On Card

I'm finally going to be able to get out of the hotel tonight to do a little exploring of San Antonio. I was hoping to do more last night, but my arrival time got delayed by several hours because my connecting flight in Dallas was delayed.  The flight was coming from Mexico too so it had to clear customs which added to the delay. 

2012 Heritage Blue Auto Andrew McCutchen

A big addition to the Cutch collection! I've pretty much stopped scouring for his cards, but sometimes some more generic searches on eBay bring up some items. I was able to add this card for a shade below $50 which is expensive, but a little less than market rate. Cutch on card autos demand premium pricing plus he hasn't signed in a couple of years. 

2006 Sluggers

2006 Triple Threads Jason Bay/Miguel Cabrera/Travis Hafner Triple Auto /9

This was a pretty big get for the Bay collection. Bay has the biggest footprint in my Pirates collection so when I find a card to add it is usually of the high end variety. Bay found himself on several variations of this card, but they are super tough finds because they feature the likes of guys like Albert Pujols.

Obviously the big name on this card is Cabrera, but when he is featured as a Marlin it keeps costs affordable. The card ran me around $42 which seemed reasonable considering the set and scarcity.

Also, I looked back at Hafner's stats. While his peak was short, he really dominated in the mid 2000s. He had 3 consecutive 5 War seasons. At the time this card was made he was quie the force.

One of these days I'll get around to showing off some more Bay's. Pretty much the only ones I've shown are recent purchases. I have 100's back logged! Maybe if trade posts and recent acquisitons dry up they can be my posting security blanket.

By the way this is the first post I've done while in flight!

Laboring on Labor Day

Tomorrow I'm flying to San Antonio for work so in turn I was in the office most of the day today trying to tie up some loose ends before I hit the road. Not the best way to spend the holiday, but I'm glad I did it because otherwise I would be digging out of a hole for two weeks once I'm back.

As far as the trip goes I'm pretty excited to head back to San Antonio. I spent a week there when I was in high school so I've accomplished most of the touristy things. Have a pretty open slate so I might just walk around and try to relax some. Anybody been recently? I'm open to suggestions.

2015 Panini Father's Day Tyler Glasnow Patch /10

I've bid on some of the Father's Day cards over the past couple of years, but fell short on most. For some reason this card only sold for .99 plus shipping. The card is actually not numbered, but according to the seller this card is considered the pyramid parallel, thus it is out of 10. I didn't bother to check to see because the price was so good either way. Panini has been releasing a ton of Glasnow cards so it has been fun picking up a few here and there.

Their were some rumblings that the Pirates might call up Tyler Glasnow, but it is looking like he will stay down in the minors. His numbers are very good, but he can struggle with command at times. He'll have a chance to crack the rotation next year in Spring Training, but the odds are he will find his to Pittsburgh in June because of service time. 

Hope everyone enjoyed the long weekend. 

Trade: Wish They Still Came With Bubble Gum

It has been a fun weekend in Bob Walk the Plank country as WVU football opened up their season last night against Georgia Southern. WVU came in only an 11 point favorite as Georgia Southern returned pretty much their entire team, and run the triple option. The good thing is the Mountaineers returned their whole defense and was able to smother the running game and cause turnovers when Georgia Southern was forced to pass. The final was 44-0!

Cards!

Jeff from Wish They Still Came with Bubble Gum and I are becoming frequent trade partners. He always hooks me up with his Pirates and WVU guys from his retail purchases.

The photo is a little run of the mill for TSC, but Cutch makes everything look cooler! This was a shot from last year in what looks like Wrigley Field.

 This was the Field Access insert set which featured some cool shots.

 Full steam ahead!

 I've been trying to win some of the Taillon cards in this set, but for whatever the reason they seem to go higher than expected.

 Some more Bowman Taillon's! Hopefully he will be ready to help the big league team next year.

 Antonio Brown has turned himself into an absolute force. Blessed with great hands and lightning fast speed, he seems to improve every year. The Steelers offense should be able to score a bunch, but the defense on paper looks to be pretty bad.

I was excited to see the Kevin White's. It is a shame that he suffered the injury as most pundits were expecting big things this year. I'll probably use this as an excuse to load up while prices go down. 

Thanks so much Jeff for the cards! Love the Prestige White's. I'll be sure to continue holding back some Braves for you and hit you up soon.

Thanks for reading. 

Appropriate Sample Size

Does your team have that one player they keep running out there over and over even if the performance begs for a change? Maybe it is a guy that had "prospect" status, or just a case of a team not having a viable alternative. I've already touched on Pedro Alvarez who falls under the first two categories. The other guy who pretty much makes every Pirate fans head explode is Jeff Locke.

The Pirates in the last few years have a well documented track record of fixing pitchers. Players such as AJ Burnett, Edison Volquez and Mark Melancon have revitalized their careers. One thing that made these turnarounds remarkable is how quick they happened. So why hasn't Locke been able to follow suit?

Locke has several characteristics that the Pirates look for in pitchers. He has a great ground ball % rate which plays well with the shift and he is among the leaders of working on the inner half of the strike zone. Back in 2013 (his first full year as a starter) he made the All Star team based on a super low ERA. While it was nice to see the Pirates winning with their fifth starter on the hill, it was more of a mirage than anything. Statistical based sites like Fangraphs predicted some hardcore regression and boy did that happen. So much so that Locke was sent down to AAA late in the summer.

In 2014 and 2015 it has been more of the same. Since the Pirates have had the Midas touch for the better part of three years with pitchers I tend to give them the benefit of the doubt. The question is how long should a team wait for someone to turn the corner? This gets even more complicated when your team is a perennial contender like the Pirates.

Here are some stats I pulled from Fangraphs among qualified starters (around 85 total pitchers).

Whip = 8th worst
K/9 = 21st worst
BB/9 = 12th worst
WAR = 17th worst
LOB% = 11th worst

His saving grace is that his FIP and XFIP usually hovers in the high 3's to low 4's which is completely adequate for a fifth starter.

Usually you can handle someone being towards the bottom of one or two of the categories I mention. A lot of times guys with high walk rates tend to be high strikeout guys so they can wiggle out of trouble themselves. As you can see Locke is his own worst enemy. If you are constantly putting guys on it only takes a hit for a run to score. Also it easy to see why he never gets deep in games. In the past ten games he has only made it past 6 innings twice. It is almost a guarantee that a Locke start will result in three or four relievers being used.

As a fan you want to hold your hat on something. With someone like Pedro Alvarez the fall back is usually his power, but with Locke you are grasping at straws. Right now his value is all tied up in his ability to be durable, but to me that only gets you so far. It's obvious the Pirates love the makeup, but with no improvement in command I just don't see how much more the Pirates can take.

My guess is I wouldn't even be writing this if Jameson Taillon or Nick Kingham would have stayed healthy. This offseason the Pirates will have to make a choice. They could non-tender him at the end of the year and try to find another pitcher to fix, or they continue to hope he somehow finds his command. To me 3 years seems like more than enough sample size to make a decision to cut ties.

Scrub All Stars

Being a fan of a team that had no chance of doing well can wear on you. During the Pirates historic run of 20 plus years of being awful it created two types of fans. You had the internal optimist fan that was always thinking the team was turning the corner and the fan that just watched out of habit because the team was part of their childhood. I consider myself the optimist fan, but realistic at the same time.

Even as an optimist, the Pirates were so bad that you had to find other means to channel your support. Maybe you could root for some prospects or just use the Pirates as a cheap means to see some dominant NL players visiting PNC park. For the longest time guys like Sosa and Pujols were among the offensive leaders in the early years of PNC park.

One event that always peaked my interest in the summer was the All Star game. While being terrible for 20 years means your team had plenty of holes it doesn't mean the Buccos were completely void of talent. Jason Kendall, Brian Giles and Jason Bay all had multiple years where they were more than deserving. With that being said the Pirates had a few years where guys had to be put on the squad just because it was the rule. The likes of Ed Sprague, Mike Williams and Evan Meek come to mind.

It terms of cardboard it made perfect sense to chase All Star related Pirates. Topps has made made it a habit to produce jersey cards since the mid 2000's featuring All Star game swatches. When Triple Threads was introduced it took them to a whole new level and I was hooked.

I've shown off a few here on the blog like these....

Over the past handful of months I've been able to add a couple more that I haven't had time to showoff....

You know your team is pretty bad when you only get one representative and it happens to be a reliever. That was the case for Evan Meek. He had a decent year, but it was just a case of a reliever beating out his peripheral numbers.

Zach Duke made the All Star team with rather pedestrian numbers. Without looking I believe he was added late as Freddy Sanchez was already on the team. He would go on to fall apart the second half of that season. His career was in jeopardy because of prolonged ineffectiveness, but he has rebounded as a productive lefty reliever.

Adding both of these patches were just as rewarding as adding the bigger names. Guys like Cutch can always be found if you are willing the shell out the cash. Duke and Meek are bought up by team collectors never to be seen again because resell value is limited.

Thanks for reading.

Mass Mailing

I feel a lot better now. Between traveling and computer issues I had been unable to send out trade packages for close to two months. That is way too long! Over the last few days I've been sorting and was able to complete 21 packages! I also have 5 more that are very close. Bob Walk the Plank is back in business!

If you were one of the contest winners rest assured they are among the group. I even threw in some extra stuff since their was such a long time gap between the contest and the actual mailing. It will be worth the wait.