Trade with Potch Wheeler

I've traded a couple of times with Potch Wheeler last year and was able to conclude another trade with him this year. It was intended to be a swap of Heritage needs but, for his part, he included more than that.

Poor Freddy. The Yankees resigned him in the off season after his excellent performance last year. He seemed to have a good spring training too. Then something happened. He stunk. Badly. In all four of his starts.   And in the last two he didn't even make it out of the second inning. With the second coming of Andy Pettite, he got moved to garbage time duty out of the bullpen. He has performed well in his limited appearances out of the bullpen. I wouldn't be surprised to see him make some spot starts down the road. None of the Yankee starting pitchers are on fire right now. Even CC Sabathia has looked decidedly mortal in recent starts.

Funnily enough, the day this package arrived from Potch, my wife and I went to see the Oklahoma City Redhawks take on the Tucson Padres. In that game, which OKC won 6-5, Jimmy Paredes was the starting second baseman for the Redhawks and went 2 for 4 with 2 RBIs.

That wasn't all the Heritage he sent. There were other base cards and a couple of the floating head stickers.  But, I need to move on to the surprise part of the trade.

This is where the trade got lopsided. He was able to send me the last two 1976 Topps Traded cards I needed to finish that subset. Both Yankees, too!

And the Yankees team card, which I have never found, in all my searches, in anything other than well-loved condition. So, getting this nice specimen was a pleasant surprise.

And a nice HOFer, too. I definitely came out ahead on this trade and will need to keep my eye out for cards to reward Potch for his extreme generosity.