On to Houston

Yesterday was a fun day for the Yankees, beating Cleveland in a game that was close enough to be exciting, but not close enough to be really tense. Cortes was shaky again but was effective enough to get the win, and the bullpen was surprisingly effective the last four innings. Giancarlo Stanton's three-run home run in the first inning was enough offense to push the Yankees through to the next round. That's as good excuse as any to show off this card again.

Great player, great card. The last few postseasons, Stanton has been the one Yankee who has consistently hit well. Needless to say, to have a chance to even make the ALCS close, every Yankee will have to perform at their best. The Astros continued their thorough domination of the Yankees this year, including no-hitting them on my birthday. In fact, the Yankees never played with a lead in their seven games against Houston this year (they won two games on Aaron Judge walkoffs). The Yankees haven't won a pennant in thirteen years, and it still seems farfetched that they could win one this year, but hopefully they'll at least be able to make the series exciting.

Yankees from Johnny

Hopefully this post will give the Yankees some good luck today. Here are my latest Johnny's Trading Spot contest wins. (Make sure you comment on his posts each day!)

These are from the new Topps Chrome '52 set that seems to be getting some positive buzz. Looks like just another Topps set to me, but these are all players I like.

Four from Topps Gallery. I assume the blue color on Stanton's card is normal and not some kind of parallel.

Finishing off with a vintage cloth sticker, from the early 1970s, and a chrome DJ LeMahieu. Go Yankees!

 

One-card TCDB trade with a blogger

The other day Diamond Jesters posted his latest contest winnings from Johnny's Trading Spot. One of those cards was a 2020 Topps Fire Giancarlo Stanton. I had seen Johnny giving that one away a couple of times but wasn't able to win one. I really like the look of that particular design (one of several for that set). It's very 1980s, looks like Transformers or something. To have a Yankee on it made that card even better.

With Matt being a Red Sox fan, I figured it was likely he would be willing to trade it, and he did! I actually initiated the trade through TCDB. You might be wondering why, when we have traded without it for so long?

I am most of the way through the process of getting all my cards for trade on the site. With the trade matching feature, I was able to match up my tradelist with his wantlist instantly, rather than take the time to manually check what I might have for him. In addition, when you trade through TCDB your cards get automatically moved off your tradelist. (Also works the other way, cards you acquire go onto your havelist.) Again, more time saved.

The site seems to be having a lot of technical difficulties lately, which is a bit discouraging, but if it says in good shape this will be a big time saver when it comes to trading. I was originally going to discard my manual tradelist when my TCDB cataloging was complete, but the glitches have given me enough pause that I am also going to keep that.

Anyway, here is the awesome card I got from Matt. Hopefully Stanton has a big game tonight!

Just enough for a Game 5

Like most Yankee fans, I wanted to see Nestor Cortes, not Gerrit Cole, pitch Games One and Four. But Cole is making Aaron Boone look like a genius, keeping the Yankees' season alive after the Yankees' uninspired play in Games Two and Three. This game looked like it was going to be like the last two, with the Yankees taking an early lead, then coasting while Cleveland slowly but surely came back. Nice to see Clay Holmes and Wandy Peralta pitch so well in the eighth and ninth. However, the bullpen is still a big question mark for the Yankees, so a "bullpen game" in Game Five makes me very nervous.

Wayne Housie on baseball cards

Outfielder Wayne Housie played nine years of professional baseball. He had stints in the major leagues with the Red Sox in 1991 and Mets in 1993, hitting .208 with 2 doubles, an RBI and a stolen base in 29 games. In 1,042 minor league games he hit .249 with 158 doubles, 31 HR, 316 RBI and 235 SB. He now owns Change Your Life Coaching, where he works with corporations, elite athletes, and others looking for personal development. He kindly answered my questions about baseball cards.

"I have baseball cards. I used to collect them, but not anymore. My favorite card is the Score 1992 rookie card."

 Thanks!

Wood vs. Wood #120

Last time, 1987 won easily, 8-0. They're bringing out the star power with this one.

This Bob Purkey card was originally owned by a kid named Bob Bolton. Purkey was a veteran knuckleballer coming off of several solid seasons who would have by far his best year in 1962. He started the season 7-0 en route to a 23-5 record and 2.81 ERA. Unfortunately, he hurt his arm in spring training 1963 and was unable to duplicate that success. Still, in 13 seasons for the Pirates, Reds and Cardinals, he went 129-115 with a 3.79 ERA, certainly a respectable career. After his playing days he owned an insurance agency and did some announcing for the Pirates. He died in 2008.

I don't know who owned this Eddie Murray card; it's one of the few I didn't get out of a pack or schoolyard trade in 1987, I didn't get it until I was an adult. Murray was one of the best first baseman of all time, and was only the third player ever with 3,000 hits and 500 home runs, joining Willie Mays and Hank Aaron. Murray's profile has never been as high as stars like that, though. He played at a consistently great level for many years but never had a truly dominant year; his only HR and RBI titles came in the strike-shortened 1981 season. In fact he only had five 30-home run seasons and his career high hit total was only 186. He also largely avoided the media after some unfair criticism early in his career. After 12 terrific years in Baltimore, he was traded after the 1988 season to the defending champion LA Dodgers, but only hit .240 as the team sunk to fourth place. Before the 1992 season he signed as a free agent with the Mets, who ended up imploding due to the failures of their other big acquisitions, Bobby Bonilla and Vince Coleman. This wasn't Murray's fault, but he failed to live up to expectations in both LA and NY. He finished his career as a baseball nomad, helping the Indians and Orioles in their playoff runs in 1995 and 1996, and ended his career in 1997 with brief stints for both LA teams. He finished his career with a .287 average, 3,255 hits, 560 doubles, 504 HR and 1,917 RBI. He had a good batting eye, with 1,333 walks compared to 1,516 strikeouts. He is the all-time leader in sacrifice flies (128). In 44 postseason games he hit .258 with 9 HR and 25 RBI, including four home runs in World Series play. After his career he has been involved in a variety of charitable endeavors but was also implicated in former teammate Doug DeCinces's insider trading scandal, paying over $300,000 to the SEC in 2012.

Cards from Johnny's baseball card, football card and stamp giveaway

Safe to say that Johnny's tailoring the prize packages now, so there's no excuse not to join the daily contests at Johnny's Trading Spot.

Starting with some Yankees. Sure was nice to have Mariano Rivera as the closer all those years. Having confidence that a postseason game was over in the 9th inning was really nice. Clay Holmes gives me zero confidence as a closer, but I guess we'll see. The two first cards I had already, both from the '99 set. If no one wants them, I'll probably hold them for the next time I see Al.

Two great football cards! I wonder if the signed '93 Topps Chris Calloway came from The Best Bubble. I got one from him almost exactly a year ago. If not, that's a heck of a coincidence. Available to trade if anyone wants it, otherwise I'm fine with having two. Rodney Hampton was another great 1990s Giants. I love the '96 SPX cards, with the really good 3D illusion, especially with the player's head. I have a few from the baseball set but this is my first from football.

Finally, Johnny threw in some vintage stamps! There are some 1953 Easter Seals seasons greetings stamps (not postage stamps), a 1952 NATO stamp, and the rest are from a 1938 set, that was used into the early 1950s, with 1 cent George Washington, 2 cent John Adams, and 3 cent Thomas Jefferson stamps. Always fun to get things that old, and there are plenty of dupes so if you see stamps you would like, happy to throw them into our next trade.

October fun

That was a fun game to watch last night. At least for one night the Yankees had a nice playoff win. Gerrit Cole was dominant, giving up just a solo home run, instead of the three-run home runs he likes to give up. It helps that the Guardians don't get many runners on base in general. This is a team the Yankees should beat. Hopefully they remember that they should have beaten Cleveland in the ALDS 15 years ago and did not, and should have beaten Cleveland in the ALDS 25 years ago and did not.

Hopefully Oswaldo Cabrera has a lot of cards in '23 so I can have some of his cards. He is so much fun to watch. Didn't do much at the plate last night, but had a terrific catch against the stands with a Cleveland fan right in his face, and then he high-fived the fans after.

Nice to see the Harrison Bader trade finally working out for the Yankees. Got his first home run as a Yankee at a key time last night. Rizzo with a big home run too. Will be nice to relax and enjoy this win with today's off day, and then see what Nestor Cortes can do tomorrow.

Hollywood bit players on baseball cards: Part 29

This is going to be a tough one. In a 1965 episode of Branded, a short-lived western starring former major leaguer Chuck Connors, a gang of outlaws terrorizes a town while the men of the town are away at a silver strike. One of those outlaws, the man in the white hat, was an ace reliever for the LA Dodgers.

It's Ron Perranoski in his only acting role! He had a brief role in the episode "Coward Steps Aside", as an extra gang member. He gets killed by Connors in the next scene, briefly taken down from behind. This was the best screenshot I could get.

Perranoski was one of the few true closers of the 1960s, and racked up 178 saves over 13 seasons, primarily with the Dodgers. He won two World Series as a Dodgers pitcher, and two as a Dodgers pitching coach, and later helped advise the Giants on their World Series run in the 2010s.

I have nine of Perranoski's Topps cards from his playing days. Here are the oldest and most recent.

 

Art on the back: 1974 Topps Football

The 1974 Topps football set reminds me a lot of the 1973 baseball set. Classic card design, lots of interesting photos with plenty of 1970's character, and best of all, lots of really fun cartoons on the back. Like '73 baseball, the subject matter was an interesting fact about the player, often related to a job or hobby, which generally makes the best cartoon subject matter. My only complaint would be that there is not enough room for the cartoon to really shine.

I have a pretty large collection of cards from this set and was able to find lots of fun cartoons to share. Some are an unexpected fun fact about the player, some provide a bit of a window into sports and culture in 1974, and a few are indicators of a time where what was considered funny was very different than what we would think is funny today.