Ramblings of an old collector

 Just my thoughts on some random topics about cards and baseball.

- Huge shout out to The Diamond King! 

He sent me this 2015 Panini USA Baseball Stars & Stripes Magenta printing plate for my Corey Seager collection! Such a sweet card! Thank you Kevin!

- MLBPA is claiming that the 18 second pitch clock is the cause of all of the arm injuries. There's no research to support it. Justin Verlander said "I think in reality, you put everything together and everything has a bit of influence. I think the biggest thing is that the style of pitching has changed so much. Everybody is throwing the ball as hard as they possibly can and spinning the ball as hard as they possibly can. It’s hard to deny those results, obviously." I have to agree with Verlander. I heard one pitcher say that he has to grip the ball harder in order to increase his spin rate. That makes much more sense to me as to what is causing all of these injuries.

- Saw a story on YouTube that there is an obvious counterfeit card that got graded by PSA. So, I'm just going to say that literally, authenticity was the only reason I ever saw to get cards graded. If they can't even do that, why in the world would you want to spend the money?

- I'm not the biggest fan of the inserts in the 2024 Topps release save one. The rainbow foil card actually looks pretty good. There's no way that I'm going to try and complete a set of them, but I will definitely keep my eye out for some of my favorite players.

     

Not the best pictures of the rainbow foil, but then again, I'm not sure I've seen a good picture of the rainbow foil cards.

- Love seeing the resurgence of Mike Trout.

- I've spent a little time updating TCDB inventory. Still got a long way to go, but there is positive movement. 

- Speaking of TCDB, I've completed 77 trades. For some of you guys, that's a drop in the ocean, but for me, it's progress. I've actually figured out proposing trades and I think the last several trades I've done I proposed them. 

- Sam Houston State product Colton Cowser has had a really hot start this year for the Orioles. I'm not telling anyone what to do, but I'd definitely be on the lookout for his rookie cards this year.

- Got my first few blaster boxes of 2024 Topps Heritage and I really like the cards. I'm not thrilled with the short prints being 1-100 though. If you've got to have short prints I'd rather they be at the end and not the beginning. Is that a set builder's mentality or is it old school? The high numbers in the older sets were always the ones that were harder to find. I think it's old school thinking.

Just some of my favorite '24 Heritage cards that I've pulled.

- Speaking of Heritage, finishing 2023 is going to be difficult. I was hoping that I could trade for the missing short prints, but it seems that most people want to trade short print for short print, which I completely understand. I think I've almost depleted all of my extra short prints. Going to have to go to purchasing them I guess if I want to finish the set.

- My Rangers recently lost a series to the Braves. I didn't get to watch all of the games, but the Braves looked really good. I'd love to see the Dodgers and Braves square off in the NL Championship Series this year. That would be a great series.

- Just want to throw out there one more time, If you haven't seen the movie "The Hill" it's on Netflix. Can't go wrong with a baseball movie on a rainy day.

- My two favorite baseball movies are "The Sandlot" and "Field of Dreams". "The Sandlot" because it reminds me of my childhood playing ball with my buddies and "Field of Dreams" for two reasons. First, I'd love to have the chance to watch a game of baseball played by the greats of the game like Shoeless Joe. Second, I'd love to have the chance to play catch with my dad one more time. 

I think that about wraps it up for now. I leave you with a quote from the great Babe Ruth...

"Never let the fear of striking out get in your way."

Peace, 

Michael

Isaiah 40:31

  

Rambings of an old collector

 I'm taking a one week break from the faces of the team posts before I start the American League to ramble on about some things. 

-I think I can say I've finally made it in the blogging world...I got a great random act of kindness package from none other than Johnny's Trading Spot. Almost all of the blogs that I've read at some point got cards from John which I thought was so cool. I kept looking at his want list hoping that we'd be able to trade or send him something, but I haven't been able to match anything up yet. Before I find anything, he sends me this...

Unbelievably blessed! Thank you so much John for the cards and making me feel part of the blogging world family!

- Once again, if you haven't seen the movie "The Hill" you are missing out. Great movie about faith, passion and baseball. You can find it on Netflix or Amazon Prime. 

- I started looking at different posts on Facebook, videos, blogs and such that had '23 Stadium Club cards. I thought those looked pretty good. I was at my friendly Walmart and saw a blaster box and said why not? I didn't get any big hits, but I really liked the cards. Couple of weeks later, same thing. I got to looking and saw that the set was only 300 cards, so yep, I decided to put the set together. I swore I was going to stick to just Topps and I've already broken that rule by collecting '23 Heritage. Now, I'm adding Stadium Club. I need professional help. 

- There are 3 subsets from 2023 that I started to try and complete. I still need 23 All Aces and 29 Father's Day patch cards. The third subset is World Baseball Classic USA team and I am down to one card... WBC-27 Kyle Tucker. Only 3 traders on TCDB have the card and there is no match. If someone has an extra one, let me know and hopefully, we can work something out.

- Getting excited for Opening Day and my World Series Champion Texas Rangers to defend their title.

-I've had a hard time finding '24 Topps at retail stores. Found it pretty easy early on, but it's been pretty scarce ever since. 

- Went to a wedding reception in Austin, TX and had a four hour layover between wedding events. What do you do when you're a card collector and time to kill? You find a card store to visit. Found one that was actually in an industrial park. I picked up some cards on a really good deal. A few star players from the '23 Stadium Club that I needed for my new set, a '24 Evan Carter and Mike Trout, '24 Blue print Kershaw and an Ohtani. 

- Shout out to RonE, Chris Cheatle and Poison75 for calling me out on my mistakes in my Faces of the team-NL West. I should have spent a little more time in my research. Thanks for holding me accountable.

- I'm not a graded card collector, but thought I'd weigh in on SGC being bought by PSA: I can't see how this is a good thing for those that do graded cards. Removing competition is never good for the consumer.

- One of my goals this year is to complete some sets. Well, I finally completed my 1984 Topps set with a TCDB trade with hershey for #144 Brian Harper RC. Now all I need to do is put in a binder. 

- I saw the best baseball game in a really long time two weekends ago. Okay, it wasn't really baseball, it was T-ball and my 4 year old grandson. It was so much fun watching the joy these kids had playing the game. 

Well, that's it for my ramblings. I'll get back to Faces of the team - American League East for my next post.

Peace, 

Michael

Isaiah 40:31

The Hill

I started to include this in my last post, but felt like it needed it's own. So, this is my first mid-week post. I doubt seriously that this becomes a thing, but you never know.  

If you haven't seen the movie "The Hill" you need to watch it. 

This is a true story of Rickey Hill and his journey to professional baseball. This is a great movie about faith and passion that just happens to be about baseball too. I was blessed to meet Rickey a couple of weeks ago and got his autograph on a card. The movie tells the story, but listening to him talk about other details that the movie didn't show is remarkable. Definitely, a miracle. 

I have been around baseball since I was 5 years old when I was the batboy for a 6 year old team that I was too young to play on. That same year, I saw my first minor league game at Turnpike Stadium in Arlington, TX with the Dallas-Ft. Worth Spurs. I played baseball until I was 19 years old. I started umpiring when I was 16 and called games for 36 years. When my oldest son turned 5, I started coaching. I coached little league for 20 years. 5 years ago, I volunteered to help coach the baseball team at the high school where I teach and have been on the coaching staff ever since. None of that even includes baseball card collecting. 

In case you couldn't tell, I love baseball. I have loved baseball since that first practice I attended when I was 5. As much as I am passionate about baseball, I'm no where near the passion that Rickey Hill had to play the game. He was told his whole life he couldn't do it and he did. I wish that I could bottle his passion for the game and share it with my players. 

I hope that if you haven't watched the movie, you'll find the time to see it. It's on Netflix and can be rented or purchased on Prime. 

Peace, 

Michael

Isaiah 40:31