Night Owl Cards

  For several years on this blog, I wrote an annual "if I was king of the postseason" post to kick off the baseball playoffs. It was fun -- just me riffing on who my favorites and least favorites were for that particular year -- but it was a lot of work. Then it started getting repetitive/monotonous and also a couple people got their undies in a bunch about what I wrote. I don't need to be dedicating a lot of time to something just to get a bunch of grief out of it, so I stopped. I don't miss it. But I do miss writing about the postseason a little. I thought it'd be fun to take a look at each of the wild card matchups in a lighthearted fashion -- no overt rooting here -- with the help of TCDB and my collection. I'm going to take a look at the oldest and newest cards in my collection for each team, plus a random card selected by the TCDB randomizer. There are some interesting connections between these teams. Here we go: RANGERS VS. RAYS Texas Rangers (cards in ...

Things aren't looking great for the Dodgers as I write this. They're down 1-0 to the Braves, already having their occasional hitting slumps and bullpen issues exposed. Now, Clayton Kershaw's out until at least Game 4 due to recurring back issues. I'm not that optimistic about the Dodgers chances this year mostly due to the fact that they played a 60-game schedule consisting strictly of mediocre-to-poor teams, with only the Astros and, I guess, the Padres the exceptions. I'm much more OK about this than I thought I'd be, probably because, like I mentioned, it's been a 60-game schedule and that's all. I don't need to be swatting down "yeah buts" all offseason if my team should win the title. A team that seems to fit this postseason much better, while also seeming to have a better chance, is the Rays. They just look like they know what they're doing, at all times. I wouldn't mind seeing them win a title, at least then I'd have some...

I collect cards for my own amusement. It's been that way for 40 years. There is nothing to this hobby besides accumulation for me. Except for a few fits and starts, I have rarely considered selling cards because I think this hobby should be as free of real world problems as possible. The formula should be simple: Have a little extra cash for cards? Buy cards. Enjoy cards. Repeat. But after 40 years, that formula becomes less and less practical. I have lots of cards, but the space for them is shrinking by the year. I also have lots of cards that are practically useless to me. They don't fit in my collection and they're not easy to trade. And, of course, any kind of extra money would be helpful. So, I'm considering again selling cards. Only a bit more seriously this time. There has to be someone out there who is a Rays collector or a David DeJesus collector. If the blogs won't take care of my excess parallels then maybe ebay or COMC will. I have resist...

One thing that Archives has over its second-tier set peers, like Gypsy Queen and Opening Day, is staying power. Although I've never liked the way Topps has approached or produced Archives, you can't help but analyze it if you are a veteran collector or a fan of history. And this is how Topps gets the word out. Collectors are going to talk about the set whether they enjoy it or not, because the set is tied to history and card collectors' histories. We think we know the way the cards should be because we hold those collecting memories close ... very close. More than most sets, Archives brings out not our love for baseball or a certain team or individual players, but our love for cards. That explains why we want to see this set succeed or -- if it can't match our appreciation for card history -- wither and die. And it explains why we get upset when Topps returns to the 1980 design, two years after it included the 1980 design in the first edition of Archives. B...

Look at that fog looming in the background. Did Topps get the Rays out at 6 a.m. to take photos? Anyway, as you know there's still a wild-card race going on in the American League East. The Rays are trying to catch the morbidly inept Red Sox. I know there are a lot of fans snickering over the Red Sox's demise. And there are a lot of Red Sox fans covering their eyes. I'm doing neither. The sole reason I am paying attention to this thing, outside of the "general interest in baseball" reason, is that I need to know: which team has the best chance of eliminating the Yankees in the postseason? This is all I care about. Which team is going to take care of that problem of watching Teixeira, Martin, Swisher, A-Rod, Gardner, Posada, Burnett, Pajama Hamburger, gag, vomit, retch, puke, barf, spew, heave ... bleah. ... Excuse me for a second. .... ... OK, I'm back. Sorry. Automatic reaction. Anyway, which team is going to take care of that problem of ...