Another One for Ninety-One

It's been a while since I completed the (bulk of the) 1991 Upper Deck Baseball Master Set. The only stragglers are a handful of errors/variations that still need to be tracked down. I picked up one of those recently on ebay for a buck and fifty cents.

TCDB labels this as #636a Variation - Date on Front.

As opposed to the card I already had, #636b Variation - No Date on Front.

These are the others I'm still looking for:
309 Milt Thompson bullseye on back
311 Luis Salazar circled i in back
354 Don Mattingly missing stats on back
SS-11 Lance Parish Silver Slugger slanted number 11 on back

One Page Of Steve Kealey

This series will highlight "one page" at a time from my binder of correspondence and autographs from former Angels and Patriots  players.

  Steve Kealey RHP California Angels 1968-1970

Correspondence received prior to 2004.

About a Pound Of Patriots

Trade Mail From Swing and a Pop-Up

Wow, seriously, probably the biggest stack of Patriots cards I've ever received in a trade package. If not, then close to the top.

Stoked to get that Rod Rust. It's already in the mail to get his autograph.

And this knocks out a big chunk of 90's cards that I was missing.

I needed every single one.

I picked out a few to highlight.

1991 Pacific #318a Error

This error has his name spelled "Stevens" not Stephens on the front and back.

#318b has "Stevens" on the back only, I need that one.

And #318c is the correct version with "Stephens" on front and back, I need that one as well.

1991 Fleer Ultra #96

I like the action shot of a scrambling Tommy Hodson.

1991 Pro Set Platinum #308

Another cool full-bleed action shot of a sea of Patriots.

1989 Topps 1000 Yard Club #9

John Stephens again, but not an error card. Just a catchy design.

1991 Pacific #189

How'd you like your name to be Harry Colon?

That would stink (pun intended).

All these Pats are much appreciated Bert, thanks for scouring my want list.

Cardboard Collections Affordable Break Results

Cardboard Collections Affordable Group Break for May was boxes of 1994 Select Series 1 and 2, and 1995 Score Series 2. I selected the Angels and my second random team was the Dodgers.

1994 Select Series 1 and 2.

Nice haul on the team cards (not showing all the dupes), netted me one card short of a complete team set. Fortunately I already had the missing Spike Owen card to complete the set.

Bummer that I didn't pull any Angels hits.

My second random team was the Dodgers. I won't show those team cards except for this hit from the Series 1 box, a 1:24 Crown Contenders.

The group was nice enough to let me have the checklists.

Again, I was able to come one card short of the set, but again, I happened to already have that one missing card.

Didn't pull much team-wise from the 1995 Score Series 2 box.

I did however get a Gold Rush parallel of the Tim Salmon card!

 And three Gold Rush Dodgers.

I was able to get a set of the Series 2 checklists.

And a Gold Rush of one of them as well.

The box also included these sweet expired redemption cards.

Right up my alley!

Overall I'm happy with the results, and I enjoyed watching it live via Facebook.

Colbey also threw in a couple nice Angels cards:

2003 Fleer Focus Team Colors #TC-TG

2017 Donruss Optic #107

Thanks for the fun Colbey.

Rarest of Rare Find, 2018 Bowman

I'm not kidding ya, this is all I could find after checking about 8 different stores over the course of two weeks. What's going on? I don't buy that the shortage of packs is all the Ohtani hype. I think Topps is purposely holding out on us. Jerks.

Anyhow, let's see if I DON"T pull an Ohtani!

Exclusive Camo Pack

Meh.

PACK 1

1:2 Bowman Trending

1:3 Bowman Birthdays

1:4 Talent Pipeline

PACK 2

1:2 Bowman Scouts Top 100

1:3 ROY Favorites

PACK 3

1:2 Bowman Scouts Top 100

1:188 Base Purple Parallel #065/250

1:2 Bowman Trending

Yep.

Two Little Bricks Of Christmas In May

Trade Mail From Johnny's Trading Spot

Nice surprise, (Kinda. John has been doing this for the last several years at least), getting two bricks of Angels cards in the mail this week.

And very nicely wrapped at that!

Even before I saw the stickie, the wrapping tipped it off and sparked a memory from last year.

John wraps his bricks in newspaper, like Zippy uses old card wrappers.

Dead giveaways.

1984 Topps Rub-Downs

This is great because it leaves me only one sheet short (Tommy John) of the complete team set. Shouldn't be too hard tracking one of those down. Prior to these I've seriously thought about buying a box to rip, for the Angels team set, boxes are pretty inexpensive. Now I don't need to!

And John included the sweet checklist card.

This one will stay with the team set, because I count checklists as part of the team set if the Angels are in order (no pun intended).

1999 Upper Deck Black Diamond Diamonation

Not so sure what "Diamonation" means (Diamond-Nation, Diamonds-In-Motion, Dina-Motion?) I dunno. Be interesting if someone did a study on the the theme words that card companies have made up and used over the years.

1988 Topps Glossy Send-Ins

These two cards comprise the complete Angels team set.

1988-1989 Fleer Box Sets

Nice selection from these awesome box sets from the period. At one time I had a ton of these, but most have been traded away, except for the Angels of course. That Bryan Harvey does not seem familiar to me though.

I always like Angels minor league cards.

I'm pretty sure that I have never actually bought a pack of Just or Best from any year. In fact, I don't recall ever even seeing these brands where most retail cards are sold. I have to assume that they were only found at card shops, or by purchasing a whole box online. 

Salmons included in the mix.

And all the rest.

Lots of really great cards John.

Christmas in May/June/July is always welcome!

TTM Return From Todd Blyleven

1994 Fleer Pro Cards Boise Hawks #3343

94-95 Fleer Excel #18

Todd is the son of Bert Blyleven, and played in the Angels minor league system from 1993-1995.
He was signed as a non-drafted free agent in June, 1993. He returned these cards on May 10th, in 130 days from his work address.

It wasn't until I was creating this post that I found out Todd was at the Vegas concert shooting and was one of those brave individuals that ran in and out of the venue helping and carrying out victims. You can read more about it here. What a good dude.

Scored It Down: The Express Gets Shut Out

A blog series looking back through my old scorebooks, noting some of the more interesting games I’ve seen.

Tuesday, August 28, 1990
Rangers at Angels, Anaheim Stadium, 7:35 PM
Nolan Ryan (12-6) vs Kirk McCaskill (9-9)

Saw the Rangers Nolan Ryan pitch a complete game, walking 1, giving up 3 hits and striking out 11, but losing 2-0 to a complete game shutout from the Angels Kirk McCaskill. The game only took 2 hours, 7 minutes.

Some Kinda TTM Record

Kevin Romine returned these cards signed after 3,916 days, sent to his home in Fountain Valley, CA on August 1, 2007. I believe that is my longest wait for a return.

Romine never played for the Angels, however, we did go to the same high school in Fountain Valley. Pretty sure he played H.S. baseball with one of my older brothers.

Stickers From The Master Himself

Trade post from The Fleer Sticker Project

I've said many times that The Fleer Sticker Project is my favorite blog. I'm amazed at the depth of research that has had to go in to each post, and I'm constantly blown away at the thoroughness of his collection! Man, there's a lofty collecting goal for me to pursue.

I forget how it came about now, I think Jon might have left a comment on my blog offering to help out with my Fleer Sticker collection, an offer that blew me away first, just for the fact that the Fleer Sticker Project guy would reach out to little old me. It blew me away a second time when the package arrived.

That's a big chunk of stickers. I was especially happy for the 83's. I didn't start the my Fleer Sticker collection until long after I had discarded a ton of them. I had ripped at least two wax boxes of 1983 Fleer Baseball back then, and for some stupid reason didn't see the stickers as part of the set, so I used a bunch, trashed a bunch, and sent a bunch as trade package filler. Duh.

These two stickers completed my 1991 set. Jon also completed my 1986 set. You'll be seeing separate posts for those completed sets later.

Above are some of the 1983 variations. The Rangers cards show the differing order of the background colors from left to right. The Tigers stickers show the different directions of the PEEL font inside the arrows. Cool huh?

Other variations included the yellow or orange outline on the Brewers glove...

And the Astros and Red Sox pennants missing "Houston" and "Boston" above the team name.

It was most exciting going through these and checking them off my master list (which is a cut and paste printout from all Jon's blog entries on the various baseball sticker years). You need to make a soft-cover reference guide for Fleer Stickers Jon. That would be awesome.

Thanks again.