Sucker For Red

2005 Prime Patches Brian Giles Patch /25

If I see a Pirates patch card featuring the short lived red jersey I'm all over it.  While the jersey/patch card is largely played out they can still offer some uniqueness. When I saw this Giles jersey I knew I had to have it. I have a few variations of this card already, but I didn't care.  Long live weird alternate jerseys. 

Also for posterity I'm writing that both me and my 4 year old daughter are still alive as of 3pm Saturday.  My wife is NYC this weekend so that created an always entertaining Dad/daughter weekend.  So far today we've had a healthy breakfast at my local Dunkin Donuts and probably chase breakfast with an adventurous dinner that will likely feature french fries.  What can I say, my daughter enjoys fine dining.  

Tomorrow I plan on taking her to Target under the guise of Christmas Shopping.  That most definitely should read Dad looks/and likely buys baseball cards. #dadwins

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Bulk Buy

I've been relatively quiet on eBay the last 6 weeks or so.  Most of my purchases have been small additions to my WVU collection. The first month or so was by design, but lately I just haven't found much of anything that grabbed my attention.  I'll grab some of the Pirate Bowman cards eventually, but right now prices are a little steep.

My only big purchase happened right before I left for my conference in Rhode Island.  It looks fancy but the price was below $20.

All these patch cards are from 2005 Prime Patches. The first 3 are /99 and are from the number. The next two /51 and are name plate patches.  At the end is the logo patch /38.

Aramis Ramirez is a fun guy to collect because his cards are dirt cheap.  All these patch cards were from one lot and only cost around $16 plus shipping.  While I knew these weren't going to get big money I thought they would go more in the $25-$30 range because of the quality of the patches. It just reaffirmed that Ramirez is one of those that just doesn't sell well.  That is ok with me as this made a nice addition to my collection!

I know I've mentioned it a 1000 times, but his trade is one of the main reasons the Pirates were bad for so long.  By far the worst trade in the teams history.  Makes me half sick thinking about it. Maybe the Cubs can send us Kris Bryant to even things out...?

Thanks for reading.

Short Term Fixes, Mailings and ARam

My home computer is still down hence the quiet blogging weekend. I know the issue is the hard drive so I'm going to give it a look today and determine the degree of the fix needed. I know sometimes when you run a Dell diagnostics test it will say the hard drive failed but the fix needed is much less serious. I hope that is the case as this computer is still relatively new. Either way I should be back to operating normal schedule by mid week.

Once I'm back up and running I have over 20 envelopes to send out to my blogging friends! I utilize stamps.com and all my saved information is on my desktop so once it is fixed many of you will be getting an envelope including the contest winners. I've accumulated a lot of trade bait since my last mass mailing.

Hey, how about a card...

2005 Prime Patches Aramis Ramirez Patch /39

Injuries really threw things out of whack for the Pirates at the trade deadline. Third base actually was a strength for the Pirates as they had Josh Harrison and Jung Ho Kang. Once Harrison and Jordy Mercer got hurt the Pirates hands hand was forced. Not wanting replacement level players like Brent Morel manning the hot corner, the Pirates were quick to acquire Aramis Ramirez from the Brewers.

The silver lining in all of this has been the emergence of Kang as the everyday shortstop. Even with about 100 less at bats he has accumulated 3 WAR already which puts him around 3rd overall for shortstops.

Ramirez got off to a slow start for the Buccos, but has been coming on the last 10 games. I wasn't a fan of him batting cleanup but lately he has begun to justify the decision. It will be interesting to see how things shake out once Harrison and Mercer are activated. Ramirez has been taking grounders at first so that might help when we play left handed pitching, but we'll have a logjam facing right handed pitching.  Either way it is a nice problem to have.

I'm just thankful they've kept their head above water the last few weeks. The starting pitching as been a little suspect the last few weeks, but the offense and bullpen have picked up the slack. Check the brutal schedule since August 4th...

Cubs
Dodgers
Cardinals
Mets

Upcoming
Dbacks
Giants

So far they've won 8 of 11 games thanks to sweeps of the Dodgers and Mets. Hopefully they can continue to play well while they get healthy.

Thanks for reading!

Laundry Day

My eBay purchases have slowed down considerably over the last month because the 2015 sets don't have much in the way of new Pirate cards. I've been spending most of my time trying to locate some rarer cards of players like Jason Kendall, Jason Bay and Brian Giles.

A few weeks back I came across a seller who was liquidating a large Brian Giles collection. The majority were Giles featured as a Padre, but he had a couple of rare Pirate heavy hitters that I had not seen before. I only came away with 5 cards, but the last one packs a good punch.

 2005 Diamond Kings Bat Relic /200

 2005 Diamond Kings Jersey Relic /200

 2005 Diamond Kings Bat/Jersey Relic /100

The mid 2000's Diamond Kings sets were great for Pirate collectors. The checklist was vast in which I'm still discovering some variations to this day. 

 2005 Fleer Classic Clippings Patch

I usually don't buy cards featuring players in their non Bucco uniform, but with combined shipping and a nice low price I figured why not. At the very least I could flip this to Gavin or the Underdog. 

Now for the big one....

2005 Prime Patches Giles/Kendall/Wilson Triple Laundry Tag /10

I had no idea that the laundry tag variation of this card even existed. I knew several variations existed, but thought they were all jersey/logo patch based. Needless to say I was all in trying to buy this card. I spent way more then I normally would for a non auto card, but I didn't care. I'm happy to give it a nice home. 

Happy Good Friday!

Thanks for reading!