From happy to unhappy to merely confused

When you sit and stare at a stack of cards, and then sit and stare at them again, and then sit and stare at them again, you eventually realize something about them.

Some cards make me happy, some cards make me unhappy, and some cards, well, I just look at them and think "what's this supposed to be?"

That's rather obvious, I guess, but I thought it was interesting that I could get all of that out of one stack of cards sent to me by Zippy Zappy Kenny from Cervin' Up Cards.

I'll start with "happy" first because some people get through only the first few lines of a post and then are distracted by college football, or food, or going outside and actually living. Shallow people.

Here is the happiest happy. It features the following happy elements: vintage, Brooklyn Dodger, card from the '50s, known baseball character, dude named "Preacher", card off my want list, and just the right amount of wear.

Seven happy points for 1954 Topps Preacher Roe.

By the way, the design for '54 Topps is one of the most genius ideas in all of card collecting -- and, you know what?I think I just thought of another post ... or countdown ... or something to ignore.

Another card that makes me very happy. The happy breakdown: It's my favorite player. It's a CardGen card, which I'll never get my hands on if Kenny decides give up all modern conveniences and move to the Amazon. It features a bit of action that you never see on other cards. I can play a game with it if I desire, and no I don't desire, but it's nice to know I could do it.

That's four happy points for 2013 Sega CardGen Clayton Kershaw.

As always, Kenny graciously wrote out a translation for the back, which is always in Japanese because it has to be difficult:

All true facts there, although I don't like the tone of that last sentence.

Kershaw's road ERA is 1.57 this year -- HOW'S THAT FOR YA, CARD GEN???? WHAT'S YOUR ROAD ERA????

Back to my happy place. Another card that makes me pleased. It's one of the Dodgers' untouchables, 18-year-old Julio Urias, all purpley.

The key happy zone points: It's an untouchable prospect, it's his first Bowman card, and it's purple "duh". All three mean I could probably sell this card for obscene amounts of money and buy MLB with the profits. Ho, ho! Goodbye DH! Goodbye interleague! Goodbye Diamondbacks!

Oh, you don't know how close I put this in the "unhappy" category for that stupid white cap. (I believe this was his 4th of July start against the Mets).

But I can't get too mad at autographs, even sticker ones. And I still like Rubby De La Rosa cards even if he hasn't pitched for the Dodgers in quite awhile. So, yup, this card is a happy one.

One more happy, even though I don't know who this is. I typed "Jeremy Rathien" into the search engine and got all these links to a cyclist. Then I realized it's a "J" not an "I". I've really got to start paying attention to low level baseball (yeah, I'll get right on that).

Happy points: It's autograph card. It's on-card. It does a cool orangey thing when it's scanned because the card is really silver. Wee! Happy!

OK, that's it for happy. I was starting to get too giddy there over a Panini card.

Let's move on to unhappy.

What the hell?

This card isn't from Kenny. This card is from three posts ago!!!!

Ah ... I know what happened here.

The boys back in NOC productions heard "unhappy" and automatically uploaded a card of Kevin Brown. Heh. They know me so well.

But back to a card from Cervin' Up Cards:

Sure, it's a CardGen card and that's always key. But it's also of Chad Billingsley (the Topps Series 2 card up top was also in the package). Billingsley's disappearance just makes me sad. He's been gone for so long, I think he's retired half the time. Also, if he was around, the Dodgers wouldn't be having this season-long problem with the back-end of their rotation.

That's only one unhappy point, but it's a very big one.

Anytime I start ripping a Panini card, I should remind myself what Tri-Star used to do with cards. This looks so terrible it cancels out the 10/25 stamped number on the back. Also, it looks far better scanned. In person I feel like I need to turn on every light in the house to get a good look at the card.

OK, here's Panini now. Unhappy factors: No logos, no nicknames. What team is this? Why do I have to look it up? That helmet is not a baseball helmet. It looks like a pottery class mistake. And, of course, silver overload belongs in 1998. But, woooooooooooo, prospect!

And now we move from unhappy, to merely confused.

Bowman Platinum always does it to me.

I'll never understand Bowman Platinum. It's not for me. Every card looks like each player is a refrigerator magnet stuck on one of those walk-in freezers. I'm just a green-grass guy.

The design is strange this year, too, reminds me of some of those Pinnacle mid-90s sets. Ol' Bowman Platinum is poking Alex Guerrero in the butt. Hasn't he had enough trouble this year?

Of course, generally speaking, all of these cards make me happy.

Because they're cards I didn't have but do now!

Those are the best. Everything else is just a card collector being a card collector.