I Think You Know What You’re About To Read By Now

With all this talk of trade posts, I haven’t even touched on anything that’s happening in baseball these days.  How about them playoffs?  Game 162 was one of the most exciting nights of baseball I remember seeing (from afar).  All I could do is follow on Yahoo and then catch the headlines later.  But if it was exciting in text, imagine what would have happened watching the live feed.

The first round of the playoffs went down to the wire almost across the board, which was great to see as well – through twitter updates this time.  I don’t get to watch tons of TV, I’m afraid, and when I do it’s not sports unless the wife is gone.  The only sad part of the division series is the Brewers/Cardinals match-up. Who do I want to win the NLCS?  The Rangers, that’s who.  If I must pick one, I guess it’s the Brewers, but only because the Cardinals should have no success in a general sense, and honestly have no business being in the playoffs this year anyway.  If we’re sending a team over to the AL, make it the Cardinals, not the Astros.

Here’s hoping the rest of the playoffs continue to be so exciting.  Tonight’s walk off grand slam for the Rangers seems to indicate they will.

Welp, that’s done!  On to the trade!

This trade with Spankee of My Cardboard Mistress spurred from a personal rarity.  He posted some trade bait and I actually was the first to comment!  I don’t always even get to read posts until days later, so this was quite serendipitous.  You’ll see that card later (or now if you scroll way down, but you wouldn’t do that, would you?).

His Airness, literally

As you can imagine, I don’t get too many basketball cards in my trades from bloggers.  I guess this technically isn’t one either.  Still, I will always accept Michael Jordan cards, especially ones I don’t have (which is the vast majority of them past 1996).  If the greatest player to ever live wasn’t so prohibitively expensive, I would actively collect the man again.  I’ll wait until I make a six figure salary to officially add him.

8th version of this card placed in the binder

I am dangerously close to the Chrome rainbow.  All I’m missing now is the regular refractor, surprisingly, and the Gold numbered out of 50.   I don’t think it’s unusual that this x-fractor has eluded me since I didn’t buy tons of retail chrome.  Trades like this are integral to prevent me from $1 ebaying myself to death.

Why is the artist uncredited?

It’s a shame that Frank wasn’t able to hit his 500th home run as a member of the White Sox.  It’s also a shame it didn’t much attention.  Jim Thome’s 600th is probably an apt comparison in my mind.  I could be wrong.  The obvious juicers had ruined it for everyone by this point.  At least there’s this sketch from Ginter.

I wonder if this jersey is authentic

Here was a cool unannounced surprise.  If you haven’t seen them, but there are repacks out there that also promise a special jersey card.  Sometimes you can see the jersey card you’ll get and I think sometimes they’re hidden inside, but this is what those value packs may be talking about.  The back says that Vintage Sports Cards obtained this from Upper Deck.  The jersey feels rough and coarse, but that could be the backing used.  There are also a couple of red threads in there, and I have no idea where that would have come from.  Let’s say that I have my doubts, but all jerseys could be fake.  I still highly enjoy the novelty of this oversized thing if nothing else.

"Don't smoke kids. Love, Tony"

I’ve shown a couple cards with Gwynn facsimile on here before.  This is a lot closer to the autograph you’ll find on card releases.  You’ll see what I mean.  Just give it time. I love how I’m teasing a card that likely I’m only truly excited about.  I have the regular, I have the silver signature now, anyone out there have a gold signature they want to part with?

I'll let the card speak for itself

Here’s what I anxiously commented on.  I kept my fingers crossed that I actually got my “dibs” in first and that I would be able to find enough to land it.  My first, and currently still only, Tony Gwynn relic.  Man does it look nice.  I’m sorry to anyone I got the jump on, but this will stay a tent pole of my Gwynn collection.

Thank you very much to Spankee for the great trade.  Hopefully we can do it again sometime soon.  I think most of you guys have discovered his blog by now, but if you’re not following it you should be.  Go now. I have nothing more for you people tonight anyway.