Just Commons Maiden Voyage

I’ve heard quite a lot about Just Commons from fellow bloggers lately and finally decided to check it out.  It’s pretty similar to sportlots.com, but you aren’t shopping from multiple vendors so the shipping rates are easier to manage.   In fact, if you purchase $10 or more, shipping is free.  So I spent $10, mostly knocking off some needs for my checklists and filling Sampler Album pages. 

 

Just Commons also has a section of $2 relics/autos and I found a few good ones for my collection:

 

Nick Schmidt is a former Razorback, so $2 for this chrome autograph is great for me.

 

I’m really proud of this Derek Holland auto for $2.  Even though he looks ridiculous with that mustache.

I certainly have not been in buying mode these days (or blogging mode for that matter), but this was a fun purchase.  Overall, I got about 20 cards, most around a dime or so.   It looks like the site adds cards pretty regularly, so I look forward to checking it out again soon. 

Pie Face Funded: Elvis Bat

Hey, look, here is something else I bought using my "Pie Face" funds:

 

I have a couple of these Museum jumbo bat cards, and I have to say- they are fantastic!  The wood is fairly smooth, so if I ever get the chance, I'd love to have Andrus autograph it.  Or maybe engrave his signature with a wood burning kit.  I think I still have one of those from when I was kid.  

Points to for identifying this pop culture reference:  Who once got in trouble for burning house numbers into the actual structure of their house and not using a separate peice of wood like he should have? 

 

Pie Face Funded: Ranger Relics

A while back I bragged about stumbling upon a Mark Teixeira "pie in the face" variation card while digging through my boxes. 

I sold it online, and got a LOT more for it than I expected.  As soon as the buyer put his funds in my paypal account, I was ready to turn around and spend it, but I was also faced with a decision:  should I get one or two really nice cards, or should I get a bunch of little stuff and maybe knock off some of my checklist needs?  I was spying a T206 Eddie Cicotte card, as well as a 1952 Topps Bob Feller.  Either would have been great additions to my collection.

However, once I started shopping on COMC.com and sportlots.com, I came across too many cards that I "need" for my checklists and decided to go that direction.  But man, that Cicotte would have been nice...

My first pie face funded cards came in today- a group of Ranger relics, starting with 3 from 2013 Allen and Ginter:

This Ian Kinsler card is really nice.  I love the cardboard stock and the bright red swatch.    These full size Allen and Ginter Relics might be something I want to collect later on.  Super nice card.

I like the minis too, just not as much as the full size.  At first I was excited to see a stain on this Elvis Andrus card.  But couldn't that just as easily come from some doofus handling the card and rubbing dirt on it from his back yard?

Does anyone know why the frames are different colors on these?  Does it mean anything? 

Finally, I picked up my first relic card of one of my newest favorite Rangers, Martin Perez. 

Love these cards, and there is more great stuff on the way!  Still, that Cicotte would have been nice....

Adrian Beltre Belongs In A Museum

Well, Topps Museum anyways. 

I repeat myself:  I have thoroughly enjoyed watching Adrian Beltre's time with the Rangers.  There is so much to like.  He plays hard, he plays well, and he has fun.  What more can you want? 

I've sort of started a collection of Adrian Beltre gifs, which have been almost as much fun to pore over as my cards of him.  Seriously, who doesn't like this kind of stuff:

Watching him and Elvis Andrus go at it every night is a blast, and is just about the best part of being a Ranger fan:

 



If loving this kind of approach to the game is wrong, then Adrian, Elvis and I don't want to be right.

There's also nothing wrong with these Topps Museum cards of Beltre I picked up this week:

Ok, the pose is kind of goofy, but so what?  At least it's a little different.  And I like getting a good look at that vacuum cleaner glove of his.  These are very nice cards in hand, the bright blue especially.    I think I have all the parallels, just need the base card now.  And my high school guidance counsler didn't think I would accomplish anything in life!

Black Friday COMC Spoils Part 8: Beltre/Rangers Time

I'm really happy with the selection of Adrian Beltre cards I got dirt cheap at the COMC.com Black Friday sale.  The relics were mostly under $1.50 each, and the most was this one at around $4:

That's a ridiculously great deal for a beautiful Triple Threads card numbered to 27.

The others that were $1.50 or less:

While not a relic, this GQ Blue Bordered card is one of my favorites.  It's fantastic in hand.

 I also picked a few parallel mini runs:

I went from nada to semi-serious Adrian Beltre collection in the past year and a half.  I think I might be able to give him a dedicated album like I've done for Tony Gwynn and Michael Young.

Not for nothing, I picked up a couple of other Rangers cards too:

This Ian Kinsler Tier One was around a buck just like the Beltre above.  These are super nice cards, so I'm not sure why they were so cheap.

Karma and Purple Bryce Harpers

I have to say I’m pretty proud of myself for sort of holding true to August-erity, at least in spirit.  Just yesterday, I had a ton of2012 Topps Finest cards loaded up in my cart on sportlots.com and was oh so close to making a purchase, when I stopped, got control of myself and emptied my cart.  Those cards will still be there a month from now, and I’m a supremely disciplined individual.   Ok, so I’m not, but I was still very impressed with myself for holding off.   I was also proud of myself for not laying out $20 Wednesday when I saw brand spanking new blasters of Topps Chrome on the shelf at Walmart.    I really wanted one too.  I mean really wanted one.  The way a crack addict wants… well, crack.  But I refrained again.  And instead of working on some urgent projects Wednesday afternoon, I shut the door to my office and whispered sweet utterances of congratulations to myself for being such a good boy.

The next morning we had a meeting at work, and long story short, something I did the company liked netted me an unexpected prepaid Visa card for $50.  When they handed me the card, two thoughts immediately sprang to mind:  1)  I needed to get out of there as fast as possible and use this on a blaster of Topps Chrome,  and 2)this gift card was obviously the result  cosmic forces of the world rewarding me for my earlier discipline.  Don’t believe me?  Look what was in the pack of special purple refractors:

This is probably about a $20 card which is what I had refrained from spending earlier in the week.   My belief now is that next week  I should prepare to spend $50 on cards but hold off at the last minute.  If my theory holds water, I will then be given the means to buy another blaster, but this time it will contain a $50 card.  Perhaps a printing plate or nice autograph.

Here are the other cards I cared about in the blaster:

A nice assortment of a Razorback, some Rangers and a former Natural.
I also got one of those nifty di-cut cards:

That Old Coot

It's been a while since I've traded, but after I received my part of a trade with Dustin From the highly literate and entertaining Coot Veal and the Vealtones, I remembered how much fun trading could be.

Dustin has a great feel for what I like and sent some great stuff:

These relics of Michael Young and Ian Kinsler were the main attraction to the deal.

 He also added a nice lot of other Michael Young cards,

and other favorite Rangers.  I especially like the Andrus mini.

Finally, here are some misc players I collect.  I think the Hinske on the 86 Donruss style card is one of my favorites ever, and something I hadn't seen yet.

If you haven't been on Dustin's blog yet, you're missing out.  It should be fun to follow his participation in Nachos Grande's blog contest.  Vegas has Dustin listed as one of the favorites despite rumors of PEDs.

Quick Cleve's Post

This week is going to be pretty busy for me, so posts will likely be even more half-assed than usual. 

I only picked up a few write-in wins at Cleve's this week, one great and one I don't even remember bidding on and don't know why I did it.  First the one I'm happy about:

Elvis Andrus just gets better and better and is one of the most fun players to watch in MLB.  I've been wanting an auto of him for a while now.  I'm not sure I see Elvis Andrus anywhere in that scribble on the card, but I'm not his penmanship teacher.

I also got this, although I don't faintly remember bidding on it:

This game used bat card of pitcher Early Wynn is fine and all, but I don't have any idea why I bid on it.  I know I did because I saw the bid card with my writing on it.  I've got another vintage card of Wynn so maybe I wanted to get something else of him.  It was only $3, so no harm no foul.

Grades:

GQ Elvis Andrus Auto  $5:  A    Now that I have an Andrus auto, I have autos of all of my favorite Rangers. 

UD Ovation Early Wynn Relic $3:  B   Can't complain about a relic of a HOFer for $3.  I just don't know why I needed this card.  It's up for trade if anyone is interested.  (Maybe I got it as trade bait?)

Bowman 2012 And The Art of Spending Wisely

I happen to be a fan of Bowman products.  Not because I consider myself a prospector, but because I live in AA baseball country, and it's fun to get cards of guys I see come through here.  It's with Bowman cards that my son has been able to get real baseball cards (sometimes autographed) of players he sees play live. 

I've built, or should I say, am in the process of building complete sets from 2010 and 2011 Bowman still, which I mostly put together through blasters.  2010 yielded me a few Strasburg cards, and last year I had monster luck with Bryce Harper cards.

I'm in for the 2012 set as well.  However, one tries not to go through life without learning how to do things better and smarter.  I realized that it could be so much easier and cheaper to pass on building the 2012 set through blasters, trades and sportlots.com.  A quick scan of eBay reveals that I can buy a master set (220 card base, 110 card prospect set and 110 chrome prospect set) for about the cost of 3 blasters.  Or, I could be patient and wait for the inevitable lot of Bowman cards that will surely be auctioned off at Cleve's from someone who buys a hobby box or two for the big hits and sells the rest for a steal at the auction.  It happens all the time.

Today at lunch, I had to go to Walmart for business purposes.  Seriously, I did.  Before I went in I reminded myself of my wise strategy:

• No blasters- maybe buy one pack to see what the cards look like
• Buy a master set online and be done with it and then chase a few good cards that I really want (i.e. Ranger parallels, autos of guys who might play for the Naturals soon, etc.) or..
• Wait to get the bulk of the set from a Cleve auction, and finish off the rest through trades

I was proud of myself for such a level headed, disciplined approach to my collection.  Confident, I went into Walmart.

Let's take a look at the blasters I bought:

 Mr. 4 Home Run- Josh Hamilton and other Rangers

I like the base set design just fine.  It's simple, and I like the placement of the team logo.  The font size of the player name is a little small though.

Of course, there are the obligatory parallels.  The orange (#d to 250) and the gold do nothing for me, but I have to say I really dig the "silver ice" parallel and the international parallel with the player's home country flag as the backdrop.  The silver ice cards have a hologram/3D look to them, and are really neat under lights.  The flag cards are very sharp too.  I'm seriously considering building a 3 pronged base set with the base card, silver ice and international parallels as well.  That would look great in a binder with 3 cards of each player layed out in rows in 9 pocket pages.

Each pack contained 2 Bowman Chrome cards.  I didn't get any big prospects as far as I know, although I've heard some good things about Josh Bell.

One thing I was pleasantly surprised about this years Bowman offering was the lack of inserts.  From what I can tell, the Bowman's Best set is the only one.  That's fine with me, as it will make building a master set much simpler.  The Bowman's Best cards are pretty nice looking I think.

Oh, I almost forgot the hit I pulled in blaster #2.  Unfortunately, I didn't get any Yu Darvish cards, which is what I was really hoping for.

Now the question becomes, do I still go ahead and just buy a master set online, or do I do this the hard way again? 

A Trade With A Guy Much Smarter Than Me

Yes, I could title all of my posts about trades with this same title, thank you very much mister smarty pants.  I secretly always hoped I could avoid a trade with David at the brilliant blog "e rayhahn, rayhahn", but not because I didn't think he seemed like a good guy, I just didn't want to get further exposed as a hack by someone who new what they were doing.
He certainly knew what he was doing with the cards he sent me:

I didn't have either of these relic cards of Young and Kinsler, and they are very welcome additions to my Rangers collection.  The Young card is numbered to 75, and is a really pretty card in hand.

He also added a couple of bonus cards.  Actually, this is my first Attax card that wasn't an insert with the Topps base card packs.  I actually kind of like it, and sort of have an interest in picking up some more and trying to play the game.  Has anyone played Attax?  Is it fun?

Thanks for the great cards David, and I hope you enjoy what I sent you.

Gypsy Queen Life Vest: Courtesy Reader Ryan

When I started this blog, I had no preconceived notions about the level of trading in which I would participate.   In fact, I don’t think trading was on my radar at all as I timidly stepped into the blogging waters. But lately, it seems like that’s all I’ve been doing,  and I’m happy to say it’s been a blast.  But how can you not enjoy coming home from a hard day of reading blog posts work and finding a nice padded envelope with your fake name on it.  That’s just what I got from reader Ryan L.  the other day.  He sent a very nice stack of cards and yet again pushed my GQ master set toward completion.  I’d spend a minute extolling the virtues of his blog, but as of yet, he doesn’t have one.  Based on my correspondence with him, I think he should.  He’s got some really nice collecting goals and it would be cool to follow his progress.  Just do it Ryan, quit screwing around.  What, do you have a life or something?  Anyway, onto the goodies:

 12 Base Cards including some SPs.  I'm now at 53% complete for the base set.

Ryan also snuck in a couple of Green Framed cards of two superstars, and minis of 3 of my favorite players.  I suppose if I really wanted to have a master set of GQ, I should build the minis.  After looking at these, I just might.

And finally, a few other cards of some of my favorite players.  The Halladay is a numbered refractor. Sa-weeet.

Since Ryan doesn’t have a blog to cover his end of the trade, let me do it for him.  Actually, I don’t even remember what I sent him, but I’ll cover the gist of what I think he would have said about me:

“I’m sure by now you are blissfully aware of the highly entertaining, edgy and relevant ‘The Adventures of Napkin Doon.’  If you haven’t read his blog yet, what the %@*% are you waiting for?  Imagine if Cormac McCarthy, Thomas Pynchon and Mark Twain had a baby and that baby grew up to write a baseball card blog.  That’s the essence of Napkin Doon.  But be warned, unless you are prepared to be challenged mentally, don’t read his blog.  Certainly, the subject matter of his blog is baseball cards, but if you read between the lines you realize that he is actually holding a mirror up to society and saying “This…. This is what you are society.’  Plus he held a tournament for hot dogs too.”

Thank you for the kind words Ryan.  I’m blushing, but I graciously accept what your post about me would have said.

A Cool Deal From Coot Veal- Part 1

A looooooonnnnnngggggg time ago, Dustin from the awesome Coot Veal and the Vealtones blog reached out and said he had an autographed card of Razorback Eric Hinske in his possession and wanted to see if I was interested.  Indeed I was interested, but I didn’t have much to offer and the trade kind of fizzled out.  Thankfully, he didn’t forget about me and recently cast his line again.  This time I had a few things to offer. 

His cards arrived in the mail Saturday, and he sent way more than I expected.  In fact, this trade will take up two posts and it still won’t cover everything.  

Today, I’ll show you the Razorbacks and Rangers, starting with the main prize of this trade:

I was fortunate to see Hinske play a few games in person while he was with the Hogs.  He has become quite the seasoned traveler in the big leagues, but I’m glad to see him continue to get a paycheck.   I was “this” close to meeting him, too.  He was friends with a girl that interned at the book store I managed back in the late 90s and apparently he came by the store one day while I was not there. 

Dustin also sent a few other Hinske cards, none of which I had yet, and some always appreciated cards of Cliff Lee.

Next, we have cards of the new superpower of MLB, the Texas Rangers.    Yes, I know they lost the World Series.    Yes I know the Angels got Pujols.  The new superpower of MLB, the Texas Rangers:

 These alone would have made a great trade.  But there's more to show tomorrow!