Blog bat around: one of a kind

This card arrived in the first mailing I ever received from Wes, the nationally renowned card provider for many card-loving bloggers. It's impressive in its own right but merely hinted at what was to come.

Bloggers are paying their respects to Wes of Area 40 (and formerly of Jaybarkerfan's Junk) as he's departing from the hobby scene for the most part. I thought I'd offer my thoughts, too. Wes' ability to buy boxes upon boxes upon boxes is impressive but his generosity is even more so and really the lesson for us cardboarders.

The first mailing from Wes arrived in January 2012 after Night Owl Cards was declared "blog of the year." Wes used to hold a contest on his old blog allowing people to vote for the card blog of the year. I won four years running, although I think Wes held the contest for only three years.

Wes then sent out cards to the winner. The first prize package was impressive enough with the shiny Archives Jackie and a hard-to-reach Kershaw Lineage foil:

The following year I was declared Blog of the Year on Jaybarker Fan's Junk once again and another card package arrived in the mail.

It's difficult to recall what came in that package mostly because while I received that package, Wes was also bombing me with random PWEs that contained stuff like this:

Yes, a relic of my favorite Dodger from the 1980s.

In my experience, Wes is the king of relic card sends. He's sent me a bunch of Dodger relics over the years and I managed to scrape up most of what he's sent:

I am fairly certain that Wes has contributed at least one-fifth, if not one-fourth of all the Dodger relic cards that I own.

But even with that, his relic-card sending can't match his serial-numbered card sending.

Once he sent me a package that contained 19 different serial-numbered Dodger cards. But that was nothing.

In the spring of 2014, I received a monster package of cards from him, containing every kind of night owl want and desire. Among that vast quantity of cards that took me two days to go through and even longer to absorb were 80 serial-numbered cards.

80!

I scanned all of them for a super-long post that seemed insane to compose but isn't nearly as insane as sending them all to one lonely Dodger collector in a remote outpost.

That same year I was voted Blog of the Year for a third straight year and Wes sent me a package for a third straight year.

That was my favorite card from THAT Wes package.

Later that year, Wes announced he was closing up shop on his blog and he took that occasion to send out several "farewell packages." Wes wasn't gone for long but he didn't take back the cards he sent.

Here are a couple cool ones from that package:

In 2016, Wes formed a "Supertraders" group of bloggers and I was included, even though I don't buy nearly the number of cards that other collectors do and therefore don't have the inventory. That didn't matter to Wes. He sent me a package.

Nifty cards came out of it.

Then he sent me another one.

More nifty cards.

The nice element of Wes' card packages is, sure, they can feature "hits," but there are other cool cards contained within, too, some that I value much more than hits. Here is an example of some of those:

And yet, those very same packages contain some crazy stuff as well.

During Christmas of 2016 I received what would be my penultimate card package from Wes. I had the dumb luck of landing Wes as my Secret Santa. There is no better person in the world to have as your Secret Santa.

That was the package that yielded 19 serial-numbered cards.

I also got a chromed-up Adrian Beltre Bowman rookie card.

And, gee golly, this thing:

The heaviest "trading card" I own.

Because you never know what you would find in a card package from Wes.

You.

Just.

Never.

Know.

And with that, I thought I'd show my top 5 favorite cards I've received from Wes. Yes, that's right, I still haven't shown any of those yet.


FIVE

There are some things that are amusing, obnoxious and impressive all at the same time. The Momentous Material cards from Topps is one of those things. I snicker inside every time I see this card: the title, the expanse of cloth. But it is a very well-designed card of one of my favorite recent Dodgers, numbered to a paltry amount. It's wonderful in the most in-your-face way possible.


FOUR

When I was in fifth grade, I knew this kid who thought the members of Kiss were gods. There were a lot of kids like that, there was nothing more popular than Kiss in 1976. But this kid was a little bit from the wrong side of the tracks and I got the feeling he didn't have a lot in his life. He really, really liked Kiss, like he might've thought they would jet down from space and take him away from his lot in life. I wonder what I could have gotten from him for this card. He liked the Oakland A's and New York Jets, too. I bet I could get every Reggie Jackson and Joe Namath card he owned for this.


THREE

Al Oliver played 35 games for the Dodgers. That's it. Out of 18 seasons in the major leagues, he played 35 games for L.A. in 1985. Yet, somehow, Donruss is making me believe that it secured a piece of cloth from a uniform that Oliver wore for one of those 35 games. OK, I'll believe you. Because believing that makes this one of the greatest relic cards I own.


TWO

I have shown this "card" many times just because it fascinates me so. Long before they were inserting dirt into cards and issuing 45 different parallels of a single card, they placed images of cards on porcelain. You could put your frosty mug on this card and the coffee table would not be harmed.


ONE

Wes has not sent too many autographed cards to me, but the ones he sent made me sit up and take notice. Kirby Higbe is not a name you hear a lot in the game, even though he was a key pitcher for the Dodgers in the '40s. He's a bit of a nefarious character in the chronicles of baseball but that makes this all the more cool. I am no fan of cut signatures, but if they are presented correctly, I will let my bias go. And I am letting it go for this card. Wes sent this to me for Christmas of 2015. It was a happy Christmas.

Those are probably my five favorites, although those could change with every new day of the calendar.

I'm fortunate enough that there are other collectors besides Wes who have bestowed me with tremendous and mind-blowing card packages. From stuff that appeared to come straight from the vintage vault, to people purging their collections onto me, to people sending entire filled binders in the mail.

Wes is not unique in what he sent or even in the volume sent.

He IS one-of-a-kind in how often he's done it and for how many different collectors.

Thanks bud. Enjoy your step back from the hobby and stepping into the rest of your life. It's been fun.