2022 Sportlots purchases: 90s and 2000s Tigers PCs

I'm back this evening with the last of my Sportlots purchases from late last year. Yep, it only took me until ::checks:: mid-March to cover my 2022 purchases!

Anyway, as we just did this past weekend it's time to spring forward and look at some cards starring players that are younger than those in part 2. Tonight's subjects are Tigers and Tigers-related PCs from the 90s and 2000s (including a small number of 2010s):

Cecil is one of the players in this post that got a very nice bump to his collection with some 19 additions, giving me a pretty nice total of 225. Since I'm not supercollecting him (as in, I'll take what I can get but I'm not actively chasing everything) I put my focus on affordable but cool looking base and inserts. There's plenty of cool to go around here with Collect-a-Books, a hologram, Sportflics, fun inserts, and more. Fleer's EMotion product is a precursor to the bordered/framed cards you still see these days.

You'll see a bit more of Big Daddy down below but the '96 foursome up top is quite cool if you ask me. Yep, we're back in the days when I loooooved Topps' products!

Two Grandersons does not equal too many Grandersons, but they're always welcome in any quantity. I think the Unique Unis insert could have been less bland but I do like the recognition for Detroit's olde English "D." The shiny Lineage parallel was a fun add too, even if it's from his time with the Evil Empire.

BInge is a Tiger I've come to appreciate a bit more lately, but I think what spurred me to collect him a bit more recently was when he joined UM's baseball coaching staff for a short time. Two of his three additions are on display here from Diamond Kings and one of Topps' many parallels.

As for Dean-o I count a massive 30 new items for his collection giving me a TCDb-dominating 469 cards. I'm now more than halfway through the wantlist I put together on the site, where I've excluded a number of issues that don't really fit my collection. This group includes some fun 90s inserts such as a '97 Studio Silver Press Proof and Ultra Gold Medallion plus a '98 Finest No-Protector parallel. The Flair Showcase card is certainly a highlight in terms of base design quality.

There's even more 90s insert-age to see here, like four different versions of his Topps Stars card, numbered between 2299 and 9799 copies. The die-cut Paramount Team Checklist is also a beaut, and who wouldn't love to see Pacific back in the game in this time of bland, thoughtless designs?

There's a few more Palmer cards below but this scan gets us through the rest of his vertically oriented stuff. The die-cut Black Diamond Reciprocal parallel and Topps Gold insert were of particular interest to me, but it was also nice to track down a cheap copy of his '01 Topps Limited base as well.

Underappreciated spark-plug Tony Phillips gets a bit more love in a scan below but right here you see him with the Angels on his '98 Score Showcase parallel, an insert that brings me back to a fun era of chasing such cards.

This purchase also boosted my Mickey Tettleton collection a bit. I'm over half the number of Froot Loops' cards documented on TCDb and maintain a huge lead when it comes to him as well. This time it was all parallels of the slugging catcher, with a pair from Stadium Club, a Collector's Choice Silver Signature, and the '97 version of Score's Showcase, another personal favorite.

Then we have the remaining six Fielder cards, all of which are landscape style. The Leaf Power Brokers and Donruss Bomb Squad inserts, the latter pairing him up with NL counterpart Andres Galarraga, highlight his ability to mash dingers. Denny's provides his second hologram card of the post. '95 Pinnacle's Museum Collection is a top 10 all-time parallel for me. I nabbed one more Sportflix issue from '95 because I've always enjoyed that product. And why not a third Score parallel as well?

We can just about (but not quite) close things out with this scan. Inge gets one more addition in the form of an Emerald parallel, appropriately from his brief tenure in Oakland in 2012. I only scored one AJax this time but I made it count in the looks department since it's a Topps Chrome Refractor. Palmer gets a couple more interesting UD items and a '95 Pinnacle Museum Collection card of his own. I have 21 cards from that parallel and another four on my list! And Tony Phillips gets three more added to his total (257, again, a TCDb lead) thanks to Stadium Club parallels.

We're not quite done though because there's still this oversized item:

Palmer joins Barry Larkin as having one of these cards in my collection from 1994 Upper Deck All-Star Jumbos. While a chunk of the cards focused on one player, this one pairs up Dean-o with ex-Giant and new teammate for 1994 Will Clark. Palmer's fellow corner IF put up five straight All-Star seasons between 1988-92 in San Fran, and he'd make his final Midsummer Classic team in '94. Dean, for his part, put up 19 homers during that shortened campaign but wouldn't reach the All-Star game until 1998 with the Royals.

Hooray, I've finally covered all of these Sportlots additions! Next time I expect you'll be feasting your eyes on a very generous trade package from one of the coolest bloggers around, and then I'll get to my backlog of other stuff (eBay, a show, and TCDb trades, at least). Happy almost baseball season, y'all!

2022 Sportlots purchases: Tigers World Series heroes and HOFers

The Detroit Tigers are an old MLB franchise, starting off their history in 1901. Six years later they'd participate in their first of three straight World Series, losing a pair to the Cubs in '07 and '08 and then game 7 to the Pirates in '09. It took another 25 seasons for Detroit to return to the Fall Classic, again losing in seven games, this time to the '34 Cardinals. The following season saw Mickey Cochrane's squad avenge those first two pennant teams and win it all against the 1935 Cubs, the first of the franchise's four titles. Though they'd fall in seven again to the 1940 Reds in a 2-1 game 7 loss, Hank Greenberg's '45 Tigers would nab the Tigers' second trophy in a decade.

It would be another 23 years until the '68 team of Kaline, Horton, McLain, and Lolich would hoist the trophy, and then16 more until the wire-to-wire '84 team ate 'em up on the way to Detroit's most recent Series win. They did earn a surprise pennant in Jim Leyland's managerial debut in Motown, 2006, though the Cardinals quickly subdued that squad. And then a very talented 2012 roster brought the franchise back to the brink six years later, only to be swept by one of the three straight even-years Giants teams. Those Tigers managed two more playoff appearances the following couple seasons but have been awful since.

That means their first World Series championship drought from their inception lasted 34 years. It took just 10 to win ring number two, and 23 for the third, followed by a 16-year wait for the most recent. If 34 years sounds bad, just imagine how Tigers fans feel about next season being the 40th anniversary of their last Series victory!

With ownership giving folks nothing to cheer for over almost a decade besides Miguel Cabrera's accomplishments, at least we can look back on some of the teams of the past, including the players who earned their place in the Hall of Fame and/or were part of the four winners mentioned above. And that's exactly what we'll do this evening as represented on cards from my recent-ish Sportlots purchase:

Statistically, Cochrane is represented with the Athletics more than as a Tiger, having been part of just four Detroit teams at the end of his career. But they were certainly fruitful, as the '34 AL MVP and first-year manager led the team to the AL Pennant. The HOF catcher was no stranger to the Series, having won two in a three-year span with Philadelphia. While he wasn't victorious in try #3 in '31, nor his Detroit debut of 1934, his team would finish the job in '35 thanks to a star-studded roster that included fellow Hall members Charlie Gehringer, Goose Goslin, and Hank Greenberg. The HOF came calling after an outstanding 13-year playing career.

Speaking of Hammerin' Hank, Greenberg's second shot at October glory didn't go as well for him number-wise as the previous year, but the 1935 AL MVP posted then-career highs of 36 HR and 168 RBI, which were enough to set the table for Detroit's fall victory. Two seasons later he'd put up a ridiculous 184 RBI, followed by 58 HR in '38. Big numbers once again would earn him the AL MVP in 1940, but after a shortened '41 campaign he'd be away for three seasons due to his service in the Air Force during WWII. Remarkably he returned in 1945 having hardly missed a beat and tasted victory once again with ace Hal Newhouser earning game 5 and 7 wins over the Cubs. He'd appear for just two more seasons with a sunset appearance in Pittsburgh, but what he accomplished over parts of 13 seasons earned him a plaque in Cooperstown.

Our next player is one who missed out on postseason glory as his career--1914 and 1916-29 in Detroit--never included a Series appearance in the years before the playoffs expanded. But Harry Heilmann did win four batting titles (in a seven-year span), including a .403 mark in 1923, and he spent a good part of the '20s as the Tigers' best player on the way to a HOF nod. That makes him one of 24 former Detroit players in the Hall, and one of just 10 who spent most if not all of their career as a Tiger.

One such player who indeed spent his whole career with Detroit is, no surprise, "Mr. Tiger" Al Kaline. Kaline was on the latter half of his career as a 33-year-old in 1968, and he ceded a decent amount of playing time to OFs Willie Horton, Mickey Stanley, and Jim Northrup, plus 1B Norm Cash (in the days before the DH, of course), but he still appeared in over 100 games that season. Better yet, he hit .379 with 2 HR and 8 RBI in the seven-game Series victory over the Cards, making his first playoffs appearance count. Although his '72 team lost to Oakland, Al finished up a great career as a player and earned glory in Cooperstown.

Al's TV teammate Kell never overlapped with Mr. Tiger during their playing careers as the Philly Athletic joined Detroit in '46 and was then flipped to Boston in '52, the year before Kaline debuted. That means the 10-time All-Star 3B from Arkansas missed out on the '45 champs by a couple seasons, and in fact he never played October baseball over his 15 seasons with five total teams. His Detroit years were largely his best, though, and his seven-year run in Motown was his longest stint with any team. That's why you can find the 1983 HOF-elected Kell (hey, that's the year I was born!) wearing the Olde English "D" on his plaque.

Lemon is one of three players in this post representing the most recent title team from 1984. The CF for the team that went on an amazing run, his 6.2 bWAR was second only to Alan Trammell's 6.8. A 1972 first-round pick for Oakland, he was sent to the White Sox in 1975, and then Detroit acquired him after the 1981 season for Steve Kemp. The Tigers easily won that deal and got nine valuable seasons out of Chester. Though he contributed just a run on no hits in the ALCS against the Royals, he'd be more useful in the Fall Classic itself. Though he's no HOF, he put up a sneaky good 55.6 bWAR and will go down in history as a World Series champ.

Should we talk about the next two guys together? Why not? McLain and Lolich were the aces of the '68 team with 31 and 17 wins, respectively. Denny was in his 6th of eight seasons with Detroit, then he'd finish up his career with Washington, Oakland, and Atlanta. Mickey was a few years older but also in his 6th season as a Tiger, and he'd play seven more with that team before his career ended with the Mets and Padres.

Before that, they were a big reason for the success of the 1968 team. McLain's 31-6 record (with 28 CG) earned him the AL MVP/Cy Young duo, and though he lost World Series games 1 and 10 (both to Bob Gibson), his game 6 victory brought the series back even after St. Louis took a 3-1 lead. Meanwhile, Lolich won all three of his starts, games 2, 5, and 7, and he even hit a homer to help his own cause in game 2! He was the obvious choice for Series MVP after going 3-0 with 3 CG and just five earned runs allowed. Neither did much of note after leaving Detroit, but their combined '68 season will forever be a part of franchise lore.

Jack Morris is '84 Tiger #2 in this post, and his first two World Series appearances were tales for the ages. He threw an early-season no-hitter in 1984 as his team stormed to a Fall Classic matchup with the Padres. All Black Jack did was throw two complete games in games 1 and 4, both wins, giving up a paltry 4 ER in his 18.0 IP. If that wasn't enough for his legacy, he went 4-0 in five postseason starts with the Twins in '91, allowing a ridiculous 3 ER in three Series starts against Atlanta, two of which were wins, including his legendary 10-inning 1-0 shutout in game 7. You'd better believe he was the MVP of that one. Toronto picked him up for the '93 season and he was back on the biggest stage in October, though this time he went 0-3 in the ALCS and World Series, though he snagged a ring with the Jays anyway. His body of work, especially his postseason success, finally earned him entry into Cooperstown in 2018.

A few decades earlier, Detroit-born ace Hal Newhouser was the one dominating things from the mound. While he went just 34-52 his first five seasons, he ripped off a 151-80 run over the next seven, beginning in 1944, and those years included consecutive MVP nods in '44 and '45 and a second place finish in '46. Though he didn't pitch in the 1940 Series loss to the Reds, things would be different in 1945 as he went 2-1 with game 5 and 7 victories over the Cubs. Prince Hal spent parts of 15 seasons in Detroit, winning exactly 200 games plus the accolades listed above. He then signed with Cleveland where he played his last two Major League seasons (1954-55). With the Indians he allowed a run out of the 'pen in the four game sweep at the hands of the Giants. Like Morris, he was elected to the HOF as a Tiger, not to mention one who won a ring in Motown.

And tonight's last player is the Big Wheel, Lance Parrish. Embodying the '84 team's strength up the middle, the 1974 first-round catcher socked a career-high 33 homers in his third of five straight All-Star appearances (out of eight total) while winning his fourth (of six) Silver Slugger award and second of three straight Gold Gloves. When you have a catcher playing like that, you're going places! And that's exactly what this team did thanks to his two homers and five RBI in the playoffs. One of those bombs went against Goose Gossage in the 7th inning of game 5 of the World Series, an inning before Gossage refused to walk Kirk Gibson and allowed his second jack of the game, putting a bow on the Series for the Tigers. Lance spent parts of 10 quality seasons with Detroit before ownership got cheap and let him walk after 1986. He'd then spend the remaining nine seasons of his career with six other teams, most notably the Phillies for two years and the Angels for four. A Hall of Famer he wasn't, but the Big Wheel formed a formidable 80s battery with fellow stalwart Jack Morris.

Since I covered everyone in this scan, please enjoy some interesting items of a few players that were already discussed. A sweet Kaline insert, a Donruss issue of Hal with Cleveland, and a Lance Parrish parallel were the lone horizontal cards in this group. Parrish pops up a few more times on some fun oddballs including an oversized Donruss piece, Topps Scratch Off, Kellogg's hologram, and 7-11 coin. '84 OF Chet Lemon joins the Kellogg's fun with a pre-Tigers issue as well.

I put a lot more time and effort into this post while deciding to focus on the careers of the players instead of discussing the cards, and I hope that work shows! For my part, while I don't usually like to take this long putting together posts, it was lots of fun looking back at some of the HOFers and World Series heroes of my favorite MLB team. What do you all think? Any favorite players or sets here?

I'll be back with one more post in this series but I have a ton of other stuff to cover so I'm not quite sure when you'll get the finale. Either way, you can count on seeing LOTS more cardboard here soon.

2022 Sportlots purchases: the Michigan stuff

We've hit February and I've got a show to get to in a couple days so tonight I've decided to start covering the Sportlots cards I purchased at the end of 2022. I've split them up into three groups so I don't drag out getting them posted for too long, and tonight you get to see the Michigan Baseball and Football PC cards I nabbed from there:

Scan #1 starts with my 12th different Jeff Criswell. You also see four of the six Cronenworths I picked up there (with two way down below), from a few different variations of '21 and '22 Topps. At some point I should compare how many Drew Henson baseball cards I have versus football, out of the 100+ in his collection. And it feels like I pick up lower-end cards of Hill far less often than I should be able to, so these two and the pair in the next scan felt like a win for me.

The other two Hill cards joined the Rainbow Foil parallel out of '20 Update, and those are Royal Blue and Yellow inserts. Also, as you can see, I definitely didn't neglect my Larkin collection (930 cards strong!) with the seven cards you see here to go with three more near the bottom. Sometimes I think '96 Topps Chrome doesn't get as much love as it deserves compared to the initial version of Finest but maybe that's just a nostalgia thing for me. Speaking of loving Chrome, the '21 Stadium Club card looks excellent as a perfect combo of the two.

Sportlots has been a good source for parallel versions that seem overly expensive elsewhere, like the Topps Limited and First Edition cards of Matheny above. Hal Morris demonstrates some fun options we had back in the 90s out of Leaf Fractal Matrix, Pacific Online (Web Card! Yep, the ones with the codes), and the Gold version of '99 Topps Stars, #d /2299. Putz's sickly green parallel came out of the 2014 product. And Clayton Richard gets in on the parallel fun with Rainbow Foil, Limited, and 582 Montgomery Collection cards, plus another one in the next scan.

Another Richard parallel and another team too as the Blue Jay appears in Topps' 150th Anniversary insert. Meanwhile, my collection of Branch Rickey is very small at just eight cards, but it was much smaller before these additions so I was glad to bolster the collection of the former Wolverine and innovator of the game. How could you possibly go wrong with products like SP Legendary Cuts and TCMA?

There ends the regular sized vertical stuff but I added a few oddball items as well, and I'm happy to report you'll see similar items scattered across the other two posts. To Larkin's collection I added an '89 Panini Sticker, which I probably pulled from a pack and stuck in the album when I was about six, plus a couple tiny Topps Micro cards. Then I got full-on oddball with a 1984 7-11 Coin of Ted "Simba" Simmons. While I'm much more familiar with the most recent offerings from the convenience store, namely the 2000 set, I have just a few of the coins from the 80s so I love adding fun pieces like this one!

The baseball group is complete with this six-pack of horizontals. My tiny collection of Bourque increases by one thanks to another Rainbow Foil parallel. A shared Padres card that includes Cronenworth gets a couple appearances thanks to 582 Club and Star versions. My Tommy Henry PC nears double digits with a Heritage Minors issue from 2020. It's pretty rare to find new items of Ryan LaMarre that I need right now, but I did track down a '17 Topps All-Star Game factory set version. And Rickey gets one last look on a classic UD card depicting him with recent birthday boy and monumental baseball innovator Jackie Robinson.

To those I added nine football cards, all of which are rookies except for the Collins, which I must have added by mistake since his '22 Prestige card would be a second-year (but is still much appreciated). Other than that, let's pretend I scanned the rest in order. QB Scott Dreisbach has four RCs I'm chasing and I picked up my first two out of '99 Leaf Rookies & Stars and Score Supplemental, so I'm happy to welcome him to the Rookie Blue project. Floyd's Playoff Momentum Retail is the 10th card in his collection and seventh of eight first-years that I need. Fellow '98 guy Griese is down to just five missing rookies out of 39 with the addition of the shiny Upper Deck Encore you see above.

Bengals rookie DB Dax Hill is the first of two Michigan uni cards, and his '22 Panini Legacy RC is my second such card of a guy who just missed out on a rookie-year Super Bowl appearance. Transfer RB Jon Ritchie is yet another '98 guy and I'm chasing four of his 12 rookies after picking up his '98 UD base. Saints OL Ruiz is the other college uni guy tonight, and the '20 Playoff of #51 is the third of seven cards I need, which is actually a decent number for an offensive lineman! Finally, Pats LB Josh Uche, who had two three-sack games this season, sees a '20 Donruss Optic RC added to his bunch, number five of the 13 I need to complete his run.

I'm quite happy with the variety I picked up that you see before you this evening and I'm looking forward to seeing what people think of the other two groups as well, so watch for those soon!

2022 COMC purchases: check out who's back!

It's 2023 but I still have some 2022 content to cover before getting to some great adds already this year.

Tonight you'll get to see the entirety of my first COMC order since late 2020. A number of factors, some pandemic-related, made the site a lot less attractive for a while as their processing speed for adding and shipping cards dipped below acceptable standards. After seeing that things were closer to normal late last year, I once again dove in during their big Black Friday/Cyber Monday deals.

About $160 later, I had a nice stack of cards for myself and some Christmas card packages to boot (some of which still need to go out once my oft-mentioned Sportlots box ships!). Here are the items I scored for my own collections:

Baseball part 1. God do I love me some 90s inserts, and few could compare to Upper Deck's Amazing Greats in 1997 and '98. Both versions look stunning, and the Maddux you see above is from the former. Its wood grain design and clear inset player image look great, plus I love the punny name of the insert. From the same year you also get a look at another GOAT insert technology: Pinnacle's Dufex. I nabbed PC guy Dean Palmer's Museum Collection parallel for under a buck, and boy does it look nice in its own right.

To those I added a five-pack of ex-UM pitcher autos, all of which I believe were less than $2.50. Bourque's is a Refractor of the only other hit I owned of him, and that's numbered /499. New Rockie Jeff Criswell gets a nice trio added to his total out of Bowman Chrome, Elite, and Topps Pro Debut, and of course the middle card is my favorite since it features a college uniform photo. He now has four such cards to his name in my collection. And I ended up with a single card, but a spiffy one, of Criswell's potential Colorado teammate, Karl Kauffmann, also from Elite. It's a Status die-cut parallel numbered /99 and gives him four autos also out of six total hits.

The other two baseball items deserved their own scans. I thought the 2013 Panini America's Pastime booklet of former Tigers (and Yankees) A-Jax and Granderson was just too cool to pass up, especially for just $6.45. I don't have many booklet cards in my collection and getting one with large relic swatches from two of my favorite Tigers OF was a coup in my book. The one you see above is the Gold version numbered /49. The Granderson pinstripe is a nice bonus!

Card number two here was I believe the most expensive one I landed for myself, but well within my price range for a card of its type. My purchase history says I dropped $8.34 for Clayton Richard's 2018 Topps Cyan plate, one of five 1/1s I bought this time (but the only one for myself). That gives the former QB/P 13 total 1/1s to his name, 10 of which are plates.

Switching over to football, it was easy to split these into vertical and horizontal scans. A couple players got the most love this time but I also added a pair of new names and lots of college action cards so I spent my money well.

My first autograph of stud WR Nico Collins was one of my biggest steals at just $3, and I couldn't complete the purchase of it fast enough at that price given they usually go for more (plus the whole Michigan uni thing). Darboh got four new additions to his count (two more below) including a sweet triple jersey/auto and a green parallel of his 2017 Prestige autograph (/150) seen here. I love the latter's use of an action shot from a home game in the Big House.

Chris Evans made his debut in my hits collection thanks to the crazy cool 1/1 Matt sent me, and now I have a college uni autograph to go with that, also courtesy of Prestige. Talented DB Lavert Hill is making his first appearance with a 2020 Prizm autograph, and so is the guy on the last card of this scan, outstanding C (and current New Orleans Saint) Cesar Ruiz out of the same year's Playbook product. I'm making a more concerted effort to add hits of players missing in my collection and that work paid off here with some great looking cards of two recent Wolverines, both in their alma mater's duds.

And who could forget the namesake of my former other blog, Mario Manningham? I scored three verticals and one horizontal card (in the next scan) of the Super Bowl hero. One's from '08 Absolute and it comes with a football chunk plus jersey swatches in the shape of his number. The second is one of his two appearances in 2008 SP Rookie Edition and is done in the style of SP's '93 product. And the last one seen here is 2010 Prestige auto limited to a somewhat strange 113 copies.

Over on the X-axis we start with the other two Darboh cards. The current iteration of Leaf is pretty sketchy but you still get some extremely cool cards from them sometimes, like Amara's inscription-laden Trinity auto seen above. The jersey/auto/RC next to it from Panini's Illusions was also pretty cheap and further enhances one of my quieter quality collections, which now stands at 47 cards!

I occasionally chase cards of some of the guys that transferred out such as QB Ryan Mallett and found a good price on the slightly flawed (bit of a crease between his first and last names) auto/jersey from 2011 Timeless Treasures. That kind of thing doesn't pop up much in the other places I tend to look, so why not drop $2 for a solid hit?

The final Manningham card--though four is NOT "too many"--is from the hit-laded 2008 SPx product, and this one's a dual jersey with the swatch windows also in the shape of his jersey number. Mario's just one hit away from joining the 100-club in this collection, which currently includes Chad Henne and nobody else! (Jake Long remains at 97 and Braylon Edwards is chilling nearby with 93.)

One of my most interesting pieces I scored this time is the Denard Robinson 2013 Panini Black Rookie Shadowbox auto you see above. I thought the card enclosed a small mini jersey but it turns out it's just a flat image in a shadowbox-type design. That's still extremely cool, plus it's a new autograph of Shoelace for my collection, and it was just $2.25, so I'm very happy with it. That appears to be hit #54 of the dual-threat QB.

And this evening's final addition is my fifth hit and third autograph of DT Chris Wormley, a Ravens draftee who now suits up for the Steelers. He's the final recipient of a college uni auto for his collection, in this case out of 2017 Elite Draft, a product that was made for collectors like me. He's got a very good signature, especially with how low standards have gotten, and this one wasn't even $2, so it happily found a home in my football collection.

I was glad to be able to take another ride on the COMC train in 2022 and score some nice cards at great prices, plus they even arrived in time for me to send some out before Christmas! I hope those of you who follow the folks I sent them to (and will be doing so soon) enjoy seeing even more spoils on other blogs and social media.

As for me, while I wait for Sportlots to send me my now-ready-to-ship box cards, I get to show off some fun early 2023 items thanks to two fantastic trade partners plus some spoils from last weekend's show. It was a great start to the year in collecting and I'm looking forward to another enjoyable one with all of you. Happy new year!

2022 eBay purchases: remembering the -embers

While I'm trying to keep up some relatively positive posting momentum, here's a look at my personal eBay wins from the months of November and December:

When talking about sets that are important in the hobby's history, 1996 Leaf Signature's one-auto-per-pack product ranks way up there. Thanks to eBay I scored my 10th from that iconic set, and second of PC guy Dean Palmer. In this case it's the Silver version (which you can kind of tell by the stamp), and those were generally limited to 1000 copies (Bronze were 3500, Golds were 500). I already own the Bronze and just need the Gold to round out Dean-o's run of mainstream certified autos. The clean look and relatively low print run meant I didn't think twice about paying not quite $3.25 for this.

Would it be an eBay roundup without something purchased from my favorite seller, markaguirre22? Back around Thanksgiving I won the pair of Zach Putnam Topps Mini parallels you see above. Again, I don't put much thought or money into the on-demand stuff, but the Blue /10 was just $2 and the Orange /25 half that, so I was cool plunking down $3 plus tax (and free shipping) to add those.

And once again he was super nice to throw in some extras of guys he knows I collect! The Hill minis are from 2008 Ginter and are the A&G Back and Black Border versions. Meanwhile, Larkin's cards hail from 2001 Pacific Private Stock and 2011 Topps mini inserts. I already owned all four but will be happy to use these as trade bait.

Switching over to football briefly, here's a not-quite-maize plate repping my team that will be continuing its playoff quest this Saturday. Standout CB Marlin Jackson appeared on a number of cards in Topps' 2005 Draft Picks & Prospects product back when Topps was able to produce those (and actually did a nice job!). What you see here isn't a base card plate, but one used for printing his Senior Standouts Relics jersey insert. A slight twist is that this is one of those products where you could find both the front and back plates, and in this case we have the latter. Here's the back of that jersey card (which I own) for comparison:

I believe this is just my second back printing plate card to go along with a Topps Mayo of Adrian Arrington. As you can see, the color yellow didn't factor much into the rear of this card, but it's a different story on the front with Jackson seen in Michigan's iconic uniform.

For under $8.50 delivered I scored my first Jackson 1/1 and his 23rd hit overall. The seller took a page out of markaguirre22's book and threw in some cool UM-specific extras:

That's three RCs of former TE/WR Devin Funchess plus a Topps Magic Mini of WR great Braylon Edwards. Once again I have all of these but the gesture was very nice, plus I happen to know someone who could use the Braylon!

Back to baseball. We're coming up on almost seven years since Doug sent me what was my first card of UM pitcher Karl Kauffmann, a player who wasn't even on my radar at the time. Kauffmann had only recently signed with the Wolverines, and even if he'd been with the team for a year or two, it was rare for players who hadn't been drafted yet to appear on cards. But thanks to Leaf's Perfect Game product, I had the start of my PC of the future Rockies prospect.

Flash forward to a couple weeks ago and I snagged my second plate from this same set on eBay. Like the one above, the one Doug sent me (a yellow version) isn't a 1/1, but one of two made instead. I'm not sure how that works with these All-American Classic plates--fronts and backs? Maybe something having to do with these saying "Base - Common"? Still, while not true 1/1s, they're fun cards to find and can still join my plate/1-1 collection. And would you believe that I paid just a bit over $2 to get this in my mailbox? Not bad, eh?

To close things out this evening I have a pair of Bowman Draft plates of pitcher Clayton Richard from two different years and separate auctions. Up top is the Magenta plate from the base 2005 product, which featured Richard's first MLB cards. He definitely looks extra creepy and possessed with his eyeballs looking like they're 100% white in the scan!

The other is from the 2009 product, though I'll mention that Clayton did appear in the 2008 version as well. The 2009 base card included stats from his 2008 MLB debut campaign with the White Sox, though he'd only be with them for part of the season when that card was produced, getting sent to San Diego in July of '09 in the deal that brought Jake Peavy to the South Side.

Thanks to these purchases--$6.64 for the '05 card and $7.63 for the other--I now count 12 different 1/1s in his PC, second only to Rich Hill's ~26 (still TBD) and one better than J.J. Putz's 11. Those are also my earliest plates of his as the oldest I previously owned were three of his four from 2011 Topps flagship.

So once again without spending a crazy amount I added some very nice stuff to a few of my PCs thanks to eBay. I look forward to showing off more additions in the form of the rest of my TCDB deals from this year before the end of the week!

12/3/22 card show report: Show This is Christmas

Christmas has come and gone and the year that was 2022 is quickly approaching its end, so let's have a look at what I brought home from my last card show of the year.

With the Michigan/Purdue Big Ten Championship game not until later in the evening I was able to head east to Taylor on Saturday, and I didn't have to contend with an especially large crowd as I pored over the boxes. After I think not quite two hours of listening to Christmas music (not the worst!) my purchase breakdown looked like this:

• 70 @ $0.20 (5/$1 box) = $14
• 2 @ $0.50 (2/$1 box) = $1
• 32 @ $1 = $32
• 9 @ $1.67 (3/$5 box) = $15
• 1 @ $5 = $5

That's a total of $67 and the seller made it $65 for me.

I did quite well picking up some quality items that have made their way into Christmas Card packages (and more that will go out in some of the remaining five that are waiting on Sportlots cards to go out), random trade bait, and cards for me.

Speaking of random trade bait, here's what I came up with out of the $1 and $2 boxes:

Here's the baseball stuff. Despaigne is #122/299, Vargas is #389/399, and Tejeda is #44/50.

And football, which as usual outnumbered the baseball. Fales is #14/25, Quick is #28/99, Prosise is #138/199, Richardson is #42/49, and ASJ is #24/25.

As always these are up on TCDB but also available here so please feel free to make me a trade offer!

And as for the stuff for myself, most came from the 5/$1 boxes with a couple $1 cards snuck in there:

On the baseball side of things I scored fun stuff of my big four PC guys: Griffey, Gwynn, Maddux, and Ripken (plus a Mize thrown in for variety). The Gwynn Stadium Club Chrome Refractor looks fantastic and brings back good memories of the product's inception. Meanwhile, the Maddux brings to mind a '98 Bowman's Best insert but is actually from 20 years later. And the Pacific Gwynn and the Bonds/Ripken Pinnacle chase cards mean tonight's post gets my coveted "90s inserts rule" tag.

Switching to football, I found a pair of new Donruss Optic RCs for Bush and Evans and they were just $0.20 each, which I'd pay any day to further that project. Graham's Press Proof is super shiny and looks great in-person. I'd skipped over Toomer's Topps Black (#d /53) parallel for a number of shows until it made its way into the $1 box, which was cheap enough for me. And Wino's Prizm parallel is a sight to behold for better or worse!

Finally, WR Nico Collins gets his own scan with this five-pack. The first is a '21 Clearly Donruss RC that's acetate and looks amazing. The Gridiron Kings card is a Pink parallel, and that's followed by a Chronicles card and Rookies & Stars Prizm parallel. Last up is an Optic jersey card that was just a buck or two, and it's just my third hit (also relics) of the receiver who's starved for even mediocre QB play in Houston.

It's fun going back and looking over my loot from a few weeks ago, but even more so I'm looking forward to seeing the reactions from folks who received their Christmas cards from me (as well as those who will in the near future). Some already have either on their blogs or Twitter, and maybe when they're all accounted for and I'm board I'll do a recap post that links to all of them.

Anyway, I hope everyone had a fantastic Christmas whether or not cards were involved. Though Christmas '23 is a long ways off I'll be back at the monthly show in a couple weeks to start piling up cards for gifts once again!

11/4/22 card show report: November big spender

A couple Fridays ago I once again made it back east to Taylor for the monthly show after missing October's, and because of that I was willing to spend a bit more than I usually do if the opportunity arose.

I spent about my average of two hours flipping through my favorite seller's boxes and came up with the following totals:

• 60 quarter cards
• 55 dollar cards
• 7 $2 cards

All of that came out to $84 and the guy asked for $80, which was plenty reasonable. I was quite happy with the amount of trade bait I grabbed, especially out of the dollar boxes, and I suspect that he moved some stuff I would have skipped from the $2s into that. Anyway, I once again came home with a good amount of trade bait for some of my favorite folks plus plenty to list on TCDB. Speaking of the site, I also stopped by a vintage dealer that's often there and grabbed a couple cards for buddies I trade with there for just $5, so that was a successful stop as well.

In terms of what I'll show off tonight, as always I'll lead off with the unassigned trade bait:

Former Wolverine Bourque is a dupe for both myself and Jeff though I didn't realize it at the time. We'll get to the Caldwell in a minute. Cobb is SN149; Ervin, Prosise, and Reynolds are SN199; Robiskie is SN50; and Stewart (a cleat piece!) is SN15. As for the Caldwell, how great could it be seeing as it's the only card here out of the quarter box?

Wait, does that say "1/1" on the right?! It sure does! I have no idea how that snuck into the pile of quarter boxes, and even then how nobody grabbed it before me, but either way it's an exciting score! It's definitely not in mint condition having bounced around in at least that box for a bit, but I'm sure it'll make someone happy.

Trade bait #2: as you can see I like getting my money's worth on the $1 and $2 cards with autographed relics, and I've always liked those Topps Strata cards with the acetate windows. Funchess is another dupe for both Jeff and me but seemed worth a grab just in case. Hardy and Mayle are both SN799 as is the Palmer manuhelmet. Prosise card #2 is SN499 and the Walton cards are SN399 and SN99, respectively.

Just shout if you want anything you see above and we can try to work out a deal!

Now we'll move on to my keepers:

On the baseball side, out of the quarter box we have a Griffey from this year's Gallery that looks classy plus a Maddux from 2008 Topps Moments & Milestones (for his 300 career wins). I believe both basketball hits were in the $2 box and those are of former Laker (among other teams) Mo Wagner (Franz's brother!) and former lots-of-teams GRIII (numbered /199). Wagner moves up to three hits while Robinson III gets his sixth. Last up in this scan is one football item that didn't fit in the next one: a Panini Unparalleled RC of Packers defensive star Rashan Gary, who's sadly out for the season with a knee injury. According to my list I now have a third of Gary's 21 RCs I'm tracking.

The rest of the football also came out of the quarter box. The Nico insert is timely since the WR actually caught a TD today despite the Texans' garbage QB situation. Darboh's shiny SAGE insert would look cooler if it wasn't partially airbrushed. Braylon's insert is from back in the 2000s when serial numbered inserts were still awesome (this one is SN1000). Former Lion Graham Glasgow, who escaped the tire fire here (for Denver, so take that for what it's worth) had eluded my collection up to this point so I was thrilled to track down his lone RC (2018 Panini Unparalleled) plus what I believe to be a "Flight" parallel.

On a day that was good to my Michigan RC collection I also picked up my very first first-year of last year's stud Wolverine back Hassan Haskins out of this year's Prestige. It's a Michigan uni card that's sure to give Ohio State collectors nightmares for years to come! Then we go back to the Panini Unparalleled well for the last time, though this isn't actually a RC but, oddly enough, a parallel, for my first card of former FB Joe Kerridge (from 2018, just like Glasgow's card). Just one of 12 issues of him made, this is the Superplaid version numbered /150, starring a guy who played in 12 games over two seasons with the Pack (not bad for a fullback!). I wasn't gonna skip a Prizm parallel of transfer RB Rawls out of the quarter box. And lastly we have one more RC, and a college uni card at that, of Pats LB Josh Uche, who just picked up three sacks in last Sunday's win over the Colts.

Well, I set out to spend more than usual to make up for the last show, plus to start re-stocking my trade package coffers and bring home some items for myself, and I'd say that I succeeded on all fronts. I'm looking forward to what will likely be my last show of the year in a few weeks in hopes of having enough fodder to allow me to do one of my favorite holiday traditions of sending out Christmas cards, maybe with an assist from COMC thanks to their seeming return to competence this year? We'll have to see, but after feasting on turkey on Thanksgiving I may be going back for seconds from a couple sources for some holiday shopping.

2022 eBay purchases: Go Blue! (and magenta and black)

It's been a while since I've had some eBay pickups to show off--it looks like the last purchase I made for myself there was in July--but I picked up a fun pair earlier this month, and as they're both former Michigan guys, why not show them off tonight to celebrate the Wolverines' win over the gutless Spartans last night?

Item #1 is a new 1/1 for one of my smallest player collections for now:

You've seen Braves draftee Jesse Franklin's name pop up a bit here (and on Jeff's blog too!) and now he's back with what will likely be the centerpiece of his PC for quite a while. For around $15 shipped I snagged this signed magenta plate of his 2020 Donruss Elite base. I've long been a fan of Elite Extra Edition and naturally love that this is a full college uni card with the old block "M" clear as day. It's extra cool that these plates are signed, and Franklin has an outstanding signature to boot. Oh yeah, and now I finally own a printing plate with a fully colorized metallic back, something I've been wanting for quite a while. What a great item to add as just my third hit of Franklin's (the other two are also signed) out of 10 cards!

My other score, purchased a bit more recently, is from a seller who should be well known around here since he's my favorite: markaguirre22. He's currently my only saved seller and I tend to check his listings for Michigan stuff weekly to try to snag some great deals, plus take advantage of his free shipping. I don't always end up with the winning bid as I do have my limits, but sometimes I come out on top.

This time I was able to land Clayton Richard's 2014 Topps Mini Black parallel, the card you see on the left. It set me back $4.50 which I thought was fairly reasonable for a card numbered 5/5. Yep, if you thought the flagship product's Black cards were tough, you have no idea what you're getting into with the Minis! I now have all of Richard's non-1/1 versions from the product except for the Pink /25.

Along for the ride as a freebie (another reason to go bid on this seller's auctions!) is Clayton's 2017 Topps Mini base version. This isn't one I was hot after myself because 2017 was the first year Topps made these "on-demand" which I'm not a huge fan of. That means I'll happily take them in trades (or as freebies, of course) but I'm unlikely to want to pay anything for them.

This pair of cards of the former UM QB-turned-pitcher got his collection over a semi-milestone to 151 cards. TCDB tells me he's the #26 overall player in my group of PC guys I'm actively chasing (e.g. ignoring guys like Clemens, Bonds, Jeter, et al who are part of my complete sets). And as you might guess, I'm his top collector on the site by a mile:

Since I had very little to scan, here's the backs of the two cards you just saw:

That's it for tonight but I should be back relatively soon with the last TCDB swap I haven't posted plus a PIF I recently received from another very cool member there. Until then, GO BLUE!

9/2/22 show report: look who showed up!

So a couple weeks ago as usual it was time for the monthly show in Taylor. I once again took a Friday off to head that way since Michigan's season opener was the following afternoon and I wasn't missing that for anything, even the fun of a card show. So off to the east I went.

John let me know that the stars aligned and that he and his wife would be able to make the roughly two-hour trek out that way from the Portage area as well. I hadn't seen him in quite a while so I thought that was awesome.

They made it there around an hour or so after I did and had been looking through my favorite seller's boxes. We got to hang out and talk cards for a bit while flipping through the dollar and quarter cards, then John went off to check out some of the other sellers.

I was happy to get to see one of my Tigers/Michigan-collecting buddies and trade a few things in-person too. I'd found a Michigan Football t-shirt for him plus picked up a cool looking Topps binder in a Facebook deal, so I got those to him along with a little stack of cards I'd piled up. Shipping the binder would have been a pain so giving it to him in-person was fantastic.

John also brought this insert of Jarrett Irons, a former LB, that I'd forgotten I'd commented on when he posted it on Twitter a while back. As it turns out he had a double of it and remembered to bring it with him. Awesome! Irons was a mid-90s Wolverine who has all of six cards to his name per TCDB, and two of them are from Hero Decks playing cards, which tend to be too nebulous for me to worry about. The other four are from the '97 Press Pass product, including this Combine insert, which shows off some of his measurables on the back. He went undrafted and was out of the sport pretty quickly but seems to have carved out a nice business career for himself.

Big thanks to John for the first Irons card for my collection, and a very well-timed Michigan uni issue at that! I hope we can get together for another show in the near future, in Taylor or elsewhere.

As for my own spending, my notes indicate the following breakdown:

• One $5 card
• Two $2 cards
• 28 dollar cards
• 52 quarter cards

That came out to $50 according to my math and the seller discounted it down to $45. My man!

Here's the generic trade bait I scored that remains available (here and on TCDB):

The Finest cards are all Refractors. I found a big bunch of them together in the quarter box and snagged them all. The Brazelton auto is numbered /350.

And that brings us to the stuff I kept for myself this time:

Abbott's a 2020 Ginter Chrome Refractor, which is one way to spruce up a boring design!  A very Michigan uni Jesse Franklin /999 hails from the same year's Elite product. It's hard to tell but the Conlon card of Greenberg is, well, Green! Speaking of that color, so is Rich Hill's card from 2020 Chrome Update Sapphire, which is numbered /45 and set me back a decent $2. Caris is the only basketball representative today, looking very Patriotic on a 2020-21 Prizm parallel.

On the football side there's lots more Michigan uniformity to love. Though it didn't scan as well as the LeVert above, the Nico parallel you see to start this image is also a Red/White/Blue Prizm. Evans' card is from the same product but is the Gold Ice version instead, which looks quite cool. My opinion of Lewan has fallen drastically the more I've learned about his terrible behavior, but I still pick up the occasional card of him like the 2019 Score Scorecard parallel you see above. New Patriot Jabrill Peppers popped up on a couple Prizm parallels of his own in the quarter boxes: Disco and Green. The slightly difficult to scan well Streets is a '99 Collector's Edge Advantage Galvanized parallel, numbered with a real foil stamp to 200 copies.

And then we have the two hits. The $2 2021 Absolute jersey you see of Collins above is just my second hit of the Houston WR. My collection of him is small at just 15 cards so I hope I can keep adding nicer stuff like this the longer he's in the league.

Meanwhile, the Paye autograph was my lone $5 purchase on the day. I don't know that it was necessarily the price it should have been but it ended up being worth it, especially with the little discount I got. Plus it's another first for me as I also didn't have any hits yet of the Colts' first rounder from '21, and better yet it's a full Michigan uni card--no airbrushing or anything! It hails from the extremely and wildly confusing 2021 Wild Card Matte product. I'll save you the details of my pursuit of more info, but from what I can tell it comes from the Matte Black version of the Red Hot Rookies Autographs insert and is numbered /50...on both sides. Yep, you read that correctly. See the stamp on the front above? Here's the back:

Today's Leaf and Panini aren't remotely the quality of the original versions of those brands, but once in a while they can be as fun as they are frustrating. Anyway, Kwity joins the football collection as new member #233.

So as usual I had a fantastic time, came home with some stuff I was excited about and also had enough to fill out 10 trade packages, a few of which have been blogged and/or tweeted about. And I got to hang out and talk cards with John, so it was a great Friday for collecting. Then Michigan opened up the season with a decisive win, so the four-day weekend was about as good as it could have been!

Depending on what comes in over the next couple days I may be recapping some of my recent TCDB deals next time, so watch out for lots more incoming cards soon!