Ringing in the New Year

Today is the final day of 2015. I'm rather glad it's over.

On the bright side, I received a package in the mail today filling some of the missing cards in my 1992 Donruss set.

I love the Diamond Kings cards. Absolutely love them. I preferred when they were part of the base set, but this was also the first year they were designed differently than the base set. 

Here I got three. Two I never had before. I'm sure I had the Bagwell at one time before I had a bunch of these cards turn into a brick.. 

Some of the base cards I was missing. I have a love/hate relationship with checklist cards. Some of them were bland like this one. Others were nice because they had an image on them. There are a couple sets I'm a couple cards short of being complete because I got rid of the checklist cards when I was younger. 

Of course, a couple cards lead me into a debate with myself. On the sets I'm collecting, do I want to get duplicates of certain cards to put into my other binders.. For example: The Grissom would go into my Expos binder if I wasn't collecting the 1992 set. The Kevin Reimer would go into my Canadian binder. 

So, fellow bloggers/readers/collectors... Do you get duplicates in this situation in order to have it in the set plus in a place to show, or do you get the one and know you have it in the set? Or do you collect the set and separate the cards for binders? 

Year End Trading

I had started a trade with CrazieJoe on TCDB not too long ago and got the cards a couple days ago. I've been preoccupied until now to get anything written up about the cards but here they are.. :)

One of the sets I'm trying to complete, 1990 Donruss. Here's three cards knocked off that list.. 

 

Another set I'm trying to complete.. 1991 Score. A few of these I had at one time, but have either lost or had damaged. Very annoying, but I'm getting closer to having this one finished too.. :)

1991 Topps. I've gone back and forth on this one for years now. At different times deciding I want to collect, then not.. Then yes.. I think I'm staying on yes. 

 

1994 Panini Stickers. It's funny. I remember seeing these in baseball and hockey when I was younger, but I was never able to complete a sticker book. The ones here knock off a bunch of my Expos wants, plus the Canadian Kevin Reimer. 

I have some miscellaneous here. Most are from my Expos list, but the 1991 Donruss and 1991 Fleer are sets I'm trying to complete. 

The Topps Big cards are completely new to me. I never saw these before. Part in parcel with living in a remote area in the 80s an 90s. Again, three Expos staring at me. 

Joe has been a regular trading partner with me on the Database and is a fellow blogger! I will be getting yours out in the mail in the morning!

1993 Upper Deck

Something different today. With us being so close to Christmas, I want to highlight the first and only time I ever got a set of cards for Christmas.

That set was 1993 Upper Deck. I loved that set. Big colour photo on the front, another photo on the back and some stats. The 840 card set had some very nice pictures, some odd ones, and subsets as part of the base that would now have an insane numbering system.

I'm going to highlight my ten favourite cards in no particular order. Also, some oddities..

So the top ten:

#136 Rickey Henderson

It's almost impossible to not include this one. The best base stealer in baseball sliding into third.

I don't know what else to say about it.. Just a great card










#146 Ozzie Smith


Here we see the Wizard making a jumping throw to avoid the slide of Eric Karros. It almost looks like Smith is levitating.

In general, one of my favourite players.









#160 John Burkett

This one is a simple one for me.. I like cards showing a throwback uniform. The first time I saw this was in the 1991 Score set, but the first time I actually registered it as a throwback uniform was on a 1992 Upper Deck Mike Benjamin card.

I often wonder how different the landscape would be if New York never lost the Giants and Dodgers.

#199 Ron Karkovice

It just looks funny.. Karkovice talking on the phone mid-game, cup of water in hand.

#308 Andre Dawson

One of two cards he has in the set (#777 is him as a Boston Red Sox player)

I like the triple exposure trick here. Upper Deck had done this a few times in their sets and I loved each one.

#406 Kelly Gruber

Again, a player with two cards in the set. The other is him as an Angel, 807.

I like how it looks like he's telling the ump "Hold on one minute!! We're talking about something important here!! Serious stuff!"

#481 Les Grandes Etoiles

Part of the Series Two Teammates "insert" you have Marquis Grissom, Delino DeShields, Dennis Martinez, and Larry Walker in front of a red sunset.

One year before the strike killed the best team in history.. So much what if in this card.

#645 Phil Hiatt

Again, a triple exposure card. And Kauffman Stadium while it was Turfed.

#113 Mitch Williams

Before he went home to play with his cows, he was a pretty good closer for many seasons, even if he caused his managers to have ulcers.

I like this one because he almost looks like a Conehead in this photo.

#294 Casey Candaele

I think this one card made me a Candaele fan even though I never saw him play. Just the all-out effort to catch the ball and just coming up short.















Now.. Some oddball things I remember from the set:

Good ol' Rheal Cormier.. Good ol' Rheal Cormier from Moncton...
Now, today people can simply Google Moncton and find out it's in New Brunswick, on the East Coast of Canada.

In 1993, I guess the Upper Deck corporation didn't do much fact checking since they have it as Moncton British Columbia..

British Columbia, for those who may not know Canada, is on the West Coast of Canada.

OOPS

  

 Now these three have one thing in common... Let's see who can find it.


















Give up?? They're cards of players who were on one team for so long that it's odd to see them in a different uniform..
Mike Scioscia, a Dodger for so long suddenly a Padre. (though seeing him as an Angel manager isn't really that odd anymore.. Maybe if he went elsewhere from Angel land it would)
Paul Molitor left the Brewers to come to Toronto and win a World Series. I'm sure Brewer fans might look at the card above and remember how odd it looked to see Molly in something other than the Brew Crew's colours.
Dave Stieb as a White Sox player.. So much wrong with that. I can't even describe it.. About half the releases were as a Jay, the others as a White Sox. This was also his last card till 1996 when he made a brief return with the Jays...

Christmas Card

Well, it's that season again.. The time of year where there are 15000 holidays, but only a couple are widely recognized.

Angus over at Dawg Day Cards has decided to send out Cards to people that asked for one. Figuring a little networking never hurt anyone I threw my name in..

This was the front of the card I received. It's the Library of Parliament just a few hours away from me in Ottawa, Ontario.

There are a few places I can think of that I would want on a card if I ended up doing the same thing one year.. I just wonder if they do anything with the liftlock during the Christmas season or not..

Anyway....








Now to the insides..

This beauty greeted me. Since getting onto the Trading Card Database and starting my blog, I've doubled my Terry Puhl collection.. From 2 (of the same year, one Topps, one OPC) to four!

Thank you! :)

But that wasn't all.. I also found a small card holder with some more treasures in there. 

 

 

 

That's two 1978 OPC cards and four 1981 OPC cards. As OPC goes, these were pretty good. In general the card stock wasn't as good as Topps and sometimes the cuts look like the person doing quality control had a little too much at lunch, but they're still great to have.

Plus.... Who could complain about these??

 

The different card stock used makes these backs really easy to read. For comparison sake, I also have the backs of the Topps cards..

There was one more thing inside the trove of treasures.. Unfortunately, I already had the set.. 

That set was the 1992 World Champions subset from O Pee Chee. Actually, it would be two subsets. The first one I mentioned which is 18 cards, and this one.. World Series Heroes. It was from the 1992 World Series and was made of four cards: Pat Borders, Jimmy Key, Ed Sprague, and Dave Winfield. 

I really appreciate everything sent to me by Angus from Dawg Day Cards. 

Hockey

Today is something different.. I know this is a baseball card blog, but it's also MY baseball card blog, so I'm doing something different today :)

As a collector of Canadian born baseball players, it's a lot tougher to do the same in the NHL. So, as a result, I decided to collect the two players who have made the NHL from my hometown that have cards made of them.

There are two: Charlie Simmer and Aaron MacKenzie.

 I have a few Charlie Simmer cards. Here are a few of the few. :)

Now. Terrace Bay is a small town on the north shore of Lake Superior, almost 300 KM from Thunder Bay. Small towns being what they are, everyone knows everyone. The funny thing is, when I was younger, I didn't realize he was an NHL player or anything else really.

I remember when I was in university, he appeared on a show on TSN (basically the Canadian version of ESPN) talking about his career. One thing that came up was that just before he stuck in the NHL, he was planning on going back to Terrace Bay to work in the mill.

My Charlie Simmer wantlist.



The other is Aaron MacKenzie. He only played a couple games for the Colorado Avalanche, but has some cards made. I have none of them, unfortunately.


Well, that's the tangent for today.. I'll be back to baseball next time.. :)

Stadium Cards

There are many things that draw me to baseball. One of them is how each stadium is different.. Aside from the bases and the mound, nothing is the same from park to park. As a collector, one of my favourite things to collect are stadium cards. 

Stadium cards, of course, are cards that show a stadium on them. I have a few, and honestly, haven;t been able to keep up with all of them.. One I do know I'm missing is SkyDome from the 1992 Triple Play set.. 

 And here's the one I do have from the 1992 Triple Play set. Camden Yard.

 1993 Triple Play. Mile High Stadium. Home of the Colorado Rockies.. Previously the Denver Bears Triple A team.

Fenway Park in 1994. These were checklists in the 1994 set. The stadiums below were from the same set.

Ahh Tiger Stadium.. I would have loved to see a game in you.. If I had a time machine, I would go to each naming of the stadium to see the layout and the progression to the place pictured above.

I remember when SkyDome was state of the art. Within 10 years of opening, people were already saying how outdated the place was. Upgrades to the stadium by Rogers have made it a nicer place, but the exterior is still large and grey. Attempts are also being made at engineering grass that will grow and stay viable inside the dome.

One of the cookie cutters, Fulton County Stadium was the only one of the group that always had natural grass. It was turned into a parking lot for a future parking lot when the Braves move from Turner Field to their newest stadium in Cobb County.

And Wrigley Field.. What can be said about this that hasn't been said before?? This, along with Tiger and Fenway, are places that look like they could be from 1945, 1975, or 1994 and still look good. Fun fact, Wrigley Field was originally known as Weeghman Field and was built for the Federal League Chicago Whales.

Shea Stadium. I like pictures of the place, but I hated watching games on TV from Shea. 

Ebbets Field. I would have loved to see a game here. 

So these are the stadium cards I have. I would love to get more..

1987 Topps

A few days ago I went into my first set. Today I'm going to talk about one of my favourites. That is of course, 1987 Topps. It's a full 792 card set and a 132 card Traded set.

Most people know about the layout and it seems to be one of those love/hate designs. I love it.

Just a wonderful set that, while in the overproduced era, I have not been able to finish yet. 

1987 Topps Wantlist

1987 Topps Traded