A real, live card from the Million Card Giveaway

No, I did not receive my redeemed cards in the mail. But I did put in an order to have some of them shipped. I'm waiting to see how long it takes for the carrier pigeon to show up.

What the title refers to is the very card you see here. It is the famed #5 card from the 1971 Topps set. It's Thurman Munson tagging out an Oakland A's player, back in the prehistoric days of the head-first slide. In my bid to complete the 1971 Topps set, I thought this would be one of the very last cards that I would obtain. But thanks to the Million Card Giveaway site, it is merely the 78th last card.

You may remember that someone offered me the Munson card for some Giveaway codes, and I promptly freaked. Well, the owner of the Munson card, Steve, was able to calm me down eventually, and after a little discussion, I saw what he was trying to do. The Munson card -- which goes for a tidy sum in minty fresh condition -- had no real value to him. But the codes might be able to produce something that he was collecting.

That's all I needed to hear. He sent me the Munson and I am sending him 15 unredeemed code cards. Done and done. Well, almost done. I've got to accumulate the rest of the code cards first. But I am collecting Series 2 and I still have some inserts to track down in Series 1, so 15 codes will be zero problem. ... Unless, of course, Topps decides to put Series 2 code cards only in blasters (And no, Topps, you may not steal my idea).

The Munson card, while not in perfect shape, is absolutely perfect for my collection. Many of my '71 cards look like this, and although I periodically try to find the best-looking '71s, I don't plan to do much upgrading. The black borders make it way too intensive.

There's the back of the card. No one ever shows the back. So there you go.

I don't mind staying out of the Giveaway game for awhile while I collect codes for Steve. The Munson card is definitely worth it. Besides, what am I going to do with another Scott Garrelts?

Now, with that '71 card out of the way, only the Aaron, Clemente, Mays and a bunch of high number cards remain! Heh. I guess I still have a lot of work to do.

Fortunately, another collector, Adam of Thoughts and Sox, recently sent me a handful of Red Sox '71s to help balance out the evil Yankee Munson. Here they are:

With the addition of Munson and the Red Sox, I now have 675 of 752 cards. That's 89.8 percent complete! I never thought I'd get to this point so quickly.

Anyway, the codes-for-a-Munson is a little bonus side effect of the Million Card Giveaway. If the redeemed cards I ordered never show up, I can say I got my card from the Giveaway site. And it's a doozy.

The deal has certainly worked better for me than what I have redeemed so far, or even the trading mechanism on the site.

Here is the card I traded for yesterday:

Yeah.

Why a 1999 Mark Loretta, you ask?

Well, it helped me get rid of another stupid Giants card, silly. Only one more to go ...