Cards from a Sox fan ahead of Yankees/Red Sox

With the Yankees and Red Sox facing one another tonight, it’s a good chance to show off some cards from one of the nicest Red Sox fans out there – Mr. Mark Hoyle. I’m not thrilled with the Yankees going into Fenway right now playing as poorly as they are, but they need to turn it around sometime. I don’t love the “it’s early” excuse. I think every game matters. When a team is fighting for a Playoff spot in September and is a game out, you better believe I’m looking back at losing two extra inning games at home to the Orioles in April.

Anyhow, maybe a road trip is what the doctor ordered to right the ship a little.

Back to the cards. Mark sent me a surprise package recently, and the highlight for me was definitely an unopened pack of Upper Deck cards from the 2006 National Convention. While tempting to leave them in the shrink wrap, that’s not how I roll, so I opened them:

Nice, three Yankees! I like the Jeter a lot. Scott Podsednik was an interesting inclusion. I figured each Chicago team had a card in the set because the National was in Chicago…but Google tells me it was in Anaheim. So I’m not really sure, other than those cards will go to those team collectors I trade with.

This was a cool item! A Mickey Mantle HOF postcard. I know I had this at one point of my life, but have no idea what happened to it. Glad to have it back!

Speaking of Mantle, a really nice Topps Chrome of “the next Mantle”, Ruben Rivera. Of course things didn’t pan out, but he really was featured on some nice cards as a prospect. I like the “new arrivals” logo on this card.

Mark also included these Clint Frazier promo cards. These totally count as a unique card in my small Frazier collection. Mark your calendars for June 13 when Series 2 comes out!

Mark, thanks for the kind package. Take it easy on the Yanks this week.