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!

The Trading Post #89: The Chronicles of Fuji

Fuji recently vacated the Athletics' spot in the #supertraders group, but that didn't stop him from sending an awesome trade package in December. He even took the time to put everything in penny sleeves for safe keeping. It was one of those trades where I had to narrow things down quite a bit to keep this from being a 20-card post, as I was dazzled by a lot of what he sent.

1994 SP Holoviews #10 Andres Galarraga

At first glance, this looks like a recent card with a hologram sticker autograph. But it's actually from all the way back in 1994. Upper Deck went all in with the hologram technology for this insert set, though there is no Upper Deck hologram anywhere on the back. The card has a Topps Chrome-esque curl, but the silver area at the bottom shows the Big Cat's 3D face on the right, and a bunch of SP logos coming out of some clouds on the left. They give the design a bit more of a 3D illusion by superimposing Galarraga's photograph over the hologram.

The card number looks like a fraction: 10 over 38. I was wondering if this was some kind of a fractured set, as I haven't seen this one before, Then I thought it might be something to do with the uniform number, but that was clearly not correct, as he wore #14. It's simply card 10 out of 38, the total size of this insert set. Simple.

1997 SPx #SPX24 Andres Galarraga

The Big Cat shows up again on a similar card a few years later, but this one is die-cut. The write up mentions that in early 1997, he became the all-time home runs leader among Venezuelans, with 252. He'd end up with just shy of 400, still a monster number. And he only played five seasons as a Rockie, so he had plenty of power outside of Denver.

There are lots of holograms on this one, even more than in 1994. The areas of the X contain a bunch of SPX logos, and the arc in the middle contains a nearly identical headshot of Galarraga against a backdrop of Rockies logos. It's even got a bit of color to it, both in Galarraga's skin tone and in the purple areas of the team logo. And there's even the familiar Upper Deck hologram on the back, this time in gold. 

Shiny at its best.

2011 Topps 60 #T60-11 Troy Tulowitzki

Topps 60 is one of those giant insert sets that I've been casually chasing for a while now. Coincidentally, I'd estimate that I've completed about sixty percent of it. This one of Tulo in that familiar batting motion documents his slugging percentage as a cleanup hitter. Between 2005 and 2010, Tulo was second overall behind Miguel Cabrera. And Tulowitzki didn't even play in 2005, and was a late-season callup in 2006. So while this doesn't quite give us an apples-to-apples comparison, Tulo was doing exactly what he was supposed to in the #4 slot.

The back of the card gives the top ten players in this stat. There are some familiar names on here, like Bonds, Berkman, Fielder, and others. And tied for 6th was Astros third baseman Morgan Ensberg. He had a relatively short-lived career, but put together an all-star season in 2005. I even picked him for my fantasy team one year (probably the year after). He didn't have lasting power, but he was definitely part of the conversation for a while.

2011 Topps Diamond Duos Series 2 #DD-22 Troy Tulowitzki / Ubaldo Jimenez

Tulowitzki's post-swing pose finally made it onto a card, one of the two-player Diamond Duo cards, another large 2011 insert set. He appears with teammate Ubaldo Jimenez, neither of whom are even in the National League right now, let alone on the Rockies. The paragraph on the back talks more about Tulo's defensive performance, so it's a little odd that Topps used a batting shot here, especially given that he appeared in this insert set three times across two series.

The back also offers a statistics comparison between Tulowitzki and Jimenez, except comparing a pitcher's stats to a position player's doesn't seem that relevant. For example, Tulo had 338 RBIs by then, compared to Ubaldo's 655 strikeouts. 

2011 Topps Target Red Diamond #RDT-12 Carlos Gonzalez

2011 marked Topps' first year all by itself in the baseball card marketplace in over 30 years. That pesky Upper Deck wasn't making even unlicensed baseball cards anymore, and Topps took the opportunity of their reinstated monopoly and their 60th anniversary to churn out bunches of insert sets. The previous two I've come reasonably close to completing, but this one I've never seen before. It fits with the rest of 2011's diamond theme, but this is a Target-exclusive insert set. I wasn't buying cards regularly at that time, but I'm a little surprised I've never seen one turn up in a discount box. Usually the red- and blue-bordered ones stand out in discount boxes full of Topps base.

This insert set spanned 30 cards over two series, and contained a pretty even mixture of active players and retired greats. Carlos' two-homer performance on August 29th, 2010 is the subject of the paragraph on the back. That sounded familiar, making me wonder if I was at that game. But I wasn't. He just does that sort of thing a lot.

2008 Upper Deck Heroes Beige #55 Jeff Francis /299

Speaking of Upper Deck, here's a familiar-looking card of 17-game winner Jeff Francis from the well-liked Baseball Heroes set. I've shown the base version of this card before. While the base card is described as a "sand" color, this is the beige parallel, serial numbered to 299. The difference in color between the two is somewhat noticeable when placed side-by-side, but trying to recall it from memory would be a challenge. It would definitely be easy to skip over if you didn't know just what you were looking for.

Like other cards in this set, and that purple Todd Helton card from my previous post, the background has a matte finish, while the photo and logo are glossy. And it's definitely reminiscent of 1959 Topps. More on that later.

2014 Topps Update Power Players #PPA-TT Troy Tulowitzki

I've seen Carlos Gonzalez's card from 2014 Topps Power Players numerous times before, including this very trade package. but this is my first copy of Troy Tulowitzki's card from that set. The "wormhole", as I previously described it, is the same shape but uses different colors. And Tulo gets a real action shot as opposed to CarGo's posed image. There's also a pattern of dots in the background, which reminds me of what you see on Panini Prizm's Pulsar parallels.

Say that ten times fast.

1999 Topps Power Brokers #PB9 Vinny Castilla

I have to wonder if Topps looked through the archives and found inspiration for Power Players in this similar Power Brokers set from 1999. This one is shinier, but the overall color and design is pretty similar. Enough of the blue wall peeks through the distortion to indicate that they're in Shea Stadium, but between the action shot, blocky font, and a pair of electrodes, there's a lot going on here. There's even a rather large nuclear symbol on the back. To be honest, I didn't even realize this was a die-cut until I viewed it several times. It's a clear indication of history repeating itself, which happens more than you'd think in this hobby.

1995 Stadium Club Virtual Reality #204 Marvin Freeman

In 1995, the sport of baseball, and its related card industry, was trying to recover from a disastrous strike that cut the 1994 season short. Topps came up with the idea to include computer-simulated statistics on some 1995 cards, such as Topps Cyberstats, and also this Virtual Reality partial parallel set in Stadium Club. Freeman had 10 wins in 1994 as the Rockies ace, but Topps thought it likely that he'd win another four for a total of 14.

1995 Stadium Club Virtual Reality #204 Marvin Freeman (Reverse)

No one really talks about it, but the the back of 1995 Stadium Club wasn't that different from the thermal camera look that Fleer famously produced in 1995. The hobby went to some strange places that lasted for the rest of the decade.

Virtual Reality, and the Web itself were just getting off the ground in 1994, barely past the concept stage. Over twenty years later, Virtual Reality still isn't quite mainstream, but it's certainly moving that direction, and rapidly. Perhaps in another 20 years, cards (or something like the Bunt app) will have an actual VR component, allowing us to see video highlights at a glance.

Hopefully it's more like that and not another prediction of what might have happened without a labor dispute.

1995 Topps Embossed Golden Idols #112 Walt Weiss

Shiny cards usually look generally silver, like a mirror. It's fairly uncommon for the thing to just be straight, bling-y gold. But that's just what Topps did with the parallels for Embossed, adding to the oddness of 1995. I haven't seen a ton of Topps Embossed in general, and apparently these are one per pack parallels that took Topps Gold to its logical endgame.

It's a very texturey card. Weiss' images are raised from the card surface both front and back, and each of the concentric layers of the border has a different pattern. Furthest out are baseballs, further in are diagonal ridges, horizontal ridges, what looks like ice cream sprinkles, etc.... Lost in all that is some letting at the bottom that reminds us that Weiss was the 1988 Rookie of the Year, and there's a little more detail about that on the non-gold back.

1995 Score Gold Rush #338 Andres Galarraga

Beginning a transition from gold to green, Score's Gold Rush parallel set in 1995 gives us a shot of Andres Galarraga signing autographs. I think. Many ballplayers were sporting shades like this in the mid-1990s, but Galarraga did not go down the goatee route, the 1990s equivalent of the big, bushy beards we commonly see today.

Score also used a different, darker shade of gold on the border than Weiss' card. This one looks less like actual gold and more like a slightly reddish alloy. The foil is a tiny bit dinged up on the edges, as whatever Score used for this product, I've always found to be easy to nick.

2008 Topps Heritage Chrome #C50 Matt Holliday /1959

Moving fully into the green color theme, Matt Holliday's Chrome parallel from 2008 Topps Heritage is serial numbered to 1959, matching the design of that year. Remember that Jeff Francis card? Now it should be pretty obvious where Upper Deck got its idea for Baseball Heroes. Not that a circle is a hugely unusual shape or anything, but the diameter and placement are almost identical.

Being from 2008, this is from the year after the Rockies went to the World Series and Holliday won MVP honors in the NLCS against the Diamondbacks. He also led a bunch of categories in 2007, including two Triple Crown categories. They didn't mention his memorable slide at the end of the 2007 regular season (hi, Padres fans!), but any green card always has a welcome spot in my collection.

1994 Finest Refractors #72 Joe Girardi

1994 Finest is right up there as my all-time favorite green set, with 2013 Topps Emerald close behind. Joe Girardi, now manager of the Yankees, spent a few seasons behind the plate as a Rockie, and even though he missed about half of the 1993 season due to injury, he still earned a spot in the Topps Finest set. Not only that, but this is the refractor version, a term we all know now but weren't so familiar with back then. 

This isn't nearly as rare as refractors from the debut 1993 Finest set, but it's still a great card, and a fairly scarce variation of one of my favorite sets. I have none of the refractors from 1993 in my collection, and only Kevin Stocker's from 1994, besides this. It was a trade package full of shiny cards from start to finish, covering all the great periods of Rockies history.

Thanks, Fuji!

The Trading Post #70: The Chronicles of Fuji

If you're a longtime Rockies fan, or even a moderately informed baseball fan, you probably know that Monday night's game in Denver between the Blue Jays and the Rockies was the first time Troy Tulowitzki returned to Coors Field following last year's sudden trade. I had planned on attending that game as soon as the 2016 schedule was released, and got a small group of friends together to go with me at the last minute.

2013 Bowman Platinum Sapphire #69 Troy Tulowitzki

The above parallel is a prophetic card, recycled photo or not. The blue background against Tulo in purple pinstripes predicted where he'd end up within a couple seasons. With as many colored parallels as Topps prints, perhaps that's not so surprising. One of them had to be accurate.

Overall, Monday's game was fairly typical. Hot dogs, a few beers, a seat on the third base side so as not to stare into the sun for half the game, Jon Gray giving up a first-inning home run then largely settling down, Nolan Arenado flashing the leather. But what was different was me. My chosen attire for the game was a Tulowitzki jersey. A Blue Jays one.

Consider it an act of protest.

I found the trade to be quite upsetting. At first I scoffed that it was just business, but the next morning and for some time after I was in a state of disbelief and sadness. My blog archive offers a glimpse into my thoughts at the time.

The Rockies hadn't ever really done anything quite like that before. Sure, they've traded a few guys I liked, and opted not to shell out for various free agents in the offseason. When Matt Holliday was traded I wasn't too fazed. Holliday was a rather subpar outfielder, and Carlos Gonzalez came over in return from the A's. But Tulo, with the Rockies since his debut, being dealt for three pitchers that are still in the minors, and Jose Reyes? It just...hurt. Especially when Jose Reyes' domestic violence incident came to light.

Maybe Jeff Hoffman and the other pitching prospects will turn out to be awesome. And the Rockies made an expensive statement in cutting Jose Reyes, which I think was the right move. Plus, Tulo's untimely departure did clear the way for Trevor Story, which no one saw coming.

2013 Topps Allen & Ginter Across the Years #ATY-TT Troy Tulowitzki

But I was eager to welcome him back to Denver. Prior to his first at bat, the fans (myself included) gave him a standing ovation as he doffed his helmet. We even got the TU-LO chant going a couple times.

Just like in this A&G insert card, Tulowitzki made a nice play or two in the field Monday night. Reyes left a bit to be desired in that department, but Story is coming along nicely, despite a few rookie mistakes. Even Nolan Arenado had a tough time in the field during his first six weeks or so, but he might be the best defensive third baseman in the game right now.

Flipping this card over tells us that Tulo shares an October 10th birthday with all sorts of famous people, from Verdi to Andrew McCutchen. He's not too much younger than me, you know. We even wore pretty much the same jersey on Monday.

2001 Topps Opening Day Stickers #10 Colorado Rockies

Which raises the question: what does it mean to be a Rockies fan?

Despite that standing O, there were more than a few people that heckled and booed him. And he did go 0-4, which I was genuinely disappointed about, though he hit a home run in game 2 of the series following what I'll call a hail delay. I'm still glad the Rockies won the game, but I felt rather conflicted throughout. Does that make me less of a Rockies fan? Does my loyalty to a player mean I support the team less?

I've always had an affinity for ex-Rockies as they traveled around the league. Charlie Hayes, in his first season away from the Rockies as a Pirate, hit a home run on May 20th, 1996. I stood up and cheered for him, even though he was on the other team. I was disappointed when Larry Walker retired without ever winning a World Series. I was happy for Joe Girardi when he helped the Yankees win the World Series in 1996. And I definitely was pulling for the Blue Jays in the 2015 postseason.

I caught a lot of heat from a lot of people for wearing that jersey. Even random strangers. Tulo's stock in Denver has gone down quite a bit, partially for some of the comments he made about management. Which surprises me, because it's nothing that the papers and fans haven't been saying for two-plus decades.

Am I a Rockies fan? Yes. But does that mean that I'll blindly agree with all their decisions and root for whichever players they put on the field? No. If they did an even swap of 25-man rosters with any given team like the Braves or the Rangers, I wouldn't show up the next day and root for the Rockies. The uniform carries a lot of weight, but so do the players that have worn it.

2012 Bowman Chrome Legends In The Making Die Cuts #LIM-CG Carlos Gonzalez

Fortunately, despite trade rumors that circled around him last year, Carlos Gonzalez remains a Rockie, and he's still capable of mashing monster home runs. For that type of consistent performance, he's rewarded with an always-interesting and always-hard-to-scan die cut card from Bowman. In 2012 he was a Legend in the Making. By now he's one of the longest-tenured Rockies and still a fan favorite.

2015 Topps Custom #NNO San Jose Fuji (AU)

In all this talk about Tulowitzki, I've been neglecting the blogger who actually sent these cards. Along with all these Rockies, Fuji of The Chronicles of Fuji included a signed, custom card of his South Park avatar, proclaiming himself as a member of the Oakland Athletics. He chose the 2015 style for this Topps Custom, a bit different from the 2008 design on his blog profile. The Junior Junkie, the other blogger to include a custom as part of a trade package, chose to go with the iconic 1987 design.

I haven't made one of these myself, but if I were to, I'd probably pick 1994. There's something about your first factory set.

1996 Collector's Choice You Crash the Game #CG16 Larry Walker

Back to the shiny. This is a You Crash The Game insert card, a redemption card that became valid only if the pictured player hit a home run during the series listed on the front. But Larry Walker broke his collarbone in June 1996, meaning he was injured for most of the summer and didn't have a chance to make this card pay off for collectors. Sadly, it's destined to remain in this format forever, always offering an optimistic glimmer of hope for something that's no longer possible.

1994 Pinnacle Museum Collection #103 Jerald Clark

You've seen this card on several blogs before, including this one. Well, at least the base version of it. Pinnacle had one of the better parallel sets of the mid-1990s with this fancy starburst finish called Dufex. Lines radiate out from the Pinnacle logo as Jerald Clark scales the outfield wall at Mile High Stadium. It's a bit harder to make out details in the photo than the base card, but then again, that's not the point of this set. There's no serial number, but it had a print run of 6,500. That's a needle in a haystack as 1994 cards go.

2015 Topps Update Chrome #US16 John Axford

John Axford's tenure as a Rockie has already come and gone. I saw him pitch last July, one of those bullpen wins that can only be generated when you blow a save and come back in the bottom of the 9th. Starting pitchers love when that happens, let me tell you.

Anyway, he got a card in 2015 Topps Update, and this is one of those sparkly Chrome parallels that everyone seemed to be buying at Target in late summer 2015. I never ended up getting one of those gift boxes they were sold in, trusting that they'd make their way to me via trade sooner or later.

2015 Topps Update #US29 Ben Paulsen (RC)

Ben Paulsen makes an appearance from time to time. He's played in a couple dozen games this season, but for now is just on the 40-man roster. Fuji threw in a couple copies of this one, which may end up in my Coors Field frankenset. It has a long way to go, and I may already have a card #29, but this is a pretty great night shot either way. And it transitions us into the non-shiny portion of the post.

1998 Leaf Rookies and Stars #171 Larry Walker TLU (SP)

Leaf Rookies & Stars isn't a set I run across too often. I was out of the hobby at this point, and while I appreciate a Larry Walker power swing as much as the next guy, the "Team Lineup Card" labeling had me intrigued. Turning the card over did not disappoint.

1998 Leaf Rookies and Stars #171 Larry Walker TLU (SP) (Reverse)

It's a team checklist, yes, but it's done a bit differently than usual. Insert cards are included on the right hand side, a unique feature among all the team checklists I've ever run across. The actual Opening Day lineup is listed as well, giving at least a little nod to lesser players that didn't get an actual card in the set. Todd Helton was just getting his career off the ground in 1998, and he bridged the gap between the modern Rockies and a couple of the inaugural players like Bichette and Castilla. You don't need more than a few players to bridge a huge portion of the team's history, sort of like the transfer of power between Mickey Mantle and Joe DiMaggio in 1951.

1998 Leaf Rookies and Stars #136 Todd Helton PT (SP)

Here's one of the subset cards referenced on the Lineup Card checklist! This is a Power Tools card, and they're definitely going for the style of a Ford F-150 commercial. The back of the card praises Helton's budding talents, even saying that the Rockies expect him to bring home a batting title. Just a couple years later he did just that, hitting .372 in 2000, his first All-Star season. Other than Larry Walker's .379 the year before, that remains the highest batting average among the numerous batting titles they've brought to Denver. In fact, since their inaugural 1993 season, they've won nine NL batting titles out of a possible twenty-three—about 40%.

Of course, that adds to the frustration of being a Rockies fan, because their pitching is consistently as bad as their hitting is good.

But maybe the loot from the Tulowitzki trade will change that in a couple seasons.

2012 Topps A Cut Above #ACA-25 Troy Tulowitzki

I couldn't really end this post with anyone else, could I? I'm not sure if this asymmetrical die cut is supposed to represent a particular shape, but he is "a cut above". An out-of-focus right field scoreboard is visible in the background as Tulo gets ready to fire an off-balance throw to a fellow infielder. This is always where he excelled, in the field. He was always a threat at the plate, though he surprisingly hasn't ever led the league in any stat. Nolan Arenado has already surpassed Tulo's collection of Gold Gloves, and Trevor Story looks to be an exciting player to fill Tulo's shoes, something Jose Reyes would have had a hard time doing even if he wanted to be here.

He'll always have a place in Denver history, and while I'll never forget the TU-LO chants echoing off the other side of the stadium at a particular 2007 World Series game, now that I got to say my goodbyes, I can better accept that Tulo and the Rockies have parted ways.