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!

2022 trade package #13: Cards on Cards

Time to get back to some old fashioned blogger trades! Today's is from Kerry of Cards on Cards. I recently sent him a mix of stuff from shows and other sources and not long after I found a bubble mailer from him in my mailbox containing a great combination of Tigers and some of my PCs:

We'll look at the Tigers today first, and almost all of them are current players, even if some are injured or down in AAA. Baddoo's Chronicles Gold Standard base looks great but I can't say the same for the bland design of the Pinnacle version with the same photo. Baez has heated up of late and socked a grand slam in a win last night so maybe he's righted the ship? I like the numbered 2022 Donruss Red parallel here, and you'll see another shortly. There's four more Miggy cards to add to his large collection (350-plus!) and I'm a fan of both the Contenders and Elite Series insert (numbered /349!) to say nothing of the other two.

Cameron's been up and down a bit but Mike's son could still turn into a productive bench OF guy. Jeimer (who needs to take an example from Baez) looks good on his own Donruss Red /2022. Manning (Rated Rookie!) still has a shot to return this season from injury, but unfortunately that won't be the case for TJ subject Casey Mize. I'm grateful to Kerry for the six new Mize cards, though! The Chronicles Revolution and Donruss base DK card are very cool and I was also happy to score my first hit of the injured prospect, a Donruss jersey!

Paredes' Chronicles Elite card looks great but mainly it's just a reminder that awful GM Al Avila lost him to Tampa in a panic trade for Austin Meadows after Riley Greene got hurt before the season. I hope Rogers can return to health soon and bump Tucker Barnhart to a reserve role (and eventually off the team for good). Skubal's been roughed up lately since a strong start, not that it matters much in a lost season like 2022.

With the Tigers covered we can get into some other player collections. I was stoked to find the five Cronenworth cards you see above since I love to see his collection grow as he's the most notable Wolverine in the Majors right now, if not tied with Boston's Rich Hill. The Classics design is pretty boring but the Revolution cards bring to mind the heyday of Pacific. By the way, the version on the right is the Fractal parallel. Michigan alum Jesse Franklin looks smart on a (what else?) Blue Prizm from 2020 Prizm Draft, and I'm now up to six cards of his, with few looking better than this one that also comes with a great college action photo.

And today's last scan covers two of my most popular PCs. Cal is still #1 by a mile and with more than 1100 of his cards in my collection it's always a thrill to get new stuff of his. That was the case with all three cards you see along the top row featuring the Iron Man: 2021 Chronicles Revolution and Prizm and 2022 Diamond Kings. I wouldn't likely be chasing these down myself unless I found them at a show in dime/quarter boxes so I appreciate folks like Kerry that take the time and effort to send stuff from newer releases my way.

Finally, we have the co-star of the package who also got to add six new cards to his collection. You might even go so far as to say that's...too many? It's the guy whose name is at the top of every post you read here! Kerry sent me a great variety of Verlanders, all of which I needed. First you see a 2012 Heritage Chrome insert (#d /1963) and then we move all the way up to 2021 Prizm's Red/White/Blue Prizm parallel, which is a few weeks early for Independence Day but plenty welcome today. The four recent Topps cards you see are a 2021 Topps Update 1992 Topps Reflux--I mean Redux--insert along with base from the same year's Gallery (still looking nice!) and Holiday, plus 2022 Opening Day. JV's off to a string 9-3 start this year with a ridiculous 2.22 ERA and 84 strikeouts. In case any of you forgot, he pitched in a single game in 2020 and none last season before returning this year...at age 39. What can you say other than: legend.

Kerry, thanks so much for sending me some great cards like you always do! Hopefully next weekend I'll be back to the monthly show to start a new stack to send back your way.

Next up will be another envelope from a good friend and reliable trade partner, so watch out for that soon.

2022 trade package #10: Sports Cards From the Dollar Store

Today is (or was, depending on when you're reading this) my birthday, and I'm mentioning that mostly because, one, I turned a year old in the weeks between posts, and two, this evening's cards come from a guy who loves collecting people born on his own birthday, February 14. That would be Doug of Sports Cards From the Dollar Store.

I don't collect anyone specifically because they were born on my birthday (though I think that's an awesome sub-collection), but if I did, some of the top choices would include:

• Baseball: Bartolo Colon, Martin Dihigo, Brad Penny
• Basketball: Joe Dumars, Tracy McGrady
• Football: Nelson Agholor, Pete Metzelaars
• Hockey: Kris Draper, Pat Verbeek
• Other/non-sport: Tommy Chong, Bob Dylan, Patti LaBelle, Alfred Molina, John C. Reilly, Kristin Scott Thomas

Anyway, once again Doug hit my mailbox with a beefy envelope, one this time that was probably 75% toploaders by weight! There was also a ton of fun cardboard goodness and that's exactly what you'll get to see this evening:

Baseball 1 of 3: current and former Tigers. Most of these aside from Avila are from pretty recent products that I wouldn't have opened myself, such as this year's Heritage (which you'll see more of in a minute). Remember when Baddoo was a rookie instead of a guy in a sophomore slump? There's some nice designs here to look at, though!

Baseball 2 of 3: starts with more Heritage Tigers, though Niko's long gone. It's nice to add to my minuscule Haase collection, though. And hey, there's a brand new Rich Hill for one of my favorite PCs! They even got him back with his current team, Boston. Also, how about that trio of slick Mize cards? (There's a few more in the next scan too!) The Chrome card is a 2019 National Convention Orange Refractor numbered to just 25, so I'd have to call that one the best in his growing collection. The Chronicles Clear Vision and Clearly Donruss (both acetate but somewhat difficult to tell from the scan) look amazing for "base" cards too.

Baseball 3 of 3: includes the rest of the Mize, including two more Chronicles versions, showing off that product's versatility. Two many Verlanders proves to be just right for base/inserts of the ageless wonder.

And then there's some top-notch hits! Demeritte bounced back to Atlanta after flunking out with the Tigers but his 2020 Select auto (#d /199) looks great. There was no way that would overshadow a  colorful Michigan uni signature of Jesse Franklin, numbered to just 50, though--that's a beaut! And one last hit sees a pairing of the previously mentioned Chronicles and Verlander in jersey form. Noice!

Red Wings 1 of 2: guys like Lidstrom and Yzerman will always be the top draw for me when it comes to Detroit hockey cards in trade packages, but the numbered Mantha and Rasmussen items are great as well.

Red Wings 2 of 2: it's a Turgeon two-fer! Turegon was a 2014 third-rounder that appeared in just nine games over two seasons with the Wings, and since then he's signed with the Wild. You couldn't ask for better with these two relic cards that feature bold red jersey swatches, though!

Basketball 1 of 1: That Hoops parallel of Caris LeVert (Teal Explosion) is something to look at! Rice and Rose are Michigan royalty at this point. And another Michigan uni auto is more than welcome to join in the fun! This time it's new basketball PC member Mike Smith out of last year's Panini Chronicles Draft. Smith was a grad transfer who started at Columbia before playing the 2020-21 season in Ann Arbor, one that saw Michigan get to the Elite 8. He's the 31st different subject in my basketball collection and this was a great card to start his PC.

Football 1 of 1: base cards of two football royalty as well are certainly welcome, but I'm sure your eyes went right for the big guns like mine did! He may only use about 40% of the sticker but Rashan Gary's still a draw for me, especially when it's a new autograph of his, and a college uni card to boot! That's auto #5 to go with a plate in his collection. And speaking of plates, the next card was probably the biggest surprise of the package for me. That's former Michigan DL Chris Wormley with the team that drafted him, the Ravens, on a 2017 Panini Unparalleled Black Plate that would have been inserted in that year's Plates & Patches product. Would you believe it's already my second 1/1 out of just four hits of the current Steeler? That's crazy but certainly worthy of its surprise appearance here!

Michigan Hockey 1/3: and as always we end with the sport of honor, hockey. Doug treated me to a good number (if not all) of the Wolverines from 21-22 OPC which looks nice as always. Connor had an excellent season and Copp chipped in a goal and two helpers in the Rangers' win this evening as I was writing this post. I'm mainly pulling for them to win it all this year since two other UMers--Tyler Motte and Jacob Trouba--also play for New York. Colorado with Andrew Cogliano and Jack Johnson (both seen here) would be #2 but they're still Colorado and what self-respecting Wings fan wants to root for them? Speaking of Wings and Wolverines, Dylan Larkin is another of the players Doug included from OPC.

Michigan Hockey 2/3: hey, there's Tyler Motte, whom I just mentioned! There's some other familiar players here as well but it's very clear that Josh Norris is the highlight. A rising star for Doug's beloved Sens, he was a 2017 first-rounder for San Jose but traded to Ottawa the following year. After two solid seasons in Ann Arbor he got a cup of coffee in the NHL in 2019-20, jumped to a 17/18/35 line the following season, and this past year he doubled his goal total to 35! Those are some great looking cards Doug sent me, especially the coveted Young Guns, which I'm sure was a double because nobody just throws those around.

Michigan Hockey 2/3: Werenski is the last of our non-hits here, including that MVP card that LOOKS like an auto but is just the latest version of UD's "Script" parallel that used to look more obviously like something else, e.g. foil. Still a fun card, though.

And then we have some fun hits for the icers as well. Like I said, Connor had a hell of a season, tying for fifth in the league in goals with 47. I'm sure he was much happier about that than he looked on his 2018-19 UD Rookie Photoshoot Flashback Materials jersey card, just my second hit of his.

Wolverwing Dylan Larkin almost equaled his career high in goals and points with 31 and 69, respectively, despite playing on a bad Wings team I hope improves at some point. The hockey stick theme is a fun design on his 2020-21 UD Game Jersey, already hit #9 for me. 

And lastly, Motte isn't listed among the playoff leaders in scoring this season but he's no stranger to the playoffs after a run with the 2019-20 Canucks, so who knows if he might be a hero if the Rangers make it all the way to the finals? His signature looks especially sharp on a 2016-17 Ultimate Collection autograph done in the style of 2006-07 Ultimate Collection's auto RCs. Numbered of 199 it shows him pictured with the Blackhawks, the team that drafted him and his first of four franchises to-date. It's my third auto and seventh hit of a guy who put up huge numbers in his junior season at Michigan.

Doug, thanks so much for sending such a large quantity of great cards, especially the hits as usual, that'll be great additions to my collections! I promise not to wait until I age another year to recap the next package you send, but before that I hope I'll be hitting you back. And at least I have plenty of time to try to stock up on 2/14 cards before next February....

Next up should be another blogger trade package, then depending on how things go I would think I'll be getting back to TCDB trade recaps. Until then, I hope the weather continues to warm up and improve in your area and that you're getting some sun and fresh air like I am--you're never too old for that!

2/5 and 3/5/22 card show reports: old and new $45s

I'm taking a quick break from posting trades to cover the shows I made it to over the past two months. As a reminder I skipped January's for weather reasons.

First up was February 5 when I made the usual drive east to Taylor Town Trade Center to hit up my favorite seller. It looks like from my notes my breakdown of the purchase that day was 10 $1 cards, 12 that were $2 each, and five out of his $5 box. I added that up to $54 went I went to pay but he gave me a price of $45 because he treats his regular customers well!

A lot of those cards will be sent out in trade packages if they haven't been already, but here's what I brought home with me, starting with available trade bait:

Nothing too crazy but those dual Diamond Kings relics are always fun and I know I trade with at least a couple folks that collect the Royals. Berroa's card is #d /299, Blalock's is /200, and Stewart's is /100. As always, please feel free to ask me about the trade here in the comments or on TCDB.

And here's the three I kept for myself, because 90s inserts rule!!! First up is a 1999 UD Textbook Excellence Double insert of PC guy Greg Maddux. As you can see it's #d /2000, hence the "double" variation, and it's also die-cut on the right side, plus it has kind of a copper grid thing going on behind the photo. The regular version isn't numbered and is plainer, the Triples are /100 with maybe a silver kind of grid background, and the Home Runs are /10 with maybe a holofoil grid. I love me some numbered 90s inserts!

Not that they have to be numbered for me to love them. I'd actually tried to trade for card #2 on TCDB just that week but the member understandably valued it quite highly. No problem, I snagged one from the $5 box. That would be another die-cut card, a '97 Ultra Baseball Rules of top PC guy Cal Ripken Jr. Besides the baseballs being die-cut the stitching is also raised/embossed, which is a very cool little detail. The back of this one explains MLB HOF eligibility requirements.

Last up and also from '97 is a super cool insert from the interesting-if-divisive Pinnacle Inside product. I for one loved it and some of the great looking inserts you could find from both years it existed. In this case we're looking at a Dueling Dugouts chase card that paired two players and included a wheel you could spin that would show each player's stats from 1992-1996.

I nabbed this one because of the guy on the back, Pudge, to add to his collection, but this would have been impossible to pass up either way.

Thanks to the magic of converting phone video to animated GIFs I can show off both sides relatively quickly like-a so:

How cool is that?! Today's inserts may suck and get short shrift due to the obsession with hits and RCs, but fortunately for collectors like me, we'll always have a treasure trove of 90s inserts to dig up.

More recently I headed back earlier this month for another run through the dude's boxes, and while I can't remember the exact breakdown, my haul again came from the $1, $2, and $5 boxes, with the later on sale at 5/$20. This time I think my total was closer to $50 and again he knocked a bit off, asking for $45. Sold! The quarter boxes were too crowded to peruse and he still didn't have any dimes to flip through so I happily headed home with these items, starting with unclaimed trade bait:

I thought both football cards I grabbed looked pretty nice and I always like to snag autographed memorabilia cards for trade bait when I can. The Brian Leonard is #d /100, and the super shiny gold Fant (now with the Seahawks) has a solid five memorabilia pieces along with numbering /299. Meanwhile, I went a bit unorthodox in picking up the Australian Silky Terrier Manupatch from 2018 Goodwin Champions because, why not? I bet someone will want it, either here or on TCDB. Once again, please claim 'em if you want 'em!

My own take home was double the size of last month's with a few fun new items:

Former UM pitcher Jeff Criswell is front and center on a 2020 Panini USA Baseball insert #d /999, and he reps the collegiate national team while Jack Flaherty is on the back shown with the 18U team. Speaking of numbered cards, I snagged two different Griffeys from 2008 Topps Moments & Milestones, each for just a buck. They each represent one of Ken's 147 RBI from his crazy '97 MVP-winning season and both are #d /150. I realize there's a ton of these and it's a goofy set but I still thought it would be fun to pick them up.

The second row opens up with the most expensive of the cards I kept for myself: a $5 2021 Leaf Metal Draft autograph of former Wolverine Jesse Franklin, as seen in an airbrushed Wolverines uniform. $5 might seem a bit much for him but that was the first hit of his I'd seen and the guy I buy from always cuts me a deal so I felt it was worth it. Welcome to the collection, Jesse!

Next is the lone basketball card I kept, a 2007-08 Fleer Hot Prospects dual jersey (/149) of former Fab Fiver Jalen Rose. Michigan's actually playing as I write this and I don't expect them to beat Tennessee--after all, they've only been winning every other game for more than a month--but I'm still glad they were able to go dancing after a down year. Anyway, my fifth hit of Rose shows him with his sunset season team of the Suns (ha!) at the end of his 13-year career. It's nice to see a couple interesting colors instead of the plain old white/gray.

Last up this evening is one more numbered insert: a 2007 Topps TX Exclusive Silver parallel of former UM LB Prescott Burgess. I can add this card, limited to just 49 copies, to the RC I'd already picked up of him. He has just 69 (nice) cards to his name on TCDB and I have 12 of them. He managed to appear in 40 games over four seasons after the Ravens took him in the 2007 6th round so that number of cardboard appearances seems reasonably appropriate to me.

That's all for February and March but I hope I'll be back in April with more great results, whether or not I spend exactly $45 again! Until then, I would expect that my next post will be a double blogger trade recap. And no matter what happens in any of their games, I'll be enjoying watching UM's women's and men's basketball and men's hockey teams as they continue to work for postseason glory. GO BLUE!

2021 Sportlots purchases part 8: more Michigan? Marvelous!

Previously: Quick summary and set wants; Big and small we have them all!; Better off Ted; A Tettle-ton of Froot Loops; Lucky Tiger Seven; Dizzying Deans, Sportlots has been Barry, Barry good to me

Just two posts left after this one! Tonight's will be another group post instead of a single player like the last one, though we're sticking with Michigan Baseball as the theme. I believe I counted 17 different players in the scans below, enough that I originally considered splitting them up, but I'm feeling motivated to finish these up. Therefore, it's more Michigan mania!

We'll start with this group since I found a lone new card for all nine players. Up top are three of the older Wolverines you'll see today: 1976 SSPCs of P Jim Burton and OF Tom Grieve, plus a '78 TCMA of 1B/OF (and UM football player as well) John Herrnstein. Burton's '78 SSPC card will sew up his four-card run whenever I can find it. Herrnstein's collection will be tougher to complete because, as a reminder, he shares '60s rookie star cards with Willie Stargell and Dick Allen.

The next four are some of the latest Michigan alumni to make their pro debuts. Blomgren, Criswell, and Franklin (2020 Bowman Draft) were all selected in the first five rounds of the '20 draft, while Brewer (2020 Topps Heritage Minors) was a Houston 3rd rounder the year before. They're all pretty good prospects, and these items represent my first for each player except Criswell (my 4th).

A couple "S" players close out the scan. First is a 2011 Triple Threads Sepia parallel (#d /625) of HOFer George Sisler, giving me 99 different items of "Gorgeous" George. The other continues the run of oddballs, especially of the food issue variety (foodballs?) in this series: an '81 Topps Coca-Cola St. Louis Cardinals issue of P Lary Sorensen. Aside from the obvious Coke logo up front and different numbering on the back, these are very similar to the base cards, but still fun pickups for your everyday player or oddball collector.

Jim Abbott got the biggest boost in numbers to his collection of the players you'll see today, and this group of nine isn't even all of them. The scan is bookended by food issues from Topps/Bazooka's 1990 partnership plus 1993 Kraft, a pop-up I won't be popping up myself. Also from 1990, starring a poorly chosen photo emblematic of the junk wax era, is Donruss' Learning Series, a 55-card set geared towards elementary- and middle-schoolers.

Then things get Canuckified with 1990 Fleer Canadian and O-Pee-Chee, a couple issues from our friendly neighbors to the north. That Fleer photo was another bad choice, to be sure. A pair of Classic cards produced in 1991 and '92 look much better to me since action shots almost always trump portraits in my opinion, plus it's always really cool to see portions of Jim's one-armed delivery. Last up here is a pair of '93 Upper Deck Gold Hologram cards, which are annoying to have to track down as a player-collector, but then I suppose they do give me a reason to collect a second version of a card where Abbott's wearing a Michigan shirt! You'll see one more of these below since he was all over that '93 set.

One last Abbott (for now) gives way to a few slightly more recent guys. I found a new pair of cards of Portage, Michigan native and 2019 Arizona draftee Tommy Henry: his Bowman Draft and Draft Chrome Refractor issues. It's always nice when I can track down stuff with backs that mention Michigan in one form or another, such as these that include his college stats.

Drew Henson is a player whose cards I get to chase in two sports, and here I have four of the five from this purchase. The first couple are from 1999 team sets for New York's Tampa affiliate, with the second apparently hailing from an "update" set that's almost identical. The '02 Hot Prospects insert he shares with another guy that had some hype behind him, Xavier Nady, is pretty cool thanks to a pair of rounded corners. And to those I added a four-player 2003 Bazooka sticker whose players happen to appear in the order of best MLB career to worst!

You'll see more of both of the other guys in this scan in a minute, but interestingly enough they're both still involved with the game despite their ages. Old Rich Hill turned 41 a few months ago but is still pitching pretty well, though of course those efforts are now for the Rays instead of the Twins, with whom he appears on his 2020 Topps Heritage base. And former Cardinals C and manager Mike Matheny made the relatively short trip to Kansas City to helm the Royals after being let go by St. Louis, the team pictured on his 2004 Topps 1st Edition parallel above.

The other Matheny cards I found were both from 2005. The first is also a 1st Edition version of his Topps flagship base, and it offers and even better action photo than the previous year's. I wonder if an out resulted from that throw? The other is the Silver parallel from Total, which wasn't as good as the 2002-03 versions in my opinion, so I'm not really disappointed the brand disappeared until the bastardized cash grab online version resurrected the name in 2019.

The rest of this scan stars William Harold Morris, and almost everything I scored of Hal this time was of the oddball variety, but that worked for me as a fun way to beef up his PC a bit. Here you see a trio of Classic cards from 1989 and '91, a 1991 Baseball Cards Magazine issue done up in the style of '66 Topps, and Morris' three appearances in a Rembrandt/Ultra-Pro promo set put out in '92. The latter was a 20-card set featuring casual shots of some baseball stars (such as Bobby Bonilla and Jose Canseco), mainly focusing on their favorite pastimes, such as tennis for the guy above. The backs included Ultra Pro holograms and a message of the "limited" nature of the cards; the ones you see here received 125,000, 250,000, and 100,000 copies, respectively.

Two more Morris cards get me just a pair shy of 300 for his collection. The first is from the US Playing Card Company's 1992 Baseball Aces deck, and it's only natural that someone playing for the Reds should be assigned a suit of that color. The other is the only "mainstream" card in his bunch, his '95 Collector's Choice Silver Signature parallel, making him the fourth Wolverine I've found from that set (Steve Ontiveros, Steve Howe, and Scott Kamieniecki are the others).

Player #2 in this scan is Hal's former teammate Chris Sabo, and as with Morris I came away with '89 and '91 Classic issues of "Spuds". You can add him to the food issue club as well thanks to a '92 Jimmy Dean oddball from an 18-card set that also included Jim Abbott among its stars. Lastly, also from 1992 is a goofy design (and funny photo of Sabo utilizing a hitting training aid) from Topps Kids. If you care for whatever reason, the latter is the variation that has two asterisks in the trademark line instead of one.

It seems like a good idea to mention that this post will be published on Juneteenth as we look at the last player in the group of vertical cards. Moses Fleetwood "Fleet" Walker was a C for Toledo of the old American Association, considered a "major league", back in 1884, making him the first black player (or just "the first black in the majors" according to the cringe-y back of the 1986 Fritsch Negro League Baseball Stars card you see on the left) to break the color barrier. That makes Jackie Robinson's bravery in 1947 no less important, though, as he fought through the same kind of ignorance and hate that Walker did. While you won't find him on too many cards, unfortunately, another of his items can be found relatively easily: a base card from Upper Deck's 1994 product Baseball: the American Epic, which describes Fleet's history a bit more intelligently.

To finish things up today, here's a six-pack for your weekend. First up is the final Jim Abbott Gold Hologram from 1992 Upper Deck, a set that included lots of those artsy cards. My Tommy Henry collection grows by one more thanks to a cool 2020 Topps Pro Debut base that makes good use of the card's orientation. A multiplayer card including fellow Yankees prospects from the time Juan Rivera and Jackson Melian is Drew Henson's other appearance from the Minors team sets mentioned above. I got two cards closer to Rich Hill's 2020 Topps rainbow with his base card and Gold Star (factory set) parallel, not to mention two more cards from his year with the Twins. And lastly, Sabo joins Morris in needing just two more cards for a milestone (he's at 198) thanks to one last food issue: a 1992 French's card he shares with HOFer Wade Boggs. I've never been a mustard guy but that 19-card set full of All-Stars is fun and I may have to try to track down more of those.

Considering these additions combined with those from some of the earlier posts in this series, I got a lot of good work done on the checklists of some of the many former Wolverines I collect, and added some fun pieces.

Still to come in the final two posts are one more single-player feature plus a last one with a team theme that I think will please many of you!