The Great Home Run Chase of '98

Similar to The Last Dance, I'm excited to watch ESPN's 30 for 30 tonight titled Long Gone Summer, which will chronicle the 1998 home run chase between Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa.

Unlike the 10-part series on MJ's Bulls, this is a solo episode focused solely on that epic summer barrage of homers. Not a big time commitment!

I remember that summer fairly well. It was between the summer of finishing 8th grade and heading into 9th grade. The Yankees were on an epic tear, but that story was secondary to McGwire and Sosa's pursuit of 62.

The groundwork was really set in 1997, when McGwire hit 58 between Oakland and St. Louis. It was almost assumed he was going to make a big run at it in 1998.

Sosa was the one who caught everyone by surprise. While still an elite power hitter, he was coming off 36 homers in '97. In '96 he hit 40 in just 122 games, so it shouldn't have come as that much of a surprise. Still, to hit 36 and then hit 30 more on top of that in the next year? Yeesh. No one was predicting that.

We obviously know how this story ends and that the summer is tainted, but I look forward to once again traveling down memory lane and experiencing the chase. Similar to MJ's '98 Bulls, which coincidentally happened in the same year, there was a lot I forgot about the story, and I'm sure that will be the case here as well.

As for cards, McGwire and Sosa cards were on fire. Pulling a McGwire became the new "pulling a Griffey." I've held on to a few cards of each over the years, but nothing tops this:

I pulled this in a pack of Score from CVS. I think at the time Beckett had it in the $60 range. I'm sure it' can be had for a few bucks now, but I can honestly say it might be the best card I ever pulled from a pack...at least from a $.99 pack.

Back in 2011, I also was fortunate to get a McGwire TTM success. I maybe wish I sent a different card, but I was just coming back into the hobby and didn't have much of an inventory to send.

I don't have a particular amount of memorable Sosa cards. My favorite is probably this Leading Indicators from Finest, which changes color when you apply body heat to it from your finger.

I also like this one quite a bit - a 1999 Gallery Heritage Proof, although I have no memorable story behind it. It simply was thrown into a box of cards I acquired last summer on a social media marketplace. It's still in a screw holder as well, as at the time I'm sure it was a solid pull.

I guess what's cool about Sosa and McGwire cards are that during that summer, it was a big deal to pull cards of these two established stars. Now, that's not cool. It's only cool to pull cards of guys who maybe stars in six years if everything works out perfectly. It's the cool thing to pull cards of guys who have potential, and at their peak, we can only hope they have a sliver of the success that these guys had.

Nowadays, it's almost like once they are stars, their appeal fades, and the hobby focuses on the guys who may eventually become them if all works out perfectly.

What a weird hobby world we live in.

ZZ sends a BG

The mail in my neck of the woods has been unusually fast, at least for PWEs. It's easy to crap all over the post office, and I know they often cause headaches. But during these last few weeks, I give props to them for role as essential workers and for dominating, at least in my neck of the woods.

On Saturday, I made a trip to the post office where I sent three different PWEs, as well as three bubble mailers.

I know he probably lives only about an hour away, but in that time, my PWE reached Zippy Zappy, and by Wednesday - just five days later - a return PWE from him was in my mailbox.

That is crazy efficient!

Props goes to ZZ as well for an unnecessarily quick turn around.

Anyhow, I recently picked up a Kei Igawa autograph, as they don't pop up very much in Japan, so thought it might give him some collateral next time he made the trip to Japan and visited their local card shops.

In a lightning quick show of gratitude, ZZ sent me this:

It's only my second Gardner autograph, I believe. This is from 2008 Tristar Projections, and is a gold numbered 24/25. He noted that Gardner is a bit like Igawa in the fact that there just aren't a ton of their autographs floating around out there.

Gardner's signature is very uninspiring here, just a straight up BG. His autograph has evolved over the years a bit - still not great, but better!

Thanks, ZZ. And thanks, USPS.

Single Digits

My quest for 1,000 unique Tino Martinez cards has hit another milestone. I'm down to needing just 9 more.

Sometimes I think that 1K isn't that impressive. Other collectors often have a few thousand of their designated guy. But then I tell myself to shut up because 1. it is impressive and 2. Tino just doesn't have that many cards.

According to TCDB, I only have 38.9% of Tino cards. But that number is crap when you consider the hundreds of cards that consistent of Yankee Stadium Legacy and Topps Tek's 900 patterns in the late 90s.

The latest two came from Tim over Cardpocolypse. Tim was kind enough to match his Tino collection with my want list and send me two. So generous and cool, and he pushed me into single digits! The International Chrome Refractor is so pretty!

I also have snagged a few serial numbered shiny recently. I'm not sure why, but some uncommon Tino's have been popping up on eBay. People selling their old stuff during quarantine, maybe? The Revolution is a Shadow Series #'d to 99.

Several gold cards have come my way, as well. I have several of the 1992 Topps Gold Winners, but never had the plain old gold by itself. The Bowman is also a gold foil version.

A couple of oddballs made their way in as well!

Last but not least, I had totally forgotten to pick up 2019 Allen and Ginter X. I'm not a big A&G fan, but the all black version is pretty cool.

I still haven't decided what I'm going to do for #1000. Maybe I'll splurge. Maybe it'll just be a run of the mill base card I missed.

Time will tell. But I'm getting close. And it's getting very real.

Daily mailbox trips

Over the past couple of weeks, I feel like my mailbox has been extra busy. Between a few TCDB trades, blogger packages, and small eBay purchases, it's infrequent that a day goes by without something for me in the mailbox.

While fun, it does force me to do one thing I don't like! Sort cards!

But that's ok. The alternative is no cards.

Here's what a typical day at the mailbox looked like just the other day.

The first was a PWE from Bo of Baseball Cards Come To Life. He gave me a heads up this was on its way, and it was six cards for my son's HOF binder that I keep for him. While I am a slacker at actually updating that page on my blog, I do take everything that is sent for him and put it into his binder. I'll provide an update one of these days.

Thanks, Bo! Some good stuff here and a nice range of cardboard from some of the more recent HOF inductees. Baines even looks like he's in disbelief that he was voted into the HOF.

The next envelope was an eBay purchase from One Million Cubs. He always has free PWE shipping, and one day tweeted he had a few new cards listed. So I checked out his page and found a card I liked at a good price.

I like the camo parallels from 2020 Bowman. This was kind of a make or break year for Florial as a prospect, but I still hold out a touch of hope he can put it together.

Speaking of prospects, I snagged this autograph for under 2 bucks including shipping from a different seller. The Yankees got Josh Stowers from the Mariners via the Reds in the Sonny Gray trade. I was confused as to why the Yanks just didn't keep Shed Long (who was sent to the M's in the trade), but they don't have many decent OF prospects, so I guess it was more important for them to try and fill that gap than with another middle infielder. I don't know, I wasn't really feeling that.

Stowers spent the year at low A and hit .273 with a good .386 OBP and 35 steals. We'll see if he can become a useful piece at some point. He was a second rounder in 2018 and last year was his first full year in pro ball, so he's got some time.

Three envelopes, all with a little something different. While it's still weird working from home, I do like being the one to grab the mail every day.  

A 2020 Bowman Blaster

From what I understand, Bowman in the wild is quite rare.

We're still relatively locked down in here in NJ. While Targets and Walmarts are indeed open, I'm not going to risk it by going hunting for baseball cards. That's silly.

What I did do, back in April, was pre-order a blaster of 2020 Bowman on Amazon. I paid $22 for it, which is $2 more than the price tag in store, but much less than you can find them on eBay from retail flippers who fill their cards and take a picture of it for Twitter. Ever notice how these flood your timelines, even when you don't follow 99.9% of the people posting them?

Since the product was still a month away, and prices went crazy, I figured I'd end up getting an order cancelation. That's apparently happening with the big box stores, unable to fulfill online orders.

However, in a true credit to this Amazon seller, I recently received a notification that my order had shipped.

I did hope to pull a Jasson Dominguez card. He's the prospect rage right now, and surely many of you consider him an overhyped Yankees prospect. Maybe he is. But he would be this hyped on any team. That's what happens when you sign for $5.1Mil and are nicked The Martian. His tools are that good. Remember, last year it was a Rays prospect who was the rage. The Rays. Whether or not he puts it all together in a few years, obviously we won't know.

Spoiler alert: of my 72 cards, he was not one of them. Bummer.

Still, it was nice to open a few packs, and I was still in disbelief the vendor came through for me.

In a rare occurrence, I pulled an autograph. First pack too. This is Reds 3B prospect Rece Hinds. He's their #8 prospect according to MLB Pipeline. These fall 1:62 in a blaster.

I also pulled a shimmer blue refractor. These are awesome looking, and actually fall 1:256, so actually a pretty rare pull from a blaster. I don't know much about him, but hopefully will recoup a couple bucks back on eBay with this card. It's numbered /150.

In terms of Yankees, I did come away with two decent ones.

I am a big Clarke Schmidt fan, so I'm happy to get his base card here. Yep, not calling this a "paper" version because that is dumb.

As for major leaguers, the only ones in the set are Aaron Judge and Gleyber Torres. I was able to snag the Gleyber. Fun to see him officially listed as "SS."

Otherwise, I got a few solid RCs and prospects, which is to be expected in Bowman. I know Luis Robert is well regarded, although nit sure why this is a RC? I guess because he was expected to be in the Majors by this time when planning was underway?

And the inserts - while no keepers (these are available on TCDB) - are all nice looking and very refractory. The 1990 Reprints look cool as Refractors, that's for sure.

It was fun to open some cards. I haven't done that in quite a while, and more than anything, appreciated the seller here honoring the original price.

The blurbs on the back

A few days ago, a nice PYE from Julie over at A Cracked Bat showed up. PYE is plain yellow envelope, FYI.

At some point Julie reached out to me about this cool lot of Don Mattingly cards she had. Or maybe I reached out to her about them. I actually don't remember. And that's why I was surprised when they showed up. Because I just don't remember!

These cards are incredibly cool, from 1991 Impel Line Drive. From what I can tell, this was a 20-card set. I'm a few short, but will track down the rest.

It's a fun set, with the design reeking of 1991 off-brand. But it fits.

A lot of the photography is refreshingly new, as it wasn't seen in 80s Topps or Donruss issues.

Beyond the range of photos, what impresses me most is how the write-up on the back the cards tries to tie in to the image on the front. When does that happen now? Mostly never, unless it's a World Series or AS Game subset. Usually the modern blurbs feel thoughtless and disconnected, so much so that I rarely read them.

That is right. I rarely read the backs of current cards.

But these cards are great. For instance, here we have Mattingly in a fairly unexciting spring training shot. But I like it! Feels behind-the-scenesy.

The back fo the discusses Don's performance in 1983 spring training as he battled to make the team.

Or look at this one. Don coming off the base likely as a pitch is being delivered.

The back of the card talks about Don's fielding being overshadowed by his bat. I don't fully buy that, even in 1991. He was always known as an excellent fielder. So maybe I don't believe the story, but hey it's a 20-card set. Gotta find some content.

I love this one, with Donnie peppering a practice net while hitting off a tee.

The back of the card talks about his dedication and work ethic.

Check out Donnie here. During BP just causally pumping so iron by the cage at Yankee Stadium. Lifting weights leads to more homers!

And the back talks about not knowing if Mattingly would develop any power. Young Donnie must not have hit the gym enough, but he obviously did develop into one of the games premier power hitters for a time in the mid-80s.

What a cool set. It's probably a lot to ask for nowadays, with card backs referencing the front.

But it sure is cool, and leads to some really interesting card backs.

Another post on patience

It's fun to get the shiny new toy as soon as it comes out. For me, that shiny toy is usually whatever new release Topps has decided to include Tino Martinez is.

Which lately, has been a lot.

It can be hard for me to not wait and to pay "new product prices," but more and more I'm finding that's just not necessary. My latest two Tino Martinez autographed cards are cases in point.

The Tino 2020 Topps Inception Dawn of Greatness are some very attractive cards. For real. Very aesthetically pleasing design. This card had a bit more of a competitive market because it is Tino's first Mariners certified autograph.

I eventually landed the /20 (which is the highest print run) and I felt pretty good about it, and didn't think I'd purse the Orange /10 or Blue /5. An orange was on eBay for $90, but I'm not paying that for a parallel when I already was content. I know some "supercollectors" feel the need for every variation, but I'm not one of them.

Eventually an Orange hit eBay with an auction, so I put in a max bid and never checked it again. Literally never did. I ended up winning it for the price of a blaster! And since blasters can't be found anymore in the real world, I thought it was a pretty good deal.

Similarly, Tino has this cool looking autograph in Topps Tribute called Iconic Perspectives. It's a thick, clearcut card. I'm a sucker for clearcuts. Always have been.

The highest print run for these are /99, and there are a few color variations with smaller runs. I made an offer on a /99 on eBay, and thankfully it wasn't accepted. The seller then reached our saying he'd give me my price shipped "off eBay", which I suppose was done to avoid fees.

I said "no thanks" and he couldn't understand it, because it was actually cheaper than my original offer since shipping wasn't included in my offer. I still said "no" and that "I'll wait for the price to come down." He still didn't understand.

As is the theme here, the price did come down. Once again for a blaster-type cost, I won won of these. This is actually a slightly rarer version Orange parallel /25.

Interestingly, his autograph looks a little sloppier and shorter here. He signed a bunch for Tribute, and I'm going to guess he was getting tired. 

You might be sick of hearing me talk about patience. These are things you already know and live by. But it's things I already know too, but don't always stick to.

So these posts are more a reminder to me to stay patient. The price will come down. It always does.