Welcome Chase Headley!

Welcome to NY, Chase Headley. Let's hope a change of scenery brings him back to his 2012 form. Regardless, nice gamble by the Yanks for a career minor leaguer and a high-A pitcher.

And so long to Rafael DePaula. I like ya, don't love ya, but I wish you the best. I've always got this 1/1 auto to remember you by!

TTM Success: Rafael DePaula

Yankees prospect Rafael DePaula signed one 2013 Bowman Chrome from me in about three weeks time. DePaul is one of the Yanks' better pitching prospects, repetting the team at the Futures Game last season. He didn't finish strong last year, and he's been so-so right now in A+. He has a lot of Ks, but also a lot of walks.

I own a few other DePaula autos, and they look a bit different from this. I'm thinking he may shorten his signature when signing in bulk. Sure looks that way, right? Or maybe they are just all fake, who really
knows?

A pair of PWEs

I could stop doing formal trades and just send PWEs back and forth and be completely content. I've loved this trend over the past year or so.

The first PWE was courtest of Ptown Tom of Waiting Til Next Year. Tom sent me a few 2013 Bowman Chrome Yankees. These will come in handing for some spring training TTMs.

The next was from Chris over at View From The Skybox. He sent a very diverse six cards, three of which are below. He basically hit everything I collect in one PWE, which was really cool. I love the Piniella especially.

Thanks, guys!

Signtature inconsistencies

I recently had the fortune of picking three Rafael De Paula certified autograph cards. As previously posted, one was actually a 1/1 and I didn't know it.

I also won an auction for a 2013 Bowman Chrome autographed rookie card. All three are on-card autos, and all three look quite a bit different.

The Bowman Chrome signature is quite a bit more narrow than the Leaf ones. He definitely used a more fine-point Sharpie. He also started his signature closer to the middle of the card. Nearly all of the Bowman Chrome autos of his I searched for has this tendency of being on the right hand side of the card as well. I like a nice, centered auto, but I don't think it exists for Bowman Chrome.

The 1/1 Leaf auto probably looks as different from the other two as possible. It actually slightly goes off the card, which is a little annoying.

If anything, I think it shows that as guys sign their names hundreds or thousands of times in a row, they are going to get a bit lazy, a bit sloppy, and a bit inconsistent.

An accidental 1/1

Over the past month, I went on a certified autograph spree. I’m not quite sure why. Perhaps it was my lack of TTMs and I needed to fill the void. I enjoy certified autos very much, I just never really actively shop for them. I’ll always take them in trades though, which is how I’ve acquired most of the ones I had before this little binge.

Anyhow, I notice a lot of Yankee prospects that ’m a fan of had some newer 2013 autos from Bowman, Panini, and Leaf (Leaf?!), so I put in a few low bids on eBay and won a few more cards than I planned on, but nothing was overly expensive, so no real harm. A little Christmas-time treat for myself, I said.

In my aggressive bidding, I won two of the same Rafael De Paula Leaf autographs. Or so I thought. De Paula is an intriguing prospect who was the Yankees representative in the Futures Game last July. No big deal, I was happy to have the cards and felt like I could find a home for the dupe. Then it arrived and I realized it wasn’t a dupe at all!

The first one that arrived is this purple refractor-type card from Leaf. It was numbered 28/50 on the back, so a nice low number, whatever that means. 

Then the second one arrived a day later. I was expecting more of a shine-less base card since the eBay item description said “This is not the numbered version.” That’s all it said. Knowing nothing about Leaf and their tiers/parallels, I just figured this was somehow less rare.

So I flipped it over, and sure enough, no number. But upon inspecting the front, I saw a different logo. It was a “Holiday Bonus” logo. Faintly under the logo, I saw 1/1 hand-written. No way, I thought. It has to be written on the penny sleeve. I slid the card out of the sleeve, and sure enough, 1/1 stayed on the card. Holy crap!

So I checked eBay and found a bunch more 1/1’s of different players with “Holiday Bonus” on them. Turns out, Leaf issued a few Holiday Bonus packs with autos and relics from previously released Leaf products.

The seller definitely missed this, and I did too until it arrived. I paid $2 for this card, and it could probably fetch $25-30 on eBay, maybe more. Not a huge number, but certainly a nice return on my investment.

Has anything like this ever happened to you?

Happy Not Opening Day! (for me)

Well, since it’s not Opening Day for the Yanks until Friday, I suppose I’ll celebrate Opening Day for their minor league clubs. I love following Yankees prospects and picking up their cards. I don’t hedge my bets on them and stockpile in hopes of flipping them for money, but I do enjoy collecting them. It’s also fun to send them TTM requests in hopes of acquiring their signatures before they make it big – never a sure bet when collecting prospects.

Here are six Yankees prospects – three position players and three pitchers – who I’ll be watching closely this year.

Mason Williams – OF

Mason burst onto the scene last year and skyrocketed up prospect charts this year. He was a 4^th round pick in 2010 and is a super athletic CFer. While the power isn’t there yet, many believe he can turn into a Jacoby Ellsbury type player. It’ll be interesting to see if he lives into the hype this year. If he does, he’ll be one of the Top 50 prospects in baseball at this time next year.

Dante Bichette, Jr. – 3B

A somewhat surprising first round pick in 2011, little Dante delivered ins short season ball. He’ll make the jump to full-season ball this year after dominating rookie level competition. His defense has been adequate enough that he is going to stay at 3B for now, although don’t be surprised to see him eventually moved to the OF and follow in his dad’s footsteps.

Tyler Austin – OF

Austin is a corner infielder who will likely spend most of his time in the OF this year. He has a big time bat, something that the Yanks sorely need to develop.  He hit some mammoth HRs this spring and I anticipate he’ll do the same in Charleston.

Jose Campos – RHP

Campos was acquired in the Michael Pineda deal, and he may end up being the more valuable pitcher. Just 19, he gears it up into the high 90s with pinpoint control. Scouts are raving about him this spring, saying he could develop into a #1 or #2 starter. It’s too early to tell, but the Yanks may have a future ace in A ball.

Rafael DePaula – RHP

Signed over a year ago but just made it to the US due to Visa issues, DePaula is an exciting international signing. He lost some development time while he waited, but most believe he is a Top 10 prospect in the system despite never having played a game for a Yankee minor league affiliate.

Manny Banuelos – LHP

My favorite player in the Yankees system, the little lefty is on the verge of the major leagues, and I think we’ll see him in the Bronx in 2012. He has a mid-90s fastball and excellent secondary stuff. He had uncharacteristic control issues in 2011, but there’s no denying that he is a future big league starter. With the logjam in the Yanks rotation, we may not see him until September, but once we do I have a feeling he’ll be here to stay.