Song for A Sunday Night

Tonight's song was #264 on Rolling Stone's 2004 list of the greatest songs of all time.

Autographed Baseball Cards A-Z

When I got back into collecting five or so years ago one of the things that excited me was the availability of autographed cards.  Perhaps I went a little overboard but I think I picked up some nice cards.  This will be an A-Z series of posts with varying numbers of cards.

2005 UD Signature Decades #SD-LB 29/50

This is my favorite set for autographed cards.

1999 Fleer SI

This is probably my second favorite set.

 2005 Topps #TA-LB

Nice to have Lou as a Cub at least for variety.  Sorry for the blurry scan. My new scanner has trouble with anything dimensional.

 2004 Topps #TA-TB

2004 Donruss Recollection Collection 19/25

Buckner filled in for Bob Brenley last night as color man on the Cubs-Red Sox game on WGN.  He was good but his voice kind of puts me to sleep.  He was a hell of a hitter.

2005 UD Signature Decades #SD-JB

Why is it that former athletes who go into politics always seem to be Republicans?

2003 UD Pride of New York # PN-LB

Lew only pitched in two games for the Yankees (at the end of the 1950 season).  He was the 1957 World Series MVP for the Milwaukee Braves.

2009 UD Goudey #GG-BY

Marlon plays the game like it should be played.  I think he's make a good coach or manager some day.

Capes?

Is this the strangest ballpark giveaway you've ever seen?

The Tampa Bay Rays are giving these away on Sunday, May 29  to the first 10,000 kids 14 and under.  They commemorate Sam Fuld's "heroic" diving catches.

Maybe "Cape Night" will inspire Sam at the plate.  After hitting .289 in April, he's dropped to .145 so far in May.

The Lost Collector brought up Jason Giambi Mustache Day from 2008. 

Pack Break -- 2011 Topps Opening Day

The other day I was early for an appointment so I decided to check out the card section at a nearby Target.  I might have been tempted to buy a pack of Gypsy Queen but they didn't have any.  Money being tight these days I decided on a single pack of  2011 Opening Day -- 24 cards  for $2.99.   I'm not the first to say this but these cards are a really good value at under 13 cents a card.

As a Cubs fan I did great with my favorite Cub Ryan Dempster,  phenom Starlin Castro and Aramis Ramirez.

There were four inserts in the pack.

Gotta love the Hebrew Hammer

I'm not a Reagan fan but he's wearing a Cubs jacket and he's throwing out the first pitch at Wrigley so it works for me.

Other notables:

Not pictured:

James Shields

Daniel Descalso

Aaron Hill

Brett Anderson

Greg Halman

Austin Jackson TT

In terms of base cards, is there a better value out there?

Songs for a Sunday Night

Released in 1987, "I've Got My Mind Set on You" was George Harrison's third U.S. #1 hit and was the last for any of the former Beatles.

"I've Got My Mind Set on You' was written by Rudy Clark and was originally recorded by James Ray in 1962.

Here's a couple of other songs written by Rudy:

Cher's "backup singers" in the video are Winina Ryder and a very young Christina Ricci.

A Card in the Grass

I'm not sure if this is a Poor Old Baseball Card  but it's definitely Condition: Poor.  I found it yesterday in the grass about a block from home while walking back from dropping my car off at the repair shop. 

 I like the hat.  In fact I bought one like it (only in black) several years ago, for my father-in-law who lives in Iowa.

Cards on Antiques Roadshow

This was on "Antiques Roadshow" a couple of weeks ago:

The card on the far right was appraised at $15,000-$20,000.

Watch the full episode. See more Antiques Roadshow.

Good Grief!

Maybe no one has noticed but it's been over a week since my last post.  About a week ago my wife and I were (and still are) in the middle of packing to move which is bad enough when without warning our computer suddenly stopped working.  The next day a  repairman diagnosed a dead (and unrecoverable) hard drive.  So off to Best Buy we went to buy a new computer.  Took it home, set it up.  Found out that our scanner is not supported and will not run on Windows 7.  Also found that my version of Photoshop Elements (4) will not  run.  So, ordered a new scanner on Amazon.  Meanwhile the new computer started to have numerous crashes.  Next day, go to Best Buy to return crappy computer.  Now off to another store, Abt, to look for another.  Good news.  Found one with similar specs but a bigger screen for almost $200 less.  So far so good.  The computer seems to be working fine.  A couple more days pass.  The scanner comes.  Set it up.  Oh boy, I can blog again!  Scan Charlie Brown.  Go to my blog.  Can't sign in.  Yep, most of you know this, Blogger is down!  So there we are.  Blogger is finally back up. FYI we are moving in about ten days so there may be another gap in posts coming but I hope after that to get back to posting daily.  

Thanks for reading.

A Born Philley

Yes, Dave Philley played for the Phillies (1958-60).  He also spent almost three years (1951-53) playing for the other Philadelphia team, the Athletics.

 1960 Topps #52

Dave had an eighteen year career with 1700 hits, 276 doubles, 72 triples, 84 homers, 729 RBI and a .270 average.  As the cartoon above highlights, Dave was an outstanding pinch hitter.  In 1958 he had 8 straight pinch hits (since tied by Rusty Staub in 1983).  He also had a pinch hit in his first try of 1959 making 9 in a row overall.  Dave also set AL season records in 1961, playing for the Orioles, for most pinch hit at bats (72) and hits (24).  Both records still stand.

Blow Out the Candles May 5

Pitcher Chief Bender was born in Crow Wing County, MN on this date in 1884.

 1992 Conlon Collection #335

Actress and singer Tina Yothers is 38 today.

1985 in Muppet Magazine

Tina in 2011

With Co-star Michael J. Fox

Blow Out the Candles May 4

Pulitzer Prize winning journalist, author and baseball fan George Will is 70 today.

George is a diehard Cubs fans and has written two books about baseball:

From my library:

1990

1998

"All I remember about my wedding day in 1967 is that the Cubs lost a double-header."

"Baseball is a habit. The slowly rising crescendo of each game, the rhythm of the long season--these are the essentials and they are remarkably unchanged over nearly a century and a half. Of how many American institutions can that be said?"

"In a nation committed to better living through chemistry — where Viagra-enabled men pursue silicone-contoured women — the national pastime has a problem of illicit chemical enhancement. Steroids threaten the health of the 5 percent to 7 percent of players proved, by a mild regime of scheduled tests, to be using them. Steroids also endanger emulative young people. Further, steroids subvert what baseball is selling — fair competition. And they strike at the pleasure of engagement with America's team sport with the longest history." Source: The state of baseball on opening day (Townhall.com, 04/04/2004)