Mail Call - May 4 Edition

Just a quick hit today. I still have those two big trade posts to do. I've got them outlined, but I need to fire up Photoshop to cut up the card scans and actually compose the text. I wasn't planning to do a post on this new arrival. It is just one of the final cards I need to complete my 1974 set. But, when I looked at it I saw something interesting, See if you can catch it.


Did you see that? If so, good for you. If not, maybe the back will yield a hint.



See that line in small print that reads "Traded to San Diego Padres, 11-12-73.*" Glenn was traded from the Cubs to the Padres early enough that Topps was able to put him on the correct team for the base set rather than adding him to the later Traded mini-set.

Got it? Now let's look at the front again.


See it now? Topps did not airbrush him into his new uniform. He is still clearly kitted out as a Cubbie. Maybe you are laughing at me for my (not so) startling discovery, but I never noticed this before on the San Diego version of this card.

* A marginally interesting additional note: We can pinpoint down when Topps went to press with the base set in 1974. The 44 card Traded mini-set includes the date that the trade featured was made. Most of the trades featured in the Traded set were dated in the first week of December. The earliest trade featured, however, was Larry Gura being sent from the Cubs to the Rangers as the player to be named later from the earlier deal that sent Mike Paul from Texas to Chicago. The Larry Gura Traded card was dated November 13, the day after the Beckert deal. So, it would seem Topps went to press late on November 12 or early on November 13.

Mail Call - May 2 Edition

Wow. Yesterday was quite the day. When I opened up the mailbox at the end of the day, I found four packages of cards awaiting me. There were two single card EBay purchases and two large trade packs. I am not going to cover the trade packs in this post. The generosity of the two trading partners was significant and deserves to have their own posts. I intend to get to them before I leave town on Saturday for a getaway weekend, which is followed immediately by a week long business trip. But, for now, here I am going to cover the two single cards I received for my Paul Blair player collection.




That is a 1971 Carl Aldana card. I haven't been able to locate a lot of information about it. While Google turns up alot of information about Aldana, it is mostly about his "traditional" art work. Near as I can tell, Aldana did a set of cards like this for the Baltimore Orioles in 1971. Beyond that, I haven't found much out in my (admittedly) limited research.



So, what is this? Looks like a run-of-the-mill 1977 Topps card, doesn't it? It is. And it isn't. This is Paul Blair's actual 1977 Topps card:



The first card is actually Blair's 1977 Burger King Yankees card, printed by Topps and distributed at area BK restaurants. With the exception of the card number, the backs of the two cards are identical right down to the same cartoon. But, obviously, they show Paul on two different teams. Both photos were taken in Yankee Stadium, though it appears on different days (thus, no airbrushing.) The sky in the Yankees pictures is overcast, while the Orioles card shows a partly cloudy sky.

Blair was traded from Baltimore to New York on January 20, 1977 for Rick Bladt and Elliott Maddox. At the time, his offensive output was down significantly and he was in the waning days of his career. With the Yankees, the eight time Gold Glove winner was mainly an late inning defensive replacement with occasional starts when one of the regular outfielders was spelled. It was in the former role that Blair played a role in one of the more infamous episodes in baseball.

On June 18, 1977, Yankee manager Billy Martin thought that Reggie Jackson was loafing in right field and had, consequently, allowed Jim Rice to leg what should have been a single into a double. Billy sent Blair out as a mid-inning replacement. What ensued when Jackson returned to the dugout was a nationally televised confrontation between the slugger and the manager (who was a slugger of a different type.) You can read the contemporaneous account in this Phil Pepe article.

Oscar Gamble Hair Club For Men

Now that I am essentially having to locate one card to complete my 1974 set, I am going to get a start on 1977. A trip to the local card shop yesterday, and I already have close to 20% of the set in my hands. The owner has another full 800 count box yet to go through and I'll go back to paw through that one in a few weeks after my upcoming travel is over. One thing that struck me in the sample of cards I went through was how popular big-ole afros were in the late Seventies.

Most of you are probably familiar with the iconic 1976 Oscar Gamble traded card. If not, you can see it here. So, in honor of that iconic piece of cardboard, I am dubbing this possibly-recurring-but-probably-not feature the Oscar Gamble Hair Club for Men:

Mr. Popularity, Part 5

Trade requests for Andy have seemed to slow down considerably in the last week. I may discontinue this feature, especially since I will be in Dallas for the Yankees-Rangers game next Sunday and, immediately afterward, jetting off on a week long business trip to BFE, France. When I get back, if the request delivery feature is active, I may just have all the decent cards in my portfolio sent to me. But, in the mean time, here is the list of trade offers I got for Mr. Messersmith over the last week. A lot of junk wax here:

173. 1973 Gene Clines


174. 1974 Buddy Bradford


175. 1974 Bill Stoneman


176. 1976 Al Fitzmorris


177. 1979 Jose Cruz


178. 1983 Keith Hernandez


179. 1984 Paul Molitor


180. 1987 Larry herndon


181. 1987 Roger Clemens


182. 1987 Jim Rice


183. 1987 Dennis Eckersley


184. 1987 Robin Yount


185. 1989 Ozzie Smith


186. 1989 Roger Clemens


187. 1989 Tommy Lasorda


188. 1990 Dave Cochran


189. 1991 Tom O'Malley


190. 1997 Scott Karl


191. 1979 Gary Matthews and 1990 Lonnie Smith


192. 1987 Don Sutton and 1999 Darin Erstad


193. 2001 Brian Anderson, 2003 Todd Ziele, and 2006 Jason Giambi

Mail Call - April 29 Edition

So, I've been pretty busy trying to finish my 1974 set. Having plumbed the depths of COMC, I shifted my focus to Sportlots, Sportsbuy and EBay. Over the last week, I have purchased enough 74s to be within 2 of completing the set, including all error cards and variations. I have received about half of the recent orders so far, but have been too wrapped up in other things to bore you with daily run-downs of the various arrivals. However today, in addition to a small lot I purchased on Sportlots, came a trade pack from Baseball Dad over at All Tribe Baseball. I feel it is important to pay notice to the generosity of the collectors I come into contact with. I wouldn't have probably made a post on just the 74s I have received. But, whenever someone sees fit to take the time to gather and ship me cards without money changing hands, well, that is worth taking the time to acknowledge. I had sent Dad some of the Topps Series 1 inserts he needed and I got some cards I needed including 4 Heritage and the very last card I needed to complete the 2011 Series 1:



In addition, he sent along some interesting Pirates cards:



1993 Topps BlackGold Andy Van Slyke. I've never seen a card from this set before. And, while I am not normally a fan of shiny, this card has a delightful design and I am going to try and research the set a bit more when I have some time.



I am not sure what to say about thus 2004 Donruss Studio Stars Jason Kendall. It is an odd card, but in a good way. I am not sure if I should hand it to the cashier the next time I try to cash a check at Target or if I should take it on my next business trip to see if it opens the door to my hotel room. In all seriousness, though, I do like this card. I just can't seem to articulate why. I've been thinking about why for a good 15 minutes and just cannot put words to it.

So, big thanks to Baseball Dad. I definitely feel like I came out on the better side of this trade.

Oh, and for you vintage fans, here is one of the numerous 74s that I have received in the last week. The Felipe Alou no position error card. I've had the regular card for several months now, but have been ignoring the errors and variations until recently.



Oh, if you are wondering what the remaining two cards are that I need to complete 1974, they are 599A, the San Diego version of the rookie pitcher card and 608A, another rookie pitcher card with Bob Apodaca's name misspelled as Apodaco.

2004 Fleer Greats of the Game

So, if you tuned in a bit earlier, you would have seen the 2004 Greats of the Game box I received today. I opened about 6 packs up right after work, but held off on the remaining 9 until after I finished chores and settled in front of the computer to watch the Yankees - White Sox game. This is a fairly large set, when you add in all the parallels, relics, autographs, super short prints, If Beckett is to be believed there is over 800 cards associated with the set. I don't intend to collect them all (particularly given that there are some 1/1 cards that sold in the four figure range. But, I think I am going to put together the base set and some of the inserts. Let' see what I got, shall we?




I really like the design of the cards. By desaturating the background, the focus is on the player and the shadow adds a little 3D effect to it. The base set consists of 145 cards, 66 of which I got in this box (with no duplicates!). Oddly, every base card I got was numbered 80 or lower. I am trying to find out if this set was issued in series. I'd sure hate to buy another box (and I am going to) and get a whole bunch of duplicates rather than the higher number cards I need. I don't actually have this Paul Blair card in my player collection, although I do have the blue parallel and gold autograph card in my PC binder.

There are blue parallels for each of the 145 card base set, numbered to 500. I received two blue parallels in the box: Bo Jackson (46/500) and this Mel Ott (314/500).



There is a 35 card parallel called Glory of Their Time, which honors players who had stellar years, numbered to the actual year. I got three of these: Harmon Killebrew (768/1961), Carl Yazstremski (751/1967), and this Al Kaline (81/1955).



Apparently there is also Glory of Their Time gold and game used parallels, but I didn't get any of those.

There is 10 card Battery Mate set, that also comes with autograph and dual autograph parallels. I got one of the base Battery Mate cards: Tom Seaver/Johnny Bench (1466/1979):


There apparently several other inserts and game used subsets, but I didn't get any of those. But, the box did promise one autograph card for every 5 packs. With a 15 pack box, I figured that I could hope for 3 autographs, though there is no guarantee it works out that way. Indeed, it seemed at the outset that I was going to be disappointed. After opening 9 packs, I did not have a single autograph card. Luckily, in the last 6, I hit my quota of three. These are sticker autos, but I like them nonetheless. Take a look:





All in all, I enjoyed opening this box and will probably order another box in May.

Mail Call - April 27th Edition