Randy Jones PC

 

Bummed this morning to hear Randy Jones passed away. His glory days were before my time, but growing up in San Diego, I'd heard his name often brought up as a Padres legend of yore. I discovered after first tracking down one of his cards, sure enough, San Diego actually had a two-time 20-game winner at one point! I saw him hanging out at a spring training game in the early 90s and he seemed like a friendly dude. I didn't interact with him then, but years later had a nice TTM success. I figured I'd pay my humble tribute to the man by checking out my Randy Jones PC in a post.

I've got 3 San Diego rookies, plus one Washington variation. Honestly I'm not sure how I acquired so many. And this is just the PC, not even pulling the pair from my '74 Topps set.

Top pic of the post shows his '75 Topps along with a similar trio of his 2004 All-Time Fan Favorites redo. Then continuing into the late 70s... 

Turns out I'm missing his '83 Topps sunset card in the PC, though I've got it in the complete set. Plenty of oddballs and other OPC I'm missing too.

But hey, above is a complete run of his Fleer and Donruss cards, as he was left out of '82 and '83 Donruss.

Some post-career releases. 

Topps 2016 Archives included Randy as an SP and autograph subject. Randy was generous with his signature over the years, so no collector should have to stoop to a butchered cut like that slabbed red thing, but hey, gives some unique flavor to the PC.

Finally, here's that TTM request I alluded to. One of my favorite customs to get back with fresh ink. As I say, Randy was happy to sign for fans, but not many Pirates autos of his out there. He had tried to make the club in spring training '83, but got cut prior to opening day. I found a couple Topps Vault photos, threw together a custom, and was fortunate enough to have him sign and return it for me. Thanks again, Randy. Rest in peace.

Joy of a Completed Player Collection: Dan Walters

Back in November 1991, a Padres catching prospect named Dan Walters was a special guest at a nearby card show. I was able to talk my mom into driving me so I could get him to autograph a minor league card of his I had recently pulled from a pack. I definitely wasn't much of an autograph hound-- I think the only autograph I possessed at the time was of '50s Olympic diver Pat McCormick, who had done a motivational talk at my middle school-- but it seemed like something fun to do. Turns out Dan lived in East County San Diego, and was even an alum of a rival high school, so it wasn't out of his way.

It was pretty cool when he got called up the following June and did a fine job filling in behind the dish the rest of that season. Dan stuck on the roster of his hometown team a couple months into the 1993 season, but as a major leaguer he tapped out a career Padre with 84 total games in the bigs. His last season in pro ball was '96, then he became a police officer. Sadly, he was paralyzed in the line of duty in 2003, eventually passing away in 2020 at age 53.

When I returned to the hobby as an adult, Dan Walters became a PC guy for me, thanks to my brush with him as a kid adding a personal connection (I only got maybe 4 or 5 ballplayer autographs as a kid, and the rest were all old-timers). For a while there I was riding high as his #1 ranked collector at TCDB. Then last year, a collector going by RollingThunder88 entered his impressive collection to the site and overtook me by a few cards. My competitive nature kicked in, and I set out to complete my Dan Walters player collection, hunting down the dozen or so cards I was lacking. Took me a few months utilizing the usual card sources-- eBay, Sportlots, COMC, and a TCDB transaction-- but I was able to land all 43 cards TCDB has listed for him, cementing the title of #1 ranked Dan Walters collector. Woo!

So now let's take a look at a full run of Dan Walters baseball cards.

He's got one card each for the years 1986 through 1989, seen here. Love the bastardized 1986 Topps design of the '88 card. The Astros drafted Dan out of high school, later trading him to San Diego after the 1988 season for pitcher Ed Vosberg.

Here's the early 90s "pre-rookie" stuff. The bottom pair aren't dupes; the one with a bit more shadow visible is from the locally distributed team set version, while the other is retail. Dan spent all 1991 in AAA and played well but was blocked on the depth chart by Benito Santiago and backups Tom Lampkin and Dann Bilardello. Then in '92, he was further tearing it up in Las Vegas-- hitting .394, a special number to Padres fans-- and finally got called up when Benito suffered an injury. 

His first MLB cards are late-season releases from 1992, Traded/Update sets for the most part. The Rated Rookie is from the Update series, only available to pull via special factory sets, so it's tougher than you'd expect a 1992 Donruss card to be. The card at the end here has some meta mojo to it, seeing as it's a San Diego police card issued of a future San Diego police officer.

Now we're into 1993, where the majority of Dan Walters' cards are from.

He was included in most of the major sets that year, getting his share of junk-era rookie cards printed in the millions.

Some oddball stuff, too.

Parallels start becoming more prevalent in '93, with Stadium Club stamping a few "First Day Production" and "Members Only". Upper Deck has the gold hologram variation with it. Looks like that quiet moment taking a knee on-deck was also the image source of his 1993 Topps card, which I've got several iterations of...

Base, gold, blank back, micro, Inaugural Marlins, Inaugural Rockies, and Rediscover Topps buyback (2017).

A closer look at the stamping reveals I've got the silver foil "Rediscover Topps", meaning I could potentially add to this PC assuming there exist blue, bronze, and gold foil versions out there for me to track down (perhaps also for his 1992 Topps Traded card?), though at this point I don't anticipate putting much effort into hunting buybacks. (Welp, ok, I just set a saved search in case something I don't have pops up cheap. At least he never got a Bowman card, so I don't have to worry about buybacks there.)

Dan's production at the plate slipped in 1993, and he spent much of the season back in Las Vegas. When the 1994 baseball card sets came out, he didn't crack a single checklist. 

...But...

..he did get a prominent cameo on Jay Bell's Topps card. Close enough for a dedicated player collector without many options for expanding a PC! I've got the rainbow of base, gold, and bilingual. These (as well as the '93 blank back and Rediscover Topps) are not factored in the TCDB ranking, just some bonus overkill.

This trio out of the mainstream wraps up the cards of Dan Walters:

1994 Osceola Astros 10th Anniversary - This might be the only card in the PC I had to break double digits buying. Not a great looking card, just a black & white sketch of a headshot, but it's scarce (guessing the set was only briefly available at a minor league stadium), so what are you gonna do?

1995 Colorado Springs Sky Sox - A friendly TCDB user sent me this tough card for free after I asked about it. Hobby warm fuzzies, right? I did my part to pay-it-forward a bit by scanning it for the site, as it was Dan's only card without images uploaded. Seems to be a Rolling Rock he's celebrating the PCL championship with in the photo. It's nice that he had that high point to remember at the twilight of his playing days.

1996 Edmonton Trappers - A stoic shot from his final stop as a ballplayer. Kind of a downer to go out on, contrasted by the happy faces on the other 2 cards here. But maybe that's fitting with how his story ended. (Rest in peace, Mr. Walters.)

So there's my Dan Walters supercollection, I guess I can call it. Thanks for checking it out with me.

The Bird bird feeder (Mark Fidrych PC)

My live-in marital partner surprised me with a bird feeder last Christmas, knowing how I've enjoyed having an active hummingbird feeder for a couple years running. Took me a while to get around to putting it up, waiting for the rainy season to be over, but I've had it up for a week now and it's pretty cool. 

It's made of clear plastic and meant to be hung in a window so you can get a close look at the birdies on display. At first the clear side walls were confusing them-- often fluttering against them trying in vain to get in-- so I stuck on some Fleer team logo stickers on the sides. But I soon upgraded that idea to slotting in a pair of Mark Fidrych cards, thereby dedicating it as a Mark Fidrych Memorial Bird Feeder... or The Bird Birdfeeder.

It's designed to be hung with suction cups to a window, but the best viewing spot I could identify was over a screen, so I rigged up a hanger instead.

I'm a little worried about a squirrel raid, (and/or maybe the crows/ravens who run the neighborhood will come by for their "protection" fee?), but no trouble yet.

I didn't take the decision to "sacrifice" good baseball cards lightly. But I already have these cards. I've got one of the '77 Toppses in my setbuild, and two more in the PC in addition to the lesser-conditioned triplicate selected for the birds. As for the '78, also got one in the 78T build, plus one in the PC, plus another one that's autographed (for/from former blog buddy "Tony L." who pops up to talk about soccer on twitter once in a while but sadly seems like Off Hiatus Cards is in fact never returning from the hiatus it's currently on). 

Ruby does some birdwatching.

But yeah, the cards in there are packaged with water-resistance in mind, and it's on the north side of the house, so not a ton of direct sunlight, so we'll see how the cards are looking after a few months, assuming they don't go missing or anything. I bet it won't take long for these cards to be imprinted on my brain more than they already are due to looking over at them many times in an average day. I suppose I could pop in any old trading cards to do the job-- perhaps favoring teams named after birds.. yeah, maybe I'll swap in some Orioles/Cardinals/Jays commons once the rainy days return-- but at least for now it will continue to serve a dual purpose, acting as a safespace for li'l tweet-tweets to find an assortment of small seeds and nuts available to eat.. while also paying tribute to a fascinating former ballplayer who happened to be similarly nicknamed due to his appearance calling to mind the character Big Bird.

A guest to the Bird feeder checks out Fidrych's early stats.

The feeder isn't super busy, but has flurries of activity at least a couple times a day so far, which is perfect. Mostly common sparrows, as far as I can tell, which are cute, though hopefully I'll be lucky enough to eventually spot some "fancier" birds stopping by.

On the topic of Mark Fidrych, I just went ahead and logged my PC into TCDB today. My 23 unique cards were good enough to crack the Top 20 there, so that's cool. I did the "add all missing cards to wantlist" thing, too, so hopefully that'll spark some trades and help me move up the list... though he only has 214 total cards listed, and most of those are either oddballs from the late 70s or low-numbered stuff from the aughts when the card companies started going nuts with cards of retired favorites. But yeah, it'd be cool to build up the PC to where I could "hang with the big boys" of Fidrych collectors.

Here's the PC, more or less (turning this post into an update of my previous Fidrych PC post from 2018)...

Some of Gio's customs infiltrated this group of cards I've got of Bird's early days.

You can see I've got dupes of his '80 and '81 Topps cards (No OPC in the mix here, sadly), though they are less fun to look at than '77 and to a lesser extent '78.. but could be called into active bird feeder duty if needed.

Love the minor league cards, even if that must've been a frustrating time for Mark.

Some post-playing days cards, including a 2003 Fan Favorites auto I scored not too long ago. I believe it's my second certified auto of his, following the (not pictured) 2003 Retired base auto I got back in 2018. 

Speaking of Fan Favorites, the "1977" (2004) refractor from a few pics above didn't really catch the light there, so here are some bonus shots of it to close us out for today: 

Refraction. Simple, yet elegant refraction.

I like how the rookie cup has gone supernova in this one.

"Get out of there, Mark! The field's on fire!!"

Yu Darvish PC (by request)

How bout them 2021 Padres, huh? They were supposed to be good but then they were actually bad. I think Padres fans such as myself are pretty much numb to it by this point. Oh well, "we'll get 'em next year."

Last year around this time, I showed off my Blake Snell PC when he joined the Padres and expectations were rising. In the comments, Zippy requested a similar post for my Yu Darvish cards, another All-Star starter San Diego acquired suddenly, whom I had also already been collecting for a while. But I had some unfinished business there because I was in need of an autograph and well.. I just finally scored one!, so let's whip up this by-request post, better late than never.

Here it is. I had decided I wasn't going to cheap out with an unlicensed stickergraph but rather find a nice on-card auto. I really liked the look of this Finest refractor and ended up winning it.

And check the serial number near the bottom... Christmas Card! Yep, this card was a bullseye-hit for my collection.

Kicking off the rest of the collection with some Topps flagship, Chrome, n' stuff.

Bowman.

More various Topps.

Yu on old Topps designs.

Heritage insert and some Ginter.

Panini cards.

Some neat stuff to close out the post. Cool cards from his early days (he was apparently very expressive on the mound back then!), plus a relic I pulled back in 2015.

I still don't have any Padres cards of his, but it's no surprise seeing as I haven't busted any 2021 product or done much trading this year. But yeah, I'm up for any Yu Darvish cards not pictured in this post. He pitched okay for San Diego, but a definite step down from when he was the Cy runner-up with the Cubs in 2020. Hopefully he bounces back for a strong 2022 and maybe then the Padres will actually be good.

Thanks for reading. Feel free to make any requests for PCs of mine you might be interested in checking out in a future post.

Bruce Bochy PC

Blogger Mario A. has never been one to bite his tongue calling out hobby fails, and a few weeks back he tweeted out a Bruce Bochy buyback auto as an example of a deflating card one might pull from the pricey, one-card-per-box Archives Signature product from Topps.

He made his point, and honestly if Topps should really exit the baseball card landscape in the coming years, giving a rest to the steady flow of Topps buybacks is something I'll be happy about.

But it so happens I'm in the minority who was excited to see Bruce Bochy have an influx of certified autographs on the market. He helmed the Padres through the height of my fandom of the team, back when I'd do my best to catch the broadcast of nearly every game. (Been a long time since I've watched through an entire Padres game, stretching back to well before cancelling my mlb.tv subscription.)

But yeah, Boch has a sentimental place in my heart, and when he departed for San Francisco I didn't hold it against him, as San Diego's front office seemed to be pushing him out the door. Those ensuing years that the damn Giants were loitering in the World Series, I could at least be happy that Boch was having success, though I wished he could've worked that magic during his time in So Cal.

He'll probably get into the Hall soon. More losses (2029) than wins (2003) doesn't look good, but I don't think you can name another manager with 3 World Series titles who isn't enshrined in Cooperstown, right?

Before this year, Bruce didn't have many autos on the market. There's an Archives "Fan Favorites" auto from a while back that I had on my radar, but he's pictured as a Giant, so I was kinda begrudgingly keeping an eye out for a good price on one and think I bid unsuccessfully on a couple. So his popping up in Archives Signature this year is a rare time that I'm thankful Topps loves buying back their cards, modifying them, then putting them back out there. Otherwise I might be waiting a long time for a decent certified Bochy auto in a Padres uniform.

Anyways, after seeing Mario's tweet, I took to eBay and was excited to find a Christmas Card of Boch in a Padres uniform with a low opening bid that I was able to secure for the collection. 

It's just what I was looking for and crowns my PC nicely. Figured I'd document the rest of my Bruce Bochy cards here.

This slabbed, signed rookie card was my placeholder for a certified autograph the past few years. Not much to like here, but it was cheap and scratched the itch. If he does get The Call, perhaps this card will see a bump in value, since I know "signed HOF rookie cards" is a somewhat common avenue for collectors to go down. Not that this specimen would grade very highly, a bit off-center and with a noticeable edge nick on the bottom.

Still need a raw, unsigned '79 for the PC (though I've got one in my '79 set). He didn't have Topps cards in '81-'83, so this is otherwise a complete run of his Topps flagship as a player.

And then some manager cards, including an unbought-back copy of the 2001 card from earlier. Sorting out my cards for this post, I was surprised to find that the Heritage here is my only card of him as a Giant.

Only Donruss card I'm missing is 1986 Donruss #551.

I expected to need a few Fleer cards, but no, he only made it into these two Fleer sets. That's being a backup catcher for you, I guess.

Oddball goodness here. Mothers, Keeblers, Carl's Jr, SGA.

Closing out with a few glorious minor league cards, including another signed card I picked up along the line. I sometimes forget Boch spent a couple years as catching depth for the Mets. (These two Tides cards seem to be the only cardboard representation from the stint; Despite playing 17 games in New York in '82, he never got a card as a Met.. [ok, eventually one: 1991 WIZ Mets. Nobody beats the Wiz.])

And dig the "C/CH" position on the 1988 card as he transitioned from behind the plate to the dugout. It's too bad the Las Vegas Stars changed their uniforms to keep in sync with the parent club. They should have kept rocking those mustard-explosion uniforms forever! "Gold star", ya know? Totally fits the name.

I'd be happy to add any Bruce Bochy cards not pictured in this post, so feel free to get in touch about a trade if you've got any to spare.

Thanks for reading and enjoy the holiday weekend, everybody.

Gavin Sheets PC

Gavin Sheets became the 4th man named Gavin to play Major League Baseball last night, following in the footsteps of misters Floyd, Cecchini, and Lux.

Congrats, Mr. Sheets!

The 25-year old went 2-4 with 2 RBI in the White Sox 7-6 win over the Twins. 

Gavin Sheets is the first #WhiteSox player with multiple hits & RBI in an MLB debut since Craig Wilson on September 5, 1998

— Christopher Kamka (@ckamka) June 30, 2021

Pretty cool.

Here's my Gavin Sheets PC as it stood on the day of his debut.

A few decent Bowman cards.

Most of my Topps cards of him are autographed, lol. The Heritage is a glossy parallel.

A pair of numbered Panini cards and a minor league issue.

Nice selection of Leaf cards here!

And a slabbed auto. Sharp looking card.

Just pulled the trigger on the Topps Now card for his debut.. which is designated as a "Call Up" not a "RC". Probably too late to get him into Update, but I'd expect him to get the rookie card treatment next year. I'm more or less content with the PC as it stands (I don't plan to chase his rookies or whatever), but I'm always happy to receive more cards of his in trade. Let's hope he has an outstanding career ahead of him!