36 for 36. At least it started that way

I recently completed another trade (I've been a roll with them lately) with Mark at This Way to the Clubhouse who recently threw his hat into the blogosphere.  Mark sent me a quick email letting me know that he had 36 cards for my '86 Topps set that I seem to be acquiring exclusively through the trade market.

I responded that I had 36 cards for him for his 2012 Topps Series 2 set, and a trade was born.

Well, I thought 36 for 36 was a pretty good deal for me.  Mark decided to add in some '77s, some Blue Jays and some Maple Leafs (!) to the package, and blogger generosity strikes again.

First, I wanted to show a couple of Maple Leafs whose time in Toronto was too short.

Until I saw the Beaupre card, I had forgotten that he played in Toronto.  Sadly, his time in Toronto was not too splendid; it was actually the last hockey he would play in the NHL, 11 games over parts of 2 seasons, and the numbers weren't too good.  Peter Zezel played for 3 seasons in Toronto in the early 90's, and sadly passed away in 2009 at the age of 44. 

I only want to show you one of the Blue Jays cards, because it reminded me of an event that happened while this guy pitched for the Jays.

I would love to know what was said on the mound the night that Cito Gaston came to take out David Wells in Boston, and instead of Wells handing him the ball, Wells threw the ball away.  David marched to his own drummer for sure, which may explain why he played for 9 teams in his 21 year career. 

The '77s I received were a welcome surprise for sure...10 more closer to that set being completed...

It's always tough seeing those Expos cards, Montreal likely will never see pro ball again.

Now, onto the 86's.  I didn't want to show you all 36, but there were a few I thought should be mentioned.

First, Jesse Orosco.

I'm sure you all remember Jesse throwing his glove in the air when the Mets won the WS in 1986.  Can you imagine that glove hitting someone in the head?  Yikes!!  Even better though, I find a post on a Mets blog relating the story of who actually picked up Jesse's glove after that game.

Next, this guy might have had a household name, but he certainly wasn't a household name (if you know what I mean)

Selected in the 2nd round of the 76 draft, 49 spots in front of some guy named Rickey

Next up is Harold Reynolds giving us the "you can only take my picture when I'm ready pose"

7 figures for hugging a co-worker...hmm

This last card I really liked, Topps got this one right for sure. 

Did you know Russell's nickname was "Ropes"??

Usually on "leaders" cards you will see players represented that lead their team in one or more categories.  This card features Bill Russell, long time Dodger shortstop.  What I liked is the quote on the back

" Depicted on Front:  Bill Russell, Dean of the Dodgers, continuous service since June 15, 1970"

I love that.  Topps could have pictured Guerrero, Marshall, Valenzuela or Hershiser, but instead kind of made the card a tribute to a lifelong Dodger.  Awesome stuff.

Mark, thank you for the trade, the cards are much appreciated!

Thanks for reading, Robert

What the 'L'

You may or may not have seen recently that Eric over at Manupatches & Hochevars (yes, that is my summer title for his blog...) had acquired a Luke Hochevar collection.  In order to recoup some of the money he invested in the collection, Eric listed a bunch of cards on eBay for the masses.

I was fortunate enough to win one of those auctions, for the letter 'L'.

Yes, a Kelly Shoppach By the Letter auto/letter card.  It has long been a project of mine to actually get enough of these letters to spell out my name.  Yes, it's been a long time, but I now have in my collection two letters towards my name.  Last winter at the Expo in Toronto I plucked an 'E' for cheap...

the $4 each that I paid for both of these cards is the right price for me.  I took a look at some of the auctions that are up for these letters (especially the hockey letters), and the prices are crazy.  I think every hockey letter that was listed was going for $100+, which to me is absurd. 

Maybe I'll just pick up another L, and then an H, and then put the four together and tell eBay sellers where they can go for the prices they are charging...

LOL...a little bitter, don't you think? 

Nah....

Eric, thank you for the auction, and for the Hochevars that came with...blogger generosity strikes again.

thanks for reading, Robert

Five "Bold" Predictions for the 2nd half

Late last night while perusing the major league standings and poring over the many envelopes that arrived in the mail (5 of them yesterday...I still wish I had taken a picture of the mailbox), I thought I'd make a few "bold" predictions and see just how little I know about baseball.

Come October I'll revisit this post and see just how badly I fared.

1.  Albert Pujols will be hitting .300 at the end of the season.  (Currently Albert is 88/328 .268)  How crazy is this?  Well let's see, there's 77 games left in the season, and assuming 4 ABs a game that's 308 more ABs this season.  That would project out to 636 ABs total.  That means Albert would need 191 hits to reach the .300 average.  Albert has 88 hits so far, so the rest of the way he would have to hit .334 (103/308). 

Yeah, I think he will get there.

2.  80 wins will be good for LAST in the AL East.  This is the team that will be sitting there come season's end:

With their starting staff an injury depleted mess, I'm hoping for 80 wins.  (They're at 43 now).

3.  The Pirates will finally break their 20 year streak of being an under .500 team by finishing with:

84 wins.

They also will not make the playoffs.   This 6 week run of amazing offense is going to come to an end, especially when they hit teams like the Reds (9 more games), the Cards (6 more games) and the Brewers (12 times, including a series that starts tonight).  The Pirates still have holes to fill at 1st, short and two outfield spots (1 if Presley is able to return quickly from concussion symptoms).

The only saving grace is that they still have 20 games against Houston (7) and Chicago (13). 

4,   MLB will only have one 20-game winner this year.

Gio Gonzalez. 

5.   Playoff teams and WS winner:

American League

Division Winners:  New York, Chicago and Texas (easy enough)
Wild Card:  Los Angeles and Detroit
WS Representative:  Texas

National League

Division Winners:  Atlanta, St. Louis and Los Angeles (NL West is also my pick for best race to finish the season, 3 games LA vs. the Giants to finish will be a classic series)
Wild Card:  Washington and Cincinnati
WS Representative:  Atlanta (just a gut feeling on this one)

World Series Winner:

Texas....3rd time is the charm.
WS MVP:  Adrian Beltre


Thoughts?

Thanks for reading, Robert

Some more fun with 2003 Topps: Nicknames

I've always loved nicknames.  Anyone who's ever had a nickname imparted on them by a friend or colleague is usually one that has earned respect.  Sometimes, even nicknames are given based on their name alone, just because it happens to belong to someone famous.

Meet "the Gambler"

Fried chicken anyone?

Some guys get their nickname because of how well they field their position.  Big but nimble of foot?  Sure...

Meet "the Big Cat"

1 HR shy of 400 for his career, not bad for never being drafted

How about this nickname for a guy whose love for playing hard earned a lot of respect from his teammates.

Meet "the Dirt Dog"

"Trot", it's as if his parents knew he was going to play baseball

How about what may be my favorite nickname of all time.  Known for his hitting prowess since the day he stepped into a major league uniform.

Meet "the Machine"

I can still remember when they had to "find" a spot for him so they could get his bat in the lineup

Now this next guy doesn't have a nickname, but I'd love to find one for him, maybe the blogosphere has one that I don't know about?

Did you know his middle name was Phifer...now that's unique for sure!

Since I don't know Cliff really well, I guess the list of nicknames I have just does not do him any justice:

1. Hired Gun.  Since he was traded 3 times in a 12 month span, hired gun kind of came into my head, but I was not sure how well MLB would like a gun reference in one of their star player's nicknames.
2. Zero.  Until Independence Day when he finally won a game, this would have been perfect.
3. The $21.5 million man.  With the 70's show "The Six Million Dollar Man" still fresh in my mind, if Cliff had any robotic parts in his body this would have been perfect.  Alas, you can't have everything.

I'm sure you all have some nicknames that you really liked, past or present.  How about posting your favorite baseball nickname in the comments for me, if you are so inclined.

Or even better, come up with a great nickname for Cliff Lee....

Thanks for reading, Robert

The late 70's were lean years in Blue Jay land

Did you ever get a trade package from a fellow blogger and the cards just trigger a flood of memories from your youth?  I had that happen to me today.  I received a package of vintage OPC Blue Jays cards from Trevor, who just started his own blog not too long ago called Supporting The Minnow. 

It was only 10 cards, but the great memories came flooding back.  The one memory that always sticks out from the lean years of the late 70's was from this guy:

9 RBI's on 9/10/77 vs the Yankees.  5 hits, 2 HR's, 19-3 win over the eventual WS champs.   How bad was it that night for the Yankees?  The Jays had three players that either went 0 for 5 or 0 for 6, and still scored 19.

An even better night for the team came in the '78 season.  6/26/78, the Jays scored 24 runs this night, and yet this fellow failed to get a hit (yes, I'm being unfair since he had only 1 AB)

I'm so glad the Jays brought back this style of numbering

The Jays scored 19 of those runs off of 3 pretty good pitchers...Mike Flanagan, Joe Kerrigan and Tippy Martinez.  The Jays had scored all 24 of their runs by the end of the 5th inning, and things were so bad that the Orioles had Elrod Hendricks pitch 2.1 innings (Elrod didn't give up a run).  Elrod was a catcher for the majority of his career by the way, and that night was the only time he stepped on the mound in his major league career.

How about cards that don't bring back a specific game, but memories of a "stadium" long gone...

Exhibition Stadium.  The mistake by the lake.  Cold as the North Pole in April and October, humid and windy during the summer months, AstroTurf hard as concrete.   Ahhhh, the good old days.  I still remember going to the Dominion grocery store and getting general admission seats for $2 and riding the TTC (public transportation) to the gates of the Ex to watch them play.

There were a few players on this team that went on to have decent careers.   4th from the left, top row is Jim Clancy, who formed a pretty respectable 1-2 punch with Dave Stieb in the early 80's.  Clancy is still, and likely will forever be the only Blue Jays pitcher in team history to start 40 games in a single season.

Rick Cerone (pretty sure that's him, bottom row, 3rd from the right) is another player that suffered through the lean years from 77-79.  Rick you could probably say was the catalyst for the improvement the Jays started to see in the early 80's.  Rick was traded to the Yankees with a couple of other players for Damaso Garcia, Paul Mirabella and Chris Chambliss.  Chambliss was in turn traded to Atlanta for Barry Bonnell and Joey McLaughlin.  Yes, a lot of the players weren't great names, but these were some very respectable players for the Jays in the "formative" years of 80-85 (yes, even Damaso Garcia who will always be remembered for burning his uniform in the clubhouse after a game). 

The Jays won a grand total of 166 games over the first three years of their existence...but for me those memories are some of the best. 

Thanks for bringing those memories back Trevor, I'll have some cards in the mail for you in a day or two.

Thanks for reading, Robert