Guess where I've been...

That's right. I just came from what has become an almost weekly visit with my LCS owner friend.

I picked up some cards and these 3 binders.  All three are small complete sets. I didn't necessarily need them, buy they were so cheap I couldn't pass them up.

Scans might have to wait until next week, but I'll show them off soon.

After all, that's what the blog is for, right?

I can see clearly now...

I had a little scare last night at the end of dinner.  I had just finished eating and we were sitting around the table talking when I started to feel dizzy.  Really dizzy.  I got up and wobbled to the island in our kitchen. My lips started tingling and I was sweating like crazy.  Honestly, I thought I was having a stroke.

Turns out it was a blood sugar thing.  Not good, but by the time most of you read this I will have spoken to my doctor.

Fortunately, the dizziness only lasted about 3 minutes.  I'm feeling better at the moment and my vision is clear.

That brings us to the baseball card part of this post.  I'm on record a couple hundred times as not being a fan of Panini and their logo-less cards.  I'm a logo snob.  I can admit it.

That's not to say Panini hasn't put out a few cards that I like.  Take the Pinnacle Clear Vision cards.  I like them.  A lot. As in I picked up a couple of "lots" of them off Ebay.

The hitters Clear Vision cards come in Single, Double, Triple, Homerun and Cycle versions.  The Cycle versions are 1/1's, but I couldn't find any print run info one the others.  They are tougher to pull as you go up the line.  

The pitcher Clear Vision cards come in Win, Complete Game, Shutout, No-Hitter and Perfect Game versions.  The Perfect Game cards are 1/1's.  

If you see anything in these lots that you'd like, let me know.  I'm primarily after the Rangers and any players I collect.

Some of the Rangers I have came from the lots I purchased.

I guess I need to do a want list for these.

This Kemp came in one of the lots and already has someone's name on it.  Yea, Matt Kemp's.  Badum bump. I'm here all week.  

Apparently, I can find the Singles.

I can find the Triples.  Just no doubles.

The Pudge actually looks fine without a logo because you probably wouldn't see it in this photo anyway.

I did manage to get one of Joe Mauer.  

The Yu Darvish card makes him look like he's pitching on a prison squad.

Hey, a Complete Game in the yard.  Some of the inmates won't be happy.  

You know Nolan would go inside on an inmate.  He isn't scared of anything.

Maybe I need him to high and tight on my dizziness.

That would scare it away.

A Day Late and $700 Short

Yesterday was President's Day.  Some of you know I have a little Presidential Collection.  It's not too big or too fancy.  It's mine all the same.

2004 Topps Chrome Presidential Refractors are high on my want list.  I only have a few.

My Presidential collection isn't based on politics.   It's purely based on the office of President.

Anyone who has been president and makes it on a card is eligible for my collection.  

I'll even take a somewhat questionable relic.  Anyone who has anything presidential that doesn't fit into their collection, let me know.  I'll probably be interested.  

One of my favorite non-card presidential items is this book.  It's the Life and Public Service of Abraham Lincoln and was published in 1865.

The cover and spine aren't in great shape, but the pages are in excellent shape including an original picture of Lincoln.  I don't know how rare the book is, but it's something I'm glad to have.  My in-laws bought it along with a big box of other old books at a garage sale for $5.

My best presidential piece isn't really presidential at all.  I got George W. Bush's autograph (top left corner) of this opening day program from the Ballpark In Arlington's first game.  He wasn't even the governor of Texas yet, but I still count it because he was elected to two terms later.

Ok, so that's the day late part.

The $700 short part is that I had to make unexpected repairs to both of my cars this month.  Total cost? You guessed it...$700.  That just means I have a number of things to mail out, but I won't be making a trip to the post office until the end of the month.  If you're expecting something from me (and even if you're not), I'll be mailing it in a couple of weeks.

Bye Bye Jeter...my favorite Jeter card and in person story

I'm not sad to Derek Jeter retire.  I am sad that I have to hear about it for the next 9 months.  It'll be the most talked about, written about, tweeted about, cried about story in baseball until the Yankees (God willing) don't make it to the World Series.

I do feel bad for the Yankee card bloggers that are a part of this community who will be losing a hero.  They are the only Yankee fans I'll feel bad for because in my experience, they are all good people.  The rest of the Yankees fans can suck it.

See, I can be mature.

I do have a favorite Derek Jeter card.  I received it way back in 2009 as part of a prize package from Bud over at the now deserted First Day Issue.

Bud sent this to me because it was a very rare 1/1 card.

See, just like a lot of Ginter parallels, it's hand numbered.  

I also have a funny story that shows Derek was a classy individual.  I was sitting near the Yankees dugout when they were visiting the Rangers.  As sometimes happens at sporting events, a gentleman jerk right near the railing had a few too many frothy beverages and began to exercise his right as a ticket buying fan to yell at the players.  He was yelling at all the Yankees.  Arod was a blankety blank blank, Jeter was a this and that.  You know, real vile stuff.  I had my oldest son with me and I didn't really need him hearing all this garbage and I know some other fans felt the same way.  Someone complained to an usher and a security guard asked the guy to tone the language down.  It worked for about 2 batters.  

The next inning, Jeter is in the on-deck circle and this guy is going at it again.  Someone ahead of Jeter fouled off a pitch and it rolled near the on-deck circle.  Derek, being a good guy, walked the ball over and handed it to a kid about 5 or 6 years old.  He didn't even give the windbag a second glance even though he never stopped talking.  It couldn't have been more than 30 seconds later and this mountain of a man gets out of his seat and tells the idiot to shut his mouth RIGHT NOW!  The guy turns around to go back to his seat and I realize it must be the dad of the kid who got the ball.  Foul mouthed guy must have sobered up at the sight of the big guy and he did shut up.  

It was the funniest thing.  

I'm glad I'm not a Padres collector

I decided that I would join a case break of 2014 Topps to get my Rangers fix instead of buying blaster after blaster and getting a bunch of cards that I didn't really want.  Lucky for me, I got a random team as well and that turned out to be the Padres.

Poor, poor Padres.

I only know two Padres collectors, Marcus at All the Way to the Backstop and Rod over at Padrographs. They may want some of the 6 Padres team sets I got in the break.

Or they may want a couple of these.

A used Yonder Alonso power player card.

A Robbie Erlin gold parallel.

This Gwynn mini and...

this Gwynn Rookie Class ring card are going to Jon over at Community Gum for his Gwynn collection.

In an entire case of jumbo packs, that's all the Padres inserts/hits I got.  Sure the Gwynn ring is something, but not a single red hot bleeding wall card in the bunch.  Pretty thin Topps.  Pretty thin.

Lucky for me, I was after Rangers, which I got.

There are 13 Rangers in Series 1.

I got enough for 6 complete team sets, plus a stack of extras. Or would that be extra extras?

I got two gold parallels, Mitch Moreland and Yu Darvish.

I picked up two Rangers minis. Unlike the Ryan mini I pulled in one of my two packs, this one isn't damaged. Yay me.

I also got the Yu Darvish die cut mini.  Undamaged I might add.

I picked up one Upper Class Yu Darvish insert.  Yawn.

I got a total of 7 The Future is Now Jurickson Profars, which means I got duplicates of the three different versions.  I also got the Yu Darvish version, including some extras.

I managed to get 4 of the bleeding wall, red hot Ranger parallels.

I hit one black parallel, a Mitch Moreland #14/63.  That's a little better.

I also scored two of these highly sought after buybacks.  At least the two Rangers I got are in better shape than some of the ones I've seen on Ebay and the blogosphere.  Some of them look like they were taken right from the bike spokes to the stamp machine.

I think this Hargrove is in better shape than the one I have in my collection.  

I scored one hit in the break.  This Elvis Andrus game sat on table leg relic.

Overall, I could have done better spending the same amount of money on Ebay on singles, but I came out way better than buying a couple of blasters at the big box store.

Good times...

Appreciating cardboard leads to a blogger mystery

Yesterday, the Blogfather, better known as Night Owl, wrote a cardboard appreciation post about a card that I truly appreciate.

As I looked at the card and read Night Owl's post, I noticed he linked to other blogs that had written about the Corrales play at the plate.  Knowing that I had written a post, I wondered if he had linked to my post and he had (which I appreciate very much).

Clicking on the link to my blog, I noticed the first comment on my post was from Chris Stufflestreet.  For those of you that knew Chris and read his blogs or traded with him, you know of his love for vintage and his generous nature.  For those of you that didn't know Chris, you missed out.  He wrote two blogs, The Vintage Sportscards Blog and 1973 Topps Photography.  Chris died of a heart attack back in September of 2012.

As I clicked on his two blogs to take a stroll back in time, I was shocked to see a post on his 1973 Topps blog that was dated January 1, 2014.  I read the post and the one comment which expressed surprise at the post and I realized the Chris must have been looking ahead to 2014 as the year he would finish his exploration of the 1973 Topps set and scheduled this post over a year in advance.  Chris wrote that he wanted to start off the New Year with card # 1 since he would be finishing the set in 2014.  Eerily, Chris wrote " 2014 will be the final year of this blog (assuming nothing bad happens to me which forces me to take an extended break)." 

I miss Chris and his writing.  I miss his take on the 1973 set, which is one of the quirkiest sets where photography is concerned.  He was only 39 when he died and that's 4 years younger than I am right now.  It makes you think.  

It also makes you wonder about other bloggers when they disappear without a trace.  Is it because they passed away or did they just give up the collecting/blogging thing cold turkey?  It may seem a little creepy, but I have three letters written, stamped and ready to be mailed by my wife if something happens to me. They are addressed to three of my blogging friends and it's just to let them know that I didn't walk away.  If...more like when my time comes, I want to be able to say a proper goodbye to the blogging community that has supported me and been so generous with me.  

Here's hoping those letters don't get mailed anytime soon.  

A tale of two hours

I spent an hour last night writing a post and when I was finished, I do what I always do.

I read it.  Then I read it again.  I knew it after I read it the first time, but it took the second reading to convince me that it was crap.  So I trashed it.

I know what you're thinking.  "Hey PATP, a lot of your writing is crap, but you publish it anyway."  Yea well, that's true, but I usually don't worry about it too much.  I was just very disappointed with how it turned out.

I don't know how professional writers do it.  Deadlines, demanding editors, critics.  Yuck.  Don't get me wrong, I'd love to get paid to write about something I'm passionate about, but I don't think I'd be able to fool anyone long enough to cash a check.

Instead of reading the results of an hour of my research, you get to view the results of yet another hour spent with my friendly former LCS owner.  Actually, most of the hour I spent with him was helping him move some cards around and picking out about 25 Rangers cards.  As I was gathering my stuff to go home, he offered me short stack of 5 vintage cards.  I offered to buy them, but he said he was giving them to me because I'd brought his grandson a stack of quarterback cards.  I said thanks and didn't look at them until I got to the car.

This is what I saw.

A 1955 Bowman Chet Nichols.  I've picked up so many of these from him, I may just start working on the set.  I know he has some big names.  I've seen the Bob Feller, but I didn't ask him how much it would cost.

Chico Carrasquel.  That's a beautiful card if you ask me.  You did ask, right?

Jack Collum has a crease down the middle, but you won't hear me complaining.

Good ol' Whitey Lockman.  Have you ever seen a guy pose so seriously?

Here is a 1961 Fleer Home Run Baker, Ty Cobb, Zack Wheat checklist.  Yea, it's a little rough, but I don't care.  I got these for a handful of Peyton Manning and Aaron Rodgers cards.

I'll take that deal anyday.