The Trading Post #111: The Chronicles of Fuji

It was just about a year ago when I blogged about a previous trade sent by The Chronicles of Fuji. Some of the themes might repeat a little bit, but Fuji is always able to send interesting cards, each carefully placed inside a penny sleeve.

My goal is to catch up on trade posts by the time the Winter Olympics start, which is just a few weeks away. Spring Training won't be far behind that, and just beyond, the earliest-ever Opening Day on March 29th. You'll probably see a flurry of activity on this blog by then, especially since there are lots of sports on (my preferred writing backdrop), a snowstorm incoming to the Denver area, and a day off work on Monday.

2011 Topps Wal-Mart Black Border #139 Eric Young Jr.

Lots of free agents are also likely to have Monday off, and Eric Young, Jr. is on that list. There remains a huge number of unsigned free agents just a month away from when pitchers and catchers report to their spring homes in Arizona and Florida, many ranked much higher than Young. Carlos Gonzalez, for example, still doesn't have a team at the moment. Perhaps everyone's saving up for Bryce Harper next year, who's expected to sign a $400 million contract.

Neither Eric Young, Jr. nor myself will be getting a $400 million payday anytime soon, but it's clear from this 2011 Topps parallel that he's much more acrobatic than I am. This is the Wal-Mart Black Border parallel, not to be confused with the Topps Black parallel, which were numbered to 60 copies and did not have the background blacked out.

Black borders have a tendency to chip, and this card is no different. But it's a great photo and is probably one of the best examples of this treatment in the 2011 Topps set. You can barely see the rest of the photo (the scan picks up more detail than you see in person), but you can tell that Young is executing a double play by leaping over a Giant in AT&T Park. I made it easy on myself to see what was really going on and just checked Young's 2011 base card. That's #48 on the Giants, better known as Pablo Sandoval.

If Kung Fu Panda were sliding into me while I was covering second, I'd also want to jump about this high.

1995 Topps Embossed Golden Idols #83 Dante Bichette

Black and Gold are my school colors. Not Missouri, not Purdue, not Army, but the University of Colorado. And Fuji sent me plenty of gold cards to follow up that black one from 2011, such as this parallel from 1995 Topps Embossed. This isn't the first time Fuji's sent me cards from this rarely-seen parallel set, so either he's gradually offloading parts of his collection to me, or he has a steady supply of mid-1990s Topps boxes.

This is somehow even more golden than Walt Weiss' card I got from Fuji last time, and I remain impressed by just how much texture Topps managed to get on this card. Usually this sort of stuff is confined to the front, but the back looks and feels just as much like a relief map as the front. No gold though, but there are some fun facts about Dante Bichette, such as that he hit the first-ever Rockies home run. That happened in their second-ever game, a losing affair at Shea Stadium on April 7th, 1993. In fact, it was the only run (and RBI) the Rockies scored, period, during that two-game set.

2009 Topps Gold Border #646 Chris Iannetta /2009

As you may have heard by now, Chris Iannetta is returning to the Rockies, increasing the accuracy of this 2009 card in one fell swoop. He's one of a relatively small number of free agents that have found a home in 2018, and I'm sure he'll quickly settle into a groove behind the plate again. In this photo, he's still wearing an old-style mask, choosing not to go for the hockey goalie variety. Either way, it seems quite rare to see such a complete example of a catcher in full gear on a baseball card. Chest protectors, masks, and mitts are quite common, but shin guards rarely make an appearance.

It was printed long after 1994, but I'm still drawn to Topps Gold. They were a bit more scarce in 2009, losing the gold foil on the front, but making up for it with a golden serial number on the back. This particular copy is numbered an even thousand out of 2,009.

2013 Topps Gold #613 Jhoulys Chacin /2013

They get ever-so-slightly more plentiful as the years carry on, but I'm sure it will be far into the distant future when the year matches the print run of 1994 Topps Gold cards. In 2013, the parallel set lost the gold foil on the serial number, just getting slightly raised black numbering. This is still an interesting number, 737 out of 2,013, matching the narrow-body aircraft that I flew on earlier this week on a quick business trip to Portland, Oregon.

Chacin is another free agent who's found a home in 2018, signing a two-year deal with the Brewers. He pitched a full season with San Diego last year, earning a respectable 13-10 record, just one win shy of his best year as a Rockie. Coincidentally, that happened in 2013.

2007 Topps Allen & Ginter Dick Perez #9 Troy Tulowitzki

In the baseball card world, artist Dick Perez is synonymous with Donruss' long-running Diamond Kings subset. But Topps couldn't stand by and let his talents go to waste, bringing him on board to "provide exclusive hand-painted images of the Hall of Famers of tomorrow". I'm not sure what relationship, if any, Perez currently has with Topps, but this 2007 Sketch Card let the baseball card world know that he was still around.

There really is a 1/1 version of this Tulowitzki card out there, but this is (presumably) not it, despite the facsimile 1/1 artist signature on the front. It's a thick card, and extremely sturdy, reminding me of those blank inserts that the card companies put in packs to confound pack-searchers. The card doesn't really tell us anything about the Rockies shortstop, and much more about Perez and his artistic endeavors. But I have plenty of Tulo cards to offset that if I want more information.

1995 SP Special FX #34 Dante Bichette

I'm not sure whether I ever saw a box of Upper Deck SP for sale when it was actually on the shelves. Or if I did, I didn't pay any attention to it due to the price. Even if I had that kind of dough as a kid, I would have spent it on Topps Finest instead. But because I never pursued it, I missed out on these holographic cards that UD printed up in the mid-1990s. Fuji must have taken note of my headliner cards in our previous trade and kept the supply coming.

Upper Deck was satisfied enough with the holographic headshot on the front that they did not include their usual hologram diamond on the back. But it's still clearly a UD card, and uses color schemes that are similar to some of the subsets found in 1995 Collector's Choice.

2011 Topps Diamond Anniversary #276 Miguel Olivo

The base variety of Miguel Olivo's 2011 Topps card once made an appearance on this blog, when I was recounting my visit to Raley Field to catch a Triple-A Sacramento River Cats game. He played in the Mexican League last year, but he's probably seen the last of a Major League park as a player. Still, it was good to see him in a Triple-A park. Perhaps it's not quite as cool as Portland, but I got a similar vibe from Sacramento, which has a vibrant downtown adjacent to the river, spanned by some picturesque bridges.

The veteran catcher was still crushing home runs in 2011, though Topps was a year behind on his team. Olivo suited up for the Mariners that year and hit 19 homers, just four off his high mark of 23. Maybe the familiarity is because I saw him in that River Cats game, but I was surprised to learn that Olivo only played one season as a Rockie. It was just the right season to take part in Topps' 60th anniversary, meaning he got this extra-shiny Diamond parallel.

2011 Topps Diamond Anniversary #141 Ubaldo Jimenez

Ubaldo Jimenez was one of Olivo's battery mates in 2010, and Olivo had the distinction of catching the first and only Rockies no-hitter. Jimenez was on the hill that day, however Topps did not pick that feat to honor with a checklist card in the 2011 set. Yes, this is a checklist card, and the shiny background steals your attention away from the small, gray print above the name banner, which says "Most single-season wins in franchise history".

Without a doubt, this is the shiniest checklist card in my entire collection, but I didn't even realize it was one until I flipped it over and saw the red background. Olivo's card has purple color coding, but this fits in with the general look of the Topps set. Topps has done it this way for most of the decade, but I find myself slightly annoyed year after year at how difficult it is to spot these checklists.

Jimenez' 19 wins in 2010 remains a Rockies season record. No Rockie has ever cracked the 20-win mark, but there's always next year!

2006 Topps Chrome Rookie Logos #CRC46 Manuel Corpas

He's not a household name in Denver, but Manuel (Manny) Corpas was the Rockies closer during their 2007 pennant-winning season. He notched five saves in the Rockies' seven wins in the NLDS and NLCS that year, and deserves more credit than he's generally given. Topps saw potential greatness in him, including him in 2006's Chrome Rookie Logos set, and this arrived to me still sealed in a cellophane wrapper.

I have no idea about the provenance of this card. Presumably it was an insert of some kind in Topps Chrome, or perhaps in a team set, but neither Beckett nor BaseballCardPedia have anything to say about the 50-card set. Regardless, it's in great shape, and has a nice /599 serial number on the back. I'm just not sure precisely where to file it.

1995 Stadium Club Virtual Reality #163 Mike Kingery

Another six weeks in the 1994 season would not have netted outfielder Mike Kingery any additional home runs, at least according to the Topps Virtual Reality computer's projections. He got several more doubles, but only two more RBIs. He wasn't a leadoff hitter, so I do have to question the plausibility of some of these computer-generated stats.

Frankly, this is a weird set. I collected it when it was new and opened plenty of packs. But despite what should be a familiar set to me, it remains quite an enigma. For one thing, I could never figure out the pattern in 1995 Stadium Club that determined whether a card got gold or silver foil. The base cards all seem to be gold. but the Virtual Reality cards can be either gold foil or silver, like this one. I've seen this partial parallel set since it came out, and Fuji sent me some last time. But it remains a curiosity. Not to mention the inserts and subsets that burst their way into my knowledge base after decades of dormancy.

1995 Flair Infield Power #4 Andres Galarraga

At least when a 1995 card is unfamiliar to me, like this Galarraga insert or Bichette's SP card above, it makes sense when I didn't actually collect it. The Dr. Who-esque wormhole on 1995 Flair Infield Power cards reminds me of Topps' more recent Power Players insert set, just a bit more muted. Fuji sent me one of those, too.

Fleer tells us that Galarraga's nickname is "The Cat", which is incomplete, to the best of my knowledge. He was always referred to as "The Big Cat" as best I can remember. But sometimes even nicknames have nicknames. The card also mentions his distinctive open batting stance, suggested to him by his old hitting coach in St. Louis, Don Baylor. I recall seeing some Galarraga cards of him as a Cardinal, but I didn't know that he and Baylor had a history before they both joined the expansion Rockies.

2010 Topps 2020 #T14 Ubaldo Jimenez

I know I've seen this set before. There are definitely some in my collection, but I believe this is the first time it's appeared on the blog. Surprisingly, this 3D lenticular insert set is not found in packs of Opening Day, but rather flagship boxes of Topps 2010. They turned the crystal ball forward ten years to guess at who might be top players in 2020. There are some sure things in this set, like Clayton Kershaw and Andrew McCutchen, but some that have virtually no shot at showing up for the 2020 All-Star game, like Tommy Hanson, Gordon Beckham, and well, probably Ubaldo Jimenez.

If you're interested in working on this set, you just have a couple years left to do it easily. By the time 2020 rolls around, you'll have to dig pretty deep into Google's search results if you search for "Topps 2020".

Fuji, I hope we're still trading in 2020, especially if you keep sending me cards like this!

How Many Dingers Are There, Anyway?

I was in Sacramento, California at the beginning of August. The girlfriend had flown out there a few days prior for the International Food Blogger Conference in downtown Sacramento, and after a few busy days at work, I boarded my first Southwest flight to meet her there and spend a couple more days.

We had lots of good food and saw some interesting sights, and while she was wrapping up some conference notes, I caught a Minor League game at Raley Field, home of the Sacramento River Cats.

Ever since the Rockies began play in 1993, I had only seen Major League games. Before that, I did see the Denver Zephyrs a couple times in the cavernous Mile High Stadium, gigantic by Minor League standards. In fact, that could be where my first-ever baseball cards came from, now that I think about it.

#walletcard in enemy territory! Raley Field, home of the #Sacramento River Cats, Triple-A affiliate of the #Giants. Tower #Bridge in background. #minorleaguebaseball

A photo posted by AdamK (@adamk0310) on Aug 1, 2016 at 6:46pm PDT

I made sure to snap a #walletcard shot while enjoying some snacks before the game. Ballpark food in Sacramento wasn't markedly different from any other stadium I've been to, but the slider trio with a side of potato chips and a cold beer really hit the spot on a hot August day.

The River Cats, Triple-A affiliate of the San Francisco Giants, squared off against the Salt Lake Bees, part of the Angels farm system (the Salt Lake Bees of Utah?), the same team that Jon Gray faced before his Major League debut.

2015 Sacramento River Cats Team Set #03 Clayton Blackburn

Clayton Blackburn didn't have quite as many strikeouts as Jon Gray, but he still cruised to a 7-0 win on 7 innings pitched. His fastball hit the low 90s, which is not bad for just returning from the DL. Blackburn has yet to make his Major League debut, but if he keeps that up, he shouldn't be far away.

I did purchase this River Cats team set at the souvenir store, and it was half-price since it's the 2015 set. Progress doesn't always happen that quickly in the Minors, so a lot of the same players could be found, including Blackburn.

2015 Sacramento River Cats Team Set #23 Jarrett Parker

Right fielder Jarrett Parker also had a good game, going 1-for-3 with a walk and a run scored. Unlike Blackburn, Parker has spent some time in the Majors, about 70 games since last season. A lot of the players at the Triple-A level are either top prospects, or have spent some time in the Majors, as we'll see.

2015 Sacramento River Cats Team Set #04 Brett Bochy

That includes Brett Bochy, who is no longer active in professional baseball, but in 2014 became the first player to play for his father. Bruce Bochy has managed the Giants to three World Series championships, and also took the Padres to the 1998 World Series, where they got swept by the Yankees. Ken Griffey, Sr. and Jr. were the first father/son duo to play together, but having your dad as a manager must be a whole different ballgame. Brett only pitched in seven Major League games, and underwent Tommy John surgery as a college junior.

At least he had it out of the way if his Major League career took off.

2015 Sacramento River Cats Team Set #11 Kevin Correia

Kevin Correia was at the tail end of his professional career in 2015, having pitched with several Major League teams since 2003, including the Giants. He was a National League All-Star in 2011 as a reserve.

The quality control of these cards is not quite up to Topps' level. The stats all seem correct, but the write up shifted dates by about a decade, saying he was picked in the 2012 Amateur Draft, and made his MLB debut in July 2013.

For a moment, I thought this might be an entirely different Kevin Correia, but it all makes a lot more sense when you just subtract ten years from those dates.

2011 Topps #276 Miguel Olivo

A couple other former Major Leaguers, though not found in the 2015 team set, still played well in that August 1st night game. Miguel Olivo, a catcher who spent a year as a Rockie, is presumably in sort of a Crash Davis role, the veteran catcher helping groom the next generation of baseball stars. Olivo was 2-for-4 with two runs scored, and made a few excellent defensive plays behind the plate.

Play-by-play stats are rather hard to come by on minor league games, but fortunately the River Cats provided me with a handy scorecard inside the booklet they handed out at the gate. My trusty ballpoint pen recorded the River Cats' side of things, but I didn't track any of the Bees' stats other than their pitchers. It left some time for social media, beer and snack runs, and photos. They also had a fun interactive promo called Baseball Bingo Mondays. Like keeping score, it requires you to pay attention.

At the gate, they handed out bingo cards, and the numbers you can punch out depend on what happens during the game. For example, a home run by the first baseman is G 60. I was not a winner, but it was a fun thing to do on top of keeping score. I imagine that a Minor League crowd would be a bit more into something like that, as I wouldn't expect more casual fans to spend the time showing up to a Triple-A game.

2015 Topps #364A Travis Ishikawa

A few of those bingo squares were punched out by the biggest contributor to the River Cats' win, Travis Ishikawa, a name that is definitely familiar to Giants fans. He easily got the most applause from the roughly 6,000 fans in attendance, and for good reason. Ishikawa sent the Giants to the 2014 World Series with a walkoff home run against the Cardinals.

Leave it to Joe Buck to take all the emotion out of "The Giants win the Pennant!" That's not your line, Joe!

Anyway, the long ball was working for Ishikawa that night in Sacramento as he hit two out for five RBIs. Olivo and Parker were both on base for his second shot in the bottom of the 8th, and the fans loved it, especially the ones catching the game from the grassy area beyond right field. A fan chased down one of those home run balls as fast as a professional outfielder.

2015 Sacramento River Cats Team Set #34 Brad Lawson

The Minor leagues aren't really all that different from the Majors, at least at the Triple-A level. Just scaled down a bit. The fastballs are a little slower, the stadiums a bit smaller, the crowds more intimate, the tickets significantly less expensive, at least for an equivalent seat. My 16th-row seat at the edge of the screen was a mere $25.

But they're still professional athletes, and trainers and coaches are still needed to keep them in top physical condition. A Minor League team set is just the sort of place for a card of the team Strength and Conditioning Coach. It is a bit underexposed, and they misspelled "New Brunswick" on the back (dropping the c), but I've sure never seen a card of a Major League trainer before.

2015 Sacramento River Cats Team Set #37 Dinger

The final card in the set is of their lovable mascot, Dinger. Like Topps Opening Day, this minor league set recognizes the existence of these furry critters. Curiously, the River Cats and the Rockies picked the same name for their mascot. Dinger the Rockie is a purple triceratops, and Dinger the River Cat is, well, a predatory cat that looks a bit like a bear.

The back of this card has quite the genesis story, mentioning "strange sounds...echoing through the air at the Raley Field construction site" on a "cold blustery night". Dinger the mascot was discovered on the river bank under the Tower Bridge (that yellow bridge you see in my Wallet Card shot). It turns out that Dinger's "energy and fun personality were a perfect fit for the official mascot of the Sacramento River Cats."

If Topps put out team sets like this for sale at the ballpark instead of just some rehashed cards from Flagship, I'd snap one up in a heartbeat. The kids would probably enjoy it too, because who doesn't love a mascot?

I still say the Rockies have dibs on the Dinger name. But either way, a mascot named Dinger has been leading the fans at nearly every single game I've ever been to. Even in Sacramento.

The Trading Post #42: 2x3 Heroes

Trading activity is starting to pick back up. This summer has been pretty quiet on that front, but my mailbox has been graced by a couple PWEs in recent days.

2013 Topps Chasing History Holofoil #CH-97 Troy Tulowitzki

These have done some damage to my Eight Men Out list with very little warning. Jeff at 2x3 Heroes mailed over this Tulowitzki card, which is the silver holofoil parallel from a 2013 Topps insert set. You've seen other varieties of this card before, including the bat relic and gold holofoil. All that's missing is the base version, meaning I'll be completing this rainbow in a highly unusual reverse order. Sort of like hitting for the cycle with a homer, triple, double, and single.

2014 Topps Chrome Orange Refractors #157 Michael Cuddyer

Jeff continued to work some rainbow magic, sending over the orange parallel of Michael Cuddyer's Chrome card, adding to the base and blue parallel already in my collection. This orange is especially appropriate, given that he's playing for the Mets in the NLCS. In fact, he just ripped an opposite-field single up the first base line as I type this. Unlike the blue parallel, this orange is not serial numbered, but it certainly scans better than the blue.

2010 Topps #445 Miguel Olivo

2010 Topps had a good base design, and they really wanted to make all the collectors know that they still had the rights to display team logos and names, unlike their longtime competitor Upper Deck, who lost that right that year.

Still, they focused a bit too much on logos and not enough on photography, as this is one of the more egregious Photoshop jobs I can remember seeing in recent years. First, that isn't really the right shade of purple to represent the Rockies, the belt is still blue, and the pinstripes are way too close together. Even worse, flip the card over and you can see that Topps didn't even bother to edit Olivo out of his Royals jersey, meaning you can plainly see where they made changes for the front photo.

2010 Topps #445 Miguel Olivo (Reverse)

I suppose it's better than just some white text saying "Signed by Rockies", but Topps' image manipulation skills had a long way to go in 2010.

2014 Bowman #20 Nolan Arenado

There, now that's a proper Rockies jersey! This image is from Nolan Arenado's rookie year of 2013, which you can tell by that commemorative 20th Anniversary patch on the right sleeve. Arenado took a month or so to settle into his role at third base, but he's quickly become one of the best all-around players in the Majors. He'd had plenty of Bowman cards by the time he actually reached the majors, but some varieties of his 2010 card go for a pretty penny.

Here's hoping he can lead the Rockies to one of these playoff games in the not-too-distant future.