Let's Trade ... Blue Sparklers?

These are probably the ultimate scanner cards, though I only have a single season of scanning under my belt and I am a long way from making the big $ leagues to scan a "SuperFractor." I'm not sure I would recover from gazing into all those little circles, if I scanned one and checked the results, full-screen, the way I like to look at these cards. One of my next collecting goals is to buy a SuperFractor of some 2000-whenever draft pick who never even made it to AA ball. You can send me yours if you'd like, so you can quit thinking about how much $ you blew on that hot prospecting tip that just couldn't miss.

Fortunately, these cards have a million points of light for the scanner to bounce their laser off, and I just drool over the results like a tourist come morning after being transported to a Colorado ski town over night, i.e. a "gaper."

Here, gape with me now:

This is one of my favorites, though it would be darn near impossible for me to make anything less than a top 50 list of these, all tied for first. I think the aliens are sneaking up on Scott there while he is busy trying to play baseball. Watch out, Scott - The Blob is coming to get ya! You just have to think something bad is going to happen on a Poltergeist card.

I'll tell you right now, the best way to enjoy this post is to click on Mr. Sizemore, and let Blogger take you on a scroll-show of the results of my scanning efforts this evening. If I could find a Complete Set of only the high-quality scans of these cards, I would probably buy one.

Go ahead, mix up a drink, take your tablet over to your extra comfy recliner, and get lost in the stars for a little while. I'll wait.

That's the closest I got to a star card, for now though. Now that you have already scrolled through 'em, lazy side-to-side style, you can scroll along down the screen with me while I babble on about these a little bit. Any card that has both dirt and grass on it turns out fantastic on these. So do all of the New York Mets cards. I like the rosin bag picking up a best supporting prop there on this card, and the Mets' logo on the back of the mound too.

These "Reverse Tatooine" cards that have an all-grass background, of which there are plenty in the zoomed-in 2013 set, turn out very well, making me likely to pick them for use in my parallel project. But this card breaks one of the rules of the project - no blue Sea Turtles on a blue border parallel. So my trade stack of these tends to have a lot of the blue teams in it.

A lot depends on the image though...some grass is better than other grass, and we get to see lots more of those little shiny points of light twinkling at us, and who doesn't like that in their grass? This card was actually set up in a permanent home in my project for a little while, until I picked up a Camo border version of this card in a lot purchase, and this Blue Sparkler got bumped. And there is an even better entry in the weird world of parallels on that page anyhows - a Sparkler Error card that is pretty neat. I think someone at Topps was checking out the grass too much perhaps the night those were printed. There is actually a series of those across several different parallels. Naturally, I'm working on a special binder page of those, for future reference after I cut the grass some evening. Don't worry, I like to share.

Of course as the man sang one time back in the 90s, 'what is from the earth is of the greatest worth.' So the actual Tatooine cards in the set this year make the very best sparkler cards this side of, oh, I don't know, Labrador perhaps. Houston Astro cards always pose an existential question for me though. If you didn't have their players on your baseball cards, would they even exist?

I mean, if I had started this post with a "Quick, name a Houston Astro without looking at your baseball cards!", how long would it take you to do it? 

That card is an example of how the various outfield walls around MLB can appear somewhat randomly on these cards, sometimes knocking the buzz out of these. I always wonder whenever I see this card if that is some sort of mark the Astros put on the outfield wall to help all their AA players trying to hit actual Major League pitching, gently telling them "look out there, aim at the crosshairs."

Other times though, the outfield wall becomes the star of the card:

This card was Designated For Permanent Assignment in the Parallel Project, until the Commissioner came along and starting dreaming up Franken-rules, like the second rule I already mentioned - that the back of the Turtle can't match the color of the card it is swimming through. We wouldn't want the players to get confused about which part is their Turtle-shell home and which part is off the edge of their world when things get bumpy. So the Commissioner had to tell this card it was to be Designated For Assignment, back to the trade pile, which happened to the equally cool Jeff Francouer card that didn't show up on time to be scanned for this post, and this one too:

... even though it didn't break the all-important No Matching Colors Rule #2. The Commissioner had to rule out cards that disrespected the other players enjoying their Cameo on someone else's cards (I know from my Base Card of this one that we see Torii Hunter and Albert Pujols here - quite telling how far apart they are in the dug-out on this 2012 shot, pretty sneaky there Topps - can't lose that in the Project). 

It wasn't long before the Commish was summoned from his post-3-martini-lunch siesta, heard to mumble something about not actually wanting to let that cool slice of grass go to waste, to rule on another multi-player mash-up card:

That decision came quickly though: Ope! Which is baseball-ese for "NO." Not enough sparkly action for the high standards of this project, though the scanner revealed another entry in a new, not-yet-revealed-to-the-collecting-public Frankenset - This Card Is Watching Me, since Topps let a TV cameraman sneak onto the card.

No more multi-player cards allowed. "But what about that Todd Helton card you let in, Commish?", asked the Press Corps that is always bothering the Commissioner wherever he goes. The Commissioner again ruled nimbly on his somewhat wobbly martini and sparkly grass feet - Grandfather Clause. Helton is in. He's beaming out of the League this year anyway. "But that one looks like his teammates are beaming up, not Helton," some wag was quick to point out. Err, Reverse Psychology Grandfather Clause. Helton stays in. "But what about that Baltimore Oriole Wild Card Blue Sparkler card you let in? That one isn't very 'wild'." Would these reporters ever leave the poor Commissioner alone to find some more of those sweet organic grass cards? The Commissioner decided to give the Press Corps something to chew on. Baltimore Oriole Sparkler would be replaced. Page entry to the project revoked. Start over....and that was the first one completed from Series One too. This Commissioner is tough; maybe he should be given more time to look for grass cards.

Ahh, now there is a classic of the genre. The wall and that ever sweet shiny grass combine just exactly perfectly. Why, this card should be a #1 draft pick in the Project. And indeed it is. It seems the Commissioner has short-term memory loss at times, and he drafts the same player twice sometimes. No one can convince him to just give up those grass cards. He needs them when conflicts with Rule #1 arise, like when Reimold's set-neighbor, Zack Greinke, had such potentially potent looking grass on his card. But that type of grass is extra-expensive, so the card scouts looking for a Greinke entry for the project were directed down towards Target, which made them happy, because Target has better customer scenery inside than a bunch of baseball cards.

What? You forgot Rule #1 already? It was only 59 posts back now, you should really try and keep up in class better. Don't let that grass up there distract you so much. Rule #1 in the Parallel Project is that only one border color can be found on each page. Rule #1 and Rule #2 don't get along very well as a result, especially when Rule #1 trumps Rule #2 and an extra, more expensive parallel has to be acquired because Topps put 5 or even 6 blue cards on the same page. Maybe Topps lingers too long with the grass cards too. The Commissioner has heard rumors. How else do you explain Topps .998 batting average on the 89,420 different baseball cards they make every year, making a .002 strike-out rate of switched autograph stickers, letters not die-cut correctly, and the various other incessant complaints from their OCD customer base, who obviously aren't into the grass cards enough.

But it was darn nice of Topps to print these just simply beautiful sparkly cards this year. They even gave them away to their loyal customers, in spite of how much they whine about them.

The shadowy cards = nice.

When I first found more than a few of these cards in the same place, I thought they would make an incredible set of cards to own later on down the grassy road. But then my sometimes stupid let's-kick-it-up-a-notch impulse kicked in and I went for the greater glory of the all-Parallel Project. Then these cards could only be 1/9th, or perhaps 10/99ths of the set, as occasionally other from-the-Topps-factory-only parallels take their place, like the basically boring Silver Slate cards, and the outrageous, in a good way, Hunter Safety cards. Or even the also boring but oh-so-wonderfully-ego-stroking Platinum 1/1 cards, of which I scored the one of only one such card the Commissioner would allow in the project (all parallels must be represented by at least one card, even those extra dull printing plates, which is part of Rule 1, subsection b, as in boring), just the other day, finally.

Overall these cards can have a lot going on, and I sure enjoy them. The idea of building a whole set of them has sailed however, as easy pick-up lots on the ole eBay dried up some time ago, and the resellers here and there will only let you have one for a buck or three, plus shipping. So you could still do it if you really wanted, and you could afford the Bryce Trout editions. Luckily, or unluckily, in my case, there wouldn't be a Puig to chase on these. I really wish these had been manufactured for Update, but Topps has bigger customers to worry about than one goofy blogger with an over-fondness for the ultimate twinkly baseball cards.

The good news for you is that every card I scanned here is up for trade. And really, what player or team rainbow is complete without a boat-load of Blue Sparkles at the end of it? That grass is better than gold sometimes. 

The bad news is that I am quickly approaching Last Call on trading season. An actual, no-Super Bowl-eligibility-for-this-card Trading Deadline. So if you are still reading this far down a blog post and you have been thinking you might have some parallels I need, well, it's time. In a few short weeks I will be leaving home and my beloved baseball cards behind for several months. 

In the world of the Blue Sparklers, I need these cards:

(6 R. Howard or 10 A. Jones), 17 (Choo), 24 (Haren), (59 Rauch or 60 Bauer); 79 (Eaton), 89 (J. Santana checklist), (112 Reynolds or 118 Matsuzaka); (120, 122, 125); 157 (C. Capps), (192, 193, 194-197); (211 Parker or 215 Beckham); 235 (Westbrook), 271 (Familia), 277 (B. Ryan), (287 or 288); 312 (S. Hairston), 326 (Andruw Jones)

(368, 371, 372); 412 (E. Cabrera), (476, 478, 481, 483, 484), 490 (C. Ross), (508 Doubront or 510 McLouth or 511 Brantly); 545 (Presley); (548 Lackey or 555 Hanrahan); 597 (M. Scutaro), 646 (Aumont)

And the Commissioner's free agent negotiations resulted in a slight over-supply of these, all up for trade, though you'll have to know your favorite player's card # to see if I have that one you just have to have, somehow. It's November, you should know your favorite player's card # by now, geez:

Series One: 12, 16, 18, 30, 48, 51, 52, 53, 57, 66, 79, 100, 103, 105, 106, 116, 121, 126, 133, 144, 145, 149, 150, 154, 156, 160, 177, 182, 194, 206, 209, 214, 216, 218, 220, 226, 236, 239, 240, 257, 258, 259, 262, 283, 285, 304, 327, 328

Series Two: 341, 347, 348, 354, 363, 364, 367, 377, 381, 384, 400, 404, 408, 429, 432, 436, 438, 444, 450,  451, 471, 479, 482, 485, 492, 496, 497, 516, 518, 520, 524, 525, 534, 539, 542, 550, 557, 558, 560, 567, 574, 590, 601, 619, 623, 630, 632, 659

The other good news on these is that you don't need an actual Blue Sparkle card to pry one of these away from me, before they all get shipped off to COMC when Base Set's base gets way, way smaller come December. Any contribution to my Parallel Project or my other random set needs would probably work.

Now thinking card #s might lead you eagle-eye types to spot a Hero # card in there, and it's been so much boring old alpha-numerics scrolling along your screen for a while now that I figure I should hook you up with one last hit of that sweet shiny grass before the withdrawal symptoms get any worse.

My scanner just loves these cards, so much so that for this one (when it "automagically" detected the borders of the item I was scanning), for the first time ever it reported the dimensions of said item to be exactly 3.5" x 2.5", even though all I ever do with the machine is scan baseball cards that are all exactly that same size.

That's how perfect this card is:

Kinda puts anything in Topps Chrome to shame, if you ask me. Shiny? I call trump on shiny when I get lost looking at these. 

This card already made the Project. And it's duplicate sitting around gathering dust here at Base Set can be yours. Whaddya got?

Let's Trade ... Short-Prints?

The cards everyone loves to hate....until one appears of their favorite player. Gimmicks. Set-breakers. You have to have them. You didn't even know you pulled one. You could care less. They make you rip packs like that mayor in Blue Jay town seeing what he can find down on the corner after work.

You gaze at them wistfully on eBay. You just can't decide what to think about Short Prints. Or what to do with them when you get one. Sure, you could send them to your favorite trading partner who collects That One Guy you pulled. But what does he send back? What is equal in trading value for a Short Print? We don't even get to know how "Short" the Print is.

So they sit there. They're a Short Print. You can't just put them in the binder with your other cards. They don't fit on the page right. You don't collect that team. You don't know what to think about them, or what to do with them. So they sit there, over in the corner of your card desk in their lonely little stack, on that box of base cards from 3 years ago that you don't know what to do with either, where you hope nothing will bother those weird little Short Prints.

And sit there. You don't want to open an eBay account. You can't throw one out. You're not really up for just adding it to the pile you're shipping off to that one trader. It's a Short Print. That's gotta be worth something, isn't it? I mean, you think you saw one on TV once, or maybe just on a non-baseball-card webpage. How often does that ever happen? People must love and desire these things somewhere.

But where? What do you do with the darn things when you pull one? You don't even understand how they play baseball in That League. And now you have a Short Print from it.

I have the answer you've been looking for. Trade it to ME!

But what can I give you back? What else but a Short Print. Check 'em out:

Cutch! MVP! Lovin' It there all googly-eyed with Pedro! If this card wasn't a short-print, there would be vandalized meme quotes drawn on this one everywhere you look.

Cutch again! A Cell-Phone Card! I bet you don't have one of those yet! And a Bow-Tie Card. Now there's a Two-Fer for ya. Good luck ever finding this combo on a baseball card ever again. And ... an Earring! It's a Trifecta!

These silly dress-up cards just don't do it for me. Does that guy even play baseball? I never see him in the MVP voting everyone is always arguing about. He must be a League Official or something, the fan in the back there is more into his cellphone. Hey, it's a 2nd Cell-Phone card! Trade for these cards and you're on your way to a whole binder page! I can even hook you up with more sartorial baseball wonderment, check it out:

Good Lord. I'm thinking all the smart baseball players told the League they weren't feeling too good before "warm-ups" at the 2000 All-Star game. They'd be OK by game time in their regular uniform, but for now it would be ahh-ite if the the 2nd place vote-getter went out there and represented for them. Yeah, that's the ticket. Nomar forgot this option. He is not impressed.

Now that's impressive. You have to be pretty frickin' cool to wear pink. I bet you don't ever wear pink. Robinson Cano though, he can Man-Up and wear pink whenever he wants. Even on a baseball card. Maybe he put on shades so no one could see him rolling his eyes all the time during the Fan Parade. I'm not sure just what is going on with all these fans who refuse to even watch the thing though. But Shades Cards are certainly cool.

Topps certainly thinks so. They made a bunch of them this year. If you look closely enough, I think you can see my scanner in there, cuz this year's batch sure scans up nice. Go ahead, click on it for a better view. Careful though, you might need your shades first.  His necklace is even glowing a little bit, just extra coolness dripping off there.

You know what else is cool? Signing autographs for kids. That really is cool. Maybe wearing cool Shades explains an autograph that looks like this:

That's not a Short-Print! Nope. Wrong blog for that kind of thing, sorry. Let's get back to the baseball cards:

Now we're talking. Classic lines, classic player, classic socks. The spare, popular 2011 design, classic "topps" up there in the corner. What's not to like? Not sure what happened to the classic "A" logo on the baseball there though. Maybe it got rubbed off in all that great infield dirt on this card. Or maybe it's an uncorrected error card. A UER SP. Boom! Now that would be a card to chase.

Vintage players on current designs. Kinda cooler than current players on vintage designs sometimes. Your Topps Master has to keep you ripping packs somehow. Let's see some more:

Hmmm. That picture sure looks familiar. Where did I see that one before? Was it here?

No, no, that's not quite it. That one is a print too though; it's hanging on walls these days in the Topps Wall Art Set that is to die for. That is one hell of a stretch Seaver had. I just know I've seen that same picture, hmmmmm....

I knew I had seen it somewhere — it was right there in the same box of cards with the _short_ print. Some Short Prints are shorter than others I guess. I don't know what to do with all those Topps 60 cards I have either. Can't see 'em too well in a room with those new light bulbs these days, can't burn 'em. Hmmmmm. Let's see some more Short Prints.

Everywhere I wander on the baseball related Internet, I see quotes from old Vintage pitchers about how they hated the batter when they pitched. Looks like The Hawk can give it right back to 'em. That poor little Cubbie there on his shoulder seems like he wants to keep his distance from that bi-cep. Damn. Keep your distance, I think it might explode.

There's more cutting-edge Vintage classic retro-ness, or something. Hard to get more "baseball" than Pinstripes at the plate.

We all love to pull Short-Prints. They take you back to that first time Topps told you softly "first hit's free, kid" and you believed them, because scrounging up some loose change for a pack of baseball cards is about the same as free isn't it? Just like swiping your debit card these days ... you don't even have to take cash out of your wallet to get you some more baseball cards. That's kinda like free too, isn't it? Cuz when you get that Short Print Hit, yeah,

Smoltz knows.

So how can you get one of these sweet Short Prints for yourself? Well that will cost you a Short Print. But which ones? You can't even read a Checklist without tripping over the Short Prints and the Super Short Prints these days, and why can't I just call them Variations like a professional baseball card critic? People slap "short print" on every other card on eBay these days.

In particular, I want some more of these Short Prints:

They are from a set of 25 I believe. The 2013 Topps Series 1 'Out of Bounds' series. Looks like I have 16 to go....those are the ones I have so far. Some of them, thanks to cool bloggers like you.

There's some others I'm interested in. I have a few more I didn't scan, like last year's Update SPs of the last 2 AL MVP winners, Miguel Cabrera and Justin Verlander. Yep, more MVP SP cards up on the block.

Cuz I love those Short Prints. I need new ones. Like the Cabrera autograph signing one from Series 2, and the Scherzer one where he's posed along with his awesome power slugging third baseman you may have heard of. Oh, and of course, your choicest Parallels can pry one of these away from me too. So as always, hook me up with your Camos, your Blacks, and your Pinks. Those new Sapphires are crazy-cool looking too. Trust me, you don't want them laying around near all your spare Short Prints for too long. You don't want to end up like that Mayor up there in Ontario, eh?

Sooo, Let's Trade! Short Prints.

Regressing

The other day I went out to buy new baseball cards to watch the World Series with. Oh, sure, I already had a bunch of Update cards from a Hobby Jumbo, but, well, you know. I need more cards.

Of course what I really need is parallels, and to get parallels I need more than extra base cards to trade for them. I need extra parallels. And that means buying baseball cards from the big colorful Box stores that sell boxes containing colorful baseball cards.

So there I was in Wally•World a whole week after the release of Update. And they still didn't have any. So it goes living back in the woods you see. So here I am on World Series night, posting about Opening Day Baseball cards. It's all 93% of teams have right now. Next year.

Because instead of new Sea Turtles I found a couple of these mysterious Opening Day blasters that could only be found at Wal•Mart this spring. And, until the other day, seemingly only at Wal•Marts south of the real Mason/Dixon line, the Chicken Biscuit line.

What in the heck is the Chicken Biscuit line? That is the true division between the north and south in our country. I think it has replaced The Onion's version of the Mason-Dixon line, the I•Hop/Waffle-House line, because Waffle House keeps marching steadily northward. Smart Yankees.

In the south, every fast food joint everywhere sells chicken biscuits. Even Burger King, and their breakfast menu is otherwise terrible. A piece of deep-fried chicken, on a biscuit. Yummy. In the north, no one sells these. Stupid Yankees. Mickey D's had them available nationally for a time a year or two back now, but they cancelled that menu item in the north, probably due to lack of sales. Stupid Yankees.

But somewhere in America there is a McDonalds that sells chicken biscuits, and 20 or 30 miles to the north of it, there is a McDonalds that doesn't sell chicken biscuits. The true dividing line.

And I only found these special blasters to the south of that line, until yesterday.

I have no idea on the mysteries of baseball card distribution. And I am very, very sure that I had looked at the card shelf in that particular Wal•Mart a couple three times this summer, and those variant Opening Day blasters weren't there. I almost took away from the experience that someone at Wal•Mart dumped these 7 month old blasters on me, instead of crispy fresh packs of Update, because I was in the only town that would be stupid enough to buy them.

So I bought them. Because I know what was in them — baseball cards I still needed. That Opening Day Highlights checklist that could only be found in these particular boxes. I scored 3 more of them:

And lots of other fun cards. So, finally, after my team is all heading for surgery and retirement parties and golf courses, I typed in my want list of all those nifty little Opening Day insert sets. And I am reneging on what I mentioned in my spring post about these cards. I do want to Chase the whole set of them, needing only 4 more of them. So I apologize to the Roy Halladay collector who asked about that card who I then turned down, despite writing they were up for trade. My very bad, and I do feel bad about that. So I hope I can find that email, &/or that gentleman is reading this again, because the good news is I also pulled that card this time, so now I have a double of it available. But only for that one guy that I stiff-armed on it.

My list follows shortly. I only have about 3 ~ 5 weeks left to set up trades before I get to start eating chicken biscuits for breakfast. And thus living without the bulk of my collection, either my old one still in storage, or my new 2011 and onwards one. And I am also probably going to start up an account on COMC to use up all my doubles, so a lot of the long lists of cards on my trade lists will disappear then too. So if you want to trade me all your 2013 Topps Parallels like I want you to, start shopping my lists. I'll try and add lots more stuff real soon.

I really liked the Opening Day inserts. I need to move on to other card projects tonight yet, so I'll only show you one more before you can start finding me all the remaining cards I need.

I would like to comment on the header picture card for this post, the Buster Posey "Play Hard" insert. I liked the nearly tie-dyed border on most of the other cards in the set, though it can't be seen on Posey's. I thought it was ironic that Posey is tagging out Prince Fielder on the card in last year's World Series. Fielder and Third Base Coach (at the time) Gene LaMont took a lot of heat for losing on that play, but of course all baseball fan hindsight is 20/20 (and usually ridiculous). Fielder was out on a very close play. But who, then, is Playing Hard on this play? Fielder is, I think. Wouldn't it be Playing Hard to block the plate? Something Posey definitely didn't do here, though no one would call him on that after what he experienced, which is explained on the back of the card.

Maybe this year's World Series will see the very last plate blocking play in the Major Leagues. We'll see. The Rules Committee is likely to make a Ruling on the subject soon.

And let's just not talk about Fielder's base-wobbling in this year's ALCS Game 6. Topps doesn't make Play Soft cards, fortunately.

I'll give you one more card before my list ... get yours ready now ... I have wanted to see how these beauties would scan ...

ehh, not so much. Much better in person. Now, Let's Trade!




Opening Day Highlights

Need: 1 Zimmerman, 2 Cabrera, 5 Altuve, 6 Sabathia

Have Available: 8 Halladay


Ballpark Fun

Need: 1 Pedroia, 2 Reddick, 4 Fielder, 9 Harper, 11 Longoria, 12 Ortiz, 13 Pujols, 14 Werth, 24 Ramirez, 25 Crisp

Have Available: 5 Kemp, 6 A. Jones, 7 Machado, 8 Santana, 15 Jeter, 18 Barney, 19 Phillips, 20 Soriano, 23 Chapman


Mascots

Need: 1 Mets, 3, Mariners, 11 Twins, 16 Astros

Have Available: 4 Cards, 5 Rangers, 7 Nationals, 13 Braves, 14 Rays, 22 Red Sox, 23 Reds


Play Hard

Need: 2 Harper, 10 Cabrera, 11 Ortiz, 19 Fielder

I know the Cabrera and Fielder cards weren't actually produced. But a few slipped out into the wild anyway with big holes punched in them. You should send them to me.

Have Available: 1 Posey, 6 Heyward, 7 Pedroia, 9 Castro, 13 Pujols, 14 Wright, 16 Kemp, 18 Ruiz, 20 Molina, 21 Freese, 24 A-Rod


Superstar Celebrations

Need: 1 Kemp, 5 Stanton, 7 Reddick, 13 Hart, 17 Headley, 20 Fielder, 23 Ramirez

Have Available: 2 Butler, 4 Votto, 11 Werth, 12 Morneau, 15 Hernandez, 18 Willingham, 19 Soriano, 25 Ortiz


3-D Stars

Need: 1 Fielder, 5 Jeter, 8 Ortiz, 13 Darvish, 14 Hernandez, 19 Harper, 21 Votto

Have Available: 2 Verlander, Cano, 7 Longoria, 11 Trout, 12 Hamilton, 18 Hamels, 22 Braun, 23 McCutchen, 24 Kemp

Joy of a Completed Binder Page

Well I've been wanting to type that post title for a long time now. A title I borrowed from the always entertaining Card Junk blog.

I have been buying packs, single cards, lots of cards and have sorted them and typed out their numbers and re-sorted them and have finally completed the first page of my Parallel Project.

May I present 2013 Topps Series 2 Cards 350 ~ 358:

I have had several pages stuck at 8 cards for quite a while now. Henderson Alvarez no-Hit the Tigers on the last game of the regular season, and now he was no-hitting this project....until a lot of Series 2 Gold cards came in, and I decided to re-check each page in the binder. I had a /62 Black border card of Alvarez, but I also had one of Juan Francisco, and I was giving preference to the horizontal card on a slot for a Black card — my favorite of the parallels this year. Probably it was the Greg Dobbs card that became the keystone of completing the page. I had him in several colors ... I sorted the stacks .... I discovered a new /2013 Gold of Francisco ... but I already had Dobbs on the page for Gold ... I found a Target Red of Dobbs ... Get Down! Page Complete!

I especially like this page because it doesn't use any Emerald (my least favorite), thanks mostly to the /10 "Silver Slate" parallel I picked up on eBay. It also helps that I could use a card from the /2013 Blue Foil parallels from Opening Day, which is true on most pages in Series 1 & 2, but not quite all of them.

Along the way I discovered how tough it can be make a nice-looking page with these cards. As the difficult cards (Pink, Black, or Camo) on a page arrive, I can start placing the more easily acquired parallels. I realized I would have to buy the low /x parallels of common players and use the most printed parallels (Emerald, Wal•Mart Blue, Target Red) for the stars. I got lucky and pulled the Pujols card from a blister pack at Toys•R•Us. (Thanks Geoffrey!)

However when I can place the Red & Blue parallels I was surprised to learn I couldn't bring myself to just use any parallel I had laying around. I couldn't use a Target Red parallel of Asdrubal Cabrera up there....red-on-red does not a good parallel make. I also realized that the team colors and card border parallels are a bit like being able to make your own baseball cards, at least in terms of the color scheme.

I managed to finish 2 other pages shortly after that one; a second from Series 2 and my first in Series 1 as well. I'll shut up now....here are cards 458 to 466:

I might re-do parts of that page as I'm not sold on the Purple-on-Red of the Pomeranz card, which is actually one of the worst in either Series with print lines in the background. The Emerald would hide that perfectly; I like Orange-on-Emerald for the Orioles but I might order Hammel and Pomeranz to switch, we'll see.

Don't forget you can click on an embedded picture in a blog for a better view of it. I scanned these in their brand new binder pages where they will live for all eternity, but the upload process shrinks everything considerably.

That is cards 317 ~ 325 from Series 1. I'm not totally into Teal-on-Wal•Mart 'Blue' either, but it will do for now.

I still can't believe I finally have some pages done. Only 71 pages to go ... then 37 more for Update, and for that one I won't have access to 4 possible colors: Silver Slate, Blue Sparkle, Toys•R•Us Purple, and Topps Factory Set Orange. I'll probably have to cave in a little and use one white Base Card per page for that one.

So blow the dust off that PC Rainbow, Team Rainbow, Master Team Rainbow, whatever partially completed collecting project you lost interest in with these cards, and let's trade some parallels!

A look at a 2013 set without au, gu, inserts or parallels? WHAT?

How could that be? Who would buy such a boring baseball memorabilia product? I have an idea who buys these, and they definitely buy 'em up because while looking for packs of this stuff I have found many a gravity feed box that is already empty.

Baseball memorabilia and bubble gum go oh so well together. I have a certain fondness for the combo that can no longer be satisfied of course, though I can never understand why. You would think Topps and Big League Chew would have got married a long, long time ago in the age of marketing synergy for everything. I think some corporate consultants are asleep at the switch on that one.

But of course it is the fault of us grown-up baseball card collectors that gum never comes in the packs anymore. If it were to ever return, I think this would be the product where it will appear.

I'm babbling on about the 2013 Topps Baseball Stickers of course. The checklist is chock full of interesting entries. Though I do not have a complete set of them, I did select the Adam Jones shown above as a favorite. Because of the bubble gum...such a rare baseball image now. I was pleasantly surprised when I took it off the scanner to discover that perhaps someone at Topps has the same keening nostalgia as myself, since that is sticker #1 in the set. But then the stickers are #d by team like an old Fleer set, and the Baltimore Orioles, of the American Leauge, are the first team on the list.

Still probably my favorite player sticker I've found yet so far.

There are plenty of Hall of Famers in the set...

...generally one per team, with exceptions of two for the Yankees, and a few younger teams that have a popular veteran not yet in the HOF. All teams receive an even 9 stickers.

Two thirds or more of MLB teams have a mascot sticker in the set, like this one which will definitely be on my Topp Ten list for 2013:

Two great hobbies for just 13¢. I will never have too many of these stickers to stick places and give to a few friends. So, yeah, I will super-collect this one! Send them along! (More on that in a bit.)

The set is a Topps product with a few images we've seen before, sometimes just the player's image from their 2013 Topps Series 1 or 2 card cropped differently, or an image borrowed from some other previously published set. Overall though there aren't many of those and I think the set will hold a vast majority of unique images. The checklist tells me there are two "RC" stickers (Bundy and Bauer), but I haven't pulled either one to see if that certain logo appears here too. I think I would laugh if I see that. Adam Eaton, who sports the RC logo on his '13 Series 1 "Topps" debut, does not have that on his sticker. I could hardly care less; I am not shooting for a set of these. My plans are a bit different, though you will have to tune in tomorrow to see.

Meanwhile, let's continue our tour of perhaps the ultimate base set: just current baseball players, a sprinkling of veterans, and two small subsets — not sticker:pack inserts.

The player images include _a lot_ of night shots. Night stickers, like this one:

A sunset sticker? I suppose.

The image gallery features lots of pitchers pitching, and hitters admiring their bat's contact a moment ago, as baseball images always will. There are some other action shots, and these are frequently from night games, like this nice one of Michael Brantley maximizing his lead-off:

Topps does continue their 2013 fetish for maximum cropping on lots of these stickers, but this is one product where that is pretty much necessary, as each sticker is only 75% the size of a card. A pity, though, that Jayson Werth's sticker...

...doesn't give up just a little more baseball game-context, as the crowd is standing and Jayson has his home whites on. Perhaps the image sleuths can sort this one out with the resources that go a little deeper than Google does, I haven't figured that out yet. This is likely a shot from the bottom of the ninth, at a night game, a time when it seems many baseball photographers have already filed their images for the evening, as I just don't see many shots like this one on my baseball cards.

Or any like this one:

Turning a double play — at night! For whatever reason, all the turning two cards I can recall, and I have seen a lot since I started reading the baseball card blogs, are always shot in the daytime. There are at least 1 more of these (Pedroia, as A-Rod waves bye-bye sliding in), and possibly 2 (Altuve), in the set I have found so far. Jason Kipnis gets a daytime shot probably taken a frame before his Series 1 card this year, and Hanley Ramirez sees some field action with his shades on, though not necessarily on a double play as the ball is still coming in and the runner is likely safe. I'm leaving you a little fun to hunt for on your own dime at just a dollar-a-go. So you can build up your trade bait. For me.

There are some fun images amidst the live action, such as a nonchalant Jacoby Ellsbury:

And it looks like Josh Willingham should be playing for the Angels:

One of the funnier single stickers keeps butting in to the packs I purchase:

Which is a portion of the Giant's World Champions montage that closes out the Sticker Album sold separately. The Album has 6 stickers included on a perforated page, which I think is great. There will never be a PSA 10 of the first Topps Manny Machado sticker (Rookie Sticker) unless it arrives out the back door of the sticker factory. And yes, I have read collectors complaining about the fact that the free stickers aren't in the packs so those 6 players will never be in Pristine 10 condition, without trimming, and of course an investment grade baseball collectible like these 13¢ stickers should never ever be trimmed. You chuckle, but graded and slabbed stickers do exist these days.

Anyhow, aside from the World Champions there at the end of the album, the set includes one other simple subset, the MLB Team logos:

These are cleverly paired; I'm sure many a younger collector could not tell me why these two teams share space.

I have enjoyed my little piles of these stickers, but I will probably quit purchasing them, so I can foist off all the left-overs on you dear readers. And thank you for reading, by the way. The blogosphere chatter does seem correct that things have been slow lately; work reared up on it's demanding demands again, and I used up most of my softball scans while I had family in town before that. Though I have been participating in the hobby a good bit anyway, via my first Group Break, which was part of the Parallel Project which is a little ridiculously time-consuming. Each blaster and skim of the current eBay action changes everything. (A few trade emails headed out into your mailbox by the time you wake up as well).

So in my usual round-about way I am announcing some trade needs. I want to complete a set of the mascots, and for that I need the Nationals' Screech and the Phillie Phanatic. I also want all the Pirate Parrot stickers ever printed. Same for Bernie Brewer, he's the Man, and he wants to go visit some places with Mr. Parrot. Send them to me and I will make that happen. I also need extras of Wally the Green Monster, the Oakland Athletics Elephant (pink ears, really, it's not just all the beer you drank watching the game), Mr. Met, Fredbird, and the Orioles' Oriole.

I am also woefully short on the Detroit Tigers collection, for which I need Austin Jackson, Victor Martinez, Al Kaline, and Max Scherzer.

I also hope to assemble a set of the team logos, for which I need the White Sox, Rays, Cubs,  Marlins, Phillies, and Padres. And all of them over again as I have lots of uses for these stickers and can use them all. If you are really, really nice and read my list of 2013 Topps Parallel Project needs maybe you can pry one of these logo stickers away from me.

Otherwise, if you need or want a 2013 Topps Baseball Sticker, I probably have one for you, including most of the ones scanned-in above. Of course, we could limbo lower than a PWE trade and trade them on a post card even, but these stickers do have purposes (tune in tomorrow), so a nice, simple PWE would be fine. Let's Trade! You could even send them to me without using a top-loader. I won't tell anyone.

Are these cards worth anything?

They look old.

They have old players on them.

They are small like those really, really old cards.

I can just hear the poor card shop clerk of the future sighing and pointing out the copyright date on the back to another non-card-collecting walk-in off the street. Presuming there still are card shops in the future.

I think there will be. There will always be enough people who want to shop in person, albeit never as many as there used to be.

These cards came from a card shop. Maybe. If an eBay vendor counts as a card shop, or the one that sent them to me happens to have an actual physical card shop somewhere, which is possible. It was real nice of them to add them to my package of 2013 parallels for no particular reason. Maybe the eBay vendor is a blogger too.

I also received a floating-head sticker:

I like stickers. But not that one. From that set (2012 Heritage), I'm only really interested in the #1 sticker it contains, the one sticker with a hat-less player by chance, Miguel Cabrera. I hope you have a double of that, and need Car-Go there to Complete Your Set!

I don't like wood paneling cards:

There's 38 more of those in my house already, before Andre showed up suspiciously close to the trade deadline, again via the eBay bonus route. The real ballplayer deadline. I will probably be trading baseball cards all year round now. I don't have a list of those 2012 minis, but I will one day. I will need some 2013 minis I am sure, whenever I find time to type in those lists.

In fact I will be on a mission to get rid of all the Wood Paneling I have. I am around wood all day at work, I've never been a fan of it on my baseball cards. So a miscellaneous lot of 2011 Heritage will get typed up with a list of minis, and I'll weigh up the shoebox of 87s to see how many pounds of cards are in it. About 3 I think.

Blah. Gypsy Queen, Floating Head stickers, and a Wood Panel card. Zero help to the Parallel Project. Unless you need them...