Here’s a short and sweet video where I open my first batch of 2018 Topps Heritage baseball cards. I’m chasing Dodgers and a Reggie Jackson auto.
In addition, I review Mosaic Wet Hopped IPA from Bootlegger’s Brewing. Enjoy!
Oscar Martinez
I was born in the shadow of Dodger Stadium and immediately drenched in Dodger Blue. Chavez Ravine is my baseball cathedral, Vin Scully was the golden voice of summer all my life, and Tommy Lasorda remains the greatest Dodgers manager ever. My favorite things are coffee, beer, and the Dodgers beating the Giants. I also blog about my baseball card hobby at All Trade Bait, All the Time.
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My mother threw out all my baseball cards. All the great cards of 50s and 60s. I’d be rich today
Mine went in a garage sale when I was overseas. I probably wouldn’t be rich today because of that though as I probably would have sold them to buy a car.
Does anyone still collect those?
I have a small collection now. Mostly I get Dodger cards. But I do have some others. Getting the older cards can be expensive. One thing I really wanted to do was get the entire set of 1959 Dodgers. Their first Championship team in LA. I got all of them on EBAY. Probably cost me close to 200.00. Most expensive was Koufax. And then Hodges and Snider. But I managed to get them all including the rookie cards which that year featured Bob Lillis and Ron Fairly. If you liked the older look, like I do, the heritage cards are the best. The hardest to find in the 1959 set was Wally Moon. He and the Jim Baxes card were 7th series. So was Gene Snyder. Snyder was the last one I got and it completed the series. Heritage cards take the design of years past and put the modern player in that card. I have Kemp in a 59 card and a 54. I also bought a couple of 59 heritage that had Roy Campanella and Jackie Robinson. Campy was in a Dodger card, and Jackie was on the Giants. When I was in high school a lot of my friends were getting rid of their cards and they gave them to me including a lot of early 50’s Bowman’s and Topps. So I had stuff like Mantles rookie card and Koufax’s too. My foster father made me throw them all in the trash. Mantles card was at one time worth over 100,000 dollars. It sells for close to 60 grand now. I had close to 2,000,000 cards.
Mr. Norris
I bet if you had close to 2 million cards, you chewed a bunch of gum.
Actually I did not. I chewed a bunch, but a lot of my cards were given to me and I used to flip for cards and won some that way. One time we were playing ball at Arroyo Seco park close to where I lived. I went into what was basically some woods behind home plate at the biggest field there. I was looking for lost baseballs. There were a lot of foul balls lost back there. This particular day I found about 4 balls, but I also found 2 boxes of baseball cards that had been opened and all the gum was gone. So were all the Dodgers, but there were plenty of good players in the cards I found. That was in 1959.
Two million cards?
Well, I guess the question of who was answered.
Talk on Rumors about Kershaw topping Greinke’s $34.4MM AAV at something like $241MM until age 37. Anybody want to predict in what year that contract becomes an anchor?
I always enjoyed the small stories on the back side of those cards. That’s where I read about the braves pitcher who hit two grand slams in one game. Fun stuff as a kid.
Tony Cloninger I remember that well,,,,,
Dave Roberts suggested today left field will likely be a platoon. I warned you all before. These guys have a full 162 game season plan before ST even starts, and ST is not going to change that.
YF
I just read that Roberts said leftfield would not be a strict platoon, so I don’t know where you read that, but this is what I read yesterday.
He did say after that, that guys would get regular days off, but he said there would be no strict platoon.
The “days off” will be against same side pitching.
Who knows? Roberts loves to change the lineup. He is on an ego trip.
Badger
I still think Kemp is going to get most of the at bats, in left.
And once he has his foot in leftfield, he will be hitting well, so he will probably only get timely days off.
Non of the other candidates, have a long history, of hitting righties better then Kemp.
Joc only had one decent year, according to his OPS, and Joc can’t hit lefties at all.
And Toles has done better, but he has only had 100 at bats, in each season, he has played in the majors.
And Kemp has more power then any of them, that is truly consistent, along with a decent batting average.
And Kemp has been hitting fourth, and Joc hits eighth or toward the back of the order, more then any where else.
And Kemp will be hitting fifth, so Cody gets better pitches to hit this year, and Kemp’s OBP should be better hitting in a better line up, like the Dodgers have.
Platoon in LF? Makes little sense since Kemp crushes pitches from both sides. But days off I could see against certain pitchers. Right now a player climbing on the depth chart is Jake Peter. He could replace Kike as the utility guy and is a plus because he hits from the left side. 2 hits yesterday in the awful looking game against the Tribe. Paredes got rocked, so his star is sinking. Peter has a leg up over Muncy.
I think Badger and Michael are right, they will make sure Kemp maybe gets days off, against certain pitchers, or when there is a platoon advantage, but we don’t have any one player, that hits better then Kemp that is competing for left.
On Catchers:
Roberts said Grandal’s swing is too long. “He’s searching right now,” Roberts said. Grandall os 0-for-11 and said Barnes will catch his first game “shortly.”
On players coming back from illness:
The team Still believes Seager has plenty of time to be ready to start season, despite interruption in throwing program.
On Prospect DJ Peters:
Dave Roberts: ” He’s going to will himself to the big leagues and stay for a long time.” Likes his work ethic and “compete” at the plate. While BA’s Kyle Glaser adds: Peters’ is ridiculously cut. Chiseled is the word that comes to mind. But as much as his physical skills, his quiet leadership and “blue-collar” work ethic drew raves from #Dodgers minor league coaches throughout last year
On Prospects:
Dustin Nosler is finally into his top 30.
http://dodgersdigest.com/2018/03/02/2018-dodgers-top-100-prospects-no-30-21/
Omar Estevez at 30.
One of the one I like to track, Melvin Jimenez at 23.
And Grandal has been with the team how long? It’s the same swing.
And what does Pederson’s swing look like?
Since none of us have a clue (taking Bluto’s approach to all baseball talk….that is we are all dumbass’ when it comes to baseball and have to wait to hear from the experts, a la Roberts), I’ll be waiting to hear from Roberts why Pederson’s career BA is .222. I see him swing and it looks like a Pete Rose swing but yet his BA is far from Pete Rose. I sure wish one of the genius’ would tell me why he struggles to hit major league pitching!
Hey Chili,
FanGraphs looked at Pederson’s swing last year:
https://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/joc-pedersons-improvement-in-one-swing/
Do did Beyond the Box:
beyondtheboxscore(DOT)com/2017/5/7/15557508/joc-pederson-dodgers-swing-changes-just-pick-something
FanGraphs article from a year ago….are you kidding me?
Pederson went on to hit…..drum roll please…. .212 with his lowest home run total and worse OPS.
Why reference an article that was proven wrong? Or is that one of the experts you listen to?
Just saying that people have looked at his swing. Spring training just started for this year!
I love FanGraphs. It’s excellent and wise. Great writing. Don’t know the other site well.
All squirrels have long swings. Squirrel can go 1 for 6 with a home run and be a hero.
Why is Joc still here? He isn’t. I traded him to Minnesota for 2 deep fried butter sticks (it’s a Minnesota thing) and International money with which I signed Ohtani. The fried butter I gave to Timmons and Catbox.
The guy that Pederson most compares with is Randal Grichuk.
Both have been in the bigs for 4 years (well both came up late in 2014.)
Grichuk has 36 fewer plate appearances.
Grichuk career #’s…. .785 OPS, .249 BA, 66 HR’s, 182 RBI’s, 15 SB’s
Pederson’s career #’s…. .780 OPS, .222 BA, 62 HR’s, 157 RBI’S, 14 SB’s
As Grichuk fell out of favor with the Cardinals FO due to his inconsistent play they moved him for a reliever and a prospect.
If there are not enough AB’s for the OF’s on the roster, why isn’t Pederson gone already? It doesn’t take a genius to see what he is and what he will be.
Or do I recall reading that Joc is in the fantasy football league….hmmm.