How I won a football card contest twice, even though I don't follow football

I realize this will annoy avid followers of football, just as it does college basketball folks when someone who doesn't know a Cameron Crazy from a Zag wins the March Madness pool:

I recently won a football card contest. Twice.

Let me clarify something first, though. By "not following football" I mean that I'm not a fan and I don't sit and watch games. But I DO know what's going on in the sport most of the time. It's a requirement of my job. Every day I pour through story after story featuring sports that could disappear this instant without a word of regret from me (I'm looking at you, golf). So, information is bound to sneak into the ol' noggin. There is a reason why I know just about every NASCAR name without ever watching a single NASCAR race.

So, yeah, I know football. Just don't ask me to enter a fantasy league.

That little bit of knowledge enabled me to win Cobb and Halladay's Super Bowl contest last month. I beat out a bunch of football fans to take the top prize. I believe I came closest to guessing the total number of points in the game.

My prize was some super fancy football cards. A number of people got a kick out of a baseball guy like me winning football stuff.

It's true, I don't care about any football card, even if it's the fanciest, most expensive item that was ever created. So, I stepped aside and let the football fans win the football cards.

Strangely, that act meant I won the contest twice. First, Joe of Cobb and Halladay found some baseball cards to substitute for the football cards. Secondly, B A Benny of  B A Benny's Baseball Card Buffet also sent me some cards because my stepping aside won him some Jets card he wanted (personally, I still haven't gotten over Mark Gastineau so I don't enjoy the Jets much).

Now that is one fine contest victory!

I'll start out with my original prize winnings and then go into what B A Benny sent.

First from Joe are some 2010 UD, as in Unlicensed Debris, of the Dodger variety. As someone very clueless about the ways of law, someone needs to explain to me why, if Upper Deck intends to argue that the appearance of logos on work attire is fair game then how come there are so many freakin' sideways shots in the set? I know there's some simple reason that I'm too dense to figure out, but it's really bugging me.

A couple of inserts from 2010 UD. The Manny Pure Heat card gives people warm fuzzies for the mid-1990s die-cut era. I wasn't collecting in the mid-1990s, so it's OK. Nothing great.

The Lincecum biography card was sent to me, I'm guessing, because Lincecum pitched against the Dodgers in this game. But the Giants won the game. I am officially against recognizing Giants victories on cardboard.

A very chromy Heritage Furcal card. I am over Heritage and Heritage Chrome cards, too, until further notice. That doesn't mean you shouldn't send me your Dodgers. Dodger cards are exceptions to every rule!

More shiny. I received four of these Goodwin mini parallel cards. This is probably the best one of the bunch.

A Bowman Heritage relic card of Mr. Sunshine, Jeff Kent. And this brings me to another hang up that I have. It's about the Bowman cut-out in its relic cards. It's a cut-out of the baseball player image that Bowman uses in its logo. But the cut-out is not very well-defined. So, to me, it looks like the side view of someone flipping someone off. Yup, what's supposed to be a bat, looks like an extended middle finger to me. I can't see anything else.

Maybe you should think about that, Bowman.

Lastly, a Ron Cey relic card, which is quite cool, mostly because I have this card already and I can start putting together my Ron Cey jersey bit by bit. How cool is it to have dupes of jersey relics? I guess that's a sign that they're not too awesome anymore.

All right, on to BA Benny's very generous gesture of sending me cards, too.

Here are a few more Dodgers from 2010 UD. I really hope I can collect all the UD Dodgers without buying another pack of that stuff. I'll have to consult the checklist and see how close I am.

Here is some more shiny stuff from the year that Topps shrunk players down so it looks like you could carry them around in your shirt pocket.

Even more shiny, going back to Ramon Martinez's last year with the Dodgers. The earlier chrome cards aren't as thick as the present day ones.

Another fancy item from 2009 U&H, commemorating O-Dog's cycle against the Giants. Ha!

I like this set a lot. I had high hopes for Terry Adams. In the end, the Dodgers were pretty lucky to get 12 wins out of him in 2001.

I am happy to see Eric Gagne in a Dodger uniform. I don't care if his autos and relics are selling for common prices. I like him. I always have. He was pleasant to me when I talked to him. I like his family. I'm not terribly confident that he'll find a spot in the loaded Dodgers bullpen, but best of luck to him.

I am actually featuring an Opening Day card last. It's the last Dodger I needed to finish this OD set. It took a real long time to complete it, too.

So, a big thanks to B A Benny and to Joe for allowing me to post a bunch of baseball cards after winning a football contest.

It just might give me enough incentive to enter any college basketball pool on the horizon. My luck in that thing has got to change. I'm due.