(First, one quick note: I may put up several posts over the next few days--as in more than one per day--as I try to close out trade recaps before the calendar flips. We'll see!)
Back in September I was happy to receive a couple envelopes from Oscar, former blogger at All Trade Bait, All the Time and current Twitterer. While he no longer blogs, you can still catch him on his Youtube channel NetChucArts where he discusses all manner of things: his art, record collection, music and concerts, his beloved Dodgers, and of course, cards. He even recently showed off the Christmas package I sent his way.
If I had any doubt it was from him based on the address, the note on the back confirmed it. Oscar has many hermanos in the hobby and I'm proud to be one of them.
One of the envelopes contained some very nice cards:
Though I'm sick to death of '89 Topps I never get tired of seeing former Wolverines pitcher Jim Abbott donning the maize & blue on his RC. Oscar hit a couple of my biggest PCs here, one of them being Griffey, and the cards you see above are from Donruss Signature and Pinnacle Inside. The former was the first follow-up to the landmark '96 Leaf Signature one auto-per-pack product, and it was a great one, while the latter is from the second and final year of Pinnacles cards-in-a-can concept.
Griffey's fellow Junior Ripken is next, and he was the winner of this package by comprising almost half of the contents himself. In addition to a base card from Fleer's fantastic 2001 Platinum set, he sent me representatives from three Cal-focused inserts from that same manufacturer: 1995 Flair's Ripken Enduring, 2000 Gamers' Cal to Greatness, and 2000 Tradition's Ripken Collection. I admire all of those sets and appreciate Oscar adding to my biggest player collection.
Last up in terms of the card stuff is a fun Tigers pair. The Miggy is a '23 Topps Team Logo manupatch starring the Olde English "D." I still happily collect manurelics, especially when they look fun like this one, and it's another card to add to my collection of the future HOFer, so, win-win! Joining him is former teammate Buck Farmer, a guy who spent most of his time in Detroit's bullpen for the first eight seasons of his career (2014-21). He can be seen on a 2015 Finest autograph that was released just a couple years after the Tigers took him in the 2013 draft's 5th round.
The nine-spot of cards, exactly one page worth, was great by itself, but then Oscar surprised me with a second envelope containing prints of some of his artwork, something I didn't previously have in my possession!
I'll preface this by saying that Oscar is one of the people in my life with whose politics I align most closely. I highly respect his views when it comes to things like both parties shamelessly ignoring the country's ills in favor of enriching themselves, the military's limitless budget that could be better spent on America's poor and homeless, and the country's shameful treatment of minorities and other nationalities.
With that important context covered, I can explain that if you haven't seen it, a few years ago Oscar, an accomplished artist, produced a series during Trump's first reign of terror called "Tromperia," a five panel series done in the Loteria art style.
I'm happy to share these to all of you who are interested here:
"La barrera," of course, is the famous wall along the US/Mexico border. Trump as a "cock" is a pretty apt image, I'd say.
Separating children, often literal babies, from their parents, whether or not they entered the country illegally, was pure evil, and portraying ICE as something as evil as the devil goes at least a bit of the way towards describing how truly despicable that group is.
Though certainly many of the stories of the families seeking a better life don't end so positively, I'm glad that Oscar finishes the series with the happy ending of this one being reunited. I also included the back of one of these to show that he included the title and numbering(!) of each piece to go along with his signature on the front of them.
Oscar, I'm honored to have received some of your artwork, and even more grateful that the subject is something I feel so strongly about. I'm happy to be able to tell you that I have a plan to frame these together, and was hoping to be able to show that all finished in this post, but it may involve a bit of trimming to get everything to fit, so I decided not to hold up getting this posted any longer. I'm also grateful for the excellent cards, and appreciate having an hermano like you to talk cards, music, politics, and more. ¡Gracias!
I now have five more trades to get through, all from November and December, and as mentioned earlier will see if I can cover each of them in their own posts by the end of the day Tuesday.
