Signing Some Balls

Another great card to add to my Album of Amazing. This 1983 Fleer card depicts Rick Mahler signing some balls. Of all the memorabilia I have in my collection, autographed baseballs have been and always will be my favorite. I think it's great to finally have a card depicting a player partaking in the time honored tradition of signing some balls.

Busting Some Packs

I love the quirkiness of this card. A ballplayer, Pete Falcone, opening up packs of baseball cards, and showing us a copy of his card he pulled from a pack. When I saw this 1982 Fleer card I knew I had to add it to my Album of Amazing.

Dilemma

Do you ever experience a dilemma when you're collecting sports cards? Ever come to a fork in the road and not sure if you should turn left or right? Recently I was struggling with a problem when it came to collecting the 2013 Topps set. I have always been a huge fan of the set because of the design and photos and I knew that I wanted to add the set to my collection, but I wasn't sure how to do it. Should I buy a factory set that had the 5 orange factory cards in hopes that one of those five would be a Votto that I need for my rainbow? I didn't like the odds of that, nor the price of around $50. I had always wanted a mini set and Topps did release wax boxes of their 2013 cards that are at a reasonable $30 on eBay. The problem with that is that there are 24 packs to a box with 10 cards to a pack. That's 240 cards to a box. With inserts, parallels, and possible printing plates and autographs that would leave me around 220-230 base cards a box, if I didn't pull any dupes. I would then need at least 3 wax boxes to try and collate the 660 card mini set which would set me back about $90...way to steep for me. While I'm sure I might have been able to pull something nice to recoup some of my costs, it was too much of a gamble for me. I've never been a pack gambler and never will be. This past week, while I was browsing eBay I noticed a listing for a complete set of 2013 Topps minis with an option to submit a best offer. Needless to say, I decided to submit an offer and was surprised to find out the seller accepted. For $34.99 shipped I was able to get my first Topps mini set and a set that I think is one of the ten best they've ever produced. What do you think? Did I make the right decision? How about you? Ever experience a dilemma is your collecting endeavors?

Mama Said Knock You Out

I first saw this card over on Dime Boxes. Nick has a tendency of finding some great cardboard and I knew I had to add this 1995 SP Rod Beck card to my Album of Amazing. I don't think there's another baseball card out there with a ballplayer sporting some boxing gloves. I wonder who would have won in a fight between Rod Beck and Nolan Ryan.

There's No Crying in Baseball!

Here's my latest Album of Amazing entrant, a 2004 Just Rookies Argenis Reyes. This is the first card I've ever seen that depicts a batter being hit by a pitch. Once I saw it I knew I needed to add it to the album. While it looks like Mr Reyes is in pain, I bet he didn't cry because as we all know, there's no crying in baseball.

Generosity from Drew

Last week Drew from drewscards posted on his blog about some free cards he was giving away. Needless to say, when I saw that the Reds were available I jumped at the chance to grab them. Yesterday the package arrived and I must say that I was very impressed and happy with Drew's generosity. There must have been close to 100 cards in the package. I was able to pull about 25 cards that I will be sending out for autographs. I've decided to pay it forward and send out the other cards I don't need (some Bench, Morgan, and Foster cards included in the mix) along with some other cards I've thrown into the mix, to the first person that comments. Thanks again Drew!

Handlebar Mustache

You just don't see these anymore. Rollie was always a favorite of mine and his mustache has earned him a spot in my Album of Amazing, right next to Coco Crisp. This is a 1985 Donruss and ultimately Rollie's last year in the majors. The old school Brewers logo is a nice touch. I always wanted to see Rollie in an early 80s Pirates uniform. To me, that would have complemented his stache nicely.

A Couple of Guitars for the Album

Here are the latest two cards to my Album of Amazing project: a 1991 Stadium Club Eric Show and a 1994 Upper Deck Chuck Finley. I like the fact that Finley is rocking out on a broken bat, a very nice touch. The Show card is special to me in so many ways. He was the pitcher that gave up Pete Rose's record breaking 4192 hit on September 11, 1985. Sadly, Show died at the age of 37 from acute morphine and cocaine intoxication at a drug rehab center.

2015 Topps

This year's flagship was released yesterday and I, like most bloggers, love the design. It's a nice change from the past couple of years. It's got everything that I want on a baseball card: great photography, easy to read name, player position and team logo. The gradient border is a very nice touch. For some reason this year's flagship reminds me of Finest, but that's just my opinion. Anyway, I went ahead and ordered the Reds base set from a case buster on eBay because I'm too cheap to buy a mess of packs to get a lot of cards from players on other teams as well as a bunch of inserts I could care less about. Just base Reds for me, that's all I care about. I should be receiving the 13 series one Reds cards sometime in the mail next week. Here's hoping the recent round of weather doesn't slow down the postal carriers.

What a Bunch of A** Holes

Another card for my Album of Amazing project and I think it goes well with my 1989 Fleer Billy Ripken card. This is the 1990 Pacific Senior League Jim Nettles. If you look at the knob of the bat then you'll see why I decided to grab this card. The thought occurred to me that with Topps releasing 1/1 bat knob cards in some of their higher end products, how cool would it be to get a bat knob card of the infamous Billy bat?

An All-Star for the Rainbow

I know that technically this isn't a colored parallel, but I couldn't resist the urge to add this card to my Votto Rainbow. This card comes from the 2013 NL All Star set. There were a total of 17 cards in the set and the only difference with this card and the flagship card is the little silver all star stamp on the front and card number on the back. This marks my 25th different Votto card for the rainbow and I still have 11 that I'm actively chasing: a 2013 Topps Black parallel /62, 2013 Topps Orange parallel /230, 2013 Topps Silver Slate /10, 2013 Topps Printing Plate /1, 2013 Topps Opening Day Toy's R Us parallel, 2013 Topps Mini Pink parallel /25, 2013 Topps Mini Black parallel /5, 2013 Topps Chrome Camo Refractor /15, 2013 Topps Chrome Atomic Refractor /10, 2013 Topps Chrome Pink Refractor /5, and a 2013 Topps Reds Factory Team set Votto

I HATE WINTER!

With the end of football season last night, my thoughts have quickly turned to spring and Opening Day. Sure, there are some things I like about winter, such as Christmas, but after January 1st I've had my fill of the season. We picked up just over 10 inches of snow on the south side of the Cleveland area and lake effect snow has started ramping up with the temperatures plummeting. The latest acquisition for my Album of Amazing project summarizes my feeling for winter perfectly! Flipping the bird to Old Man Winter because we all know the boys of summer are right around the corner.