2015 Justcommons purchase: managing to find more Gibbys

Time to show off some recent pickups from a large Justcommons purchase--my largest in fact at more than 150 cards!  Today's subject is Kirk Gibson, a player known for his time with the Tigers (and a few games with the Dodgers, Pirates, and Royals, I guess).  I managed to bolster Gibby's collection with the following nine cards:

Kirk Gibson 1992 Topps Gold Winners

Gibby was the epitome of a winner with the Tigers and Dodgers; the Royals, not so much.  Although Kirk had a decent season for the '91 Kansas City squad in his only year with the team, they went 82-80 and finished 13 games behind the AL West best Twins.

Kirk Gibson 1994 Score Gold Rush

After a forgettable 16 games in 1992 with the Pirates (who certainly weren't forgettable in another classic 4-3 series loss to the Braves), Kirk was back home with Detroit in '93, and he put up a few more decent numbers, though it was clear his best, or at least healthiest, days were behind him.  Here he is from Score's first parallel set way back in 1994.

Kirk Gibson 2001 Topps Limited

Topps included this classic Gibson moment in its 2001 50th anniversary flagship set, so when they produced less than 4000 "Limited" factory sets on glossy, thicker card stock, this "Golden Moment" was included, naturally.  By the way, that's it for our run of gold-themed cards!

Kirk Gibson 2002 UD Piece of History

But our celebration of his '88 season certainly isn't done yet.  This set from Upper Deck captured some of the game's more prominent players and achievements, so it wasn't going to be caught dead without mentioning the '88 World Series game 1 homer.  I like that it also mentions his NL MVP from that year, since it seems to get lost in the shuffle sometimes.

Kirk Gibson 2005 Diamond Kings Framed Red

Gibson looks a bit older here as a member of former manager Alan Trammell's staff, but it's clear from his coaching and managing tenure that he hadn't lost any of that fire he showed as a player ever single day.  Kudos to Donruss for labeling him as a "Legend" in this beautiful set, including this Red Framed parallel.

Kirk Gibson 2005 Upper Deck Classics

I'd say Upper Deck nailed the "classics" theme with this card, wouldn't you?  10 years after his final game in Motown Gibby is pictured in a throwback uniform of his first and last team, eyeblack smeared like war paint and short sleeves offering two tickets to the gun show.

Kirk Gibson 2012 Topps Heritage

Kirk Gibson 2013 Topps Heritage

Kirk Gibson 2014 Topps Heritage

These final three cards depict Kirk as manager of the Diamondbacks, and he held that post from about midway through 2010 (interim) to last year.  While his overall 353-375 record wasn't exactly shiny, he did bring Arizona a nice (and surprising) 94-68 2011 campaign, including a playoff berth, before going from middling to bad.  It's just as well that he's gone, though, as Arizona made some hilariously confusing moves over the offseason.  Lucky for Detroit fans he's now available to call games on TV sometimes, but who knows when his next coaching opportunity might come along?

That's a new total off 139 Gibson cards, and I look forward to showing off more as I get them!

Please also check out my post on TMM tonight as I display more Justcommons pickups--these of Mike Matheny, Hal Morris, and Chris Sabo.

2013 trade package #15: TOO MANY JEFFS

So yesterday I learned how a trade package could both make me look like a total dumbass and prove to me how generous online traders could be.

Among the various deals I've been working on is one with Jeff Wilk of 2x3 Heroes.  He has a couple Red Wings cards I want (which you'll be seeing here soon), and in return I picked up a bunch of stuff for him on COMC (and found some nice throw-ins as well).

Around the same time I was getting ready to ship those to him, Jeff Wiltse, a reader with whom I've traded before, let me know he was sending me something, so I asked for his address so I could return the favor.  He promptly did, and then I promptly got him confused with the OTHER Jeff whose last name starts with "Wi."  As it turns out, I hadn't yet swapped addresses with Wilk, and unfortunately I totally brain-farted and sent Wilk's cards to Wiltse.  Therefore, I'm a dumbass, QED.

When I let both guys know about it, though, I got a great reaction from each.  Wiltse was kind enough to let me know he'll pass Wilk's package on to the correct address, meaning they'll have traveled to Illinois via South Dakota.  And Wilk was nice enough to understand how I could have confused both guys, despite the fact that

"They spell and pronounce their names differently."

Rest assured that I'll be making it worth Wiltse's time and money to have gone out of his way to help out a dumbass trader (and I owed him for what he sent me below anyway!), and maybe I can even convince Wilk to trade with me again if I promise to route his cards through somewhere less remote.  Or direct, I guess I could send them directly to him next time.  Whatever.

ANYway, here's the awesome thing that Jeff Wiltse sent me:

If you haven't seen one of these before (I sure hadn't), it's a 2010 Topps Heritage stamps panel.  Like some of the other panel-type cards you may have seen, it's the size of three cards lined up horizontally, and in this case it features three images of Tigers stars on stamps.  I like the player selection here:  Verlander and Cabrera are no-brainers, and I think Porcello could become a staff stalwart very soon, today's performance against Minnesota notwithstanding.  Hey, what's the worst that could happen if the Tigers keep trotting him out on the mound--they've already given up on the season by having Don Kelly on the roster and re-signing Jose Valverde!

The back is very cool and brings to mind some of those old Topps team leader cards.  In this case, you get some team vitals, including stadium info, Pennant and World Series title years (of course it doesn't include 2012, which would have been two years in the future at the time), and all-time single-season batting and pitching leaders.  It's fun to see just a couple players like Cobb and Greenberg dominate most of the categories, and the devastating '68 duo of McLain and Lolich nearly duplicates that feat below.

Thanks again, Jeff Wiltse, for a fantastic and unique piece to add to my collection, and of course for saving my butt because I cain't read good.  I'll get some goodies out to you very soon!