Skip

When I was back living at home and we had leftovers for dinner, my dad would call them "skip," as in:

"What's for dinner?"

"Skip"

I don't know the explanation for that term, other than he got it from his family when he was growing up. But I still think of it whenever leftovers are on the menu or whenever anyone talks about "hand-me-downs." In my head, they're known as "skip."

So, that is what you're going to get here -- skip. My mom used to call dinner leftovers "this and that," and that's appropriate here, too. A post of "this and that," "leftovers" and "skip."

Let's dig in:

1. TOPPS UPDATE

The checklist for the 2012 Topps Update set is on the street and I counted up 16 Dodgers cards. Here's the list:

US3 - Adam Kennedy
US4 - Matt Treanor
US38 - Elian Herrera
US52 - Clayton Kershaw
US57 - Hanley Ramirez
US102 - Brandon League
US107 - Randy Choate (EDIT: Topps has him as a Marlin)
US113 - Scott Elbert
US133 - Matt Kemp
US170 - Jerry Hairston
US191 - Bobby Abreu
US217 - Matt Guerrier
US262 - Matt Kemp
US293 - Shane Victorino
US304 - A.J. Ellis
US324 - Jamey Wright

Grouping the Update set by team is a bit of a crapshoot because the checklist doesn't mention what team each player is featured with on the card. But I think I can safely say that there is Hanley Ramirez's first Dodger card in this set and the first Shane Victorino Dodger card since 2003.

But did you notice who was missing?

I don't see Adrian Gonzalez anywhere.

I even looked through the checklist three times. Adrian Beltre. But no Adrian Gonzalez.

I think I know what this means. It probably means Topps went to press before the big blockbuster trade. There is no Josh Beckett, Carl Crawford or Nick Punto in the checklist either.

I hope that's what it is. If there's some super short-print of Gonzalez in a Dodger uniform, I won't be buying very much Update out of protest.

On the good side, though, FINALLY there is a Dodger card of A.J. Ellis to chase.

2. DISCOUNTED BLASTERS AT TARGET?????

I've mentioned periodically how frustrated I get with my Target's selling practices when it comes to cards. Unlike Walmart, where I can find discounted cards virtually every time I visit their card aisle, Target is very stingy in this area.

My Target features the $1.59 power packs and that's about it. 2011 Lineage is still there full-price, various Bowman issues from the past are still there full-price. My most irksome experience was seeing 2008 Stadium Club sitting on the shelf more than 2 years after it came out -- still FULL PRICE!

So the following just stunned me:

On Twitter, I have seen people display blasters from Heritage and Gypsy Queen from THIS YEAR marked down to $11.99. This is especially painful as I have enacted another card-spending suspension, and I can't even get to my Target to see if they changed their ways as other Targets apparently have.

While I'm on the topic of discounted blasters, have you seen what PunkRockPaint pulled out of an $11.99 Bowman Platinum blaster today? Socks, my ass.

But nicely done.

3. YES, I CARE WHAT MY CARDS LOOK LIKE ON THIS BLOG

Some folks apparently don't think like me when it comes to displaying cards on the blog. I like my scans to be relatively straight and dirt-free.

This is a product of being somewhat of a neat-freak (although if you ever saw my card desk or desk at work, you would wonder why I described myself in those terms). But it's mostly because I like to put on a good show.

I scanned this card from @SWLVguy yesterday, but refused to put it on the blog:

Yuck. I hate that I'm showing it here. Look at all those dust particles. It makes the card of Andre's little brother look like it's 45 years old. This was the result of a dirty scanner and a dirty nine-pocket page.

This is much better:

I try to run a clean establishment.

Also, I neglected to show another card @SWLVguy sent yesterday, even though I scanned it. I hate when that happens, too. So here it is:

That card of "Oisk" is from the 1990 Pacific Baseball Legends set. I think Pacific was running out of legends at this point. Tom Paciorek is also in the set. As much as I love to obtain cards of post-playing days players like Paciorek, I will never confuse him with a baseball legend.


4. LOUIE, LOUIE, LOUIE, LOU-EEEEEEEEEE

I've tallied up the votes for the "Best of the '70s" card of Luis Tiant.

It was pretty good vote, considering I couldn't put a poll up on the sidebar. I think before I have another "Best of the '70s" session, I'm going to have to figure out how to work a poll into my template without messing everything up.

So, there were 24 total votes -- less than usual, but OK -- and here are the top three:

3. 1973 Topps - 3 votes

Nothing I'd ever pick, even though it is one of those ancient cards from my childhood.

2. 1976 Topps - 7 votes

My choice. I'm glad to see others liked it so much. It really was a two-card race, between the '76 card and this card:

1. 1974 Topps - 9 votes

Terrific.

The '74 card is now listed as Tiant's best '70s card in the tabs at the top of the blog. Thanks for voting, and I'll try to get my act together for the next time.

So, there you are, a little bit of everything. New, old, left over, reheated, swiped from others, this and that.

In other words,

Skip.