2015 trade package #23: Cool original Maddux card from GSNHoF

Another month, another Great Sports Name Hall of Fame trade package from Tim, one that almost blew up my mailbox because it was bursting at the seams with greatness!  I only have one card to show off to you over here, but please stop by Too Many Manninghams tonight to see why I continue to laud SpastikMooss as one of the hardest-working and most generous traders out there.  Here's what I have to feature for you baseball fans this evening:

Greg Maddux 2003 Sweet Spot Patches manupatch

It's about time I did more to beef up my Maddux PC (which still requires a ton of scanning, of course), so I asked Tim if he would grab this for me with the copious amounts of credit he piles up as an effective COMC flipper, and then send it to me in a future deal.  Trust me when I say that I owe him plenty to justify all the great stuff he's sent me, including this excellent Maddux manupatch from 2003 Sweet Spot.  

It's actually my second from that specific set (Zito) and one of quite a few patches of this type that I've accumulated.  They make fun PC additions, especially for collectors like me that don't acquire things just to try to re-sell them, and that allows me to throw the "value" complaints out the window.  They look nice and I get them knowing full well that they aren't "real" relics, whatever those even are nowadays.

Anyway, Maddux is a guy I still love to collect after having been a kid for a good part of the 90s, a.k.a. his heyday, so stuff like this is always on my radar.

Thanks again, Tim, and hopefully I won't have to make you wait too much longer for an appropriate response of a package!

2015 trade package #11: check out my Gibby from GSNHoF

My next two-part trade package comes from that smelly state underneath mine, but Tim, who runs the Great Sports Name Hall of Fame, is an outstanding and very generous trader that exhibits all of the good qualities typical of a person from anywhere other than Ohio.  The SpastikMooss has found his calling as a flipper on COMC, balancing collecting and selling in a way most of us could only dream of, and that leads to some great trades between us.  Most recently I sent him a group of cards centered on one of his newer PCs, Shyrone Stith, and in return he sent back some stuff he was nice enough to track down for me on COMC.  Seriously, take a gander at his port once in a while--it's something I enjoy doing because it changes so often!

Because he's cool enough to put in the effort to find my Michigan guys, most of my haul is over on TMM as usual, but I did notice a card in his port one day that I knew I had to ask him for, and Tim was generous enough to include it in this very package:

Kirk Gibson 2002 Stadium Club World Champion Relics jersey

Kirk Gibson cards are nice.  Kirk Gibson Tigers cards are nicer.  Kirk Gibson Tigers hits are nicest.  And Kirk Gibson Tigers hits celebrating the 1984 World Series are the nicest-est!  I thought Topps did a nice job of designing this relics set back in 2002, and I think well enough of it that this is now the third card (Trammell bat, Maddux jersey) I've acquired, and there's others I'd love to add, especially Lou Whitaker's; Gibby also has a bat version I'll try to find.

I'm happily adding this to my Gibson PC, which I recently pretty much completed scanning.  As one of more than 100 cards it's my eighth hit, comprising three autographs and five relics.  Speaking of the latter, this one is noted multiple times on the card as "regular season game-worn."  I don't particularly care that it didn't come from a postseason jersey from that year, but the fact that it might actually be "game-worn" is nice!

Tim, thanks again for a fun package, and hopefully I can contribute more to your PCs, especially the new ones!

2013 trade package #27: a SenecaQuest at Spastik's request

Old Spastikmooss Tim, he of the Great Sports Name Hall of Fame, has been on a mission for quite a while, and that mission is

I don't think there's any reason to try to argue anyone else is the world's #1 collector of journeyman QB Seneca Wallace, and that's just awesome.  So he's taken his talents around the interwebs to make that happen, and you can actually follow his progress in a thread on Blowout.

Well, I was finally able to contribute to that goal by sending him a package stuffed with Bengals (they sell well in his area) and assorted trade bait, and all I asked in return (since he's been so generous in past trades) was a small handful of singles from his sale/trade bait.  Here's what I got Tim to send my way:

A 2007 Score base card of Wolverine/Raider Charles Woodson.  This was the only Michigan Man in the bunch, which means it was always destined to make its way to my mailbox, and anyway I'll appreciate it way more than anyone else that might have ended up with it.

A shiny Gordie Howe 2012 Panini Father's Day card.  Considering he's such a legend in this state you'd think I would have more of him.  Well, this is a start, and a nice one at that.

Speaking of shiny, how about a 2013 Bowman Silver Ice parallel of future Tigers closer Bruce Rondon?  Topps went overkill with the parallels yet again, but this one looks great for sure.  I hope Detroit's bullpen remains stable for a while and that Rondon can ease into an apprenticeship there before taking the reins within a few years.

And speaking of shiny Tigers, what better way to close things out today than with this slick 2013 Bowman Blue Sapphire Refractor Rookie Reprint (Topps?  REPRINTS?  Now I've seen EVERYTHING) of Detroit icon Al Kaline.  The reprint thing may have gotten stale years ago, but I'll give the blue Refractorness a thumbs up regardless, and it's a fun addition to my small Kaline PC.

Thanks again as usual, Tim, for another fun trade!  Good luck to you as you continue your chase while living in the Worst State Ever.  Readers, help a great trader out by moseying on over to the GSNHoF and trading with or buying from Mr. Mooss!

A Great Sports trade package with a Freehan that wasn't solo

Tim from GSNHOF (who's a recent newlywed, by the way, so make sure to say congrats!) let me know he'd be sending me a package of stuff, especially thanks to his success with Listia, and lo and behold, said package arrived yesterday.  Besides throwing in a few Lions, he sent me this great bunch of cards representing your 2012 American League champions (yeah, I'm calling it--stick a fork in the Yankees):

Let's see, we've got today's beast of a starter and probable winner; Boesch, whom the Tigers haven't missed much, I guess, since he was left off the postseason roster; Verlander, who needs no introduction; a Mark Fidrych I definitely didn't have because I don't have nearly enough of his stuff!; an excellent Freehan that made me smile because it has a mark in the upper-left corner where it was obviously pinned up; and a Freehan I DIDN'T have--his 1969 Topps Deckle Edge, which I had recently decided to pursue as part of his PC, so great timing, Tim!  What's hilarious is that in the very same batch of mail I received this card which I won on eBay:

Oops!  Oh well, now I have a pair of outstanding '69 Topps Freehans to do with whatever I please!  So thanks to Tim (since I opened his package first), I have 31 Freehans, not including my COMC pickups I have yet to scan.

Thanks again for a great trade, Tim!  I also have a post over on TMM showing off the Wolverines he included, so make sure to check those out, but feel free to head on over to the Great Sports Name Hall of Fame first!

New tab item: Player Collections and Rainbows

Just a quick post tonight to highlight a bit of work I did to get myself moving along on a couple projects:  up there at the top where all the tabs are you'll see a new one called "Player Collections and Rainbows."  It's my intention to use this as a place to show off exactly those two things--player collections, in which I go for all of a player's base cards made during their career (currently just Bill Freehan, though I'll probably be adding Kirk Gibson before long) and rainbows I'm building, which right now is limited to Rich Hill's 2008 UD Baseball Heroes cards.  Should you prefer, you can also view that entire collection at once as an album here on my Picasa Web Albums.

Having seen some of you pursue similar projects, this seemed like it would be a fun undertaking and something more worthwhile to spend my money on than junk wax, such as anything Topps ever produces again.  I've had organizing and posting these projects on the back burner for a while, but now I finally have a little time to get things started, and I think now that they are I should start making more progress quickly.  Here's a bit about the two current pursuits and why I'm chasing them:

Bill Freehan:  Because Bill was a Tiger for his entire 15-year career, I had a few of his items in my collection already which I acquired through various channels over the years.  However, now that my collecting efforts are more focused on former Michigan players as well as the Tigers, Freehan is a natural fit--I'm sure I've mentioned a gazillion times that he played for my alma mater, and he happens to be one of the better players the Wolverines produced, being responsible along with Barry Larkin for the lion's share of our players' All-Star appearances. (11 in his 14 full seasons!)  I'm also more interested in starting with someone who played back when there was only one manufacturer to make things easy on me. 

Further, I'm defining what I consider a complete collection of his base cards to be those that were produced during his career, e.g. nothing from Topps reprint sets, no autographs, no oddballs, etc.  In fact, the wackiest I got was including his Topps Game and 1975 Mini cards because those seemed normal enough.  That gives me a reasonable 20 to chase, (of which I have seven currently) and only his RC will really set me back anything significant.  Now that I finally put together that wantlist, I'll be more likely to pick those up at the shows I hit around here, though recently I had been able to pick up a couple here and there.

Rich Hill 2008 UD Heroes rainbow:  I can definitely blame this one 100% on Tim from the GSNHOF.  I say that thanks to this trade which essentially set me off on this quest.  Really, when someone literally hands you that much of a head start, how can you not pursue it?  I don't blame him at all for passing these on to me because he knew how much of a fan I am of Hill, another Michigan baseball product, plus he's shown a great deal of focus and commitment in becoming the world's foremost Seneca Wallace collector.

It also doesn't hurt that these are some great looking cards, especially the above patch that I got in a trade with Eric from Manupatches and MustachePatches.  But besides that one, there's quite a few cool variations involving base, serial numbering, autographs, jerseys, patches and colors--30 total cards, actually, of which I own 13.  This won't be an easy challenge because that's an oxymoron, but that's because I'm looking down the barrel of tracking down three cards each numbered to 10 and five, only one of which I've seen on any of the major sites I frequent--eBay.  But what fun would this challenge be without accomplishments like that?  Tune in for further updates as I either inch closer to completion or totally fall flat on my face and admit defeat!

Of course, if you have ANYTHING from either wantlist, conveniently located here, please let me know and we'll make a deal--I have cards and money, and I'll gladly give you either in exchange for YOUR cards.

Merry Strasmas Jr. and stuff that's less-hyped

Thank God the Nats don't pick first next year...
Derek (of Tomahawk Chopping) and I recently completed our first non-break trade, one that was mainly centered around our 2011 Bowman wantlists.  Of primary interest to me was Derek's ability to cut a major swath into my Chrome needs.  In terms of what was changing hands involving 2011 Bowman stuff, I came out way ahead, so I made sure to send a bunch of Bravos Derek's way, including a few hits he had previously coveted (the best being a Mike Minor autograph).  Well Derek responded in kind, AND HOW:  today in the mail I received

the love child of Stephen Strasburg, the Virgin Mary and maybe the ghost of Mickey Mantle, as far as the baseball media are concerned.  Yes, it's the second coming of Strasmas, Bryce Harper's Bowman Chrome Prospects "RC".  The reason I'm so excited is not because I'm any kind of prospector--I'm just doing my best to complete this set like everyone else, along with the "base" Prospects and Bowman's Best, which is just a great looking set that's fun to collect.  This guy is probably the best of the bunch, and it puts me 1/3 of the way towards my set-building goal.  Seeing as how this is currently a very desirable card that's probably worth its weight in sticker autos, I really appreciate Derek being willing to send it my way (where I promise it will remain with the rest of my set, not in an eBay auction titled "Bryce Harper Bowman Chrome RC PSA 10? 1500 HR? L@@k" with a BIN of $1000) so thanks again to a great trader and blogger.

Thorzul rules, politicians drool
For those of you who didn't see Thorzul's post today, first, shame on you for not following his awesome blog, but secondly, go show some support for a guy that (among others) got handed a pretty raw deal thanks to some continued questionable decisions in his state.  Politics aside, (and that's often best among friends, naturally) dude deserved better, as does education in this country in general.  You don't want future generations unable to point out Canada on a map or think that $200 for a pack that includes a scrub sticker auto, quad-single color jersey and serial-numbered scrub RC is exactly what the consumer is begging for, do you?

More trade bait draft II stuff
Update courtesy of the man himself, Tim, including draft order and a hint about the card that'll earn you a free box of UD baseball.

Not enough no-hitters
Anybody catch that gem by Justin Verlander last night?  I'm making it official:  if he throws another no-no this season, I'm officially changing this here blog's name to Too Many Verlanders, and old Curtis will just have to deal with it.  I did it once before and I'll do it again--this time permanently.

Go 'Nucks!
I don't technically have a horse in this race, but it's been fun watching Vancouver's quest for the Cup, a co-worker pulls for them, and they have the advantage of having a former Wolverine star, Jeff Tambellini, possibly playing for them tonight in the clincher, so good luck to the Canucks!

GSNHOF trade bait draft II: get in now for some big hits!

This here is a quick post I wanted to throw up to make sure everyone knew about Tim's second wheneveral (I dunno how often he'll do them, but hopefully more!) trade bait draft.  If you have absolutely no idea what I'm talking about, please refer to this handy recap of the first draft (of which I was a satisfied participant).

Anyway, Tim is back at it and better than ever this time.  A total of nine slots, each $20, will be available, with something like twice the hits available compared to TBD #1--he's currently at 88 (with hits defined in this case as autos, jerseys, manurelics and printing plates).  For a quick look at what'll be available, check out the hits here, plus the other stuff here.  Here's a quick sneak peek if you're lazy or something:

Tim's post has all the details, but let me just point out that you get a LOT for your $20 (delivered) entry fee.  But wait, that's not all!  If all nine slots fill up, Tim will randomly choose one of the trade bait cards, and if that gets chosen in the draft, the drafter will win a box of 2009 Upper Deck baseball series I retail from yrs truly.  That's 24 packs of 18, homes.

I myself won't be participating this go round, but pending the final decision on a date/time will almost assuredly be there to watch because the last one was such a blast.  As of this posting, four of the nine slots have been snapped up, so there's still plenty of room.  As a reminder, you'll get something in the neighborhood of 9-10 hits, plus a bunch more goodies, and you'll have the fun of choosing things draft-style with some of the coolest peeps in the card blogosphere.  Also, it's possible that Tim's girlfriend won't be watching an award show this time, so we got that goin' for us.

So what are you waiting for?  Go get you some hits and fun for cheap!

Box recap: TK Legacy Michigan VI

This won't be a more formal review partly because it's a set that's not widely available, plus I didn't get images of the box before I ripped it.  Therefore, here's a quick recap.

After yesterday's Desmond Howard/Anthony Carter signing, Dustin and I wandered around the (very few) tables at the show.  I found myself drawn to the one table with unopened boxes and recognized the guy as a seller I'd seen many, many times at the Gibraltar Trade Center shows I sometimes go to.  For $70 I picked up a $25 box of 2010 Topps Update hobby baseball and this $45 box of TK Legacy Michigan VI.  This is a series of boxes I'd often seen at the various shows I'd attended but never seriously considered for whatever reason (probably price).  However, $45 for 10 packs, each including a Michigan player auto, seemed like it would be fun.  And so it was, even more so than I thought.

It would appear that multiple series exist for each team that was represented, and each series includes a diverse set of players from various eras.  Even more interesting is the fact that a "limited" number of boxes are made (I believe my label indicated 680).  Each four-card pack included base cards, checklists and a couple different inserts, such as program covers and notable games.  As for autographs, there are base versions, plus different insert variations.  That being said, here's a look at what I pulled:

Base:

Hooray for players/coaches I know!  Most of them, anyway--I didn't really know Lilja, Zurbrugg or Kattus, but everyone else played (or coached, in Moeller's case) during my lifetime.  It was interesting getting a pair of kickers since Michigan's suffered a dearth of quality at the position the last few years.

MOAR KICKERS!  As I said, there's a big range of years represented here, though I don't know if there was any rhyme or reason to how they broke these series up.

The Rivas was my only base double, so I decided to show the back to represent one of those.  Not a bad design, if not exactly top-notch (at least it's not Classic or one of those really low-quality unlicensed cards!).

Inserts:

Yeah, I called the checklists inserts.  I decided to show the front and back of Checklist 1 since I pulled two of those.  I caved and decided to show the Troy Smith game "The Rivalry" insert because I could balance it out with a Michigan win (from 1943, though).  I didn't pull any actual sketch cards, but the ones showing off what you could potentially pull were decent.  The Program Cover was my favorite insert and I wish I'd pulled more.

Autographs:

Sweet, another Breaston!  Looking over the checklist he was about the best I could have pulled (though there weren't many to choose from).  Considering his autograph is usually just "SB", getting his jersey number was pretty cool.

One of several players for whom I had no hits (because they never would have had one otherwise), "Whatchoo talkin' 'bout" Willis was a safety from 2003-2005.  As you can continue to see, most of these players signed their jersey numbers as an additional inscription.

Actually my second Knight, Marcus donned the Maize and Blue from '96-'99, which means he was on the '97 National Championship team.  If "Marcus Knight" isn't a college football player name, I don't know what is.

Rockin' some serious sideburns is one of our recent kickers, Hayden Epstein.  I can definitely say I didn't have any of his previous hits, but now I have two!  (see below)  Epstein was Michigan's kicker from 1998-2001.

I have to admit I knew nothing about Kattus, a TE from '82-'85 (which means he started before I was born), so I found out through Wikipedia that he was a senior captain, drafted by the Bengals and also played for the Jets briefly.  With Brady Hoke back we may see Michigan tight ends in the NFL once more.

I remember hearing Oluigbo's name a bit during his stint at Michigan, but since he was a FB from 2004-2006 he wasn't exactly high profile around here.  Still, another first, which is cool.

My first Ecker, and instead of remembering him for NOT PITCHING THE DAMN BALL TO BREASTON in the clusterf#$k that was the 2005 Alamo Bowl, I like to remember his big play in the 4th quarter of Michigan's win against OSU in 2003, a 30 yard pass (I believe) along the sideline during which my reaction was "Go go GOGOGOYEAH!  Wait, who was that?"

Vanalstyne was a DE from 2003-2006, so there's not much more to say about him other than--yep--this is another first for me.

This here is an insert set hand-numbered to 100 (mine's #83) and I thought it was cool to get a QB I knew like Dreisbach, of whom I had nothing.  Dreisbach was here from '95-'98, though of course he didn't pilot the '97 champions--he played Drew Bledsoe to Brian Griese's Tom Brady, then the following year, with Griese graduated, backed up--guess who?--Tom Brady.  He did end up in the NFL, if only briefly.

#'d 73/100, Here's Epstein #2, part of an autographed insert set that celebrates various Michigan achievements.  This FG would have been in the 2001 MSU game, AKA the Clock Game, in which MSU (at home) inexplicably got an extra second on the clock from their own timekeeper, then won on the last play of the game.  What's funny is that that event can't be what's pictured on the card, which includes Tom Brady as the holder on what appears to be a botched hold.  Interesting choice, to say the least.

All that for $45 was a steal as far as I was concerned, and I foresee a few more boxes of this stuff in my future if I can continue to find them at decent prices.

Stay tuned for a look at my 2010 Topps Update baseball hobby box pretty soon, plus a ton of stuff I know I have coming in the mail this week.  Also, please make sure to head over to the Great Sports Name Hall of Fame as he's drumming up interest for a hit-filled trade bait draft #2, to which I may be contributing some stuff in an effort to increase the number of potential participants.  I was part of the first one and I can guarantee you won't wanna miss this one!

Memorial Day catchin' up

Happy Memorial Day, everyone.  Let's celebrate with a new post since it's been quite a while!

Trade #4 with Great Sports Name Hall of Fame:
The march to 300 Michigan hits continues thanks to Tim of the Great Sports Name Hall of Fame.  I recently picked him up a couple hits from Blowout, as I'm known to do, and in return he sent me a couple really nice PC additions:

Here's a B.J. Askew 2003 Bowman's Best auto RC, my favorite from this package.  I liked some of the early-2000s Bowman's Best designs, and Askew ended up with a pretty cool signature here, including his number.  This is Askew #3 for me, and I hope that collection continues to grow.

Next up is a Mario Manningham 2008 Stadium Club Impact jersey.  A nice blue swatch from Super Mario's rookie year, and it's serial numbered to boot.  This is Manningham #19 for me, and I have a feeling #20 is just around the corner.


Tim was also cool enough to throw in some other fun stuff for me, including a pair of great A.L. shortstops--Ripken and Alan Trammell, as well as a couple Lee Suggs cards that should make for some good trade bait for someone.


So don't miss out, get trading with the Mooss!  Thanks, as always, Tim.

More 2011 Bowman happenings:


Thanks to the magic of--what else?--Blowout, I've now completed my 2011 Bowman base set and cut a HUGE swath through my Bowman's Best wantlist.  I'm not going to show those off until I have the set finished, but I can't wait to do so because it's such a great looking set.  Keep an eye out for that down the line, once I can finish picking up Harper et al.

Fire Jim Leyland everybody!!!

Thanks to a total panic move on the part of the dysfunctional Tigers, Detroit is no longer privy to the ostensible talents of Mr. Scott Sizemore.  That's a really nice way of saying the jackasses in charge, including the increasingly dubious Dave Dombrowski, totally gave up on Sizemore and sold fairly low on him, in return for a (former first-round, as if that matters) RELIEF PITCHER.  I was already all over Detroit for the total mistake of extending Jim Leyland's reign of terror, but now that we're continuing the trend of shipping out the only second basemen that can play worth a damn (Polanco, anyone?) I just don't see how we're going to fill the position competently.  Then again, competence isn't exactly in abundance from the top down in this organization right now.  Anyway, I'll continue to enjoy this season's bright spots, like the consistently awesome Justin Verlander and the busting out catcher, Alex Avila, while I pray for some serious housecleaning to right the ship.

Fire Tressel!  Wait, he fired himself?
Ohio State coach Jim Tresselll (the extra "L"s are for lies, now a bigger JT trademark than the vest) resigned, or finally got forced out, or whatever (maybe he gave the president permission to fire him, it seems that's the way it works there).  Why anyone in the world was surprised at his actions given his track record is totally beyond me, but here's hoping this total waste of a person never gets to enjoy coaching a D-I team again.  While on one hand it's nice to see a guy who falsely played the morals/religion card get shot down so spectacularly, I wish Michigan still had the chance to even the score with him now that the playing field would seemingly be more equal (not all Big Ten schools can pay their "student ath-a-letes" so well AND turn a blind eye to literally any indiscretion).  Anyway, for now I'll enjoy the spectacular implosion that is THE Ohio State University's football team while I cross my fingers that the NCAA shows some cojones for once and rightfully wipes out the records for any games played by ineligible players.  Plus, of course, I'll laugh at Tressel upholding at least one recent major OSU tradition:  going out in a blaze of controversy and shame.

Last trade post of April is Spastik-Fantastic

Continuing my decent success with trade bait posts, Tim (a.k.a. SpatikMooss) of the Great Sports Name Hall of Fame and I agreed to our third trade.  From this post I sent him the Joel Hanrahan and Duce Staley (a favorite of his) autos, along with a couple other odds and ends (such as some Josh Cribbs, another Tim favorite).

In return, I got the following package today:

Some Tigers playing cards, a cool oddball Cecil Fielder and a nice serial-numbered Tom Terrific insert.  Tigers+Wolverines (+ what I'll show in a minute) = a great trade package.  Here's a closer look at the Fielder in pop-up book mode:

I have to admit I hadn't seen these before, so this is a pretty cool addition to my Tigers collection (despite my lactose intolerance).

And now for the two highlights of the deal:

A Braylon 2007 Leaf R&S Crusade jersey.  While I've said before that Brown's not my favorite color, it sure beats plain white jerseys, and this is a solid Braylon relic (#d to 250).  Interestingly enough (to me, only, I'm sure), this is currently my only 2007 Braylon hit.

And a Braylon-Derek Anderson 2008 Leaf Limited Team Threads dual prime jersey.  Tim smartly picked this up on the cheap despite the fact that it's #d to 25.  While I don't usually collect multiplayer cards that include non-Wolverines, this is my second such card, and the other also features Braylon (and a different Browns QB, Charlie Frye).  I like that while both jerseys are deemed to be "prime", Edwards' is more deserving of the moniker, being multicolored and all.

So that's two new Braylons for the ol' PC and another great trade with Tim.  While he's still reloading after his epic trade bait draft, he frequents the BlowoutCards forums as much as I do for great PC and trade bait fodder, so get to trading with the guy already.

Thanks, Tim!

WON'T SOMEONE PLEEEEEEASE THINK OF THE CHILDREN?!

Nothing much to report today; still waiting on some good stuff in the mail.  But I wanted to take a moment to recognize our very own SpastikMooss for his sure-to-be legendary BlowoutCards forum thread found here.  To give you just a little taste,

And to sum up Tim's efforts, despite Helen Lovejoy's stern disapproval,

Sunday Fun: SpastikMooss: Master of Trade Bait

Come on, you didn't think I'd pass up a chance on that one, did you?

In all seriousness, Tim of the Great Sports Name Hall of Fame put on a unique event last weekend when he ran what was as far as I can tell the first ever trade bait draft.  In hopes of a cash infusion, he managed to convince six participants to pony up $10 each to get to pick 25 cards from his available trade bait.  Considering I was well aware of some of what he had to offer, I jumped at the chance.  Luckily, I landed the third pick, which meant I at least got a couple of the cards I wanted most (alas, I missed out on a couple Rich Hill jerseys, but I'm still happy with how I fared overall).  Here's a look at how I did:

2008 Upper Deck Heroes Navy Blue Autographs auto:  This was my #1 target and #1 pick (which would have been grabbed by Justin of Justin's World, I'm sure, otherwise (he got one of the remaining Hill relics; the other was grabbed by BA Benny, who apparently enjoys kicking puppies and hates freedom).  I'm trying to see how many of the nearly endless variations I can get after acquiring a good chunk of them from Tim, and this was another good step towards that.  The blue suits the card very well since it goes along with Rich's team colors.  It was a great start and I was very happy with it.

Wanting to get at the remaining autographs before they ran out, I grabbed this 2006 Bowman Scott Olsen autograph.  He's now with the Nats and hasn't looked terrible effective, but I thought it would make good future trade bait for me, and an autograph is an autograph, plus all the other hits I wanted were gone at that point.  In fact, that was the last auto/relic I'd end up with, and despite my 3rd overall pick I finished with fewer "hits" than everyone else.  However, I still had another card on my radar that I hoped nobody would grab:

This 1967 Topps Bill Freehan.  Tim had all of his non-hits listed pretty much by set and number but not player, but they were helpfully sorted by team and I was able to deduce that this one was a Freehan I very much wanted, which should now be pretty much my oldest Tigers card (beating my '68 Kaline by a year) to the best of my knowledge.  It's at least my best old Tigers card anyway, and should help get me working on collecting the former Wolverine/Tiger.  <segue>Speaking of former Tigers</segue>

throughout the draft I pretty much focused on getting Detroit stuff for me.  Towards the end when I ran out of obvious choices Tim helpfully picked out some great stuff, such as the Black Gold Tettleton, some older Detroit players, and a trio of Rusty Kuntzes he was liquidating (and that sentence is about as dirty as the start of this post).  One last Tigers card made it into the bunch along with some other great stuff:

That's right, some multi-player rookie cards!  It's nice to recognize some of these guys too, such as manager Bruce Bochy.  There's also a '71 Athletics dual RC in there, which is pretty cool.  I also nabbed a Barry Larkin for the old Michigan PC, and Tim grabbed me a couple older Topps cards toward the end when I was out of ideas.  Lastly, I ended up with some other nice stuff:

In this group you'll find a RC of Alex Gordon, a great Frank Robinson insert, a WBC Refractor, a Yo Mama of Ryno (non-Original Back) and a couple later round steals:  a Finest Anquan Boldin RC and BowChro Marques Colston RC.

So overall I was very happy despite finishing with "just" two autographs--I still landed the card I wanted the most (the Hill) plus another that was tops on my list (the Freehan) PLUS a lot of other great stuff.  I have the Olson available for trade, plus likely more of this stuff, and others will stay in my collection.  Long story short, I can easily say I got my money's worth, and Tim's well within his rights to charge more next time.  As a reminder, check out the full results here, and more importantly, keep an eye out for his next draft, because you won't want to miss out--it was definitely a major event and everyone had fun with it, even those that were just watching.  I should mention that I've had preliminary discussions with Tim about co-sponsoring a similar draft to expedite getting another one going, so keep an eye out for that, especially once I'm able to reload on trade bait items myself.

Big thanks again to Tim and everyone else that participated!

Three Wise Men

(Interesting sidenote:  I have a pile of Michigan football stuff to scan into the collection and post, but because there were just three in this latest shipment, I took the easy way out and posted these first.  Why should you care?  Because the second card in this trio puts me at exactly 200 (different--I have a couple doubles that I'm not counting) football hits in the collection.  If you still don't care I won't be surprised, but I'm happy to reach that milestone and be well on my way to 250!)

Today brings a break in my anticipated series chronicling my recent CheckOutMyCards purchases (I made it to one in a row, which is bragable) because I received a trio of cards I snagged on eBay this weekend (hooray for quick shipping!).  And what a trio it is:

I got all three of these 2008 Press Pass SE Gridiron Graphs Gold autographs for $16 delivered.  Not too shabby, and as far as I can tell that finishes up the Wolverines in that group for me (I already had the Adrian Arrington).  By my count that puts me up to 18 Hennes, 13 Harts and 13 Super Marios.  I'm sure I don't need to mention that I love the Michigan uniform action shots.  Press Pass isn't at the top of my list of sets, but they tend to make some pretty solid autographed sets and I think these look great.

Three cards do not a lengthy post make, so I'll take a moment to remind everyone (especially Derek, HINTHINTHINT) that a large focus of my Michigan collection is our fabled draft class of 2008, one which included:

• Jake Long, OT, round 1, #1 overall, Miami Dolphins
• Chad Henne, QB, round 2, #57 overall, Miami Dolphins
• Shawn Crable, LB, round 3, #78 overall, New England Patriots
• Mario Manningham, WR, round 3, #95 overall, New York Giants
• Mike Hart, RB, round 6, #202 overall, Indianapolis Colts
• Adrian Arrington, WR, round 7, #237 overall, New Orleans Saints

Crable's not a big focus of mine because he was never really a star here, but you can see from my collection that I have a good number of the rest, both because they've turned into solid-to-above average NFL players, plus they were favorites of mine while playing in Ann Arbor.

On a related programming note, tune in soon for more recent pickups:  COMC baseball and football purchases, another eBay buy that's totally unrelated, and my haul from Tim's (GSNHOF) trade bait draft over the weekend, which is due to arrive imminently.  Eventually I may even return to posts that aren't 100% about my personal collection!