1953 Topps Project - Bob Adams

Haven't posted a 1953 Topps card in quite some time, here's the next one towards my set:

If we're being honest, this is far from one of the most exciting cards in the set.  I don't know very much about Bob Adams.  He lasted roughly 14 years in Major League Baseball, but was only an everyday player for a couple of years around when this card came out.

It's not a good sign when the write-up on the back of your card mentions your minor league stats and your ability to avoid grounding into a double play as highlights.  Oh well, I'm grateful to have Bob in the collection nonetheless.  One card closer to completing this classic set...

Set Progress:  48 of 274 (18%)

Signature Sundays - Will The Thrill

This week's autograph was one of the bigger additions to my Will Clark player "accumulation" from this past year.  It comes from one of my favorite sets for autographs, 2005 Upper Deck Baseball Heroes:

This is card #95 on the checklist, the fifth and final Will Clark card in this set.  Each player has five sequential cards on the checklist; the first four in the vertical Heroes layout you're used to seeing, with the final card being a horizontal painting.  This is the emerald auto parallel, numbered to 99 copies.  All of the autographs in this set are on card, one of its primary draws (the amazing checklist doesn't hurt either).  Obtaining the five Clark emerald autos has been on my list since I got back into the hobby years ago but I just don't run across them that often, and when I do the asking price is often outrageous.  I'm happy to finally land my first, rest assured I'll continue to scour eBay for the other four.

This is my third Clark auto in total, and my fourth 2005 Heroes auto.  It is definitely one of my best pick-ups from 2012, so I figured it was time to feature it here.  Do you have any autographs from this set?  If you could pick one off of the checklist who would you go for?

Adrian Gonzalez, We Hardly Knew Ye - My First Ever Printing Plate

I apologize to all of my hockey card collecting friends and readers that the balance I usually try to keep between baseball and hockey card posts has swung so heavily in baseball's favor as of late.  With the NHL lockout looming on the horizon like a black cloud I'm so disappointed as a fan.  Just as the sport was truly starting to make a recovery from the last lockout, and had secured the TV contract here in the US that it had pursued for years, and now this.  I haven't read all the news, and I have no idea what the problem is here other than the vague concept of the argument over revenue split between players and owners.  Frankly, I don't care.  I can't imagine that two groups of grown men who are all making millions and millions of dollars can't find a way to keep their profitable arrangement running.  Whatever the details, whoever is to blame, one thing is for certain...everyone loses.  I'm just having a hard time getting enthused about hockey cards against this backdrop.

Anyway, enough about that.  This isn't a post about the lockout.  Today's post features a new addition to my recent quest to accumulate as many Adrian Gonzalez Red Sox cards as I can.  It's my very first printing plate, actually my first 1/1 of any kind.

This is the cyan printing plate used to produce Adrian's 2011 Bowman Chrome card.  I've always been more of a set collector, so I've never really pursued printing plates.  I guess I always assumed that as 1/1s they were incredibly expensive as far as modern cards go.  When I started seeking out 2011 and 2012 Gonzalez cards for this player collection on eBay I was surprised when I came across this one.  It was a buy-it-now auction, and I snapped it up immediately at an even $20 with free shipping.  Seemed more than reasonable when I thought about the number of blasters I've purchased at the same price that didn't yield much for my collection.

One thing I've learned in looking at a few of these recently is that a printing plate can look pretty bland if you get the wrong plate color and card combination.  I was very satisfied with this one, because despite the empty border along the bottom, you get a really clear idea of what the player photo looks like.  Although there's nothing on the front that references this as being a Red Sox card directly, you can clearly see the Boston letters across the front of Adrian's jersey (which I believe may be airbrushed on this particular card).

Here's a look at the back.  I've been collecting for the second time around for over 5 years now, so I guess a 1/1 was long overdue.  I really like the concept of these printing plates, I'll be tracking down more of them for sure.

Do you own any printing plates?  If so, does $20 seem reasonable for someone like Gonzalez?

Adrian Gonzalez Red Sox Cards - Count
Total Cards - 17
#'d /2011 - 1
#'d /999 - 1
#'d /60 - 1
1/1 - 1
Relics - 0
Autographs - 0

Signature Sundays - A World Series MVP

I've got a decent size backlog of autographed cards that I've been meaning to show on the blog for a while now, so I'm going to try to get one up at least every Sunday for a few weeks here.  Today's card is a very recent eBay win that just arrived in the mailbox this past week.  It's my first Allen & Ginter autograph of any kind, none other than Mike Lowell:

As a Red Sox collector this was a huge win.  Many considered Mike Lowell a throw-in when he came to the team from Florida in the Josh Beckett deal.  He quickly silenced any critics though, and wound up playing the final 5 seasons of his career with Boston.  In those 5 years, Mike hit .290 with 153 doubles, 80 home runs and 374 RBI.  Those numbers are even more impressive when you consider that due to injury Lowell appeared in just 612 of the Red Sox 810 games over those 5 seasons.  If you average it out he missed nearly 1 out of every 4 games.

One of the greatest individual season's I've had the pleasure to witness in my time as a Red Sox fan was Lowell's career season of 2007.  He was an absolute hitting machine in his second season with Boston that year, and was able to stay healthy as well, appearing in 154 games.  The result was a .324 batting average (the only time in his career that he topped .300), a career best 191 hits, 21 home runs and a career best 120 RBI.  Lowell was selected to represent the American League in the All-Star game, and finished 5th in AL MVP voting.  His strong play continued during the team's post-season run.  In the World Series against the Colorado Rockies Mike hit .400 with 3 doubles, 1 home run and 4 RBI.  He was named World Series MVP while leading the Red Sox to their second Championship in four years.

I know Mike's not a Hall-of-Famer or anything, but I was surprised at how little this card went for.  My cost was $4.06 plus a little over $3 to cover shipping.  Pretty reasonable for an on card auto of a World Series MVP if you ask me.

Adrian Gonzalez, We Hardly Knew Ye - A Red Sox Player Collection

When the Red Sox and Dodgers agreed on that gigantic salary dump they called a trade a few weeks back, I was both excited and disappointed. Excited that my favorite team managed to unload one of the worst contracts in MLB history (at least so far), as well as a pitcher that had declined in both on field performance as well as general character.  Disappointed that the best hitter on the Red Sox was what made the offer acceptable to Los Angeles, and that I'd never get to see Adrian Gonzalez take another at-bat in a Red Sox uniform.

The more I thought about it, I decided it would be interesting to try an Adrian Gonzalez player collection.  I generally shy away from player collecting, but in this case I'm going to restrict it to Adrian Gonzalez Red Sox cards.  I have no interest in anything from his days with Texas or San Diego prior to Boston, nor will I be clamoring for that first card to show him in a Dodgers uniform.  I like this approach because while we're still talking hundreds of cards, it makes the total number of cards out there much more manageable.  Best of all, I won't have the "what if he gets traded" anxiousness, because it already happened.  Each new card I pick up will be one more for the Red Sox collection.

Before I show any new stuff, here's what I've already got towards the collection:

This Gypsy Queen Framed Green parallel is the first Gonzalez Red Sox card I ended up with.  I pulled it from a retail rack pack last summer.

Of course I picked up the Framed Paper parallel as well, numbered to 999 copies.  I still say the Gypsy Queen framed parallels were the best looking cards of 2011.

Limited to just 60 copies, for now this 2011 Topps Black parallel is my lowest numbered (and most valuable) Gonzalez card.  That will change very soon though...

I truly have no recollection of how this 2011 Topps Update card came into my possession.  It may have been a trade package.  If you sent it to me, then thank you!

2011 Bowman's Best insert snagged last summer from Check Out My Cards...

One of my current favorites is this 3D insert from 2011 Topps Lineage.  I know these are based on the extremely rare Topps 3D cards from the late '60s, but as a child of the '80s they remind me of Kelloggs and Sportflics.

The next three cards are recent eBay pickups, all parallels from the 2011 Topps Update Series set. Two Diamond Anniversary cards...

...and a Gold parallel, serial numbered to 2011.

Oddly enough I have this Gold parallel card but not the base version.

Here's an example of an awful and unnecessary Topps insert.  It's been just over a year since this card was printed and neither of these guys are Red Sox any longer.  Sigh.

I picked up a 2012 Allen & Ginter Red Sox team set a while back.  Gonzalez is a short print in this set.

These next two cards both came in a trade package from Night Owl. In addition to Adrian's base card from 2012 Opening Day, he also sent along this Fantasy Squad insert:

I don't normally buy much Opening Day, so these two were much appreciated.

This Topps Attax card also came from Greg, in the same package I'm pretty sure.

Here's Adrian's 2012 Topps Archives base card, based on the 1980 Topps design.  Along with the card that led off this post, it's the only Gonzalez Red Sox card I have that I actually pulled myself from a pack.

Finally, here's a 2012 Gypsy Queen base card.  This one came in an awesome surprise package from Casie at Drop the Gloves.  I still have a half-written thank you post in the drafts folder, but there were a ton of cards in the envelope resulting in quite a bit of scanning work.  I will get it up soon though.

So begins my Adrian Gonzalez Red Sox collection.  16 cards and counting, a very modest start considering all that's out there.  If you've got any that I don't have available for trade let me know...

Red Sox Collection - Gypsy Queen Jon Lester Relic

Not much time today, and I'm off to poker night shortly, so just a quick post for now.  Here's a recent addition to my Red Sox collection, a 2012 Topps Gypsy Queen Framed Mini Relic of left-handed starter Jon Lester:

Jon, like seemingly everyone else on the squad, has had an off year to say the least.  On top of that, I've gone on record quite a few times as saying I'm not the biggest fan of relic cards.  So why did I buy this one then?  Well I won it for the opening bid of 99 cents plus $2 shipping.  What can I say, I'm a sucker I guess...

There's nothing on the back that indicates this is a game-used swatch either.  Oh well, for around $3 total I'm happy to add this card to my Red Sox collection nonetheless.

Collecting Whalers - 2012-13 O-Pee-Chee Retro Ron Francis

One recent trend I've been very thankful for is the inclusion of Hartford Whalers cards in more and more modern-day sets.  There have been at least a handful of new Whalers cards each year for the past two or three years, and in my opinion the sample size has been just right.  There have been enough new cards to give me something fun to chase, but not so many that the chase becomes overwhelming.  A few weeks ago I noticed in a post on Just A Bit Offside that Ron Francis is included as a Hartford Whaler in the Marquee Legends subset in 2012-13 O-Pee-Chee hockey.  I'm still on the lookout for the card featured in that post, but I was able to snag the retro parallel of the same card, which I think looks even better than the base:

It's not an exact match, but the closest thing I could think of off-hand to compare these cards to are the All-Time Greats cards from the 1960-61 Topps hockey set.  I really like that this retro parallel is full color compared to the black and white photo used on the base version of the card.  I also like that while this is the same exact photo used on the base card, it's cropped further out on the retro parallel so that you can see just how much green the Whalers used to sport.  I would have to say that this is one of the most colorful Whalers cards that I own, period.

The back I would say is so-so.  Not the best card back I've seen, but not the worst either.  I don't plan on buying much, if any, 2012-13 O-Pee-Chee but I would like to track down Milt Schmidt and David Krejci retro parallels, as well as the Brendan Shanahan and Ron Francis Pop-Ups inserts, both of which feature the players in Whaler garb.

Have you picked up any of the new O-Pee-Chee yet?  If so, are you going for the set or just grabbing some singles like I am?

Coming Back Around...Slowly...

So taking a week away from all things card-related (all things computer related too for that matter) was really nice.  In fact, it was so nice that when I got back from Ireland I decided to take another week away from cards.  No blog posts, no card purchases, no browsing eBay, nothing.  It was long overdue.  I think the fact that the Red Sox totally suck, combined with what seems like a certain lengthy delay (at best) to the start of the 2012-13 NHL season, has made this break relatively easy to bear.

Plenty happened while I was gone, though.  One of my favorite Red Sox personalities of all-time, Johnny Pesky, passed away.  The team also shed more than $250 million in payroll in one of the more remarkable "trades" I've seen pulled off in my lifetime.  I'm starting to feel my interest towards the hobby slowly creep back, but I'm still not all the way there yet, so for today I'm going to wade back into the blogging waters with a simple, one card post.  Continuing my recent trend of acquiring 1964 Topps baseball cards, here's the latest addition to my collection from that set:

This card is one that has been on my most wanted list for quite a while.  I've wanted a copy since I first laid eyes on the card this past winter.  Aside from my love of 1964 Topps, this one filled a longtime want for my collection; a vintage Berra card.  The 1963 season was Berra's final year playing for the Yankees, so this is a manager card, but I like it nonetheless.  I think the portrait that Topps selected is just perfect.  Weathered face, sweat-stained cap, bat resting on his shoulder...classic.  Besides, it fits quite nicely with my Johnny Pesky manager card from the same set.

After months of searching I decided on this copy, which I am really happy with.  Any vintage baseball card collection worth its weight in salt should have a Yogi Berra.  After all, he is one of the greatest (some say the greatest) catchers to ever play the game.  If his personality and one-liners aren't enough to get you to appreciate him, his 10 World Series titles as a player should be.

At some point I'd like to add a vintage Berra from his playing days.  1953 Topps would be the obvious choice since I'm working on that set, but I've seen a couple of other great ones as well, most notably 1950 Bowman.  Any suggestions?

Vacation from the Shoebox

Posting is going to be non-existent here for the next 10 days or so, as I'm out the door on my way to Ireland.  This trip's been on the bucket list for quite some time, especially given that such a large percentage of my family's ancestry called (and calls!) the country home.  I'll be back soon enough, but in the meantime this seemed like the most appropriate "card" from my collection to leave atop the blog...have a great week everyone!

Red Sox Collection - 1949 Bowman Johnny Pesky

After straying completely off-base with a random non-sport post a week or so ago, today I'll go with something that's a bit more in my collecting wheelhouse; my Red Sox collection.  I'm not sure what it is, time of year maybe, but I've been focusing quite a bit on Red Sox cards lately.  A month or so back I scored a card that instantly became one of my oldest and most prized Sox cards:

This 1949 Bowman Johnny Pesky is a great reminder to myself that this hobby is a journey, not a race.  I've wanted a copy of this card for a few years now.  It fits into my collection on a few different levels.  Besides being a new Red Sox card, it's also the fourth card in my very modest Johnny Pesky collection.  This is the oldest of the four Peskys I own, and it's likely the oldest I'll ever own (there's a '48 Leaf Pesky that's way outside my price range).  Add to that the fact that I'm a huge fan of vintage Bowman baseball cards and this one was a must have.  The thing is, this card just doesn't pop up very often, at least not in a condition I'm satisfied with for a price I'm willing to pay.

Finally, after a couple of years of waiting patiently I decided on this one, and for $35 shipped I'm more than satisfied with the condition.  This is the first '49 Bowman I've ever owned.  I have to say that I like the '50 and '52 sets a bit more, but adding a card that's now more than 60 years old to my collection is pretty cool nonetheless.

Here's a look at the back.  Not a lot of difference here between the '49 set and the later Bowman sets of the 1950s.

What's your oldest card of your favorite team, baseball, hockey or otherwise?