TTM Tuesday

I got three ttms back this past week.

First up is Jose Cruz Jr. Cruz was a highly touted prospect when he came up to the big leagues in 1997 with the Mariners, but only spent a few months with Seattle before being traded to the Blue Jays.

He would spend next 5 seasons north of the border and his last 6 seasons in the majors would be split between 7 different teams; including 3 different teams in 2005. He did win a Gold Glove in 2003 with the San Francisco Giants.

Next up is Brady Kahle. Brady has a great story! He started selling his baseball card collection a few years ago to help out a friend that has cancer. CARDS4ACAUSE is the name of his charity. I'm sure most of you are familiar, but if not I'd encourage you to look him up. 

He was featured on a 2016 Topps First Pitch card, which I sent to him and he signed.

I included a small donation with my ttm request and he also included an Upper Deck card that features him and his cause.

Finally, we have racing legend Al Unser Sr. I sent the request to the Unser Racing Museum and he returned the Allen & Ginter card I sent as well as two cards of his own.

I like big gloves, and I cannot lie...

I wasn't buying packs in 1986. I didn't buy my first pack until 1988.

I can't imagine what my reaction would have been if I had pulled this card as a kid.

For those of you that were buying packs at the time, do you remember this card?

What was your reaction? How about now? Like it? Love it? Hate it?

baseballcardpedia.com has become my friend

Anybody else out there use baseballcardpedia.com? Anyone contribute to the site?

I've been using it quite a bit recently in trying to research different sets and cards recently. It's been helpful. I know anyone can update it, so I try to take the information with a grain of salt, but for the most part it's the best I can find.

The one thing I wish the site had was more pictures. From what I've seen there is typically just a picture of one of the boxes. I wish there were pictures of the actual cards. I know that would be a lot of work and take up a bunch of space, but a guy can dream, right?

On set I've learned a little more about using baseballcardpedia is the 1998 Topps parallel sets. There are three different parallels.

There was a factory set issued with a Diamondbacks stamp and another factory set issued with the Devil Rays stamp that were only sold in those local markets.

To be honest I don't remember these from back in 1998, but I've become familiar with them over the years since.However; I didn't know before reading it on baseballcardpedia.com that each factory set was limited to 5000.

The third parallel set is a Minted in Cooperstown parallel set. The site says that these cards were "printed at the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, NY through the use of a portable printing press." That's pretty cool. I wish there was some indication as to how many of each card was printed there.

A week ago I came across a binder at my LCS. I could see that the $10 price tag said it was "'98 set D-Backs Inag." and that peaked my interest.

I asked to look at it and was surprised to see that it was in fact a 1998 Topps Diamondbacks Inaugural issue set, or so I thought. I was actually missing 3 different D-Backs stamped cards (#5 - Vladmir Guerrero, #42 - Brad Ausmus, and #104 - Willie Green), but had the regular version of each of these cards. This makes me wonder if they just didn't get stamped.

But then there was another twist. There are 504 cards in the set. Behind 306 of the cards there was a second D-Backs stamped card. There were 6 additional regular base cards, and the 4 Minted in Cooperstown cards that you see above.

In addition, there were these 8 random inserts from the factory set. I know this because the previous owner had cut up the factory set box and taped it to the inside cover of the binder.

5 of the 8 cards feature Roberto Clemente, and I couldn't be happier.

Finishing off a mini team set!

Julie, of the blog A Cracked Bat: Baseball Cards and a Hot Dog, sent me a package recently with some awesome D-Backs cards. Thanks again Julie!

Part of the package was a near complete D-Backs team set of 2015 Topps mini cards. The only card missing was the Yasmany Tomas RC.

Since it was only missing one card, I quickly added it to my cart on comc and it came in a recent shipment.

I'm a bit torn when it comes to team sets. I would love to have every D-Backs card ever issued, and thus have every team set, but I just don't see it happening, so I rarely go after team sets.

But then again, when I come across a team set at a great price or am gifted one, as was the case with this one from Julie, I hesitate breaking it up and sorting it by player, which is how most of my D-Backs cards are sorted.

How about you? Do you collect team sets? How do you sort cards of your favorite team, by set or by player? Let me know.

Paul Goldschmidt All-Star Stitches

I picked up the 2014 Topps Update All-Star Stitches card of Paul Goldschmidt in my most recent comc order to go with the 2013, 2015, and 2016 that I already had. Hopefully there are many more that I can add to this page over the coming years!

It's finished! 2002 SP Legendary Cuts

I got the final card (Dizzy Dean) I needed for the 2002 SP Legendary Cuts set in my latest comc order. here is the set in all it's glory! It took my over 4 years to complete it (December 2012 - February 2017), but here it is.

#1 - Al Kaline

#2 - Alvin Dark

#3 - Andre Dawson

#4 - Babe Ruth

#5 - Ernie Banks

#6 - Bob Lemon

#7 - Bobby Bonds

#8 - Carl Erskine

#9 - Carl Hubbell

#10 - Casey Stengel

#11 - Charlie Gehringer

#12 - Christy Mathewson

#13 - Dale Murphy

 #14 - Dave Concepcion

#15 - Dave Parker

#16 - Dazzy Vance

#17 - Dizzy Dean

#18 - Don Baylor

 #19 - Don Drysdale

#20 - Duke Snider

#21 - Earl Averill

#22 - Early Wynn

#23 - Edd Rousch

#24 - Elston Howard

#25 - Fergie Jenkins

#26 - Frank Crosetti

#27 - Frankie Frisch

#28 - Gaylord Perry

#29 - George Foster

#30 - George Kell

#31 - Gil Hodges

#32 - Hank Grennberg

#33 - Phil Niekro

#34 - Harvey Haddix

#35 - Harvey Kuenn

#36 - Honus Wagner

#37 - Jackie Robinson

#38 - Orlando Cepeda

#39 - Joe Adcock

#40 - Joe Cronin

#41 - Joe DiMaggio

#42 - Joe Morgan

#43 - Johnny Mize

#44 - Lefty Gomez

#45 - Lefty Grove

#46 - Jim Palmer

#47 - Lou Boudreau

#48 - Lou Gehrig

#49 - Luke Appling

#50 - Mark McGwire

#51 - Mel Ott

#52 - Mickey Cochrane

#53 - Mickey Mantle

#54 - Minnie Minoso

#55 - Brooks Robinson

#56 - Nellie Fox

#57 - Nolan Ryan

#58 - Rollie Fingers

#59 - Pee Wee Reese

#60 - Phil Rizzuto

#61 - Ralph Kiner

#62 - Ray Dandridge

#63 - Richie Ashburn

#64 - Robin Yount

#65 - Rocky Colavito

#66 - Roger Maris

#67 - Rogers Hornsby

#68 - Ron Santo

#69 - Ryne Sandberg

#70 - Stan Musial

#71 - Sam McDowell

#72 - Satchel Paige

#73 - Willie McCovey

#74 - Steve Garvey

#75 - Ted Kluszewski

#76 - Catfish Hunter

#77 - Terry Moore

#78 - Thurman Munson

#79 - Tom Seaver

#80 - Tommy John

#81 - Tony Gwynn

#82 - Tony Kubek

#83 - Tony Lazzeri

#84 - Ty Cobb

#85 - Wade Boggs

#86 - Waite Hoyt

#87 - Walter Johnson

#88 - Willie Stargel

#89 - Yogi Berra

#90 - Zack Wheat