The Pre-Covid19 Card Collector

I've been a bad blogger lately, not posting much by my standards, and not reading as many card blogs as usual either. Sitting out contests, free-card giveaways, and bat-arounds. Just been riding lowkey on the hobby lately, I guess. I half-joked on Twitter recently...

You know how there are "pre-war card collectors"? I'm thinking about becoming a pre-covid19 collector. Kinda done with 2020 cards. Seems like a good cutoff point. Not into all the $20-per online cards and recon missions for Bowman blasters in the wild hunting for 17-year olds.

And I try not to be too much of a Rob Manfred hater, but really feels like the current sport known as Major League Baseball keeps getting further and further away from the game I fell in love with 30 years ago. And when we start seeing games again finally, it'll be further still. Perhaps painfully so.

It feels good to just kind of draw the line and "set free" baseball and baseball cards to go do their thing without me being too emotionally invested over it from here on out.

No baseball season this year? Fine, whatever.
Constant overpriced gimmicks from Topps? Hey, good for everybody who's into that stuff, but I'll hang back.
Extreme hype over the latest hot prospect? Best of luck to the kid, but I don't really care.

And sure, this is mostly just talk from me, I know. If/when the Padres finally see dividends from their young talent and sniff playoff contention, I'll probably get excited and watch some games. And I'll still collect new cards of my favorite active players (in that I won't, like, forbid traders from sending me current cards).. but for the most part, I'm going to half-assedly try to confine my collection to be pre-2020 cards.

Anyways, this is really just yet another "look what I got" post, so here are some recent pickups. All older stuff, though.. which I suppose goes along with my intention of not messing with current cards much anymore.

Basically I want the hobby to remind me of "the good ol' days".. carefree days of childhood. Reggie Jackson was my first real "PC guy" as a kid. I still have the Reggie cards I accumulated back then, and have added a bunch since returning to the hobby as an adult. He's not really a priority these days, as I consider the PC "good enough" as it stands without worrying about the endless stream of post-career cards. But once in a while a card'll catch my eye, such as when I saw this 1970 Topps Super on another blog recently. Had to track down one for myself. Great shot of the young slugger grabbing a heaping helping of lumber at the old Yankee Stadium.

The back is basically the same as his flagship '70 Topps card, but here's a pic. I believe this is my first 1970 Topps Super card, though I already had a couple 1971 Supers so I knew what I was getting into.

The other main guy I collected as a kid, at least for a while, was Garry Templeton. I've explained why before, and I'm always conflicted about ever repeating myself on this blog. Probably over 99% of readers either don't remember or don't care about hearing it again, but I'm always concerned there'll be one reader with a sharp memory saying to himself, "Oh great, Gavin is explaining why he collected Garry Templeton again.. [eyeroll]" But yeah, I was a kid in San Diego just getting into baseball/collecting. My good buddy Doug was already collecting the obvious choice (Gwynn), so I didn't want to copy him and looked elsewhere. Garry Templeton was the Padres' captain at the time and longest-tenured on the squad. Plus he had a fun name that reminded me of Charlotte's Web. So yeah, while my peers were collecting flashy guys like Strawberry and Canseco, I took the road less traveled. haha

This '76 Tulsa Oilers minor league team issue is Garry's very first card. I had been after it for a couple years, finally scoring it at a solid price a little while ago. It's not quite as awesome as the first card I landed from this set, but still pretty cool.

The back. Wow, .401.. impressive.

Garry hit .321 for Tulsa in 1976 before getting the call to St. Louis in August. Tulsa has been in the news lately, apparently a rough place for black people, historically. I wonder how Garry enjoyed his time there. Allow me to take a moment to say #BlackLivesMatter. Racism is fucking stupid.
There's my soapbox statement, lol.

Sneaking in a modern card, here's Kris Bryant's 2015 Stadium Club RC. This was on my Desperate Double Dozen wantlist for a long time. It got to the point where I didn't even care that much about owning the card anymore, but I was just looking for some closure, so I gave up waiting for anybody to trade it to me and took a look for it on eBay and ended up winning this one for a few bucks. Done and done.

Switching to non-sports, I was pretty excited to score this Axl Rose rookie-- at least I think it's his earliest trading card.. correct me if I'm wrong.

It's a promo for the 1991 Brockum Rock Cards set, though funny enough neither he nor Guns N' Roses ended up having a card in the actual set. For better or worse, I consider GNR an all-time favorite band of mine. And especially since I've started my 1991 MusiCards blog last year, I've been more interested in music cards.

Yeah, in general, I've really been enjoying opening my card collection up to non-sports cards in recent years.. again, using cards as a way of reconnecting with stuff I loved as a kid.. first with Ghostbusters cards, Goonies cards, then Pee-Wee Herman cards (post forthcoming), and more recently MST3K cards (post also forthcoming) and music cards.


Let's close today with a really old card..

My interest in old-timey aviation is pretty much limited to Howard Hughes (post forthcoming later this week, hopefully), but I ended up stumbling upon this neat "playing days" Amelia Earhart card and had to pull the trigger.

1936 Carreras Famous Airmen & Airwomen #25. She has at least a couple earlier cards, so no "rookie card" top-loader for this one, but still super cool to have an Amelia Earhart card that was printed before her tragic disappearance the following year.


In conclusion..

Love this quote from the otherwise terrible Topps-produced Garbage Pail Kids Movie (1987). Like this guy stuck in a bad movie, I'm deciding to leave mankind to its folly and retire here. Into this world of memories.


...I mean, not really.. But I think it's best if I try to focus on pre-2020 cards and stop worrying about the current state of things.
Thanks for stopping by.

Mad Magazine cards from 1988

Here's a follow-up post to one I made back in those carefree days of early February when I posted about Mad Magazine cut-out cards from 1990. Since those were billed as the "All New 2nd Series" I was curious about the inaugural series and hunted them down, too.

Here you go! As you can see, these borrow heavily from the 1988 Topps Baseball design, which makes sense as this issue came out in '88.

Here's the front cover. It's issue No. 282 (Oct 1988). "Designated Hittee" Alfred E. Neuman. Cool.

And yep, I bought an extra copy so that I could keep one intact and cut the other into "cards". Like with the 1990 counterpart, these don't have corresponding backs, with the inside cover being another of those "fold-in" gags.

The references are no doubt very dated today, but still interesting items for a card collector with a quirky, wide collecting breadth, such as myself.

Now let's see if there's any baseball stuff inside the magazine....

Welp, no inside feature on baseball cards (unlike the 1990 issue), but a couple things worth sharing.

Bob Uecker takes some ribbing among other celebrities of the time.

A baseball comic in a "how to stay cool in the summer" feature.

 Not baseball related, but I'm sure someone will get a kick out of this Alf gag.

In tracking down the back-issues with cards, I ended up with a couple eBay lots that included additional issues. Maybe someday I'll flip through them, but I don't really need them so if anyone wants to trade for these two, let me know. I'm a big GNR fan, so perhaps I should hang onto the Slash one. Whatever.

Anyways, I haven't been able to find any evidence of a 3rd series of "Mad's All-Star Flopps" so I suppose my collection of these pseudo cards is now complete!

Thanks for stopping by and take care out there (or "in there" as the case may be).

Can't get enough of that Duff -- Adding to the GNR collection

Busy week for me with some work training stuff going on. Not much time for my normal cardblog reading/writing. But here's a quick post.

I've mentioned here over the past couple years that Guns N' Roses is one of my all-time favorite bands.. perhaps thee top band for me at this point in time.. Some great jams, and high on the nostalgia meter for me, as Appetite For Destruction was among the first few cassettes I ever bought back in the day, and videos for the likes of "November Rain" and "You Could Be Mine" were all over MTV back when I was at my most influenceable.

Last year, I scored an Axl Rose auto in a megatrade. And now in addition to the band's lead singer, I've added the bassist, with a semi-certified auto of Duff McKagan.

This was another inclusion in my order from Newbury Comics (one of the few big remaining independent [non-Amazon] CD stores)-- in which I also got a Harry Shearer autograph.

With a dark cover, maybe a silver pen signature would have popped better, but hey, still looks good.

Along with the signed booklet came a sealed CD-- not a bad deal for about the same price I used to buy new CDs for back in the day. I've listened to the album and it's really good! You don't have to be a GNR fan to dig it. I'd say it's probably closer to 70s rock along the lines of The Band and T-Rex, perhaps even some of the mellow blusier numbers from the Rolling Stones. Thoughtful tunes from an aging rocker who's seen it all and lived to tell the tale.

This isn't my fav song on the album, but a good one that's available on YouTube, so there it is.

Duff is best known as GNR's bassist, and he took a turn at lead vocals on a few songs such as "So Fine" (Use Your Illusion) and "Attitude" (The Spaghetti Incident). He's also put in time with supergroup Velvet Revolver and had short-term stops with alt rock legends Alice In Chains and Jane's Addiction.

He's from Seattle and is a big Mariners fan.

So yeah, my Guns auto collection has doubled to two. Still a few left to round out the band, with the biggest name to add being Slash-- and while you might assume his trademark top hat would have popped up in the likes of Ginter, Goodwin, or Pop Century over the years-- no, he doesn't seem to have any cards out there as of right now. Oh well, I'll keep looking to add to my GNR collection. Maybe I'll complete a starting lineup of signatures for the band by the time I'm knockin' on heaven's door.

Mama Kin (Guns N' Randoms)

I haven't done a "Guns N' Randoms" post in a while, where I clear off some cards from my sorting table so I can file them away, and title the post after a GNR song, going roughly in chronological order. I think the reason for the delay is the next song up "Mama Kin" (Aerosmith cover) doesn't lend itself well to a title for cards. I mean, yeah, there's a prominent fellow cardblogger named Kin Kinsley, and it would make a solid title for a trade post featuring cards from him, but unfortunately I don't recall ever trading with him and I can't wait indefinitely for that to happen.

The opening lyrics are "It ain't easy, livin' like a gypsy" so maybe I should feature some Gypsy Queen cards or something? Nah.

The best I can muster is that "Mama Kin" doesn't sound too far from "Templeton."

Keep in touch with Templeton
Tell him where you've gone and been
Livin' out your fantasy
Sleeping late and smoking tea

As if this post hadn't scared off enough prospective readers already, I'm leading off with a trio of overproduction-era cards. Somebody alert Blogger to prepare backup servers ASAP because the imminent traffic surge on this post may cause a system failure!!

But check it out, these aren't (quite) junk after all. They're Tiffany/Glossy versions I picked up to spice up my Garry Templeton PC.

And another off-the-beaten-path Templeton, this a shiny gold sticker from 1981.

A blogger I can't recall now was talking highly of Boys of Summer inserts from Score. Prone to peer pressure, I went looking for a cheap example I could fit into my collection. I settled on Bret Boone since he's almost a guy I collect thanks to being from my neck of the woods not to mention he played a few solid season in San Diego. While the steamy mirage thing is kind cool, honestly this 1994 design doesn't do much for me and I'm second-guessing this $1 purchase. The 1993 design is pretty hot though (pun intended), featuring a big, bright sun behind the player. I'll have to keep an eye out for one of those, especially the Piazza, Pedro, or Klesko.

I love adding cards of the late, great Ken Caminiti, especially from his short-term stops, and especially hits. He only played 54 games with the Rangers, so he doesn't have many cards with them, making this bat relic even cooler in my eyes.

The 2018 Margot auto was an add-on buy with a recent eBay win. He hasn't been great this year but figures to stick as the Padres center fielder for the long haul. He's still only 23.

Another 23 year old Friar, Franmil Reyes was tearing up PCL pitching earlier this season, and was called up for a brief stint in San Diego but is now back in AAA (Update: just recalled again). He has very little cardboard on the market at the moment. I picked up this 2014 Bowman Chrome mini refractor on COMC a while back.

Speaking of Bowman Chrome refractors, time to ride the wave! I'm a sucker for these wave refractors.

I especially dig 2015 Bowman Chrome, on the left there. Continuing from what I was talking about in yesterday's comments regarding how it's nearly always a design mistake to use foil for the player name.. I think that's one reason why collectors seem to agree that the Chrome version of a design typically looks better than the standard/flagship/paper. Chrome cards never have foil. In this example, 2015 Bowman (standard) kinda sucks because it's often hard to read the foil names. But the Chrome version looks great, one of my favorite designs of the past few years of any product. The moral of the story is card companies should refrain from using foil for player names. Logos and borders? Sure, fine. But not names!

Anyways, I was looking at cheap colored parallels from 2015 Bowman Chrome on COMC, and among the sea of unknowns, I found this blue wave Matt Chapman. A little surprised to find a solid card like this of the A's starting 3rd baseman for just 65 cents. Maybe one day I'll work on a parallel frankenset of 2015 Bowman Chrome since I dig them so much, but I think I need to put some other collecting projects to bed first.

The 2013 red wave David Holmberg was $1.25, which might seem like a lot to pay for a card of a guy I don't collect, who was released by the lowly Orioles in spring training, currently struggling with Colorado's Triple-A team? Well...

Christmas Card!
Not that I go around paying over a dollar for just any card stamped 12/25, but a neat looking refractor? Sure, probably.

Let's close the post with this, a solid lot of '64 Topps needs from COMC. Just looking for good deals on cards that hopefully weren't too beat up. Some of these I wouldn't mind upgrading someday, but good enough for now. I also focused on high-numbers, trying to cross off a few more from the pesky last series. I'm scratching at the door of 2⁄3 complete with this set now. Probably won't wrap it up by the end of the year (especially with me being distracted by my '57 Topps project), but maybe sometime before the decade's out if I keep at it.

Well, thanks for reading, and always remember:

It ain't easy, livin' like ya want to
And it's so hard to find peace of mind
The way I see it, you've got to say shit
But don't forget to drop me a line

The Mega-Trade Proposition

I recently ended up with an extra 2004 Topps Retired Hank Aaron autograph. Yep, I just recently landed this white whale of mine, and then funny enough, I was in the right place at the right time to snag another. Instead of selling the dupe for a substantial profit, I set out for a mega trade. I had 3 big cards in mind owned by 3 trader buddies. So I dug up cards to supplement the Hammer auto tailored to each trade prospect.

My #1 choice card was pulled a few years back by Tony Burbs, well-respected Cubs collector, so I gathered up some good Cubbies to back up Hank.

If that didn't pan out for me, Card #2 on my list was Shoebox Shane's Mike Trout liquorfractor rookie. I didn't have high hopes for him being agreeable, but I would have swapped out the Cubs for some good Sox and hoped for the best.

If that didn't work out for me, Card #3 in my sights was the Tim Duncan auto that Fuji recently stumbled upon.**

And if those all didn't work out, I'd field offers on the blog and Twitter, and if nothing seemed right, throw Hank on eBay.

But that's a moot point because Tony Burbs graciously agreed to my offer (with only a minor alteration), and I was able to score my first choice. :)

BOOM!!! Axl Rose auto from 2013 Topps Archives. This was a huge card I had been pining for for a long time. I knew Tony lucked into pulling it, his greatest pull, and I had hoped to one day be able to put together a strong enough offer for it. Very happy to have swung this mega trade!

I've realized recently that Guns N' Roses is currently my favorite band, as you might've guessed with them frequently getting worked into my posts over the past few months. What can I say, they're just the band I most dig listening to these days. (I'm musing on typing up a post covering my favorite bands over the years.) Appetite For Destruction was among the first few cassettes I ever bought for myself as a kid in the late 80s, so there's plenty of sentimental value for me there, too.

In difficult times, I turn to the lyrics of W. Axl Rose, with his wisdom being a beacon steering me towards the right course of action. They've got dozens of songs I love deeply, though I might have to say my favorite song is "Locomotive".

"Locomotive" is my jam, especially on a Friday afternoon when I get off work. If I were a professional baseball player, it'd be my walk-up music.

Anyways, back to the card.. Looks like Axl has two Topps certified autos on the market: this card from 2013 Archives, and a framed mini from 2013 Allen & Ginter. Both cards consistently sell on eBay for $300+.

Tony kindly threw in a couple surprise bonus cards too. Sweet auto of Joe Musgrove, a hometown hero of mine, and a Desperate Double Dozen need of Tim Blackwell's mustache. (Expect a big Tim Blackwell PC post coming soon.)

Before Tony agreed to the trade (I had to wait a little while before I made the offer because I had gotten a card off his "most wanted" in a recent order of mine, so had to wait for that to show up so I could add it to the offer), I came up with a list of big-money cards I would be interested in mega-trading for:

Axl Rose Topps 2013 Archives or Ginter auto
Mike Trout 2011 Topps Update cognac parallel
Tim Duncan auto (pack-certified and on-card)
Roberto Clemente 1955 Topps (PSA graded, low grade is fine)
Hoyt Wilhelm 1952 Topps (PSA graded, low grade is fine)
Gavvy Cravath 1914 Cracker Jack (PSA graded, low grade is fine)
Kirby Puckett 2003 Topps Retired refractor auto
Andre The Giant auto (certified authentic)
Michael Jordan 1986 Fleer (PSA graded, low grade is fine)
Mickey Mantle 1953 Topps (graded, low grade is fine)
Mickey Mantle 1957 Topps (graded PSA 4 or better)
It would be reaching on my part, but certified autos of Clemente, Mantle, or Ted Williams would also have my interest, for sure.

I guess that's sort of an Expensive White Whale list for me. I'll have to keep that handy in the event I end up with another really nice card to trade someday (or win the lottery or something).

** I hit Fuji with an alternate trade proposition for the Duncan, sans-Hank, but still with plenty of pop. He declined, which I totally respect, though it was an impressive lot, but he gave me some solid personal reasons for his inclination to retain the card, and it seems like the card has "untouchable" status for him, and would still be even if the Hank was part of the offer.

Welcome to the collection, we've got cards for days

Anyways, I can't thank Tony enough for this successful mega-trade knocking off a dream card for me!

Rocket Queen (COMC order finale)

This post wraps up the highlights from my latest COMC order. It also completes the series of posts over the past several weeks titled after Appetite For Destruction songs.

1. "Welcome to the Jungle"
2. "It's So Easy"
3. "Nightrain"
4. "Out ta Get Me"
5. "Mr. Brownstone"
6. "Paradise City"
7. "My Michelle"
8. "Think About You"
9. "Sweet Child o' Mine"
10. "You're Crazy"
11. "Anything Goes"
12. "Rocket Queen"

Maybe I overestimated the Venn diagram intersection of card collectors and Guns N' Roses fans, but whatever, I'm a big fan of the band and I'll likely continue my "Guns N' Randoms" posts with the Lies album up next. Why not, right?

Gotta admit I added this card to my COMC inventory for the sole reason of having a hit card to cleverly include in my "Rocket Queen" post. A "Rocket" Roger Clemens Gypsy Queen relic did the trick. But I also kinda collect him since he's a member of the Springfield Nine (I collect any baseball player who guested on The Simpsons), so it'll have a home in that PC, not just used as a prop for a blog post.

I saw one of these on Sport Card Collectors and had to grab one for myself. I'm a big fan of 30 Rock's Katrina Bowden, and this is my second card of hers after an auto I got a couple years ago. It's got a neat "film strip" thing going on with the acetate inset picture.

Sometimes I search COMC for serial-numbered cards by lowest-price-first and look for anything cool/interesting/cheap, and that's how I ended up with this /150 Bartolo. Pretty neat that the old guy had a no-hitter going deep into a game last week.

A couple more cheap numbered refractors I picked up. Looks like Heyward is having an ok 2018 so far. As for Christian Friedrich, I kinda liked him during his 2016 stint with the Padres, so that was enough for me to pull the trigger on this Bowman Chrome insert a few months ago, though I probably wouldn't today. He seems to be without a team this season.

Another lowest-price-first search, but this time with Topps Throw-back Thursdays, the little online-only print-to-order sets they crank out on a regular basis. Grabbed this "1996 Star Power Design" (print run of 1118) to spice up my little Cespedes PC. A nice thing about these is they're on hearty Heritage-type stock.

Finally, here's what might be my new favorite (non-framed) mini in my collection.. or at least in the top ten. It's a Chrome-ish Ginter refractor from eTopps. Between the time that I bought it and when I received it, Jim Thome was elected into the Hall of Fame, so that's pretty cool. I just bought my first mini magnetic one-touch for it to display it in style, I like it so much.

The card celebrates his 500th home run. Numbered 968/999. And with eTopps, you gotta figure a lot of that print run is sitting in a Topps warehouse forgotten about by the owners. Anyways, this shiny mini pairs nicely with the autograph I recently picked up as the best cards in my Thome PC.

Thanks for reading, guys, and remember:
If you need a shoulder
Or if you need a friend
I'll be here standing
Until the bitter end

Paradise City

Continuing in the series I've retroactively titled "Guns N' Randoms" where I show off some pickups that I may or may not be able to group together in a meaningful way under the title of a Guns N' Roses song, here are some various cards I've picked up recently that relate to my personal "Paradise City" hometown of San Diego/El Cajon.

Oh won't you please take me home! I thought this risque 2017 Chrome refractor photo variation of Kris Bryant was hilarious when I first saw it making the rounds last year on Twitter, and had to include it in my latest COMC order. Here, Kris seems to be enjoying an intimate moment with the Cubs logo, or perhaps someone out of frame. Or you could look at it another way and see the design as some sort of robotic wiener. Regardless what's going on, it's a very amusing card and a nice addition to my KB PC. The pride of the University of San Diego is off to a good start this year, among league leaders in hits and average in the season's first couple weeks.

I was really happy to finally track down this Mike Reinbach minor league card last month.

The O.G. Guy from Granite, I've made several 70s customs for him, but I believe this is his only actual playing-days card before he went to Japan and became a star over there. It's also my oldest minor league card now, put out my TCMA in 1975.

And here's a Japanese Mike Reinbach card. I actually had this one, but hey, it was an upgrade for me, plus it was probably cheapest vintage Japanese card I ever bought. Put in a low bid and ended up winning it.

Also snagged this Reggie Bush in my latest COMC order. I think I searched serial-numbered cards sorted cheapest first, and looked for anybody I collect that I could pick off cheaply, with Helix High's Reggie Bush among the few finds.

I showed this card like a week or two ago on the day I bought it, but that was a pic from eBay and felt like cheating putting it on the blog, so now that it's in hand, here's El Cajon's own Greg Louganis.

My obsession with black refractors is well documented on this blog, and I love this Kevin Kouzmanoff eTopps card in the 1985 Topps design, another COMC pickup. Kooz had 3 nice seasons in San Diego, then bumped around for a while and battled injuries before finishing with a terrific 13-game comeback with the Rangers in 2014.

There's the back, if you're interested.

Oh! And hey, speaking of Topps revisiting their old designs, for those of you not on Twitter you might not have heard yet, but details of 2018 Archives were announced today. The cards in the base set will use the designs of 1959, 1977 and 1981. I'm very happy about this since Topps has yet to totally wear out any of those designs. Particularly 1981 rarely gets much love from today's Topps. Another cool thing about this year's Archives is it will include The Sandlot inserts, with autos, to boot. Hopefully they're not impossible pulls that Archives sometimes uses to toy with us (Heavy Metal autos, Charlie Sheen autos, Will Ferrell autos, Kevin Costner autos, etc.) Anyways, I'm excited for it and will likely pre-order a couple hobby boxes soon.

Here's a late, great pair of San Diego fan favorites. Both numbered Pacific cards, though the Cammy is definitely more eye-grabbing.

This is a special custom I cranked out for Cardblogger Con NW '18 last month. It was a coincidence that our favorite players suited up for the Padres (Kerry- Ozzie, me and Rod- Gwynn, and gcrl- Garvey). I think it makes for a nice little memento of the meetup.

I didn't spend much time on the back, but I did hand-number them /4, keeping this one for myself. I should note that I whipped these up right before I thought to invite Ken, which is why he got snubbed (Sorry, Ken!). Had I known he would be able to make it, I might have also included Rickey in a Padres uniform, since he's one of Ken's main PC guys (I did make a special Rickey custom for him that I gave him along with a few other customs, so I don't feel too bad about the situation.)

Thanks for reading and have a great weekend! May the grass be green and the girls be pretty!

"Take me down to the Paradise City where the grass is green and the cards are shiny"