TCDB trade: FiresNBeers

Tonight's post is the first in a series of unknown size that will cover around 30 (and still growing!) trades I've made on TCDB over the past few months. A few of the larger deals will probably get their own posts while I'll group smaller ones together so it doesn't take forever to get through these.

First up is FiresNBeers, a.k.a. Brian from Wisconsin. Brian's one of my favorite people on the site and someone I talk to pretty often because we both do some work maintaining it by handling inaccuracy reports (IRs) for missing checklists, wrong images/other info, etc. There's a group of dedicated folks who put in a ton of effort to make sure TCDB is as useful and accurate as it is and Brian is one of those people.

That's one of the reasons I decided to send him a nice trade package of stuff from his wantlists at some point last year, largely to say thanks. A bit later, he was the one to whom I sent a Robin Yount relic I found at a show in return for a Paul Goldschmidt manurelic I sent to Daniel, and he was generous enough to let me pick some stuff from his trade list as well.

The items below comprise everything he sent me, including the cards I picked plus a few surprises:

Not too surprisingly, Brian is a big Brewers fan, and over his years of collecting he's compiled quite a few Milwaukee police team sets. Above are some of the cards I picked out, with some bonuses he added. Basically the photos stay the same for a given year with only the various suburbs' names changing. 

I was interested in scoring cards of two former UM alumni, Jim Paciorek and HOFer Ted Simmons. Jim has just two MLB cards to his name--1987 Fleer and its Glossy version--so oddballs like these help grow my collection of the brother of the more well known Tom. All of his cards here are from 1987.

Simmons, meanwhile, never played baseball for UM but attended school here so he fits the parameters of my collection. Brian had cards of him from each year of 1982-85, 12 cards in total. Pretty cool!

I'll just have to figure out how I want to store these as they're larger than standard trading cards and therefore won't fit will in my 5000-count player collection boxes.

Most of the rest of what you'll see tonight consists of '84 Tigers, other well known former Tigers from during my fandom, and a few other PCs. Here Bergman and Evans represent the wire-to-wire champs of 1984 on pre-Tigers issues. MLBPA prez Clark's late 90s offerings are shiny and cool. Philly/Detroit legend Cochrane won two rings with the A's and one with the Tigers (1935) and was also the manager for the latter (as well as their pennant-winning club the year before). Big Daddy oddballs are always fun. And you can't have too many Grandersons, especially when they have awesome photos like this one.

Henneman joins Fielder as one of the better early 90s Tigers of my youth and one of the best at the closer position. Hernandez was a standout himself in the role in '84, winning the AL Cy and MVP awards, and I scored two pre-Detroit cards of him plus one of '84 OF Herndon. I've been growing my Inge collection a bit since he joined Michigan's coaching staff. And Jackson was sometimes the next best thing to Granderson, so I ended up with four cards (one more below) of him, including a Finest Refractor as the last card of this scan.

Parrish and a sticker of Morris represent the last of the '84 champs here while bookending the rest of the baseball stuff, and the sticker is a good reminder that Jack was a Series hero for another team as well! Simmons gets two more oddball appearances and I have to say that the 1992 Carlson Travel '82 World Series card really pops. The Brew Crew didn't take home the win that year but you can't exactly blame Simba who put up 2 HR and 3 RBI in the loss to the Cards. Cobb, seen here in miniature form, never won a ring himself despite three trips to the Fall Classic, losing to the Cubs twice (1907 and '08) and Pirates ('09).

Brian also had a good selection of football to choose from so I grabbed 10 cards of 10 different players, starting with the three above: WR Derrick Alexander, RB Tim Biakabutuka, and OL John "Jumbo" Elliott.

And here's the rest of the football stuff: QB Elvis Grbac, LB David Harris, WR/KR Desmond Howard, DL Maurice Hurst, OT Jon Runyan (senior!), RB Derrick Walker, and TE Jerame Tuman.

I owe a big thanks to Brian for all this great stuff, not to mention all the times he's made my life easier on TCDB, and I'll be trying to score some new stuff for him at future shows. If you're on the site and haven't traded with him, he comes highly recommended from me so go send him a proposal!

TCDB trade: randylaw, part 2: Detroit Tigers 1980s-today

 

Welcome to part 2 of my recap of the large deal I made with randylaw on TCDB. Since I already explained how the trade was done in part 1, plus I have a LOT of stuff to show off today, let's get right to it!

Today's theme is Detroit Tigers players from the 1980s-today (obviously not including the '84 guys I showed off last time):

There are a few guys in today's post for whom I acquired under five cards, and four of those players bookend this photo. Miggy and Castellanos ('14 Topps RC) are two of only three active players I counted in this post, but that's because the sets lean 90s-heavy. Granderson (including an SI For Kids Card) is obviously a favorite of mine, and Guillen, on a shiny UD Spectrum base, was a fun and productive player not that long ago.

Next we have three stalwarts of some bad 90s Tigers teams, but ones I enjoyed watching growing up anyway. There's a quick five-spot of former 1B and current MLBPA chief Tony Clark. While he didn't exactly live up to his top prospect billing he did have a solid career. A couple creative late Pinnacle issues--Inside and X-Press--highlight the group.

I bet if you asked a bunch of people my age who their favorite Tiger for much of the 90s was, they'd say Cecil Fielder. His 51-homer season was a blast to watch, and blast was something he did often, compiling almost 250 bombs in parts of seven seasons in Motown in a successful homecoming from Japan. In his group here you'll find a mix of oddball, low-end, and some of my favorite brands that modernized design like Ultra and Stadium Club. The '96 Ultra brings back memories of busting packs searching for my Tigers and the many cool inserts that were available.

Playing on the opposite corner from Fielder was Travis Fryman, who also debuted with the Tigers in 1990. He put up consistently solid numbers in Detroit before departing a year after Cecil, heading to Cleveland by way of the expansion D-Backs. His haul starts with some low-end stuff as well but I was able to add some mid- and later 90s stuff too, with my favorite being the '96 Score Dugout parallel.

My Mike Henneman (also known as "Henne-butt-chin"!) collection got a very nice boost in this deal. Though the former reliever only spent 10 seasons in the Majors he was effective to the end, putting up 31 saves (against seven losses, granted) in '96 with Texas, his sunset campaign. Before that, though, he tallied 154 saves and 57 wins in eight-plus seasons with the Tigers (and then got flipped to Houston). I scored a couple of his 1987 XRCs, a few oddballs, and some other fun 90s items among 23 new items.

I wouldn't leave out Brandon Inge, whom I affectionately refer to as "BInge", if I had any chance of adding cards of his. I like that the five above show his positional versatility, a reminder that he went wherever he was needed on the diamond.

Austin Jackson ("A-Jax") was another somewhat recent favorite of mine who won me over as Granderson's replacement after the latter was dealt. All I could get of him here was a '17 Topps base of him with the White Sox, but it was worth an add for me.

Nokes was with Detroit for just four-plus seasons, but the former PTBNL in a deal with the Giants had a big '87 season and played during my early impressionable years of being a fan, so he immediately became one of my favorites along with Lou Whitaker. There's plenty of oddball stuff to enjoy there--Holsum Discs, what's up?!--but my favorite is no surprise to anyone: the Sportflics card.

Rounding out this scan is a guy who was a big contributor to the team's success around 10 years ago, Magglio Ordonez. I ended up with only Tigers cards, though I can't remember if I did that on purpose or if Randy didn't have any White Sox stuff I needed. In any case, that meant plenty of nice shiny stuff from the mid-2000s on like Bowman and Topps Chrome, and my favorite of the bunch: that beautiful 2007 Bowman's Best base.

This photo (which is a good example of why I prefer scans when they're feasible--just look at this mess!) includes just two players, meaning their hauls were among the largest of the trade. They also both happen to be PCs I've been focusing on more lately.

First is slugging 3B Dean Palmer and 14 new cards. Only three of them have him in a Detroit uniform, but that's down to what I needed and what years I could grab, meaning the rest are with the Rangers and Royals. I was glad to add some new Stadium Club items, including one with a cameo from future Tiger Ivan Rodriguez. Also, the Tigers trio is pretty solid with Finest and Fleer Showcase issues.

The other is the late Tony Phillips, who got an excellent bump of 36 items to get him over the century mark. The versatile IF/OF spent a good chunk of his career with the A's, winning a ring with the '89 team, but the five years he was with Detroit were his second longest tenure with a team. Here you can see I came up with one Oakland card, one after he joined the Angels, and 34 with my favorite team. They span 1989-95 so as you'd expect there's a ton of variety, with multiple Panini stickers, Stadium Club looks, and some Donruss, Leaf, and even a couple Triple Plays! You'd better believe I'm super excited for that Sportflix card, though.

We'll finish up today's post with more guys with few cards bookending larger groups. Polanco and Pudge joined Magglio in contributing to some of Detroit's playoff teams so I still like adding stuff of them when I can. Sheridan was a Tiger from 1986-89, again, when I was just starting to watch the team, so I rooted for the Ann Arbor native back then. I think a lot of us thought Thompson was going to be an ace, and I for one was pissed when Detroit sent him to Texas for Juan Gonzalez's stupid ass, but injuries meant he never pitched for the Rangers. And then there's the last guy from this post still playing (probably, since that's pending a return from surgery) in Verlander, popping up on a 2018 Heritage base.

As for the other two players, the first is Tanana, who pitched for 21 seasons, eight of those with his hometown team. He was such a fixture of the franchise in the 80s and early 90s that I accidentally included him in the photos for the previous post without thinking, before remembering that he didn't join the team until June of '85. I came out of the deal with 20 new cards of his, beginning with '86 Donruss and ending with '93 Score and his sunset season. Like a number of other players seen here today you'll notice I found some stickers and other oddballs of him, plus a number of brands I love like Studio and Stadium Club.

And last but definitely not least today--so say 20 new cards of his own--is Fruit Loops himself, Mickey Tettleton. I think I initiated this trade with Randy because he had so many needs out of the stuff I'd grabbed in that Facebook Marketplace lot, but what sealed the deal for me was that he had so many new cards I needed of guys like Palmer, Phillips, and Tettleton as well. Better yet, 16 of these were made depicting him with the Tigers, and a lot of them show him in action behind the plate. This haul also got him over the 100-card mark, putting me at about a quarter of his collection, which is pretty cool!

That's "all" I have for today but I hope you enjoyed this look at what was largely a throwback to 80s and 90s Tigers, with a few from the successful teams from the decade starting in 2006. If you liked these you won't want to miss the finale which has lots of interesting stuff you may not be expecting!

2019 trade package #38: Nachos Grande

Way back near the end of November Chris, who runs Nachos Grande, announced his Season of Giving giveaway in which people could sign up for some free cards of their favorite teams, with Chris trying to oblige as best as he could.  He's always been a good dude to trade with and I appreciated the dual goals of finding good homes for unwanted cards and sending things out for the holiday season, so I put my name in, and he was nice enough to send a stack of Tigers (and a few other things) my way.  If that's not the epitome of holiday giving I don't know what is!

Here's what Chris sent this time:

We'll lead off with possibly my favorite card of the whole package, a '98 Paramount Team Checklist card featuring Tony Clark, kind of the Tigers' Nicholas Castellanos of his day.  Detroit developed him as a high draft pick and he put up some good numbers on some awful teams before being cut loose in his seventh year.  At least he made the playoffs a couple times after that!  This card is another pefect example of how fun Pacific was back in the 90s.

Encarnacion was Clark's teammate for a few seasons and went on to win rings with the Marlins in '03 and Cardinals in '06 (against the Tigers!).  Fulmer's Bunt insert from 2017 was new to me, and I'll continue being a broken record in hoping he returns to health and effectiveness next year.  Hunter gave the team a couple quality seasons before retiring after a one-year return in Minnesota.  Kaline looks great on a 2002 Fleer Fall Classic base.  Kinsler (also '17 Bunt) was one of my favorites in his three-plus seasons in Motown and 2B hasn't been the same since he left.  Playoff hero Magglio appears on a 2008 UD Heroes Charcoal parallel #d 352/399.  Palmer's big bat was a rare highlight on some bad 90s teams, and '99 UD retro was a highlight of that year's releases.  And I somehow didn't have the base version of Phillips' '94 Collector's Choice base where the underappreciated multi-position player can be seen going airborne turning two.

And now some horizontal cards and more!  I didn't arrange things like this on purpose but the cards down the left side are all new to me while the other two are dupes.  While Granderson's redundant thanks to my '08 Topps complete set, I needed two of the '14 Topps base:  Miggy's 2013 AL RBI leaders base and an issue of V-Mart sliding into home in better times for him and the franchise.  '84 champ Larry Herndon's '88 Topps Big card was also new, and I'm sure I'm lacking a bunch of Tigers from the three-year(?) run of the product.  And then there's my co-favorite item today, an '85 Topps Rub Downs piece that includes Lou Whitaker along with Carney Lansford, Mario Soto, and John Denny, plus a glove and a couple of balls.  Chris had it in a penny sleeve with the instructions card, which was cool from a collecting perspective, and also wise of him since the other piece is so thin.  It's a very cool oddball item to add to Sweet Lou's collection, now sitting at 290 different items.

Lots more Tigers to get to!  Casanova had a great name but not a bat to match, and he was one of many players the Tigers acquired from the Padres or Astros in the 90s.  Higginson's act wore thin for me toward the end of his tenure, but that '98 Flair Showcase card is a thing of beauty.  The Bowman Chrome card (2012) is of RP Matt Hoffman, a 26th round pick that found his way into the set for some reason.  I'll always appreciate Robinson for being just good enough to entice the Orioles to send Mickey Tettleton to Detroit.  And while the humorous Sparks didn't put up great numbers, I do appreciate the fun design of 2003 Studio and its cool background photo of one of the entrances to Comerica Park.

Ok, now we're done with the Tigers.  Knudson's not worth mentioning but the 2011 Topps Attax cards of the park and mascot Paws are fun.  The former is actual a foil version but it was hard to get that to come across in a scan.

And last up today is a trio of non-Tigers cards, in this case Barry Larkin, a guy Chris also collects for some reason.  He sent a nice mix in the form of 2005 Throwback Threads, 2015 Contenders, and 2016 Topps Archives.  Those of you who know me at all shouldn't be surprised that I'd rank them 2, 1, and 3, in that order--Michigan uni cards almost always win--but all three look great no matter what.

Chris, thanks again for including me in your Season of Giving, and I'm glad you liked your own Christmas cards from me!  Let's do more trading in 2020, especially if I can hunt down more set-fillers for you so you can continue the completion momentum you've got going in your latest series of posts!

2019 trade package #25: Nachos Grande

Fellow Barry Larkin enthusiast and awesome trader Chris of the somewhat recently redesigned Nachos Grande put in some quality time updating his trade lists by set not too long ago.  That's a move that I think will pay off handsomely both for his collection and those of many other collectors.  In my case I had plenty of interest in some of his trade fodder from his Fleer Sports Illustrated breaks, so I claimed a few cards, for which I'll be rewarding Chris pretty soon:

Everything here is from SI's debut collaboration with Fleer, and what a product it was!  Great photography (naturally) on vibrant, glossy cards printed on thick stock.  Best of all, a number of those cards were reprints of classic magazine covers.

The top three cards above are the Tigers I claimed--a pair of Tony Clarks and one Travis Fryman.  Two of the better players from some of Detroit's lean years, they manned the infield corners in Motown for a bit of '95 (Tony's first season), then 1996-97, until Fryman was traded. They combined for 121 HR, 483 RBI, and 13.4 bWAR as teammates and rare bright spots on some rough squads.  Thanks to TCDB I've become more open to adding cards of non-PC guys because I get stats on how many items I have of every player, so I was happy to add these, putting me at 107 of Clark and 117 of Fryman.

The other base card I absolutely had to have was one of the cover reprints I just mentioned, starring PC guy Ken Griffey Jr. and fellow 90s badass/HOFer Frank Thomas.  The two graced the front of the August 8, 1994 issue, one that came out during that year's strike-shortened season, which was one to remember for a number of reasons.

And speaking of covers, Kenny's fellow Junior Cal came along for the ride on an Extra Edition parallel (#273/500) of another one, the biggest get of the package for me.  This was somewhat early on in numbered inserts so it's a terrific piece, with the July 29, 1991-dated mag highlighting the Iron Man nearing streak game #1500 while "enjoying the best season of his illustrious career."  Baseball-Reference would tend to agree, noting a career-high 11.5 bWAR and personal bests in HR (34), RBI (114), AVG (.323, in a full season, so not including 1999), and OPS (.940).  Oh yeah, and he won his second AL MVP.

Fleer was always a manufacturer that remembered to think about the kids in the hobby, so they included these Great Shots mini posters as a fun insert.  Naturally I grabbed Cal's version along with one of perennial Gold Glover Greg Maddux.  They don't hold up to well after being unfolded and folded again numerous times but they look great and feature more of that interesting photography.

Chris didn't stop there, though, sending me a nice pile of Tigers while he was at it:

Plenty of interesting guys here.  Alvarez never panned out, but Anderson looked like he might provide some value (if not #1 overall pick value) before injuries derailed his career.  Blair was a bit like Edwin Jackson, coming to Detroit by way of five other teams and enjoying a pretty nice season (16-8) in '97, bouncing around a fit, then returning toward the end of his career.  As for Fister, the Tigers fleeced the Mariners for a very effective pitcher, then did the opposite in getting Robbie Ray (and others) from the Nats while having no idea how to use him and getting relatively little value when they flipped him for Shane Greene in a three-team deal.

Exavier Logan has one of the more disappointing nicknames in the game's history when you learn that it's meant to rhyme with "book" instead of sounding like the explosive weapon.  Iglesias, Infante, and Peralta were all decent-to-above average middle infielders for the team.  And card-collecting aficionado Dmitri Young gets paired with his much younger (12 years!) brother below.

Yep, there's Delmon, who had a few big hits over a couple seasons with the Tigers.  Appropriately enough, former speedster Brian Hunter leads off, and he's probably already stolen second, too, after he went off for a career high 74 swipes in '97.  Lastly, it's a bit sad to see former ace Scherzer on a card with Big Sexy Bartolo Colon (who shares my birthday!) and future Tigers IL in residence pitcher Matt Moore.

Chris, thanks again for making those SI cards available and getting them to me along with some great Detroit stuff so quickly!  I'm gonna take a little bit to get back to you while I await next month's show, but I'm also putting together a Sportlots haul that will be of great interest to you.

2014 COMC pickups #4: Tigers autos of yore (or the 1990s)

In honor of the Tigers' 4-0 start (which was fraught with plenty of danger), here's a couple autographs of players from...the 1990s when the Tigers were terrible?  Well, it's not the era I'm going for here so much as the players.  I didn't have hits of either guy, plus I was a fan of both of them during their stays in Motown, so when I found a couple nice deals on COMC, I grabbed them to add to my Tigers PC:

Tony Clark 1997 Donruss Signature Autographs auto

Clark is very well known among Tiger fans, and likely even many casual fans who watched baseball in the 90s and early 00s.  He was the second overall pick in 1990, right after Larry Wayne Jones, and was often the best offensive player on his team for the decade, not that that's saying much.  A California native, he debuted with the Tigers in '95, and stayed with the team through the 2001 season.  While his 1996-99 campaigns saw him hit .277 and average 31 HR and 98 RBI, his final two Detroit seasons were disappointments, and the team let the Red Sox grab him on waivers in late 2001.

After producing middling results with the Sox, Mets, and Yankees from 2002-2004, he experienced a resurgence, albeit brief (and fluky) with the 2005 Diamondbacks, hitting .304 with 30 HR and 97 RBI in just 130 games.  After two-plus seasons more in Arizona, he was sent to the Padres in 2008, then rejoined Arizona for his final season, 2009, although he played in just 144 games those last two seasons.

The Tigers had a lot of hope for Clark, who, for a couple seasons put up numbers that lived up to his draft status, but it was all for naught since the Tigers were downright awful during his tenure, going 471-644 (.422) and failing to surpass 79 wins.  His declining stats made letting him go a bit easier, though it was still sad to see a mainstay leave.  Fortunately, his post-playing career has been more positive, as he was recently named the permanent executive director for the MLBPA.  The highly-respected Clark was deputy to the previous occupant of that position, Michael Weiner, who passed away last year.  According to wikipedia, Tony is the first former Major League player in that role.  Based on that respect, plus many good memories from his playing days, I'm happy to add a beautiful on-card auto from the excellent '97 Donruss Signature set to my collection.

Mike Henneman 1996 Leaf Signature Extended Autographs auto

Henneman, a fourth-rounder in 1984, was a Tigers RP from 1987-1995, so unlike Clark, he at least got to experience playing on some GOOD teams, especially his 1987 rookie season when Detroit clawed its way to the playoffs before losing to the eventual champion Twins in the ALCS.  Mike was an incredible 11-3 with seven saves out of the bullpen that year, and he actually went 49-21 between '87 and '91, also tallying 80 saves.  With a few exceptions, he was pretty much the team's closer from '88 on, and do you remember when relievers used to pitch that many innings per game?

Detroit traded him to Houston late in '95 for 1992 #1 overall pick Phil Nevin, who wouldn't begin to live up to his potential for a couple more seasons, after he was gone from Detroit.  Henneman, meanwhile, finished 1995 with the Astros, then signed with the Rangers for the '96 season, piling up a career-best 31 saves, though he also went 0-7.  His only autograph would come in the form of the above card with Texas as he was included in 1996 Leaf Signature, along with like EVERYBODY else that year (but seriously, it's a landmark set, and one I still enjoy to this day), giving me a second on-card signature to enjoy today.

Mike also found his calling after he retired as he's now serving as the pitching coach for the West Michigan Whitecaps, Detroit's single-A team near Grand Rapids.  I attended a Lansing Lugnuts (Blue Jays affiliate) game last summer and caught a glimpse of the former bullpen ace.  I hope coaching suits him well and that he can work his way back up to the Majors, imparting advice from his 10-year career.

Stay tuned for more COMC Tigers pickups soon!