Kershaw kwest kontinues

My plea for Clayton Kershaw autograph cards has turned out quite nicely. Since the original post, I have added three Kershaw autographs to my collection.

The two most recent ones have come from Kerry at Cards on Cards and Marck at The Collective Troll. The one here is from Kerry. It's on-card and it's a 2008 Heritage card, so this is one tremendous card.

The only drawback is Kershaw's jersey is obviously airbrushed or whatever the heck they did to it. It's an awful job. It looks like Kershaw is wearing a blue blouse. Or men's pajamas from the '60s. Just terrible.

But that bit of ugliness hasn't deterred me in my quest to collect Kershaw cards. Even though my player collecting comes third behind my set- and team-collecting quests, I have decided to start a page that lists my favorite Dodger players. On the page, I have a list of the cards that I own from each of those players. If you find a card that isn't on that list, and the player is still with the Dodgers (for example, I have zero interest in Ron Cey cards with the Cubs), then I am officially intrigued.

The page features only five players right now: Ron Cey, Sandy Koufax, Orel Hershiser, Hideo Nomo and Clayton Kershaw. And it's incomplete -- I haven't gotten to the monstrosity that is my Hideo Nomo cards. (EDIT: Yes, I have). But I'll be adding to it as I go along. Also, the cards are in a bit of jumbled order. I'm not the most organized fellow.

I've also linked the page under the sidebar title of "My Favorite Dodgers to Collect." I don't expect to become A Player Collector. So, there will always be cards of those five that I need. But that's totally cool with me.

Meanwhile, both Cards on Cards and The Collective Troll were nice enough to send other cards besides the Kershaws. I'll show Kerry's cards first, since his Kershaw started it off, and I can supply the big finish with one of Marck's cards.

The first of the non-Kershaw cards from Kerry that I'm showing is a 2005 Upper Deck Steve Schmoll. Schmoll was one of those gimmick pitchers with the underhand delivery. Doesn't it seem like these guys are cheating? It seems to open the door for able-bodied pitchers to throw with their feet, or something else odd.

Gil Hodges swinging for the fences on a Ted Williams Card Company card. Hodges looks colorized on this card. I wonder how many colorized cards there are. A nice write-up on Hodges' four-homer game on the back.

One of the cards I needed from Fleer's greatest set of the 1990s. They really broke out of their early '90s doldrums with 1994 Fleer.

Here is crazy Pinnacle with its gold fetish and crazy 1996 with its Karim Garcia fetish. It all goes together for this over-the-top Zenith card.

Eric Karros, 2000 Skybox Metal. This is about as subdued as Metal got.

Two more Hideo Nomos for the incomplete Nomo player collection list. Kerry sent several 2002 Upper Deck Dodgers. I've always found the white grid design at the bottom odd. But at least it sets it apart from other UD sets, which is a constant UD problem.

Thanks again, Kerry! Your cards should be arriving any day now.

That bring me to The Collective Troll. You might remember I had that Carl Crawford Exquisite autographed card that I was shopping around in an attempt to get a Kershaw. Well, after many miles added to the odometer, Troll came through and acquired the Crawford card for this:

It's my earliest Kershaw card, from 2005, back when Kershaw was a member of the U.S. junior national team.

Normally, I'm looking for Kershaw wearing his Dodger uniform, but this card's awesomeness breaks the rules. What a great-looking, patriotic card that is. Clayton got a little sloppy with the signature, but the stars and stripes balance it out.

But that's not all that Marck sent.

He sent some Dodgers from 1995 and 1996 Score. If you're looking for Dodgers I need, mid-1990s Score is a real good place to start.

And here's a 1991 O-Pee-Chee Premier card that I didn't have yet. Voltigeur Butler!

And this card represents the last Allen & Ginter National Pride card that I needed to complete the insert set.

My base card quest continues. Still looking for #30 Howard and #339 Schaefer.

Finally, I landed this card from The Troll. A Park-Ishii jersey swatch card, and also a very patriotic-looking card! Also quite thick. Not as thick as the Crawford card that Marck is so pleased to receive, but believe me, I'm much happier with this than the Exquisite card.

So, thanks guys for the Kershaws. I'm always in the market for any other Kershaw cards. And hopefully, I'll have the player collection page updated with all of my favorite Dodgers eventually. But the top five is a good place to start.