At the Trade Deadline 50: Secret Santa Delivery from Plaschke, Thy Sweater Is Argyle

In a bit of a twist, Greg Zakwin of the blog Plaschke, Thy Sweater Is Argyle and I were assigned as each other's Secret Santas in the Bob Walk the Plank gift exchange organized by Matthew Scott. I received a big stack of cardboard in the mail from Greg, touching on many of my collecting interests.

As with most very large trade packages, I just scanned many of the highlights from the bunch. It's Christmas Eve as I write this, and there are family events to participate in. There are some big names here, but I think my favorite card of this bunch is actually the 1975 SSPC card of Roger Craig. He is pictured on the front as a coach for the Astros, but on the back he is listed in his new position as a coach with the Padres. As a player, he was on three World Series-winning teams and also lost the first game in Mets history. I've been meaning to pick up some more of those SSPC cards, but as with many of my hobby aspirations, I haven't really got around to it yet.

Other sports were well-represented in the package, as well as non-sports, like NASCAR (lol!). Von Miller is the cornerstone of the Denver Broncos right now, a team that is clinging to playoff hopes at the moment. I think that to get in, they have to win tough games against Kansas City and Oakland and hope that Miami loses to New England next week and that Pittsburgh beats Baltimore this week. Basically, the defending Super Bowl champions need to take care of business, and they need some help elsewhere to get into the postseason tournament.

It's always nice when I get some Yao Ming cardboard in my hands. He was a great player, but his career happened when I was out of collecting, so I have very little of his cardboard. There were plenty of Rockets from several eras in the package. How charmed was Robert Horry's career? He has seven NBA Championships with three teams, more rings than greats like Michael Jordan, Magic Johnson, Kobe Bryant, Tim Duncan, and Shaquille O'Neal.

Here's some horizontal cards, with some Broncos wearing college uniforms and a Max Scherzer/Bartolo Colon sighting. I still haven't been able to decide on a favorite card of 2016 for P-Town Tom's contest yet, but I think Colon's Topps NOW Home Run card is in the running.

These are cards for TV shows that are very popular, but that I have never watched. I pretty much checked out of watching television a decade or so ago. I will watch a movie from time to time, and I watch sports occasionally, but I can't remember the last TV series I watched for more than an episode or two. Ron Swanson, however, has been the subject of enough memes that I have a pretty good handle on the character. I think he is the official mascot of Greg's blog. Archer is something I'm only vaguely aware of, mostly due to reading about Greg's pursuit of the set and its sketch cards.

This is a terrible picture, but this is a 1967 Coke cap of Harmon Killebrew. It looks better in person. Killebrew was from a town not far from the town I spent my teen years in, and is probably one of the few positive things that have ever come out of that place.

This Rashad Evans card hails from 2010 Topps UFC, and is the Onyx parallel numbered # 067 / 188. Evans had a pretty good run to start his UFC career, but appears to be on the downside of things now, losing 4 of his last 6 fights.

Jay Cutler spent a couple of seasons as the Broncos' starter at quarterback. He had plenty of talent, but attitude questions and injuries (and interceptions) have made him a polarizing figure in Denver and then in Chicago. His trade to the Bears led to the Kyle Orton era in Denver, which eventually led to Tebowmania, which was a bright spot after many years of less-than-exciting football. I am pretty sure that this is my first Jay Cutler relic. It comes from 2008 Upper Deck Masterpieces.

This card could cause a lot of contention in my household. For some reason my eldest son decided that he hates the Broncos and loves the Bengals. Seeing both teams together on one card could totally blow his mind. Terrell Davis helped the Broncos win a couple of Super Bowls and racked up plenty of awards in an injury-shortened career. His inclusion in this TD Threats relic set is somewhat questionable, as the main stat highlighted is the number of touchdowns each player scored in 2001. Corey Dillon scored 13 TD's, while T.D. scored 0 TD's in an injury-plagued year. But this is a cool card in spite of that, as it is pretty rare for me to make an addition to my Denver Broncos collection.

This is probably my favorite card of the package, as I don't think I had a Clyde Drexler relic in my collection yet, and he played a role in helping the Rockets win their 1995 Championship, reuniting with his college teammate Hakeem Olajuwon. The relic is contained in that basketball die-cut window, and this is just a good-looking Championship Material relic card from 2009-10 Topps Basketball.

This was a fun package to open, and I was very happy to add some cards to player collections that I often neglect, especially the relic cards for players I didn't have relics for. I'm glad that I decided to participate in the Secret Santa project. It was fun to shop for my person, and it was fun to receive a surprise package in the mail. Thank you to Greg Zakwin for the cards and Matthew Scott for organizing the exchange!

The Japanese Sumo Wrestling Cards and Menko Blog Sent a Little Bit of Everything My Way

A while back, R Laughton of the Japanese Sumo Wrestling Cards and Menko blog reached out to me, saying he had a few things he'd like to send my way. He really did send me a little bit of everything, including the things you might expect to see on a blog about sumo wrestling cards and Menko. I didn't scan it all, but I scanned enough to show the breadth of the things that came out of the stuffed mailer that arrived in my mailbox.

First up was a stack of sumo cards from the 1999 BBM set. I don't know much about sumo, but I did a quick read-up on the sport. Two things that really interested me about sumo were the dedication required to be a professional and the complex ranking system.

He also enclosed a large group of menko cards from the 1950's. Again, I am not an expert in this world, so I can't say much more about them than what he told me. Luckily, his blog is a great resource for someone wanting to learn more about menko. Out of this group, I particularly like the Western-themed cards, as cowboy movies are something I enjoy watching from time to time.

The back of each card features a Rock-Paper-Scissors symbol and a fight number, which are two different ways of playing games with menko. Originally menko were used in a game that Americans of my generation would recognize by the name Pogs, where a card is thrown in an attempt to flip the opponent's card over. Then kids started collecting the menko instead of playing with them, and these alternate game aids were printed on the backs to give them a way to play games without damaging their cards.

Here are a couple more menko, which feature big robots and monsters, but I don't know if they are generic or tied to a specific property.

The backs of the cards suggest that they might belong to different sets, although I can't be certain of that. The one on the left has a very clear line where the bottom layer of cardboard doesn't reach quite as for as the top layer of cardboard. These things are thick.

Moving into things that are more familiar to me, R Laughton included a big stack of cards from BBM's 1995 Pro Wrestling Cards set. A couple of my favorites were these logo cards from AJW and JWP. One of my favorite wrestlers, Command Bolshoi, is the current President of JWP, while AJW folded in 2005.

Here are a few of the wrestler cards included in the stack. Some of these wrestlers are still active now, 21 years after the release of this set.

R Laughton also touched on many of my mini-collections and player collections. There was a wide array of good mustache cards, with Franco, Viola, and Garcia among the standouts. There was some nice cardboard of Jim Abbott, Carlos Correa, Goose Gossage, and some shiny cards featuring Andrew McCutchen.

 There was a little bit of football cardboard in the package, as well as a number of neat NASCAR cards. For the NASCAR scans, I mostly chose the craziest of the die-cut cards, as there were many designs I was not familiar with. The other day I took one of those Facebook quizzes that asked if you could name the driver of the pictured car. I did pretty well on the quiz, but whoever made the quiz must not have realized that the driver's names are usually printed above the door and/or on the windshield of the car.

Closing out the cardboard portion of the scans is a six-pack of Nolan Ryan cards. They include a Goose Gossage cameo (or is it a Nolan Ryan cameo?) and a Coca-Cola oddball. You've gotta love those old Astros uniforms. I've wanted to get a Nolan Ryan rainbow jersey for years (probably decades) now, but I've never been able to pull the trigger on it.

Finally, he included an unopened pack of Star Wars: Episode I widevision cards with a price tag from 7-11 in Japan. I am still mad that 7-11 pulled out of Idaho, as I have to travel at least one state away to get a Slurpee. This is a cool collectible, though, and I might just leave it unopened for now.

That is just a sampling of the cool stuff included in this package. I am extremely grateful for all of it, and I am excited to be inducted into the world of menko. Thanks, R Laughton!

Showing Off 1: There's a First Time for Everything

The somewhat local card shop hosts a card show every few months. I hadn't ever been to a card show, so I thought I might try it out. I got there about an hour before the doors closed, so probably about half of the dealers had already closed up shop. There were still a fair number of tables occupied, though, so there was still a decent amount of stuff to look at.

The first thing I bought was the last two packs from a box of Topps Chrome on the table of the guy running the show, so I could get change for my $20 bill. The thumbprints on the cards all came from me. Not much to say about the base cards. Here they are:

And here are the two horizontal cards from the packs. I think my favorite thing about Topps Chrome cards is the smell that they have. It's a plasticky chemical scent that probably causes cancer in the state of California. I have just confirmed that Panini Prizm cards have the same scent.

I did not pull either of the two autographs allocated per box, and I had to settle for two base Refractors as my inserts. At least they are Refractors of decent players; Joe Mauer and Yasiel Puig. I guess I ought to put the Puig on eBay. It's going for upwards of $10 right now. That just seems a little ridiculous to me. But I guess the demand is there. I've picked up a little bit of Chrome here and there so far, but I didn't think I wanted to try building the set, as you only get about 3-1/3 base cards per pack. At $2.99 per retail pack and assuming perfect collation, it would take me 67 packs to build the set, or $200.33 + tax. Boo! Sure, there is the off chance that I could hit some kind of crazy hit and be happy, but especially on the retail side the odds are against me. So I ordered a complete base set from a case buster on eBay for $25.00 and am calling it good. Now I can pick up a pack here or there without feeling driven to buy Moar! and Moar! in an attempt to finish a set. In looking at my Bowman set I finally decided to do the same thing, as I have busted a lot of that product and still was quite a bit short of a full set. I enjoy building a set just as much as anyone else, but I like to keep my sets mostly achievable, like Opening Day or the flagship set, stuff that offers 7 or 10 cards in a lower-priced pack. That is probably enough rant for now. I should just be happy that I pulled a Puig Refractor and not some scrub base card.

I think I read a blog post a while ago that warned against wearing team- or player-specific clothing to card shows because then that's all people will try to sell you, but I forgot about it until just now. I wore my Marshawn Lynch Seahawks jersey to the show, and everyone tried to sell me Russell Wilson? cards, even people who had Lynch cards visible on their tables. I had to explain to them that I am mostly a Denver Broncos fan, and I don't think any of them believed me. Next time I will have to wear something neutral.

The guy I bought the next batch of cards from really tried to push a Ronnie Hillman (one of this year's Broncos Running Backs) relic card on me, but this is the card I was interested in:

The card says something about this being a Veronica Mars card, but I don't even know what that is. This is a card signed by the actress who played Deb in Napoleon Dynamite, Tina Majorino. I don't think there were ever any Napoleon Dynamite autograph cards released, so this is about as close as it gets for fans of that movie.

I also got this Panini Prestige die-cut transparent acetate card of Marshawn Lynch from the same seller. It is a pretty good addition to the collection, although I don't know why the guy didn't lead with it, as I was wearing the jersey featured on the card. Same colors, same player, everything. I don't know.

The guy was pretty frustrated by the lack of business he'd had at the show and told me he wouldn't be coming back in December for the next one. I don't know what card shows generally look like, but there can't be a lot of collectors in this area anyway, and the guy didn't exactly have a table overflowing with stuff that would pull in piles of cash.

Many of the dealers had two tables covered with 5000-count boxes of singles, maybe some display cases for bigger hits, and a couple odds and ends like bobbleheads, magazines, or complete sets. Most of them seemed to be pretty happy with the amount of business they'd seen. This dude had probably 50 cards laid out on a small table, and I didn't see anything mind-boggling among the selection. I would imagine a show is what you make of it.

He tossed in these two Elway cards. I guess that's pretty cool. I didn't even notice them on the table until he added them to the stack. I want to know why Elway is so flippin' orange all the time. He's like a human carrot. I was watching the Denver game this last week and the camera kept zooming in on his face. It was scary. I guess this explains it.

The last table I lingered at had some player-specific boxes of basketball cards. I overpaid for six Hakeem Olajuwon cards for my long-neglected player collection. Don't get me wrong, these are all the nifty insert cards I wouldn't have been able to purchase at the card shop in my youth (I could only afford base cards because I am terrible at saving my money) and I like them, but I overpaid.

When I was a kid, Olajuwon signed a deal with Spalding to release a shoe that kids could afford. The internet way-back machine tells me the MSRP on those was $35.00. I had a pair of them and still store part of my Olajuwon collection in the box they came in, but they didn't really have any staying power. Just a few days ago he released a new shoe as part of his DR34M SHAKE fashion line. The price on it is $185.00. It is also butt-ugly. I guess even our heroes can have flaws.

I may already have this base card. I may even have a picture of it on this blog. I don't know.

 After I got the Olajuwons I felt a little bad about the price I paid for them, the show was just about to close, and my pocket was pretty much empty of cash, so I left. I think that if I go again I need to give myself time to dig through the cheap boxes and work toward my want lists rather than just running around at the last minute without a plan.

The highlights of the show were probably the Majorino autograph, the Puig Refractor, and the two Olajuwon Flair Showcase cards.