Happy Christmas and a Merry New Year!

It's almost 3:30pm around here so it's getting close to Christmas Eve and the opportunity to finally open my Christmas gift to myself.

A bunch of 24 Panini Cooperstwon packs!

I have them here since last month and I did a great effort to not open at least one before Christmas.

I will also have these Hockey packs to open that Edgar sent me and which I've been keeping too to open this evening.


I just want to wish you all a great Christmas and that 2015 brings all the good in the world.

Cameo card

I mean the umpire of course...

What are they looking at?

Rick Cerone is not liking what he's seeing...

...Lance Johnson is doubting what he's seeing...

...Jeff Wetherby is not that excited of what he's seeing.


So what it is they are seeing!?

It's the Chicken Dance!

Will Clark - Woman Perspective Post (Vintage Edition)

Here I am with more woman perspective on the field.

And in vintage mood again.

Blame the fact I'm new to this hobby and to baseball history and I'm getting to know vintage stuff.

And back then there were a couple of players quite interesting.

By the title you akready know I'm talking about Will Clark.

I have cards of him from his early years in the ML so I got to know his younger side.

1988 Topps Big #9

Look at that gentle smile. He looks like the boy next door.

Still trying to grow some beard.

But then looking at the action photo we see a sports boy. One of those that never leave the field until the last minute.

That is one good looking sporty boy!

And there is always a special thing about dirty uniforms...and tight ones too.

1988 Donruss Diamond Kings No. 21

This card is not very flattering for Will but I've seen worse! But got to say that if it was for this single card I would not pay attention to Will.

I proclaim at this very moment that the Diamond Kings series are quite the enemy for women. It scares the hell out of us and keep us away from sports cards.

1990 Upper Deck #556

What is so good about early '90s in Upper Deck is that we get almost 2 full photos of the players. And that is a great example for Mister Clark.

On the front a giggling Will.

Yes.

That is giggling in my book.

Man giggling.

But giggling.

And that is what draws me to Will Clark. The fun going on. The good vibe he passes with his smile.

I think of Will like the vintage Hunter Pence.

All smiles most of the times but when he is at bat he has this serious and committed face.

Just look at the back photo. I think he was caught looking but the look on his face shows me he is up for quite the swing in the next pitch.

1986 Fleer Baseball's Best Sluggers vs. Pitchers #6

This is the rookie card of Will in my collection.

I know that the '87 cards of him are the ones regarded as his rookie cards. But this one is the one for me.

And it's from '86. A year before the ones released in '87. That's why the AVG stated in the card says it's from Minor League.

This card made me think if Will has something going on. Like a small accident or so that made him have the lip a bit turned upside down on the left.

But really. It makes me want to pat him.

Yep.

Pat him.

That twisted smile makes me want to pat him.

1987 Fleer Limited Edition #8

'87 was the true rookie year for Clark in the Majors and here he is in the dugout.

The first year is always scary. He seems a bit lost.

I want to pat him again.

And those black eyes...uhhhhhh Makes his face longer!

Can I say I want to hug him?

1988 Fleer Sluggers vs. Pitchers #8

Ahhh the sophomore year.

Even the black eyes are bigger! No more longer face but a man face.

Young Clark has grown up quite nice!

Except for the spectacles. Was it fashion back in the '80s?

But in Will everything looks great.

And he seems more accustomed with all the people.

But really, where are the women? With Clark in the field the women should be the majority in the stands!

Ahhhh ok. I understand. They have all fainted already.

1989 Fleer SuperStars #8

This is the last card of Will Clark I have in my collection.

I have saved the best for last.

I don't know why, and cannot really explain why I like this card so much.

There is no smile nor a great pose to the photo.

It's simply Will Clark.

Bobby Witt '90 cards

Today's post is again about 1990 cards.

I'm going through my Upper Deck and Fleer cards of that year and check if I have the same players in both sets.

So here is a Bobby Witt post.

First his '90 Upper Deck #636 card.

This front photo looks like it was taken for his school year book. But If I were a teen at the time I'd probably be goggling all over this photo.

He sure looks handsome and...oh wait...this is no 'Woman Perspective' post.

Sorry there.

I already said that I truly like this Upper Deck card design, and for what I could see at least in '91 they repeated it but with a bit more colour on the back and the bar on the front is not on the top but on the right side.

That brings me to the card back where we have a photo taken during a game. To compensate the 'female magazine' front photo.

He seems to be trying to crack the code the Catcher is telling him.


Now his '90 Fleer #315 card

And there we have an action photo for the front of the card.

It seems the player back on the field is running for the wall to catch the ball hit by the player at-bat.

I like imagining the play just by looking at the photo. Primarily because it's fun and then because I don't know when that happen and never saw it. Like I can read in some blogs where fellow bloggers say they remember a specific game or play by looking at the card photo.

I try to make my own memories from the cards I collect.

The card back is the normal Fleer card back design. No photo...but with that 'Did you know?' stuff that I like.

And for what I can read Witt didn't have much to be proud of.

But that particular stat that make me recognize Witt from the others is the 'Led AL in wild pitches'.

So when I hear or read about Bobby Witt I just go 'Ohhhh The Wild Pitcher!'.

That's who Witt is for me the 'Wild Pitcher'!.

1990 Upper Deck Brett Butler

Todays post is about '90 Upper Deck card #119.

At first I was confused to which player the card was dedicated.

Then I noticed the player that was lying down was a Padres' player.

That's the problem of intertwined letters logos and teams using same colour scheme.

I noticed the stripes after that too.

Well, after all this I knew Mr. Butler were the one standing.

Butler is ranked #122 in the List of Major League Baseball players with 2,000 hits with 2,375 hits.

Looking quite good this card!

I imagine this being a 2B play. Just don't know if Butler were safe or not. since he seems like returning to 2B from 3B side.

But what stands out to me in the photo is that little cloud of dust. There, upon the Giants logo.

This makes the card eligible to figure in my 'dust-is-in-the-air' collection.

And looking at the card back...

...I'm sure it would make my collection two times!

Brett is making more dust to fly!

If I were Upper Deck, I'd switch the photos. The back photo is great. I cannot get tired of looking at this beauty.

This might be a photo from the next play. I can picture Butler keeping safe in 2B and then in next play stilling 3B.

There is a small shadow next to the base but since I don't see any body part from a player I think it might be from the 3B umpire. And Brett would be safe!

Having cards with photos of players batting is always cool. But I love to see photos of players playing defense and running the bases.

Every beat makes the game.

And if the beat makes the dust go all around hell yehhhhhhhhhhh!

1990 Fleer Joe Girardi

The moment I opened that '90 Fleer pack I got this big smile.

Yep. I got one card of a player I've never saw during playing years but know him from baseball world.

It's our skipper.

I only got to watch baseball back in '09. That's when my cable operator added ESPN America to the channels list.

So it was only then that I could assist an entire season. Or a single game for the matter.

And it was back then that I was introduced to Mr. Girardi.

I didn't even know he used to play for Yankees! I was that far away from baseball.

You can try and follow it from the web, by reading or watching youtube videos but is not the same thing I can assure you.

It only makes me feel like I'm really across a long ocean.

This card came in one of the 3 '90 Fleer packs I got alongside the '90 Upper Deck packs when I decided I'd try to know more about vintage players.

Yes, '90s is vintage for me because I know nothing from that time and even less I'd know from the '80s, '70s, and so on.

What I learned so far about baseball and collecting all came from the blogs I read and the possibility of buying some packs and boxes from time-to-time.

So with this card what did I learned?

I've learned that the first Girardi ML club was the Chicago Cubs for which he debuted in '89.

Also learned that he had changed nothing. The same looks. Only older of course, but the same Joe.

On the card back...

...I also learned he has a degree in Industrial Engineering.

That's cool.

E got one HR in his rookie year that's not bad. And he had .661 hits/game. Again not bad, thinking Catchers are not that impressive with a bat.

Girardi woulf play for Yankees between '96 and '99. I'd like to have at least one card from those years.

1990 Fleer Kirby Puckett

Kirby Puckett is a one-team-player. And that makes me like having his card.

Even if he's big enough to almost pop out of the card! That's the feeling I get everytime I see this photo.

He seems to be looking to a far ball, like he had sent it for a long trip.

was this a HR swing?

I like thinking it was.

This is '90 Fleer card #383. I like palindrome cards. So this is a plus to Mr. Puckett.

I got this card on one of the three packs I bought back when I started buying baseball cards.

So this was one of the first '90s cards I got right after buying 2010 and 2012 cards.

I thought I might try see what players were making fans happy back at XX century.

Looking at card back...

...one can see that Kirby have a MLB 6-year .323 BA at '90 season start.

After ending his career at '95 he got a career .318 BA.

That, for a newbie and probably for a expert collector, is quite awesome!

I think it would have been nice of Fleer to have the player on the 'Vital Signs' block to wear the real player number.

Kirby is a HOF since 2001 and if I didn't payed much attention to his card at first, after some reading and some youtube videos I started to look at it with a new light.

When we see a player during his playing years we know him, we remember those specific plays he made on that particular game.

With those players when we look at their cards we can almost see those images playing right in front of us, just by looking at the photo on the card.

But I new, at first that he might have been some player because I also got this card of him.

Bo Jackson I new was great and if together with Puckett they were the 'Human Dynamos' I was lucky enough to get his card.

Mike Flanagan - Fleer 1990

The Orioles are having the best season since a good couple of years. Right now they're 1.5 GB Yankees. I don't know if it is the retro bird that's helping them but they are truly making a run for the playoffs and something more.

And because of that this post goes to Mike Flanagan. Here is the 1990 Fleer card I got of him. Never mind it's from his Toronto times but that was all I got.

"Flanagan was a starting pitcher for the Orioles from 1975 through 1987. He was named to the American League (AL) All-Star Team once in 1978. The following year, the first of two times he would play on an AL pennant winner, his 23 victories led the circuit and earned him the league's Cy Young Award. He was a member of the Orioles' World Series Championship team in 1983." (info from wikipedia)

'79 was the year with most Ws for Flanagan in his career. And when he came back to Baltimore after the Blue Jays 4 seasons span, he even managed to pitch a no-hitter for the '91 season.

Will Baltimore make he playoffs alright and win something more? Will it be their year? Postseason is almost here to elucidate us.

1990 Upper Deck Jose Canseco

Can anyone tell me why is Canseco running away of the front photo?

I like this UD card design a lot!!!!

I like cards with 2 photos even if they usually have the secondary card small and usually only face-size. But here we have an almost 2/3 photos in the back of the card! That's plenty of image to look upon! Ok...if you like having all ML stats you may be snapping at me right now. I'm happy with a couple of years, like the last 5 years in max and a bigger photo.

       

And Canseco does have a good looking card back stats for that matter. For this specific card I'd say I'd switch the photos. The first one make me really think he is like falling of the picture.

His Yankee career is something to forget. But that's not his fault but the stolen-policy that I don't like! And believe it's not only in baseball. Having a team buying a player just for other team not having him, and then not even use his skills to play often is not something I believe in.

Well...none the less I'd like to have his Yankee card.