does raul mondesi regret his tattoo, and other random musings

while it is true that raul mondesi had a cannon for an arm, i wonder if the cannon tattoo visible on his 1998 upper deck card

was fully thought out.  from one angle it looks like a cannon, although the fuse is still lit even though the cannon has discharged, and from another angle one might mistake it for some sort of rocket. or something else, i suppose.

the back of that card is pretty interesting, too, as we have pylons and a car in the background.

i'm also curious about mondesi's 1996 fleer emotion xl card, although it's no fault of his that the emotion fleer slapped on there is 'pounding'

i don't feel pounding.  or tardy, for that matter.  what was fleer thinking?

along the same lines of lack of thought, here are a few other cards that i've scanned without a real purpose. although i suppose you could say that i scanned them for inclusion in a random cards from my scanned folder post, so there was a purpose. whatever.

1987 topps orel hershiser

1990 donruss mickey hatcher

1992 score rookie and traded carlos hernandez

1997 topps stadium club pedro astacio

2007 topps heritage derek lowe

2009 upper deck o-pee-chee scott elbert black parallel

and 2012 bowman chrome prospects jt wise

as in wise enough to not consider 'pounding' to be an emotion?

taking the trade train from p-town

tom from waiting 'til next year let me know that he had found some oddball dodger card, and asked if i would be interested. of course i would! so, the cards were sent my way, and my collection is all the better for it.

the package included some 'swell' cards, including actual swell cards, of which one was this 1990 swell baseball greats steve garvey card

i've got one in the garvey binders, but needed one for the dodger binders.  excellent.

there were also quite a few 1975 (some say 1976) sspc cards, such as willie crawford

crawford was traded after the 1975 season to make way for reggie smith in the outfield so i can't really complain about the dodgers not keeping him around, but he had some solid years as their right fielder.  crawford won a world series ring at the age of 18 in 1965, and helped the club return to the fall classic in 1974, too.  he almost became a double dipper as part of the team of my youth, but didn't make the club out of spring training in 1977.

there were a bunch of pacific legends, too, like this 1990 clem labine card

labine was a 2-time all-star and a key cog on the dodgers' 1955 world championship team, so i'm glad to see him get some cardboard appreciation.

here's a very cool 2009 tristar obak duke snider card

he's shown as a member of the fort worth cats, which puts this image from 1946.  snider spent that season with the dodgers' double-a affiliate, playing alongside future dodger coach monty basgall.

tom was kind enough to include an insert card of the reigning cy young award winner and mvp, clayton kershaw - a 2014 donruss diamond kings card

modeled after the 1984 version of the diamond king subsets.  you all know who the first dodger diamond king was, don't you? yes, it was steve garvey.

here's a 2012 bowman chrome prospect card of o'koyea dickson

he was a 12th round pick in 2011, and spent 2014 at double-a chattanooga.  will he make the jump to okc in 2015?  let's wait and see.

here are a couple more cards from the package that may not otherwise have warranted a scan - 1994 donruss billy ashley

and 1987 donruss brian holton

this may well be the first time anyone has bothered to scan a 1987 donruss brian holton card.  you're welcome.

thanks for the cards tom!

scratching my joc itch

i wouldn't necessarily call it legal advice, but i received a package a couple of weeks ago from the stackhouse law office in farmington, new mexico.  in it, corey noted that during his time watching albuquerque baseball (it's been the home of the dodger triple-a team since 2009, as it was from 1972 through 2000 with 2003-08 spent as the marlins' triple-a affiliate), joc pederson is the best he's seen.

behind the note were a number of pederson's cards, instantly increasing my joc collection by 10 or so cards.  here they are:

2011 topps pro debut

2012 bowman chrome prospects

2012 bowman prospects

2012 topps heritage minors

2012 topps pro debut

2013 bowman topp 100 insert

2013 bowman chrome cream of the crop mini refractor

2013 bowman chrome draft picks & prospects

2013 bowman draft picks & prospects

2013 bowman platinum prospects

2013 topps heritage minors

2013 topps heritage minors 1964 bazooka style insert

2013 topps pro debut

now i'm sure that this new mexico attorney is not one to fib (saul goodman he is not, i am sure), so i'll take him at his word.  plus, here's the back of the 2013 bowman chrome cream of the crop mini refractor

that's not bad company.

as a dodger fan, i have been following pederson the last four-plus seasons as he has climbed through the organization.  so far in his first season in the abq, he has 23 homers in 94 games to go along with 25 steals and a .315 batting average.  and, as a dodger fan, i recall monster numbers that mike marshall and greg brock and franklin stubbs put up in albuquerque a generation ago.  still, i was a bit nervous at the trade deadline when some talking heads were reporting the pederson was potentially available in trade talks.

listen to the lawyer, ned.

hall of famer ron santo's memorial patch

i am sure that many have said it, but i most recently recall bert blyleven noting that one is either a hall of famer or they're not.  the idea of being a hall of famer, but not a first ballot hall of famer, is silly.  you are or you aren't.  but, when people are involved, and in this case baseball writers and then veteran committee members, it sometimes takes a while to get things right.  ron santo was a hall of fame player. we didn't get to see him be recognized as such, however, until about a year after he passed away in 2010.

the cubs wore a '10' patch (santo's number) during the 2011 season.  you can kind of see it on starlin castro's right sleeve here on his 2012 topps card

he's turning two!

but it's much easier to see on castro's 2012 topps archives card

at the all-star game, the patch got moved to the left chest as memorial patches often do.  here's castro's 2011 topps update diamond anniversary cognac thingy to prove it.

before all that, the patch was on the left sleeve (spring training, i presume) as demonstrated by matthew szczur on his 2012 bowman chrome prospects card

szczur?  i would love to hear harry caray try to pronounce that.

i had the pleasure of meeting santo back in 2005 or so at a work related function.  he signed a ball for my son, and i told him that i hoped he would get the call from cooperstown.  it's too bad that call didn't come until 2011.

double dutch

i recently posted some cards from a package sent by jeroen, the dutch card guy.  here are some more boys in blue sent by the orangeman.

2012 panini triple play matt kemp

this is the first time i have featured any of these on the blog.  i did buy a couple of packs of the stuff when it was released, just out of curiosity.  

this might be the last time james loney appears on the blog. this is his 2012 bowman card

the same set (i think?) that this joc pederson card came from

but different from this 2012 bowman chrome prospects jt wise card.

bowman is too confusing.

jeroen included some minis - like this 2012 topps mini andre ethier

and the double play turning dee gordon.

that's cool because now i have a dupe of the gordon for the double play binder.  same for this next card, a 2013 topps emerald parallel of gordon, once again, turning two.

the other cards in the package were 2013 minis of adrian gonzalez

and clayton kershaw

i know jeroen collects kershaw, so i appreciate him giving this one up.

thanks for the cards jeroen - good luck with your studies!

oh, bowman - why must you confuse me?

ok, this card is pretty straight forward.  it's a 2012 bowman card of matt kemp.  

as i mentioned yesterday, i don't buy bowman product so i get these cards as part of trades.  case in point, the kemp was sent to me by marcus at all the way to the backstop, and it is much appreciated.  also included in the package was this card

it's apparently a 2012 bowman chrome prospects card of joc pederson.  that's what i'm calling it anyway, due to the card number 'bcp104' on the back.  now i am assuming that this card was inserted into a pack of regular old bowman like the one that yielded the kemp card.  typically, i categorize inserts by the base set that they come with.  that's why posts where i show a gold parallel or a mini or a crazy looking insert will just be labeled with the basic set from which it came.  i can't have labels like '2010 topps update vintage legends' or some such nonsense.  like this next card, which came from 2012 topps archives, but is a 1958 topps combos insert.

to me, it is 2012_toppsarchives_kershaw-koufax, not 2012_toppsarchives1958toppscombo_kershaw-koufax.  so, back to the bowman chrome prospects card.  normally i would just call it 2012_bowman_pederson_chrome, but bowman has me so confused that i broke down and labeled it with the bowman chrome prospects tag.

thank goodness there were some good old fashioned non-insert cards included in the trade.  some double plays to boot!  here's a 1993 upper deck mariano duncan, with not one

but two turns at second.

hello, mike scioscia!

luis rivera

over jorge (george) bell

a couple of twinkies - 2012 topps trevor plouffe

and 1992 score greg gagne

and finally mike brumley's 1992 score card

with an almost unnoticed appearance by cal ripken, jr.

thanks for all the cards, marcus.  especially the ones that were easy for me to catalog.