A Yay! and a Grrrrr!

Yay! = Locating one of the few John Jaha cards I need and having it arrive in the mail.

This one is a Fleer/ProCards Denver Zephyrs card. I'm not sure if these were distributed in set form, packs or team sets like a lot of minor league issues but it's number 2647 on the back so it almost belongs in one of the Yankee Stadium sets. It's a nice photo but the border and font selection reeks of clipart or something of a "Little League" design. It's cute when your kid is on it, but when it's a grown up playing pro ball, not so much.

Grrrrrrrrrrrrrr! = Finding and ordering a John Jaha card for the collection and getting a note a few days later saying they're "out of stock."

A couple days after receiving the above card I found a 2000 Topps MVP Promotion Jaha listed on eBay. This is the first I've seen since 2001 so I jumped on it. A couple of days later the seller send me a message saying they were out of stock and that the listing was done in error. Dang! I was offered the choice of a full refund or a generous "gift certificate" to spend on their other listings. It was tempting but they're stock is notoriously over-priced and I only use them when desperate (like in the above situation). It worked out fine in the end, just no card and the search continues.

For those who have some ultra-rare Jaha cards kicking around, here's all that I need for the complete super master collection:

1997 Flair Showcase Legacy Collection Masterpiece Row 0 #169 (1/1)
1997 Flair Showcase Legacy Collection Masterpiece Row 1 #169 (1/1)
1997 Flair Showcase Legacy Collection Masterpiece Row 2 #169 (1/1)
1997 New Pinnacle Press Plate #23 (have Cyan back, need any others)
1997 Sports Illustrated First Edition #151 (1/1)
1997 Topps Pro Shooters Marble Checklist #1 (the one with Jaha on it)

1998 Circa Thunder Super Rave #62 (/25)
1998 Flair Showcase Masterpiece Row 0 #116 (1/1)
1998 Flair Showcase Masterpiece Row 1 #116 (1/1)
1998 Flair Showcase Masterpiece Row 2 #116 (1/1)
1998 Pacific Online Winners #398
1998 Stadium Club Printing Plates #142 (four different 1/1)
1998 Ultra Masterpiece #199 (1/1)

1999 Ultra Masterpieces #128 (1/1)

2000 Pacific Copper #313 (/99)
2000 Stadium Club Printing Plates #104 (four different 1/1)
2000 Topps MVP Parallel #27
2000 Ultra Masterpiece #124 (1/1)
2000 Upper Deck Exclusives Gold #191 (1/1)

All but five are 1-of-1s and I'm not sure the 1998 Pacific Online Winners exist for Jaha. At the rate I've been going for the past two years, it'll be another nine months before I track down one of the above. Good times. In that time I hope to have my collection scanned and posted on my website. The scans are done, but resizing and plugging them into the site is time consuming and I don't know how much demand there is to see a few hundred John Jaha items. If nothing else, I'm hoping it'll act as a resource for various issues and parallels from the late-90s.

Bruce Lee "Enter the Dragon" Costume Card in 2009 Upper Deck Piece of History Baseball

I was just looking at the checklist for the Hollywood memorabilia cards for the upcoming 2009 Upper Deck Piece of History Baseball and this caught my attention:

Bruce Lee, Enter the Dragon (Robe)!!!!!!!!

Yes! There's also a trench coat from Humphrey Bogart in Casablanca, Will Ferrell's shirt and pants from Old School and Will Smith's robe from Ali. The checklist rules. However, so did last year's but without the rights to use their names, let alone images, confusion set in and the cards were among the most disappointing for me for the year. 

Here's the complete checklist (note a couple are merely worn by the star, not necessarily in a particular film):

Name	Movie	Memorabilia
Drew Barrymore	Charlie's Angels	Motorcycle Pants
Heath Ledger	Lords of Dogtown	Shorts
Sean Penn	21 Grams	Shirt
Denzel Washington	John Q	Baseball Jersey
Denzel Washington	Hurricane	Sweater
Will Ferrell	Old School	Shirts/Pants
Will Smith	ALI	Terry Cloth Robe
Mike Myers	Austin Powers III	Costume
Rachel Mc Adams	Notebook	Slip
Tom Hanks	Da Vinci Code	Blue Shirt
Arnold Schwarzenegger	End of Days	Sweater
Bruce Lee	Enter the Dragon (before his death)	Robe
Humphrey Bogart	Casablanca	Trenchcoat
Sidney Greenstreet	Casablanca	Robe
Adam Sandler	Shirt	Spanglish
Ben Stiller	Shirt	Zoolander
John Wayne	Shirt	Worn
Greta Garbo	Dress	Worn
Ben Affleck	Robe	Gigli
John Hurt	Costume Top	Highlander
John Hurt	Costume Top	Highlander
Pamela Anderson	Skirt	Worn

 

Wanna See Some Pictures for 2009 SP Legendary Cuts?

The pictures are a little fuzzy as they're from a sell sheet, but here's the first images I've seen for 2009 SP Legendary Cuts Baseball.

There's definitely a stamp feel to the design. It's classy but I'm not liking the lack of colors on the base cards. But let's face it, the draw for this set is the cut signatures. They always have been and they always will be. But without the pictures of the players or personalities, I find a lot of the prestige to be gone. You might as well make the card a redemption for the entire document in which it was cut from. Maybe that's a thought to breath some new life into this stale brand whose concept has been borrowed and recycled many, many times over the years in all corners of the hobby.

Anyways, here's a little more info taken from the sell sheet (there's not a heck of a lot other than the promise of the various hits):

Cards per Pack: 5

Packs per Box: 12 (60 cards per box)

• Two Cut Signatures and one Mystery Cut Signature per case.
• Two hard-signed autographs per case.
  
• Four memorabilia cards per box, including one dual Generations card.
• Seven 20th Anniversary cards per box and one 20th Anniversary Memorabilia card per case.
• Classic Signatures #/99 or less.
• Future Legends Signatures #/149 or less.
• Generations Dual Signatures #/99 or less.
• Legendary Cut Signatures #/25 or less.
• Legendary Memorabilia #/175 or less with different color parallels #/150 or less.

The on-card signatures are nice, although somewhat ironic given the flavor of the brand. The Cut Signatures continue to be the draw but seem very risky.

How about another avenue to reinvent the product? It's already one for the mid- to high-rollers. Why not take it a step further and make it ultra-premium? Offer a cut signature in every pack and charge $400-500. It seems like a fair price given what some of the similar products are selling out at. I don't buy it at $150 a box now, so I'm not going to feel bad for having to sit it out at an even higher price. At least the vintage nature of the cut signatures would make the price seem somewhat more justified.

2009 SP Legendary Cuts Baseball is scheduled for an April release.

You Knew It Was Coming: 2009 Topps World Baseball Classic

With all the World Baseball Classic patch redemptions that won't ship until the fall and the insert set in 2008 Topps Update, it was pretty obvious that Topps wasn't going to sit back and not make a set on the much-hyped but largely meaningless international tournament.

Releasing on March 11, 2009 Topps World Baseball Classic will be a 55-card box set with a mix of players from all 16 nations participating in the tournament. From a Canadian perspective, the highlight of the checklist is the first MLB-licensed card of Mariners prospect Phillippe Aumont. Russel Martin, Justin Morneau,  and Joey Votto are the only three other Canucks represented.

The USA leads the way with seven members of their roster in the set, follwed by Cuba, the Dominican Republic and Japan with five players each.

Here's the complete line-up for the set broken down by country:
Australia: Luke Hughes, Grant Balfour
Canada: Phillippe Aumont, Russel Martin, Justin Morneau, Joey Votto
China: Chenhao Li, Tao Bu
Chinese Taipei: Che-Hsuan Lin,Fu-Te Ni
Cuba: Michel Enríquez, Yulieski Gurriel, Alexeis Bell, Yoandris Urgelles, Alexander Mayeta
Dominican Republic: Albert Pujols, Alex Rodriguez, Hanley Ramirez, David Ortiz, Jose Reyes
Italy: Frank Catalanotto, Lenny DiNardo, Mike Napoli
Japan: Yu Darvish, Daisuke Matsuzaka, Kosuke Fukudome, Ichiro Suzuki, Akinori Iwamura
Korea: Byung Hyun Kim, Jae Seo
Mexico: Matt Garza, Joakim Soria, Adrian Gonzalez, Jorge Cantu
Netherlands: Jair Jurriens, Shairon Maris, Gregory Halman
Panama: Arquimedes Nieto, Randall Delgado, Carlos Lee,
Puerto Rico: Geovany Soto, Jonathan Sanchez, Carlos Beltran, Alex Rios
South Africa: Justin Erasmus, Gift Ngoepe
USA: Derek Jeter, Jake Peavy, Chipper Jones, Jimmy Rollins, David Wright, Evan Longoria, Derrek Lee
Venezuela: Miguel Cabrera, Carlos Zambrano

The 2009 Topps World Baseball Classic carries a suggested retail price of $9.99 per set.

Complete Checklist

Coming Soon: 2009 Upper Deck Icons Baseball

The only 2008 football card I bought was an Upper Deck Icons Autographed Letterman Patch of Mr. Lando Calrissian - Billy Dee Williams. The set has a couple of other celebrity signatures that I had some moderate interest in, but I pulled the trigger on this one character actor mainly because of the cheap $10 price tag.

The formula and brand have now gravitated over to baseball with 2009 Upper Deck Icons Baseball. The SP Authentic-esque checklist includes 100 base cards, 30 rookies numbered /999 and 30 autographed rookies numbered to a maximum of 600 copies.

Boxes consist of 10 six-card packs, with 12 boxes in each case. With a box expect the following: five numbered inserts or parallels, two Lettermen cards (not necessarily signed), two jersey cards and one autograph. Does anyone else get the feeling Upper Deck really is channelling the SP Authentic vibe here?

Autographs will fall about one per box. There's 60 Lettermen (up to /99), 75 MLB Icons (up to /99 - something tells me guys like Steve Pearce and Glen Perkins are going to be the majority of the 'icons' but I merely speculate), 15 MLB Future Foundations (up to /199) and 10 Legendary Icons Autographs (up to /50). Lettermen Autographs are two per case, or one in six boxes and will include some celebrities.

Game-used cards fall two per box with one being numbered /149 or less. The memorabilia line-up includes 15 Future Foundations, 75 MLB Icons, 10 Legendary Icons and blue and gold parallels for rainbow seekers. There will also be one 20th Anniversary Memorabilia card per case.

Personally, I'm not too excited. It looks like a chase set, which isn't really my cup of tea. If there's a good celebrity or two, I may go after singles but I'm not counting down the days by any means.

2009 Upper Deck Icons Baseball is scheduled for a July release.

Something a Very Different for Topps' Star Wars Galaxy 4

There's literally thousands of different Star Wars sketch cards out there. Some, better than others. Topps is trying something a little different with the soon-to-be-released Star Wars Galaxy 4: die-cut sketch cards.

The set uses two different designs (a Darth Vader helmet and a Storm Trooper helmet) to act as the canvas. And rather than going the traditional sketch card route, the die-cut sketches are being done by well-known underground artists (if anyone who's considered underground can be well-known). The result are some, well, odd looking cards. Here's a couple (images from StarWars.com):

 

Yes, that is a kiss mark and those are two praying fingers standing in spaghetti on Vader's helmet. I'm still not sure what to make of them on a personal level. They're definitely unique conversation starters but I'm scratching my head over what praying fingers standing in spaghetti mean. Toss in the Star Wars reference and you've got one of life's great mysteries. 

And while these certainly are weird, there's lot of - how do I put it politely? - enthusiasm (that is not me) towards the franchise.

Here's an article that explains the background of the die-cut sketch cards that, at the very least, has made me respect the art of these cards and appreciate the fact that there's still a little risk-taking going on in the hobby.

Anybody know any Dante Culpepper collectors?

A few months back I won a lot of cards that included what looks to be about 150 Dante Culpepper cards. I'm not much of a football fan and would rather get these into the hands of someone who would enjoy them or at least look at them on occasion. Want more details? Email me.

My New Pet Rock

Over the years of collecting Montreal Expos, I've always enjoyed getting autographs. I've scaled back somewhat since the team moved to Washington and no longer actively go after autographs of guys I've already got. That being said I made an exception a few weeks back when I snagged this:

 

I know I've already got a couple of Tim Raines autographs but this one caught my attention. Sure it has a white swatch and it's numbered out of 30, but what I'm digging is the addition of his nickname "Rock." It's a simple thing that makes this card much more unique than a lot of the other generic signatures I've got.

Raines was a beast on the base paths 25 years ago. I'm convinced that if Rickey Henderson wasn't a bigger beast, we'd see Rock in Cooperstown eventually. But like his former teammate Andre Dawson, I don't think there's going to be an Expo in the Hall of Fame to join Gary Carter anytime soon.

Catching Up and Getting Organized

With Spring Training comes a little Spring cleaning. It's been a hectic month as I've been settling into a new position at work while still working the old duties as the search was on for a new staff member. In the meantime my desk at home has become a hodge podge of this and that and neglected goodies. I'm working on getting that tidied and organized so I can go into Spring Training with a clean desk (Or, more likely, a new batch of goodies rather than a card of Pinocchio from a Shrek the Third oddball set staring at me every night when I get home from school. I said it was a hodge podge of cards, so don't ask.).

Speaking of Spring Training, I might actually be able to take some in as I'm off to Phoenix for a conference in 13 days, which is about when Arizona is going to be hopping with the early sounds of summer. While I'd love to make it to a session or exhibition game, I don't know if the schedule is going to allow for it but if all goes well I will be catching my hometown man Steve Nash take on the Celtics, which will be my first NBA game since the Vancouver Grizzlies innagural season.

I'm hoping to post a couple of box breaks this week and they're doozies: 1993 Upper Deck Fun Packs, complete with mascot holograms and glow-in-the-dark Kirby Pucketts and 2007-08 In the Game O Canada Hockey - a patriotic take on how a company can make a major set without a professional license. I also have thoughts on steroids bouncing around in my head again that I might get around to, as well as whatever else presents itself.

Finally, way back in at the start of the year Matt F. did a blogging marathon which saw him make a pile of posts in a couple of days. Part of the fun was the many generous contests he offered. One such contest I was fortunate enough to win. Here's my prize:

 

A 2008 Bowman Chris Seddon Blue Border Autograph (272/500). Note the pretty on-card signature. Let's hope there's more on-card goodness throughout the year.

I owe another HUGE thanks to John A. for ANOTHER shipment of Expos, which included some vintage O-Pee-Chee!