2017 Sportlots purchases: RIP and PCs

An amazing World Series has given way to a rough last few weeks for Major League Baseball after the tragic deaths of retired Blue Jays and Phillies ace Roy Halladay (plan crash) and top Red Sox prospect Daniel Flores (cancer), who was just 17.  Unfortunately, another former player passed unexpectedly a couple weeks ago as well, and this time it affected the Michigan Baseball family and one of my player collections.

Former Wolverines pitcher Ross Powell and his dad were found dead from carbon monoxide poisoning in a van they were using for their recently-opened lawn care company.  Ross was just 49 and his dad was 72.  Their tragic passing was on my mind as the baseball world mourned an all-time great in Halladay and a potential future star in Flores.  Needless to say I extend my condolences to the families of each and hope MLB honors each of their contributions to the game.

While I already showed off my Powell pickups from Sportlots in my last post (along with those of another too-soon deceased player in Steve Howe), I do have some items today representing a couple former Wolverine baseballers and PC guys that have long since passed:  Charlie Gehringer (1993) and George Sisler (1973).  I had a great time tracking down a good bunch of cards of each, many of which skew more towards the oddball side, making it even more fun to add them to those collections.  So enjoy these new cards of a couple Hall-of-Famers:

Let's start with the Mechanical Man.  Gehringer's haul begins with a 1980s trio, with a 1983 Donruss HOF Heroes leading off.  Those Dick Perez works of art were just becoming a Donruss staple back then.  Next is a 1986 Sportflics Decade Greats, another fun example of 80s holograms.  That's followed by the very recognizable 1987 Hygrade All-Time Greats, with a great casual shot of ol' Charlie.

The next four hail from the large multi-year Conlon product of the early 90s, with the first two coming out of the 1992 version, the third from '93, and the last from '94.  I love that the second '92 card goes with Charlie's awesome nickname right up front.

Last up is Gehringer's base card from the excellent 1999 Upper Deck Century Legends set.  This product paired classic photos with a beautiful design--so basically, a typical Upper Deck issue.

I also found a couple cards of non-standard size.  On the left is a 2003 Upper Deck Play Ball 1941 Reprint, which is probably as close as I'll get to that card, at least for a while.  The smaller card on the right is a 2011 TRISTAR Obak T212 Mini, and like the Conlon earlier it also has the "Mechanical Man" nickname.

My Gehringer collection remains small, but this ten-spot at least bumps it up to 44.

Now we'll move over to "Gorgeous" George Sisler (don't worry, none of these cards feature that nickname).  Like Gehringer, his first scan begins with three cards from the 1980s.  First is George's card from the 1977-84 Galasso Glossy Greats set (with Sisler's card hailing from the 1980 version focusing on the '20s), an issue that made me look into the name and find out that it was a TCMA product given out to folks that bought complete sets from early dealer Renata Galasso.  Very cool!  That's followed by a Pacific Legends card from the same year, one that features a grinning Sisler in a photo we'll see twice more in this post.  The last of the trio is from a 1985 Woolworth's Topps boxed set that focused on all-time records, in this case George's then-lead in hits in a season (257).

As was also the case with Gehringer, I found four of Sisler's Conlon TSN issues, with these hailing from 1991, 1992, and a pair from '93.  The quartet manages to depict him with two of his three career teams:  St. Louis and Boston (Braves).

The final two cards in this scan are a bit more modern.  The first hails from 2001's version of one of my all-time favorite products, SP Legendary Cuts.  There's that Sisler grin again!  Boy would I love to have a cut signature of this all-time great.  That's joined by one of his two issues in 2010 Topps' Legends of the Games insert set.  This one, showing him as a St. Louis Brown, is from the flagship product while the other, which I don't have yet, came out of 2010 Update and includes a Braves photo instead.

Finishing off 2010, the first card we have here is one of Sisler's two appearances in that year's Topps National Chicle base set; I currently lack the St. Louis Cardinals SP version that can also be found.  Also, that smile looks mighty familiar....  Next is a base card from Panini's excellent 2012 Cooperstown product--a card I surprisingly lacked despite owning two of the very cool colored parallels.  Speaking of 2010s Panini, we'll finish up the regular sized cards with Sisler's base from 2014 Classics, featuring a slightly altered repeat photo from the previous card.

Opting for small ball, we'll end today's post on a pair of 2011 Topps-branded minis.  On the left is one of his four appearances in that year's Gypsy Queen Minis set--he also has a Browns issue, and each of those has an SP version with a different photo.  To its right is the very vintagey looking Kimball Champions insert that was somewhat oddly included in 2011 flagship.

14 new Sislers put his collection at a nice even 80.

I'll be back with more stuff from my huge Sportlots haul soon, but first it's time to show off some new trade packages, so watch out for those soon!