Guys From Granite 2019 recap

Similar to my annual "Gavins in pro ball" post, here's another exercise for me to keep track of the lesser-known active players I collect. Time to find out how professional athletes who went to my high school did in 2019.


Trenton Brooks

Trenton had a solid 2019 in the Indians organization. After a couple months at A+ Lynchburg, he was promoted to AA Akron where he hit .274 with 9 homers and 22 doubles in 241 at-bats. The 24-year old mainly plays right field these days. I got a nice TTM return from him a couple years back.


Andrew Brown

Drafted by the Phillies in the 13th round of the 2016 draft out of Granite Hills High School, Andrew performed well to start his career, but had a rough 2019, putting up an ERA of 6.17 for A+ Clearwater. He had 20 starts, plus came on in relief 4 times. I tried requesting an autograph through-the-mail with the custom on the right a couple times in the past with no luck, but maybe I'll try one more time in 2020.


Jayson Rose

Sadly, looks like Jayson's brief career in pro ball has come to an end. An 8th round pick by the Brewers in 2017, Jayson struggled to stay healthy in 2018, was cut loose by Milwaukee in April of 2019, and didn't get picked up by another team. Bummer. All the best to Jayson in the next chapter of his life.


Travis Taijeron

Travis is the only active Guy From Granite who's made the majors, getting into 26 games with the Mets in 2017. After spending 2018 with the Dodgers' AAA club, he returned to New York in 2019, spending the season at AAA Syracuse. His 24 dingers were one behind the team lead (Rene Rivera), and his 64 walks led the club. But his average was down (.229) and he struck out a lot (165). He's currently a free agent and will be 31 next season, so I'm not sure what 2020 has in store for him, but I wish him luck sticking around.


Jordan Verdon

Jordan was drafted by Detroit in the 23rd round out of San Diego State University in 2018. He spent all of 2019 at A- Connecticut, playing 1B and DHing. He hit .246 with 12 doubles in 142 at-bats. I sent out a TTM autograph request with the above custom near the end of their season (my only TTM attempt to an active player in 2019), but haven't gotten a response yet. I should remember to try again early next season. I also just now bought his first real card. but I think I'll publish this post now rather than wait until it arrives.


This year broke a run from 2016-2018 of GHHS Eagles turning pro, as no alumni were drafted in the 2019 MLB June draft. But there are some talented kids coming up, so I wouldn't be surprised to see a new streak start up in 2020.

That's it for baseball. Elsewhere in sports...


Jimmie Johnson

The 2019 season started on a positive note for Jimmie, as he won the 2019 Advance Auto Parts Clash in February, though that would be the highlight of the year for him. He would go on to score 4 top 10 finishes, but wound up finishing a career-worst 18th place in the final standings. The 44-year old recently announced that the 2020 Cup season will be his last as a full-time driver. A seven-time champion in the NASCAR Cup Series, he's had a hell of a career.


Joe Cardona

Joe plays long snapper for the Patriots (and is a U.S. Naval Reserve lieutenant in the offseason). Back in February, he brought home his 2nd Super Bowl ring as New England beat the Rams. He's played in all 12 games so far this season, with the Patriots looking to make yet another deep playoff run.


So there you have it, Granite Hills alumni doing our hometown of El Cajon proud.

Cards from Doug, Greg, Matt, Billy, and Jeremy

We're entering that ol' season of giving, and while in the past I've done mailing-blasts and blog-events leading up to Christmas, it always ends up being an exhausting undertaking, what with all the other stuff going on this time of year. So this year, I'm thinking a nice post-xmas giveaway. It'll likely be a card "draft" giveaway not too unlike Night Owl's recent event, with lots of prize options and multiple winners. I've been a lucky winner in a few recent cardsphere contests (not to mention greedily calling dibs on a bunch of primo slots in Wes's big 12/25 event), so I feel the need to give back. So stay tuned for that and be sure to take a moment later in the month to check in with the blog for a chance to win some cards.

Got a few different incoming mailings to cover in this post, and this first one is from Doug at Sports Cards From the Dollar Store. This card is one of those gimmicky but fun cards from Panini where they take a photo of a guy wearing a Santa hat, then make relic cards from the hat. Nice card to spice up my modest PC of this guy I went to high school with.

I think these are the first 2018 Heritage Minors cards in my collection, maybe. Good selection of future Friars, highlighted by a blue Logan Allen.

Some 1970 Padres.. imported from Canada....

O-Pee-Chee! Always fun.

More nice Padres cards of promising guys who failed to become quality major leaguers or are on their way to such a fate (prove me wrong, Francisco, prove me wrong!). Sean Burroughs bat relic, in case you can't read the tiny text. Keyvius Sampson made the majors with the Reds in '15-16, but looks like he was out of baseball last year. Neat auto. Like most Padres 1st round picks, Donavan Tate washed out of baseball after an unimpressive minor league career. The former two-sport star tried to return to football last year, but doesn't look like that panned out.

Some other PC cards. Good stuff.

And cards of lady wrestlers I collect. I think my Alexa Bliss PC doubled thanks to this mailing!

Very appreciated, Doug! I think this return makes the Felix Millan auto you traded me for pale in comparison, but I'll try to hit you back next time.

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Next up is my prize from Night Owl's recent 10 Year Anniversary giveaway. I was lucky enough to get into the list of eligible players, though the randomizer threw me down near the bottom of the draft board. By the time I was on the clock, most of the cards that caught my eye were gone, though I was able to add a nice Andre Dawson 2011 "legend variation" to the PC.

Greg was kind enough to throw in a bonus card for my recently-begun '72 Topps setbuild. I am at 6.6% complete with this godforsaken set and already know it will be the Baines of my collecting existence for the next several years. I just need to keep telling myself it's a long term project. Just moving along with a random card here and there, such as Jim Brewer here, and eventually down the road, I'll have it in my sights.

Thanks, Greg!

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Next up is a PWE from Sport Card Collectors.

Lovely pair of cards here. Billy Hamilton was surprisingly let go by the Reds recently and picked up by the Royals. Best of luck to him in KC.

Some Astros and Bellingers.

Thanks, SCC! Hope you like the return PWE I sent.

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Here's a surprise holiday PWE from Billy at Cardboard History.

A half-dozen basketball dudes I collect. Tim Duncan trio, Dirk, TJ Leaf, and Manute Bol.

Thanks, Billy! I've been working on sending some cards your way soon.

 - - - -----o

Lastly for today is a contest win from Jeremy at Topps cards that never were.

I wasn't expecting this lot of Brian Giles cards.. and though my PC of his is pretty large, pretty sure I needed just about all of these!

The prize in the contest was Jeremy would send you a few customs he made of your choice. I was a little confused if he had already made them or not, and I asked about Chris Jones, a guy from my high school who played in the bigs but never got a real card from his MLB career. Jeremy kindly obliged. Glad to have these whipped up for me!

I also asked about some missing Rod Beck cards that Topps neglected to make, and he came through big there, too! (Beck has a Gold '92 Topps card-- a replacement for a checklist-- but not a standard issue in the set.)

Of course I'm partial to the San Diego era cards, but all are appreciated.

Thanks so much, Jeremy!


Thanks again to everybody who's sent me cards. And thanks for reading.

Superfractor auto pickup! (Guys From Granite - 2018 recap)

Collecting cards of guys who went to my high school is among the favorite avenues of my collection. It's time again to check in on the active pro ballplayers who graduated from Granite Hills High School in El Cajon, California.

And I've just picked up a new "best card" in this minicollection!:

Boom! I've got a few superfractors in my collection already (three of Gavin LaValley and one of Brian Humphries, another guy from Granite), but this is my first superfractor auto, which are a bit more prestigious. Feels good to have a legit claim to being the top Travis Taijeron collector out there! I know he's not likely to become the next Mike Trout or anything, but as I say, I like collecting dudes from my high school and am stoked with this pickup.

Travis Taijeron made his major league debut in 2017 with a handful of games with the Mets at age 28. He then signed as a free agent with the Dodgers for 2018. He didn't get a chance to play with the NL Champs, unfortunately, as they kept him down in Triple A all season. But he had another solid year: .271 average, 11 HR, 44 RBI in 87 games for the Oklahoma City Dodgers. And he was on fire in the playoffs (.600, 6-10, 2 HR, 3 RBI). Seems to me that LA could have used a clutch guy like that off the bench in the World Series!

Back to baseball cards, I was getting worried that his 2017 Topps Now "call up" card would be the lone remnant from his time in the bigs. He didn't get a card in either 3 of the Topps flagship products in 2018. No Heritage or High Number either. And he got no love from Panini at all. Just when I had pretty much accepted that he wouldn't have any true rookie cards, he popped up in one of my eBay searches with an auto RC in 2018 Topps Chrome Update. He doesn't even have a base card in the set, just the "Rookie Autograph" card (and all the parallels* that come with it). Hey, I'll take it!

*PARALLEL CARDS: Blue Wave Refractor #/150 (1:1,950), Blue Refractor #/150 (1:2,065), Green Refractor #/99 (1:3,157), Gold Wave Refractor #/50 (1:5,963), Gold Refractor #/50 (1:5,994), Orange Refractor #/25 (1:13,416), Red Refractor #/5 (1:59,940), Red Wave Refractor #/5 (1:59,940), SuperFractor 1/1 (1:385,084), Printing Plates 1/1 x 4 (1:53,662).

In addition to the superfractor, I've picked up these so far-- blue wave (/150), blue (also /150), and green (/99)-- and have been keeping an eye out for more at the right price. It'd be nice to go after this master rainbow, but since printing plates are included, the chances are very slim of it ever being completed (I haven't seen any of the 4 plates for sale yet.) Some of his cards have been selling surprisingly well for a guy pushing 30 who didn't even play in the bigs this year. But I'm just happy Travis got a real major league rookie card and that I've been able to pick up new certified autos of another Guy From Granite.

And I get a kick out of the card being numbered RA-TT.

And now for the other active Guys From Granite in the minors...

Trenton Brooks

Trenton had a fine 2018, slapping a .281 batting average with 5 boom-booms and 28 two-baggers in 107 games in A+. He's a good kid and I'm rooting for him to make it up to Cleveland eventually.

Andrew Brown

There are a ton of "Andrew Browns" in the world today (makes it hard to search for his cards), but this guy, b. 10-24-97, had a nice 2018 season: 72.2 inning pitched with 60 strikeouts and just 17 walks with a 2.11 ERA in the Phillies chain. I'd wager he'll make it up to AA in 2019, and if he keeps this up, he's likely to be the 9th guy from Granite to make the majors before long.

Jayson Rose

Jayson only pitched 3 innings total in 2018 (no runs allowed, for what it's worth).. Not sure what happened, but I gotta assume he got injured..? Let's hope the Brewers' 2017 8th round pick bounces back strong in 2019.

Jordan Verdon

Jordan was a 23rd round pick of the Tigers in 2018. He got off to a great start in Rookie League (.381 average, 1.130 OPS), but struggled after getting promoted to A ball. But he's still just 21 and will have some time to show what he's got.

Sean Ross

Ok, Sean Ross isn't a pro, but I'm including him in this post because he has cards (2016 Leaf Perfect Game). He was a late draft pick by the Jays out of high school in 2017 but chose to attend San Diego State instead. He played in 12 games as a freshman this year, picking up 6 hits in 18 at-bats, good for a .333 batting average. He also pitched in relief once, but it didn't go well. He also played with the St. Cloud Rox, a wood-bat college summer league team, and got 28 hits in 100 at-bats (which my math skills confirm is a .280 average.) He also pitched once with them, with 1.2 scoreless innings. I think I cemented myself as the world's #1 Sean Ross collector earlier this year when I picked up his 1/1 purple parallel auto.

Joe Cardona

Cardona is the only active NFL Guy From Granite (2nd ever behind Tommy Vardell). He signed a four-year contract extension with the Patriots this past June. Good for him! Cardona, also an officer in the U.S. Naval Reserve, was the snapper for the 2016-17 Patriots in their Super Bowl LI win over the Falcons. Looks like he's played in all of New England's games since 2015, though he's been hampered by a shoulder injury lately and could possibly miss time if it keeps bugging him.

Jimmie Johnson

Sure, let's bring up this NASCAR bigshot while we're at it. Heck, he's probably the most successful GHHS grad ever. In 2016, Johnson won his seventh championship, tying Richard Petty and Dale Earnhardt for the most Cup Series championships of all time. Pretty impressive! He hasn't had much success since then, unfortunately, and at 43, his prime years might be behind him now, but he's still quite the competitor. The 2019 racing season will be a major transition year for my old classmate, as he's parting ways with both his longtime sponsor (Lowe's) and crew chief (Chad Knaus). I'm hoping Jimmie can get that elusive 8th championship sometime, but even if he doesn't, he's still an all-time great in racing history.

And so there you have the former Granite Hills Eagles who are active in pro sports today. All the best to them as they fly like an Eagle in 2019 and beyond!

Bountiful Trades That Which Did Occur

Seems like September was a quiet month on the trade front for me for the most part, but in the past week or so I've gotten several nice trade packages in the mail. Let's check 'em out!

Judson from My Cardboard Habit leads us off:

Three big needs off my Desperate Double Dozen!

That's the Burger King variation of Reggie Jackson's 1977 Topps card, a marked improvement over the airbrushed flagship version we're all more familiar with.

And speaking of Reggie PC needs, that's a gorgeous Reggie Sanders rookie. I remember when I was a kid, I held 1991 Leaf Gold Rookies in high esteem the equivalent of a superfractor today. I pulled the Von Popple and it was a vaunted centerpiece of my collection for quite a while. Took me a while, but glad to finally add the Sanders all these years later.

As for the Klesko, well I have a ton of his cards as a Brave and Padre, but it's nice to round out the PC with cards of him from the brief stint in San Francisco at the end of this career.

Oversized stuff like this can be awkward to store, but neat to add to the ol' collection. The Ginter box toppers of Harper and McCutchen are pretty sweet. The '16 Heritage panel is right up the alley for a guy like me who's a Padres fan and also has some Red Sox sympathies. It's the only thing from this package I was expecting. When Judson first offered up the panel a few months back, it was the Mookie Betts appearance that most interested me, though since then Travis Jankowski has become a guy I kinda collect too. I heard Christian Bethancourt might be used as a triple threat next year: catcher, outfielder, and pitcher! That would be pretty cool if a guy got regular playing time at all those positions in the majors. We'll see if it shakes out.

Big thanks for the cards, Judson! Glad we good! Best of luck to your Rangers this postseason.

(Funny enough, the other 3 trading partners in this post are all Cubs fans, so good luck to them too!)

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Next up is my first trade with Trevor P. from Bump and Run Football Card Blog:

Some awesome gimmicky cards from a simpler time! A pair of Boggs, and short-time Padres favorites Robby Alomar and Roddy Beck.

Some old-timers I collect. I botched at tetrising the cards for this picture; should have put the 2 horizontal cards together in a row, and the 3 vertical cards in another row. Tetrising is in fact a valid word according to my spellchecker.. go figure!

Ah! Now there's a properly tetrised photo! Tetrised is not a valid word according to my spellchecker. So, tetrising? Yes. Tetrised? No. Ok, got it. Anyways, these are cards of active guys I collect, featuring a couple Sales, including a sweet Chrome refractor, plus Adam Jones with a bat barrel poking out of his butt (ouch!), and a McCutchen GQ mini.

I think Trevor's mainly a football guy, so it's no surprise he was able to hit a few of my football interests, possibly the best well-rounded football lot I've ever gotten in a trade, as far as guys I collect.
Marshall Faulk - SDSU legend.
Robert Smith - Honestly like him just from his brief MST3K appearance.
Tommy Vardell - Guy from Granite!
Reggie Bush - fellow East County San Diego boy.
Ricky Williams - I ran track against him back in the day (ok, not sure if I specifically ever had a race against him, but we were both around city invitationals at the same time, so maybe? Some of my track teammates did race against him.)
Gavin Escobar - We're both named Gavin and both went to SDSU.

Other sports were included too, with this nifty trio of cards. Mutombo is a fun dude to collect. I went to high school with Jimmie Johnson. And Gretzky is one of my very few hockey PCs.

Awesome stuff, Trevor! Thanks a lot. I'll get a return out to you soon.

-   -  - - - ---o

Dimebox Nick is always good for a stuffed PWE to hit the spot.

Nice lot of Padres from the past.

And a bunch of current Padres, with emphasis on Tyson Ross. I hope he can bounce back healthy for next season.

Are you guys sick of seeing 2011 Topps parallels on my blog yet? Well, this little lot brings me to 19% complete. It's a fun frankenset to put together, but still a long way to go.

And here's a pair of Padres legends pictured in their less-familiar uniforms (I kid).

Great stuff as always.. Thanks, Nick! I dropped a PWE in the mail to you a couple days ago.

-    -   -- ---o

Last up is a surprise PWE from Tony Burbs:

Nice boost to the Bryce Harper PC. Gotta love those Bunt Program inserts.. happy to land this one.

And a bunch of Sox, both of the Red and White variety. Very nice! I had eyes on that Hoyt Wilhelm newspaper giveaway from a few weeks back, so it was a very nice surprise to see it pop up.

Speaking of socks.. Can I talk about socks for a moment? I pretty much only wear grey socks. White socks are too bright and can be distracting to an outfit. Black socks seem to be too hot and get sweaty easily. Grey socks are a great middle ground! Plus, if you're a household who divides laundry between whites and darks, well, grey socks can go in either load, no problem. Grey (or "gray" if you prefer, though I favor the old-school "e" spelling) socks are clearly superior footunderwear, though despite this, they don't seem to be widely accepted. When it's time for me to buy new socks, I have to go online because basic grey socks aren't typically available in stores. This just seems wrong. Please consider converting to being a grey sock wearer and thereby helping make it easier for me to buy socks. We must rise up! Grey socks are the best way to go!
Ok, that's enough rambling about socks.

Thanks, Mr. Burbs, for the excellent cards! Hopefully I can scrape up enough Cubbies to get a sufficient return out to you shortly.

Thanks again to all these trader-buddies and thanks to you for reading. One more recent card package I need to get to, a big box from John Miller, but I think it'll need its own post, as it is not family-friendly. (Anybody know if Blogger allows pictures of naked ladies? Probably not, huh. I might have to do some censorship.)

Cards and Cold Ones

My kickass wife has a great tradition going called 12 Days of Beermas where everyday leading up to my birthday/xmas eve, she gifts me with a nice craft beer. I think this is the 3rd year doing it. She gets a kick out of finding microbrews I would like (and don't worry, I pour her a taster of each). She's more of a beer snob than me. I definitely appreciate a lovingly crafted beer, but I'm not above slumming it with PBR. She also has an encyclopedic memory about her feelings on beers she's tried, whereas I'm nowhere as good at keeping track of that kind of stuff.

Since some other blogs like All Trade Bait All the Time and Bob Walk The Plank slip in a beer review post from time to time, I thought I'd try joining in. I've never been very good at critiquing food/drink, so my "reviews" will be brief. Today I'll be featuring the first 7 beers from Beermas so far this year. And I'm matching them up with a Christmas Card from my collection. Because why not?

Here we've got my first James Shields autograph on a 2015 Topps High Tek Clouds Diffractor. Was glad to pick up a card featuring him as a Padre (seems to be a spring training uniform with the weird pit things). He's paired up here with a Freigeist Ehrenfeider. Germans make good beer. This one's an unfiltered altbier. It was pretty good; a little fruity. Just 4.8% ABV, so pretty light compared to the rest of these.

Here's a close-up on the Shields numbering.

Next up we've got a Giancarlo Stanton jersey relic from Panini Immaculate. Bet The Farm is a crisp IPA. I wasn't clever enough to do it on purpose, but the Grain Station name of the brewery is kinda close to "Giancarlo Stanton". 6.5%

This one was an easy one to match up. The label has a cartoon dog on it, so of course Crime Dog is the clear choice. This Chicken Killer Barley Wine packs a punch. Very boozy at 10%

C.J. Wilson goes against the grain here with a can of 35K stout. This was a pretty good beer. 7%

Jimmie Johnson sleighs his NASCAR competition, and this Ninkasi Imperial Pumpkin Sleigh'r will get your motor running. Maybe not quite as much sweetness as I like from my pumpkin ales, but imperials are all about jacking up the ABV. 9%

Rock guitarists get lots of girls, so this Electric Warrior oatmeal stout would naturally attract a girlie card. I'm not sure who Kyara Tyler is, but she's a cutie. Picked this card up on Listia recently. Smooth dark beer from Idaho. 5.3%

Let's finish off this post with VIP Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. Kareem probably won't be partaking of this Vanilla Infused Porter from Hop Valley Brewing Co. anytime soon due to religious beliefs, but that's ok. I was really excited about this one, though it couldn't quite live up to expectations. Not bad, not particularly good, just interesting. But hey, I'd drink it again! 5.9%

I'm looking forward to the next 5 beers and will likely do a follow up post with them later.

Happy Holidays, everybody!