Night Owl Cards

Bad news first. I found so many goodies at the garage sale on Friday that I went back again today to add to my stash. But the weather had turned cooler and the folks had closed up shop for the weekend. Oh well. My disappointment was brief, because I liked what I found on Friday. Great stuff. I could stand in front of that guy's file cabinet for a week-and-a-half and find something I want. So here is what I took home. Again, nothing spectacular, but I found it interesting and very useful in the vast card collecting scheme of things. We'll start with the Mike Piazzas. I bought 11 cards, including the 1994 Pacific card up top. I find as a Dodger collector that I have a harder time acquiring Piazza cards than almost any other recent player. I blame the Mets fans for that. So I snapped these up quick. Here is a 1993 Donruss (I can't believe I still need Dodgers from this set), a 1995 Topps cyberstats , a 1994 Stadium Club HR Club member, and a 1993 Triple Play. Next up, som...

The 1972 Topps Set blog is back in business!!! After a month of quiet, our friend MMayes is back to featuring the grooviest set around. And he returns with a bang by featuring the one and only F-Rob, as the kids would say today. He's better known, of course, as Hall of Famer Frank Robinson (how ghastly would it be if we actually referred to stars of the past as "B-Rob" for Brooks Robinson, "J-Rob" for Jackie Robinson or "T.W." for Ted Williams?) To celebrate the return of the '72 Topps blog, I've decided to feature this monstrosity/rare masterpiece from the 1972 set: Wow. This is card No. 166, Chris Speier In Action. And someone obviously took the "In Action" statement a bit too literally. This card has seen more action than Kim Kardashian on a "Tilt-a-Whirl" (I don't even know what that means). I received this card in a trade, believe it or not. I actually requested it, knowing fully its history and condition. Ye...

Thanks to reader Drew, my 2009 Topps Series I set is now officially complete. The Marlon Byrd card is mine, and I can remove the throwback Byrd card that I had as a seat-filler. It's fantastic to see readers out there coming to the rescue of fellow collectors. Because I believe we all know the feeling of thinking we have completed a set only to realize we've missed a card or two. It's happened to me at least a half-dozen times. Probably the most disturbing case, for me, came with the 1984 Topps set. I had purchased the entire set at once, the first time I had ever done that. It was my intention at the time to rid myself of the time-consuming practice of collecting a set. After all, I was a big shot college boy, and I didn't have time for frivolity (chasing girls and drinking beer is definitely not frivolity. It is gravely serious business ). But much, much later, at least a decade later or more, I was cataloging my '84 set and realized I was missing one card. I...

How many times have you uttered the phrase, "I can't believe this guy is still in the league"? I know I've done it often. But no one has surprised me more by his ability to keep showing up in a major league uniform than Rudy Seanez , featured on this 2008 Upper Deck night card. His career has spanned 20 years. Can you believe that? I can't. He pitched for the Dodgers on two different occasions , including appearing in 73 games in 2007, but I was never all that impressed with anything he did. Such is the life of a reliever. The thing that most amuses me is how many teams want the guy and then how many teams don't want the guy. Some Rudy Seanez facts: -- Teams traded for him five times -- Teams released him six times (the Red Sox released him twice) -- He has played for eight teams (Indians, Padres, Dodgers, Braves, Padres again, Braves again, Rangers, Red Sox , Royals, Marlins, Padres a third time, Red Sox again, Padres a FOURTH time, Dodgers a third time, ...

Either later today or tomorrow I'll be headed to the only garage sale I mark on the calendar each year. I'm not much for garage sales, and when it comes to cards, the garage sale has become one giant landfill for 1991 Donruss . You almost never find anything decent in the card department anymore. Or at least I don't. But there is this one sale that spans the same weekend each year. It's part of the town's field days weekend, an easy excuse to leave work early, stuff your face and get drunk. A bunch of the town's residents also gather all their junk together and hold a mass garage sale. You can go from house to house to house and buy plates that were eaten on in 1974 and video cassettes of "The Goonies ." One guy with a house on the corner has one of those card-catalog type filing cabinets jammed full with sports cards. I have paid him a visit each of the last 2 or 3 years. You can tell he only got into collecting when he thought he could get rich off ...

I have lots of questions about cards. Most of them are mundane and probably not worth answering. But these are the kinds of questions that hound me until I get an answer, so hopefully someone has one. Question 1: I bought a blaster of Upper Deck Series 2 today, mostly in the quest to try to snare as many Dodgers as I could. However, I turned up zero Dodgers and a case-load of Mets , which does me no good but probably helps a bunch of bloggers out there. The question is, does this qualify as a Mets card? It was the guaranteed relic card in the box. Milledge is now a National (or minor leaguer or whatever he is now). But the jersey bit, with the cool stripey line, is obviously a Mets jersey. When I am classifying such cards in my team binder, I always go with what team is listed on the front. In this case, this would be a Nationals card. But the jersey is so apparent . So, Mets fans, is this a Mets card? A Nationals card? Or do you whip it across the room in disgust and let the ...

I'm a person who is well aware of his faults. No need for you to call attention to them. I know the rundown. I have the list. I check it daily. But even though I could start a blog on the topic, there are times when I come across a fault of mine that I never knew I had. Trading cards through the blogosphere has brought one particular previously unknown fault into focus, and here it is: I suck at pulling Minnesota Twins cards. You may think this isn't much of a fault or that it doesn't even fall under the definition of the word, but let me tell you: if you are trading cards with a Twins fan, it's a definite shortcoming. I don't know what it is. You may think it's because the Twins are a small-market team and the card companies don't feature as many Twins players. Well, then how come I have no problem pulling Kansas City Royals and Houston Astros? How do you explain my Carlos Lee temple o' cards in the basement? I most certainly pull small-marke...

When I was growing up, a major league pitcher was required to have two things. He had to have a mustache ... ... and he had to have long hair. Those were necessities to being allowed to patrol a major league mound. In fact, I think it was in the collective bargaining agreement. "No ball player may be permitted to toe the rubber unless he owns a fabulous head of hair." And so it went. You pitched. You sported a mustache. And you had long hair. Pitchers were like Samson. Cut their hair and they couldn't get the ball over the plate. Unless you were Tom Seaver . But Seaver was, like, God. Sometimes, a pitcher could get away with one terrific mustache and some fierce sideburns. No long hair necessary. But if you couldn't grow a semi-respectable mustache, like Bob Stanley here. Then you better grow some long hair. And feature some chest hair, too. It was a fact of life 25, 30 years ago: Mustache ... ... long hair ... ... mustache...