Fuji Funds My Nest Egg

I was one of the luck 30 or so people to receive a mailing from San Jose Fuji over the last week.

First and foremost, I'd like to pause this post to go throw these in a safety deposit box...

...because my kids's college education is now set!

My favorite card of the package is this Joe Pepitone card. It's a fascinating card from 1968 Atlantic Oil. "Collect card 7 and win $10." That is a lottery! Baseball cards are gambling anyways. This card is very very cool. By the way, $10 in 1968 would be about $74 now. More nest egg fuel!

Fuji hit my PC guys with a Ty Hensley auto and a Tino RC. For what it's worth, I still consider this Tino's RC even though it's probably not factually correct. Oh well!

What a gift. Or two gifts! I really like these relic cards. Although I'm confused as to why the gray on each of these has a different texture. I assume they are taken from different uniforms, such as part of a spring training jersey or players weekend jersey.

Speaking of Severino, I'm very sad about his TJ Surgery news. He's such a talented pitcher, but this just doesn't bode well. Maybe he'll be back at the end of 2021, but with last year being mostly lost due to injury, and now this, there will be a lot of "what could have been" when looking back on his career.

Fuji rounded out the package with a TCMAs that are older than me, and a Ryan Sink Bowman Chrome auto.

Great package from a great person. Thanks, Fuji!

Thanks, Didi

Didi Gregorius signing with the Phillies capped his Yankees career.

It wasn't big news, as the Yanks were still a bit elated about Gerrit Cole at the time. 

But he will be missed. He was a great player and I'm not sure any shortstop could have performed the way he did in a very tough situation, which was replacing a Yankees legend. He reminds me quite a bit of the burden Tino had to deal with when he replaced Don Mattingly.

He evolved into a middle of the lineup force, and hit some massive post-season homers.

Didi's TJ surgery was unfortunately what began to end his career with NY. He came back and just didn't quite produce the way he had before, although he still managed to hit 16 homers in 82 games.

But what is also showed was that Gleyber Torres could handle the everyday SS duties. And with DJ LeMahieu and and Miguel Andujar coming back, letting Didi go was the easy way to save some $$ for the Cole signing.

Didi was a team leader and a great personality, and I wish him nothing but success in Philly. Here is a card I picked up of him right before he left:

Thanks, Didi.

Utz Utz Baby

In the past few weeks, I've seen a lot of card folks posting about 2019 Topps Utz promo cards. Essentially, this is a 100 card promo set inserted into snack pack bags of Utz chips. The cards look just like a 2019 Topps card, but with an unmistakable Utz logo on the front, similar to Topps Opening Day.

Also similar to Opening Day - no foil!

Mark Hoyle was kind enough to send me Didi Gregorius, the first card I've received from this promo. I'm all for food-issue and other oddballs, and given how few of them we get in modern times, this is a nice win for the card collecting community.

The rest of the Yankees checklist includes:

4 Aaron Judge
9 Johnathan Loaisiga RC
12 Gleyber Torres
37 Chance Adams RC
42 Aroldis Chapman
53 Didi Gregorius
54 Miguel Andujar
55 Luis Severino

And the complete checklist:

1 Buster Posey
2 Yadier Molina
3 Brandon Crawford
4 Aaron Judge
5 Lorenzo Cain
6 Aaron Nola
7 Whit Merrifield
8 Wade LeBlanc
9 Jonathan Loaisiga
10 Adam Jones
11 Dansby Swanson
12 Gleyber Torres
13 Javier Baez
14 Steven Duggar
15 Kyle Tucker
16 Shin-Soo Choo
17 Jesus Aguilar
18 Sean Reid-Foley
19 Nick Markakis
20 Kohl Stewart
21 Francisco Arcia
22 Khris Davis
23 Shohei Ohtani
24 Ryan Zimmerman
25 Nolan Arenado
26 Kris Bryant
27 J.D. Martinez
28 Ramon Laureano
29 Byron Buxton
30 Joey Votto
31 Blake Snell
32 Clayton Kershaw
33 Carlos Correa
34 Todd Frazier
35 Corey Dickerson
36 Ronald Acuna, Jr.
37 Chance Adams
38 Trea Turner
39 Mookie Betts
40 Paul DeJong
41 Austin Hedges
42 Aroldis Chapman
43 Josh Harrison
44 Rhys Hoskins
45 Max Scherzer
46 Willson Contreras
47 David Bote
48 Justin Turner
49 Miguel Cabrera
50 J.T. Realmuto
51 Robinson Cano
52 Starling Marte
53 Didi Gregorius
54 Miguel Andujar
55 Luis Severino
56 Jonathan Schoop
57 Jake Bauers
58 Trey Mancini
59 Kyle Schwarber
60 Salvador Perez
61 David Price
62 Dee Gordon
63 Nick Pivetta
64 Francisco Lindor
65 Joey Gallo
66 Corey Kluber
67 Jeff McNeil
68 Jake Arrieta
69 Freddie Freeman
70 Brad Keller
71 Jose Ramirez
72 Julio Teheran
73 Mike Clevinger
74 Cedric Mullins
75 Eric Hosmer
76 Matt Carpenter
77 Harrison Bader
78 Justin Verlander
79 Miles Mikolas
80 Mike Trout
81 Jacob deGrom
82 Corey Seager
83 Jose Altuve
84 Michael Conforto
85 Juan Soto
86 Charlie Blackmon
87 Johnny Cueto
88 George Springer
89 Marcus Stroman
90 Jose Quintana
91 Jake Lamb
92 Christian Yelich
93 Brian Anderson
94 Eddie Rosario
95 Matt Chapman
96 Edwin Diaz
97 Ryon Healy
98 Paul Goldschmidt
99 Ryan O'Hearn
100 Nicholas Castellanos

When the throw-ins are better than the card purchased

My eBay Bucks were going to expire late last week...all $1.50 of them.

I wanted to spend them on a card without spending extra, so I gave myself a fun challenge. Most of the cards I found were pretty standard base cards, like $.99 with free shipping. But then I saw this for $1 plus $.50 shipping, so I snagged it.

Sonny Gray is in the dog house and won't be returning to NY. Brian Cashman has been very open about wanting to trade him. For whatever reason, Gray never figured it out in NY. I am certain he'll be bounce back wherever he ends up. Anyhow, I thought it would be cool to have a relic of him as a Yankee, given that his tenure will end up being just 1.5 seasons with the team.

The seller also threw in two cards around the Gray gray swatch:

I was actually more excited about these, especially the Montgomery!

In all, I think I did pretty well for my massive amount of eBay Bucks.

His inner Kid

In the latest Sports Illustrated for Kids issue, I was happy to see a Yankee included in the uncut 9-card sheet. I don't believe there's been one since 2016, when Gary Sanchez was included.

One might expect it to be Aaron Judge (hasn't received an SI Kids card yet), Giancarlo Stanton, or perhaps Luis Severino. However, it ended up being one of the Yankees biggest kids, Didi Gregorius. Unfortunately my card got bent a little in the mailbox, which is always a possibility.

Didi plays with a kid-like enthusiasm, and is certainly a terrific role model for kids, so hard to be upset with this post. Not only does he exhibit exuberance on the field and in the dugout, but his post-game emoji-filled Tweets are the best in the game. Every player has their own emoji (except him!).

Outside of Didi, there weren't many notable stars. Dak Prescott of the Cowboys was definitely the biggest name.

All in all, another fun month of cards from SI for Kids.

Sometimes red ink is ok

I remember being a student and getting a paper or test returned. A lack of red ink usually meant I did pretty well. The more red ink, the worse it was going to be. I remember a biology test once where it looked like my teacher cleaned up a murder scene with my paper.

But there are times when red ink can be ok. In fact, it can signify an A+. In this instance, this is my first red ink autograph of anytime, and it comes to me courtesy of Collecting Cutch:

Look at that beaut! That is a card I've wanted for a long time. The red ink as part of a Team USA card makes it even cooler in my opinion.

Equally as cool for me is a card I never thought I'd find, let alone own. This is when relics were still pretty new, and having three star members of the Yankees on one? Good luck. It's still a hard card to locate, and I'm not sure how Mr. Cutch tracked one down and sent it my way.

Part of me thinks Brian (the mastermind behind Collecting Cutch) looks out for me because I'm a fellow player collector, but I know he's helped my collection far more than I've helped his.

He also sent me a few cool Yankee cards. This card stuck out to me. Is Clemens about to throw the bat at Piazza here, only to be blocked out by the Upper Deck Vintage logo???

Also, the back tells me Tino had three hits! Cool. I don't remember that.

A Stanton base card! This are still new and rare and exciting to me. It's my second after Heritage.

A few more from 2018, including a rookie of Miguel Andujar. He has 9 hits this year, and 6 have gone for extra bases. Once he settles in, he's going to be a good one.

Oh, and this guy is really good too. Just gets better by the game, it seems.

Brian, this was a beyond generous card package, with two big old whales I never thought I'd get. Thank you!

2018 Opening Day Lineup

Opening Day! Very exciting. The Yankees stink on Opening Day, so I fully expect a loss. In fact, they've lost 6-straight Opening Days. That's bad!

But I'm excited. Hopefully this is the year to get in the W column on day 1.

Here's the lineup the Yankees will trot out there today. Best of luck to all of your teams - except the Red Sox.

LF - Brett Gardner

RF - Aaron Judge

DH - Giancarlo Stanton

C - Gary Sanchez

CF - Aaron Hicks

SS - Didi Gregorius

3B - Brandon Drury

2B - Neil Walker

1B - Tyler Austin

SP - Luis Severino

Hertiage breakin'

I was fortunate enough to buy a lot in Nachos Grande's three-box Heritage break. I'm glad I did too, since my Target has been bone dry when it comes to Heritage.

Gavin mentioned it, but the collation on the three boxes didn't seem great. Although not SPs, I was unable to land base cards of Aaron Judge, Giancarlo Stanton, Gary Sanchez, Chad Green, or Clint Frazier. Not quite what you'd expect. I was still really happy with my haul below, but I definitely expected at least one of those guys.

I got on the board early with a Chrome Refractor of Didi Gregorius #'d to 569. These fall 1:61, so that was a good start for me. It's a great looking card too.

In the very last pack, there was a black border card. Although not serially numbered, it looks like these are limited to 50 cards of each and fall 1:51. Chris did a great reveal where we knew it was a Yankee, and I was praying for Judge, Stanton, or Sanchez as he slowly showed the card. It ended up being this guy. Not bad!

While I didn't get a Sanchez base, I still did pretty well with him, including two inserts and a couple of The Topps News All-Star cards.

I wasn't completely shut out on Judge!

I found the back of this card interesting, as it mentions that Cooper is no longer on the Yankees.

And there's Big Mike's (likely) last Yankees card. Good luck, sir.

As part of the break, we also got a random team. I was assigned the D-Backs, so I was hoping for a cool Goldy. And I got one!

Chris, you ran a great break - from the organization to the live stream to the shipping. Thank you!

Pirates fans are good to me!

The two Pirates fans I regularly swap cards with - Bob Walk The Plank and Collecting Cutch - are very good to me. In fact, my last two "just because" card packages have come from them.

Last weekend, I showed off a few cards from Matt at The Plank. That same day, a bubble mailer from Brian at Collecting Cutch arrived.

Easily, the highlight was this sweet Didi Gregorius autograph from Topps Tribute. What a great card. I don't mind that he's featured as a Diamondback, as the red actually looks awesome. It's also a reminder of how well the trade has worked out for the Yankees.

Smile! You've got French's. I have 100% never seen this oddball set. It's awesome! Great looking cards, and tempting to try and get it dual-signed via TTM. Hmmm...

SI! I didn't have this Jeter cover, but remember it well. Love having it as a card. The Pettitte is cool too. I like the simulated stats on the back. In 1998, Pettitte went 16-11 with a 4.24 ERA and 146 Ks...a step down from the previous few years and his projection, but not too bad. I still get SI each week, but honestly it just goes in the trash most week. Who has time to read it?

Tino! I'll always love Collector's Choice

While I'm not the biggest WBC fan, it's hard not to love adding an additional new Jeter to the collection! Not a bad looking card, either. Nice, clean design. It's always odd seeing Jeter in another uniform. I guess I should get used to seeing him in one of those ugly Marlin hats.

Lastly, I really like this Diamond Kings Gary Sanchez. I think this set looked great.

Brian, thanks, my friend! I'll keep my eye out from some sweet new McCutchens!