Can I Get Some Mint Jelly with that PWE?

I recently received the latest PWE in my ongoing back-and-forth with Mark Kaz of This Way to the Clubhouse. As usual, all of the cards were great, and were needed for my Red Sox collection, but there was one that stood head and shoulders above the rest:

Oh yeah, my very first "Pork Chop" Pough card!  "Pork Chop", whose birth name is Clyde, apparently got the nickname from a coach as a kid.  In his professional career he rose as high as AAA ball with three different franchises, but never managed to crack an MLB roster.

He may never have played a game with Boston, but nonetheless he instantly becomes one of the best names in my Red Sox collection (I count minor league Red Sox cards towards my collection).  Let's take a look at some of the side dishes that accompanied Pork Chop in the PWE...

Gotta love '90s Studio.  The '94 set with the lockers in the background is a step down design-wise from the beautiful '93s in my opinion, but they're still more interesting than a good portion of the other cardboard printed up that year.

Some Red Sox prospects sites state that Gentile possessed "Pedroia-esque grittiness", but it doesn't look like that was enough to get him past AA ball.  Appears to have hung up the spikes for the final time a few years ago now.

I confess to never having heard of the 2001 Fleer Triple Crown set prior to receiving this PWE.  I'm trying not to be too hard on myself though, as it appears that the folks at Fleer printed up approximately 486 different sets in 2001!

Here's another set I'd never heard of before, 2005 Leaf Century.  If it wasn't for Zistle I don't know how I'd possibly track my collection.  I have tremendous admiration for those of you who use manual spreadsheets to track your team collections.  For me, that would make the hobby too much like a chore and I think I'd lose interest pretty quickly.  I shudder to think what will happen if the evil folks that run Beckett manage to railroad Zistle in court like they're attempting to do.

If it weren't for the Pork Chop Pough, this might have been the card of the package for me.  It's from the 1987 Topps Boardwalk & Baseball boxed set.  I'd never heard of these before, and I'm even more ashamed to admit that I'd never heard of the failed theme park after which the set is named, and where it was presumably distributed.  To be fair, I was only four years old when it opened and it didn't last very long.  Certainly an interesting card though!

Here's a great Tim Wakefield Fleer base card.  The design is solid and I love that the picture captures Wake about to deliver his signature knuckle ball.

It's funny, I just received my very first Red Sox cards from the 2013 Panini Hometown Heroes set a few weeks ago in a trade package that I've yet to post here.  Those were all base cards though, and now Mark has hooked me up with my first insert!

Finally, a nice Jason Varitek from the 1965 Topps rip-off beautiful 2003 Upper Deck Vintage set.  Always happy to add a new card of the longtime captain to my collection, and this is one of the nicer ones I've received to date.

All great cards indeed, but none of them can hold a candle to this one.  Thanks as always Mark, my next PWE is already en route to Delaware and should be showing up in your mailbox any day.  In the meantime, someone please pass me those mashed potatoes!