rod rocks

rod from padrographs has been ripping a ton of packs over the last few months, and is now sharing the cards he pulled with many in the good ol' blogosphere. i received the cards he sent my way and was happy to find this 2023 topps heritage high numbers taylor motter card

among the bounty.  this was one of my most wanted non-dodger cards! always a good day when a card from the "nefarious 9" gets knocked off the list!

rod sent some other cards that fit my mini-collections, including this custom card of brandon dixon

that would fit with my tatooine cards. i decided to keep it with other custom cards that i've received from folks over the years. 

one of the boxes rod opened was 2023 topps stadium club, and he sent me the kodai senga card

for the "nob" collection, and the michael harris card

that would fit in either that same collection as the senga or the lurker collection. i put it in the lurker collection thanks to ronald acuna jr's presence.

most of what rod sent my way were twins cards from his breaks, and there were some good ones, like joe ryan's card from stadium club

the visitor side of target field gives a great view of part of downtown minneapolis through the plaza into the warehouse district and beyond. target center, the home of the timberwolves, is the building with the target mascot on it.

you don't see 1982 fleer too often these days, so i figured i'd show this jack o'connor card

and there you have it.

here are a couple of hall of famers - harmon killebrew on a 1991 sportflics kellogg's corn flakes baseball greats card

and jim thome on a 2021 topps allen & ginter historical hits card

torii hunter is hanging on the hall of fame ballot, but i don't see him being voted in by the writers. here's his 2022 topps stadium club chrome card

showing him doing what he did best - robbing home runs!

thanks to the variety that rod sent, i was easily able to compare a 1988 topps card of backup catcher tom nieto to a 1988 topps insert from 2023 topps update of twins stellar rookie edouardo julien side-by-side

that's pretty close, with the player name being the most notable difference

here are the backs

i think the twins are going to be fun to watch this year with julien and royce lewis playing together. here's another julien rookie card 

that's from the totally unnecessary 2023 topps cosmic chrome release.

speaking of unnecessary, here's a silver patterned foil parallel of christian vazquez

from last year's update release.

one of my favorite cards in the package was this 2023 topps holiday byron buxton card

it looks like buck in in the midst of a snowball fight, and he has just thrown a snowball out in the yard.

adding to the fun, rod also included a package of pop rocks

which i hadn't had since the late 1970's. now i'm off to eat them while drinking a diet coke just to see what happens.

thanks rod!

you're my inspiration

i enjoy being a part of this blogging community. hosting my own blog(s) has helped me appreciate my collection more than i otherwise would have, and reading the blogs of others and the related interactions has led to the expansion of my collection beyond what i would have thought possible.

the trades are the big things, of course, but just seeing cards posted by fellow collectors that i would not otherwise be aware of often inspires me to add those cards to my collection. here are just a few recent examples.

fuji posted some old baseball card magazines a while back, including one that featured this 1990 card of steve carter and jeff huson

huson, of course, is standing in dodger stadium, and so off i went to add this card to my dodger stadium collection. while searching for the card, i found another 1990 baseball card magazine card to add

i have no problem adding barry bonds cards to my collection. these cards are especially appreciated now that the original right field scoreboard is no more.

back when 2022 topps stadium club was released, i made a big deal of how the vladimir guerrero card featured a photo of him sitting at the edge of the visitor's dugout at dodger stadium. nick from dime boxes commented that topps had used that same photo before, and so i tracked that card down, too

that's from the 2019 topps x vlad jr the legend online set. i had no idea until nick took the time to comment.

night owl shared this 1971 topps partridge family card

a while back, and i decided it would make a quirky addition to my dodger stadium collection. i don't really believe that they are in dodger stadium ,but the sign makes reference to the facility so it makes the grade. i was curious about the people in the background - as in are they players - but this photo from getty images

suggests that they are just extras and not actual dodgers. looks like guys like jim lefebvre missed out on more tv credits. i used to watch the partridge family in reruns in the mid 1970s, but don't remember this particular episode. i checked it out on prime video and the dodger piece is part of a "blink and you'd miss it" dream sequence. in his dream, danny bought the dodgers for his little brother chris after achieving superstardom success as a solo artist. this after a review of a partridge family show said that danny had "star quality". the twist at the end of the episode is that the reviewer was actually writing about chris and got their names mixed up. hilarity ensued, indeed.

night owl also shared this 1997 sportflics kellogg's card of ralph kiner

with one of the photos being the same one that was used for a 1950 sport magazine cover. this is significant because that photo shows kiner wearing the black armband that the team wore for their late teammate tiny bonham for the last couple of weeks of the 1949 season. i did not have a card in my collection to represent that memorial, but after seeing night owl's post, i picked up a copy and now i do!  i've updated my earlier post that referenced this armband as well.

finally, jon at penny sleeves recently hosted a spate of giveaways featuring dozens of great cards. one of the cards he offered up was this 1978 tcma the 1960's denny mclain card

had jon not posted that card, i would likely have never known of its existence. the card is significant to me because it shows mclain wearing the black armband he and his teammates wore for their late manager chuck dressen. dressen passed away in august of 1966, so the team wore the armbands for just a short time. i had previously searched for cardboard (and even just photographic) evidence of the armband but came up empty as i obviously missed this card. even though i was too late to claim the card in jon's giveaway, his post informed and inspired me to find another copy and add it to my collection.

thanks to all who blog and post cards for us to see, sometimes for the first time!