Repack Haiku #439 (Ryne Sandberg)

Joined Teddy and Frank

As guys hired to manage

After call to Hall

 

1990 Topps #398 Ryne Sandberg (AS)

 

When Sandberg was hired to manage the Phillies in 2013, he became just the 3rd person to manage a team full time after being elected into the Hall of Fame, joining Ted Williams and Frank Robinson.

Red Sox Frankenset: Choosing Cards #28-30

It's time to take a look at a few more cards and see which ones deserve inclusion in my Red Sox Frankenset. Just a refresher, I'm going through my Red Sox doubles and picking the best at each number for the Frankenset. 

 

We're starting page #4 today, and it features what is, so far, my favorite and least favorite choices for the set. Here we go!

#28

 

Favorite Card: 1997 Upper Deck #28 Jeff Suppan

My Choice: same

 

This is a great group of cards. We have a "minor league" card of Ted Williams, a League Leader card for an out-of-nowhere Cy Young season, and a great team card featuring 2 fan favorites. The easy winner though is Jeff Suppan taking a humorous bite out of a baseball. It's an all-time great Red Sox card!

#29

 

Favorite Card: 2022 Bowman #29 Bobby Dalbec

My Choice: same

 

Nothing against Bobby D, but this is a pretty boring card and wins by default. I even checked what other #29 cards I had, and there were some great ones (1965 Topps #29 Felix Mantilla and 2011 Topps Opening Day #29 Jonathan Papelbon would have been strong contenders if I had doubles of them!) Oh well, I suspect as I continue on there will be more slots where I have but one uninspired choice.

 

#30

 

Favorite Card: 1992 Upper Deck - Baseball Heroes: Ted Williams #30 Ted Williams

My Choice: same

 

Two nice swinging shots, but Teddy Ballgame beats Burks all day every day.  This make up for not picking Williams in spot #28.

 

So with these three selections, our first row of page 4 is complete:

 

  

Two great cards bookend a mediocre one in the middle. Not much of a selection this go around, but would you have made any different choices?

Repack Haiku #438 (Al Pedrique)

Pride or cowardice? 

Had staff walk Bonds all series 

To pause milestone hit

  

1988 Donruss #361 Al Pedrique (RC)

 

Pedrique was serving as the interim manager of the Diamondbacks when the Giants came to Arizona for a 3 game set. Barry Bonds was sitting on 698 career home runs, and Pedrique felt that having #700 hit on their home turf would be a slap in the face. He instructed his pitching staff to walk Bonds whenever possible, and during the 3 game set Bonds was walked 6 times (including 3 times intentionally). Bonds did hit a home run that series - in the 9th inning of the last game.

Time Crunch At The Card Show!

Apparently, the card collectibles hobby is thriving down here in the Shenandoah Valley. After attending my first card show since high school back in July, I had a chance to attend a second one last month. Unfortunately, I didn't have much time to spend there, only about an hour and a half or so. With over 80 tables, it was a race against the clock to find some cool card at good deals! How did I do? Well, I ended up making purchase at 5 tables.

 

Table #1

 

My primary goal was to hopefully find some cards to help me complete the 1977 Topps and 1971 Fleer World Series sets. Unfortunately I struck out on that end, but this one dealer had a lot of vintage cards, including a small box of 1956 Topps he had labeled 3 for $5. I went through and found three Red Sox I needed at least!

 

Table #2

 

This next table caught my eye not because of the cards, but because he had a bin of publications, with the one on top featuring the favorite team of  another blogger who I thought appreciate it. As for cards, he didn't have much but I did find a couple I could use.

 

 

He also had a few "team bags" including the Red Sox one. 

 

I already had the top card, but when I flipped it over I saw a card worthy of taking a shot:

 

The pack itself wasn't great, mostly 2024 base cards, but there were a few good cards I needed so no huge loss. I found it funny that after picking up the Ice Foilboard parallel of that J.D. Martinez card, the base was among the cards in the team pack.

 

  

Table #3

 

This table had what I am always looking for - cards 10/$1! Fortunately they were grouped by team too, making it easy to rummage through. Again, I found some cards for another blogger, but the rest were purely for me! Had I more time, I'm sure I would have spent half the day at this table.

 

 

 

Table #4 

 

My time was running short, so after a quick perimeter check I settled on this table. Ultimately, I'm very glad I did, but the dealer did leave a sour taste in my mouth. His setup was obviously geared to the high end guys, with most of his table space dedicated to graded cards. In a small section to my left, he had some boxes of ungraded cards, with a nice sign stating quite clearly that the penny-sleeved cards were 3/$1, while the ones in top loaders were $2. I concentrated on the penny-sleeved cards obviously, and found some cards from this year that otherwise bypassed my local retail store when they first came out.

 

I wasn't going to thumb through the $2 cards, as it looked like they were all parallels of modern sets that don't really move the needle for me, but there did seem to a small section of older cards hidden in the box. I flipped through those, and found a very beat up but otherwise glorious vintage Red ox card i just had to have. That's where the sour taste comes in. As I handed him the cards I wanted to purchase, he looked at this vintage card and asked for $5! After seeing the look on my face, he held the card up again, inspected it closer, acknowledged the creasing on it and said "How about $4?". That's when I called him out on his sign. Top loaded cards $2. This wasn't a case of a card getting misplaced in the wrong section of the table. Penny-sleeves, top loaders, graded cards - that's all he had. I didn't want to walk away from the card, so I met him a little and offered $3, which he took begrudgingly, mumbling about how he didn't have time to check his cards before the show. Dude's looking for people to buy his $100 graded cards and he's trying to squeeze $3 from me. it doesn't matter anymore, because I now this beauty:

 

 

This is my second card from this set, one of the few affordable playing-era ted Williams cards out there!

 

Table #5 

 

OK, I'm down to about 5 minutes left, and I still haven't done the one thing I have always done at card shows since I was in grade school - find some packs to rip! Fortunately, I found a guy with some cheap $1 junk wax era packs for sale.

 

 

That'll scratch the itch for awhile! I'll have to do something fun with these like another pack war or something.

 

I only spent about $25 there, which is fine by me. It would have been nice to be there longer and really hunt for deals, but I had to pick up something special for the family:

 

 

Meet Cannoli, the latest addition to the family!

17 Years And Counting!

My apologies in advance, as I'm just copying and pasting this from my original post, only updating the number.

Just a heads up, this isn't a sports or sports card related post, but it's one I hope you'll stick around and read nonetheless.

Today is an anniversary of sorts for me. 17 years ago today, I was in a hospital having a cancerous growth removed from my right testicle. I officially became a cancer survivor on this date.

I was lucky. I caught it early enough to where I didn't need chemotherapy. Because of this, I encourage others to perform regular self examinations. Since most of my readership is male, that includes you. I'm providing information to help you learn what to check for. Do yourself a favor and read it. Check yourself. It doesn't take long to do, and it could save your life.

Maybe you've skimmed this post, and maybe you've truly read it. Maybe a few of you will consider this but forget, and maybe some of you will actually take the time to check. If I can get just one person to start regularly checking themselves, then I've done my job.

Go for it. Play with yourself. Just wash your hands before you go back to sorting cards! ;)

 

Repack Haiku #437 (Tom Henke)

His last year was best

Wanted to go out on top

Be with family

 

1991 Ultra #362 Tom Henke

 

After fulfilling his dream of pitching for his home state Cardinals, Henke retired after a dominating 1995 season. He converted 22 straight saves on his way to 36 total, winning the Rolaids Relief Award and earning his second All-Star nod. When he retired, he was 5th all-time in saves.

When It Comes To Giveaways, Johnny Is The Hostess With The Mostest!

In our little niche of the blogging community, there are a lot of generous individuals who frequently give away cards. Few would argue that Johnny (Johnny's Trading Spot) has probably given away more cards than anyone else.

 

Johnny's latest mass exodus of cards was a giveaway he held on his blog last month. 30 pages of 9 cards each, 30 PWE as these cards were randomly assigned and given out. I drew lucky #19

 

 For me, this was one of the better pages of the ones he listed. Sure, I didn't get any Red Sox, but the page is full of baseball cards and most of it is vintage! Not just vintage, but 70's Hostess abound! 

 
Favorite Card: How often does someone just give you a card from 1959, seriously? 

 

Thank you so very much for the cards Johnny!