Fifty Year-Old Dodgers in my Mailbox? Yes, Please

Aloha, everybody, 

Elite collector, Mark H. sent surprise packages around the hobby recently, and I was lucky enough to be included in that group. 

Check out my video below as I show off the absolutely beautiful Dodgers that came from Topps wax packs four and five decades ago. THANKS, Mark!

P.S. Please remember to "Like" and Subscribe to my YouTube channel, NetChucArts, for more collecting, art, beer, vinyl, and assorted topic videos. 

Aloha! 

Let's See Some Vintage From the Card Show

Aloha, everybody, 

I wanted to go to the card show today...but alas...things didn't work out. So let's do the next best thing and check out some cards that I got on my last trip there. 

Everybody knows, I love my Dodgers, but this here's the greatest catcher ever...

Here's a new addition for my World Series subsets. I have Games 4, 5, and 6 from this set...

Fleer is a bit of a junk product, but they put together some great combo cards...

Now let's get really vintage...

Maybe fear struck out, but my card searching on that day didn't. Every collection of baseball's legends has gotta have this guy...

You better have one of his cards too...

Did I find any Dodgers? You betcha. Slightly miscut, but I'll take it. A bargain for a quarter in the overpriced LA card market...

More heroes from the Windy City...(all of these are available for trade remember)...

How about some Curt Flood? The Hall of Fame won't let him in...but my collection sure will...

You probably already have about five of this one, right, Mark? 
I love those stadium archways in the background. 

We'll finish off with a cool LA Angels card from 1961 Topps. 

I LOVE vintage! Aloha! 

Three Weeks in a Row to the Card Show. Do I have a Problem?

Aloha, everybody, 

Yup, despite the slim choices of card dealer tables, I headed out to the card show for my third week in a row. 

I'm trying to fill gaps in my PCs, and looking for cards to send out to my trading buddies. This week's trip brought modest success on both fronts. 

I won't be showing what I picked up for you all out there, because  I prefer those to be surprises. I'll tease a bit by saying I picked up cards for collectors of teams on the east coast, the World Series champs, some for entries into a blogger's contest, some for folks waiting for return-trade packages, and a couple for folks who commented on recent ATBATT posts. 

Here are the cards I rounded up for myself. Let's start with the vintage. These three are from 1960 Topps. I already had them, but I picked these up cheap enough to take a chance they might be upgrades for the ones in my binder...

Turns out, happily, the 60's I already own are in better shape than these. All three have soft, roundy corners. 

That said, if any set collector, or someone looking for starter vintage wants these, let me know, since they are up for trade. 

These filled holes in my Dodgers team checklists...

That's a great action shot of Willie Davis in a day game at Dodger Stadium. As the great Vin Scully would say, it's a "shirt sleeve crowd". 

Davis is either ducking away from a high and tight one, or he's reacting to being hit by the pitch. Note his batting helmet is nowhere to be seen. Philadelphia catcher Jim Essian's posture suggests he's possibly caught the ball. Anybody out there know the history of this one? 

More in-game action from the seventies...

The Dodgers wore those away uniforms with blue piping through the 60's and 70's. They dropped the piping in the 80's, and the unis have remained the same since then. 

Norm Sherry knocked one more off the 1962 Dodgers set...

Sherry's rockin' that man hair that runs all the way up to his neck. 

The last three cards are of the modern variety. First up is Larry Doby. After learning Doby was the pioneer who broke the color barrier in the AL, I decided to collect him. 

Zippy Zappy has announced he's collecting Doby as well, so I'll be keeping my cardboard eye out with two of us in mind. 

The final two cards hail from a tribute set. They're not particularly handsome cards, but they fill collecting needs because, believe it or not, I didn't have any cards from these players. These are my first. 

Now that I've cracked the ice, it's time to find better looking cards from these baseball legends.

Aloha! 

Aloha, everybody,

I hit the card show last weekend, and after scooping up a few cards for my Perfect Game Project, I started scanning the binders and boxes on the dealers table for any other available gems. Here's what I came up with...

I grabbed this '72 Topps Willie Davis - without remembering I already have a copy. There's so much groovy going on in this card that I just couldn't walk away from it - well-loved or not. 

I love cardboard with World Series Heroes doing World Series shite, so I jumped on these...

 That's Johnny Bench about to drop the Big Red Hammer. I swear I can hear the roar of the crowd when I look at this card. 

Another WS card, another appearance from Bench. 

Brooks Robinson on Tattoine. What an image! 

Everybody knows BobWalkthePlank is Pirates HQ, but there's always room in my collection for the Sarge on a great card. 

I grabbed some cards to add to my "Defunct Teams" PC...

Bonus: Defunct, highly insensitive/probably racist, team logo. 

Chuck Stobbs, 1955 Topps

Here's a couple of suggested taglines for the back of Stobby's card: 
"Stobbs was one of baseball's first bonus babies." and "Southpaw Stobbs once had a 16-game consecutive losing streak."  

Willie Davis wasn't the only Dodger I found in the binders...

I added one more card from my favorite Brooklyn southpaw, Johhny Podres. 

And I grabbed this for a buck. Overpaid? Not in my mind. 

Finally, this little slice o' cardboard that didn't really fit any themed page in my binders, but I hadda have it. 

Monobrow stare? Check.
Funky name? Check. 
Too bad ol' Zup wasn't repping a defunct team, I woulda had the trifecta. 

Aloha! 

One Man's Dime Box Cards Are My Treasure

Hey everybody,

Spring Training is well underway and Opening Day is right around the corner.  What a great time of year!

Something else that's great is making trades with fellow bloggers and ATBATT's readers.  Today I'm covering a trade with one of the top bloggers in the game today, Good 'ol Nick, from the venerable Dime Boxes blog. 

This time Nick included a note expressing regret that he was low on Dodgers and how he hoped the inclusion of some other HOFers would make up for that.  Are you kidding, Nick?  Your trade packages are ALWAYS chock full of fantastic cardboard, and this time was no exception.

As usual, Nick sent so many cool cards I had a difficult time just to separate out nine cards to fit on my scanner for this post. That said, let's check the top nine I chose:

One can never go wrong sending Dodger vintage to me. 3-Dog was one of my earliest favorite Dodgers.  I was just a kid, but I quickly latched onto Davis because he was a southpaw just like me!

 I dig this psychadelic 70's card of Maury Wills and his well-used mitt.  It's said that the groundskeepers for the evil Giants over at Candlestick Park used to saturate the area around first base with water in the hopes of slowing down the speedy Wills. Ha! Good luck with that.

Now for one of today's Boys in Blue...

 RYYYYYYUUUUUUU !!  Now that Zack Grienke is not going on that ridiculous opening weekend trip to Australia, Manager Mattingly has declared Ryu will take the mound for Game Two of the season. 

 I love Ryu's game face when he pitches. Intense, baby! Come git some....

 How about this crazy card of Roger the Dodger?  Just what the heck is going on here?  I'm guessing this photo was snapped during the laid back days of Spring Training. I wouldn't be surprised if the camera were pointing backward, thus unintentionally creating the first selfie ever.

Nick also sent over some cool cardboard from other teams...

 The Catfish!  I'm presuming someone may have sent this card to Nick because of his "Grips" collection. If so, thanks for parting with this awesome card, Nick.

Another great card of a great pitcher.  Although pictured here with his first team, the Indians, I'll always remember him as an Oakland A.  Hey Ecks, can you hear it?  "High fly ball into right field....SHE IS GOOOOOOOOONE !!!!!"

These Cooperstown Collection cards are beautiful.  I only have a handful, and now I can add the Georgia Peach to that group.

Finally, this little foldout whose origins I don't know, but I am now proud to own.  I've mentioned before that I may not be a Yankees fan, but I can appreciate those Yankee greats from yesteryear.  Yogi Berra is certainly one of those Yankee players whom I admire and collect.

Yogi lost his wife of 65 years - 65 YEARS! - this past week.  What an epic love.  My deepest condolences, Yogi. 

And Nick, my THANKS for a great trade.  I'm already gathering a fistful of cards to send out to you  for our next trade.

Thanks for reading, everyone. 

A Request, A Hootiful Trade, And A Fistful Of Awesome Cardboard!

Hey everybody,

I thought I was gonna just sit back and soak in the glory that is tonight's domination of Kid Kershaw over the frisco gang.  Well, I managed to do it for 7 innings before I couldn't resist the urge to jump online and see what's happ'ning in the blogoworlds.  BTW, it's currently the bottom of the 7th, and Kershaw still looks strong, ahead of the giants by a score of 4-2. (Update: 9th inning.  Kershaw pulled. Closer Jansen in. Update 2: DODGERS WIN !!!  We sweep them bums from the bay! YAHOOO!!!)

Well, in my blog travels I came across a request from Brian over at Play At The Plate.  It seems Mrs. PATP underwent surgery, and Brian is sitting in the hospital with lots of time on his hands.  He asked us to write some more posts so he can pass the time reading.  Well, I'm not sure Brian meant to include my rantings as "writing", but that's what he's gonna get, cuz that's how we roll out here in blogolandia.

Since I'm trying to do a humble but nice thing here - I figured I'd post up about another nice thing - a  grand package o' Dodger cards that recently arrived from the Dodgers' biggest fan on the east coast, the venerable Night Owl.  Yeah, this package was grand; it was chock-fulla Dodgers cards that were nearly all new for me.  Furthermore, it contained some real cardboard jewels.

This package had so many cool cards in it, that I was having a very hard time settling on a top nine to present, so Brian provided me with an answer.  He requested some viewing and reading fodder, so let's go ahead and check out a whole lotta cards.

Starting off with a beautiful, shiny card from another one of those guys I just can't have too many cards of,  another venerable soul, Hideo Nomo.  I love the way Nomo's eyes peek out at you over his shoulder.  I also love the understated but great die-cut design. 

 Speaking of outstanding Dodger pitchers from the past, on outstanding hunks of cardboard...presenting a motion card of Bulldog Hershiser.  Very cool!

 Not every pitcher is great.  Here's the vastly overrated, first Korean pitcher the Dodgers ever had.  The Texas Rangers threw an incredible amount of money at this guy, and I was glad to see him go.  How about that green LA cap.  This must be a Spring Training Saint Patty's Day game.

 Back to pitchers worth their mettle.  As good ol' Night Owl mentioned the other day, Greinke was also a mystery to me before he came over to the Dodgers.  I knew he put up decent numbers with his past teams, but that was about it.

This season Greinke has really shown himself to be not only a great pitcher, but a great teammate.  Even though he had his collarbone broken early in the season by that punk from San Diego, he got right back on the mound and defended his teammates by returning the favor after Yasiel Puig was hit by the Diamondbacks.  Greinke got some grit!

Lookit these swell old-time Dodgers from Swell.  These are my first cards from Swell.  How does N.O. know exactly what cards to send?  It's cuz he's swell!  (See what you get when I write a post that I hadn't planned on writing, Brian?)

 Here comes the Bison!  I totally dig this die-cut!   I know most bloggers out there ship their Dodger finds out to the Owl, and why not?  He earns them with his mastery of blogademia.  The nice thing is, us other Dodger bloggers get to benefit when the Owl ships his extras out to us.   This is one time I'm happy to catch sloppy seconds.

Another Nomo.  This card is great because
A. It's new for me, and
B. It's a checklist, but it commemorates Nomo's No-No against the Rockies.  An awesome game that I had the privilege of watching on TV.

 Night Owl really knows how to put a package together.  He sent a variety of sets from a variety of eras, and - he sent a variety of cardboard media.  Here we have a sticker with a frame of happy floating knockout stars.  Hey, Ana Lu, check out the mini dust that Saxy is kicking up in Wrigley, the home of the Cubs!

 My second Panini card, first one of Jackie.  Awesome card, in spite of it feeling like it cramped Jackie a bit around the head.  

 Absolutely cannot have too many cards commemorating this moment.  I've now got one more to add to the collection. 

Mike Piazza used to be my favorite Dodger catcher of all time.  Lately that's been lessening with his declarations that he would never enter the Hall of Fame wearing a Dodgers cap.  Hmm....

 I remember buying packs of this product back in day trying to pull a Dodger auto, any Dodger.  Well, it took more than a decade, but I finally got...any Dodger.
 

 How about this card?  EK sporting an awful goatee.  I absolutely don't remember him going through this phase.

 Vintage Dodger goodness !  YEAHHH !!! Thanks Night Owl !! Awesome card. 

 I remember the Dodgers P.A. guy used to announce World Series MVP Pedro as "Payyy - Droohhhh  Goo - Rare - Ohhhhhh !"  Loved it.

 Mondy here looks like he's gonna pop this one up, but it's a great shot, nonetheless.  Raul here is the guy I was most comparing the Dodger's young phenom Yasiel Puig to.  From the small slice of Puig I've seen so far, he's going to be well beyond "El Canon" Mondesi. 

 Yet even more vintage Dodger gold.  This is a great card featuring the King of all Unibrows.  Wally here is more than a funny tagline about facial hair, however.

In Dodger lore, he was known for launching massive home run shots over the short left field wall at the Coliseum, where the Dodgers played before moving into Dodger Stadium in 1962.  The Colesium's left field wall was a short 250 feet from home, but there was a 42 foot high net that had to be cleared in order to hit a home run to left.  Wally mastered it, and his massive home run blasts became known as "Moonshots".

 Here's the hottest Dodger hitter these days.  No, it's not Puig, it's Hanley.  This is my first card of Ramirez as a Dodger, and it's a great one. 

Closing is the all-time Dodger favorite that N.O. and I share, the Penguin.  It certainly was action packed when Cey was in the line up, and he was no slouch with the glove.  Cey anchored the hot corner in the days of "The Infield".  I have a suprisingly small collection of Cey cards considering he's my favorite, but that number just jumped up by one.

THANKS for the great cards, Night Owl.  What a great package that was.  And there are still a whole load of cards I didn't show.  Wow.

Thanks for reading, everyone!