Tossing some more fuel on the fire.

If you've read most of my posts since the beginning (especially the earlier ones) you know that I don't have any player collections. I tried player collections when I returned to the hobby in 2003.

I did pretty good with Gwynn and Ryan. Gwynn was pretty easy to find, actually. He's never had really high card values and started playing in the early 80's. Nolan cost a bit more, and I think the earliest card I have of his is mid-70s (I might have a '71). The problem came with all those dang parallels, jerseys, and autographs. Tony Gwynn appears on well over 8000 cards now, somewhere around 3000 of them are relics and autographs. Nolan Ryan is on over 9500, around 6000 of them are relics/autos. (Wait, what?) So, needless to say, I lost interest in trying to collect such a large number of cards. If I do base cards only, Nolan appears on nearly 2000, and Tony on 1300. *These numbers are based on Beckett searches, and some of the autographs are relics as well. Some of the base cards aren't exactly mainstream. I accept the total card number to be accurate, but believe the auto/relic/base numbers are higher than actual releases.*

I've been debating new player collections for a while now. There is a small number of autographs in my collection of players I like, and I've left it at that for a while. But let's be honest, I'm never going to touch a Pujols or Ichiro autograph. I'd like to honor a few more players, and in a bit of a larger quantity. So I've decided to start basic. We'll see where this ends up in a few years. The plan is to collect the flagship Topps cards (including any Topps Traded) for each player. Main/base cards only, no subsets, checklists, All-Stars, etc. Of course, if the player appears with someone else as part of a RC (like Nolan Ryan with Jerry Koosman), that'll count. I'll also add a game-used bat for each player.

I've chosen the following players for now:

• Nolan Ryan
• Tony Gwynn
• Albert Pujols
• Ichiro
• Frank Thomas
• Ken Griffey Jr.
• Barry Bonds (He's no hero in my eyes, but I still want him for this collection.)
• Jose Canseco (Likewise. But he was my first favorite player.)

I'm not ready to start actually collecting these cards yet. I'll be putting together a list eventually - it won't be too hard - and then I'll start thinking about working on this collection. I mean, it's not as though I don't already have a large and broad enough collecting goal...

Nobody better lay a finger on my Babefinger.

It isn't real, people. It isn't real. 179 ring trade requests, most of them for my Babe. Heck, there's three on that screenshot all from one person. I have 14 rings, all different right now, and I want to hit 45. So if I end up with another Babe, I'll trade it away, but until then, the Babe is mine.

Speaking of which, I guess that means I need another 31 codes. And the funny thing is, I don't really care much for the cards. That is, until I pull a die-cut, diamond-embedded card, or something really worth it.

Going Postal 3: Spotlight from the Upper Deck

Oh, the puns. I was talking with my grandmother and said a pun at dinner last night, and she said I'm taking after my grandfather. You'll see what I mean in a minute.

LA Dodgers vs. NY Mets, 2005 playoffs

This is a very busy week. On Sunday I head to LA for baseball and sightseeing. I'm excited, even though I've been to LA two and a half times in the past decade or so. There really is a lot to do there! I'll be seeing nine games in nine different parks, touring the two MLB stadiums, and racking up a pretty large number of miles (ugh, gas prices). The only LA-area baseball game I've seen in 20 years is the one above. I took that picture. Mets won, by the way. The series clincher. I was rooting for the Dodgers, just so you know - being a Braves fan I chose the Dodgers over the Mets.
This week is full of preparations for the trip and I have several activities going on in addition to packing. I'll have a temporary addition to the family when I return in the form of a feline, so there's preparations for that as well. And there's the A's game on Thursday. And I just picked up Rock Band 3 and I gotta tell you, those games have been quite a big part of my life in the past year. Plus, I seem to spend an hour or more every day writing and reading blogs. Anyway, what I'm getting at is - there are so many distractions for me, and I have a hard time concentrating, so if you're working with me on trades or something and I don't respond, I will get back to you eventually. If I go a few days without responding, don't think you're insulting me by poking me with another email, although it shouldn't go for that long.

So, now, onto the postal post. Not much lately, which is fine with me. I finally sorted most of my inserts by team, and if I have time this week I'll finally have a good trade bait page. Or maybe next month. Today brought two non-trade arrivals.

First, a 2006 Ovation autograph of David DeJesus. I'm using this COMC image, because I'm just too busy lazy to scan my own dang card. He's going in the A's autograph stack! (Which really is a stack in a little cardboard box, with a few other autographs and relics from baseball and non-sport, since most of that collection's in Georgia).

And, my 2000 Upper Deck set is now complete. I'm slowly getting some of these base set runs done, and I'm quite happy about it. Even if I don't put them together by hand. I have such a broad interest in cards, it would take more effort, money and time than I'm willing to provide to hand collate so many sets. I do have several sets that I put together by hand, so I'm not that lazy. In fact, there are about 120 sets right now in various stages of completion. At least 2000 Upper Deck looks much better than 1999 (what I think is probably the ugliest flagship Upper Deck set):

So, did you get the pun? Yeah. It was bad. Okay. I'd stop, but it's just so much fun.