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 trade package #8: Nachos Grande

Today's trade package is one I was super excited to receive, and I was anticipating getting it just as much as I was impatiently waiting for today's Michigan Football spring game to get here since that marks the warmer (eventually) season and serves as a reminder that college football will be back before we know it.

The star of today's post actually almost came to Ann Arbor on a football scholarship before opting for the diamond and a Hall of Fame career. That would be one Barry Larkin, a guy who gets heavily collected by Chris of Nachos Grande. Chris generously let me pick from his Larkin dupes after he got them added on TCDB and I ended up with almost 50 new cards to add to my own collection (which still pales in comparison to his PC by more than 400!).

So here's a quick look at what he sent in this package stuffed with Larkins (and a few other PC guys too):

Scan #1 has the most oddball items of any of today's images but we open with a favorite of mine in Sportflics. This is one of the 1987 Team Preview cards and it includes a solid 12 players up front, some of which were big contributors to the Reds' 1990 title such as Eric Davis, Tom Browning, Larkin, and Paul O'Neill. The other two cards in that row from Classic and Topps/Toys r Us are also from Barry's RC year of '87.

Down the middle we have a Topps Magazine trio from 1990 that includes the previously seen Eric Davis plus fellow Wolverine and '90 champ Chris Sabo, plus a pair of U.S. Playing Card Company cards. And the bottom keeps up the oddball theme with food issues from Dairy Queen, Kraft, and Milk Bone. Hey, I didn't say it was all human food! I'm always a fan of cards showing former Wolverines participating on Olympics teams.

As we head deeper into the 90s there's less oddball stuff but it's still there. '93 Studio's Heritage insert looks awesome and is perfect for a game that works so hard to honor its history. UD's Fun Pack product tried all kinds of stuff to hook kids, including "base cards" that were, among other things, stickers. And there's our second Kraft card of the day--one of two food issues in this image.

'95 Score's Hall of Gold was a fun insert that shouldn't be confused with the Gold Rush parallel. It looks like September of that year was Barry's lone appearance on the cards that could be found in SI for Kids magazines. And Tombstone is the last of the food cards you'll see today.

The bottom row starts with one of the best looking cards of the envelope straight out of the greatest era for inserts, and that's a '96 Bowman Bowman's Best Preview Atomic Refractor. Hell yeah! Next to it is one of a few Larkin appearances in '96 Collector's Choice Silver Signature parallel, and after that we have Fleer's E-Motion XL with its design that included frames and stamps.

For a product that was all about the one-per-pack autographs, '96 Leaf Signature has a base set I find very appealing. Pacific Online is more annoying to collect because it's huge and the variations are hard to track down, but Barry's Reds team checklist looks cool too. And it's too bad the Pinnacle name didn't last beyond 1998.

I've long thought that 1998's offering was one of the best in terms of SP Authentic. The Gold Label (another gem!) next to it is the Class 2 version while the base sees Barry in the field and following through on a swing. And Paramount was one of a number of excellent Pacific offerings, with the '99 Copper parallel as an example above.

The bottom row runs it back with Topps Gold Label (1999 Class 3), the third year of Topps Stars (also 1999) and 2000's Pacific Prizm. On a scale of one to five, Topps gives Barry the following ratings on his Stars card: Hitting: 4; Power: 3; Speed: 4; Defense: 5; Arm: 3. Oh yeah, and give me the Pacific version of Prism over Panini's slightly differently spelled product any day!

This last scan that's 100% vertical cards has some of the highest-end stuff you'll see today. 2000 Pacific Vanguard was big on card thickness and shininess so you know I'm a fan. The back notes that Larkin is one of two Reds to join the 30/30 club, and of course the other one (at the time) was Eric Davis; Brandon Phillips joined the club with 30 jacks and 32 steals in '07. Next is our final Gold Label offering of the day: another Class 3 version from 2000. And even if its silver foil is so reflective that it doesn't scan well, 2001 Leaf Certified Materials was 100% certified Grade A high-end!

Next, 2001 SP Game Bat brings to mind the fad of one-per-pack bat cards that we enjoyed 20 years ago. And after that we have one of my favorites of the whole package: 2003 E-X. This product had multiple variations on the name and design but the '03 version was one of the best as it was mostly clear acetate! Larkin's 2004 Donruss World Series Blue insert is a great reminder of his excellent stats in the '90 World Series sweep of Oakland: .353 AVG (6/17) with a .421 OBP and 3 runs scored.

Heading to the bottom row we begin with the Retail version of Fleer's 2004 Skybox L.E. (limited edition) product. It can be easily differentiated from the hobby version which is die cut along the top. A flying Larkin once again turning two stars on a 2004 Ultra Gold Medallion card which is itself die-cut. And then we have one of the most recent cards you'll see in this post, a 2011 Gypsy Queen Framed Green parallel. You all know I'm not a big fan of the Ginters and GQs of the hobby but the framed cards do look quite nice.

Here we have six horizontal cards before we get to the final verticals. Up top are Barry's base card from Pacific's 2000 Aurora set plus the Pinstripes insert. Since his Reds wore unis with stripes I'd say his team was 100% appropriate to be in the set. Also from 2000 you can see his 2000 Upper Deck Gold Reserve base. That product used the same photos as the flagship product but had different design elements, especially the eponymous gold, and if you compare the two you'll also notice that the Gold Reserve card lacks the All-Star notation. The next card is a 2001 Upper Deck Vintage team checklist which uses the old floating heads look you might have seen decades ago. This card is great for me since it doubles as a Griffey appearance. Larkin and Junior were Reds teammates from 2000-04 and coincidentally they both made the All-Star team on the bookends of those five years!

The last two horizontals are Topps cards of the reprint variety, so don't be fooled and think they're older. On the left is a 2011 Topps 60 Years of Topps Original Back which very helpfully says "reprint" on the back. Of course that's another look at his '95 Topps base you see up there with its unmistakable design. The other is from last year's Stadium Club Greats insert which reprints Larkin's appearance in Stadium Club's 1991 debut product.

We're getting near the end now with two more vertical items that couldn't be more different. On the right is a 1992 Panini Sticker. I very likely pulled one of those from a pack when I was nine and dutifully stuck it in my album but now I have one that I can keep intact. To its left is one of just two numbered cards you'll see today, a 2011 Topps Tier One Blue parallel which is numbered /199 up front. I still need Barry's base card but this Michigan fan is certainly happy to say GO BLUE to the one he owns!

I had to say "near to the end" in the last scan because we've got two more Barrys to admire, and they're both relics, my 23rd and 24th hits of the HOF SS! On the left is a 2003 Prestige Connections dual memorabilia card that includes a Larkin bat along with a jersey of three true outcomes poster boy and feared slugger Adam Dunn. It's numbered /400 on the back and has just a little bit of damage in a couple places around Larkin's bat piece, but looks amazing otherwise with its bold red background.

The other brings to mind the kind of relic A&G is known for but it's actually much older than that product. The jersey you see before you is from 2002 Topps 206, but you still get that framed cigarette card look. I'm guessing this is one of the earliest, if not the first, examples of Topps making the framed minis, and you have the nice little cutout in the window so you can actually touch the relic piece.

This is simply an outstanding bunch of cards to add to a collection I'm happy to keep building so again I really appreciate Chris' generosity. These may have all been dupes to him, but they were new to me, and he could have just as easily decided to keep them to trade on the site for more Larkins. Trust me, I'll do my best to pay him back, especially if I can find some he needs somewhere in the wild.

We're not quite done yet, though, because Chris also let me grab four more cards of three other PC guys:

Bookending the top row are 1998 Sports Illustrated cards of Mr. Padre Tony Gwynn and Dean Palmer. One's an all-time great HOFer and the other...is a guy I still enjoy collecting. Speaking of Dean-o, I also snagged a '98 Pacific Online base of him. Down below is one other 2001 UD Vintage team checklist card, and if you look closely enough you'll realize I grabbed this one thanks to the presence of another Wolverine: current Royals skipper Mike Matheny. 2000 was his first of a five-year stint with the club culminating in the 2004 pennant, but he'd be in San Francisco for his sunset season in '06 when Edmonds was the only guy on this card to win a ring that year. In terms of the 2004 team, Matheny, Renteria, Lankford, and Edmonds all participated.

So once again I'd like to say a big thanks to Chris for allowing me to grab nearly 50 Larkin cards from him, many of which are of above-average quality or more. I'm hoping I have some success finding stuff he can use out of the boxes at my local card show if not elsewhere so I can reward his generosity.

Up next will be one more large trade package from one of the usual suspects, and then depending on what else comes in I may finally be able to recap my bevy of TCDB deals so I can put those stacks of cards on my desk away!

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!

2020 trade package #29: a Penny Sleeve For Your Thoughts

 

Moving on from the last post to this one, we're going from "one of one" to "One of a Kind." More on that in a minute, but first I want to start as usual by introducing today's sender.

Jon who runs A Penny Sleeve For Your Thoughts decided to celebrate his excellent blog's fifth anniversary a couple weeks ago with a cool one-card PWE giveaway. There was lots of nice stuff to choose from, and my eye caught a player I like to collect, so I happily claimed the card, and not long after I received it:

Here we have former Michigan catcher Mike Matheny on a parallel of his 1998 Stadium Club base card called One of a Kind. While the more familiar First Day Issue versions were available in that year's retail packs, this insert was rarer (#d /150 instead of 200) and available only in Hobby and HTA packs. Besides the numbering you'll find two main differences between these and the base cards: the foil background and logo in the corner. Naturally they don't scan as well as they look in hand but hopefully you get the idea.

I was glad to add a new card of the former Card/Brewer/Giant/Jay, ex-Cards manager, and current skipper of the Royals, because I just don't get to do so that often these days. That it was a rarer numbered 90s parallel was a huge bonus. It marks the 103rd card of Matheny in my collection.

Many thanks to Jon for celebrating a nice achievement with some generosity! Here's to many more years of A Penny Sleeve For Your Thoughts. I'll do my best to provide some content for him in the form of a return package, possibly a PWE of my own. The rest of you should make sure to follow him if you aren't, and keep an eye out for more posts around the blogosphere celebrating receiving cards from a great member of the community!

2019 Sportlots purchases: twelve for Tuesday

As I keep rolling along on these Sportlots posts I'm back today with one of the bigger ones you'll see in this latest series, covering all of the Michigan Baseball guys whose cards I nabbed this time.  Scanning/editing/captioning/cataloging/uploading everything took me a while, which is why I haven't posted in a couple days, and I'm really starting to lean closer to transitioning to use TCDB both for cataloging/checklisting and scans.  I've been meaning to overhaul my collection links here anyway, so maybe I'll put in some effort before the end of the year to make things easier on myself.

In the meantime, here's a fun deluge of new cards!

#1 today--and in pretty much any post where he features--is Jim Abbott.  I'm pretty happy with the mix I found here, opening with a Starting Lineup card, mixing in some inserts, and going a bit oddball with a Topps/Coke Commanders of the Hill card from '93 plus '94 Fleer Extra bases.  The bottom-left card represents the last of Jim's '94 Score issues I needed--the Gold Rush parallel of his highlights subset appearance in the base set, the one that honors his amazing no-hitter.

Also among pitchers getting in on the action today is #1 PC dude Rich Hill.  For fun I added his base card from the goofy 2017 Honus Bonus product, then knocked seven cards off his checklist.  The one outlier is a Upper Deck Rookie Foil Silver (#250/399) parallel while the rest hail from Topps products made in 2017-19.  In that pile you'll find two each of Limited Edition versions, All-Star Game-stamped cards, and ("On-Demand") Minis I needed.  I'm slowly marching toward hitting 300 of his checklist cards I'm chasing and am at around 63% of his total at the moment.  Here's hoping the free agent lefty finds a nice home with a legit contender (e.g. one that won't waste his talent) over the off-season!

For a relatively underappreciated HOFer, Barry Larkin's prices often tend toward those belonging to bigger stars, so I'm always glad when I can add quality stuff like this on the cheap.  Up top I have a couple early/mid-90s inserts along with a great double-dip from UD's 1995 Special Edition product.  You know I love me some Fleer/Sports Illustrated mashups like the one you see here from '97.  The trio of '98 Topps Stars cards--base, Bronze, and Silver--were cheaper than I expected considering they're all numbered.  So were the two '99 Flair Showcase cards that end this scan, and what a beautiful product that was!  The hobby is worse off without manufacturers like Fleer.

Here's a couple more Larkins that get their own scan.  I may be in the minority but I absolutely love 2001 Topps Fusion as it combines three of the best iterations Bowman's Best, Gallery (seen here), and Stadium Club, in those products' entire runs.  And I couldn't resist another UM uniform card, in this case the second of a pair of his variations from 2017 Contenders Draft.  I've now completed his runs of base cards in both products seen here.

Almost everyone else here is a supercollection of mine, including new Royals manager Mike Matheny.  TCDB helped me realize that the first card seen here, a checklist from '94 Ultra (which also includes Mike's RC) existed since Beckett ignores the player depicted.  Score another one for that excellent site!  The other four needs were from 2002 Topps Chrome and UD Victory, '04 Topps Total Silver, and '05 Bowman Heritage Mahogany.  A nice five-card day gives me exactly 100 of the 218 cards of him I'm currently chasing, with more possible now that he's managing again!

When it came to one William Harold Morris it was a tale of low end and high, with pretty much nothing in-between.  I knocked off his '93 Pacific Spanish base along with both Topps Inaugural factory set cards honoring the Marlins and Rockies that year, and Stadium Club Members Only parallels from '95 and '96.  After those I upped the ante with '97 Flair Showcase (Row 2) and asking price with a '97 Bowman Chrome International Refractor and 1999 Pacific Prism Holographic Purple (#215/320).  That effort paid off as I hit the 75% mark of his checklist on the nose with 270/360!

Here's one of three new PC guys you'll meet today.  Ray Ricken is another one of those guys whose name was unfamiliar to me, but thankfully he came up as I searched through TCDB for Wolverines I was missing.  The Yanks took him in the 5th round in '94, and he bounced between minor league levels with them as well as the Padres before ending his career in indy ball in 2002.  The pitcher appears on cards from '94 Stadium Club Draft Picks, '96 and '97 Bowman, and '96 Topps--the one base I already had.  The above haul got me to six of his 11 issues, plus I added a couple minors cards from Best and Fleer/Excel.  Three autographs from '97 Bowman will make him a bit difficult to chase, but I'm sure I'll get there eventually.

Hey, it's Spuds!  Here you can see I tracked down seven needs from Sabo's checklist plus a fun oddball--one of his 1990 Starting Lineup cards variations.  I also knocked off an early need in his '88 Topps Traded Tiffany, grabbed yet another appearance from '94 Fleer Extra Bases (I think this is the last one), and came up with a 2014 Topps Update World Series Heroes insert.  Hey, the dude went off in the '90 World Series!  To those I got a nice little 1993 run:  Pacific Spanish and Pinnacle (not sure how I didn't have that already) plus, like Morris above, the Topps Inaugural Marlins/Rockies cards.  And I almost matched the feat I did for Hal, getting Sabo to about 74%.  That's lots of Reds cardboard!

I bunched these four guys together because they formed a perfect nine card scan, and the first two players are today's other n00bs, players that also came up in my TCDB search.  Russ Brock was a pitcher drafted by Oakland in the second round in '91 while Flannelly, a 3B, was yet another Wolverine picked by the Yankees, in the third round the same year.  Neither made it to the pros but both were included in the '92 Stadium Club Dome set, which featured some of the same goofy photography of prospects found in that year's Bowman product.  Those are their only mainstream issues but each has some minors cards I might chase, like Brock's '93-'94 Fleer Excel card above.

For the sake of brevity I can also lump Putnam and Richard together.  As with Rich Hill, I found some recent Topps flagship versions of them I needed.  Zach's cards are the 2017 All-Star Game and Limited factory set versions while Clayton's hail from 2018 (All-Star Game and Gold /2018) and 2019 (base and All-Star Game).

We'll end this post with a HOFer in George Sisler, who's nearing the century mark.  I landed a second card of him but found out it was a dupe after it arrived, so for Gorgeous George it'll just be this 2011 GQ Framed Green parallel of his first of two cards in the base set.  In case you're curious, I have both of those base cards--the other depicts him with the Braves--plus three versions of card #2 including, nicely enough, the same green parallel.  Hopefully soon I can go on a nice little Sisler spree and cross the 100-card mark.

Next time I post you can probably look forward to something shorter with fewer items to gawk at.

2018 Sportlots purchases: PC predators

I just received my first trade package of the year but that'll wait for another day as I already had a draft of today's post ready to go.  This evening we'll be ditching the vintage stuff (mostly) and perusing some cards from my Tigers and Michigan Baseball player collections that didn't warrant individual posts because I just found a few of each.  New cardboard:  GO!

One scan, three former Tigers greats.  Gibby gets three new additions thanks to '95 SP's Silver parallel (which is listed on TCDB as "Superbafoil" for some reason) and a couple 2001 Topps versions:  Chrome and Home Team Advantage.  A high-flyin' Tram doubles up Mark McGwire on '92 Leaf's Black Gold parallel, a.k.a. "What '92 Leaf's Base Set Design Should Have Been" (sorry if I say that every time) and he joins Gibson in the '95 SP parallel set.  Last up is a great 2017 Verlander pair:  Diamond Kings and Stadium Club.

And on to the Wolverines.  Jim Abbott is one of two players that hit the four-card mark today.  A '92 Seven-Eleven hologram coin is the most unique item I added of him this time, his '95 Finest base (White Sox version, #233) is the highest end, the Pinnacle Museum Collection from the same year is my favorite, and the Circa card from '96 wasn't a bad throw-in.

As for the single-card guys, we'll begin with Astros pitching prospect Brett Adcock, whose collection doubled thanks to that 2016 Bowman Chrome Draft base you see dead center.  My non-supercollection of superagent Casey Close (no Major League cards to chase) got a little boost to seven items thanks to a 1990 minor league issue.  It's been a long time since I rock & rolled and added a new Freehan item to one of my favorite Tigers/Wolverines PCs, but here you can peep the Tigers great on his '66 O-Pee-Chee card, one that's surely seen better days.  I still lack three checklist cards for pitcher Scott Kamieniecki but did track down another of his minors cards from '89.  And Elliot (not "Elliot") Maddox's completed PC grew by one with his appearance from 1990 Swell Baseball Greats.

Hal Morris is another PC guy who got a card knocked off of his checklist thanks to that '96 Collector's Choice Silver Signature you see leading off this scan.  But new Blue Jay Clayton Richard had the most productive day in terms of new adds with four Topps-branded cards from 2018:  Flagship, Big League and its Gold parallel, and Heritage.  I wonder if he'll get a card with Toronto this year or if Topps will ignore him in favor of a 13th Aaron Judge subset.  As for Leon Roberts, I completed his checklist a while ago but lately have had some luck finding Senior League cards of his, this one from Pacific.

And here's a nice bunch of players to close out the group today.  I still need plenty of help in terms of my Chris Sabo collection but this time I did score both a fun oddball, an '89 Fleer box panel card, plus a need, the Golden Rainbow parallel of his '94 Stadium Club card.  I also bumped up my George Sisler PC to 85 cards with a pair of decent Topps inserts from 2010-11.  100 cards here I come!

That leaves three more players.  I considered it too oddball to be part of his supercollection checklist but happily picked up pitcher Gary Wayne's 1993 Pacific Spanish issue, and now I'm showing it off about a week before his sorta namesake, the Reverend Richard Wayne Gary Wayne, returns on Netflix's excellent Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt for its final season.  I managed not to get shut out when it came to my favorite PC, Rich Hill, thanks to his nice horizontal appearance from last year's flagship Topps product.  And finally, we travel all the way back to 2006 and Topps Chrome for a base issue I somehow didn't have:  a Gold Glove subset card starring former catcher and manager Mike Matheny.

That wraps up the collection of smaller additions to my PCs so look forward to bigger bunches of cards featuring some of your (and my) favorite stars, not to mention a brand spanking new trade package!

2018 Sportlots purchases: A-toZ PCs

Before I cover the last two single-player posts I'm going to use this one to show off the rest of the PC guys for whom I mostly just picked up a handful of cards (or even just one!).  They didn't fit the Tigers/Reds theme from a couple posts ago but they do share one thing in common:  all are former Wolverines, which isn't a surprise since the vast majority of my PCs are Michigan guys.

So here's a bunch of different players, some of whom I hope you recognize:

Jim Abbott is surely one of the most well known guys in this post and it didn't take much luck to turn up eight new cards of the one-handed wonder.  There's a nice mix of oddball--'90 Topps Magazine and '96 Angels Mother's--base, including a cool pairing with Nolan Ryan from '92 Pinnacle, and parallels, especially '96 Pinnacle Starburst.  I now count 259 cards in his collection.

Previously I didn't have enough cards of former Yankees OF prospect Casey Close to warrant an album, but thanks to these four I went ahead and made one, adding to a couple Michigan-specific items I already had.  Close is now known as a superagent who represented Derek Jeter, among many others, but in the 80s he was toiling in the minors for New York and Seattle after a terrific college career.  These four minors products, two each from '88 and '90, capture him with the Columbus Clippers (Yankees, AAA) and Calgary Cannons (Mariners, AAA).

If you've read at least a few posts on this here blog you know my favorite supercollection is that of current Dodgers lefty Rich Hill.  While putting together this massive Sportlots card I was fortunate to find a couple new cards for my assault on his checklist, this pair of Topps All-Star Game Silver cards from the special stamped sets the manufacturer made for the occasion.  In knocking off a couple more cards for those rainbows I also got closer to the 300 mark and am just five short!

I'm still lacking one freaking card ('94 Stadium Club Team First Day Issue) for my collection of late pitcher Steve Howe, but I did find this interesting pair to bolster it.  He's the third of four players I grabbed from the 1990 Dodgers Target set, and the second of another quartet, this time from Line Drive's 1991 AAA product.  You already saw Ross Powell's card a couple posts ago and you'll see the other two shortly.

One of those guys is former Brewers pitcher Mike Ignasiak.  I completed his 15-card collection a while ago but I'm always on the lookout for new stuff like this Minor League trio with cards from 1990-92.  The brands represented are Grand Slam, Line Drive, and Skybox, and the teams are the El Paso Diablos (AA) and Denver Zephyrs (AAA).

The other is pitcher Scott Kamieniecki, a pitcher mostly know for his stints with the Yankees and Orioles.  To his nearly-completed run I also added a trio of Minor League issues with the '91 Line Drive card book-ended by '90 Best and 1991-92 ProCards Tomorrow's Heroes (and its little foil diamonds).  Albany was the Yanks' AA squad while Columbus was their top affiliate until 2007.

Former Brewers/Giants/Cardinals catcher (and manager for the latter) Mike Matheny is one of the more well-known guys among my PCs, and I managed to track down new checklist needs from three of his four clubs (the Blue Jays aren't represented since no cards of him with the team appear to exist).  Those are, in order, a '98 Pacific Online Red parallel and base cards from 2005 Donruss Team Heroes and 2016 Topps Heritage.  I'm getting reasonably close to 100 unique cards for his collection not to mention 50% of what I've checklisted so it's nice to have productive days like this.

Former QB/current pitcher Clayton Richard is a few years into his return to San Diego, and while he hasn't been terribly effective he's at least been able to eat some innings for them.  As you can see here I finally nabbed his 2017 Topps Update base and got the Rainbow Foil parallel to go with it as my first examples of his issues from that product.  I still have lots of his stuff to track down, especially cards released over the last couple years, but I'm at just about 60%, and hopefully future posts will see more bunches of his cards.

The last of the multi-card players for today is former pitcher (and Michigan Baseball manager) Geoff Zahn.  As with Ignasiak I completed his run a while ago but was glad to find other stuff to add, like this oddball pairing.  On the left is the third and final Kellogg's issue I added through this series, in this case from 1979.  It's not exactly mint--the scan doesn't show how much the card's cracked--but it's not like I especially care as I'm just happy to have another fun lenticular food issue.  And as promised I can show off the last of the '90 Target Dodgers.  Zahn was with L.A. for the first two-plus seasons of his career so he too was part of that very cool perforated set.

And now we'll take a quick look at the guys for whom I picked up just one new item:

• Brett Adcock, a 2016 4th round selection of the Astros out of Michigan, is my latest brand new player collection.  The lefty isn't high on the team's list of prospects for now but you never know!  The first card for his debut is his 2016 Bowman Draft base and I currently have 16 of his cards to track down.
• Like Howe above I need just one card to complete Jake Fox's PC, though the quad auto I'm hunting will be much, much harder to find.  In the meantime I added my first non-checklist card thanks to this shiny 2006 TriStar Prospects Plus base from his time as a slugging Cubs catching prospect.
• Former White Sox IF and current front office guy for the same franchise Chris Getz has a larger checklist for me to chase, but I likewise added a Minor League issue, this one from the 2008 Just Autographs product from which I already own an autograph.
• That's right, it's a run on Minor League cards!  Injured pitcher Zach Putnam completes the trio with another TRISTAR-branded offering, 2009's Projections.  Zach was a member of the Indians organization at the time and this card includes a shot of him with his pro debut club, the Mahoning Valley Scrappers, a low-A affiliate in the NY-Penn league.  The Niles, Ohio-based team is still affiliated with Cleveland today.
• Vintage legend George Sisler is the lone HOF PC guy in this post (though Nolan Ryan does make that cameo!) and while I usually can find more new items of his at a time I was happy to add this SSPC HOF card from the product's 1980-87 run.  There's no date on the back so I'm not exactly sure when it was made, but I do like that it shows him as a member of the 10-person 1939 Hall of Fame class that was the fourth ever inducted and also included Lou Gehrig (thanks to a special election due to his health).  It represents my 83rd card of the one-time single-season hit king.
• Last up is a final SSPC offering, once again from 1975, of former Cardinals (among other teams) IF Ted Sizemore.  I'm adding it to his completed collection along with another non-checklist card as a fun vintage oddball item. 

Two more large single-player posts await, so stay tuned!