Break It Down For Me, Fellas.

Due to the copious amount of half-writtten posts therein, I have declared March to be the month where I settle all unfinished draft folder business.  This next week, I am bound and determined to get up and thank all of the kind souls who have traded with me and sent me cards. 

      Yesterday, I posted a contest winner and low and behold today I discovered another pile of booty I won from a generous blogger that had not been given proper showcase.  This batch comes from Gavin of Baseball Card Breakdown, a fine blog I suggest highly (mostly because of stuff like this).  Last June, defgav held a One Year Anniversary contest where the prizes were lots and lots of lots of autographs.  And when he announced the winner in early July, the randomizer had given me the magic number of 21 which came up, so thank you random chance and Marquis Grissom for the following lot:

I chose the lot with the nicest Mets autograph - shocker, I know.  The Ron Swoboda has found a happy place in my Amazin' auto collection; odd coincidence that this is the second mention of good ol' Ron this week.  The George Foster auto is also pretty cool, and as for Toby Harrah and Daryl Boston, well, they aren't bad guys, are they.  Heck, those Topps Retired autos are cool no matter what.  The other 5 cards here I think are in return for the aforementioned Marquis Grissom rookies I sent Gavin.  Or maybe he just threw them in because he's a nice guy.  I honestly can't recall.  Who knew that Jacob DeGrom would pitch so well and win Rookie of the Year?

Oh, but that's not all for this little post, look at this:

You gotta love the use of old school stamps for the job they were intended.  When I worked at the baseball card store back in the day, we used to buy stamp collections for pennies on the dollar (since most stamps aren't worth more than what they are issued for, after all) and then used most of the stamps to just mail stuff.  It was a slightly ingenious/diabolical way to keep shipping costs down.  Lastly, take a good look at the note Gavin included...

He drew me a David Wright sketch card!

As you can see, I cut that beauty out right away and believe me, it has since found a place of honor in my Wright collection as (technically) my first 1 of 1 of him.  Thanks Gavin!

Everything But The Verlanders.

This month, I settle all draft folder business.  This week in particular, I am clearing out all the trade posts that I began but for whatever reason, did not finish. 

This one is not so much a trade post as it is a contest winning post, but hey, stuff came in the mail from someone else, so it counts.  This pile of goodness came in June of 2014 from Dennis of Too Many Verlanders (née Too Many Grandersons, who currently patrols right field for my Mets).  Thanks to the magic of randomization, I came in 6th in his spring cleaning sweepstakes and got to choose from an array of prizes.  He was also just flat out giving away stuff and I chose a couple of lots from that booty as well. 

Given that the best cards were gone, I decided to try my luck: behold a 100 card Super Value (re)Pack.  The lots I got were one of Mark McGwire (because why not) and the creative batch of "what's news" football cards: New York, New England, and New Orleans. 

Here are what I thought were the best cards from the first pocket of the repack:

Most of these speak for themselves.  There is a Met, a trade line, a nifty photo, some vague 80s Fleer, The Penguin, a 1970's Expo, and a couple of Tigers, the last no doubt chosen because of the originator of the pack. 

I remember opening this repack vividly because of the second pocket of cards:

Yup, someone down in repack central thought this collation was a good idea.  Dinged corners aside, this means some Big Topps oddballs are coming!

This repack was obviously meant for a Tigers fan because of the mass quantity of bengals there in.  There is also a nice Daniel Murphy in there too. 

 Before there was such a glut of faux-vintage nostalgia cards everywhere, there was Big Topps.  They made the cards in the slightly larger size of 1950s cards and included funny little cartoons on the back.  They were so ahead of their time.  They produced these for three years to a very bemused and uncaring public.  They should bring these back.  Oh wait, they've done Heritage for 15 years now, never mind.

The McGwire lot included some wonderful shiny stuff.

I think we all have a soft spot in our hearts for Big Mac.  I know I do.  I liked those late 80s A's teams against my better judgment and very few will say they hated the 1998 season at the time.  Unless you always hated Mark McGwire, I see very little reason hating him now.  The difference between McGwire and Barry Bonds is I always hated Barry Bonds from moment one; PEDs don't even come into either discussion.

There were some big cards in the package as well, bigger than even the Big Topps.  Dennis took special care to make sure I didn't think that sandwich of cardboard had cards in it and was not a spacer.  How nice. 

Oh yeah, and that 1978 Expo was not just an old card, it was an O-Pee-Chee.  I cannot recall ever getting vintage Canadian goodness in a repack.  Just a great package all around.

Dennis also included a nice little note congratulating me on my win:

Thank you, Dennis!  Your obsessive player collecting is an inspiration to us all.

Two Trades and a Chicken Dinner.

       While I was idle for a couple of weeks in terms of actual blogging, I never rest when it comes to trades.  Let's catch up with a couple swaps and some contest swag.

Robert from $30 a week habit has quickly become a go-to guy for all my obsessive online trading.  First off, he's really polite.  I mean he might not be just the most polite person in the cardblogosphere, he might be one of the most polite people I deal with period.  I am a sucker for good manners.  If I had a daughter, I would totally let her date Robert.

I had seen that Parnell rookie on his Insanity Set blog and had to have it, so I swapped him a few other numbers for it.  He also had pulled that Wright and figured I would give it a good home (he figured correctly) so I sent him some other stuff and the trade was complete.  He threw in the shiny and the Archives Mets as well as those minis.  Polite and generous?  Heck, forget my hypothetical daughter, I might date him...thanks Robert.


I broke down recently and bought some Gypsy Queen (yeah, I know) and was underwhelmed as I expected to be.  But I pulled a great numbered mini Colby Rasmus card, which reminded me of a trade from while back with Dennis of Pictures of Men.  Dennis was very receptive to getting that Rasmus into his collection, so we worked out a deal for a David Cone jersey card (a Met that I somehow did not have a jersey card of).

Dennis was also quite giving by sending me most of the Topps Series 2 Topps Mets he had and a couple of my 2012 rookie cup needs (woohoo...someone reads my wantlists!).  Sadly, given my hectic schedule recently, I only just mailed his card out, with a few additions due to my laziness and his generosity.  With any luck, those cards will find their way to Canada safe and sound. 

Last but not least, I won a contest on The Chronicles of Fuji:

Not only are these Japanese cards pretty damn nifty, they were free!  I am a sucker for free.  They will find a nice spot in my small but expanding Japanese card pages.  Plus, how cool is it that Fuji has his little icon on his return address labels?  But Fuji, I have to ask, my bad eyes cannot seem to decipher what your little Fuji Avatar is thinking about...please let me know what it is. (UPDATE: I looked again, is it sushi?) Thanks again Fuji!