2024 trade package #27: Baseball Cards Come to Life

And now we've come to my final trade package of 2024. This one arrived just after Christmas and was a fun surprise from Bo over at Baseball Cards Come to Life. He and I had previously made a trade via TCDb a couple years ago but this was our first "blogger" trade outside that site. Bo asked for some of the beat-up vintage I made available a few weeks ago and I came up with a pretty solid group of those for him in addition to some other stuff that I found on his wantlists.

He was nice enough to return the favor with some extremely cool stuff he must have pulled straight from my own wants as all were new to me:

The top group here represent my favorite items in the entire package. I wasn't familiar with the 1969 MLB PhotoStamps because their combination of vintage and oddball-ness made me unlikely to notice them. So I'm grateful to Bo for gifting me four of the Tigers that could be found: PC favorite Bill Freehan and fellow Detroit greats Willie Horton, Denny McLain, and Jim Northrup. I love the fact that these came out the year after that team won it all, and receiving these inspired me to add the others to my wants: Kaline, Cash, Stanley, McAuliffe, and Lolich.

The vintage action didn't stop there, though, as he included two '72 Topps base that I needed: Ted Simmons plus Darrell Evans' In Action subset appearance. That's a second-year of Simba and it puts me very close to his full Topps base run. Technically it's a second-year of Evans as well; His RC came out two years earlier instead, then he got consecutive base sports in '72.

Going back to oddball-ish stuff, the bottom row includes a Superstar back of Mr. Padre, a Topps Sticker of Willie Hernandez (shared with HOFer Steve Carlton), and a UK Mini of Jack Morris. There's enough of these one-offs that despite being common still represent holes in my collection, though not if someone like Bo can help it!

Next, he included a trio of Brandon Inge needs. Though I've long since had the '07 Topps base, I did indeed lack the Red Back seen above (I didn't scan the reverse, so trust me, bro). From that same year I was also treated to a horizontal photo of him attempting to make a crazy diving play in the stands (found in that year's Upper Deck product), and then Brandon's appearance in Topps' throwback 206 product released in 2010.

The last of the baseball content was one of a number of 2001 UD Vintage team checklists I've been chasing for a while because they include one or more guys I collect. In this case, Cal's the lone Oriole in my PC, but I do remember this team well, one that included ex-Cleveland star Albert Belle, Jeff Conine, Brady Anderson, and more.

Did Bo's generosity end there? Most definitely not! Also tucked into this envelope were three former Wolverines I needed from 1975 Topps football: longtime NFL O-linemen Dan Dierdorf and Reggie McKenzie, plus 10-year NFL CB John Rowser, who suited up for Green Bay, Pittsburgh, and the pictured Broncos. I now have 12 cards from this set, partially thanks to Bo, and just need #s 203 (an All-Pro card that includes HOF G Tom Mack) and 395, which is Giants RB Ron Johnson.

Bo, thanks for sending all of these needed cards my way! I hope we can increase the frequency of our trading in the new year and fortunately that shouldn't be too difficult with you making your wants available on my favorite trading site!

And once again thank you to everyone who contributed to TMV as a reader, commenter, and trade partner. I appreciate you all and will keep going in 2025--as long as none of you try to hold me to a three-post-per-day pace. I can't promise I'll put up six posts in a single month! But please do keep in mind that I still have a good amount of 2024 content to cover in the form of pickups from Facebook, TCDb, eBay, and shows, plus at least one other surprise source.

I'm not sure how long it'll take to catch up on those, so for now, I'll wish a happy new year to everyone who took the time to read this. May your 2025 be filled with good news, good friends, good food, good health, and everything you could want!

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!

Trade me cards for my three new baseball player collections!

(Note:  this is being posted on both blogs to reach the widest audience possible)

On one or both of my blogs I recently alluded to the fact that I was soon to add three new players to the list of guys I'm PCing.  (I'm also planning an overhaul of my single/player wants to better reflect what I collect.)  Although they're all Michigan alumni (as are most of the guys I PC), they're still baseball players, and it seems reasonable for me to at least try to trade for them through TMV.

Today seemed like a good day to try something different; in the past I began player collections either thanks to existing inventory, a few pickups through trades, or online purchases.  This time I'd like to begin by announcing these collections, then seeing what I can trade for before proceeding to the usual "buy 'em all on eBay/COMC/Sportlots/Justcommons" method.  As it turns out this time, all three are pretty much of the "vintage" variety, spanning 1969-1985, which is the biggest reason I thought I'd reach out to the blogging world first; after all, for many of you this is your bread and butter!

So what I'm going to do today is list all three new players and the cards of them I need, which is about 99% of them right now.  If you have any you're willing to trade, please just let me know which in the comments and I'll work out a deal with you.  Trade loot will range from "cards of your favorite team I can dig up" all the way to "pick out some stuff on COMC on me!"  I see the latter happening mostly if this pursuit leads to a bigger trade, but you never know.  Think of this as helping a player collector and further greasing the wheels for some trading fun!

Once I have some stuff to show off I'll do some formal write-ups of each player as I've done for my other newer PCs on TMM recently.

Ok, on to the new players and my needs for each (images courtesy of COMC):

1.  Elliott Maddox, 1971-1981 (Tigers, Senators, Rangers, Yankees, Orioles, Mets)
1971 O-Pee-Chee #11
1971 Topps #11 RC
1972 O-Pee-Chee #277
1972 Topps #277
1973 O-Pee-Chee #658
1973 Topps #658
1974 O-Pee-Chee #401
1974 Topps #401
1975 O-Pee-Chee #113
1975 Topps #113
1975 Topps Mini #113
1976 O-Pee-Chee #503
1976 Topps #503
1977 Topps #332
1978 Topps #442
1979 O-Pee-Chee #28
1979 Topps #69
1980 O-Pee-Chee #357
1980 Topps #707
1981 Donruss #397
1981 Fleer #326
1981 O-Pee-Chee #299
1981 Topps #299
Have/pending:  0/23


2.  Leon Roberts, 1975-1985 (Tigers, Astros, Mariners, Rangers, Blue Jays, Royals)
Please note that this is NOT Leon "Bip" Roberts; if you're gonna Bip me, do it with the Roberts I actually want to collect!  As a matter of fact, thanks to this concern, I've created a "NOT Bip Roberts" tag for the blogs!
1975 O-Pee-Chee #620 Carter/Hill/Meyer/Roberts RC
1975 Topps #620 Carter/Hill/Meyer/Roberts RC
1975 Topps Mini #620 Carter/Hill/Meyer/Roberts RC
1976 O-Pee-Chee #292
1976 Topps #292
1976 Topps Traded #292T
1977 Topps #456
1979 O-Pee-Chee #81
1979 Topps #166
1980 O-Pee-Chee #266
1980 Topps #507
1981 Donruss #48
1981 Fleer #608
1981 Topps #368
1981 Topps Traded #825
1982 Donruss #415
1982 Fleer #329
1982 O-Pee-Chee #186
1982 Topps #688
1983 O-Pee-Chee #89
1983 Topps #89
1983 Topps Traded #96T
1984 Donruss #399
1984 Fleer #356
1984 Topps #784
1984 Topps Tiffany #784
1985 Topps #217
1985 Topps Tiffany #217
Have/pending:  1/28


3.  Ted Sizemore, 1969-1980 (Dodgers, Cardinals, Phillies, Cubs, Red Sox)
1969 Topps #552 Sizemore/Sudakis RC
1970 O-Pee-Chee #174
1970 Topps #174
1971 O-Pee-Chee #571
1971 Topps #571
1972 O-Pee-Chee #514
1972 Topps #514
1973 O-Pee-Chee #128
1973 Topps #128
1974 O-Pee-Chee #209
1974 Topps #209
1975 O-Pee-Chee #404
1975 Topps #404
1975 Topps Mini #404
1976 O-Pee-Chee #522
1976 Topps #522
1977 Topps #366
1978 O-Pee-Chee #118
1978 Topps #136
1979 O-Pee-Chee #148
1979 Topps #297
1980 O-Pee-Chee #46
1980 Topps #81
Have/pending:  1/23 (and 0/1 one-of-ones)

Again, if you have anything on these lists for trade, please drop me a comment and we'll work something out.  Help me pile up some vintage PC guys and line your...well, not your pockets, that wouldn't work, but your shelves with sweet trade cards!