Heartbreaking Cards of Staggering Genius: February 2015

February 28, 2015

What's In My Hidden Treasures Autographed Baseball Box?

One of the great things about living around Atlanta is that each month I could attend three strong card shows if I was ambitious. I've been averaging about two a month and at each show I tend to pick up the materials for five or six blog posts per show. This creates the "problem" of having a lot of material backlogged to post someday and here is one such post.

At one of the first shows I attended I took a chance at his Tristar Hidden Treasures that had been opened for $3.00. Let's see what was inside...

My autograph turned out to be former Milwaukee Brewers prospect Mat Gamel. He was once the Brewers top third base prospect as you can see from my certificate authenticity.

In 2012 Mat tour his ACL in his knee and missed the entire 2012 season. During Spring Training of 2013 he re-injured the knee and missed 2013 as well. Sadly just a few weeks ago he re-injured his knee for a third time while taking part in advanced Spring Training with the Atlanta Braves. So it looks like his career has been cut short by injury but I've always got a space in my autographed baseball collection for another "Mat" even if it is missing a "t."

February 26, 2015

Andy Pafko's Birthday Megapost

Yesterday was "Handy" Andy Pafko's birthday and he would have been 94. When Pafko passed away in 2013 I wasn't writing on the blog too much and so I never really did a farewell post for my favorite ball player. Instead I'll start doing yearly birthday posts highlighting some of my recent pickups of random Pafko collectibles and cards.

Let's start with a 1-of-1 sketch card drawn by artist Qwasian. He has a ton of original sketch cards available on eBay and I was able to get this one for a pretty great price. I have a lot of "favorite" Pafko cards and this one if certainly a new addition to that list.

There's nothing on the reverse side except a semi creepy mirror image of Pafko drawing bleeding through.

It was only recently that I noticed [probably it was my trading partner Mike D. that let me know] that in the 1994 Topps Archives set there were foil stamped and non-foil stamped versions of the cards. Here's the non-foil version.

1994 Topps Archives 54 #79 [No Foil Stamp]

I have about 15 non-foil versions and only recently picked up the stamped version...which is on the left below. It just goes to show no matter how much you think you know about checklists there's always some surprises waiting for you. I've included the original 1954 version on the right and you can see the blue is slightly different between the two version.

1994 Topps Archives 54 #79 [Foil Stamped]

1954 Topps #79

Here's a signed version of one of the rarer Pafko cards, 1979 Diamond Great. Wrigley Wax has a great post on the Cubs version of the set with some great background on its origins.

1979 Diamond Greats #79 Andy Pafko [Autographed]

Another odd pick up was this autographed card that I had never seen before. After getting the card in hand it turned out to be a fan creation...

Unnumbered Photo Card [Autographed]

...and on the reverse side you can see it's just a printed photo that has been trimmed.

One of the odder Pafko pickups were these contest cards given to attendees of the August 25, 2004 game between the Cubs and Brewers. I believe these were for a contest to receive a Cubs jersey.

MBNA Scratchcard Ticket 8/25/2004 #13185

And the reverse side has some great stats including sacrifice hits and total bases.

MBNA Scratchcard Ticket 8/25/2004 #13185 Back

In the eBay lot I also received three more scratched tickets numbered #05892, #06020, and #05336.

These signed envelopes seemed to be created in honor of the 1992 New York City Baseball Card Spectacular. Although it's mainly just a signed envelope with a canceled stamp on it, the Dodgers logo is actually a patch.

I ended up picking up two copies with different stamp designs.

Just like the 1994 Topps reprint foil stamping issues I didn't realize existed there was also a non-foil stamped version of the 2013 Topps Archives Pafko with a 1990 Topps design that was given to Cubs season ticket holders a few years ago. I have several copies of the stamped version but this is my first non-stamped one.

2013 Topps Archives #CUBS-55 Andy Pafko [Non-Stamped Version]

This Pafko card comes from a card game APBA Major League Baseball Master Game that was originally published in 1975.

I also made a little progress in collecting all 1,957 copies of the retrofractor from the 2002 Topps Super Teams set. This one was numbered #0658 out of /1957 and it brings my total versions to seven I believe.

2002 Topps Super Teams #36 Andy Pafko
Retrofractor #0658/1957

February 25, 2015

Show and Tell #124: The Tale Of The English Mariners

I recently received a nice little stack of Mariners cards from England from Jack of blog The Pursuit of 80's(ness). Here are a few of the highlights.

A deckle edge Ichiro. If you haven't been following along this off-season you may have missed that Ichiro signed a one-season contract with the Miami Marlins for $2 million. He is the Marlin's first Japanese player.

2012 Topps Deckle Edge #69DE-6 Ichiro

During John Olerud's five seasons with the Mariners he won three Gold Gloves at first base.

2001 Donruss Studio #145 John Olerud

Lastly here are two Ken Griffey Jr.'s that I didn't own yet. Ken will be eligible for the Hall of Fame and it will be interesting to see how high his voting percentage will be and if he can make a run at Tom Seaver's record of 98.84%.

1997 Score #499 Ken Griffey Jr.

2003 Donruss #459 Ken Griffey Jr.

February 24, 2015

2014 Topps Garbage Pail Kids Series 2

Much like my recent return to trying to keep up with WWE story lines, I've also made an attempt to pick up a couple packs of each new Garbage Pail Kids release that appears at my local Target. My pack had some interesting subjects including parodies I wasn't expecting to find, i.e. The Walking Dead, Dr. Doom, and Ghost Rider. Here's what I pulled:

#83b Chiseled Chad

#82b Cracked Mack

#93a Rick Grimey

#84b Foggy Augie

#92a Bomb Ed

#121a Cuckoo Kevin

#91a Door Knox

#106a Eyecicle Ira [Green Border]

#126a Trey Cycle

Garbage Pail Kids Battles #2 Flo Sing vs. God of Warren

February 23, 2015

My Tumblr Blog: Card Roulette

If you don't follow my on Twitter [@_MattF] you might not know that I have a tumblr called Card Roulette in which I post at least a card a day with no comments beyond the basic card numbering information. It's sort of like a random spin of the roulette wheel of my card collection.

My Bill Schroeder Mega Post

It's funny when you think about it. This post I'm writing is going to be the most comprehensive post on Bill Schroeder Green Bay Packers cards the world has ever seen. I am unrivaled in my Bill Schroeder card prowess and the world may never see a Bill Schroeder post of this grandeur and greatness.

I collect Bill Schroeder cards not just because he was a pretty great receiver for the Packers or that he attended UW-La Crosse for college, Schroeder was born in my hometown of Eau Claire, WI. He was was initially drafted by the Packers in 1994 but didn't get playing time with them until the 1997 season and had three outstanding seasons from 1999-2001. Most of my cards come from that period including a relic card.