Hard work pays off...

I'm in the midst of cataloging most of my cards. This is taking a loooong time. But occasionally, it has it's rewards. Going through five one thousand count boxes of random football cards, ( dozens of RC's of Tim Couch, Duante Culpepper, Chad Pennington, etc.. etc...) I found this in one of those boxes.
I don't remember buying it, and have no idea where it came from. But SWEEEET!
Finding stuff like this makes the monotony all worthwhile.

This just in...

apparently in an effort to save money in this economy, MLB has designated the home team to provide the umpires for each game.

Needless to say, it's not going well for Atlanta in Philly. I'm not sure what drug the homeplate umpire is on, or whether he just can't see further than five feet in front of him.

Bobby's going to get tossed tonight, I can feel it. With Hamels running 3 feet in fair territory causing the throwing error, and the ump not even asking the 1st base ump on appeal.... I dunno.

On top of that, we get to see Hamels laughing about it in the dugout, gesturing to his teammates how far he was in fair territory... it's going to be a long night.

Look at what I got....

The results from Joe Collectors latest case break are in. Jeff always does a great job with these case breaks, and my loot got here super quick.
The latest offerings is the brand new(at the time) 2009 Topps Finest.
First, the base cards.... they're shiny, although they don't scan that well....

Upton, Volquez, and Uptons' twin brother.
Pence, Dempster, and Berkman

Longoria, Dye, and Kazmir

Beltran, Sheffield, and Figgins

A-Rod, Beckett, and Captain Cheeseburger

and yes, those three were put together on purpose.

Chris Young Red Refractor 06/25

now these are nice looking cards.

and now, the best card out of the bunch....

Awwww yeah! B-Mac!

Also included in the package were two other cards...

a completely random Black bordered Joe Mauer jersey

and... oh look. An auto of Tyler Flowers......

Jeff must have a sense of humour.

Thanks Jeff! And if anyone wants to get inon the fun, head over to Joe Collector for his latest casebreak ... a dual 2007 Sweet Spot baseball and football break.

EDIT: oh yeah, any of these cards are available for trade.... except for McCann of course. And maybe Flowers. Just for the masochist in me.

More cards we want to see...

in the continuation of the Goose Joak project... my Braves team set gets three stronger.

Reid Gorecki RC
Matt Diaz

Omar Infante

you can see the rest of 'em here.

Looking for a Sweet Spot?

well, it's over here.

If you haven't already, head over to I Am Joe Collector and sign up for his 2007 Sweet Spot case break.
Oh, what's that? You don't like baseball? Well go anyways 'cause he's doing football as well. That's right, TWO case breaks of 2007 Sweet Spot. One baseball, one football.

Tell him I sent you. (no don't, he might charge you extra...)

Where I've been....

I'll give you three guesses...

#1
#2

#3

I'd give it a 4/10.... meh.

What did you think?

Finally! A use for all those Nationals caps...

and a Contest Update. All in one handy post.

Tonight was Washington vs Pittsburgh, Ovechkin vs Crosby, the future of the NHL. And they did not disappoint.



If you managed to hang in for the entire video, you saw about 200 hats thrown onto the ice. Mostly Nationals caps. No one wants those anyways.
Ovechkin - 3 goals, a hat trick. Crosby - 3 goals, a hat trick (no caps thrown for him though)

Washington up, 2 games - 0.
Boston/Carolina 1-1
Vancouver/Chicago 1-1
Detroit/Anaheim 1-1

Looks like the beginnings of an amazing 2nd round.

and the Idiot of the Month goes to...

I realize that in this day and age, everyone looks for excuses. It was their fault I did it. This is why we have so much trouble in our schools. No discipline. No responsibilities. No self respect or respect of others.
I suppose since parents tend to have no control over their children nowadays, that I shouldn't expect grown adults to have control over their parents.

LINK

You have a millionaire son and you are trying to sell $100 worth of meth. Give your head a shake woman.
And Joba.... for the love, get her some help.

unbelievable...

This is why playoff hockey is the best playoffs of any sport. Turn up the volume nice and loud, sit back, and enjoy.

this months MVP is....

it's May 1st, which means it's time to select the Atlanta Braves MVP for April. I feel honoured to be selected to choose the winner of this monthly award. The winner will receive my undying devotion and, in this months case, a promise to go out and actually find some of his cards.

This months winner is none other than catcher David Ross.
David really saved the Braves' bacon when Brian McCann went on the shelf. 2HR 6RBI .321AVG .457OBP .653OPS while gunning down 3 of 6 attempted steals. I was critical of the Braves for signing David to a two year deal in the Spring. Not because of the player, but because I was tired of the Braves continuing to not give their young home grown players a chance and insisting on using veteran free agents. (that usually never pan out)
In this case, they were right. David has proven his worth.
Congrats on the MVP David! All David has to do is to supply me with his home address, and a certificate of achievment will be on the way.

This months runner up is Jair Jurrjens.

Jair is 2-2 with 1.72ERA. His record is misleading. Both games he lost, were 1-0 affairs. Will someone score the man some runs please? He should be 5-0, not Grienke.

Honourable mention goes to Martin Prado.

As a side note, 2B Kelly Johnson was a runaway lock for this award until a week ago. Then he forgot how to hit. Kelly is in the midst of an 0-1,000,000,000,000 streak. Here's hoping Kelly bounces back, and soon...

the latest installment of "What Am I?"

Today's mystery card is actually a set. A large set. Here's the Dale Murphy from it for visual reference. ( a thanks to Bob Wickman for stopping by to help demonstrate scale)
This is a Barry Colla set from around 1989... but according to my handy dandy 2009 Standard Catalog of Baseball Cards (all 1850 pages)... the only Barry Colla collection from those years are postcard sets. The Murph you see here is 8"x10".
The ones I have are as follows (I'm not sure if I have the whole set..)
Cal Ripken Jr
Rickey Henderson
Don Mattingly
Darryl Strawberry
Dave Winfield
Orel Hershiser
Mike Greenwell
Ozzie Smith
Roger Clemens
Mark McGwire
Gregg Jefferies
Darryl Strawberry #2
Will Clark
Dale Murphy
Tony Gwynn
Jose Canseco
Dwight Gooden
Mike Schmidt
Andre Dawson
Kirby Puckett
Don Mattingly #2
Jose Canseco #2
Mike Greenwell #2
Wade Boggs
Don Mattingly #3
Wally Joyner
George Brett

Any ideas?

Not to late to enter....

you still have time to enter the Great Playoff Hockey Challenge, or something like that.

make your guessses here.

Good luck.

so close I can smell it...

Two cards. that's all I need to complete last years' A&G set before this years comes out. I still have a few left to trade that I haven't given away to others trying to complete this thing.
Does anybody have #312 and #313?


EDIT: darkship comes through.... Thank you Todd!

Where have you gone Bill Wennington?

I'm in the middle of Spring Cleaning. Yuck. But it needs to be done. Since there's still snow outside, I'm working inside. The house is pretty much done. Yay.
But my "card closet" is not. It needs it. Desperately. So in I dive. The beginning of Organization 101.

In the next few days you will see random posts like this one. If you want, pay no attention to my ramblings.. if you feel my pain, listen in. you can help. Yes. I'm talking to you.

Random babble #1

Somehow, card #431 Bill Wennington from '90/91 Hoops got up and left. Crawled out of the binder and went home. I looked through my monster box of doubles, and he wasn't there either. Now, I have a case of these waxboxes...(yes, a case) and I will open them all if I have to. It'll save me from sending them to dayf slowly over the next while...
but if you happen to have a minty fresh Bill Wennington #431, and you're willing to share... great.
I thank you. And I'll still be able to send stuff to dayf.

2009 Goudey = Big steaming pile of crap

Zman over at Autographed cards has the first look I've seen of the new '09 Goudey.

My wallet just got a little fatter looking at those cards. I will not be buying any needless to say.

What happened to all the really good sets? Why do they insist on taking all these really great ideas and ruining them?

Get your guesses in...

Go here to see the prize....

Rules are simple... pick the winners, pick the amount of games needed, and guess the answer to the tie breaking bonus question.

(6)Carolina Hurricanes @ (1) Boston Bruins

(8) Anaheim Ducks @ (2) Detroit Red Wings

(4) Pittsburgh Penguins @ (2) Washington Capitals

(4) Chicago Black Hawks @ (3) Vancouver Canucks

each series is a best of 7 games....

Bonus Tie Breaking question: Who will be the Conn Smythe Trophy Winner? (playoff MVP)

Good Luck!

EDIT: guess all the way through to the finals.... winner of Carolina/Boston vs Pittsburgh/Washington and winner of Anaheim/Detroit vs Chicago/Vancouver, then the Finals

cutoff is Friday 5pm MST

Wow!

That was some playoff hockey! Two amazing Game 7's... and the Braves beating the Cardinals. Before I get to the hockey... an interesting note to the Braves/Cardinals series.

Pujols is 1 for 8 with 3 strikeouts. The Cardinals have "intentionally" walked Chipper 5 times. Including 4 tonight. There is no way that LaRussa is letting his guys pitch to last years Batting Champion, while Bobby is letting his young staff go after what is considered the best hitter in all of baseball. Interesting chess match.

Now the good stuff. If you don't like what you saw in tonight's Game 7's, you're not a sports fan. Wow! Great action and intensity. And some of the greatest goaltending you'll ever see. Amazing.
How Carolina came back against New Jersey I'll never know. I watched it, and I still don't know. Two goals in the last 1:20 of the game to win 4-3. Unbelievable. Cam Ward deserves a medal for his heroics in the Hurricanes' net.....

Speaking of heroics... the only reason there was a Game 7, or a Game 5 for that matter, is Henrik Lundqvist. Unbelievable. The Rangers were no match for the powerful Caps, but Henrik stole, took, absconded, with 3 games.

Wow. This is the reason that playoff hockey is the best sports has to offer, better than the Superbowl, far better than the World Series....

for the love of the gods...

WTF are they doing???? And it's an SP to boot.

Contest Prize announced

Time for another contest. We haven't had one in awhile. As you all know, it's playoff time! And what better way to celebrate than with a contest.
The first round ends tonight. Starting with round 2, pick the winners of the remaining series all the way through to the Stanley Cup Finals!
(relax, don't start thinking yet, I'll have the bracket up late tonight or tomorrow)
They'll also be a couple of tie-breaker questions.

What will you win? I'm glad you asked. The winner will receive a complete set of 1977/78 OPC Hockey Glossy Inserts.

These were randonly inserted into packs over 30 years ago. But don't worry, I've completed the set for you.

Questions?

EDIT: the contest is live! Go HERE and make your guesses...

Stay Tuned....

keep checking back for a contest announcement... coming soon.

Prizes and details to be announced Tuesday or Wednesday, depending when I can find them.