Christmas cards are coming! Both incoming and outgoing, as it turns out. I'll have more details on the outgoing items when I have a bit more clarity on my COMC and Sportlots shipping situations, but the good news is that there will be a Too Many Verlanders Christmas Cards 2022, which means lots of you will be getting presents from me!
As for items going the other direction, I have lots to show off thanks to multiple blogger trades, eBay purchases, TCDB deals, last weekend's show, plus the aforementioned Sportlots and COMC buys.
Today's trade package is a terrific combo of "stuff I set aside for you", Christmas cards, and a giveaway, all from Matt of Sport Card Collectors. My not-so-secret Santa let me know to expect a rare bubble mailer from him and that's exactly what I got just before the calendar flipped over to December. This thing was absolutely stuffed with goodies, so here's a quick rundown on what he included:
A big stack of current and past Tigers dominated most of the envelope. Baez (a very quality Museum base) and the returning Boyd (shout out to John!) are the current guys here. The team very recently cut bait with Candy, who had a good amount of potential but was trending in the wrong direction for what he'd cost. Washington signed him and I'm interested in seeing how he does. I can't say no to a Prizm Refractor and numbered Donruss parallel! Cobb looks great on his Gallery card as well.
Check out the killer G's to start this scan! I love the Grandy '07 Chrome Refractor which was new to me, as was Hammerin' Hank's Diamond Kings Artist Proof (and Kuenn's too!). Infante was a quality middle infielder for some of the Tigers' more successful teams in the 2000s and 2010s. Kaline is always, and I mean always welcome in envelopes heading my way! As is young pitcher Matt Manning, for whom you see two items here before another one that somehow got lumped into the next scan. V-Mart had some big moments before his bat waned late in his career.
Mazara has discoed off to other teams that aren't Detroit and that's fine by me. I wonder if Meadows will be healthy enough to appear in 100 games this year? Looks like one of Manning's cards got grouped in with fellow injured and talented Detroit P Casey Mize on some nice looking cardboard. Morris makes as much sense as anyone on an insert throwing it back to the '87 set. Nathan was a Tiger for all of 63 games over two seasons--almost entirely a nice 2014 campaign--but that was long enough to get on a team-appropriate Chrome Orange Refractor.
A few of these guys are active but only the guy in the middle--Tork--is currently with the team as they're hopefully cutting out the dead weight to bring in some quality players to pair with the youngsters. I appreciate the card of Spencer since I don't have many yet, and I still have high hopes that he'll adjust to the bigs after a rough 2022. Norris and new White Sox OF Victor Reyes look good in Topps' Royal Blue parallel here too.
Here's the rest of the baseball stuff, starting with a six-pack of A&G Minis. Bunning and Morris are HOF pitchers that began their careers with Detroit so it's fun to see them here together. Each appears on two different versions as you can tell by these backs:
And now we get to the football content, much of which is made up of my giveaway winnings. The RC/rookie-related cards of Collins and disruptive Detroit Lion Aidan Hutchinson are much appreciated, especially the latter as I work on building a collection of this year's #2 overall pick who's been a "bust" to Spartan and Buckeye fans only.
The Topps Heritage Minors auto of former OF prospect (who retired due to injury) Brock Deatherage was a fun surprise! It's numbered /100 and the guy had one of the most metal names in the minors. Just don't look at his social media if you don't want to further lower your opinion of the education level of pro athletes. I love the autograph, though!
And to finish off the sport, why not include a wax pack of '88 Donruss? I haven't decided what to do with this yet but at least for now I'm keeping it sealed.
But I'm most excited about the autographs of Hutchinson and his fellow 2021 partner in crime off the edge, David Ojabo. Hutch's auto came from 2022 Prestige and features a nice shot of him on draft night when his home state team took him #2 overall. He's been worthy of the pick ever since overall, even with a few quiet games. While his signature leaves something to be desired, that's nothing new for athletes these days!
Ojabo's card is terrific as well. He thrived on the other side of the defense that Hutch played, coming up with huge moments himself. The Nigerian-born defensive stud moved with his family to Scotland when he was young, and rewarded Michigan's interest in him with 11 sacks in his one season as a starter, the last of which led to the iconic "O-ja-BO!" call by Gus Johnson in the Wolverines' romp over Ohio State. An ill-timed injury after the season hurt his draft stock but he was still selected in the second round by coach Jim Harbaugh's brother's team, the Ravens. I love having my first autograph of the future defensive star be a Michigan uni card from a Panini Origins autograph set available in this year's Chronicles product.
One last card in this image was a total surprise for me: a Chris Evans 1/1 proof card from 2021 Leaf Metal Draft. It's a Crystal Blue version of the State Pride insert, which ends up being the perfect color for a Michigan guy like the current Bengals RB/WR/KR. Part of the design obscures Michigan's state motto, "Si quaeris peninsulam amoenam circumspice" ("If you seek a pleasant peninsula, look about you") because that's where the autograph would go. The current incarnation of Leaf has been pretty shady, but these state flag cards still look amazing. I'll happily add this as my first hit of Evans, an out-of-the-blue (pun intended!) Michigan uni 1/1 in a very generous trade package!
Here's the back of the proof card for completeness, and because it's fun to stare at.
The three new players here bump the unique subject total count of my UM football collection to 236, and the overall count is a minor milestone of 1600!
We're not quite done just yet because the giveaway included a few other cards courtesy of Panini. Three are from Panini Chronicles like the Ojabo above. The Chubb, numbered /49, is a Purple parallel from the Donruss Retro insert. Goodson's auto is a Contenders College Ticket Autographs Red version. Hall's signature is from the Donruss Rated Rookie Autographs insert. And finally, the parallel of Fant was inserted into 2022 Prestige packs and is an Xtra Points Premium Gold version numbered /99. Many thanks again to Panini and to Matt for giving these away. I've since put them up for trade on TCDB but will happily offer them here as well to those interested in working out a trade.
Matt, thanks so much again for this ridiculously stacked envelope. I'm grateful to be one of the folks you trade with and I appreciate your holiday season generosity here. I can also promise you'll be quite happy with your return envelope once everything I ordered gets shipped my way, so you should look forward to a merry Christmas yourself!
Stay tuned for more great Christmas cards coming soon.
