The Trading Post #174: Dime Boxes (Part 3: Shiny)

One year later, I'll finally be wrapping up the longest post series ever. I've had this last little pile of goodies set aside from Nick's 10th anniversary over at Dime Boxes, which has now moved houses with me in the same little team bag.

But wait, you might say. Didn't Nick just celebrate his 12th blog anniversary with another giveaway? Yes, yes he did. And I have a whole new stack of cards on my desk related to that, which I hope to get to before his 13th. 

No promises.

But even with all the changes over the past year, weekends in mid-January still mean NFL playoffs, which make for some of my favorite background content while writing these posts. 

What completely escaped my attention several days ago is that somehow I just passed my own tenth blog anniversary! As of the 15th, apparently I've kept this little thing going for a full decade. And looking back on my first-ever post, it was pretty much just an explanation about how Nick got me started on this whole thing in the first place.

We have truly come full-circle.

2002 Topps Chrome Traded #T68 Sandy Alomar Jr.

What hasn't changed in the past decade is my love for shiny cards. Part 3 of this blog series that has sprawled across the biggest period of change in my life will focus on the shiny, or at least the serially-numbered.

If any of my readers play the daily baseball-themed puzzle game Immaculate Grid, take note of the above card for the next time Cleveland and Colorado intersect. Sandy Alomar, Jr., the 1990 AL Rookie of the Year (also a useful bit of info) briefly stopped by 20th & Blake for 38 games in 2002, as documented on this Topps Traded card. A true "Short-Term Stop", to borrow Nick's phrase.

Alomar was well into a lengthy career by 2002, so the short paragraph on the card back only has room to simply tell us that the White Sox traded the veteran catcher to the Rockies for Enemencio Pacheco, a pitching prospect who never progressed past Triple-A.

Speaking of the White Sox, the team where Alomar spent the second-longest portion of his career, I recently learned of a documentary available on YouTube called Last Comiskey. I've only watched one of three parts so far, but it offers a look at the 1990 White Sox season, their last in the original Comiskey Park.

2017 Finest Breakthroughs #FB-NA Nolan Arenado

Turning to 2017, when Nolan Arenado still covered the hot corner for the Rockies, we come to the Topps Finest insert set "Breakthroughs".

As best I can tell, this set was unique to 2017, but it absolutely has the look and feel of a mid-90s insert set, something like Power Zone from Stadium Club. It has all the elements. Huge block lettering in all capitals, an eye catching star pattern suitable for a comic book panel, a team logo that is bursting through an area of fractured rock or broken glass, and a close-up action shot. The player's name and the Topps Finest logo are squeezed into the corners like a mere afterthought.

How can you not love something like this?

The theme does actually have a point, in that the card back gives us the player's "Breakthrough Moment". One of Nolan's mentioned was his second-ever Major League home run, a grand slam off of Cy Young winner David Price in early 2013.

2017 Topps Chrome #92 Trevor Story

I'm not sure where Nick found all this 2017 Topps Chrome, but he sent me a base card that could possibly have come from the same pack as that great Arenado insert card. 

Six years ago to the day, the Refractor version of this Trevor Story card appeared on the blog in The Trading Post #112, and then the Prism Refractor version about a year later, both courtesy of Julie at A Cracked Bat, whose blog has sadly gone silent.

Surely I am nearing having the rainbow by now, right?

2021 Topps Update Gold #US195 C.J. Cron /2021

To my eye, this C.J. Cron parallel from 2021 looks more bronze than gold, but there's a /2021 serial number to prove that this is indeed the gold parallel, serially numbered with a print run equal to the card's calendar year.

Cron, currently a free agent, finally found a spot to settle down for a few seasons after changing hands like a hot potato. The card back calls it "five homes in five years", bouncing between the Angels, Rays, Twins, and briefly the Tigers, before finally reaching the National League and spending a few seasons in Colorado. The Rockies traded him back to the Angels in late 2023 along with Randal Grichuk in return for a couple pitching prospects.

Guys like that are useful to keep in mind for Immaculate Grid. I can't tell you how many times I should have guessed Nelson Cruz.

2003 Topps Traded Gold #T265 Clint Barmes FY (RC) /2003

Going back to 2003, we find that Topps Gold had a slightly lower print run. Topps oddly decided to document their 52nd Anniversary on the card front, as well as adding a 1st-year Card stamp that I believe is unique to 2003. The Chrome variety of this card has the same stamp in a non-foil version, and I've also seen it on a Hanley Ramirez card.

Thanks to Google Image Search for finding those. This is my 379th post. No one's memory is that good, not even mine.

Prophetically, in The Trading Post #134, I pointed out exactly where on the card back I would expect to find a serial number if I had a rarer version of this Clint Barmes card. Little did I know that one would eventually find its way to me.

2018 Topps Fire Hot Starts Gold #HS-19 Charlie Blackmon

This is not the first gold parallel from 2018 Topps Fire that has been added to my collection. In fact, it's not even the first such card of Charlie Blackmon. For a brand I can't recall ever purchasing at retail, I have a surprising number of Topps Fire cards filling my binders.

This one of Blackmon and his iconic beard is from the Hot Starts insert set, which highlights strong early-season performances. Topps got pretty specific on the card back, pointing out that Blackmon's first seven home runs of 2017 came in a mere 77 plate appearances, good for a "blistering" [note the fire pun] 9.1% Home Run Percentage.

Interestingly, for all you "Coors!" folks, those first seven home runs all came on the road, tying the team mark set by Ian Stewart in 2010. Even Trevor Story's white-hot 2016 debut included some shots at Coors Field. Refer to my prior post in this series for my fond memories of catching at least one of those at Buffalo Wild Wings.

It seems quite rare for the Rockies to play at home on Opening Day. Their home opener is usually a few days into the season, and that trend will continue for 2024, scheduled for April 5th, on what would have been my dad's 77th birthday.

The Rockies are indeed known for hot starts. More often than not, April and May is the best time to be a Rockies fan. No wonder I like spring so much. But by the time we reach the All-Star break, the team is usually out of the running.

By the way, we know Blackmon will be a Rockie for at least one more year, but to my knowledge he has not yet announced any plans for retirement.

2016 Donruss Optic Pink #48 Jonathan Gray RR

Jon Gray, who went by Jonathan on this 2016 Panini card, finally got a taste of the World Series and even won his ring with the Texas Rangers last year. If it's not going to be here, at least it's nice to see former Rockies find success somewhere.

In the 2023 Fall Classic, Gray threw 4.2 innings, struck out seven, and even got the win in Game 3 after taking over for Max Scherzer who had to depart with back spasms. That's the perfect way to get around the difficulty Jon Gray often had in the first inning.

This shiny Donruss Optic card is the Pink parallel, unique enough to warrant a second look on this blog, but not rare enough to earn a serial number.

2021 Bowman Chrome Prospect Autographs #CPA-DM Daniel Montano (AU)

Nick was apologetic about this card's condition. He knew I'd enjoy an on-card Rockies autograph, no matter how obscure the player, and I'm glad he threw it in. The blue ink is a little smudged, and though I was able to clean it up somewhat well, I assume it once had something spilled on it. I probably could have done a better job cleaning it, but didn't want to further damage the autograph.

We'll see how Daniel Montano progresses, but he hasn't really spent much time above the High-A level yet and has dropped off the team's top-30 prospects list. It isn't looking too promising. Still, I'll never turn down a shiny autograph.

2020 Topps Chrome Rookie Autographs #RA-DN Dom Núñez (AU)

The final card of this series is another on-card autograph which seems to have made it through the past few years in much better shape. Dom Núñez even cracked the code and made it to the Majors, though unfortunately he put up a -1.0 bWAR over three seasons, and despite showing a bit of pop for a catcher by hitting twelve home runs, he never exceeded a .200 batting average. Even in this day and age where a guy like Luis Arráez can hit .354 and be an extreme outlier, .180 for your career is not going to cut it.

In any case, I do remember seeing Núñez play, and I can at least make out his initials in his signature. I also enjoy the 2020 design. It's one of those designs I got quite familiar with, given how much time I spent on Topps Bunt when nothing was happening in the early years of the pandemic.

It's unlikely I'll ever match my high-water mark from 2015 of 72 posts in a year, but I certainly hope to beat 2023's total of just 6. I'm a third of the way there already, and looking forward to my second decade of baseball card blogging.

Congratulations to Nick on on ten, eleven, and twelve years!

The Trading Post #163: Card Hemorrhage (Part 2: Rockies)

I'm doing my best to pull myself away from the news to write this, but it's clear that 2021 is not getting off to a great start. Needless to say, what happened Wednesday in Washington was abhorrent. So as I eagerly await what I hope are swift and harsh consequences for those responsible, allow me to present this, Part 2 of a recent PWE receipt that arrived from Jay at Card Hemorrhage.

1991 Fleer #307 Dante Bichette

None of the cards found in Part 1 involved any Rockies. They're all reserved for this Part 2, starting with one of the original Blake Street Bombers, Dante Bichette.

Now, it's honestly somewhat rare for me to receive unsolicited cards printed prior to 1993. That was the inaugural season for the Rockies and Marlins, and even in 1993, few brands gave us Rockies pictured in their new uniforms. And I'd imagine that collecting one of the four most recent MLB teams cuts down the incoming duplicates considerably, so there is that benefit if anyone out there ever decides to collect the Marlins.

But Jay knew Rockies history well enough to include a card of Dante Bichette in the visible-from-space 1991 Fleer set. He was a Brewer in 1991 and 1992, but he began his career with the California Angels. He was still pretty young then, and the highlights Fleer gives us on the card back mostly highlight his minor league performance. He had yet to emerge as a power-hitting slugger, but he clearly has the stance and forearm strength to be one.

Note the sliver of the catcher's mitt in the lower left, if you can safely look that near to the yellow borders.

2017 Topps Heritage #96 Gerardo Parra

The 1968 Topps design, used for 2017 Heritage, is much more muted. But there is one little flash of color in Gerardo Parra's neon Franklin batting gloves. I miss having this lefty around. He was a great clubhouse presence, as we saw when he won the 2019 World Series with the Nationals. He played in Japan last year, and it remains to be seen where 2021 will take him.

I do still enjoy this Heritage design, and I've shown it so many times that I just might have a complete team set by now. Maybe 2017 Heritage was just a really big deal for some reason? It's come in from all corners of the country.

2019 Topps Heritage #85 Chris Iannetta

A bit less so with 2019 Heritage. We're skipping a year of Heritage, jumping straight into the 1970 design. I did buy a value pack of it, but haven't seen it as frequently. And the colors here are even quieter. Gray borders, no neon sports apparel, just a little yellow and dark red in the lettering.

A stern-looking Chris Iannetta (with his name spelled correctly), looks ready for the most boring game of catch ever. He hung up the catchers mitt after the 2019 season, retiring as a Rockie.

2019 Topps Heritage #256 David Dahl

David Dahl recently signed with the Texas Rangers, but maybe we haven't seen the last of him in Denver. Iannetta played elsewhere in the league before returning to the Rockies, so perhaps Dahl will do the same someday.

The card back has his minor-league stats going all the way back to the Pioneer League in 2012, where he crushed 10 triples and 9 home runs with a .379 average. He clearly rocketed past that step in his minor league development. That's fairly unsurprising, because a lot of these guys who end up in the Majors spent much of their school and minor league careers being the best player around. 

The card back tells us in the little cartoon that Dahl hit his first career grand slam on September 24th, 2018, but it looks like Topps got this wrong. I happened to be there that day, and while Dahl did hit a two-run homer, I don't recall a grand slam. They must have meant his game a couple weeks earlier, September 10th, 2018.

2019 Topps Heritage #253 Kyle Freeland

Our next entrant in the Very Serious Portraits category is the first current Rockie of the post, Kyle Freeland. He was fresh off his stellar 2017 season, in which he earned a 17-7 record with an under-3.00 ERA, the first Rockie to do so. His cartoon on the back shows a batter with a broken bat, as though his fastball is cutting through the wood like a lightsaber. The stat associated with that cartoon is that he only allowed one homer per 50 batters faced, no small feat inside Coors Field.

2020 Topps Heritage #123 Dom Nunez / Sam Hilliard (RC)

This has been a Topps Heritage-heavy post, and the 2020 set will take us across the finish line. It's based on the iconic black-bordered 1971 set, and so far the borders are holding up well. It remains to be seen how much chipping we'll see in the coming years. 2007 Topps hasn't really presented major problems, although the glossy finish of that one might help out. 

This Rookie Stars two-player card features Dom Nunez, who briefly appeared late in the 2019 season, and Sam Hilliard, who has had playing time in 2019 and 2020. This is already Hilliard's third Infield Fly Rule appearance. I'm assuming that this photo was taken at the same shoot as his Turkey Red insert card from 2020 Topps. It might even be the same photo, just edited differently.

As the card back tells us, Dom Nunez became one of the few players to hit a home run in his first Major League at bat. It went into the visitor's bullpen, so the grounds crew should have had no trouble retrieving it for his trophy case. Hilliard showed good power too, putting up an OPS above 1.000 during his debut 2019 partial season.

2020 Topps Heritage #151 Jon Gray

Jon Gray and his flowing locks will wrap this post up. He's pretending to look at the catcher for his signs, much like Chris Iannetta is pretending to prepare to catch a pitch. I believe this, and probably most other photos in this post, were taken at the team's Spring Training site in Arizona. I especially like how you can see the tarp deployed across the field in the lower right.

I'm not sure this post is among my best. That might have something to do with my state of distraction with the deteriorating state of the world, or that I just don't have much to say about these posed photographs. Probably a bit of both. 

In any case, I can't believe that all this came from one single PWE. Thanks, Jay!

The Trading Post #149: Dime Boxes

Mystery PWEs usually contain a little bit of everything. They're fun to get, but it can be difficult to weave all the cards in a post together. I told a friend once that I felt like what I wrote were little more than "glorified captions". But every so often, the contents of a PWE can be easily sorted into categories and pairings. A shipment from Brian some years ago (post #90) came to mind as I started putting this post together.

This PWE in particular came from Nick at Dime Boxes, and his Free Card Friday offerings earlier this year lead us to our first category. I mean, I guess these were all free. But I only selected two in particular. The rest were graciously included at no extra charge.

Category 1: Free Card Friday Oakland A's

2017 Topps Throwback Thursday #96 Yoenis Cespedes /1118

Of all the numerous cards that Nick offered, this is the one that caught my eye. It's modeled after a 1996 Topps subset called Star Power, which I could have sworn I've had on the blog before. I can't seem to find such a post, but it pretty much looks like this. The original is glossy on white card stock, while this is thicker and printed on actual cardboard. I think the typeface on the right side is a little different here, too.

The set itself is an online exclusive called Throwback Thursday, where Topps released one themed set a week using various past Topps designs. According to Beckett, this has a print run of 1,118. There isn't much on the card back about Yoenis Cespedes himself, but there are a couple paragraphs explaining what the Throwback Thursday set is, which design they picked for this weekly set, and yes, #TBT is there too.

This is from the sixteenth weekly set, featuring top Home Run Derby performers, and the card design changes the words "Star Power" to "Derby Legends". Also in this weekly set are names you might expect: Aaron Judge, Giancarlo Stanton, Mark McGwire, and more, Home Run Derby winners all. This photo is from Cespedes's second of two consecutive Derby wins, 2014's contest in Minnesota. The team logo and photo on the back have him as an Oakland Athletic, but he was traded to Boston mere weeks after becoming just the third repeat winner in Derby history, and only the second besides Griffey, Jr. to do it consecutively.

2006 Topps Chrome X-Fractors #155 Eric Chavez

The other Free Card Friday selection I made in those early days of the theme was another Athletic, Eric Chavez in shiny X-Fractor form. This one certainly looks like a proper Oakland card, containing plenty of yellow and green on the border and in the photo.

The first time I ever saw an X-Fractor was in the 2003 Chrome set. I found a couple at a card show still in their uncirculated Topps case, and they were numbered to a little over 50 copies. That's pretty much what got me back into the hobby. Just a few years later, the background pattern remained, but it simply evolved into yet another parallel without any particular scarcity. 

Serial numbered or not, I've continued to collect these, and a glance at some past posts led me to a rookie year Nolan Arenado X-Fractor sent by The Junior Junkie (post #30). It's certainly not one of the bank vault-worthy Griffey specials he has in his collection, but five years on, I should probably consider getting that one graded. Or at least put it in a toploader.

Though he spent most of his Gold Glove-caliber career in Oakland, Eric Chavez later became a Yankee, and it was there that he found himself involved in an all-time great blooper. I speak, of course, of the noggin incident, which gave us one of the best-ever baseball gifs. Just a simple groundout followed by an around-the-horn toss, after which Chavez accidentally hit pitcher Cody Eppley in the head with his toss back.

Category 2: Shiny

2016 Bowman's Best '96 Bowman's Best #96BB-NA Nolan Arenado

Speaking of Nolan Arenado, as I often do, here's a shiny card of him on the 1996 Bowman's Best design. Topps has quite the archive of past designs to use in reprints and reproductions, and that archive exploded in the mid-90s. Post #90 from Highly Subjective and Completely Arbitrary shows us what the contemporary 2016 set looked like, and this 1996 throwback was an insert set that year. It's faithful to the original, perhaps even a bit thicker, which is never a bad thing.

Even the stat categories on the back haven't changed. In an early attempt at advanced statistics, Topps included analytics like At Bats per Extra Base Hit, Games per RBI, and others. These aren't true Sabermetrics like we know them today, but certainly an attempt at trying to measure actual production beyond just counting. Interestingly, Games per Stolen Base is still on here as it was in 1996, and Nolan's rate is up in the mid-sixties. The game has certainly changed since that was a meaningful statistic for most players. Few players are still swiping bags these days. Nolan has more career triples than stolen bases, and triples are still somewhat rare even in the hitter's paradise that is Coors Field.

Below the Bowman Best Stat-Scan, as the analytics are officially called, the card back mentions Arenado's defensive wizardry, as cards usually do, stating that his Super Skills are his "astonishing reactions and short-area quickness at 3rd base".

2018 Topps Allen & Ginter Glossy Silver #36 Trevor Story

Compared to X-Fractors and Bowman's Best, Allen & Ginter really doesn't play in the shiny space. But this is a glossy parallel, so for A&G, this is about as shiny as it gets.

Specifically, this Trevor Story card is a Glossy Silver parallel, not to be confused with just the Glossy parallel, which Beckett has listed as a 1/1. I'm not sure how you'd tell the difference between those two, especially since I once saw an A&G mini (also from Nick, post #22) that was simply serial numbered with a blue ballpoint pen.

Cards like these were found in certain "hot boxes", Hobby boxes where all the base cards looked like this instead of the usual matte finish. A&G did something similar in 2017 with foil parallels, and Nick found those for me too.

As usual with Allen & Ginter, there isn't much on the back other than statistics verbosely spelled out. Batting average of Two Hundred Fifty Three, Drafted in June Two Thousand Eleven, and so on.

Category 3: My Friday Night

2019 Topps Utz #86 Charlie Blackmon

I'm breaking my own rules already by putting just a single card in this category. But follow my lead.

Last year, I searched high and low for Topps Utz cards, an oddball food issue set found in packages of Utz potato chips. I was never able to find any, though I did end up with numerous bags of delicious, crunchy potato chips as a consolation prize. I may have been looking in the wrong place, as even though the Utz bags I found last year had MLB team logos all over them, these cards were only offered in the mini snack-sized multi-packs, or so I've read.

I still don't know what I did wrong. The 10-ounce bags are basically a snack size for me.

It's true. I'm not making that up. I'm not proud to admit it, but once a bag of chips enters my kitchen, its lifespan is usually measured in minutes. Hours if I can tap into a supply of willpower.

I did a grocery run on Friday and got a bag, but they weren't Utz. I managed to make it last all the way until 10pm, about nine hours.

Anyway, I finally have an Utz card in my collection.

And as far as Friday goes, Charlie Blackmon was the hero for the Rockies that night. The Rockies were losing by a run in the bottom of the 9th. Ryan McMahon tied it up with a solo shot, saddling the Angels bullpen with yet another blown save. After a double and a pair of walks, Charlie Blackmon hit a 3-1 pitch over the wall for the second-ever walkoff grand slam in Rockies history. Ryan Spilborghs had the first, a 14th inning sprint around the basepaths back in 2009. The broadcast crew has been talking about little else the past couple of days, seeing as how Spilly has been on the TV team for years.

And all this happened around the time I finished that bag of chips.

Category 4: Infielder Parallels with Outfield Wall Banners

2017 Topps Gypsy Queen Green #245 DJ LeMahieu

This might seem like an oddly specific category, but I promise it will work out. First up is DJ LeMahieu, who has taken over a top-3 spot in 2020's batting average category now that Charlie Blackmon's .400 run is long gone. A well-rounded player, DJ is equally comfortable at the plate and in the field. He's just about to catch an incoming ball in this photo as a Pepsi banner looms behind him. 

This is the Green parallel from 2017 Gypsy Queen, which have arrived from all over the Cardsphere ever since. It's grown to be one of my favorite GQ designs so far. Curiously, more than a few of these parallels seem to have some centering issues. I haven't really noticed that on the base cards. Perhaps that's widely known among GQ aficionados, but this isn't a brand I follow too closely. I don't think I've ever bought it at retail.

2011 Topps Diamond Anniversary #286 Melvin Mora

Back in 2011, Melvin Mora got a curiously similar shot during his brief time as a Rockie. The incoming ball perfectly obscures his uniform number 6, which is currently worn by catcher Drew Butera. And just like DJ's card, Mora is in front of an outfield banner, which I believe is a Sony ad.

This is only Mora's second appearance on the blog, and by far the shiniest. This is one of the sparkly Diamond Anniversary parallels from the 60th year of Topps. They're not terribly uncommon, but they're certainly eye-catching. And the equivalent Mike Trout rookie card in 2011 Topps Update is worth many thousands of dollars, depending on the grade.

I haven't looked too closely at the 2021 Topps sell sheets, but by this count, they're up to their Platinum anniversary, the 70th. 2001 gave us untold levels of gold foil, 2011 has all this diamond shininess, but it remains to be seen just how much platinum will work its way into the Topps offerings next year.

Category 5: Jon Gray Parallels

2018 Topps Big League Rainbow Foil #239 Jon Gray /100

As a low-end set, I see Topps Big League arrive here frequently. The base cards I see a lot, and same with the gold parallels, which are really just a border color. There's no special foil involved there. But this is the first truly rare Big League card I've seen, the Rainbow Foil parallel. It's numbered to 100 right on the front, directly in Jon Gray's line of sight. He's probably used to that sort of thing, as I imagine having hair that long gets in your eyes at least once in a while. Between him and Blackmon, the Rockies don't mess around when it comes to long hair. That Utz card, by the way, tells us that Blackmon calls his mullet a "mu-LAY".

The card back has a fun "Did You Know?" fact about Gray, mentioning that one of his hobbies is ghost hunting.

It's really a shame that the league doesn't let these guys be themselves as much as some other sports do. Gray has his ghost hunting, Mike Trout has his meteorology, Charlie Blackmon is into fly fishing, CJ Wilson has quite a few varied interests. Sadly, fans don't really get to know about much of this unless they happen to see the occasional tweet or Cut4 post. Baseball card collecting is already a pretty niche hobby, and I'm sure that I'm one of the very few who actually still reads card backs. Major League Baseball might be able to have a player show up on the list of most famous athletes if they let them express themselves more. 

Although I have to hand it to Trevor Bauer. He's certainly trying his hardest.

2017 Topps Allen & Ginter Mini A&G Back #227 Jon Gray

All I'm saying is that card backs are a gold mine. In fact, you'd never even know this was a parallel if you didn't flip it over. Obviously, this is the mini-sized parallel already, but beyond that, this happens to be one of the back variations. It's the A&G back, just like Nick sent once before from the 2017 A&G mini set. He's filling out that 15-card page nicely, pretty much singlehandedly. My collection would be so much poorer without everything Nick has added to it over the years.

I've seen these twice now, so I'll flip this one over for you. It's only fair for me to scan the card backs once in a while if I keep stressing how important they are.

2017 Topps Allen & Ginter Mini A&G Back #227 Jon Gray (Reverse)

Category 6: Game Cards

2007 MLB Trade-Up #NNO Brian Fuentes

This is our final category, and I am pretty much in the dark about what this card is. This category will need a lot of research. That will be particularly difficult because Beckett has precisely nothing about this Brian Fuentes card. There's a giant comic-book exploding 1, a giant team logo, and not much else besides a quick note that Fuentes was the first Rockies reliever to make it to an All-Star game. That was in 2006, during a game held in Pittsburgh.

That and the 2007 copyright date help me narrow this down a little, and the card back on this playing-card-esque product has an MLB Trade Up logo. Still nothing on Beckett, but this does show up on a board game site. I've never heard of it, let alone played it. And I don't see a checklist other than a 52-card deck. If this is truly a deck that small, Fuentes might very well be the only Rockie in it.

I do know that Nick has always been into baseball card games, and has written a lot about MLB Showdown over the years. He's quite the collector of oddballs, and it's appropriate that he sent me something Beckett doesn't know about.

2011 Topps Sega Card Gen #257 Seth Smith

Unlike MLB Trade Up, I do see Sega Card Gen at least mentioned from time to time, primarily from the small handful of card bloggers residing in Japan. This doesn't quite feel like a playing card, but it does have rounded corners, despite what my scanner decided. It's a set that ties in to an actual arcade game, blending two of Japan's big entertainment industries. There's a spot on the arcade cabinet for your cards, along with a touchscreen where the game is actually played. I don't know if the cabinet can actually read which cards are inserted, or if that's more for display purposes and you have to enter your deck into the screen manually. I'd expect to see a QR code or something on the card back if it's the former, but the card number is pretty detailed, specifying "J11-257/410". So maybe that's what the system looks for.

2011 Topps Sega Card Gen #257 Seth Smith (Reverse)

In any case, the card back is nearly all in Japanese, so I have little idea what's going on here. Seth Smith is listed as a Power-hitting corner outfielder, his birthdate is there in YYYY/MM/DD format, and his height and weight are included in metric measurements. Beyond that, there are some numerals and bars which I assume relate to his skill in power and contact and fielding and so forth, but a lot of it is a mystery.

And apparently it's a Topps product, just like the Utz card. So I guess this isn't entirely an oddball after all.

Is it?

I guess each collector can decide for themselves.

2018 Card of the Year

You're not seeing double.

Tom at Waiting 'Til Next Year is running his annual contest for card of the year, and if you've seen my previous two entries, you have a pretty good indication of what I selected for 2018.

2018 Stadium Club Photographer's Proof #98 Jon Gray

I know I picked a Stadium Club card of Rockies pitcher Jon Gray two years ago, but I promise this is a different card. I always like Stadium Club, and most of my December posts covered an entire blaster of the product. But this parallel example of Jon Gray came via an earlier group break run by Trevor.

The extreme scarcity of this case hit carried a lot of weight in my selection this year. Another pin-sharp photograph of Jon Gray pitching at Coors Field earns points too, even though it isn't quite as picturesque as his 2016 card. The horizontal orientation lets us see Gray's pitch grip, what looks like a four-seamer. And the filmstrip foil on the right side seals the deal, reminding me of one of my other favorite hobbies.

It's strange, really. For so much of the Rockies' history, it's been all about their offense. Larry Walker is still trying to get into the Hall of Fame, and he's inching toward the 75% ballot threshold, but his excellence is still being discounted by the existence of Coors Field. Todd Helton is probably going to suffer the same fate. But these past few years, the Rockies have finally been able to figure out pitching, which has led me to pick pitchers each of the three years I've entered the Card of the Year contest.

Unfortunately, the usually-great Rockies offense has been about as bad as it's ever been, especially during the 2018 Postseason. The team has been extremely quiet this offseason, only signing Daniel Murphy so far, so don't expect a lot of changes on the field next year.

We'll see what products come out in 2019, but my next Card of the Year may not be very different from the past few.

The Case Hit Group Break (Part 1: Rockies)

I keep signing up for group breaks, including Nachos Grande's upcoming break, so it's only right that this blog gets its money's worth for all the PayPal transactions I've been doing. Over the summer, Trevor at Bump and Run Football Card Blog ran a break for 2018 Stadium Club, 2018 Topps Series 2, and 2018 Diamond Kings, as well as the usual handful of extras that make it in to many shipments. I had these sitting on my side table for months, and it turns out that I did quite well!

Stadium Club is always a favorite, and I have a blaster sitting on my coffee table that I've yet to open. That's definitely more due to busyness than patience, but I'll get to it someday. If I wait another couple months I might just give myself a nightly Hanukkah gift out of that blaster. You know, because the celebration is for the holy oil lasting seven nights plus one extra night.

I've never run one myself, but it seems to be quite difficult to sell all 30 teams, so most breaks these days seem to be good for two team slots, a selected team and a random team. It should be no surprise which team I selected, and the all-powerful randomizer chose the Pittsburgh Pirates as my second team. I'll be splitting those up into two posts, starting with the team that was most recently swept in the playoffs.

2018 Stadium Club #6 Carlos Gonzalez

This year's Stadium Club design isn't necessarily my favorite. Lots of bloggers haven't liked the lettering of the position being so large, and it is a bit more imposing than the faint outline of the team name. This year's set reminds me a bit of 2006 Upper Deck, but let's be honest, there are only so many things you can do with a minimalist full-bleed design.

Carlos Gonzalez, the Rockies right fielder, can frequently be seen laying out like this to make a catch. I've seen it in person more than once and it's exhilarating to watch. Here, he's doing it on the road, but I can't quite tell which stadium this is. There's an extremely faint outline around the ball, making me wonder if this is an effect of HDR photography. I took a couple photos of my cousin juggling last month, and the HDR software in the iPhone left an outline some distance above the ball itself. It was much more pronounced, so maybe a fancy DSLR and a $4,000 telephoto lens will minimize that effect.

2018 Stadium Club #204 Charlie Blackmon

These come in horizontal alignment, too. We never seem to call it "portrait" or "landscape" in this hobby like we do on our computer screens, just plain old "vertical" and "horizontal".

The photos are pin-sharp, as usual, letting us see pretty much every strand of hair in Charlie Blackmon's beard. And mullet. And even on his forearm. Once you look past that, you can see the well-liked Rockies spring training logo, as well as a prominent bat doughnut as Charlie warms up.

It's pretty difficult to color-code a design like this, but Topps managed to subtly do so on the back. It's a vertical back, and the background is meant to look like you're looking down on the field from the seats in the upper deck. Those seats are color-coded, and they're purple on Rockies cards, yellow on Pirates cards. Those don't actually match the real seats at the ballparks (Coors Field seats are dark green), but it's a clever way to group each team. The upper portion of the back even reminds me of 1993 Fleer Ultra.

2018 Stadium Club Red Foil #290 Nolan Arenado

Colored parallels are still found in Stadium Club, and I ended up with a couple of these. I'm not sure on the relative scarcity of these Red Foils, but they stand out pretty well, maybe a bit more so than in past years. Nolan's uniform number looks ever so slightly odd near the large position letters, but this is a great card which shows the five-time Gold Glover doing what he does best. He might be the best third baseman in the game. "An apparent consensus has been reached" on that. The card says so.

2018 Stadium Club Photographer's Proof #98 Jon Gray

We'll rotate 90 degrees and enhance on this card of Jon Gray. He's had some trouble handling the pressure of the high-leverage games he's appeared in, but I think he'll be a fixture of the Rockies rotation for some time to come. He's certainly good enough to appear in a small-ish set like Stadium Club, which apparently has a new type of parallel, Photographer's Proof.

I honestly had no idea what I had on my hands this whole summer, but this is an amazing pull! It's a 1:2 case hit, or 1:512 packs. It's not serial numbered, but if it's anything like those Members Only parallels, there are probably less than ten copies. A glance at eBay seems to put the print run at just seven.

Design-wise, it seems to be a replacement for the Contact Sheet insert set, using the filmstrip theme on one edge of the card. Trevor kindly put this in a penny sleeve, and I'm amazed at how lucky this pull is! That's why we do group breaks, I guess.

2018 Topps #668 Tyler Anderson

I got shut out of Rockies in the Diamond Kings box, but that's fine. That Gray card will make up for a lot. There were a few Pirates in the box, so at least I got a look at the design. It wasn't advertised up front, but Trevor also added in a blaster of 2018 Topps Series 2, and a few base cards went into my pile. I just finished sorting the factory set, but it's nice to have a few extras here and there.

Tyler Anderson was a regular member of the Rockies' rotation, earning a record of 7-9 this season. I saw him pitch a time or two at Coors this year, and he started NLDS Game 2. He did his best to keep the Rockies in the series, as did most of the pitching, but the offense just didn't get the job done.

I haven't kept up too closely with the 2018 releases. at least not beyond what I see on the blogs. The waterslide set is one I might have a little trouble remembering in a few years.

2017 Topps Bunt Blue #22 Jeff Hoffman

On his 2017 Bunt card, and by extension the Blue parallel, Topps predicted that Jeff Hoffman would "almost certainly" be a member of the Rockies' rotation, but that seems not to be panning out. The key return from the Troy Tulowitzki trade had a rocky six games in the majors during 2018, is currently playing in a High-A league, and didn't make the 40-man roster during September callups. Luckily for the Rockies, they have a few other young stars like Kyle Freeland and German Marquez to hold things down.

Right next to that blaster of Stadium Club, I have an unopened blaster of Topps Big League, the low-end replacement for Bunt. The mobile app is still active, but I haven't kept up with it regularly for a few years. These Blue parallels were nice, though. Sort of a poor man's printing plate. Beyond the headliners of the break itself, it and the rest of these cards were a nice bonus.

2018 Topps Opening Day At The Ballpark #ODB-COR Colorado Rockies

I'm not terribly broken-hearted about the demise of Bunt. But if Opening Day inserts are gone, Topps and I are going to have a problem. They're continually the best in my book, and they certainly have me eagerly awaiting the next home opener.

This 2018 card shows the home opener from 2017, which was Bud Black's first home game with the Rockies. He's facing the field for his first national anthem ceremony at Coors Field, and little did he know that he'd lead the team to a Wild Card spot two years in a row. In fact, that Wild Card game against the Cubs a couple weeks ago was the first Postseason win that Black ever led a team to, despite over a decade of managerial experience, mostly with the Padres. Before that, the last win he was a part of in the Postseason was Game 7 of the 1985 World Series as a member of the Royals. It's amazing that you can spend over thirty years in the sport between Postseason wins.

I'm sure when Matt Holliday rejoined the Rockies this summer, he and Bud Black had a chat about the 2007 Tiebreaker game. Black, you see, was in his first year managing the Padres when Holliday may or may not have touched home plate.

The Rockies rarely begin the season at home, and that will be the case in 2019, too. They'll face the Dodgers on Friday, April 5th, after a road trip against both Florida teams. They'll be the first to see the new Marlins logo, rumored to debut next month. It's probably best they start on the road, as early spring snowstorms are quite common around here. And the city has embraced the Friday afternoon party we can always count on.

1994 Topps Gold #186 Marcus Moore

Following Mike Munoz in the Obscure Rockies Relief Pitchers category (which you used to actually find in a base set) is Marcus Moore, who appeared in 56 games as a Rockie during their Mile High Stadium years. He was traded to the Reds in 1995, but didn't suit up for them until '96. He earned two saves in 23 games for Cincinnati, then that was it for his career.

I remember the name, and I remember this card, as I remember most from 1994 Topps. I assume we have decided to call it "The Home Plate Set", but it will always be my first factory set to me. This is probably a photo from spring training, as the Rockies never wore black jerseys during the regular season for many years. Ballplayers still wore stirrups back then, and you can spot a little "CR" logo on his left ankle.

And of course, it's a Topps Gold parallel, perhaps my favorite parallel set of all time.

1994 Pacific #191 Pedro Castellano

How about another Rockie I've never shown on the blog before? We'll turn to Pacific for this one, that quirky brand which existed in that weird space between being an oddball and a major producer. Appropriately for this Venezuelan utility player, part of this card is in Spanish, as Pacific frequently used on their cards. Sort of a Latin American equivalent of O-Pee-Chee.

Pacific used gold foil for this 1994 set, which pretty much everyone was doing at the time. Pacific also took a shot at making their own version of the Topps Rookie Cup, a rather flat-looking trophy in the lower right. He's listed as a "1994 Rookie", but didn't actually play during the 1994 season. His career spanned 51 games from 1993-1996, mostly during that inaugural year.

1994 Pacific #205 Armando Reynoso

Armando Reynoso, a member of the Mexican Baseball Hall of Fame, had a card in the same 1994 Pacific set. Mr. Pickoff is in the legendary Wrigley Field on this card, and you can just make out the basket below the foul pole. Reynoso pitched in the Windy City twice in 1993, but judging by the ivy, it looks more like early spring than mid summer, so I will date this one to May 5th, 1993, Cinco de Mayo. Reynoso took the loss in a quick afternoon game, just two hours and eighteen minutes.

I've seen this set numerous times, but I only now noticed the marble-like color-coded design at the bottom, very similar to what Score Select looked like in 1995. 1993 Fleer Ultra had that look too, but Pacific was way more of an innovator than anyone gives them credit for.

1994 Pacific Silver Prisms #20 Andres Galarraga

Our final card was printed before the advent of serial numbers or a set label on the back, but from what I've read, there was a print run of 8,000 cards. Quite scarce for 1994. The Big Cat appears before a triangular Silver Prism background; there is also a circular background variety.

If you flip it over, you'll find a big purple diamond, as well as a few highlights of Galarraga's 1993 campaign, such as his league-leading .370 batting average, totals for Hits, Doubles, and Home Runs, and a mention that he was the 1993 NL Comeback Player of the Year. It's not an award that has nearly as much prestige as the Rookie of the Year, but apparently it's been awarded in each league since 1965. Galarraga was the only Rockie to earn it until Greg Holland did so last year.

Trevor did an awesome job for me on this break! I feel quite bad that it's taken so long for me to finally put up a post, and I haven't even gotten to the Pirates yet. No case hits in there, but we will get a look at some old-time Hall of Famers and that 2018 Diamond Kings set.

The Shiny Donruss Group Break

Two months ago to the day, the cards from Colbey's Donruss Optic group break showed up in my mailbox. After a bunch more travel in September, and a nail-biter of a sudden-death game last night, I have a little time to get back to blogging. In the 2018 NL Wild Card Game, the Rockies managed to hold the Cubbies to a single run in 13 innings, the longest-ever elimination game in MLB Postseason history, advancing to the NLDS and bringing the month of Rocktober back to Colorado.

The cards that arrived from Cardboard Collections looked pretty familiar, and I've seen plenty of 2016 Donruss in the past few years. It's a common fixture in trade packages, and it's only 150 cards large, not counting short prints. But the shiny version, Donruss Optic, basically a clone of Topps Chrome, is a bit harder to come by. $4 to add the shiny quasi-parallels was literally a small price to pay.

2016 Donruss Optic #107 Nolan Arenado

Nolan Arenado will start us off today, and he began the scoring last night with a sacrifice fly, allowing his buddy Charlie Blackmon to score from third. Charlie was sent back to third after a ground rule double ended the previous play before he could score. But number 28 came through in the first, though he and much of the Rockies offense were shut down by Jon Lester and the Cubs bullpen for most of the game.

It was one of the greatest pitcher's duels I've ever seen, and to have Kyle Freeland on one end of it was amazing.

There are a handful of parks with brick behind the plate, and this Donruss Optic card may have gotten its photo courtesy of Wrigley Field. It's a bit tough to tell for sure. Regardless, Nolan won't soon forget his most recent game in the Windy City, including that odd hug with Javy Baez.

2016 Donruss Optic #48 Jonathan Gray RR (RC)

The Rockies gave Jon Gray the ball in last year's Wild Card game, which they lost to the Diamondbacks. Gray is notoriously unreliable in the first inning, so Bud Black decided not to go with him this time around. He'll surely start at some point in the NLDS. 

He's long past being a Rated Rookie, perhaps Donruss' most famous subset besides Diamond Kings. And he's shortened up his name, just going by Jon these days. He's a strong pitcher, and I'm glad to have him in the rotation, but he hasn't quite been able to handle the pressure like Kyle Freeland. 

2016 Donruss Optic Purple #53 Trevor Story RR

It doesn't seem that long ago, but Trevor Story was once a Rated Rookie, too. His flurry of home runs at the beginning of the 2016 season is mentioned on the back, but no one knew that he'd soon take to regularly launching home runs onto the left field concourse at Coors Field, some even eclipsing 500 feet. I've seen him hit home runs in person, and I can assure you, he absolutely puts them into orbit.

This purple parallel (a border color tailor-made for Rockies cards) shows Story in the field, where he's no slouch, either. In fact, he speared a liner yesterday with a man on, which kept the momentum on the Rockies' side.

I've noticed that Donruss is prominently featuring player's uniform numbers on these photos, which is just as well, since this is of course an unlicensed set. Gray's #55 is a bit covered up, but #27 and #28, the stellar left side of the Rockies infield, are clearly visible, and show one of the more significant uniform changes since Marvin Freeman and the early days of the franchise. 

2016 Donruss Optic Purple #56 Tom Murphy RR

There were about as many purple parallels in this shipment as base cards, and that Rated Rookie logo is enjoying its time back in the spotlight, after years of being shoved into basements and closets.

Tom Murphy, #23, played in a handful of games for the Rockies this season, but there is a bit of a logjam at the catcher's spot this year. Chris Iannetta is enjoying Rocktober once again, and apparently Drew Butera became a Rockie about a month ago, unbeknownst to me. But the real catcher hero yesterday was none other than Tony Wolters (which ESPN kept mispronouncing "Walters"). With two outs, Wolters singled Trevor Story in during the top of the 13th, and it ended up being the game winner. Scott Oberg wasted no time in striking out the side in the bottom of the 13th, and the Rockies got to pop some champagne for the first time in quite a while.

2016 Donruss Optic Aqua #72 Carlos Gonzalez /299

CarGo has been a Rockie for ten seasons, but other than when they clinched a playoff spot last year just edging out the pre-Yelich Brewers (and I guess Friday when they sealed this year's spot), yesterday was the first time CarGo got to spray champagne around the clubhouse. It couldn't have been easy for the Cubs to watch two teams in two days celebrate in Wrigley Field as visitors, but that's how it ended up this year with the two tiebreaker situation. One of the four teams had to lose two winner-take-all games in a row. I would have preferred it if that had been the Dodgers, but we'll get them in the NLCS, unless the Braves take care of them first.

The Yankees have won the AL Wild Card as I wrap up this post, so I'll close with this Aqua parallel of Carlos Gonzalez' Donruss Optic card, serial numbered to 299 copies. I bet this one is at Wrigley, too, judging by that brick and the fan in blue and red apparel. Maybe even from the same game as Nolan.

CarGo's Diamond Kings card from 2016 Optic is the only one from the set that has appeared on this blog before, a trade post concerning Highly Subjective and Completely Arbitrary. Looking back, that was one of my favorite posts I've ever written. It might be a while before I find the time to do an 18-card post like that again, but five cards at the beginning of the month is a good start, and that means I might be able to do multiple posts in October.

Er, Rocktober.