some things old, some things new, some things acquired, (almost) all things blue

i have a few random additions to the collection that i want to show, plus a blogosphere meet-up to recap. those are always two great things to share, and i am going to start with this 1957 topps brooklyn dodgers team card

this card does not replace the one i already have in my dodger collection as it's somewhat blurry and creased, but rather brings me one card closer to completing the entire 1957 topps set. i am down to needing just 30 cards. i think this is definitely something i can finish in 2023.

here's a 2010 topps heritage manny ramirez chrome parallel

i look back fondly on the "mannywood" days, despite how it ended with his positive tests for peds. i may turn a focus to heritage chrome now that my base chrome sets are nearly complete.

this next one is a 2021 topps archives retired player signature card of andruw jones

it's his photoshopped 2008 topps card, numbered 04/16 which is fairly low. i didn't really intend to keep the card (one andruw jones auto is enough for me - this one came in a lot of dodger cards that i purchased for the other cards included in it) but i figure people who want a low-numbered andruw jones auto would prefer that it be with him as a brave. not a dodger or a ranger or a white sock or a yankee.

now that we have the random acquisitions covered, here's the skinny on the meet-up.  i was fortunate to have lunch with friend of the blogosphere mr. haverkamp yesterday as he visited family in the land of 10,000 lakes. it was great to exchange cards in person!  i unloaded some giants cards, and was able to add some in return. i was given a couple of the 1982 union oil volpe portraits (steve garvey and dusty baker) along with a dusty baker post-dodger pc need:

that's a 1989 mother's cookies giants coaches card. i enjoy adding these to my collection, and mr. haverkamp has provided more dusty items to my collection than anyone else over the years.

the last card mr. haverkamp handed over was this 1977 msa disc of steve garvey

it's the detroit caeser's variety 

and is the first of these cards that i have slabbed and graded by psa.  we had a short chat about these items and the scarcity of the fbi discs that are on a number of collectors' player collection want lists. i have no illusions about ever finding a steve garvey fbi disc, although i do know of another collector who has one - mrmopar.

although mr. haverkamp does not blog, i'll still add this meet up to my list of blogosphere folks that i've been able to meet in person - here's the list:

paul from carl crawford cards

brian from highly subjective and completely arbitrary (several times)

gavin from baseball card breakdown (twice)

madding from cards on cards

rod from padrographs

ken from cardboard hogs

mr. haverkamp

i hope to add more folks to this list in the future. in fact, i was oh so close to meeting up with fuji earlier in the month, but a last minute change of plans on my end kept me from heading to san jose. hopefully next time i will be able to keep to the script and add that meeting to the list!

thanks mr. haverkamp! great to put a face to the cards you've sent over the years!

collecting dodger cards has its benefits

where i grew up, most of the kids i traded cards with were dodger fans. there was a giants fan and a yankees fan, too, so i was able to wheel and deal for the odd bob welch card now and again. most of my trading back then, however, focused on set completion as a result.

fast forward about 30 years, and now most of my trades are team based, thanks to the blogosphere. what makes things even better as a dodger collector is having the most visible among us also collect dodgers. i've often referred to the cards that i receive from night owl as hand me downs, and i am happy to have them. recently, night owl attempted to clear out some of his dodger duplicates, and he sent some cards my way that no longer reside on my want list.

here's a helping of gold themed cards:

1992 topps were the first of these i ever saw as i didn't buy leaf back then.

these next two cards made me chuckle

they were both needs, but i had found the kevin brown card at the february card show and the eric young card was also acquired in a sportlots order while the package from night owl was in transit.

you can't really tell that this is a 1999 bowman international parallel of jesus cordero

and that's probably ok. cordero hails from the dominican republic, and the background image is of a nice beach scene which is the furthest thing from my current weather reality in the upper midwest.

there was a healthy batch of 2008 upper deck documentary cards, including a few that featured andruw jones

this card is focused on the success of the dodger offense in a game against the giants, so you know there is no way jones is featured in the writeup on the back.

pogs!

i still don't really understand what these things were but they were very popular. i would have sworn i already had this pog combo but i did not.

it's not too often that i receive dodger cards from the early 2000's as that seems to have been a low point in many people's collecting tenure, but here is a new to me fred mcgriff card

for such a short-time dodger, he seems to have a lot of cards, many of which i am still in need of.

i've got a big post focusing on topps chrome coming up which made me appreciate these four refractor parallels

only one standard refractor and three fairly unnecessary refractor parallels. if they were blue refractor parallels, i would not refer to them as unnecessary. i'm not a monster.

i mentioned in an earlier trade post that it is rare to receive cards from more upscale products, and night owl sent a couple from 2013 and 2014 topps triple threads

as well as a couple from 2018 and 2019 topps tribute

cool stuff.

i'll finish up the package from night owl with some lower end stuff. these two cards are from 2018 panini donruss

one is a holo green parallel of cody bellinger's 1984 donruss design card, and the second is the variation version of his card. and finally, a card from 2019 panini chronicles - score

that is mostly notable for the fact that panini forgot to color bellinger's jersey number blue. it's great to see the red number on a panini card for a change!

around the same time that night owl's package arrived, i received a note from bo at baseball cards come to life that he had picked up a large dodger collection and had some cards to send my way. i'll start off with a few topps gold cards - two from 1993

and one from 1994

perhaps my favorite cards of the bunch were two new to me cards from 1988 sportflics

that's orel hershiser and mike marshall. a long time ago i focused on trying to complete the 1989 dodger run of cards with great success. maybe i will focus on 1988 in the near future.

i hadn't seen any cards from 1996 donruss signature series before receiving an ismael valdes card and this chan ho park card

from bo. my first thought was that it looked like a knockoff due to the lack of foil with the signature series oval label, but i guess that's how they were produced.

no lack of foil or whatever it is that makes fleer metal universe cards look like they do on this 1997 todd worrell card:

it's always great to receive dodger cards in the mail, and in the cases of these two packages, i appreciate the efforts made to review my want lists. i will take your dodger dupes!

is he worthy?

one of the players who received a fair amount of coverage during the last couple months of 2020 regarding hall of fame voting was andruw jones. it sure seems like his prospects for induction are looking up with his vote total hitting 41.4% in his fifth year of eligibility.  if he is inducted, he joins the likes of jim bunning, frank robinson, gary carter, and jim thome as hall of famers who had a somewhat random mid-career stint with the dodgers.

there is cardboard proof of this:

that card is a 2008 topps chrome xfractor that i found among my dodger dupes. jones joined the dodgers for the 2008 season - his first as a non-brave. it did not go well. jones was out of shape and was injured during a good portion of the season. he had the worst year of his career (his ops was .505!) and the dodgers released him prior to the 2009 season.

he continued to play, and had some success in the ensuing years with the rangers, white sox, and yankees, respectively, but he was obviously not the player he had been for 11+ years with atlanta.  with the braves, he won 10 straight gold gloves in center field, and is likely the best defensive centerfielder in the history of the game. his dwar is off the charts, anyway. he also hit 368 homers during his tenure with the braves, and 434 overall. he ranks pretty well amongst other hall of fame center fielders, but then again, so does kenny lofton (another random dodger!).

after tracking down a hoyt wilhelm autograph for my hall of famer collection, i thought about jones and the fact that he may one day be enshrined in cooperstown. as a result, i decided to pick up an autographed card for my dodger collection - this 2021 topps archives signature series 2008 topps allen & ginter card:

i should probably do the same for bunning (he is the only modern dodger player in the hall of fame for whom i don't have a certified autograph card, although i do have a couple of ttm successes from him). here's the back:

if jones does get the call, i would most likely track down a card featuring him with the braves for my hall of famer collection, should i choose to add him. at this point, i am not sure that i would just because i can't get the memory of his performance as a dodger out of my mind.