Latest COMC Order Highlights

Which was more than a month ago, but hey, I gotta get back in the habit of posting (and just writing in general) again.  Nothing I post is even gonna be as timely as this anytime soon, and I’m buried in tons of stuff needing to be scanned again.  So just enjoy the pretty pictures of cards & politely tolerate my struggles to saying something of note about them, eh?

Starting off big with a Boog Powell RC!

I couldn’t pass it up at the price.  Condition is surprisingly decent too.  Ol’ Boog was intended for Project ’62, but he already has three apparently.  Thus, it remains with me.  I will entertain offers, but I’m in no hurry at all to let it go.

Jamaal Charles Number Patch..

I put Jamaal Charles back in my full-on collection category after his amazing return to form last season.  Due to being by far the best player on a historically sucky team, his return from serious injury got overshadowed, but it’s no less impressive than Adrian Peterson to me.  To put up the same kind of yardage & yards-per-carry Charles did before the injury, with the total QB incompetence he was working with in 2012 (at least Ponder bothered to show up for AD & didn’t actively hurt the Vikings chances of winning most weeks), damn impressive.  I think, due to his penchant for breaking off more big runs than maybe anybody else going right now, Jamaal Charles could easily break 2000 yards with a more competent team around him.  And he might be able to do it with fewer carries than anyone that’s come before.

It would be safe to say I’m a huge Jamaal Charles fanboy at this point.  Also, I hope whoever the dipstick that let Orton go and replaced him with Brady f*cking Quinn got fired so hard he’s never allowed to make any even the most marginal of what could be considered important decisions for the rest of his days.  Because HOLY CRAP dude!

1974 Topps Bob Gibson..

Just about the only Cardinal I’ll allow in my random baseball binder (only Lee Smith as a Card, Ozzie Smith as a Padre, & maybe crazy-hot prospect Oscar Tavares have exceptions made for them).

In the meantime, my asshole neighbor just threatened to call the police on me for noise right after she just slammed the hell out of her door.  Have I mentioned lately how much I absolutely HATE this godforsaken hellhole in which I live?  Moving on.

Andre Dawson Leather Nameplate ManuPatch..

Monte Irvin Leather Nameplate ManuPatch..

I never really cared for these nameplate things until I finally got the above two in my hands.  Much nicer in person.  Got them for what totaled out to just over $2 apiece, if I recall collectly.  I’ll gladly do that anytime.  These cards are also pretty much the upper limit of thickness that will fit in my current favored binder pages.

Matt Murton UD auto..

Japan’s single-season hit king (last I checked), and quite probably my favorite “failed” Cubs prospect.  He might’ve been the name I gave my ginormous 3 foot tall stuffed bear from my toddlerhood if I were a wii youngling in the mid-2000s rather than the late-1980s/early-1990s (it was named after Jerome Walton, for the record).  Anyway, thanks to this and an ’06 Chrome Black refractor, I think I’ll be up to 4 or 5 keepers of Murton, once the I get ship one I picked up after this, and once my Just Minors auto turns up.  That auto being from the infamous 4-Just Minors auto lot I picked up for $6-something years ago just for Murton, that also included some guy named JOEY VOTTO.  No, I never get tired of mentioning that Votto auto falling into my lap before he became a thing.  Thanks for asking. 😛

Harold Baines auto!

I picked up freakin’ sweet (though the photo is kinda depressing) Harold Baines auto for my dad, because I finally brought the Gordon Beckham Heritage auto back to my place, because he’s one of dad’s all-time favorite White Sox.

Vintage George Brett..

Not exactly minty fresh, but it was cheap as can be.  Looks nice on a page across from the above Bob Gibson.  Can be had for something I’d like more.

Bonds rookieness..

What a pleasant looking fellow.  I’m sure he’ll never turn into a giant raging ego case that will topple records through questionable means and bring (preposterously overblown) scandal to the game.  Nope, never gonna happen.  Straight class, this guy.

A trio of Fergie-Ferg-Ferg..

I now have Fergie Jenkins RC & 2nd year cards.  I’m trying to get all the regular issue cards from his playing career.  It is going to take awhile, but progress is being made. 🙂

1955 Bowman Bill Wightkin..

Random Bears vintage!  This feller immediately became my oldest football card by far upon landing (and 4th oldest overall), by about a decade.  I believe my prior oldest football cards were two Bears defensive backs from the same year, from sometime in the mid-1960s.

More Fergie!

We’ll finish out this post with THE card of the order.  Leaf Legends of Sport Fergie Jenkins auto #’ed /20.  I’ve been wanting an inexpensive Fergie auto ever since I gave mine to Mario back in the day.  This only set me back a little over $6, I believe.  I didn’t realize it at the time, but it turns out these cards (or at least this one) are super thick, so I had to pick up an extra 130pt magnetic holder for it.  Weirdly, despite the sorry state our local K-Mart is in (corporate raider suck ‘er dry tactics, from what I understand), they still have these things with two extra thick Ultra Pro magnetic holders + a stand for $4.99 that I’ve seen nowhere else.

Update: The cretin next door actually did call the police on me.  So I politely informed the officers that those two started things in the first place with their constant door slamming & how utterly useless the office has been, then sent them upstairs to deal with the stompy jerkass up there.  It was all very pleasant and easy, and it feels like a weight has been (at least temporarily, cuz THIS F*CKING PLACE) lifted off my shoulders.

So I guess that be that.  Apologies for the weird tangents and asides, and that unintended dramatic subplot, and thanks for stopping by!

My soul is gentle, but don’t doubt my fire…

Diamond Gallery #1: Fresh Vintage Sox (and Other Things)

So my first Diamond Giveaway order arrived, and while it was mostly Die-Cuts, I did pick up a little vintage this time too.  Have a look, won’t you?

1969 Topps ’68 HR Leaders Frank Howard/Willie Horton/Hawk Harrelson..

The back..

The card is beat to heck all over, easily the worst of the bunch.  Yet for some reason all the creases & things are easy to miss at first glance if you aren’t paying attention.  Also a previous owner of this card underlined all the Orioles on the back of the card, which is amusing and gives the card an interesting character and backstory that I’ll likely never know.  I picked this up for my dad, a big longtime White Sox fan, because Hawk is the longtime television voice of the team (and gets an undeserved bad wrap, in my rarely humble opinion).

1969 Bill Melton RC..

The back..

The bottom corners on this are a little worn, and the entire top edge is rough.  Also intended for my dad, but currently sitting in the one of the rookie pages in my random keeper binder just because I’m bringing back so much Diamond Giveaway White Sox stuff for him.  More on those later in this post and future posts as well.  Also another card back cartoon showing how easy players have it today.  Even the lowliest major leaguer doesn’t need to work for an engineering firm in the offseason.  If anything, they’d be doing local commercial endorsements for it today.

He doesn’t care too much whether or not I get these for him, but the jolly fat man does enjoy them once he has them.  So I pick him cool (and very cheap) White Sox cards when I come across or occasionally pull them.  He’s got a shelf with some no-name prospect that never did anything auto, Ron Kittle & Darryl Boston autos, a Luis Aparicio stadium seat relic, a ’70 Topps Aparicio & ’78 Wilbur Wood, and a couple recent shinier cards.  Also that Gordon Beckham Topps Heritage auto still hangs out there.

1975 Topps ’52 MVPs Bobby Shantz/Hank Sauer..

The back..

This one’s for me.  One of my first ever vintage cards was a 1961(I think?) Hank Sauer MVP card, so he holds a special place in my collecting heart.  The card is a little rough around pretty much all the edges and corners, but considering the shape my other ’75s are in (the couple minis I own notwithstanding), this one isn’t really that bad at all.  The walks per 9 innings and total bases were probably still relatively deep statistical measures of greatness in 1975.  The former may still be.

1976 JR Richard..

The back..

Great card of a guy that didn’t play real long, but was so damn good while he did.  Definitely should have tried to pick up another card or two of JR.  The cartoon tidbit is rather interesting as well.  Good on ya, New York Press.  Minimal damage on the card, but it doesn’t look or feel very sturdy (basically the opposite of the clearly loved but still structurally sound ’75).

1977 Beltin’ Bill..

The back..

Man did Bill age fast or what?  He looks like he’s still in high school on his RC, then less than 10 years later he’s a grizzled old vet with a halfhearted pornstache and perm just playing out the string.  You can almost see the wheels in his head turning, wondering what became of his once promising career.  And now that I’ve depressed everyone, this card is in pretty decent shape.  I’m also open to dealing for more Bill Meltons and JR Richards (and Richie/Dick Allen, but that’s another post entirely) if you got ’em and don’t need ’em.

’78 George Foster..

Or Geroge, as one of the many Diamond Giveaway typos referred to him.  Not much to say about this suh-weet card other than that it’s condition is fine and I knew I was bringing it back the second it ended up in my port.  Those sideburns are badassss.

Fisk In Action..

The back..

What an outstanding photo.  I knew I had to get this one when I saw it too.  Also for dad, it will look GREAT with his little collection.  One card did get back ordered, and that was a ’71 Bill Melton.  So if it takes awhile, let’s hope it looks okay whenever it decides to come.

And with that, we’re done for now.  As ever, thanks for stopping by!  We’ll check

Next time, Gadget…

Flea Market Finds #12: Ninth Binder page + Mojo

Ugh, mojo is such a dumb word (unless we’re talking super intelligent monkey supervillains or card blogging hands), but I digress.  While the weather is hitting record highs, so to are my blog hits.  And I’m closing in on posting every day for a week straight for maybe the first time ever in the history of this blog.  Things seem to finally coming together in my little corner of the blog netherverse.

Anyway, we’re heading down the final stretch of the flea market posts.  Only a couple more posts after this!  Then I’ll have even more to post, since the flea market comes up again this Saturday.  I’ll try to do this month’s flea market finds up much quicker though.

There are also new sketch card posts in the offing.  I colored seven more last night, and hope to finish the last two Justice Leaguers and three Star Trek captains later tonight.  I also have at least three much-belated trade posts to post, and one fresh one at the moment, with more coming in the not-too-distant future.  So things aren’t going to be slowing for probably the rest of this month anyway.

I will be sending out a few trades this month too, some old (sorry it’s taken so long, guys), some new (I’m trying to be quicker about it).

That all tediously said, let’s get to the action!  Mojo Jojo Hand first!

Three-color patch-jo! Hey wait...

This was the other $1.50 card he gave me for $1 (it was apparently priced $6 at some point).  It’s pretty cool looking, but it’s odd.  The card isn’t #’ed, and the patch itself is making me say “hmm…”, because the colors seem to be reversed.  I can’t figure out where the patch could possibly have come from.  There doesn’t appear to be anywhere on the jersey where a thin strip of white patch meets red jersey with gold on the inside like that.  I is confused and mayby have the eyesight of your average NBA ref, but it was only $1, so whatevs (any information most welcome though).

I also have a regular non-patch version of this, probably pulled from an eBay “hot pack” or retail repack box at some point.  Anyway, if you want either, have at thee!

Now for the fun part of this entirely too long blog post, the next binder page!!

Beckett inserts x2, 1983 topps Traded Don Baylor, 2010 topps Joe Saunders Gold parallel /2010, 1977 topps Graig Nettles, 1983 topps Yaz, Frank Viola rookie!, 1977 topps Willie Randolph (Rookie Cup FTW!) 1983 topps Tom Seaver

Why Purchased: Hall of Famers and stars of their day on the most perfectly designed ever made, 1983 topps, and nearly vintage Yankee greats.

Keepers: Sadly, probably nada.

Notes: Why are topps Traded cards of the era ALWAYS in infinitely better shape than regular cards?

You know how you end up with the name Graig?  When one parent wants to name the kid Greg, and the other wants to name him Craig, and they decide to compromise.  Which is proof that compromise is not always a good thing.

At least they didn’t name him Jermajesty or Caleb or something awful like that.

I didn’t know the Viola was a rookie until I was fooling around looking up late-’70s/mid-’80s rookies by year on Check Out My Cards.

I enjoy Rookie Cups and Rated Rookies entirely too much.

Mind-Blowing Statistic: Yaz had three 40-home run seasons, and no others over 30 (or 28 to be exact).

I was struggling to come up with something, but that’s a pretty good interesting stat right?  All cards except Willie Randolph are available (he’ll be going out in a way overdue trade).  Thanks for stopping by!

I feel like chicken tonight!