, a manu relic with the Blue Jays logo and Joey Bats on it is quite all right in my eyes

Chances are if I were to end up in a bar with A.J., I'd do my best to steer clear of the dartboard.

Thank you for the envelope A.J, very much appreciated!!

Thanks for reading, Robert

2 points

For years, I have heard about the In the Game memorabilia points program, but had never participated.  I took a look at the back of this Joe Sakic card that I received from across the pond and realized that you need to accumulate 400 points in order to obtain a hand numbered memorabilia card (out of 20).

At one or 2 points a  card, that's an awful lot of pack busting, and I'm sure at the end of the day it cost a pretty penny to ship the 400 points to ITG.

At the end of the day, I think I'd rather just have this card for my Joe Sakic collection...

Yea, it looks like it has been at the bottom of a couple of packages in its time, but it doesn't matter to me.

It's gold, and it's now part of the Sakic PC, which is growing quite well lately.

Thank you again Jeroen!

Thanks for reading, Robert

A bakers dozen of serial numbered pages are in the books

As promised last night, here is the next completed page for the serial insanity set.  It is actually page #2, cards 10 through 18.

A pretty nice mix of sets and colors, and one of the few pages where I picked up more of the cards on my own than what the blogosphere sent me...

#10  Nathan Haynes courtesy of Max at the Starting Nine blog
#11  Ichiro
#12  Christian Friedrich courtesy of Kevin at the Diamond King blog
#13  Chipper Jones
#14  Johnny Mize I picked up at the 2012 National
#15  John Lindsey I picked up in a trade on the Bench website
#16  Kosuke Fukudome courtesy of Ted at the Crinkly Wrappers blog (retired)
#17  Dan Uggla I picked up at the 2012 National
#18  Brad Hawpe courtesy of Derek at the Tomahawk Chopping blog

The way that everyone keeps sending me cards, I may be showing more pages off sooner rather than later.

Here's hoping....

Thanks for reading, Robert

Serial Insanity cards 1006-1010

Starting to fall a little bit behind on these cards again.  It seems as if my goal of hitting 1100 by year's end is not totally out of reach, or so the blogosphere says.  I've received packages from Jeroen who runs The Dutch Card Guy blog (thank you Jeroen!) and from Dennis at the Too Many Verlanders blog (thank you Dennis!) in the past couple of days that have augmented my totals.

Here's the latest 5 card post, courtesy of Kevin at The Diamond King blog  (yes, it's blog promotion day...)


Enjoy.

Card # 1006:  B.J. Upton

 

Serial Number:  376
39th card out of 50 for the Rays

Interesting to note that when I looked up B.J.'s profile on baseball reference's website, they list him as a center fielder, third baseman and second baseman.  B.J. hasn't played 3rd base in the bigs since 2006, and he hasn't seen 2nd base since 2004.  That's kind of like saying when I leave a comment on your blog I've become one of the writers on your blog.  Please be sure to give me proper credit....

Card # 1007:  Frank Robinson

 
Serial Number:  340
43rd card out of 50 for the Nationals/Expos franchise.

If I recall correctly, this is only the 2nd card of an Expos player that I've used toward the Nationals totals (Andres Galarraga is the other that I remember...).  Frank was a real ball magnet in his day, he was hit 10 or more times in a season 11 times, and two other seasons led the league in HBP with totals of 9 and 8.  I guess 586 career HRs will make any pitcher do what they can to keep from being hit out of the yard.

Card # 1008:  Marshall McDougall

Serial Number:  673
43rd card out of 50 for the Rangers.

Damn red parallels from 2006 Opening Day, why do I like you so?  By the way, this may rank as one of the best names in the set so far.  By the by, Mr. McDougall had a career total of 18 ABs in 2005, striking out 10 of the 18 times he stepped to the plate.  Marshall also played more positions (4) than he had hits (3).

Card # 1009:  Jim Edmonds

Serial Number:  478
40th card out of 50 for the Cardinals

The Cardinals become the first team in the NL Central to hit the 40 card mark.  I had to take a 2nd look at this card before I scanned it, because it seemed weird that there was no top border for the card.  Anyone recall any other sets out there that had 3 borders??

Card # 1010:  Christian Friedrich

Serial Number:  12 (!)
25th card out of 50 for the Rockies

Now that the Rockies have hit the 50% mark, there are only two teams remaining that haven't reached 25 cards (Astros, Orioles).  The Gold Bowman Chrome scanned quite well (better than I thought it would), and this card finally completes the 2nd page, which I'll show off tomorrow.

thanks for reading, Robert

Day 2 at the Expo: Sakics and Chevys

I really enjoyed myself on the 2nd day of the Expo, partly because I decided to free myself of the need to complete sets, and just go after stuff that I really wanted. 

Kind of similar to impulse shopping at the grocery store, but without the junk food making me fatter than I already am.

I saw one table that had piles of $1 cards, nothing of which I was really interested in.  Around the corner from those dollar cards were stacks of cards for $3, and when I saw a bunch of 50's and 60's Parkies, I was interested. 

I only plucked two of them for myself, because I was just getting started when I hit this table.  But at $3 apiece for a 57-58 and a 60-61 pair of Maple Leaf commons, I had to have them.  Gerry James didn't have a long and storied career with the Leafs, 149 games over parts of 5 seasons.  Ehman was also a part timer over his first few seasons in the NHL, but expansion gave him a chance to play full time for 4 years with the Golden Seals.   Ehman was also part of the Leafs Stanley Cup winning team in 63-64.

OK, enough of the history lessons.  You may or may not remember that I went to Toronto a few months ago hoping to get a "nice" addition for my Joe Sakic collection, but came away empty handed.  I lucked out yesterday, and picked up this nice 2 color jersey card of Joe...

I've never been a big proponent of paying larger sums of money for a jersey or autograph card.  A few dollars I can stomach, but when you get into the realms of the Cup or other "luxury" products that are on the market, I usually will pass.  This card is #'d 17/25 (the first hook for this sucker), and the nice blue stripe on the jersey swatch made the card too good to pass up, even for $20. 

The next table that I hit was a boon for my Sakic collection, as I picked up 15 cards at 50 cents apiece.  The funny thing about me hitting this table was that the Sakic cards weren't the first cards that I noticed in the 50 cent boxes.  I had noticed a stack of 95-96 Players Club parallels, which was great, until I opened my backpack.  Yes, the notebook was inside, but the want lists weren't.  

Pissed!!  You better believe it.  Instead of moping, I started digging through the boxes, finding the odd Sakic card here and there...

I was very happy to find a Post Pinnacle Sakic card, I don't think I had ever seen it before until yesterday.    By the time I arrived at this table, I had been walking for over an hour, and was getting a little weary.  This table actually gave me the time to rest, as I spent about half an hour sitting at these boxes going through them. It also allowed me to empty out my pockets of a bunch of change that I had been accumulating since I walked in.  Win-win indeed...

You're probably wondering what the Chevy portion of the title of this post is about.  It's really about another opportunity to laugh at myself, which I've already done twice while telling the story to people.

Friday, I had no problem recalling where I parked my truck, because it was near a bright yellow Penske rental truck.  Easy peasy.

Yesterday was a totally different story.  Usually when I park in bigger lots, I take the time to find some kind of landmark so I can remember where my vehicle is when I leave.   I failed to do this yesterday.   So I spent the better part of 20 minutes walking up and down the aisles, looking for a grey Chevy Equinox with PA plates.  What's even better, I pretty much ate crow 3 or 4 times while looking, because the place was so packed, that people were asking me if I was leaving.  Each time I said "as soon as I find my truck, I will be!!".

I couldn't believe how many people in Canada drive grey Chevys.

Another successful Expo in the books....

thanks for reading, Robert