The Trading Post #140: Nachos Grande

One nice thing about being perpetually behind is that I never have to go fishing for post ideas. It's pretty unlikely that you'll ever see me publish something titled, "Top nineteen cards showing the Pirate Parrot".

Here are two, in case that's what you're here for.

But seriously, the incoming stacks of cards are starting to multiply, as my fellow Cardsphere citizens are keeping my mailbox full. Those are the blogging priority, because I'm extremely thankful for all the carefully selected shipments put together by fellow traders like Nachos Grande. That blaster of 2018 Big League will be in a holding pattern for quote some time to come.

Mom gets to skip ahead, though. Hope you understand.

And what's that you say? 2020 Topps Series 1 is already out? Get in line, I guess.

1999 UD Choice Yard Work #Y12 Vinny Castilla

Nachos Grande's "Season of Giving" has happened before. It took me until early February to get the posts up that time too. He's appeared on The Trading Post theme numerous times, and that doesn't even count all the group breaks he's run. In short, he can take credit for a sizable chunk of my recent collection, and it shows no sign of slowing down.

One of the more eye-catching cards in this stack was a copper foil insert from the final year of Collector's Choice, known in 1999 as UD Choice. Just like a shiny little penny, complete with raised "Yardwork" lettering on the right. It's part of a 30-card insert set, and Castilla is one of two power-hitting Rockies to appear in this colorful homer-focused set.

Specifically, this card describes how Vinny Castilla began his 1998 campaign with a bang, smashing two homers in the brand new Bank One Ballpark on Opening Day, spoiling the inaugural game of the Arizona Diamondbacks. I've seen Pacific chronicle that first-ever D-Backs series elsewhere, mentioning Pedro Astacio's first win of 1998 on his Pacific Online card.

The error that Upper Deck made on this card comes toward the end of the paragraph on the back. After the newspaper-style blurb about the game, they go on to include a "Prologue" about how Castilla would finish his 1998 season with 46 home runs, a career high that he never eclipsed. Todd Helton later bumped Castilla's 1998 season down to fourth all-time in franchise history, but the problem is that UD should have called that an "Epilogue", not a "Prologue".

Card backs are so much fun. One of these days I'll dive into early-90s Score sets and read those novellas.

2005 UD All-Star Classics Midsummer Classics #11 Todd Helton

Here's a less-coppery Upper Deck card showing a youthful-looking Todd Helton. The good stuff here is on the back, where we learn that despite all those Blake Street Bomber power hitters, despite the 1998 All-Star Game actually being held at Coors Field, despite the rule that every team must have at least one All-Star representative, no Rockie homered in an All-Star Game until 2003. Blackmon and Story have both done so in the past couple years alone, but Helton set that Rockies first on the South Side of Chicago.

This insert from Upper Deck's 2005 All-Star Classics also mentions that now-defunct rule that the winning league would get home field advantage in the World Series. It was implemented in 2003 following that disastrous tie in Milwaukee in 2002. The TV networks laid it on thick with "This time it counts" promos, but the American League usually ended up with the win, and the rule was finally rescinded in 2017.

Just in time for the Astros to come along.

But that's a different story.

2009 Topps Ticket to Stardom #136 Todd Helton

It's been a few years since we've seen Topps Ticket to Stardom in these parts, not to be confused with the more violently-named Rocket to Stardom, a late-90s Ultra insert.

The card back highlights Helton's evening on June 10th, 2008, where he went 3-for-4 with a three-run home run. He was sporting a goatee later in his career, so I'm guessing this photo is from much earlier than 2008.

It would appear that Topps grouped teams by card number in this set, as Helton's card is just one before the Troy Tulowitzki card I received years ago, but a closer look at the checklist shows that it's as random as ever. Fleer got pretty weird in their later years, but I loved how they set up their checklists alphabetically by team.

1997 Metal Universe #75 Kevin Ritz

Speaking of weird Fleer (and rockets, I suppose), how about some twin-barreled robotic laser cannons on Kevin Ritz's 1997 Metal Universe baseball card?

Somehow, that's a valid sentence.

And yes, that's what's on this card. Nothing in the whole hobby scans worse than Metal Universe.

As weird as you think 1996 Metal Universe might be, trust me, 1997 is weirder still. Part of me wants to complete it just for the sheer insanity of it. Artist Clayton Chambers is credited with the artwork, mentioned on a card back that would fit perfectly in a late-90s video game menu screen.

There's a perfectly reasonable explanation for all this, in that Fleer was once a subsidiary of Marvel Enterprises, long before their parent company started cranking out billion-dollar box office blockbusters under the Disney umbrella. There are plenty of Marvel Metal cards out there that look a lot like this, just without any sort of baseball tie-in. Blending baseball and comics isn't the craziest idea to ever come out of a boardroom, but they just don't fit together. I've been through enough mergers in Corporate America to recognize this as a collectible manifestation of "our cultures are really similar!"

1999 Fleer Tradition #528 John Thomson

Even after over six years of writing this blog, somehow there are still Rockies making their Infield Fly Rule debut. And it's not like John Thomson was a one-and-done guy. He spent all or part of five seasons with the Rockies. He didn't have a great time as a Rockie; in fact his 1999 record was an abysmal 1-10. He did turn things around a bit elsewhere in the Majors later on.

Players with cameras is a fun mini-collection topic, but this is just the second one to appear on the blog. I'm guessing Thomson wasn't slated to start this game in Dodger Stadium. He's hanging out with the photographers and looking through a surprisingly beat-up telephoto lens that's likely worth more than my first car (and maybe even my second). He just has his warm up jacket on, and it looks like it's late afternoon with the California sun casting long shadows on the seats and the foul pole in right field. It doesn't look like game day for this starter to me.

1999 Pacific #152 Jeff Reed

Think of this: 1997 Metal Universe is so crazy that a Pacific card isn't the craziest card in the post. Instead, this is really a nice, normal design, with a fantastic horizontal shot of catcher Jeff Reed in full extension, not to mention the Coors Field home dugout in the background. Pacific even kept it simple with silver foil. None of that red, green, or copper foil you'd find from them on occasion.

There are lots of specific game performances mentioned on card backs in this post, and this one is no different. Jeff Reed came on as a pinch hitter on July 27th, 1998 (back when I still got summer vacations), and ended up with a walkoff double in the 13th inning. Todd Helton got on base to start the 13th, and Reed came through with two outs to send fans home happy.

1999 Pacific #148 Darryl Kile

Incidentally, one of those two outs in the bottom of the 13th came from pitcher Darryl Kile, who pinch hit for Curtis Leskanic, worked a 3-1 count, and popped out to the catcher. Reed was on deck at the time and settled the matter a few pitches later.

It was one of those kinds of games.

In case you were wondering, that's not the game Pacific chose to profile for Darryl Kile's card. They went with September 20th, 1998, in which he pitched 10 shutout innings on 102 pitches in San Diego.

10 shutout innings; how's that for a lack of run support? Kile would have had a "Maddux" if the Rockies did anything at the plate that day before the 11th inning.

In that 11th, Larry Walker pinch-hit for Kile and singled in the game's only run. Dave Veres got the save, and Kile picked up a well-earned win, his last of the 1998 season, and good enough to earn a spot on a Pacific card.

2000 Pacific Crown Collection #96 Larry Walker TC

Pacific didn't have much baseball life left in 2000. They put a single set out in 2001 and decided to focus on other ventures. But 2000 offered some good Pacific sets, including the primarily Spanish-language Crown Collection. If you're wondering whether this card back thought highly enough of Walker's clutch hit back in 1998 that saved Darryl Kile's shutout, sorry to disappoint. In fact, this card is a team checklist, or rather a listado de jugadores del equipo, helpfully checking in card #96 for us.

I thought I'd point out the CHS memorial patch on this card, which the Rockies wore for most of the 1999 season following the events at Columbine High School.

2000 Topps Own the Game #OTG13 Larry Walker

This Own The Game insert card looked incredibly familiar, but what we have is ever-so-slightly different from a card Night Owl sent a few years ago. That one focused on Walker's batting average, but this one, showing Walker in a home uniform, looks at his slugging percentage instead. Now that I have a couple cards from 2000 Topps Own The Game, I can see that it's basically a league-leader set. And since Walker led the Majors in both average and slugging in 1999, he got two cards in this 30-card set, as did other players like Mark McGwire, Randy Johnson, Pedro Martinez, and more.

Walker's slugging percentage was a whopping .710 in 1999, and .567 for his career to that point. That stat dipped ever so slightly by the time he retired, finishing at .565. That's currently 12th all-time, and still ahead of Hank Aaron, whom Walker was compared to on the card back.

Now that he's a Hall-of-Famer, you'll probably be seeing a bit more of Larry Walker on the blog. 

1999 Topps #438 Matt Belisle / Matt Roney (RC)

We'll get back to Hall-of-Famers before this post is over, but not before a quick detour to draft picks.

A pair of Matts appear on this 1999 dual-player card, Matt Belisle and Matt Roney. Though he's pictured as a Brave, Belisle is actually the only one of this pair to ever play for the Rockies. He was a Rockie from 2009-2014 and finished an even 32-32 in relief appearances before entering journeyman status. He pitched as recently as 2018.

Roney, on the other hand, accumulated a 1-10 record over two seasons, mainly with the historically bad 2003 Detroit Tigers, who went 43-119, the worst mark in the MLB since the 1962 Mets. Even recent Tiger and Oriole teams haven't been that bad.

At first, I thought one of the Matts here was Matt Holliday, whose Rookie Card also appeared in this set.

1999 Topps #442 Matt Holliday / Jeff Winchester (RC)

That's actually this one, a few card numbers away in the same subset. Holliday's career lasted about as long as Belisle's, retiring as a Rockie after the 2018 season. I guess I got to see his final game, which was Game 3 of the 2018 NLDS against the Brewers, in which the Rockies were swept. I crunched the numbers, and Matt Holliday has appeared in five-eighths of all Rockies Postseason games (fifteen out of twenty-four).

Rockies Postseason appearances are truly once in a blue moon, aren't they? Two dozen playoff games in club history, and just ten at home. Blue Moon wheat ale, born at the Sandlot Brewery in Coors Field, has a name that ended up being a little too appropriate.

Holliday's cardmate, the only non-Matt in this pair of cards, is Jeff Winchester, a catcher who never progressed past Double-A.

2007 Bowman Heritage Prospects #BHP15 Greg Reynolds

As long as we're doing Infield Fly Rule debuts, how about pitcher Greg Reynolds? I've mentioned him a time or two, but this is his first card here. He had a forgettable Major League career, finishing with a 6-11 record and a -1.5 WAR. Mostly, he's famous in Denver for being selected second overall by the Rockies in the 2006 draft, ahead of players like Evan Longoria, Clayton Kershaw, Tim Lincecum, and Max Scherzer.

It's a good retro card, at least. You don't see actual cardboard often anymore.

2018 Donruss #106 Kyle Freeland

Of course, the Greg Reynolds story is just one data point. They've drafted some greats, like Helton, Tulowitzki, Arenado, Blackmon, Holliday, and Story, to name a few. It remains to be seen how Kyle Freeland's career will shape up, but he's another highlight of the Rockies draft history. He grew up a Rockies fan, and came darn close to pitching a no-hitter a couple years ago.

Every so often, Bowman cards pan out. Turns out I was sent a Bowman Chrome Prospects card of Freeland way back in 2015. He's progressed well enough to get a card in 2018 Donruss, an obvious Coors Field card that shows the raised outfield wall in front of the bullpens, with a bright Comfort Dental billboard just beyond.

That section of Coors Field has been a rotating stream of Denver-area businesses over the years, and watching old highlight reels brings back memories of defunct brands that used to do well enough to advertise in a ballpark. Airtouch Cellular, for example, has been showing up on a lot of Larry Walker highlights recently, and that brand has since evolved into Verizon Wireless. US West was another, one of the Baby Bells that is now part of Centurylink.

These phone companies are something else with their mergers and acquisitions. Which is how you end up with bipedal robot battle tanks on baseball cards.

That about does it for the Rockies, but there were a handful of unopened packs thrown in, which are always a joy to open whether you've completed the set or not.

1989 Topps #269 Tom Bolton

1989 Topps was one of the first sets I completed, and by "completed", I mean I bought a hand-collated set at the local card shop when I was a kid for under $10. I should have known then that this would not be a successful retirement strategy. I even kept a sealed pack of 1992 Stadium Club squirreled away for a time until my curiosity got the better of me.

I don't really know much about Tom Bolton. Topps lost interest in him after he was traded in 1992, but Upper Deck kept him in their sets until his retirement in 1994. What really caught my eye on this card is the Ferris wheel in the background. It's one of the last vestiges of random card backgrounds, sort of like that legendary Luis Alvarado parking lot card in 1973 Topps.

And it says more than a little bit about the circus that's been following the Red Sox this offseason, beginning with Alex Cora's connection to the Astros cheating scandal and his subsequent departure from the Red Sox managerial position. And let's not forget the Mookie Betts trade that's been in question for several days, and the media frenzy surrounding it.

1990 Donruss Bonus MVPs #BC-26 Alan Trammell

I've had 1990 Donruss on my Completed Sets list for a really long time. Not quite as long as 1989 Topps, but I definitely obtained it during my first foray into the baseball card hobby as a kid. However, these one-per-team MVP bonus cards have proven surprisingly elusive.

Alan Trammell got the nod for the Tigers that year, and is the final card in the 26-card insert set. It's hard to imagine a 26-team league, especially when it seems like we'll see a 32-team league shortly. Anyway, Trammell, now a Hall-of-Famer, spent his entire career with the Tigers, and is currently part of their front office. A friend of mine who grew up a Tigers fan ran into him at a sports bar outside Coors Field when Trammell was a coach with the Diamondbacks. My friend felt that nagging sense of familiarity, but only realized after the fact who he had been talking to.

There are enough incomplete insert sets in my collection that I'll open packs of anything, and I'm still likely to find something worthwhile. I have a feeling that I'll catch up on my blog posts before I complete 1988 Donruss, unless I just buy the set outright.

2010 Upper Deck #516 Aaron Hill

The final unopened pack Nachos Grande threw in for me was 2010 Upper Deck. I have around five or six pages worth of this set, so I'm likely to find a slew of new cards even in one single pack. This Aaron Hill card is one of them. It shows Hill when he was with the Blue Jays, er, Toronto, and had just led the league with a mind-boggling 682 at bats in 2009, earning a small splash of red text on the largely empty card back.

There's also a small splash of red on the front, that "TED" patch on his sleeve. That was a memorial patch for Ted Rogers, the owner of the Blue Jays who passed away in 2008. That's the same Rogers family that founded the Canadian telecom Rogers Communications, for which the Jays' home park of Rogers Centre is named.

Below that is an official Blue Jays logo that got Upper Deck in a massive amount of legal trouble.

I consistently can't do a Nachos Grande shipment justice without writing 3,000 words. And I didn't even show you Jamey Wright's Metal Universe card with tiny Death Stars floating all over the place.

OK, here.

1997 Metal Universe #78 Jamey Wright

Thanks for reading!

The Most Overproduced Set Ever. Probably.

When you hear the word "overproduction", or its more derogatory cousin "junk wax", what do you think of?

Those words probably conjure up images of sets like 1991 Donruss, maybe 1990 Topps, or perhaps one of the earlier Upper Deck sets. It could be one of the color bombs like 1991 Fleer. 1987 Topps is a strong candidate, but it's just too iconic to be lumped in with some of the others. Maybe you know the sets from that era so well that the only one it doesn't make you think of is 1990 Leaf.

But for me, I think the best example is 1988 Donruss, also one of the worst-collated sets ever. Maybe one day I'll break down and buy the factory set, but I feel like I've been on a perpetual quest to complete it since I was a kid.

On the same day I drove that Ferrari, I stopped by the Colorado Mills mall afterwards. Inside a sports memorabilia shop filled with autographed bats, jerseys, and other things of that nature, I found a box partially filled with sealed packs priced at a buck apiece. I selected the five packs from 1988 Donruss, swiped my card, and instantly added to my collection.

As an aside, what's the proper slang equivalent for "swiping" a chip card? "Inserting?" Too technical. "Chipping?" Maybe. We'll probably still be "swiping" our chip cards in much the same way we "dial" an iPhone or "roll down" a power window. Or even "text" over iMessage, which isn't entirely correct.

Let's get to the cards.

1988 Donruss #309 Darren Daulton

If nothing else, opening up some overproduction packs gives you a look at some minor stars that haven't had cards in ages. Darren Daulton participated in the 1993 World Series, and had a pretty good season in 1992, earning a spot on the All-Star team and finishing sixth in MVP voting. "Dutch" was one of the Wild Bunch 1993 Phillies, coming up just a bit short that year, thanks to Joe Carter's walkoff home run in Game 6.

1988 Donruss #238 Bobby Bonilla

Bobby Bonilla, a six-time All-Star and near-MVP (second only to teammate Barry Bonds) ended up being a journeyman player later in his career, though he was a Marlin in 1997, winning his first and only World Series ring. But in recent years, he might be most famous for the financial deal he worked out with the Mets. As part of a deferred payment plan, the Mets will pay him about $1.2 million annually (every July 1st, in fact) until 2035, when Bonilla will be 72. The contract makes the Mets an annual laughingstock, but much has been written about how it's not as bad a deal as everyone makes it out to be.

And yes, Bernie Madoff indirectly had a hand in all that. Sort of isn't that surprising that the Mets re-signed Jose Reyes to a minor-league deal after the Rockies waived him.

1988 Donruss Bonus MVPs #BC-15 Kirby Puckett (SP)

Sadly, Kirby Puckett passed away about ten years ago. But he won two World Series, was elected to the All Star team every season besides his first two, and was a fan favorite in Minneapolis for quite a while. The MVP logo in the upper left signifies that this is an insert card, or what Donruss that year called "Bonus Cards". According to BaseballCardPedia, this card, from the second half of the Bonus Cards insert set, is very slightly harder to find than the first half. I'd have never thought a phrase like that would be said about 1988 Donruss, but apparently there are a handful of short prints out there.

Maybe those go for two cents instead of one.

Despite its alleged scarcity, this card is an example of the primary gripe I have with 1988 Donruss. It's dark. And yes, I do realize that Mr. Puckett is African American, but many of the photos in this set are quite underexposed.

1988 Donruss Bonus MVPs #BC-24 Will Clark (SP)

Camera flashes can only do so much. Depending on their power and a few other factors, they're pretty much useless beyond about thirty feet. And action shots in sports are not done with a flash. But photographing a guy under a helmet in direct sunlight just doesn't give you the best results. Another Bonus Card, this one of Will Clark, demonstrates this.

I didn't pull his card in these five packs, but one of the worst underexposures in the whole set can be found on Nelson Liriano's card #32. Flip through your stacks of '88; you'll see what I mean. And who doesn't have stacks of 1988 Donruss?

1988 Donruss #324 Rafael Palmeiro

Perhaps the most glaringly obvious thing about 1988 Donruss (and most 1988-ish sets) is that steroid use hadn't taken over the league. Maybe Jose Canseco, but that sort of goes without saying. Rafael Palmiero, one of the asteriskiest players with an asterisk, was a bit more on the Regular Human end of the athletic spectrum when this photo was taken, in sharp contrast to cards from later in his career.

1988 Donruss #1 Mark McGwire DK

Same goes for this Diamond Kings card of Mark McGwire. He looked a lot different during his home run chase of 1998, and not just because of the facial hair. But his rookie year was good enough to earn Card #1.

Dick Perez did what he could, but this still looks a touch dark to me. When it comes to Diamond Kings cards, the painting always looked creepy enough that I never really noticed the tiny action shot in the lower area. Even on a set like this you can still spot new things.

1988 Donruss #326 Barry Bonds

One can't bring up steroid use without mentioning Barry Bonds. For the longest time, he was my least favorite player in the league, but I did start warming up to him a little bit once his greatness became undeniable. And say what you will about his steroid use, he stood head and shoulders above the league when almost everyone else was using PEDs, too.

1988 Donruss #34 Roberto Alomar (RC)

1988 was almost 30 years ago. Players that are now in the Hall of Fame were once baby-faced rookies, or Rated Rookies if Donruss thought particularly highly of you. Alomar had no major league experience at this point, but went on to have a stellar career, even leading the league in sacrifice flies in 1999. Plus a slew of stolen bases, and even a couple hundred home runs.

Of course, the back of the card is sure to mention the rest of the Alomar family, father Sandy and brother Sandy, Jr.

1988 Donruss #657 Gregg Jefferies (RC)

Looking even younger is Gregg Jefferies, who had one of the hottest cards in the whole set. The 1988 price of this card could have paid for these packs twice over. It's slightly disappointing to know that it's worth pennies today, but there is something about having cards that were totally out of reach back then.

I still need to find a Griffey rookie, though. It's a glaring omission in my collection.

1988 Donruss #88 Jeff Reed

Jeff Reed is probably the least recognizable player thus far. It's been a lot of Hall of Famers, and a few more that should be in the Hall. But Expos cards are few and far between these days, plus Jeff Reed played behind the plate as a Rockie for several seasons in the late 1990s.

Still, pretty underexposed.

1988 Donruss #638 Bob Melvin

Mostly I've been featuring younger players, but in 1988 there were lots from the old guard still in the league. Melvin has spent the last decade or so as a manager for a few Western teams, including his current tenure as skipper of the A's. Melvin actually only had a few years' experience by 1988, but he had a relatively short career, and didn't play past 1994. He was one of numerous players whose career was ended by the strike.

1988 Donruss #401 Tommy John

Tommy John had been in the league since 1963, and was nearing the end of his career at the not-quite-Jamie-Moyer age of 45. He never won a World Series, as he always seemed to be on the wrong side of the Yankees-Dodgers rivalry in the late 1970s and early 1980s. But of course he is known for the surgical procedure he underwent on his elbow in 1975 that now bears his name, and lesser known for the dubious distinction of being the only player to commit three errors on one play. Still, he came pretty close to 300 wins, and was an All Star in three different decades.

1988 Donruss #305 Bob Boone

Tommy John's career predated the Designated Hitter by quite a bit. I'm sure he got plenty of plate appearances, but I doubt he was the type to wear batting gloves. Melvin and Bob Boone above also don't use any fancy batting gloves, and it didn't seem to hurt anything. In addition to lots of underexposed shots, there are plenty of "bats resting on shoulders" shots. He might be in the on deck circle, but that's one of the most casual postures I've ever seen on a card.

Like the Alomars, the Boones are a longtime baseball family, in fact one of only four to have three generations in the Big Leagues. Ray Boone played as postwar baseball cards were becoming what we know today, Bob you see here, and sons Bret and Aaron played until quite recently. Aaron, of course, won the 2003 ALCS for the Yankees with a dramatic extra innings walkoff home run.

1988 Donruss #249 Paul Molitor

Even the great Paul Molitor can't escape 1988 Donruss. But he's a batting glove guy, apparently.

1988 Donruss #641 Stan Musial Puzzle

Donruss' big selling point were all the puzzle pieces. Every year, they'd pick another baseball legend and create a 27-card puzzle. Technically it's 63 pieces but I've heard of no one that's ever split each card up into its constituent three pieces. At least, I never have. They make enough of a mess of tiny paper shreds just taking them out of the border.

So we'd know what the final product looked like, Donruss always included a card showing the completely assembled puzzle. I've completed a few of them, but I'm still a few short on Stan Musial's 1988 puzzle, even after these five packs. I've seen this card a few times, but didn't quite notice the old-style black and red Cardinals logo before yellow crept its way in.

I have a bit of sorting to do on this set. I just have too many to keep it in binder pages anymore, so I'll probably be moving it to a box soon. But don't be surprised if a few 1988 puzzle pieces make it onto my Eight Men Out list so I can complete this beauty of Stan the Man.

And all that for a mere five bucks. I even found a few commons.

A conversation at Fleer, 1989

"Bob, check this out! I put the player's head outside the frame so you get this nifty 3D effect!"

1989 Fleer #480 Jack Howell

"Nice, Fred, but you really should put the bat outside the frame, too. It looks silly getting cut off like that. Here, let me show you."

1989 Fleer #322 Marvell Wynne

"See? Doesn't that look better? Let's pick it up again tomorrow."

1989 Fleer #523 Pete Incaviglia

"Fred, That's not what I had in mind. Remember what we talked about yesterday? Try it again."

1989 Fleer #97 Jim Rice

"How's that, Bob?"
"Well, it's better, but the bat is cropped at the top of the frame. Looks a little odd, don't you think?"

1989 Fleer #581 Juan Samuel

"Bob, I'm just not feeling this whole 'bat outside the frame' thing. I just put it behind his head so you can't see it."
"Good enough. Hey, can you do the Billy Ripken card real quick before you go to lunch?"