Duke Snider - Banner Seasons

As most of you know Duke Snider died yesterday.  One of my previous posts on the Duke of Flatbush detailed my affinity for the former Brooklyn Dodger great as well as an autographed card of his that I have and the favorite oddball baseball item in my collection.

Today, in honor of Snider, I bring you a more than cardboard card that depicts Snider literally crowned! (Do Dukes normally get their own crowns?  I don't know, but this Duke deserved it). 

The Dodger lettering is actually made of some fuzzy material raised from the card surface that I am going to call felt: I am guessing the way this material simulates the feel of an actual banner is why the card series was called "Banner Seasons."  The back of the card details Snider's and the Dodgers' achievements in 1956.

With a great picture and the cool effect on the front, this card is one of my favorites of Snider.  Thanks Duke for all the joy you brought to Brooklyn!

Two Cool Dual Relics

So I stopped by my local card shop yesterday afternoon and I picked up a bunch of game used cards of various players I like or did like before they retired including Randy Johnson, Tony Gwynn, Justin Verlander, another David Wright and the two cards below.

Both are from the 2009 Upper Deck SP Legendary Cuts insert set called Generations Dual Memorabilia.  I have always found those Dual Memorabilia cards to be hit or miss depending on whether the two players depicted together made sense and were both players I liked or at least respected.

First, is this Chase Utley and Joe Morgan card.  Though Morgan might not be the best announcer in the world, he is a Hall of Fame second baseman.  His Stolen Base numbers are great and he got caught less than once in four tries.  Utley, if he continue to be productive and play at Citizen's Bank for the next five years, will also have hall of fame numbers.  So this pairing made sense to me.

Next, Jose Reyes and Tim Raines.  The pairing here has to do with the two players' stolen base prowess.  Raines got caught less than once every five and a half tries and had over 808 steals in his career.  He is a boarder line hall of famer and, as a bonus, is depicted in his expos uni.  Reyes, if he can stay healthy and develop the power he has shown at times could end up being an infielder's version of Raines.

Anyway, I liked these two and I'd be interested to know what you think of them.  The Utley and Morgan card might even be up for trade, but only in the right deal for something interesting and/or 2011 related.

Trade Bait: Minis!

I know a lot of my fellow bloggers out there love minis.  I enjoy them, but probably not as much as some of you do.  I do really like the Kimball Champions from Topps 2011.

Anyway, over the years I have scored several minis from packs that I would be more than happy to trade with someone that will give them a better home than I have.

Here they are:

2010 Allen and Ginter #NA49 - National Animals Zebra

2010 Allen and Ginter Base Minis: #321 Carlos Gomez and 297 Isaac Newton

Allen and Ginter 2009: World's Biggest Hoaxes and Hoodwinks #12

Allen and Ginter 2008 #PA4 - Pioneers of Aviation

and Topps 206 #HE15

Shoot me an email or comment if you are interested!

And the winner is....

Again, thanks to everyone who entered: there were 38 different individuals who entered, so the response was great.

Hearing about your favorite minor league teams was cool.  I have actually seen nine of the MiLB teams you mentioned play at their home stadiums: the Brooklyn Cyclones, Binghamton Mets, Harrisburg Senators, New Britain Rock Cats, Hudson Valley Renegades, Durham Bulls, Bowie Baysox, Syracuse Sky Chiefs, and Greensboro Grasshoppers.  I have also seen several more play against some of the above mentioned teams.

Well onto what you have all been waiting for:

Congratulations to Night Owl, a long time Dodger fan and follower who runs a great blog.  Check it out here if you have not yet: http://nightowlcards.blogspot.com/

I have the package all set to go and I included some other Dodgers cards for you, so just email me your address and I'll get that in the mail.

Thanks again to everyone who participated!

Contest Update: Another Card Added to the Prize Package!

Hey, so the response to my first contest has been great!  I appreciate all your entries, and I find it cool to know which MiLB team is your favorite.  Keep the entries coming in: you have until Sunday night to enter here: http://clearcutcards.blogspot.com/2011/02/first-contest-when-pitchers-and.html

I also wanted to let you know that Gary, the creator of these cards, has offered to send who ever wins an extra card depicting everyone's favorite baseball loving dictator: Fidel Castro!

So thanks everyone for the great response, and thank you again to Gary for his wonderful research and artwork.

If you have not yet, check out Gary's blog here (he just posted a Mickey Mantle card for all you yankee fans):  http://infinitecardset.blogspot.com/

Until Monday, everyone keep enjoying those Spring Training Reports and Regular Season Projections.

First Contest! When Pitchers and Catchers Report Opening Day is Within Sight

The Mets had pitchers and catchers are due to report by today (though many did yesterday), and my hopes for the likes of Jenrry Mejia, Jon Niese, and Josh Thole are at their height.

In honor of that I am announcing Clear Cut Cards' first contest.

First, the prize: how many of you have heard of The Infinite Baseball Card Set?  Well, if you have not I strongly suggest you check out the blog here.  Fortunately for us card collectors Gary, the illustrator and researcher of the cards, decided to get twenty cards from the infinite set printed and made them available to us under the title of Series 1.  I ended up with an extra pack of series one, which are all beautifully illustrated, and that will be the prize.

The particular set that will be the prize is numbered 213 out of 1000.  I will also do my best to include some cool cards from the winner's favorite MLB team.

Second, entry requirements.  Each person has the opportunity to gain three entries.  You get one entry just for leaving a reply to this post with your favorite MLB and minor league baseball teams' names (yes I want both).  You get a second entry for advertising the contest on your blog (post the link along with your favorite teams' names).  You get a third entry for being a follower of my blog.  It is as simple as that.  I'll collect the names, randomize them three times, and get the prize out to the winner.  The deadline for entering is Feb 21st (12:01am), the day the Mets have their first full team workout.  I'll select the winner that day too.

I look forward to your entries and seeing which minor league teams you root for (I have a pretty good idea of which MLB teams you root for).

PS: Gary did give me the ok to use this set in a contest, so thanks Gary!  And, seriously, check out his site if you haven't already: http://infinitecardset.blogspot.com/

Also, I'm a Binghamton Mets guy myself.

Valentine's Day

I'm lucky enough to have a wife who got me some baseball cards for Valentine's Day.  It is always fun to rip packs, even on Valentine's Day.

Here were my two favorites from the packs (she always does better than I do at picking packs with Mets in them):

2011 ToppsTown David Wright

2010 Allen and Ginter Carlos Beltran

Also, check back tomorrow afternoon as I will be posting contest details!

A Different Kind of Baseball Plastic - Soda Cups from Around the Nation

Well Throzul Will Rule decided to assign those in the card blogosphere to write a post about cups we have amassed from sports stadiums we have visited.  I have always collected these, so I was happy to comply.  Unfortunately, for me, my cup collection went through a purge two years ago (one of my wife's demands) so I am left only with my favorites and the ones I have obtained since the purge.  Well here they are:

I start where most players do - in the minor leagues.

The left most and center cup are from Orioles farm teams: The Frederick Keys and the Bowie Baysox, A Carolina League and AA respectively.  Both are from the summer of 2008 when I was living in Baltimore and able to attend four different minor league games, an couple of Orioles games, and a couple of Nationals games.  The right most cup is from the Greensboro Grasshoppers.  I was a big fan of their logo which is part of the reason I kept this cup.  They are in the same A league as the Keys, but much further South.  I attended their game in 2007 when I got to see a whole slew of minor league teams around the Chapel Hill area.

Next, onto my baseball team, the Mets.

The first two cups are from Shea and the right most cup is from Citi Field.  Now, I would have kept more Mets cups, but for some reason the tops always start falling apart.  I'm not sure if that is because I use them more than my other cups, or just because they tend to mimic the team whose logo they bear.  Anyway, the center cup is from the final year at Shea.  It was a heart-breaker, but I was there at the final game to see it in person.  The right most cup is from the first year at Citi Field.  It is interesting for a couple reasons.  First, it is the smallest souvenir stadium cup I have ever seen.  I was kind of pissed because it seemed to me that I was getting jipped out of soda despite the fact that it is so much cheaper than the cup itself.  However, on the bright side this cup has held up a lot better than the previous souvenir cups, so that has tempered my anger over time.  It is also interesting because that year the Mets had different souvenir cups throughout the season.  This was the first in the series.  I kind of liked that idea, because as a Met fan who attended a bunch of games throughout the year I was kind of tired of getting the same design cup at every game I attended.  Unfortunately, that was also the year I moved out to Chicago so I did not get any of the other designs.  I have also found that many of the food stands at Citi do not carry the souvenir cups, which is strange.

Next, here are the cups from after the purge.  These are all from my 2010 baseball road trip with Q, chronicled here.

The left most cup will look familiar to those who read Thorzul's original post.  It is from a Brewers game, the first stop on the trip.  The second is a White Sox cup.  I was kind of disappointed by the design on this one.  The third is from the Twins' new stadium Target Field.  The right most cup depicts Fred Bird, the Cardinals mascot.

Finally, here are two of my other favorite cups from over the years that I saved from the purge.

The first is from an Atlanta Braves game.  That was from 2007, and is probably the furthest I have ever driven for a single game (not part of a road trip).  The second cup is by far my favorite: a Red Sox cup from a 2006 game when I sat in the Green Monster seats.  Now the seats enough could have won this cup a spot in my cabinet, but the graphic on the cup actually uses the same effect as a Topps 2020 insert card.  It is kind of cool, and also surprising that a team would spend the extra money to embellish a cup that people would buy no matter how cheap it was to make - see the White Sox cup above.  I also do not remember it being priced much higher than other souvenir sodas, but I could have just forgotten.

Well, thanks for reading and if you are still with me, then I would like to reward you with a heads up.  I am going to post my first ever contest on February 15th, the day the Mets' pitchers and catchers report.  It will be easy to enter and the prize will be a small set of relatively unique cards.  The rest you will have to wait until the 16th to find out!

Trade Bait - Finally Topps 2011 Comes to Chicago Suburbs

Fortunately this morning before heading to work I read Nachos Grande's blog, where he compares the outcome of four rack packs vs a blaster.  As a result I went a Target near work and was happy to see some 2011 Topps of my own.  I went with the four rack packs and was rewarded with six Mets (two rookies) AND a Piazza reprint.

This year I am going to collect the Met and Cubs team sets and any their inserts as well as any NY Giants or Brooklyn Dodgers inserts, so I now have:
Mets - #56,119,129,147,203,207 + Piazza reprint (original back)
Cubs - #16, KC-11

So with those wants, I thought I'd post some of the inserts I got that are up for trade. Ideally I'd like similar Topps 2011 stuff in return, but the Kimball Champs inserts are my favorite.  Let me know if you are interested!

First a gold parallel Chris Volstad - he has not really lived up to the hype, but he is still young.

The scan is crooked, not the card.

Next up a Ryan Howard Topps 60, now I am not as much a Phillie hater as many of my Met friends, but if I can turn this card into a Cub or Met it is worth it.

Finally, here is a Kimbal Champion - I am much more an NL fan than an AL fan which is part of the reason this one is up for trade.  I don't necessarily need a David Wright KC in return for this one, but something that plays to my NL or at least pitcher bias.

Claimed!

I think my favorite pull from the four rack packs was this Starlin Castro Kimbal Champion card: I love his pose on the bottom! (Not up for trade)

Email me with any offers at thebrooklynmet at hotmail dot com.

Topps 2011 Waits Another Day: Game Used Edition

So I checked walmart and target again today with no luck, my local sports card store did have boxes of both packs and jumbo but was only selling them by the box.  So, instead of Topps 2011 I ended up with some cool game used stuff and a Logan Morrison rookie card.

First up is my second David Wright game used card. 2008 Topps Highlights.  One thing I like about this card is that the back actually has some cool statistics which most game used cards do not.  Mine also has a blue pinstripe unlike the one depicted below (I'm always a fan of a more interesting jersey piece).

I also grabbed this Quad Swatch card from 2009 UD Ballpark Collection.  I couldn't pass up a single card with jersey pieces from four great players from the same team that all helped the Red Sox win the Series in 2007.  I don't really root for the Red Sox too much anymore, but I was still rooting for them in 2007 and I collect all four of these players, so I was happy with the find. Some of these quad patch cards have strange combinations of players, but this one makes a lot of sense.

Let me know what you think, and in the meantime I'll keep enjoying other people's posts of 2011 Topps.

Snow Day Rather than Topps 2011 Day

So due to the depicted item below, too much of which appeared outside my door this morning, I was not able to find any Topps 2011. 

I actually checked one walmart, with no expectations, since I had to be out anyway but they only had 2010 Topps stuff.

So instead of opening Topps 2011, I added 22 cards to my Edgardo Alfonzo collection thanks to my first purchase from sportslots.com.  Sportslots has its benefits and drawbacks.  The big benefit is price and shipping.  Commons are as low as 18 cents each and shipping can be had for 8 cents each.  The drawback is that it is harder to search for specific singles and most cards do not come with pictures.

Regardless, I certainly enjoyed picking up so many Alfonzo cards on the cheap.  Here is my favorite: a 2003 Edgardo Alfonzo Diamond Kings #125.  It's one of those depicted in a Mets uni despite being signed by the Giants as a free agent during the off season.  Enjoy!