Out of necessity arrives a contest

I found one of those pink slips in my mailbox earlier this week that said there was a package waiting for me. It took me a day to get down there, but this giant thing finally made it into the doorway.

The box is from Rob, known as steelehere on this blog and on his old one that stopped operating some time ago. I've shown you some of the things he sent me in the last two posts. He said he needed to downsize and thought I might be able to use some of the items inside either for my own collection or trade material.

Well, here's the thing. I just got back from another trip to the post office to send off a few card packages. It took me weeks to get those packages assembled, packaged and shipped. And there are stacks of trades behind that. I have a list of 20-25 people long. I really don't have the time for any more trades at this particular point.

So I decided a contest might be the way to go. I took some things out of the box that will be good for some trades in process. And I saved some items for myself. And the rest will be sent out to the winner of the contest.

But before I get to the contest, let's see what I'm keeping.

A couuple of Dodger items, of course. The drawing of Carlton resting his arm on Koufax is a little too weird for me. But Koufax is Koufax.

A bunch of inserts from 2010 and 2011 Topps. I need all of these. And by "need," I mean it fills a hole that I had forgotten about four years ago. But it's so hard to let go.

This is from the Topps reprint set from 2001, I believe. I was never fully aware of the set until somebody just last week showed these on their blog (I'm sorry, I forgot who). And then they fall out of the box. Funny how that happens.

Reading material from back in the day. These should be entertaining. Ron Luciano, who I've mentioned grew up in my hometown, would have completely overshadowed Joe West if they umped at the same time. Twitter wouldn't even know who Joe West was.

This is the famed Jason Varitek rookie card. It's also the card that caused Varitek to decline to sign a deal with Topps, leading to no Varitek cards in Topps sets until 2007. I'm not sure what the story is behind this card, but the intrigue is good enough for me to want it in my collection.

 Tim Wallach rookie card from 1982 Fleer. As you know, I don't care about rookies. But I will always take a 1982 Fleer card I don't already have. Sorry Tim Wallach Collector.

Penny sleeves! There's no way I will ever run out of these, but just to be sure, let's throw another 100 on the pile.

A Sandy Koufax bobblehead! These were given out this season, so it's pretty cool I have one in my hot little hands already. I love the scoreboard in the background. It commemorates Koufax's perfect game in 1965.

I will add this bobblehead to the one of "The Infield" that steelehere sent earlier. And now there is officially no more room for bobbleheads in my abode.

OK, so that's about all I'm keeping, except for a few items that I'll mention when we get to the contest portion of the post.

And speaking of that, this is the contest portion of the post!

Let's see what you're playing for:

Some shiny Bryces. Remember when he was all clean-cut and non-smudgy? Yeah, me neither. But these can be yours.

A bunch more inserts from 2010-11. I think I might need some of those Turkey Reds. But too late. I've already earmarked them for the contest.

Wooo! Look at all the minis! These are the Kimball minis that I don't collect because I'm an A&G snob. So these are available, along with five more I couldn't fit on the scanner.

This is yet another insert set from the mid-1990s, this one from 1995 Fleer. I'm not keeping this one, not because it's only two cards away from being complete, but because I detest the 1990s phenomenon of featuring one player on the front and one on the back, as this set does. It should be one card per player, unless you're going to split them up in tiny boxes like the prospect cards back in the day.

Oooh, inserts. Canseco in a Yankee uniform. They can all be yours.

Superstars of the NBA. I saved a couple of Kareem cards for myself because he appears on the only NBA set I ever collected, from the late '70s. But I have no more need for basketball cards in my life.

Fancy basketball and numbered hockey. I almost kept the Modano card for meself. But that would be selfish.

Some notable rookies. The Greenwell card is the tiffany version. You're just lucky there were two Gubiczas, because I needed one.

A few more notable cards.

These are pretty cool. They're placards from past major card shows that I guess they gave to VIPs or exhibitors or something (I'm not cool enough to go to major card shows). In any event the placards feature a card embedded into it. These are two hockey ones.

Here are a couple football.

And here are two from each Chicago baseball team.

I saved one or two of these for myself and some others are going out in trade packages. But all six above will go in the contest package.

Golf cards. I don't know anyone who collects golf, but all of these guys are the best of the best. That's some guy named Tiger in the top left corner.

This dude is all over the World Series and he's a red parallel. I should put this on ebay right now. But it's going in the contest.

Last item. It's a relic card of Mariano Rivera.

I think there's a few other things that I'll throw in there that I didn't show, too.

To enter here is what you must do:

You need to leave a comment on this post with your guess of the combined batting average for the Royals and Mets in Game 4 of the World Series. Game 4 is scheduled for Saturday. Therefore, I will leave the window open for entering the contest until 3 p.m. eastern time on Saturday. Nothing filed after that time will be considered an entry.

Whoever gets closest to the combined batting average without going over, is the winner.

And I'll package up those items and send them off, hopefully before Christmas.

But if it doesn't get there until Christmas, what a Christmas present.

Thanks, steelehere, for thinking of me in your downsizing mission.

We all do what we must, don't we?