The Trading Post #8: A Cracked Bat

I mentioned recently that Jared of Catching up with Collecting forwarded a few Rockies cards from Julie at A Cracked Bat that were meant for me. They took a circuitous route to get to me, but arrive safely they did. That makes Julie the first blogger with a repeat appearance in "The Trading Post" series, though I do have one more pending.

Julie's first trade package included several cards from 1994 Pinnacle, but one must have missed the boat.

1994 Pinnacle #103 Jerald Clark

Outfielder Jerald Clark appears here in a great "at the wall" shot in the old Mile High Stadium, complete with Bronco Orange plastic seats. When they tore down that stadium, they sold off most of the seats to collectors; it's not uncommon to find a pair in various finished basements across the Denver area.

Close examination of this card shows a fan wearing a Buffaloes sweatshirt, the mascot of my alma mater, The University of Colorado. Denver-area sports are quite well-represented on this card, along with a very prominent Cubs logo.

Julie threw in a small handful of early 2000s cards, including what I believe to be only my second card of catcher Ben Petrick.

2001 Stadium Club #173 Ben Petrick

Petrick made an appearance in the 2002 Topps base set, but I am fairly certain that I don't have any others. I'm not much of a player collector, but doubling the size of a PC in one shot is always nice.

I recall Ben Petrick signing autographs on the first base side at Coors Field before one Rockies game, but there were just one or two fans ahead of me when he left for the dugout. Just as well, because I surely didn't have a card of him handy.

Next, one which is a little older than I thought at first glance, but it's just a year after Larry Walker made a pretty serious run at the Triple Crown in 1997.

1998 Leaf Rookies & Stars #52 Larry Walker

I've never purchased a pack of 1998 Leaf Rookies & Stars, but I've managed to acquire quite a few cards from that set. It turns up surprisingly frequently in discount boxes and bulk purchases. The Blake Street Bombers were a sight to see in the mid- to late-90s, and Walker might have been the best of the bunch. He had quite an arm, too.

The bulk of this package consisted of 1994 Bowman. This was shortly before seemingly every Bowman card in production had a black border with an uninspired design, but it's still chock full of players I've never heard of. The more things change, the more things stay the same.

1994 Bowman #404 Mike Zolecki (RC)

This is an appropriate design for the era. As we all know, gold foil (which doesn't scan well) was all the rage. Mike Zolecki was drafted by the Rockies in 1993, but never made it to The Show.

1994 Bowman #356 John Burke (FOIL)

John Burke, on the other hand, did spend a couple years in the Majors, but the reason I am featuring his card is for the "FOIL" subset, which can be identified by a different back and the slightly raised imprint of the Rockies team logo on the front. Bowman reserved this style for some of the more promising players and superstars in the set, and it really is pretty eye-catching, even for 1994.

One last thing I noticed while thumbing through these cards was a strangely long-looking name on Ellis Burks' card.

1994 Bowman #414 Ellis Burks (UER)

Bowman was so busy making cards of players that never made it out of Double-A that they threw in an extra letter on Burks' card, misspelling his first name "Ellkis". As us techie types tend to notice, "K" is quite near "I" on a QWERTY keyboard, so it was probably a simple typo. This error was not corrected, and his name is spelled correctly on the back. I love finding little details like this!

Thanks to Julie for the cards, and a Happy Thanksgiving to all my readers!