10 Cards from the Dollar Box #13

Sometimes, Baseball Cards are like Tribbles. Things start out innocently enough, but then...you know the rest. Routine access to a big ole box of randomly assembled Baseball Cards....so nice:

Why I selected it: I have always wanted a Topps Cosmic Chrome card that I could hold in my actual hand, instead of just seeing them on a computer screen. Would all those colorful interstellar takes on Oooohhhh, Shiny make me feel like I am visiting outer space, too? Only one way to find out. And, if I am going to own exactly one Cosmic Chrome Baseball Card, which seems likely, well then I want it to be a Miguel Cabrera card. It's not like I am ever going to spend $5 per card, in-pack, particularly when the whole pack is later going to end up priced as you see above, or, even cheaper.

Biggest surprise found about Cosmic Chrome cards? They have stats on the back. Begs a certain question though: Why?

Why I selected it: I once started a collection of Xfractors. You shouldn't be surprised that that is a 2013 related effort, for the Xfractors in 2013 Topps Chrome. On those cards, the pattern zooms itself in and out, like you are heading towards the Abyss but then can easily skip a visit there by simply tilting the Baseball Card in the opposite direction. 

On these Stadium Club Chrome cards, the whole idea is just, stupid. The pattern just sits there, little different from how that scan looks. The point of Stadium Club is, supposedly, to enjoy the best of Baseball photography. Obliterating that photography in a superfluous parallel pattern like this, or making Chrome cards of epic photographs in the first place — all that obviates the whole supposed point of the whole product. So, another product, Not For Me. This one hasn't survived the Fanatics chopping block, at least for the short time being. Certain products may just become "semi" annual and I would guess Stadium Club Chrome will be one of those.

But I do collect Detroit Stars cards, and the only way I could remember that one could be found on this Casey Mize card, and nowhere else, was to buy this copy so I could later get a more intelligible copy of the boring old "base" card. So, I just picked up this device that can summon any object to me at any time, and summoned that card, or, at least, to my next shipment of wonderful Baseball Cards, whenever that may be.

Why I selected it: When I was going through the $ Box, I simply pulled every Oneil Cruz card I came across. Since at the time he was injured after a Rookie Year that revealed he was, gasp, only Very Good, rather than already receiving Hall of Fame votes, there were a lot of them. 

Do I really want what are usually labelled not "Rookie Card" cards, despite the official logo, but rather "Rookie Year" cards? By the endlessly argued "Rules" that no one has ever seen written down, RC-logo inserts don't count as Rookie Card cards because they are just, inserts. Of course if the player on the Rookie Year insert is named "Shohei" you will still have to pay $10 (or more) for it, even though otherwise no one really wants Rookie Year inserts, "they" say. 

On that Oneil Cruz card I do like the elbow pad with some sort of Pirates team motif graphics, so that will be a possibly interesting detail tidbit on other Pirates cards. Otherwise, I don't usually want Rookie Year inserts, either, and probably should have edited my little stack of cards that day. Checklists of such cards routinely look basically pretty dumb, starting just a few years later.

But for everyone else, when the RC Logo appears in a pack, even on an insert, everyone gets to go home a "winner" with that feeling they "got something" from their lottery ticket.

Why I selected it: I collect Satchel Paige cards. I have a feeling he will be a player where I will end up with 9 different cards, all using the same picture, a future post series here, someday.

With this card, I'm not positive what set it comes from. It is an extra-thick card, but there is no indication it is not a base card in the source product. The "T" on the front makes me think it is from Topps "Tribute" but I can't remember for sure if that is a Topps product. I think so?

The card-back text leads with "Triple Take" so I will thus presume this is a card from Triple Threads. A collection of these would look nice enough I guess, but I have to wonder if anyone really cares about a set of Triple Threads cards, rather than all the "hits" in Triple Threads for which base cards have to be assembled, just, because. Eyeroll please, Satchel.

Why I selected it: At the time, I thought I might collect this small checklist of the "Legends of the Game" from 2010 Topps Baseball. But over time I have come to quite dislike this design with all the pointless darkness to it. I will keep this card until I find another one with this picture of Jackie Robinson on it, which probably won't take too long. Quite an unusual backdrop; I again suspect this may be at the Polo Grounds.

Why I selected it: Seems like a nice standard addition to a collection of Oneil Cruz Rookie Card cards. I probably snagged it on the "just-in-case" chance this has a different image than his card in the non-Chrome Topps Baseball set in 2022 (couldn't recall). Also have no clue if this is regular Topps Chrome, or if it might be "Sonic" Chrome. I don't think anyone can hear regular Chrome, but Sonic is supposed to make some sort of noise, somehow. This card is rather quiet.

Otherwise I find "base" Chrome cards to be a fair bit less enticing than their regular cardboard cousins. Despite the Oooohhhh, Shiny, I want more to "Ooohh" over than just, silver.

Why I selected it: I like these inserts. This was their 2nd appearance in Gallery, in 2022, the last year (for now?) it was issued. Year one of "Next Wave" was a fair bit less visually appealing. I could see assembling some pleasing additional copies of year two. If I don't, then this one will look nice on a page of Powder Blue inserts.... 

Why I selected it: ...same as above, except I already have a set of these die-cuts, just recently completed. But if I have a page of Powder Blue inserts then it surely needs a die-cut representative. Particularly now that by scanning it, I can see how much Topps leaned into the Powder Blue on this card, even 11 years ago, when only one team in MLB was regularly wearing the Powder Blues. Topps, couldn't wait for more, it appears.

Why I selected it: I've been waiting to get this one into the scanner, to see how it turns out. This stack of cards probably got a little mixed with 10-months-ago and 1-month-ago purchases as this one was definitely from last winter. These are extra thick cards, the first clue they aren't just useless, regular base cards. They are also Gold bordered, another clue they aren't just useless, regular base cards, though they are not serial #'d like pretty much all other Gold cards are.

The final clue that this isn't just a useless, regular base card is the printing of the "facsimile" signature, which is done in dramatic shiny Gold ink. And that's why I bought it.

I found it very surprising that Topps would still take an interest in producing a card with a facsimile signature on the front; something I can't recall them otherwise doing in the 21st Century outside of just one set, 2007 Topps Baseball, except for when they are faithfully re-issuing an older design that included them. Probably there are more examples in the Bowman product line.

But at this point, the concept of autographed Baseball Cards is so here, there, and everywhere that when you type something like "2005 Topps Baseball" into a Google Images Search, the top results will all be of cards autographed "in person" by a player. And there are uncountable thousands of Baseball Card collectors who ONLY collect autographed cards, one at a time. Every single person who plays Major League Baseball has an actual autographed card, or hundreds of different ones, that can be collected now. The only "real" Baseball Cards are the autographed ones, "The Hobby" routinely seems to want to say.

That all makes the old-timey tradition of a not-real autograph just look rather quaint on a brand new 21st Century Baseball Card. And to include them but also to then blow it up via special gold-ink printing — Topps, err, Bowman, is darn proud of these "signatures."

So, I decided to collect some of these dramatic fake Gold signatures. They look cool on a Baseball Card. Even when they are essentially a useless regular insert card of a by now long since failed Prospect (exception: Pomeranz had a solid MLB career) wearing a fake uniform.

Why I selected it: Ya gotta remember, this was purchased back in the offseason before the 2024 season, when the glimmer of hope around Torkelson was actually glimmering, a little. Even though my LCS had dumped all his Rookie Card cards into their Dollar Box already. So this one went straight into my pile of 91¢ acquisitions as soon as I saw it. 

At least, it will help make progress on the HICKORY collection.

Bonus Round

Why I selected it: This is an unusual card in that it begs a question: What is Tyler Stephenson doing here? Is he racing back to the dugout?

I initially was intrigued by this being a Night Card, on the 1986 Topps design, which looks like Night on the top. A little subset collection of that concept would look purdy neat, I thought. And, it still might. I am a long ways from making final decisions on what to do with 2021 Topps Baseball cards. I think there should be 150 different 1986 design cards issued with it, as well as another 100 or 150 Chrome/Mojo cards, generally with a different image, I believe, though I haven't tested that proposition. So there might be 9 2021-1986 Night Cards to be collected, dunno.

This is also Stephenson's 2nd Rookie Card card to feature him blowing a bubble, while he is playing Baseball. That makes this card a Bubble Gum, In Action card, and those are my favorite kinds of Bubble Gum cards. This one might not count as a Rookie Card card, because remember, insert cards don't "count" as Rookie Card cards, nevermind what the RC logo is doing on the card. There are Rules about this stuff. This is a Rookie Year insert, and don't you forget it.

Stephenson's regular Rookie Card card in 2021 Topps Baseball does at least solve the riddle of what is happening on this odd card, as the image was clearly taken immediately after this one; on that card Stephenson is looking up to begin fielding a pop-up. So, someday, this card could end up in a few different odd corners of my collection. We'll see.

Double Bonus Round

Why I selected it: Because, surprise. I was kinda taken aback to see players who -might- become players for my favorite team, already Photoshopped onto my favorite team. I mean, that's stuff that only happens with the real Major League teams, the ones that play in the East or West divisions. Everybody knows the teams in the Central divisions are just Farm Teams now, and they don't need their prospects Photoshopped into their uniforms because their prospects will all eventually fail. But if they don't, they won't retire from a team in a Central Division, either, so no one wants to see them in fake Photoshopped uniforms like these, later on.

So once a Detroit Tiger(s) was (were) selected to be on a prestigious Bowman Chrome Prospects fake MLB uniform card, I had to hop right aboard this particular bandwagon.

Triple Bonus Round

Why I selected it: Well because I like these Topps Chrome Prisms. Having a yellow outfield wall stripe on one might be kinda neat. Might not. At least the classic "mb" ball-in-glove logo is in full color, unlike some other teams on the always more increasingly boring 2022 Topps Baseball design. Though I appreciate elegance in Baseball Card design, 2022 was just a bit lacking in....something. 

Anyhow I grab Prisms when I see them, even when I'm not sure if I need my requisite one, just one, copy of one of them from a given year. I really need to make a little list of which years I still need Prisms, Pinks, and Sapphires for, from both the vertical and horizontal divisions, before I go delightfully jumping into the $ and 50¢ boxes down at the LCS. So, I guess I'd better get goin, and get some more homework done...

10 Cards from the Dollar Box #12

It's that time, again

Why I selected it: I'm collecting Johnny Evers cards now. Because I have to eventually Man Up and buy the ultimate Johnny Evers card - the t206. Because I have Tinkers, and Chance. So this will help keep the motivation inching forward.

Plus this card makes me wonder - why doesn't Panini do this, like, all the time? & by "this" I mean just print a portrait card, with the design conveniently covering the logo they aren't allowed to print. Works, perfectly.

Why I selected it: I love Baseball Cards with real live Trees on them. But this won't go with the "Trees" collection, which is still sadly quite small. I also collect oneil cruz Baseball Cards. I think I will easily make it to 9 of his cards with the good ole RC logo; scoring this one in the 91¢ box will help. And, odds I would ever purchase a whole "box" of Topps Archives Snapshots Baseball Cards? Zero.

Why I selected it: This is just a great Ichiro card. Babe Ruth "called his shot" and hit a Home Run. Ichiro, he's more like, y'all hold your beers, Ima hittin' a Single right here, right now. When the continually growing Ichiro collection finally gets committed to binder page (s), soon (ish), this is one is "First Team," all the way.

Why I selected it: How many ways do I love this card? Let me count the ways:

It's a Horizontal card.

It's not a Detroit Tigers card, it's a Detroit Stars card.

It's a Foil card.

Foil cards look great, in-scan. Check out those little glowing stars on a Detroit Stars card. Ace.

That's it. 4 ways.

Why I selected it: I collect Wade Boggs cards, sort of. I only collect Wade Boggs, Sad cards. Wade Sad, lotsa sometimes, on Baseball Cards. The "Mojo" pattern makes this whole card look sad and gloomy. Perfect.

Why I selected it: This card is "Fire." See all those little graphical flames on it? That proves this card is "Fire." Further proof is the serial number stamped on it. That means this card is not only "Fire," but is also "Money." 91¢ is "Money." I could probably also easily fool someone into thinking it includes a battle-tested Game-Worn, actual swatch from Omar's compression sleeve there in that big blue rectangle, which otherwise, well, why is that big blue rectangle there, anyway? 

Fortunately, Omar Narvaez, In Action, makes it (kinda? a little? part-way) easy to forget that big blue rectangle, and since I collect Omar Narvaez cards, I needed one that was "Fire," like this one. Panini brings the heat, particularly when they don't even have to lift the airbrush, for a change.

Omar signed a 2025 Minor League deal the other day, so there might could be yet one more Omar Narvaez Baseball Card, in the future.

Why I selected it: Didja notice this Baseball Card doesn't have a "35th Anniversary" stamp on it? That's because this is an actual 1985 Topps Baseball Card, not a re-enactment. They still sell these, sometimes, down at the LCS, if you look long enough.

This card has it all. The mustard melting sorta triangle, the Swingin' Friar, and most importantly, how could you collect Sunglasses Cards without this one?

Why I selected it: Hey, look, the Dollar Box finally ran out of 2022 and 2023 Baseball Cards for me. This will be fun. Neon Prisms? Oh, yeah.

Why I selected it: Not a Prism, but almost certainly the 2024 Topps Chrome Pink Horizontal Champion, in my house. Arm Cards are still weird, though.

Why I selected it: I'm still waiting for an officially checklist announced "Powder Blue Parallel." Or at least a nice run of inserts with such a title. What's taking so long? The Topps Eye clearly loves the Powder Blue. At least in 2024, there is Neon Powder Blue striping, which is real cool time.

This is a "Royal Blue" parallel, sometimes called a Royal Blue "retail" parallel, because it doesn't appear in the Hobby Boxes for the rich kids. Just the cards sold at the Big Box stores for us regular, every day collectors continually funneling our money into the system.

So this one might become the Blue Jays 2024 Topps Baseball delegate to the Powder Blue Collection. Because I like Powder Blue Catcher gear in particular, and "Royal" blue = classy, particularly on The Neon. Although I am not fat, I like it that Baseball Players are allowed to be.

Bonus Round

Why I selected it: This is a "Bubble Gum, In Action" Baseball Card. And those are cool. I'm going to throw you out - while I'm blowing a Bubble. That's how slow you run, slugger.

It is only kinda-sorta apparent in the scan, but this is the 2024 Topps Chrome card for Trea Turner. So for the Bubble Gum, In Action collection, I might as well Oooohhh, Shiny it, when I can.

Why I selected it: Probably because of a whole other card, one I have already posted:

At the simplest level, I like Horizontal "Sliding" cards quite a bit. But when I came across the 2024 Chrome Verdugo, I was simply perplexed by Topps just randomly using a different image for the Chrome, as compared to the "base." 

Why doesn't Topps do this in all the various Topps Baseball styled sets, routinely?

OK, so, this "Pinch Runner" deal

We were all looking forward to the anointment of the next Herb Washington this year. It seemed so simple....we'll see.

My time for blogging grows short again, as work will soon have me 150 miles from home, comfortably appointed in a big ole empty farmhouse, but without a scanner or my collection of Baseball Cards. Maaaaaayybeeee if I can ever get caught up on the joys of self-employment and filing taxes on my own, which means hours and hours of sorting receipts and horrible drudgery, I will celebrate and buy another scanner just for road use. But I doubt I will -ever- get 100% caught up on that dreary-ness.

Anyhow I do have a nice run of posts stockpiled for part ways into January and have been making tremendous progress on resolving stacks and stacks of Baseball Cards, which has been great. But one small stack of cards on the desk needs to be dissected...

Wait.

I'm showing you an actual "Pinch Runner" card? 

2024 Heritage card #407 just says "Outfield" on it; everyone has had to deal with this annoying card -

That's the mini version; quite annoyingly, I still don't have the full-size version. But luckily, I have a very sweet stash of some of the Minis.

The odd appearance of "Pinch Runner" is present on all the parallels:

This also holds true on the other full-size Heritage parallels, and also in the parallel Minis.

First I want to mention that I quite like the #407 2024 Heritage card. The Pink&Yellow combo in the '75 design is a great one, and it perfectly complements the selected Taveras image with the pink palms and striping on his batting glove, plus a nice appearance by the Alternate Blue uniform (never to be known if Home or Away), with a perfect display of the Texas flag shoulder patch, all on a crisp, unique image. Also included as a free gift bonus is even a stylish signature from Taveras, one not pointlessly dropped into a dark portion of the image as on so many 2024 Heritage cards, with each one depositing the facsimile signature in exactly the same place, courtesy of software. But really all the way around, a bang-up Baseball Card.

I also like that an obscure Taveras Rookie Card seems to have foreshadowed his elevation to Baseball Card fame, some 3 years before -

I picked up that card completely by chance discovery in the Buck Box, and pretty much just because of the basically pretty 24 Heritage card. I have no idea what I will do with that card, though it too is a darn nice combo of pink&blue.

But tonights topic is - why was such a simple thing as printing a "Pinch Runner" card in Heritage all screwed up, causing endless confusion and also basically costing every Heritage set collector an extra $15 just to finish a set? I don't know for sure, but through the year 2024 I found some clues on some other cards that might inform on this, at least a little bit.

Also this seems like a good place to point out: Herb Washington is still alive. Thus there is a chance he could still appear in some "2024" Heritage, via an autographed card, in the High Numbers set, which is said to be still "on the way," in "first quarter, 2025." His "autos" would sell very well, I expect, and that's what a lot of people want when they purchase a box of Baseball Cards, particularly the most vocal ones. Me, I just want the Baseball Cards; I'm weird like that.

My first, and prime, suspicion about what might have happened is this card:

See - there's Leody Taveras running the bases, he must be real, real good at that. He even brings a sliding mitt with him when he bats, indicating he might routinely get the "sign" from the bench. 

Another 2023 card maybe reinforces this a little:

Oh, I get it now. Taveras has to bunt his way on base; so he must be fast and then he must get used as a Pinch Runner a lot.

See how much you can figure out the game of Baseball just from Baseball Cards? It's easy.

So hurry, up, pick us a Pinch Runner and get these cards down to the printer already. Let's go get some stock tips from drunken traders enjoying Happy Hour down at the bar.

That doesn't explain why the regular card #407 says "Outfield" on the front though, and only the parallels say "Pinch Runner." Still a bit of a mystery to examine, but first I want to detour into another supposably key feature of Baseball Cards: accuracy.

There is a simple fact about Leody Taveras' play in the 2023 season, the one that should generate the results used on 2024 Baseball Cards.

In 2023, Leody Taveras was never used as a Pinch Runner, not even once.

As for stealing bases, he went 14-for-18, which does place him around 70th in MLB that year, for the "SB" stat. One could also tease out his exact ranking via consideration of the "CS" stat, and probably there is a website that already did that, if you can look more closely than me.

But in the 21st Century, it is easy to see who really was a Pinch Runner in 2023, courtesy of Baseball Reference, specifically at:

https://www.baseball-reference.com/leagues/majors/2023-appearances-fielding.shtml

The final column on the right of Player Appearances is labelled "PR" for, of course, Pinch Running; clicking on it will cause all of the players in 2023 MLB to be sorted by how many times they were a Pinch Runner in a Major League Baseball game in the 2023 season.

Now it should be noted there will never be another Herb Washington in Major League Baseball. Err, well, there certainly -could- be, but in the Data Mining era every game outcome probability is taken so seriously that the concept of a team using a roster spot on a speedy player who can't hit and can't field is incredibly unlikely.

Maybe the closest we could have gotten was the now ended career of Billy Hamilton, who did get picked up on a couple rosters with an eye to being a Pinch Runner during expanded rosters in September and possibly October. He would have made for a perfect Herb Washington tribute card, but his last game was in May, 2023 so that just couldn't work out.

Given the modern easy access to every baseball event statistic, Topps certainly could have made the Pinch Runner card using an actual Pinch Runner in 2023. Here are a few of their options, starting with a player who tied for 2nd in the stat at 14, and actually is in the 2024 Heritage set -

Sharing the lead at 15 PR insertions are 3 players:

That's Chavis' final card now, it appears; he did not play in MLB in 2024 and thus an accurate call @ Topps.

Hey, look, another sliding mitt. Caballero appeared in 104 Games in 2023, not enough to make a regular Heritage checklist when it has to have about 100 Rookie Card cards included in it first. Yes, a full 20% of the checklist = RC now.

And one more sliding mitt, a good photo choice for a serious threat on the basepaths. Despite making it into 69 games in 2023, that is Dairon Blanco's First Topps Card, which finally appeared in 2024 Update. He only has one other card so far, in one of the Chrome Platinum releases complete with the RC logo making it his One True Rookie Card (truly a rarity in 21st century Baseball Cards), but nobody ever knows what year those Platinum Chrome cards actually represent. It is nice to see the irony of a speedster sporting uniform #44 though.

Blanco, by the way, lead all of MLB in 2024 with 42 Pinch Running appearances, more than double the 2nd place player in the stat. The Leody Taveras stat for "PR" in 2024 was just, 2.

So real Pinch Runners do exist in MLB, though not in an exactly-like-Herb-Washington way; it is pretty interesting that the rules tweaks and new base size created a fair bit more Pinch Running in 2024.

But I believe there was yet more happening in the 2024 Heritage set that could have made things turn out differently. And, perhaps, some other certain path was planned before things went haywire, for who knows what reason.

As it turns out, "Herb Washington" is included in 2024 Heritage - on a card back -

It is of course a stinging bummer that these card backs are far easier to read after they have been scanned. I still struggle to believe how not-seriously Topps treated the Heritage brand this year, for one of the most popular sets in Topps' history.

This card clearly indicates that the whole concept of a Herb Washington tribute was on the mind of whomever was assigned to 2024 Heritage, probably some 13-14 months ago as I write, a bit more so than the parallels does, or the strangeness revolving around card #407, and card #82.

That is the Heritage card for a player who has been following me around some this year; this was my 1st card in my 2nd pack of 2024 Topps Baseball:

,

which was also my First Card in the one blaster of 2024 Topps Chrome that I tried out. (The Neon didn't really need Chrome-ing, it appeared to me; though I did hit the Judge base card so the blaster was only a $15 experiment later, instead of $35).

Jose Rodriguez made the 2024 Topps Baseball checklist there right in prime time Series One, on the strength of a pretty notable Major League Baseball career previously, in terms of just who gets a Baseball Card, and who doesn't. That's because that career consists of appearing in exactly one game in the 2023 season.

Now as things have played out, I believe he appears in 4 products with 4 different total images even with repeats in 2 pairs of products, plus one Bowman card and no shortage of Panini & Leaf cards available to commemorate this career. And I almost forgot one other card appearance, in 2024 Topps Chrome Update, where he had exactly one card. Not just one checklist spot, but just, one card. That was his 1/1 "Rookie Debut Patch" card, which sold for around $1,500, iirc. That sounded incredible until my friendly LCS owner pointed out that it is widely speculated that the players themselves tend to buy up those cards when they appear for sale.

This is moderately likely to be Jose Rodriguez' only year of appearances on Topps cards, which is because in the first few days of the 2024 season, the White Sox sold his contract to the Phillies. Upside: that was a decision by Dave Dombrowski. Downside: when the 2024 White Sox are selling your contract for cash, well...

But the more serious fact about Jose Rodriguez was that in mid-summer 2024, he had not cracked the Phillies Major League roster; rather he was suspended by MLB for a full year for violating the No Gambling rules. At only 23 years old as I write, losing a year of participation in Pro Ball isn't necessarily an automatic end to a career, but there is certainly no shortage of mid-20s players as good and many better in MLB systems.

And what happened in Jose Rodriguez' one and only one game in Major League Baseball? He was inserted into a game on June 20, 2023 at "The Rate," wherein he did not get an At Bat, but he did score a Run in Major League Baseball. He also played Second Base, not SS, for one complete, 3 outs inning. Just one, though that is one more than Herb Washington.

Thus the entirety of his offensive body-of-work in the Bigs was --

-- as a Pinch Runner.

10 Cards from the Dollar Box #11

It's that time again ... that time when I didn't have time to document some individual topic for a post today, and that time I need to put in to wipe out the stack of $ Box cards from the LCS, which sometimes lately grows taller, faster than it grows shorter. Let the scanning commence

Why I selected it: I really thought this one would scan better. And, I thought I would join up with the high-rollers, who can only collect ultra limited edition cards such as the ones found in "Sapphire" products. My plan is simple enough - accumulate just one Sapphire card, from each year it has been available. I won't really care whether the card came from Topps Chrome Sapphire, or Topps Chrome Update Sapphire; I find them both equally farcical. Bowman anything Sapphire is right out.

I also want to shade things toward picking a card not from a "blue" team, cuz the last thing one of these cards needs is more blue on it. The Guardians logo comes off better than most in the 23 design, and it looks like there is a lot of the green, green grass of a ballfield in the original image. So I was hoping for some more "Atomic" like refractor-ing, since the Sapphire pattern is just the older Atomic pattern but with a bucket of dark blue paint slopped over almost everything.

Which is why - I don't get it. These are just ... dark blue Baseball Cards. There is hardly any "pop" or razzle-dazzle at all here. The Oooohhhh, Shiny quotient is just - weak. 'course all anyone really wants from a Sapphire product is the Rookie of the Year vote-getters, and pretty much nothing else, so all of my complaints here are totally irrelevant, to anyone. The product sells out, reliably, every time it is produced, so it will be with us for a long time to come, I expect. 

I even tried examining this card under the lights of the Christmas Tree. No improvement. I don't get it. Maybe I should try a Sapphire Rookie Card card instead, that might help. I guess.

Why I selected it: I love Pink Baseball Cards. They remind me of Bubble Gum. I somehow started liking this design too; it looks like the Baseball player inside of the keyhole is going to unlock a World Series Championship for the team lucky enough to enjoy his services. Or something.

Sadly, another key element disappears in the scan: this is card # 001/299. After all these years of basically ignoring serial #d cards (except of course for the ones in 2013 Topps), I thought it would be fun to finally own a card #1.

So how'd that work out for me? Not too good. It seems these aren't actually the simple Pink parallel, these are technically the "Fuschia" parallel. Oh, I see. Did the whole Bowman universe have a Fuschia-Pink parallel in 2023? Maybe. I look at all Bowman cards as all part of the same exact set, the Bowman set. I don't care if they say Platinum or Strata or Invincible or Volcanic or whatever, it's all Bowman to me, but with an incredibly difficult time sorting out just what subset is what, because there are countless separate checklists running inside of each Bowman box, anyway. And in the end, old-timey just, paper Bowman cards have both a /299 Fuschia parallel, and a /175 Pink parallel too. But only these "Prospect" subset cards, with their own run of card numbers, have this cool keyhole design. 

Maybe I would enjoy owning 9 of these still-Pink-to-me Prospect cards? I looked through the checklist just now and that looks tough. I only knew roughly 10% of the players (of the "Tigers" I only knew 1 of 4, and I do generally know who they draft each year). Even after 2 full seasons of play should have brought all the hot Prospects to the Big Leagues, right? No. The vast majority of prospects fail, and thus the vast majority of Bowman cards are just money-lit-on-fire, by someone. The players I had heard of, all had stupid high prices on them. Every time I ever try and Bowman just a little tiny bit (one pack every 6 years or so, though they are no longer sold in packs anyway, just blasters and bigger boxe$), this is the result.

I only managed to burn about 3 quarters and a dime; it was surprisingly easy to get them to ignite. What has happened to Vincent Perozo? Not much. He didn't have any cards produced in 2024, an almost certain death knell to his Baseball Card oeuvre, and likely an end of his journey to The Show. No large ladies have sung on his career, and he might still end up on a Minor League card somewhere, maybe, possibly, perhaps. Or the Mets might have 4 Catchers injured in 4 days, Perozo is rushed to Queens to play for 3 days, and then Fanatics will put him in a half-dozen Topps products.

However although this same image is used in no less than 4 separate Bowman "products," it is still the only image used for a Baseball Card of Vincent Perozo. Ever. Across those 4 products I estimate there are at least 50 (technically) different versions of this card. Amazingly, he does not appear in any Leaf products, probably because Leaf employees are afraid to walk around teenager Baseball diamonds in Venezuela with cash in their pockets.

Thus it looks there might be a silver lining for me here in the end in that this card could well turn out to be a "One & Done," and I do like those. Normally that phrase only applies to Major League Baseball Cards, with MiLB and prospect cards sometimes conveniently ignored for the concept. To have only one pre-MLB Baseball Card here in the 2020s must be incredibly rare, or maybe isn't at all but is just completely unknown, because these hard working young Baseball players are completely unknown to everyone anyway. Could go either way. I will be stashing this card for a rainy day. Best of luck, Vincent.

Why I selected it: Props to whoever decided to shoot this photo around a batting cage, old-timey Baseball Card style. This 2022 Archives card is printed on the appropriate "vintage" stock as it is called these days. The photo resolution and print quality completely destroys oh so many of the 2012 Heritage cards that use this design, to the point of making '12 Heritage laughable really. If you like 1963 Topps, these cards are great. I would chase the whole 100 card checklist if a portion of them weren't created with those abysmal fake backdrops - unlike this card. So instead this card is a solid start to a nice one page homage to 1963. Looking forward to it.

Why I selected it: I am always hyp-mo-tized by a Baseball about to be caught on Baseball Card, when one is arriving @ glove horizontally, in the infield. I always like how the player is still focused on a point outside of the image frame, because Baseballs are thrown very fast by Professionals. I also like the lurking Umpire.

Why I selected it: This is a Short Print. So, I wanted to increase my bottom line by a profit of a couple three quarters, err Dolla Bills. Holla.

Why I selected it: I collect Manager cards. Sort of. When I see a Manager on a Baseball Card, I stick it in a box, one I haven't started pulling cards out of, yet. But I figured I should for once get with the in-crowd and collect Manager Rookie Card cards, like everyone else does, maybe.

Many a Tiger fan wished Francona had been available when Jim Leyland retired, alas. I am surprised / not-surprised that Francona's "health issues" were completely temporary. He is clearly a Lifer. The surprising part is he seems to be thinking he will see any different result in Cincinnati than most any other famous Manager has been able to achieve in the Central Division, ever since he lost the 2016 World Series. He must relish Challenge. I already root for essentially every team in the NL Central; 2025 will be even more challenging, for me, in that regard.

Why I selected it: I loved Bazooka comics too, surprise, surprise. Those are still made, I think. I guess seeing this "card" up on a screen now will make me a little more cognizant of my next sighting of Bazooka gum. I think it only comes in a box with 2 dozen or so pieces; a bit more than I would want. 

Oh well. I have another mid-00s Bazooka comic-card for Ichiro also. I bought this one hoping there might be a 3rd one kicking around the few years of Bazooka brand Baseball Card checklists. That would make a nice 3 "card" row on a 2nd page of Ichiro cards.

So, close. There are actually 2 more of these comic-cards for Ichiro. But, they are each horizontals. So, I can't make a row of them on either a page of verticals, or a page of horizontals. Back to the, yup, drawing board, I guess.

Why I selected it: Because it will look nice on a page in a flip-through binder of Baseball Cards. For that, 100% authenticity is not required. And for the price of an original, I could have a good 3-4 full binders of Baseball Cards to enjoy.

This is I think the 3rd card from this reprint set I have picked up from these $ boxes; they aren't perfectly identified on the back in terms of year of creation. So just now I un-lazied into figuring it out (why I write these posts) finally and that reveals this is a, surprise, 1994 Topps production. And a pretty well done attempt at this. The brightness of the yellow background might betray it's inauthenticity a bit more than some of the other colors in the 54 set. It is definitely better than some 21st century Topps attempts at 1950s reprints.

A particular charm of these 54 reprints though, is a sharp reproduction of the back of the card, on the same white base stock. This makes it very easy to enjoy the creative work that went into the backs of the cards.

Why I selected it: This is an insert set from 2020 Topps Baseball, called "Topps 2030," which was supposed to be an imagination of what Topps cards _might_ look like in the year.... The next year they did essentially the same thing by anointing some design Topps 2091 in 2021 Archives and I thought there are/were at least one more attempt at such a thematic "future" motif. I guess it can't be any easier to dream up new names for insert sets than it is to create new insert designs, this deep into the thing called Baseball Cards.

So I got confused and then it took me a fair long while to ever figure out where these cards came from (hint: the weirder the card #, the easier it is to find on COMC, something I often struggle to remember), or to remember that I had a couple straight pack fresh, from all the way back in 2020. I thought they were all a part of Archives.

But I like the Ooohhh, Shiny here and once I started using a thumbprint on my phone I got the reference on the front of this card, though it is now dated already too. Kind of an inherent risk for such an idea I guess.

The checklist proves to be 20 cards, with 3 Rookies now already looking just, ordinary. So I might make 2 full pages of this and delete a couple of the 3; but then there are also some failed Free Agent Stars as the Data Mining Era of Baseball relentlessly tarnishes Stars faster than ever before. The cards are cheap at least, except there is of course also a Judge & an Ohtani on the checklist. That is a +/- in that Superstars are great but after a while it gets old contemplating needing a $5 card on every single checklist ever made for a year, or 7. So maybe I just need 8 more of these after Bryce, we'll see.

And Ooohhh, Shiny.

Why I selected it: 1972 Topps is the best design to mess around with, I think. I am collecting a "Day-Glo" orange version of a 50 card Archives take on it, which looks just hideously purdy. And though I don't generally ooohhh and ahhh over Purple Baseball Cards like I do over Pink Baseball Cards, I had to have at least one Purple Refractor Psychedelic Tombstone. Is this the best possible Purple '72? I dunno. But I also want 9 cards of any player cheeky enough to wear Uni # Zero, so here I go.

Bonus Round

Why I selected these: It is so nice to see the 1988 design printed accurately, for one. And I like something about each of these cards. The Turner has a nifty stealth Logoman on it; I can't get enough Riley Greene Rookie Cards (this photo should have been his Topps Baseball issue, in a better world).

There are 150 subjects on the 2023-1988 checklist so it looks likely that my first constructed page of these will have to expand. Darn.

Bonus Bonus Round

Why I selected it: Johnny Bench always looks good on Baseball Cards.