More of the Same

Earlier this month I walked away from a Target grocery run with several boxes of cards. I wrote about the first two boxes here and here, and today I'll recap the final one. This time we're talking Series Two.

I'll give it to you right at the top--none of the Series Two I opened held any hits, variations, or Luis Robert cards. If you're looking for those, you'd best stop reading now.

No, these boxes were pretty par from the course and included a steady diet of base cards and the occasional insert.

I'm not typically a big fan of insert sets that focus on a single player (the Gleyber Torres set from a year or two ago was annoying), though I'm okay with this Players of the Decade set featuring Mike Trout. Trout will go down as one of the greatest players of all-time, so that's more excusable than a rookie from New York.

I attempted to purchase the Dodgers team set on eBay when the set was released, but didn't find any listings with a low enough price. So I'll be chasing these the old-fashioned way. These boxes held four of the twelve Dodgers from S2.

A Turkey Red Joc Pederson dropped out of a pack, and I'll happily take it. Joc was nearly traded to the Angels in the offseason, but he's still a Dodger for now. Not so sure that'll be the case after this season.

Rounding out these cards with another Turkey Red, this time of an absolutely jacked Rickey Henderson. I'm not sure which stint with Oakland this photo is from, though I wonder if it coincided with Canseco and McGwire's--looks like he could be a third Bash Brother.

Happy Joc Pederson Day!

Well, Labor Day too.

Dodgers top prospect, Joc Pederson, should be called up for the expanded rosters today. For most Dodger fans, this is a long time coming. In honor of this special occasion, I decided to make up a couple of cards for the newest Los Angeles Dodger.

I'm not sure why one came out so much brighter than the other, but whatevs. I should be back to my daily posting tomorrow, but we'll see. It has been busy around these parts. 

Trade with Reader Douglas: Picking Up Some Prospect Autos

I completed my first trade with blog reader Douglas. He approached me after last week's trade bait post and we quickly agreed to a deal. 

Most appealing to me was this clean Joc Pederson auto. Pederson is the Dodgers top prospect but is stuck behind inferior talent.This is my only Pederson auto, but hopefully more will be in the future.

Sticking with Bowman Sterling, this auto comes from Dodgers 2013 2nd round draft pick, Tom Windle. Windle will probably be on the fast track to LA as a lefty-specialist, though with the stacked bullpen there is no reason to rush him.

Greinke is my newest binder guy, though more on that later. This card was more of a throw-in on our deal, but is still an awesome card. I dig these Pastime cards, licensing or not. This bad boy is #'d 122/125.

This card put the deal over the top and is my first auto of the 2013 1st round pick. IN fact, this is my first auto that is #'d 1 out of anything. This card hails from 2013 Leaf Memories, a set I am fairly indifferent on. The card isn't too shabby, though there is nothing exciting about it. Either way, I was able to pick up a seet John Hancock of one of the Dodgers top right handers on the farm. I now have my eyes set on Zach Lee.

In addition to the sweet ink above, Douglas sent over some set needs and miscellaneous Dodgers. Thanks for the trade Douglas. 

Joc Pederson Mini Refractor Contest

This contest is for a Joc Pederson Mini Refractor from 2013 Bowman. The winner will receive the card pictured below, as well as a stack of cards from a team of their choice. Contest ends 1/14/14 at 9:00pm PST. The rules will be explained below. Good luck!

To enter this contest, perform one of the two things below. You may perform both for a maximum of two entries per day.

• Comment on this post.
• Retweet one of my contest tweets on Twitter

Rules:
You can comment on the post once a day, and everyday you comment will add an additional entry into the contest. I will occasionally tweet about the contest, and you can retweet those to enter as well. However, only one retweet per day will count towards the contest. You must be following me on Twitter for your retweet to count. This helps me keep track of who is entering, and I like the followers. The winner will be selected using Random.org, and will be notified via email and/or twitter. The winner will have one week to send me their mailing address. I will ship the card to the winner for free!

Box Break Madness: Dodgers, Puigs, Autos and More

Friday night my LCS owner had a baseball box break. He was going to break two boxes of Bowman Sterling, a box of 2011 Leaf limited, a box of Topps Finest, a jumbo box of Bowman Draft Picks and Prospects, a box of WBC Tribute, and a box of Triple Threads, with the exception of the Leaf box, all were from 2013. A spot in this break cost 40 bucks, which is pretty damn good if you ask me. The problem was I had no card money and was initially left to watch.

My buddy Dikran, the same guy who got me this sweet Christmas present, heard about the break and decided he wanted in. Now, he isn't your average card collector. He doesn't have a favorite team, or a favorite player. He likes the big, chunk-a-licious hits you can find in the high end products. Because of this, he usually passes everything else down to me. If it has a decent value, I end up listing it on eBay, but for the most part I use the cards to complete sets and trades, or simply add them to my various PC's.

Dikran not only decided to buy a spot into the break, he bought three! That means triple the opportunity to pull some nice cards. 

The owner randomized the teams with the names and we were pretty ecstatic. The Phillies, Mariners and....the Dodgers!

Yay! I would be adding some new Dodger cards to my collection tonight, I thought. Seems like most of the guys in there thought that too and instantly attempted to buy the Dodgers from us. Nobody even got an offer out before I turned them down. This was finally our chance to get some Dodger cards from products I couldn't afford.

Time to rip some packs. I'll start with the hits from the Phillies.

Roman Quinn

Cord Sandberg

Jake Sweaney

Nothing too valuable. I have only ever heard of Roman Quinn, but I still don't know that much about him. I wasn't expecting much from the Phillies, but we ended up with three autos. Pretty damn good.

On to the Mariners. They have good high level prospects, so the potential here was good. Let's take a look at the hits.

Austin Wilson

Brad Miller

I have never heard of Austin Wilson before, most likely because he was a late second round draft pick of a team I don't follow, but he put up pretty good numbers at Stanford. Brad Miller is thought to be the Mariners shortstop for the next few years, but after adding Robinson Cano their infield became a little crowded. They may move Miller and stick Nick Franklin in at short, or they may move Franklin. They may also decide to not move any one. These were not my only Mariners autos though.

Taijuan Walker

Unlike the previous cards, this Taijuan Walker auto is a refractor #'d 73/150. It is going for about 10 bucks on eBay, but I plan on holding on to it. It sounds like he could be the next big thing, and with the attention Seattle has, a decent season from him would improve the value of the card. 

Now we can move into Dodgers territory. We were half way through the break before any Dodgers showed up, but they eventually did. Needless to say, I was very pleased with what we walked away with. I'll start with the non hits, and move down from there.

Absolutely beautiful cards of top prospect Joc Pederson, minus the Giant. I  do not understand putting rival team prospects on the same card, but at least the colors have a nice contrast. 

In addition to these base cards, I got about 25 Dodger bases from the varying products. Moving on to the big stuff now.

Shawn Green

One of my favorite players, if not my favorite, when I was growing up. This card is #'d 272/299, and will be placed with the rest of my Green cards. I plan on uploading my secondary player collections soon, so be on the lookout for that.

Chirs Anderson

My first Chris Anderson auto! The big righty was the Dodgers 1st round choice in this years draft, and has had a solid showing in the minors so far. He is someone to watch for, as he may make a late season debut in the bullpen this year.

Julio Urias

One of my favorite cards of the bunch comes from 17 year old lefty, Julio Urias. Urias sprung on to the scene this year, putting up gaudy numbers for the Great Lake Loons. The fact that he only recently turned 17 has many people turning their heads, including myself. Pitchers are hard to predict, especially when they are as far away from the majors as he is, but he seems to have the potential to be a very successful major leaguer. The Dodgers will have to teach him to sign is autos in a more central position though.

Adrian Gonzalez

I have been wanting to get my hands on an A-Gon auto for quite some time now. I would have liked to have had one with him in a Dodgers uni, but this gets the job done. It's a beautiful card, and didn't cost me a thing. The owner wasn't really running the break. A friend of his was sorting the cards as they were pulled and was jealous of our success. He is a big Dodger fan, which I learned from his Brooklyn hat and his Dodgers sweater. He got stuck with the Rays, who had very little cards to offer in the break and was obviously upset. When the A-Gon was initially pulled he tried to say the Red Sox person would get it. I said BS, this is a 2013 product from a guy the Dodgers acquired in 2012. He gave in and placing it in our modest stack of Dodgers,

  

Of course, there had to be some Puig's in all of this madness. In fact, I got three different Puig cards all with the same picture. Thank you Topps!

But the most valuable card we pulled from this was a different Puig. One with a different picture no less.

This by far, one of the nicest cards I have ever seen. It is the refractor parallel, meaning it's #'d 139/199. This baby sells for around 50 to 60 bucks on eBay, which is where it might end up. As much as I like Puig, I would rather sell it and use the money to buy some cool Kemp or Kershaw autos. If any Dodger fans want to make me an offer on it, I'll gladly listen.

At the end of the night, we walked away with 11 total hits, and a ton of other cool cards from the Dodgers, Phillies, and Mariners. The biggest hit was pulled by a friend of mine who didn't get to attend the break. He put a #'d /3 Yoenis Cespedes Auto Relic from Triple Threads. As nice as that card was, I am much happier with the haul we pulled in. Dikran was nice enough to pass all the cards down to me, though I will be looking to getting some nice cards for him to return the favor.

Every Non-Dodger card shown, except the Puig Sterling Refractor, is available for trade. I will add them to my trade bait shortly, so be sure to check that out.

Speaking of my Trade Bait, you may notice it is a little thin. I haven't bought many packs recently, which explains the shortage of hits. I'll look to buy some cards again when Series 1 comes out later this month. Expect more cool cards to come this year.