NOW or Later

Keeping up with the NOW releases is not very hard during the season.  I follow every move of the Pirates so when a unique moment happens I know to check the next day to see if a card is created.  The ones I struggle with are the releases during the offseason.  

I was caught off guard when Topps created cards for all the award finalists.  I knew Josh Bell had been nominated as a "finalist" for the NL Rookie of the Year, but didn't pay much attention because Cody Bellinger was going to be win in a landslide.  It never entered my mind that a card would be produced for the honor to lose to Bellinger.  

Thankfully I was tipped off by one of my buddies that a card was produced.  So thanks to him and Topps for having a longer purchase window.  This allowed me to snag it from my normal spot on eBay for the discounted price.  

Nothing really special about the card other than the fantastic throwback uniform.  This officially puts to bed my NOW buying for the year unless the Pirates trade a big name today or tomorrow. 

I haven't added things up, but I'm guessing the Pirates once again fell middle in the road in terms of overall releases.  I'm perfectly fine with this as it allows me to buy all the cards.  I don't see how Yankee collectors can keep pace. 

Thanks for reading.

Oscar Sends Some Holiday Cheer

I'm still experimenting with some phone scanner apps to get me by until I buy a new desktop computer. So I apologize for bad cropping.  

Right before Christmas I had a nice surprise PWE from my pal Oscar.  I think he hit everyone up in a huge wave of three mass shipments.  That is a great way to spread some holiday cheer.  Nothing beats a cardboard Christmas! 

Both Harrison and Cole have a ton of trade rumors surrounding them.  As an outsider looking in it is easy to understand why.  Harrison signed a multi year deal a couple of years back.  He had a terrible year right after signing it and it looked like the deal was going to be under water.  Thankfully Harrison balanced back last year and had a nice 3 WAR season.  I'm sure the Pirates don't want to risk the possibility of him falling back again and looking to get the deal off the books. 

As a fan the Cole trade rumors are a little harder to swallow.  In order for the Pirates to be good next year they will need Cole on the hill and Cutch in the outfield.  Cole has had some extreme variance the last three years in performance.  In 2015 he was a bona fide ace, 2016 he was hurt most of the year and 2017 he was plagued by the long ball.  With only two years of control the Pirates have to weigh keeping him on the roster or cashing in for minor league assets.  My gut says he will be gone before Spring Training.

Such a great card.  While he was a good player for the Pirates he is probably more remembered being part of the deal that netted Van Slyke for the Buccos.

Smith and Smiley were both key arms in the early 90's playoff teams.

Man, do the Buccos ever need Glasnow to tap into his potential.  He was a train wreck at the MLB level last year. 

Thanks for the nice holiday surprise Oscar.  Happy Holidays my friend.

Thanks for reading.

The Best Kind of Christmas Cards

I'm in my mid 30's so just about every Christmas card I receive has pictures of all our friends families dressed up.  My wife was a good sport this year and only put our daughter on the card.  I despise coordinated pictures. She is always the star anyway, my wife and I are just space fillers.  

Maybe next year I'll make a Bob Walk the Plank oriented Christmas card. I bet my uncle would love a 1990 Bob Walk Donruss card.  Maybe if my wife decides we need to be in the picture again, I'll photoshop Bob Walk in.  Hooray great ideas!!!! 

Speaking of holiday cards my pal Angus sent a nice baseball themed one my way a couple of weeks back. It had some nice cardboard surprises inside that needed a formal thank you. 

Off Season's Greetings!

Is Kellogg's cards the king of the oddballs?  It would probably get my vote.

It was cool of Angus to throw this card my way.  I'm pretty sure it was pack pulled! Love sets that feature the college uniform.

So much awesomeness in one scan.  Teke by default wins just about every cardboard comparison, but this would be a close race.  You have the rugged good looks of the Candy Man and the always top notch Mad Dog and Cobra.

Thanks again for all the cards Angus.  I hope you are enjoying the warmth of Arizona. 

Thanks for reading!

Secret Santa

Apologize for spamming the blogroll with these posts, but I'm trying to stay on top of missing Secret Santa packages.....

I got a few emails from Secret Santa participants over Christmas saying that they have yet to receive a package.  Now that we are a few days past the holiday I'm hoping that any missing packages have arrived.  Please shoot me an email and I'll try and see what is going on (mattscott82@gmail.com). 

My plan is to close out things next week by linking all the posts on blogs and thank you Tweets in one final post.

Hope everyone had a nice holiday!

Happy Holidays

Happy Holidays to all my card loving friends.  May the holiday season be filled with plentiful amounts of Bob Walk cards.  Enjoy all the time with friends and family!

Wish it Want it Do it

Just the other day I posted a printing plate of Sean Casey where I mentioned that I thought a few autos existed featuring him in the Pirate uniform.  Welp.....!!!!!

 2006 Flair Showcase Sean Casey Auto

I don't always search for Casey on eBay, but I think I had mentioned him so many times lately that the searches became more prevalent.  Sure enough the timing was perfect and an auto popped up with a BIN price of $3.99.  I instantly purchased it. 

Cards like this hold a special place in my heart.  I love when players that have short runs with teams get represented with cardboard.  At the very least your hope is an Update card, but every once in a while you get lucky with a relic or auto from some of the more obscure sets.  Thanks Flair! 

Thanks for reading!

Secret Santa Stuff

I've been in contact with many of you about your Secret Santa packages, but wanted to get something up in case I missed someone.  If you haven't received your package, or have yet to hear from me on the reason why your package is late shoot me an email (mattscott82@gmail.com).  I'll do some detective work to see what the issue is.  Trying to avoid some of the issues we had last year of people not acknowledging arrival of their packages.

I've enjoyed reading all the posts and Twitter shout outs.  I'll write something up after New Years that will tie everything together.

Kin Picks me Up

I'm seeing the finish line after a long stretch of extended work hours. That alone puts me in a better mood, but the generosity of some of my cardboard buddies has really put it over the top. This most recent installment is from fellow WVU alum Kin.  He also included a nice letter which was a cool touch. 

Steve Kline played his college ball at WVU and is probably best known for his tenure in St. Louis as a left handed reliever in the early 2000's. He is more famous in our community for this great Ultra card.  I actually have a Steve Kline story.  A bunch of my friends went to a Pirates/Cardinals game in Pittsburgh while I was in college.  We jokingly yelled Let's go Mountaineers to him and he came and signed a bunch of stuff for us and chatted for a minute.  Cool guy for sure. 

Again I apologize for the odd looking scans.  With my crazy long work schedule I haven't had much time to at least attempt to fix my main home desktop computer.  Lot's of phone pics and scanning apps. 

I've never met a Jason Bay auto I want/like.   Kin knows my weakness for Canada's greatest export.

When this card first came out it was among the hottest Pirate releases of the year.  Both guys had considerable prospect pedigree so prices weren't exactly cheap.  Bell had a pretty good rookie year and looks to be a nice piece in the years to come.  Glasnow is more of an enigma.  The guy has dominated the AAA level, but has yet to show anything at the MLB level.  He is a tall guy (6"8) so according to scouts he has a hard time repeating his delivery, thus his command turns to shit.

Prime Patches is one of those sets that when you think you have everything under the sun a new card pops up.  I bet there is something like 30 variations of Bay cards in the set.  I love all of them.  I have a sickness and Kin is an enabler.  

My NFL fandom dwindles some every year.  I enjoy watching the Steelers when time permits, but I really don't care if they win or lose.  Even after the controversial call in the Patriots game on Sunday I just kind of laughed and went on with my day.  With that being said I do enjoy watching videos of fans absolutely losing their shit when stuff like this happens.  That is always worth a laugh.

Collecting wise I still enjoy receiving as many Steelers cards as I can.  I like seeing the different football sets.

A touch of gold on the "S" makes this a two color patch!

Artifacts was a fun Upper Deck set.

Morozov and Lang were both members of the Pens when I would take advantage of their student rush program.  Basically you paid $25 bucks and got the best available ticket.  Sometimes you could get lucky and get some really nice seats.  One time we had 8 people in our group thinking we would have to split up, but the Pens gave us box seats.

LOVE these autos!!!  The Lang especially as he had some crazy good years with the Pens.

Jason Kendall and Brian Giles are often my only options when looking for Pirate hits in the late 90's early 2000's. EX seemed to fancy and unattainable when it came out.  Now my cardboard friends just send them to me out of the blue.  What a world!

Here is a card right in my wheelhouse.  Just the other day I was showcasing a Sean Casey printing plate featuring him in the Pirates uniform.  I'm such a sucker for short termed Buccos.  Kenny Lofton played awesome during his half season as a Bucco.  He only has a few cards that document his stay.  This 205 relic is one of the best.

Some numbered cards of current Steelers including superstars Bell and Brown.

Nice that Kin sends me WVU cards being that he collects them himself.  I think I may be the benefactor of him narrowing his scope which I'm completely fine with.

I'm not one of those people that think the old way of doing things is better than any recent version, but with auto cards it may be true.  Early autograph sets seemed to go with the less is more mantra which you don't see much in current auto sets.  Early sets like this SP auto, Donruss and Leaf were all top notch.

Kramer played in Morgantown as a Black Bear two seasons back and Gyorko is from Morgantown and a former Mountaineer.

Also, I love the Martin Donruss Studio card.

Man that Jose Guillen card was a must have back around his debut time for the Buccos.  He would go on to have a pretty nice career, but the Pirates called him up too early.  He would be up and down several times which most believe stunted his development.  My favorite thing about Guillen was his absolute cannon of an arm.

Kin comes in strong at the end with two great Bob Walk's.  Little known fact is that Bob Walk ended Desert Storm on his own.

Thanks for the nice surprise package Kin.  I'll need to think about how I'm going to hit you back.

Thanks for reading.

A Not so Secret Santa

Shout out to Adam from Cardboard Clubhouse for being a good sport.  I essentially made him buy me something in order to even out the Secret Santa.  In hindsight I probably should have just recruited another person, but instead just threw myself into the fun.  Poor Adam drew the short straw and received my name.  In hindsight it seemed a little weird telling someone to go buy me something.  Either way Adam agreed and sent me some nice cardboard. Maybe I should just start emailing random people and telling them they should send me cards.

Adam sent a bunch of nice Steelers cards my way.  When I was buying Steelers cards on a regular basis Bettis was probably second to only Hines Ward in my collection.  I love when I can receive Steelers cards via trade (or Secret Santa!) because I would venture to say they are among the most expensive teams to collect.  A rabid fanbase and legitimate superstars create the perfect storm.

 Ugh.....Excuse the quality of some of these scans as I've had to use some phone apps in order to keep the blog from falling behind.  My main scanner is hooked to my desktop computer that is currently not working. For single cards these apps work really well.  For big posts I need to practice some more.

The Steelers have done a good job over the years on what players to give long term deals.  The one notable mess up was Rod Woodson.  He had several really good post Steeler years.

 Prestige is a very nice set. I always liked their numbered parallels.

 I'm not sure if this era of Finest Football is as popular as its baseball counterpart, but still cool nonetheless.

 More Bus!

 One of the best cards I've ever seen pulled in person was from Gridiron Kings.  I was in a card shop and saw the owner pull a Unitas auto.  It was pretty cool.  I'm a sucker for canvas cards so no matter if it is the football or baseball version, I love it.

 XFL superstar Tommy Maddox!

 Sometimes less is more with cards.  Such is the case with Donruss hockey.

 Gravedigger!!!

 International sex symbol John Candy Man Candelaria.

 I'm a sucker for team cards.  Even the new ones I love.  This also mixes nicely with my love of manager cards.

 Collectors Choice was a major part of my youth.  Money is tight as a kid so you needed sets with good bang for your buck.  Collectors Choice was a choice of mine more often than not.  Looking back on it as an adult it was probably even a bit underrated because UD had some great photo choices.

When I think athlete Mike Lavalliere often comes to mind.....

 My favorite card is the blatant screw up by Topps on the Gregory Polanco card on the bottom row middle card.  The picture is actually Aramis Ramirez.  The funny thing is they did it on a couple of sets.  Quality Control!

 I probably buy just enough football because of my WVU collection to form an opinion on some of the sets that are out there.  For me the best looking and bang for you buck set is regular Donruss.

 Sparkly Cutch!

 I'm a sucker for any Pirate related Wakefield release.

You should always end a post with a bang! The batter has no idea how over matched he is.

Thanks for being a good sport Adam.  You definitely took one for the team.  Thanks for sending so many great cards.

Ho Ho Ho