Time For Some New Cards

Here it is March and I still haven't bought any new boxes of cards.  Not sure why, I should really have at least picked up a box of Upper Deck Hockey by now, but I haven't.  That doesn't mean I haven't picked up anything new.  Time for another COMC "Blaster Box".  For roughly $20 I picked up some cards I need....well...want is probably a better word.  No autographs or relics in this batch.

On a side note, I would like to thank the US Postal Service for forwarding this package to me.  See, despite graduating with honors I am kind of an idiot.  I actually mailed these to my old address in Chicago.  After not seeing them for a month I had actually given up on seeing these and was going to reorder them.  And then boom - here they are.

So what did my four Abraham Lincoln's get me?

Some Heritage needs.  Hey 2016 Heritage is out!  I'm still working on 2009 and 2012.  I've been putting 2009 together for 7 years?  Crap, I'm never going to finish this damn set.

A couple of Vinny cards for my personal collection.  Any card of Vinny in a "rain" jersey I will buy without even looking at the price.

Have you ever traded away a card you actually needed to complete a set?  Yeah, I've done it a few times.  This Bergeron completes my 2013-14 Upper deck set.  Well at least the non-Young Guns part of it.

Just a random card of two of the greatest players in Lightning history.  I really, really like the Chemistry on Canvas set.

Speaking of canvas - how about some Upper Deck Canvas?  What a nice memory of Jonathan Drouin in a Lightning uniform.

Sometimes I just start adding random Lightning cards.  All of these were under a dollar.  So, at least one of those "Hot Prospects" has panned out for Tampa Bay.  Gudas is currently in Philadelphia trying to figure out how many match penalties he can get before getting suspended.  Korobov is back in the KHL as far as I can tell.  The lesson?  You can't have too many prospects.

Some Young Guns for the collection. A former Lightning prospect, a current Lightning prospect, a Duck who as kind of rumored to be a future Lightning player and Jesper Fast.


Yea new cards.

Hockey Season is Here - why not get some new cards

There are days that I wish I could live a little closer to Target so that I can fulfill those daily urges for more cards. Most days I'm glad that I don't. It helps keep me from flinging money away on blasters and packs of cards that end up in the back of the closet. Laziness trumps collecting desire 99 percent of the time.

However, there are times when I really, really want some cards and I don't feel like buying an entire box or organizing a trade. So I journey out to COMC (check out my cards) and put a personalized “blaster” together. Keeping the total (without shipping) to somewhere around $20 I pick and choose some cards that I need. Here is the latest “blaster” I put together:

Heritage needs:

I'm probably never going to complete either the 2009 or 2012 sets, but it's always nice to plug away. Rizzo and Posey pretty much finish off the non-short print needs. I ended up picking up only one 2009 Heritage and it's another Cub – Ryan Theriot. For some reason, scores of women in their young to mid-twenties wear Theriot jerseys to Wrigley even up to this season despite the fact he hasn't sported the pinstripes since 2010.

1983 Topps:

The Cal Ripken, Jr. was the first card to go into the shopping cart. Love the orange and white uniform collection (along with the no belt look). The Wade Boggs rookie card is one of the bigger priced cards in the set. Since I'm not looking for huge value I settled with an off-center version with a really good price.

Vinny Lecavalier Personal Collection:

Through six games this season, Vincent has yet to make the line-up in Philadelphia. It's beginning to look like his career in the NHL is almost over (although you wonder if his old coach/nemesis John Tortorella might be able to find a use for him in Columbus).

I went with a theme for these three – Stanley Cup. It's always nice to see your favorite player's name associated with the Holy Grail.

The Russian Rookies:

One shiny Namestnikov, a retro of MY BOY NIKITA KUCHEROV and a Young Guns of the recently suspended Nikita Nesterov. The Lightning kind of shot the wad with rookies over the last few years. This year, it's probably just going to be Slater Koekkoek and Jonathan Marchessault.

The autograph hit:

JT Brown Artifacts Auto Facts. Whenever you can get a fourth-liner's autograph for around a dollar you gotta do it!

The memorabilia hit:

2014-15 Jonathan Drouin Trilogy Tryptics.

A very nice card from Jo Drouin's rookie year. It's numbered to 400 and is a two-color swatch. Can't really get much better than that!

So there ya go. Fourteen cards, all killer – no filler!

My NSCC Haul!

OK. So I didn't actually go to the National Sports Collectors Convention. It was in Cleveland. I've been to Cleveland twice and I think I've hit about all I need to see (except for the “Christmas Story house”. Besides, next year's NSCC is back here in Chicago and if I put in my request for days off now, I should be able to go (unless I'm paddling a kayak through some remote waterway like I was the last time it was in the Windy City).

However, I was so jealous of everyone posting their loot from the NSCC that I went online and bought some cards. A healthy PayPal account and a couple of hours to spare led me to pick up 17 new cards from COMC.com. For roughly the price of a blaster I added 17 cards to my shoeboxes. Here, presented with commentary are those 17 newest cards.

2011 Topps Finest Refractor Rookie Autographs Zach Britton

It's an Oriole. It's shiny. It has an on-card autograph. Winner Winner Winner. Britton has taken over as the closer for the first place O's and not doing a bad job of it. Say what you will about the O's front office, but they saved themselves some money by letting Jim Johnson ($10 million) walk and finding a way out of the Grant Balfour ($4 million) contract.

Instead they installed former starting rotation savior Britton in the closer role and he's thrived. He's converted 24 saves while striking out 51 batters in 58 2/3 innings. All for the low, low sum of $522,000. Which once again proves that teams that spend more than $4 million on a closer are insane.

2008 Topps Sterling Eddie Murray

One for the personal collection. For some reason I never know what to make of these Sterling cards. I like the fact that they frame the action, but the serial numbering seems excessive. Is there any reason to only make 250 of these cards? Other than artificially driving up the value of course.

2012 Topps Heritage Dee Gordon

I have a deal with myself. Anytime I buy cards on COMC I have to knock at least one card off of my “Wanted” list. I'm pretty sure that I had this Gordon card at one point and then traded it away because I am bad at keeping track of things. Oh well.

2010 Bowman Platinum Jake Arrieta

I've been in Wrigley for two of Arrieta's starts this year. Both times he's taken a no-hitter past the 5^th inning. I've never been to a professional game where a no-hitter has been pitched. Much like knocking down a hole-in-one,I would like to attend a no-hitter before I die. I should put together a sports-related bucket lists of things I'd like to see that are out of my control. I'd also like to catch a foul ball, just once. My niece is five and she already has a foul ball. Life isn't fair.

2012 Topps Heritage Aroldis Chapman

He throws really, really hard. I like the fact that there is someone who just brings the heat. I also like the fact that he doesn't have any wins this year. If you're a closer you should either get the save or the loss. When I see a closer that has 5 or 6 wins I think, “He's probably blown a lot of leads only to get bailed out by his offense in the bottom of the inning.” That's not cool. Don't be a wins poacher.

2013 Bowman Dylan Bundy

The price was right for a rookie card of the O's best prospect. I'm glad that they made it through the deadline without parting with any of the big three young pitchers in the organization. While the pressure to make a big deal to WIN NOW there is something to be said for holding on to your prospects. Especially pitching prospects since projecting their success is pretty much a crap shoot. Bundy is working his way back from Tommy John surgery and it isn't unreasonable to think he might make it back to the majors in time to help the O's in September.

2012 Topps Chrome Wei-Yen Chen

If I was to tell you Chen is 12-4 this year would you believe me? No, you would probably go look it up and say, “huh – how about that”. On a staff without a true ace Chen is at least the most consistent of the starters. He goes out there every start and gives the O's about 6 innings of solid work. He doesn't dazzle nor does he get knocked around. He's only had one start where he's gone less than 5 innings (June 28^th against the Rays) and has only one start where he's gone eight innings.

2013 Topps Manufactured Rookie Card Patch Eddie Murray

Card number two for the personal collection. Normally I'm not a fan of the manufactured patch card, but at least it's not a fake jersey letter. I kind of like the reprint of the rookie card on a cloth background. I also like any card that says “Congratulations” on the back. Thanks for the inspiration Topps!

2008 Razor Signature Series Bobby Bundy

And Justin G. goes WAY off the board for this pickup. Honestly, at this point I was just looking for an on-card autograph at a reasonable price. The older of the Bundy brothers, Bobby is also working his way back from elbow surgery. After showing some success in the A level, Bundy has struggled a bit over the last few years. If he can work his way back from the elbow issue, maybe he can find a spot in the organization as bullpen arm.

2009 Bowman Draft Picks and Prospects Chris Tillman

I guess Tillman is the “ace” of the staff. Or at least the number one starter. Well, he was the opening day starter. It's kind of weird to think that he is only 26 years old. Oriole fans have been on the phenom/bust/phenom/bust roller coaster with him for what seems like a decade.

He has nine wins on the year which is boosted slightly by the 4.76 average in run support he gets during his starts. Come stretch run/playoff time he's going to have to turn it up a notch as he won't be seeing that type of support against quality teams.

2014 Bowman Blue Kevin Gausman

2014 Topps Kevin Gausman

2013 Bowman Draft Picks and Prospects Blue Refractor Kevin Gausman

2013 Topps Finest Refractor Kevin Gausman

Yeah, I kind of went on a Gausman run there didn't I? When I went back to Baltimore this summer for a wedding (Congrats Little Cuz!) it was in the midst of the Jeff Samardzija trade talks. It kind of surprised me that the popular consensus in the Charm City was that if the O's were going to pull off the trade it would be better to ship Dylan Bundy to Chicago instead of Gausman. Now granted some of that could have been due to the “what have you done for me lately” syndrome. With Bundy on the shelf and Gausman contributing it would be easy to forget that Bundy is the top-rated prospect.

Luckily, Oakland went all in for the Shark and O's fans can look forward to a future rotation with both Gausman and Bundy starting. It'll be interesting to see how much Gausman pitches down the stretch. He has been bounced back and forth between Norfolk and Baltimore quite a bit (12 starts in the majors and 11 in AAA) and is at about 112 innings pitched between the two. In 2013 he threw about 129 innings.

In spring training it looked like he would have an innings cap around170 innings, but since his last call up it seems like Buck Sholwalter might be removing that limit. I could see him moving to the bullpen once Miguel Gonzalez is recalled from the minors. Granted, I would rather see Ubaldo Jimenez sitting out beyond center field eating sunflower seeds, but you don't pay someone $11 million to pitch in blowouts.

2000 Skybox Matt Riley

Speaking about blowouts. Hey it's former prospect Matt Riley! I bought this card more because of the photo than of the player (Motion Blur-Jo!). The former 3^rd round pick was a hard-throwing, left-handed prospect during the lean years for the Orioles at the turn of the century. He lasted parts of three seasons before injuries and a lack of discipline derailed his chances of being the next Brad Pennington.

He was shipped to Texas for the legend that was Ramon Nivar (one career RBI for the O's) and then quietly faded away. Not before I stocked up on a few of his rookie cards, though.

2008 Bowman Draft Picks & Prospects Jake Arrieta

Another early card of the Cubs current ace. Arrieta was the opening day starter for the O's in 2012. By 2013 he was on the Cubs. The 2013 opening day starter for the O's was Jason Hammel. By 2014 he was on the Cubs. The 2014 opening day starter for the O's was Chris Tillman. Will he keep the streak going?

2013 Bowman Draft Picks & Prospects Chrome Draft Picks Hunter Harvey

The last card in the bunch has the longest set name in the history of baseball cards. Also, in keeping with the Justin G. curse the day I selected this card, Harvey was shut down for the season with an elbow injury.

Seventeen cards at an average of $1.44 per card. The most expensive card was the Britton and the least expensive was the Dylan Bundy Bowman. The card I feel like I overpaid the most for was the Matt Riley. The card that looks better in person than online was the Britton. The best value I thin was the Gausman Finest refractor.