The Trading Post #126: A Cracked Bat (Part 2: Not as Shiny)

As we saw in Part 1, I have a strong affinity for shiny cards, but regular cards, including those dripping with gold foil, have a place in my collection too. That brings us to Part 2 of a recent shipment from Julie at A Cracked Bat, featuring cards printed on regular card stock but no less awesome or less new to my collection.

2017 Topps Bunt Vapor #V-CG Carlos Gonzalez

I purchased some 2017 Topps BUNT when it was for sale at Target, but I didn't manage to pull any cards as rare as this purple Vapor insert of Carlos Gonzalez. It's numbered to /99 right on the front, and shares equal scarcity with inserts featuring two other background designs, Splatter and Galaxy.

I still have the BUNT app on my iPhone, but I haven't opened it in months. Like most of the BUNT set, this card ties in to the digital app, as the back includes a scratch-off area with a code to redeem a digital version within the app itself. Unfortunately, Topps didn't give collectors much time to do that, as the unscratched code expired in December 2017.

Luckily, in case you missed that short deadline, Topps included a paragraph to keep detail-oriented collectors like me happy. We're told about how CarGo closed out May 2012, which included a game with three home runs, followed the day after with a shot in the first inning. That feat has totally slipped under the radar, and all because he had a night of rest. He'd be immortalized in baseball history with Scooter Gennett and Mark Whiten if he had hit all four of those in a single game.

2017 Topps Fire #175 Nolan Arenado

Those BUNT inserts could easily be confused with Topps Fire, but Fire went a little bit more over the top. This trade package as a whole represented my first-ever look at the set, and here's an example of a base card after the couple parallels and inserts from Part 1. The little light spots all over the card are supposed to be sparks rising in a column of smoke, but they look a little more like a starfield to me, giving this card a very sci-fi look. Maybe something out of one of the Thor movies.

Topps also went with a selective color look here, desaturating Nolan Arenado's skin tones while leaving his purple uniform intact. They also left the 2017 Spring Training patch on his right sleeve alone, the burnt orange of the Arizona desert distracting a little bit from every possible Rockies color.

2018 Topps Fire #164 Charlie Blackmon

We'll see plenty more of Nolan later, but here's how Topps Fire evolved with the 2018 set. I still have a pretty small sample size with Topps Fire, so I'm not sure how much the card backgrounds vary from card to card. The few I've seen each look pretty unique, though. If you ask me, they look a lot like recent Diamond Kings, especially the Aurora inserts. Charlie's beard is as wild as the background, and Topps gave us a little more right-sleeve patch action, this time with the Rockies' 25th Anniversary patch.

Along with teammate David Dahl, Blackmon got hitched after the 2018 season concluded (no, not to each other), and Dahl and Blackmon will be the starting corner infielders this year, as the Rockies appear not to be pursuing Carlos Gonzalez in free agency. That will give Ian Desmond responsibility in center field. He does have experience in position #8, but not in an outfield as large as Coors Field's. He's been a disappointment at the plate, so hopefully he can turn things around. Seeing Ian Desmond and Daniel Murphy coming in to basically replace CarGo and DJ LeMahieu will take some getting used to.

1996 Donruss Press Proofs #224 Dante Bichette /2000

Dante Bichette was always more of a corner outfield guy himself, but he did play center on occasion. The "loincloth" design element of 1996 Donruss lists him as a Left Fielder. It's an excellent bat rack shot, and you might notice the overall design has a little more gold tint than usual. That's because it's a Press Proof parallel, as noted vertically on the right. That little rectangular medallion in the center gives us the print run of "1st 2,000 Printed", although there is not an actual serial number. It's a rarely-seen variety, and my first example from the 1996 set. I have a couple from 1995, which have appeared on the blog before.

This is a great addition to my collection, and as it turns out, I don't seem to even have the base variety. It will be one of the easier rainbows to complete, as this and the base card are the only two types out there. To find a card that's as rare as a Stadium Club First Day Issue before the regular one seems pretty unusual, especially from a set printed shortly after the overproduction bubble collapsed.

1996 Pacific Gold Crown Die Cuts #DC-29 Dante Bichette

Pacific gave us a similar take on Dante Bichette in 1996, choosing to highlight some of the same stats on the card back as Donruss did, primarily his league-leading stats in home runs and RBIs, and his solid batting average of .340, way above his usual .310. It wasn't quite enough for the Triple Crown, as Mike Piazza was a few points ahead (Piazza was always ruining things for Bichette), and of course Tony Gwynn was heads and shoulders above everyone, way up at .368.

Pacific had it right; it truly was Bichette's "finest season as a pro", and he never eclipsed those numbers. He even came pretty close to the MVP that year, just being edged out by Barry Larkin.

Of course, with Pacific we can always count on some unusual designs, such as this massive die-cut gold crown, which distracts us from the nearly identical photograph they used two years later in 1998 Paramount. It's not the same image, as Bichette is a little later in his follow-through on this one, and 1997's Jackie Robinson patch is nowhere to be found, but that same WGN logo at Wrigley field is peeking in on the lower right.

Sadly, 2019 will be the final year the Cubbies will be broadcast on WGN. They're starting up a new regional sports network in 2020, to be known as Marquee. In their perpetual short-sightedness, the league and the teams are alienating their local fans, especially those wanting nothing to do with cable TV. Cubs day games being broadcast on WGN, which was once in an affordable basic-cable tier, allowed many of us young fans to watch games after school, and is probably why there are Cubs fans everywhere.

I've written about this before, and I think in this day and age when attention is more and more valuable, locking your content behind a paywall with ever-increasing fees is going to force plenty of people to simply look elsewhere. I've even heard marketing pundits compare it to boxing. It's not that boxing is gone, but it's not a thing that everyone listens to on the radio like they did in the 1930s. And if there is another strike in 2021, MLB is going to have an awful time trying to get those fans back.

Anyway, that's enough pontificating about media distribution for now. The whole point of this blog is to pontificate about baseball cards.

1996 Pacific Estrellas Latinas #EL-11 Andres Galarraga

Julie found another one from Pacific's Estrellas Latinas insert set to go along with Vinny Castilla's card that arrived just a few posts ago. That's a complete team set from this 36-card insert set. Granted, it's just two cards, but that's not bad for a set I had no idea even existed a few months ago.

Now that I have two to compare, it's clear that the gold pattern in the background is identical across the whole set. The card back has the Spanish paragraph with an English translation as usual with Pacific, which means we get to see Andres Galarraga's nickname in two languages, "el Gato Grande" and "The Big Cat". We're also told he stole 12 bases in 1995, not something one would expect for someone with a nickname like that.

2015 Topps Mini Black #442 Tyler Matzek /10

Tyler Matzek was found throughout Topps sets for a while, but he's completely fallen off the radar, as he hasn't pitched in the Majors since 2015. The back paragraph refers to him as a "one-time Minor League 'wild man'", so maybe those tendencies crept back in. Still, he also got a card in 2015 Topps, which means he got a card in 2015 Topps Mini, along with all its extra-rare parallels. This Black parallel is numbered to a mere 10 copies.

If you can believe it, this isn't even the rarest card Julie has ever sent me. I once received a 2014 Stadium Club Members Only parallel from her. It's a bit of a guessing game on those but there are probably just seven out there. Short of just sending me a printing plate, that's about as rare as it gets.

The 2015 flagship design will be remembered for being a bridge between the solid-color borders Topps used throughout their history and the quasi-full-bleed designs we have today. Night Owl ranked it at the very top of this decade's designs, and it's definitely memorable.

2018 Topps Gypsy Queen #65 Trevor Story

Topps has finally decided that "Gypsy Queen" takes up too much space on a design, so they just shortened it to GQ. They did this on autograph cards last year, and the change has now arrived on the main set. I don't think I've ever bought a pack of the stuff, yet I am pretty sure I have something from every year it's been out. 2018's design is a bit more modern-looking than some past years, and I actually like this quite a bit. I particularly like the photo of Trevor Story flinging a ball toward first base while nonchalantly blowing a bubble. That's how routine it is for him.

Not even a retro design like Gypsy Queen is immune to Sabermetrics, as the card back mentions that Story had 11 Defensive Runs Saved last season, tops for NL shortstops. That paragraph resides above a little gold-colored plaque with the Gypsy Queen name in it.

2018 Topps '83 Topps Blue #83-76 Ryan McMahon

Story has a locked-in starting gig, but Ryan McMahon's future with the Rockies is uncertain. He'll probably be a utility player for some time to come, and he's got some big shoes to fill if he wants to play on the right side of the diamond with some big names ahead of him. In fact, the Rockies recently signed Mark Reynolds to a Minor League deal, and he has plenty of experience playing first base at Coors. The young prospect, though he looks good on this 1983 design, has his work cut out for him.

2018 marked the 35th anniversary of the '83 design, and Topps honored it with a 100-card insert set featuring current and retired players, along with the usual slew of colored parallels. This is obviously the blue one. It's the continuation of the 30th Anniversary 1987 cards printed in 2017. Julie has sent me those, too. I still haven't purchased any, but Topps is using the 1984 design on their Anniversary cards this year.

Speaking of, I'm just a few weeks away from my own 35th Anniversary, so to speak. I was born the same year Don Mattingly's rookie card was leaving the Topps factories.

2018 Topps MLB Awards #MLBA-23 Nolan Arenado

Half the size of the '83 Anniversary set, Topps put out a 50-card MLB Awards insert set to honor 2017's top performers. To no one's surprise, including Topps', Nolan Arenado added another Gold Glove to his trophy case. At the time, it was his fifth, and he won a sixth for his 2018 campaign. As Topps says, "there's little drama associated with the announcement". His Defensive Runs Saved count reached 20, and he was credited with 57 completely subjective "Good Fielding Plays".

The design is a bit unnecessarily busy, but the photo selection is appropriate for a defense-focused card of maybe the best defender in the game right now.

2018 Score #13 Nolan Arenado

He's great at the plate, too. Panini recognized that, and added Nolan to the 2018 Score set, yet another of the many legacy Pinnacle brands they have resurrected. They took a page from 1989 Fleer and many others in editing the bat to extend outside the frame, and we can also see soon-to-be center fielder Ian Desmond in the on-deck circle.

I'm a little disappointed, because if there's one thing I associate with Score, it's the novel-length write-ups found on the card backs. This one has a bit about his rate of home runs per at bat, massively higher than the average big-leaguer, especially with runners in scoring position.

Someday I will read all my old Score cards. I can only imagine the gems hiding in there. For example, I just learned that Jim Clancy, #424 in the 1990 Score set and then an Astro, was the first Blue Jay to reach 100 wins with the club. He remains third on the all-time Jays win list, behind Dave Steib and Roy Halladay. Interestingly, and perhaps unsurprisingly, no Rockie pitcher has reached that milestone yet. The current leader is Jorge De La Rosa, with 86.

1990 Score #424 Jim Clancy (Reverse)

That's what a Score card should look like. Yes, I realize that Clancy's write-up is shorter than most, but that's because Score included his complete career stats, something Topps did for the 2019 set to everyone's appreciation.

2018 Panini Chronicles #35 Nolan Arenado

By the way, that Score card isn't actually a main set. It's a 30-card insert set for this one, 2018 Panini Chronicles. Like the Score insert, it uses the same photo front and back, although we do get a different write up on the base card. Nolan doesn't just rack up Gold Gloves, but also Silver Sluggers, and he's becoming so feared a hitter that the number of walks he's drawn has been increasing steadily, as this card tell us.

If I collected other sports, I'd probably know Panini's lineup better. After all, they have the exclusive license for both the NBA and NFL. Baseball seems like it's getting more niche all the time, and Panini has the licenses for both the most popular sports league in the USA, and also the one with the best-known players. Not a single MLB player is on ESPN's 100 most famous athletes, not even the generational superstars like Mike Trout, or the flashy crowd-pleasers like Yasiel Puig.

2018 Topps Heritage New Age Performers #NAP-14 Nolan Arenado

Topps has kept the New Age Performer insert set going with Heritage for a while, usually offering some funky hippie fonts to take us back to the late 1960s. When I saw this card, I thought of another particular card of his that I thought was a New Age Performer, but it was actually something from Topps Archives.

2018 Topps Archives #66 Wade Davis

There are a couple pages of 2008 Heritage in my collection, and a real 1959 Topps Robin Roberts card, my first-ever vintage card, so I am a little familiar with this design. At first glance, I thought it was Heritage, but Wade Davis hadn't quite hit the big leagues in '08. So that leaves Topps Archives again, and they changed the card stock just enough where I can't pick it out by feel anymore.

This marks Wade Davis' first appearance on the blog. He was a bit shaky in his closer role, something I witnessed firsthand in 2018, but he still led the NL with 43 saves. He was a "door-slamming fireman" more often than not, but six blown saves is not great. We'll see if he can stay atop the NL leaderboard in 2019.

1994 Fleer Extra Bases #246 Greg Harris

The final cards of this post are from yet another new-to-me set, the oversized Fleer Extra Bases. It's a monster 400-card set that I never knew existed, and I have no idea how you'd store that many cards like this. The width is exactly what we're used to, but they're about an inch taller. I guess it would fit in 9-pocket pages if you just leave the top row empty and use 50% more pages.

The aspect ratio allows for some unique cropping, but I am pretty sure there are no horizontal cards to be found. The usual Rockies of the inaugural era turned up, as well as Greg Harris, who is also making his debut on Infield Fly Rule. This gentleman is Greg W. Harris, not to be confused with his ambidextrous contemporary, Greg A. Harris, who played for Boston at the time.

Fleer tells us that Harris "has the ability to be one of the Rockies' top pitchers." That may have been true, but Harris did not fare well in two seasons with the Rockies. He went 1-8 in 1993, and technically improved his win percentage in 1994 by going 3-12. His career ended a year later, his career cut short by a botched surgery, but he ended up winning a lawsuit against his doctor. Quite the crazy story.

He became a Rockie via a trade with the Padres, who also sent Bruce Hurst to the Rockies. Hopes were high, but Hurst's best years were behind him. He only appeared in three games as a Rockie, and he was one of many players whose careers ended with the 1994 strike.

This has gone down as the worst trade in Rockies history, as they shipped Brad Ausmus, Doug Bochtler, and Andy Ashby off to San Diego. Believe it or not, Ashby was the PTBNL in this one.

At least they got it out of the way early.

1994 Fleer Extra Bases Second Year Stars #15 David Nied

We'll close with another chapter in Rockies pitching busts, the first overall pick in the Rockies/Marlins expansion draft, David Nied. Rumor has it that the Atlanta Braves chose to protect Deion Sanders over Nied in the draft, but they were none too happy with Neon Deion after he split time between the Braves and NFL's Atlanta Falcons during the 1992 Postseason. The latest episode of 30 for 30 tells that story brilliantly.

Anyway, the Rockies have had problems with pitching literally since day one. That reality has changed, and the perception is starting to change, as well. But despite what Fleer says, Nied didn't turn out to be a Second Year Star. Elsewhere in this 20-card insert set, you'll find a few Marlins from the expansion draft, including Jeff Conine and Trevor Hoffman. Also in that set are Mike Piazza, Pedro Martinez, and Tim Salmon. Nied is the lone Rockie.

It's a good design, though, and you can find this filmstrip theme in various Stadium Club inserts. The four images on the left aren't actually any different. Rather, they're just progressively zoomed-in. It looks similar on the back, but with a slant.

Julie included lots of the Blake Street Bomber guys with this stack of Extra Bases cards, but based on who I got in the insert set, I chose to take a darker path and get a feel for how bumpy the pitching really was in those early days.

Some of these sets are so new I just haven't had a chance to buy them yet. But Julie has some sort of magic way of unearthing surprises even for this seasoned collector.