Muesum Quality John Olerud

I have been steadily adding to my John Olerud collection which is now at 118 cards!

The last four were contributed by Shelliebee over at The Middle Child.  Fortunately I had some cool Rockie cards to send and got the below museum themed Olerud cards in return as well as a bunch of other cool stuff.

First, a nice museum quality frame:

Next, a Museum Collection Pinnacle card and its base counterpart:

Thanks a bunch Shelliebee, I'll continue saving my Rockie cards for our next trade!

6 Games in 7 Days

Starting Wednesday I will be on a tour of six different baseball stadiums in seven days. Here's the breakdown.

5 MLB games 3 NL 2 AL
1 Minor League game
Of those six stadiums I have already been to three.

Pictures will follow (I'll keep you in the dark about which teams I'm seeing until I post pictures), but for now here are three cards that my friend Q, who is joining me on this trip, picked me up in Cooperstown, NY at a card shop there.

As he said, they are three generations of Met first basemen. One can only hope that the last is as good as the first two. Interestingly enough, none of the three are depicted in their Mets uniforms. I'll have to ask Q if that was intentional.



I think I now have three Ike Davis cards. Anyone out there with any more that wants to trade, let me know.

Wish me luck!

More Mets Autographs: Party Like Its 1999

These two come from Upper Deck SP's 1999 signature edition.

First John Olerud, whose praises I have sung before.


I was so happy to grab this off ebay when I did about ten years ago. Now, I am even happier. I does not appear that Olerud has many autographed cards out there, so this one has kept its value nicely. I guess that doesn't matter though, because I won't be parting with it anytime soon.

Second, here is the Al Leiter from the same series.



Leiter pitched a total of seven seasons for the Mets and though there were a couple of bad seasons in that mix, I remember him as a big game pitcher. He also had some stellar statistics during what was likely the heyday of the steroid era. His WHIPs were frequently below 1.30 and got as low as 1.50 in his first year with the Mets, 1998. He also had 8.1 K/9 that year with a 2.47 ERA in 193 IP. I'd take that line on my fantasy team any day.

Trades

Thanks to Roy over at The Paper Chase for a great stack of my favorite Mets. It was a pleasure sending him some Blue Jays cards in return.

Here are some of the cards I netted in the deal:

First, on the heals of my last post, an Aurora John Olerud. Aurora was a weird set, but now I have Olerud, Alfonzo, and Piazza from this set.

Next an Ultimate Victory Edgardo Alfonzo which I like because he's got some shades on.

Here's a sweet Piazza SPx Radiance card. I enjoy the fact that the SPx medallion (or whatever you call their logo) is actually cut into the card. Plus, I think the rays emanating from the medallion are amusing.



Finally, a nice John Maine from Topps 206. I like the Topps 206 set because of the exposure effects on the sets, and I like Maine because I kept reminding everyone that the Mets got a young pitcher in return for Kris Benson and that he could turn out to be an interesting player even if Jorge Julio stunk. Then Maine went out and had a great year (better than anything Benson would do with the remainder of his career), and while he has never replicated that performance I am hoping he has a solid, injury free, high strikeout year.

And on the other side of the diamond: John Olerud!

So I do not think it is coincidence that in one of the best defensive infields the game has ever seen, and clearly the best defensive infield the Mets ever had, there were two of my favorite all time players.

When one thinks about John Olerud, if one remembers him, one thinks of him as a James Loney type player. However, upon closer inspection one realizes that John Olerud was a rich man's James Loney. While the homeruns might seem similar, that is where the similarities end. Olerud had some monster OPS years, his best coming in 1993 whn he played in 158 and had a 1.072 OPS and OBP of .473 (ridiculous) and also led the league in doubles and Batting Average (Johny O was never fast either, so those weren't cheap hits or doubles). Then again in 1998 with the Mets his full season OPS was .998. Loney has never topped .919 and that was playing only about 60% of a full season. Anyway, the point is Olerud was much closer to Will Clark and Edgar Martinez than James Loney as far as offense goes. Plus, he won the gold glove three times.

So, in light of his playing time with Fonzie I thought it appropriate to show Olerud's card from the same Metal Universe set. This time the backdrop is central park. Though the picture itself a bit blurrier than the Edgardo Alfonzo, on this one you can actually make out the mini portrait in the lower right hand corner which I think is interesting.



I also happen to own an Olerud card which was limited to a 5 card run, which I believe is my lowest run card.

Here it is with an enlarged close up (edited) of the imprint in the foil that makes it special. Even with my novice attempts at making the imprint clearer through digital editing it is hard to tell, but it reads "The National Atlantic City." I do not know much about it, though I would guess it has something to do with the national card show which was probably held in Atlantic City that year; however, if anyone knows more about it please feel free to share.















So along with these last two posts I have updated my have lists of these two players. Let me know if you have any of their cards not on my lists, as I would certainly be interested in trades.

Thanks!