2025 trade package #29: Scribbled Ink

Tonight's trade package, the final one of 2025, came from Paul of the erstwhile blog Scribbled Ink (plus he also ditched Xitter as cool people are wont to do). He and I don't trade all that often anymore as he's been busy with family and other stuff, but fortunately we do get together for the occasional deal. I sent him some cards around Christmas and then of course he sent the above BOX my way, which usually indicates insanely awesome goodies (spoiler alert: it contained some insanely awesome goodies).

Seriously, Paul's basically the Wes of the north when it comes to what he sends me these days from his estate sale purchases. Here's what my former fellow Michigander sent me late in December:

This complete boxed set of 1993 Pinnacle Cooperstown is a great place to start. Not only does it include the box portion, but it comes with an attached panel featuring a good look at the front and back of Cal Ripken Jr.'s card:

Also, box sets with printed checklists on them are awesome. Also also, boxed sets are awesome. This is a great looking set from when the Pinnacle brand really got its design juices flowing. The checklist is excellent and it includes PC guys Ripken, Gwynn, Griffey, Larkin, and Fielder, plus the rest of the lineup isn't exactly chopped liver. For taking a stab at who'd make the Hall back then, they did a pretty good job. Of this bunch, only these guys haven't been selected: Murphy, Mattingly, Bonds, Clark, Clemens, Gooden, Carter, Gonzalez, Fielder, and McGwire. Out of that group, you've got a few "not quites" along with PED-adjacent names. So, yeah, great start!

Here's the rest of the card portion, plus a bonus 2024 schedule for Paul's current home team, the New Hampshire Fisher Cats, who play Double-A ball in the Blue Jays organization.

Switching over to football for a minute, Paul included a RC of HOF DB Ty Law, plus Michigan uni autos courtesy of Panini Contenders Draft Picks of FB/TE Khalid Hill and S Tyree Kinnel. Hill was an outstanding blocker who could occasionally catch a pass while Kinnel played in Ann Arbor from 2015-18 as a solid contributor in the defensive backfield.

So what other kinds of ridiculousness did Paul get up to this time? Let's start with this:

Go ahead, get all of your plate jokes out of the way. This roughly 8" plate features some great artwork of the Iron Man throughout his career, and of course it was made to celebrate Cal standing alone as the leader in consecutive games played.

The back has four different write-ups on the outer edge while the inside is useful for identifying it--and making it known you should not be eating off of this thing! I'm not sure who else was part of this series distributed by the Bradford Exchange other than Lou Gehrig and Mark McGwire. Regardless, it's a great looking showpiece and Paul did a great job getting it to me in ONE piece.

Next, if this ball looks familiar, that's because you saw one like it in a trade package from Kerry last year. The main difference is that this one has a different photo, and a black & white one at that, on one of the panels. All I can say is that great minds think alike because this one is just as cool as the one Kerry was nice enough to send me (also in a box!).

That's already some very nice stuff, but we haven't gotten to the true ridiculousness yet. I'll give you a hint: the Ripken ball above wasn't the only one in this package:

As soon as I pulled these out, I immediately DMed Paul and asked him if they were what I thought they were: baseballs (ROMLBs, in fact) signed by Griffey and Ripken. While he couldn't offer a COA from either, the previous owner of them (Paul acquired them through an estate sale) was considered a "reputable" collector. Considering I have zero interest in ever giving these up, that's more than good enough for me to consider them to be authentic. So, one more time, autographed official MLB balls of two of my all-time favorite HOF PC guys of all time: Griffey and Ripken. Now do you see why I'm saying Paul's ridiculous?!

In all seriousness this was just another example of Paul's extreme generosity (you know, the same guy that sent me separate shipments including a Mickey Tettleton signed bat and then a Dean Palmer game-used one) which I assure you I completely appreciate and don't take for granted. I have no idea how to get him back for these but I'm currently scheming away so I can return the favor at some point.

Until then, thank you so much, Paul, for another incredible box of greatness! Your mailings remain undefeated and you've more than earned your place on the hobby Mount Rushmore of generosity with Wes. This was a fantastic way to close out my year in blogger trades and I'm still picking my jaw up off the floor from you sending me those two baseballs. Readers, please show Paul some love in the comments!

I'll try to be back a bit sooner for the next few posts which will close out 2025 for me. I would expect those to be: the December show, eBay pickups, and one or two posts recapping TCDb trades from July-December. Then I'll be able to move on to 2026 with this month's show and two blogger trades I've already been fortunate enough to receive!

2025 (sorta) purchase: TriStar signed mini football helmet

Happy August, y'all! I believe this is the last item I need to show off from May.

Some of you may recall that back in February I posted a couple TriStar mystery signed baseballs I picked up from Dave & Buster's last year. Well, back in May around my birthday I made a return trip determined to use up my tickets (I'm not planning on going again for a while) with designs on nabbing a similar item. For something like 50% more tickets than the baseballs, I got a mystery mini football helmet:

As always the box gives you an idea of some of the biggest names you could find, though we all know those are super unlikely.

Naturally J.J. McCarthy's name drew my attention here, though I'd love getting pretty much any Michigan player's signature on the iconic winged helmet.

As Rice's example proves, it's not just NFL team helmets you can find, but also special Hall of Fame versions too.

And you also have a shot at redemptions for other stuff like signed cards and jerseys.

As expected, I ended up with a helmet, and while it wasn't of a player I collect, I was reasonably satisfied:

Hey! It's a Vikings QB! Just not the one I wanted.

But Daunte Culpepper was a fairly notable NFL QB for a few seasons in the 2000s. UCF's signal-calller from 1996-98, he trended up in all of the important stats and placed sixth in the Heisman voting (won by some guy named Ricky Williams) in '98. The Vikes took him at #11 overall in '99, the fourth chosen at that position after Tim Couch, Donovan McNabb, and Akili Smith, went 1-2-3.

Daunte would start 80 games for Minnesota over the 2000-2005 seasons, and from 2000-04 he was at his peak, piling up 129 TDs, two Pro Bowl nods (03-04), and a second-place finish in '04 to Peyton Manning for Offensive Player of the Year.

Unfortunately he went just 38-42-0 for the Vikings, and he'd finish his career with short stops in Miama, Oakland, and Detroit. In the case of the latter, he went 0-5-0 for the toothless Lions in each of 2008 and '09 before hanging 'em up.

All that said, he was a pretty big name for a while at the start of that decade, and therefore a solid name to pull here.

As for the item itself, I think these Riddell mini helmets are quite cool and lend themselves well to autographs. Culpepper's signature looks like "Dt C???" but at least he included his jersey number with Minnesota (and Detroit), #11.

I haven't decided what to do with this yet as I'd need to determine interest first, but I think my ideal situation would be to swap it for one of a player I like. I'm not really a seller at this point in my collecting career, and I'd prefer to get something similar in return instead of cards.

So while I try to figure that out, if anyone's interested in it, please drop me a comment here and maybe we can work something out.

And the next time you see a post here I believe it'll be my lone blogger trade package from June.

2025 trade package #5: Scribbled Ink

(No image to identify the sender of tonight's package since his blog is now defunct and he wisely dumped his Twitter account!)

Back in late January I received an early contender for the best trade package item I'll get all year. And now here it is, almost mid-April, and it's still appropriate to think that way.

Check out this mystery box sent to me by buddy of the blog Paul, formerly of Scribbled Ink:

WHAT COULD IT BE? So, yeah, I knew what it was, but not what it was, if you know what I mean. This isn't the first time Paul's sent me something of this sort as I posted this package from him a couple Octobers ago that included a Dean Palmer gamer.

Well, Paul struck again, and once again he gifted me an amazing item:

This fine looking Rawlings bat appears to be signed! Let's enhance that image a bit:

This autographed bat is so fine you might even say it blows my mind because, hey, Mickey signed it! That's none other than former Tigers slugging catcher Mickey Tettleton, a favorite of mine from those terrible 90s Detroit squads. The man they called "Froot Loops" added that very inscription to his interesting signature, plus a couple other notes: "3x Silver Slugger" (1989 with Baltimore, 1991-92 with Detroit) and "2x All-Star" ('89 again and '94 in Motown).

I don't know how he does it but I'm impressed that this is the second time he's sent me a full sized whole-ass bat that I immediately love.

Thanks again for thinking of me, Paul! I'm looking forward to getting you back when I have a reasonable stack of cards (if not non-cardboard items, since you like to be so unorthodox!). For now I'll work on getting this displayed along with the Dean-o gamer, and who knows, maybe that'll inspire me to chase one or more myself so I don't have to rely on you for all of my signed memorabilia needs. As always I appreciate your generosity and hope you and your family are doing well, including the future Ohtani (or at least Skenes) you're raising.

2024 (sorta) purchase: a Dave & Buster's duo of baseballs

I haven't discussed it much here if at all, but occasionally I enjoy heading to arcades in my area for fun and prizes. To be specific I'm not referring to the old-school pump-quarters-into-Pac Man-type arcade, at least not in this case because those are fun too, but instead the ones that are ticket-driven. Instead of quarters you load up credits on a card and swipe that on various games to earn tickets you can redeem for different prizes. My favorites at these arcades tend to be the coin-pushers, especially the ones where you collect small sets of cards that you redeem for tickets (Star Trek and Willy Wonka for the card-collecting, Angry Birds for coin towers).

So there's a Dave & Buster's about a half hour from me that I started going to last year. After a couple visits and far too much money spent (though I had fun, at least!) I piled up enough tickets--20,000--to redeem for a prize I had my eyes on from the moment I walked through the prize area:

I'm sure many of you have seen these TriSTAR baseball blind boxes. You get one certified signed ball featuring any of the players listed there, or far more likely, someone else.

I wanted to get a few different shots of the box before I opened it and inevitably tossed it so you could see some of the cool examples of possible (yeah, right!) pulls.

Here's one last look before I reveal which one I got. It's pretty cool that they offer not only ROMLBs but also apparently World Series balls like Betts' here.

So what did I get on my first try?:

I'll say that I was a bit disappointed getting Juan Gonzalez only because I don't really care for him. Back in the 90s when I became a big fan of the game he was an absolute beast, piling up 40+ homers five teams and winning the '96 and '98 AL MVPs. Then in November of '99 the Rangers traded him to the Tigers for a couple players I kind of liked, P Justin Thompson and IF Frank Catalanotto, plus future All-Star closer Francisco Cordero.

His lone season in Detroit was one of his weakest but I probably wouldn't have minded that if he hadn't been so whiny about the park's dimensions. It wasn't a huge surprise when he turned down the Tigers' extension offer even though it was huge money at the time. I doubt Detroit makes their surprise 2006 run to the World Series with his albatross of a contract on the roster, and that's partly because I'm not so sure they would have put up the money to pick up guys like Ivan Rodriguez and Magglio Ordonez.

Anyway, he peaced out as soon as he could after the 2000 season, signed with Cleveland, and had a resurgent year with them, then returned to Texas for a couple years, and went out with a whimper in 2004 with KC (33 games) and '05 back in Cleveland (one AB).

He's also had some steroid rumors thrown at him but who didn't back in that era? I might have at least tolerated him if he'd never come to Detroit, but that experience soured me on him. So long story short: very good player, but I'm not a fan.

That's cool because I sent the ball to Paul as part of his Christmas package after I offered it to him and he accepted it. I hope he enjoys it!

Having headed back there once or twice more I once again accumulated enough tickets to give this another shot and see which other players I might be able to get. This time I was much happier:

Let's see: HOFer, likeable player, and an inscription to boot. Now that's a winner in my book! Jim Palmer's the type of guy I could have possibly met back in the old Gibraltar Trade Center show days when I attended lots of great signings, but I guess that never happened. No problem, though, because I've got this nice keeper!

I like how they include a cardboard stand for the balls, which also come wrapped in plastic for protection, plus they come with a little card listing the players' accomplishments, as you also saw for Gonzalez above.

Palmer indeed won three AL Cy Youngs in a four-year span ('74 was definitely an off-year for him), and his eight seasons of winning 20+ games helped him to a career total of 268 in 19 seasons. He earned rings with the Orioles in '66, '70, and '83 while also losing to the '69 Mets plus the '71 and '79 Pirates. I think anyone would be thrilled to win three World Series in six tries!

Jim gave it one more shot in '84 but went 0-3 in five appearances and hung 'em up, having played all 19 of his MLB seasons for Baltimore. Six years later he was a first-ballot Hall of Famer having appeared on more than 92 percent of the ballots, joining Joe Morgan and getting in ahead of fellow pitchers Gaylord Perry, Fergie Jenkins, and Jim Bunning.

I'm glad to have Palmer's signature in my collection and will make sure to get a baseball display cube for it to add to my other signed memorabilia that's on display.

As I continue to make the occasional trip out to D&B's, will I get more of these? Very possibly, since my location hasn't really had any big-ticket prizes I've wanted to save up for. The only way I may mix it up is to shoot for one of the same company's signed football jersey boxes instead, though those cost more than twice as much as these balls. Should I get any more of them I'll happily share what I get here, and depending on the players, may even make them available in trade!

2024 trade package #8: Sports Cards From the Dollar Store

Let's get roaring into May while completely ignoring that the calendar as I'm writing this shows that tomorrow is the last day of July!

The first trade package I received that month came from the most prolific of all of my trade partners: Doug of Sports Cards From the Dollar Store. This envelope was definitely different than the norm in terms of dimensions and weight for reasons I wouldn't be able to guess until I'd ripped it open.

The cardboard content was uncharacteristically sparse, though plenty familiar as it starred three players from my favorite MLB team. Miggy's from a Topps on-demand product from 2023 called Game Within the Game, one of 10 art cards done by Paul Jennis. At 1,612 copies printed it's on the higher end of rarity, which is cool by itself, plus the card looks great.

"Whiffin'" Willi Castro left Detroit after the 2022 season and naturally became a quality player for the Twins, putting up 2.7 bWAR last year while getting on pace to equal or exceed that number as a 2024 All-Star. You see him here on a Topps UK base from 2022.

I did use the word "familiar" above when referring to the team these three cards share, though that didn't necessarily refer to the players. Rucker didn't ring a bell but I did find him on the lower end of Fangraphs' top Tigers prospects. He's a 3B taken in 2023's 4th round out of high school and therefore a reasonable choice for Panini's Elite Extra Edition product, like the 2023 base you see above.

That was it for cards but not the package itself, not by a longshot. No, friends, I was treated to not one, not two, but four beautiful autographed 8x10s of some excellent Michigan Hockey alumni.

Michigan sports blog MGoBlog recently put together a two-part series on the top 20 careers of Wolverine NHLers (part 1, part 2, and you should totally check these out if you love Michigan Hockey) and two of the four guys here made the cut, fairly impressive given the large quantity of quality Michigan icers to play in the league. I'll borrow a bit from those posts for those three guys and give my own thoughts on the fourth:

Andrew Cogliano: Ok, so I have to admit that of the four photos, this one stumped me for a bit because the auto wasn't a gimmie and the player's name doesn't appear anywhere. Eventually I compared the signature to cards I have and came up with LW Andrew Cogliano, a guy I tend to associate with teams other than the Oilers. His UM career started the the school year after I graduated--2005--but I still got to see him play in-person a bit.

Per the aforementioned Top 20 posts, 

"The recently retired Cogliano was the inspiration for this piece, a player who had a hell of a run as a middle six winger for a bunch of teams. That's not what he's most remembered for in the NHL, though. That would be his remarkable iron man ways, as Cogliano at one time owned the longest consecutive games played streak in the NHL at over 800 games. He did not miss a single game his first 10 seasons in the NHL and remained remarkably well conditioned into his mid-30s."

"He started out in Edmonton but found a home in Anaheim, a fixture of the Ducks' really good teams in the mid-2010s in the middle six of the lineup. A well liked guy everyone would have a spot on their team for, that allowed older Cogliano to make deep runs in the playoffs with Dallas (2020) and Colorado (2022), the latter winning him a Stanley Cup."

Also of note, this is my second 8x10 signature of Cogs courtesy of Doug, who previously sent me one back in November of 2019, the 33rd time I'd shown off cards from him here!

John Madden: Not the meathead NFL coach/announcer but the guy who won a pair of cups with the Devils and another with the Hawks, Madden was a four-year C in the mid-90s for some very successful NCAA teams including the 1995-96 champs.

Per the Top-20 list,

"By his second season in the NHL, Madden had built a reputation as a top tier penalty killer and go-to matchup center for the always-stingy Devils, winning the 2000-01 Selke Trophy for the best defensive forward in the NHL. Madden was able to put himself in contention for such an award by not just being a great defensive player and a scrappy, fierce forechecker, but because he provided some valuable depth scoring too."

"Madden won two Cups in NJ and then departed for Chicago in 2009-10, then age 36, and won a third ring with the Blackhawks as a gritty veteran 4th line center. Madden's unusual, versatile career and distinction as one of the top defensive centers in the NHL lands him here."

EDIT: Jon Merrill: Thanks to Chris for pointing out that I got the wrong Jon/John from the Devils! Merrill's name has popped up quite a bit here especially thanks to Doug but briefly, the D from nearby Brighton was a three-year Wolverine at the stat of the 2010s and was a second round pick by New Jersey. This past NHL season was his 11th and he's suited up for a total of five teams including Detroit briefly in 2020-21. I don't see him surpassing anyone on this list but a double-digit year NHL career is nothing to sniff at!

Al Montoya: Montoya's the odd man out here as he understandably didn't make the list, though said list includes only one goalie (Marty Turco), and that's in line with the alumni the Wolverines have produced at the position. To be clear, that's 100% based on his not-terribly-exciting pro career of 168 games (136 starts) over nine seasons with six clubs. You wouldn't have guessed that back in the mid-2000s, though, when he was a highly rated hot-shot freshman. His first year coincided with my sophomore year and first with season tickets, and he'd go on to win 86 games over his three seasons, highlighted by a charge to the Frozen Four in his first year on campus. While he didn't live up to his billing as the 6th overall pick in 2004, he was a blast to watch guarding the goal for some excellent teams while I was a student.

Brendan Morrison: Morrison is my favorite of this quartet despite the fact that he played at Michigan the same years as Madden and therefore before I was ever on campus, and even though he never hoisted the Cup. That said, he was arguably the biggest superstar in this group during his college years having won that NCAA championship I mentioned in Madden's blurb plus winning the Hobey Baker Award, a.k.a. hockey's version of the Heisman. New Jersey had drafted him in 1993's second round and he'd spend parts of three seasons with them before eight solid years with the Canucks. A few other destinations followed and over the course of his 14-year career he'd pot exactly 200 goals and 401 assists.

His Top-20 write-up mentions,

"Morrison was never going to be able match the heights he achieved in college in the vastly more talented NHL, where his skill level was not overwhelming in any way, but Morrison still cobbled together a successful career."

I'd say 14 years in the league after that kind of college career is pretty solid.

Many thanks to Doug for this amazing group of signatures that adds to a growing collection of of Michigan Hockey autos not just on cardboard but on some eye-popping pictures too! Your generosity never ceases to amaze me and I appreciate you finding these for me. Rest assured I'm taking my responsibility of maintaining diplomatic relations seriously and working on a return for you.

Everyone else can look forward to another blogger trade package next time!

2022 trade package #15: Sports Cards From the Dollar Store

Doug of Sports Cards From the Dollar Store has been among the most generous trade partners I've worked with since I started this blog whether we're talking quantity or quality. For the former, this is the 46th package of cards from him that I've posted over here alone, along with 56 I covered on Too Many Manninghams before retiring that blog. Sure, there's some overlap in those, but that's still impressive!

And he's sent plenty of quality over the border to me as well, providing some of the best pieces of many of my PCs, especially when it comes to Michigan Hockey, but many other collections as well.

I'm leading with all that because a couple weeks ago he sent me a tracking number for his latest salvo and mentioned that he'd put a surprisingly hefty amount of insurance on it. What could possibly justify that?

Well the package arrived not that long after, and its size, if not the weight, had me thinking, "Ok, something good's in here, but what could it be?"

There were a few cards to be had,

set aside in their own envelope:

Oh cool, a nice quartet of Kyle Connor, the Michigan native who potted 35 goals and 36 assists in his lone season with UM (2015-16), then bolted for the Jets, who took him #17 overall in '15. All he's done in his five full campaigns since then is average 35 goals a season, including a career high 47 this year (plus 46 assists, also a personal best by a mile). The Lady Byng Award winner ("sportsmanship and gentlemanly conduct combined with a high standard of playing ability") is certainly a great player to build a collection of right now as his future continues to look bright. These give me 17 of him, including a RC (seen above) and a pair of relics.

So those were great but obviously not worth the price of shipping and insurance and size of the envelope alone. What else was in there?

Penny sleeves! PressTine is the company that makes Doug's beloved repacks so I'm betting these were included in one of those. Who can't use more of these?

That's still not all, of course. I mean there was this larger item:

Doug mentioned he'd been meaning to send me this sports section from a 2017 newspaper, The Record, which covers the Waterloo area near his home of Kitchener, Ontario. It's pretty obvious why thanks to that attention-grabbing photo of a runner proudly wearing her block "M". Jaimie Phelan hails from Kitchener as well and had a great career as a Wolverine, and that includes what this story highlights: going from last to first in the 1,500 meter (metre!) final at that year's NCAA track championship, earning her congratulations from fellow Wolverine Jacob Trouba (of hockey, of course), and a "family friend" named Bobby Orr. Not bad at all, young lady! This is a very cool mashup of Doug's hometown and mine and I'll be glad to hang onto this.

So if you're looking at the size of that mailer and doing the math with everything I've covered so far, you're probably guessing there has to be something left, right? Those are all great items but that can't be it, of course?

Of course.

Whoa, a signed jersey, sweet! I'll admit I don't know my NHL numbers that well, I wonder who #81 is? Man, this is exciting!

Oh. Oh wow. I think those cards were a hint, guys. This here is most definitely a signed Kyle Connor jersey! Let's open it up and have a nice look at it:

The only hockey jerseys I own are a few versions of Michigan's, and nothing too high quality, so I'm very, very impressed with how nice this one is! That Jets logo patch dead center is T-H-I-C-C.

And here's the back while I have it unfolded. Connor's nameplate is huge and in great shape and the numbers are excellent too. Kyle picked a nice place to sign his name plus he added his jersey number, a nice touch.

See?

Just for the hell of it I snagged a shot with the jersey and its included COA. I haven't figured out how I'm going to store/display this just yet but I have to say that framing it isn't exactly out of the question since this is most definitely a piece made to be seen!

Doug, you've sent me some doozies over the years, enough that I should put together a post showing off the best of the best, which I'm sure would be very impressive. But I have no idea how I'm going to return the favor on this one. To be sure, I will, but I'll have to do some searching to find something that justifies this extreme level of generosity! Thank you so much for one of the coolest items in my whole collection, a rare add to my autographed memorabilia collection. I look forward to reading comments from some awed and/or jealous readers after posting this! WOW!

12/4/2021 card show report: "Sweet" Christmas!

To say that Saturday, December 4 was an exciting day for me earlier this month would be an understatement. A week prior Michigan overcame years of futility to punch Ohio State in the mouth and beat them handily, earning them their first trip to the conference title game. The Wolverines ended my Saturday on a high note by demolishing Iowa 42-3 in a game filled with highlight reel plays and left the fans delirious with joy over their upcoming playoff appearance. Yep, it was a pretty good day.

And the start of it was just as awesome for me too. I headed east to Taylor as I do monthly for my usual card show, though I went that day instead of my usual Friday excursion for a special reason. The show had hosted the occasional interesting autograph guest in the past, but nobody in my experience elicited as much excitement as that day's signer: Lou Whitaker.

I couldn't tell you the last time he signed around here, and I'm not even sure the last time I paid for an in-person autograph--maybe Red Berenson at the old Gibraltar Trade Center years ago? So this was a Big Deal, and for once I had no problem ponying up $50 for the experience, which ended up being very positive!

For as many people as there were in front of me the line never felt interminable, and after maybe 30-45 minutes I was in front of Sweet Lou himself with a large framed poster I'd grabbed probably more than 20 years ago at the Ann Arbor Art Fair. I'd always planned on having him sign it someday if I could get to a signing so that's exactly what I brought with me. He asked me where I'd like him to sign and I told him it was up to him. He ended up placing a huge, super legible signature right around his butt, and I'm very happy with the result:

Here it is hanging in my office/card room on a wall along with another Tigers signature (albeit one I bought second-hand), that of Bill Freehan.

Long story short, getting to meet Whitaker and get his signature was a big moment for me and one that I'll remember forever, so it was easily worth the $50 and my time. It'll be even more enjoyable once the committee voters get their heads out of their asses and elect him to the Hall.

So while I was there I paid my usual visit to my favorite seller, though a somewhat shorter one thanks to standing in line for the autograph. He actually noted that I was one of the very few people he noticed that came for the signing and stuck around to look at cards as well, which is kind of sad since I want to see this show continue for obvious reasons.

Anyway, I made pretty good use of my time by snagging 15 quarter cards that were 5/$1, 15 dollar cards, 18 that were $2 each, and even six that were $5 apiece. He called the total $80 and then I was heading home with lots of stuff that ended up in Christmas Card packages (some of which remain to be seen!) and a few things for myself too:

The available trade bait portion is just two cards because I was able to target almost everything to the packages I was going to send out. The pair includes an '08 Sweet Spot auto /150 of former Rangers P Scott Feldman plus an "S" letter manupatch/auto of Oklahoma WR Jalen Saunders out of '14 Upper Deck. (By the way, I'm rooting heavily against the Sooners in favor of Kerry's Ducks tonight, so go Oregon!) These are the kinds of cards I like to grab from the $2 boxes from time to time to beef up my FS/FT stuff on TCDB, but as always they're available here as well, so please shout if you're interested in either.

And the "for me" pile is relatively small too but still really, really good. First, I doubled my collection of former UM SS/Rockies draftee (2020 5th round) Jack Blomgren in scoring an autograph of his out of 2020 Elite Extra Edition for just $2. He's the 30th different player in my Michigan Baseball PC and I'd love to see him replicate some of the success that another sort-of recent Michigan guy, Jake Cronenworth, has had in the game.

Next I added to my collection of former blog namesake Curtis Granderson's hits with a 2016 A&G jersey. He may be shown there with the Mets but will forever be a Tigers favorite in my book. I now count 14 hits of him: nine relics, a manurelic, two autos, and auto/relic, and a plate. You can never have too many, I say!

Getting back to the Michigan stuff the most expensive card I picked up for myself was in the $5 box: a 2020 Bowman Chrome Blue Refractor auto (# /150) of another Rockies draftee (2019, #77 overall), pitcher Karl Kauffmann. It's only my fifth card of his so I knew it would be a need and didn't mind ponying up $5 instead of waiting to find it slightly cheaper elsewhere. The color kind of sold me on it too. I actually have more hits (three autos and a plate) than base cards (one) of the potential future Rockie.

We happen to be alternating between hit types and teams though not by design--as usual I'm going alphabetically. Ian Kinsler closes out the baseball group with a 2010 UD Game Jersey. I know these are among the lowest end of hits these days but I think I only paid $1 and as I always say when I mention him, I enjoyed his time in Detroit, not the least because he produced well and was part of the deal to get rid of Prince Fielder's dead weight. This is my third relic of his and all show him with his original team, the Rangers, but maybe I'll land a Tigers card at some point.

And then for the 2021 Big Ten Champion Wolverines we begin appropriately with a Michigan uni card, a 2021 SAGE Premier Draft of WR Nico Collins, a guy who had the shitty luck of being drafted by the Texans. At least he finally caught his first NFL TD the other day in a rare win against the Chargers. Speaking of California teams, transfer RB Justin Fargas played his entire career for Oakland, and I was glad to find a 2008 Select Young Stars insert (# /999) of his in the quarter box. And our final player today, like Collins, is active in the league, though out for the year with an Achilles tear. Brandon Graham has recorded 59.0 sacks and 19 forced fumbles over parts of 12 seasons with the Eagles and I'm always happy to show this defensive standout some hobby love when I can, like his 2021 Donruss Red Press Proof parallel above.

So to recap, that day I

• Met Lou Whitaker and got his autograph
• Picked up some great cards while at the show
• Enjoyed Michigan trouncing Iowa and winning the Big Ten conference title game

I think Luke Cage would have to agree that was a great Saturday a few weeks before a sweet Christmas!

With this stuff covered I believe my next few posts will be recapping trades but you never know. Either way they're going to drag into 2022 but I'd rather take my time instead of stressing myself writing up posts. I'm always glad to give people who send me stuff the effort they deserve as thanks, so I promise I'll start getting to those soon!

2021 eBay purchases: still king of Dick Mountain

Card collecting for me is a fun hobby so I don't aspire to much there aside from completing some sets and chasing player collections. That said, I do put some extra effort into being the top of the heap when it comes to collecting Dick Mountain, a.k.a. Rich Hill. I have close to a 300-card lead on the second best member on TCDB, and nobody else has stepped up to claim the title, though as I've asked before, why would anyone else take it that seriously?

Anyway, I made four eBay purchases myself in the months of July and August with each of the results heading to my Hill collection, and now I'm showing them off in what I consider least to most impressive:

All four of these came from the same seller while I only purchased two of them. Some of you probably know what that means: they were sold by markaguirre22, a.k.a. Gary. Not only has he been selling Rich Hills (and some other recent Wolverines too) at great prices with free shipping, but he's also thrown in some bonuses a few times now, making him my favorite seller by far.

So what we have here is a quartet of Hills from 2017 and 2018 Heritage. The pair of 2018 cards represent my earliest purchase in this group, made the day before Independence Day. I dropped a hair under $1.50 for the one on the right, a 100th Anniversary parallel that features a cool gold foil stamp. Those were apparently limited to 25 copies, not that Topps could be arsed to number them. I decided the price was fair for a card that limited, and then Gary threw in the base version on the left, which I also needed, and which happens to be short-printed, so I certainly appreciated the generosity.

And then just a couple Saturdays ago I snagged the card you see in the upper-right for a bit under $2, a steal of a deal considering just five of them apparently exist. That's because it's the 2017 Heritage Reverse Stock version, with a glossy-ish back and matte-like front. And then I was pleasantly surprised to find the Bright Yellow Back version on the left in the same PWE, since I hadn't bid on that one, which is a tad easier to find at 25 copies. Again, no serial numbering here.

Here's a look at the backs to give you a bit better idea of what's going on, though the Reverse Stock card is much easier to discern in-hand. I doubt I'd notice the different shade of yellow on the back of the left card, especially if I was sorting through a box or case break, but I'm not Topps' target audience, so I'll just be glad the seller knew what he had and labelled them clearly for me.

Next up is yet another Hill entry from Upper Deck's 2007 Sweet Spot product. I know these are fairly polarizing in the hobby due to some of the autographs having a tendency to fade over time, especially the ones on the manu-baseballs. I've generally had good luck with mine, though, and this Bat Barrel/Red Ink version looks great to me! It's limited to just five copies, and I somehow managed to win it with a $3.61 bid plus tax and shipping, which made it $8.23, which is still ridiculous. Rich has 24 cards in the product, seven of which are 1/1s, and I have 12 of the remaining 17 now, with two of them being limited to just five copies. The remainders are numbered to 5, 5, 10, 15, and 15. I'll keep plugging away because I look forward to the day when I can show off the full run!

And to finish up, you had to know I tracked down another 1/1--my 25th of Hill--to top what you just saw. This Pure White autograph hails from, get this, UD Black. Rich could be found elsewhere in the product as part of the Illustrious Dual Autographs with fellow prospect Sean Gallagher on cards numbered /25 (which I own), /15, and /1. Besides those, it's this Pure White 1/1 and four plate versions. I haven't done a count lately but Hill--as with most players, I'd assume--has much fewer 1/1 autographs than other types of that card like plates and parallels. Of the 25 cards I own of the ultimate rarity starring Hill (that I have catalogued; still working on those 2008 Triple Threads...), only four (including this one) are autographed, and one of those is a plate. So yeah, this was definitely a big want for me, and that explains why I won the bidding war at a bit over $20 delivered for this beauty.

Though my overall spending is way down from recent years--I just passed the $800 mark thanks to Friday's show--I'm still throwing money around when it makes sense to bolster my favorite collections. And that's why I can continue to stake my claim as the king of Dick Mountain!

Stay tuned as I'll likely get that show report up in the next few days since I once again don't have much to show off.

Until then, if you have any, show me your Dicks! uh...Rich Hills that you have for trade.