Break from routine

 I’m a big routine guy. I’ve probably shared it before, but I just thrive on routine and having a ‘normal’ kind of schedule day to day and week to week. I generally try to drive the same route to work. I bake each type of baked goods at work in the same order and try to keep it the same. On days I work, I generally have the same breakfast (4 Nature Valley crunchy oats and honey granola bars with a diet Mt. Dew) and the same lunch (either 2 ham and swiss sandwiches on 12 grain whole wheat bread or 1/2 of a leftover meat lovers thin crust pizza). When things get out of routine, it just doesn’t work well for me and I get anxious and irritable. Just extra trouble that I don’t really want or need. 

These last few weeks have been out of routine for me. Karen hasn’t been breathing well and thought about going into the hospital a few days ago. She has some oxygen ordered, so hopefully that will keep her out and she can ride it out until the 2nd week of April when we go to Mayo Clinic.

 My stepfather passed away about 2 weeks ago, so we’ve been dealing with trying to help my mom get things planned for the service. 

At work, the store has been doing a remodel. I used to have a big oven that could fit 2 racks of bread in it, and a rotisserie oven that could fit 20 pans of stuff in it. Worked perfectly for me during holidays where I could run 20 pans of rolls and 2 racks of bread at once. Some idiot in corporate decided we need to take the rotisserie oven out, take the 2 rack big oven out, and replace them with 2 1-rack ovens. They say the rotisserie oven was a dinosaur and they wouldn’t be able to order parts for it anymore, but it has broken down maybe once in my 13 years there. 

Our family dog is also probably on her last leg, but in all honesty, I feel like things are going to start getting better and maybe get back into a routine again. 

Karen has the Mayo stuff in 2 weeks, and that could open up a world of good possibilities if it works for her. 

While my stepdad is gone, talking to people at the service showed me that my mom has a good group of friends that are there for her that can be there sometimes since we are about 2 hours away. 

I have been learning how to get rocks to bleed with these new ovens, and still have a few weeks to work out the kinks before Easter. My boss said that if there is a big backlog of stuff to bake, that they may just send me home after 10 or so hours during the holidays. Seems better than the 12 hour or so shifts during the last few holidays. 

While I’ll be a little sad to see our dog go, I have been ready to be dog free for about 8 years. I’m just sick of the responsibility, messed to clean up, the money you have to put into them, and the damage they do to the house and furniture. The fish tank is more my style, and I’ve been getting the tank close to where I wanted it. Got a few more guppies, and hopefully I’ll get some babies soon. That’s when the fun starts. On top of all that, Karen’s mom is out of town for the weekend!

With all of the extra stuff going on, I’ve just put the post writing on the back burner. That doesn’t mean I haven’t got any cards lately. 

Greg of Night Owl Cards sent me a package about 2 weeks ago filled with Topps needs. 

The 1974 Traded cards were the oldest ones. I’m probably 20 or so cards away from completing that set. It’s always cool to get some 1975 Topps cards from the king of 1975 Topps. I think 2024 Topps Heritage High Number is out, so I’ll have to see if I can get my hands on some and send Greg something he needs. 

Most of the package was Dodgers, and they helped fill in holes in many Topps sets. 2009 and 2011 Topps Update are pretty close to being complete for me, but he still found some holes. 2012-2015 or so were years I didn’t really purchase any packs, so those have many cards I need, especially 2014. 

2017 Topps is a set that I bought some packs of, but just don’t have much of the set. The early Bellinger was a cool find, but the real pull from the package was the 2nd year Mike Trout!  I know rookies are generally the most valuable cards of a player, especially before everything was mass produced, but 2nd year cards can surprisingly be worth a lot and be much easier to find. 

Thanks for the nice additions to my collection, Greg!

I also had the chance to visit John of Johnny’s Trading Spot during Spring Break, as he mentioned in a recent post. 

He had a nice stack of Rays and Tigers for me, which were mainly recent parallels that I’m sure he found in those boxes he gets from K n T Sportscards in Ormond. 

On top of that, I found a ton of stuff I needed in his trade boxes. 

Those 2 stacks were Topps needs. 

Next are favorite players, Tigers, Rays, rookies, and some parallels. 

Some of the highlights include a 2001 Bowman Chrome Jack Cust. I always liked the power that Cust had, and it is always cool to add a 2001 Bowman Chrome card to my collection. The Paul DeJong is a Montgomery parallel. I must’ve went through a box or 2 from when he was getting his player collections in order, because I found a number of guys it looks like we both collect like Xander Bogaerts, Jacob deGrom, and Cecil Fielder. I love those 2025 Topps Diamonte parallels, and to get one of Casey Mize was awesome. 

There were so many Rays from sets I haven’t got my hands on. 2015 Finest, 2022 Archives Snapshots, and 2025 Bowmans Best. I miss Randy Arozarena on the Rays. I almost want to throw away the Mariners cards I pull of him, but might just save them and mail them to $ternberg when he wins MVP this year and brings the Mariners a title. Another Diamonte appearance with the Rays team card.  

I’ve always been a fan of John Lipon. I moved to Lakeland, Florida in 1990, so the Lakeland Tigers were one of the first baseball teams I saw play. Lipon was the manager, and I may have even been to a game he managed. He was a great manager for the club, skippering them for like 20 years and winning at least 1 league title. John picked up a few minor league sets, and I was lucky enough to score a few early ‘90’s Lakeland sets. The 1990 Topps Lynn is a box bottom. The Rudy Pemberton and Warren Sawkiw bring back memories. In 1993 or so, I was trading cards with my friend Paul after school. He had that Lakeland Tigers set that Rudy and Warren were on, and he must’ve got them to sign the cards. I think I traded some ‘93 Topps Braves for the whole set, including the signed ones. Don’t know if I traded them away or what, but it was nice to get the set again (minus the autograph), and strangely enough, I basically traded Braves for them. The 1996 Leaf Signature Series Extended sets have some nice unknown guys, like former Braves/Padres/Tigers/Japansese Leaguer Melvin Nieves. There were tons of Prism parallels, and a cool 2025 Topps Rainbow parallel of Dillon Dingler, a guy I hope has a great season for Detroit. 

None of the rookies I found were anybody high, but nobody can deny that 1995 Nomar Garciaparra cards were very hot in the late ‘90’s. That Jeff Francouer was on the top of Beckett hot lists in the early to mind ‘00’s. I’m not necessarily a fan of any of the next guys, but a rookie of a well known guy that I don’t have is always a good pickup. 

Lastly, the parallels. Nothing earth shattering, but I always am a sucker for 1998 Topps Minted in Cooperstown cards, as well as refractors. The 2007 Heritage Zimmerman is a yellow name parallel. 

Thanks, John for the great pickups!  I’ll hopefully make it out to your place again sometime this summer with some more Braves. 

A few days before my stepdads funeral, my brother in law picked up an Easter Egg box of 2025 Topps and pulled the pastel color Skenes parallel, and sent me the pic. 

The night before the funeral, we drove down to Lakeland, and stopped at Target before going to the hotel. I picked up an Easter Egg box, and guess who I pulled? 

See?  I think my luck is turning around and things are going to get back to normal soon. 

Thanks for checking out my latest post. 

-Jeremy

Latest pickups

I recently saw some cool things on eBay and decided to finish some sets and grab some cool pieces of history. Let’s start off with the sets. 

A few years ago, I was able to purchase a 1998 Topps Inaugural Rays complete set from a guy on Facebook for less than the price of the regular set. This set gave me 2/3 of a Rays master 1998 Topps set, with the regular and Inaugural Rays versions complete, and the Inaugural Diamondbacks set missing. I found a decent priced Rays Inaugural D-Backs set on eBay, and was able to get a Rays 2002 Topps Total team set and get a reduced shipping charge. 

That’s the D-Backs set. 

There’s the regular set. 

And the Inaugural Rays set. 

I could kick it up one more notch and try to go for the Minted in Cooperstown parallel set. I’m still missing a few, but I’m close to halfway done with that one. 

8 of 17 ain’t too bad. If I were really nuts, I could go for the Chrome and Chrome Refractor versions and complete a team rainbow. I’ll keep picking up singles here and there and see how close I can get. Here’s a Tony Saunders rainbow if you were wondering what it looks like. 

Base, Inaugural Diamondbacks, Inaugural Rays, Minted in Cooperstown, Chrome, and Chrome Refractor. 

The other items I picked up were kind of historical items. I remember when Topps Chrome first debuted in 1996 that it was a huge set. The first Chrome set came out in 1993 with Topps Finest, and Topps Chrome was a premium brand with some novelty still attached to it when it came out in 1996. I found an advertising panel for the set, and at around 10 bucks, I felt the price was right. 

Mike Piazza, Cal Ripken, and Tom Glavine grace the front. 

There is just info about the set on the back. 

I also found another panel for 1997 Bowman Chrome. This was the set that started the rookie craze and paved the way for the iconic Bowman Chrome autographed rookie card. While the autographed rookie wouldn’t come out until 2001, had the 1997 Chrome set never happened, we wouldn’t have the 2001 Pujols autographed rookie, the 2010 Trout autographed rookie, and all of the other autographed Bowman Chrome rookies. Name a player, and they probably have an autographed Bowman Chrome rookie. The 1997 Bowman Chrome set made that possible. 

I’m going to keep this flier with my Chipper Jones cards. 

I would love to find an ad sheet like this of 1993 Topps Finest. I have a 1989 Upper Deck DeWayne Buice promo card, and with the 2 promo sheets I added to my collection, I feel like I have some of the iconic sets represented. Maybe just need the Finest sheet (if it exists), and something from 1991 Stadium Club, 1990 Leaf, and 1989 Bowman. 

I’ve had a little bit of fun lately, as I’ve attended 2 Stetson University baseball games. The first one actually wasn’t a Stetson game, but was a tournament game of Notre Dame and Iowa that was played at Stetson’s home park. I met up with my friend Jim, and got him a card of Wes Obermueller that he got signed, and I got a Nick Ungs 2004 Topps card signed. 

On Tuesday, we went to see Stetson play FGCU. It was supposed to have a baseball card giveaway, but they gave away pennants instead. They had schedule posters in the entrance of the park, and I got one to get signed by the 4 players on it. Kyler and I had the poster, 3 cards from a 2023 Stetson set, and a 1993 Topps Traded Andy Barkett to get signed. Andy’s son Isaiah plays for Stetson, and he usually attends the games. Kyler helped me spot everyone on the poster before the game, so we got that one done. Later, Jim pointed out where Barkett was sitting, and we got him. Isaiah Barkett was on the poster, so I got a father and son in the same day. I don’t think that has ever happened before. The game was kind of bittersweet for me. My stepdad had been battling cancer, and passed away the day before. He treated me like his own kid, and we’ve been to many ballgames together. He beat me at a pool noodle tossing contest at a Corpus Cristi Hooks game in 2017. A Texas native, he would always say ‘God bless Texas’ after the national anthem. After the anthem at the Stetson game, I gave a good ‘God bless Texas’. While Stetson fell behind 9-0, and intimately lost 14-12, I think my stepdad gave Stetson some magic as they hit a Grand Slam and pulled to within 2. It was Kylers first Grand Slam, and made the defeat a little easier to swallow. We’re going to the game on Tuesday as our church purchased a section of seats. I grabbed another schedule poster that I’ll get signed, and let Kyler have the first one. I also found a few more players in the 2023 Stetson set that are one the roster, so I added them to my stack, and we’ll try to get those finished tomorrow. Before the game, I’ll pay John from Johnny’s Trading Spot a visit and look through some of his trade boxes. I have some Braves for him that he can hopefully use. 

Maybe someday I’ll find more 1998 Topps versions of Rays cards to complete that rainbow someday, as well as finding a 1993 Finest ad. While the Rays might not be a popular team among collectors and ‘96 Topps Chrome and ‘97 Bowman Chrome might be sets that make flippers laugh, they are all cool to me, and I will continue collecting stuff like that because that’s what I’m into. 

Thanks for checking out my latest post. 

-Jeremy 

Taking some time for the 'custom'ers

 Originally when I started this blog, it was where I could post images of my custom cards. I never dreamed that it would lead to me making entire complete checklists of missing players from Topps sets, let alone finishing any off. Well, that happened, and I decided to post about my real cards along the way. That has led to many trades, and a (basically) complete run of Topps sets from 1980-2002. I do many more posts about my card collection and very rarely make custom posts anymore, but I still make them. 

Recently, an opportunity came up where I could print some basically for free, so I figured it would be as good a time as ever to finish off some Topps Rays team sets. I've already posted about the 1998 Topps Rays set, so I'll start off with the 1999 Topps set. These include the Traded sets as well. Currently, I have the 1998-2003 sets finished, and the only thing that is keeping me from starting on the 2004 set is just figuring out how to get that outline of the photo that is in the box on the lower left hand corner of the design. I think I may have figured out a way, though. Without further interruption, here is your 1999 Topps and Topps Traded set of missing Rays players and coaches. (Note:The Traded sets start after the managers and coaches in the set)

Any of the photos with the numbers on the bottom corners were some of my first works, done about 10 or 11 years ago. The number on the bottom matches to the number in the set, and the one on the right is the number as it relates to the customs I've done if the first one started with the number one. 

Some of these first works have errors like player names being done in a too light or too dark color, which made them tough to see, or things like incorrect font types. As my laptops, photo editing programs, and skill got better, the errors were fewer and further in between, and some cards that I had to add logos to or blend colors together in order to get rid of watermarks are done so well, that you might not be able to tell. 

This Riddoch one appeared on HaughtCorner.com in an interview with Larry Rothschild. 

Starting with these ones, the fonts are correct and more detail is paid to how the actual set had things. They were probably made within the past year. 

(except for this one). I believe another person made it, and I had to change the font with the name and it came out outlined in white for some reason. 

Rookie of Jim Morris, the guy the movie 'The Rookie' with Dennis Quaid was based off of. 

Really the only good photo of Sparks I could use came from a 2000 Bowman card. It will appear in the next few sets. 

2000 Topps/Topps Traded

Sparks card #2 with the same photo

R.I.P., Tropicana Field

Really wish the Highlights cards in 2000 and 2001 would say what the highlight was. This one is for hitting a HR in his 35th different park. 

I believe I had to remove an autograph from this one, as it was the only photo of Enders I could find.

This one was worse. Only photo of Fiore as a Ray, and it had watermarks completely over the photo. The beard and neck look a little airbrushed, but other than that, I'm happy. 

Did anyone remember Doc Gooden as a Ray?

(The 2nd Guthrie card should have the name as Travis Harper. This is an uncorrected error so far)

Had to take a photo of Taylor as a Rockie and make it into a Rays one. The hat almost looks real. 

2001 Topps/Topps Traded

The 3rd and last Sparks card with the same photo. 

The new logo for the Rays (see photo on next card) debuted in 2001. Morris last pitched for Tampa in 2000, but in the movie, they showed him pitching in the 2001 new Rays uniforms. I called that out the minute I saw that in the theatre, and I wish more people would have noticed that other than me. 

Rolls is one of my favorite Rays. He couldn't hit, and played on some of those miserable early '00's Rays teams, but he hit 2 HRs off of Roger Clemens of the Yankees on my birthday in 2003, and kept Roger from getting win 300. 

Another highlight card with no caption. This was Fred’s 400th HR. 

This design is a variation of the 3-player top prospects subset in 2001 Topps, and was actually used as a 1-player design in a Cubs Wrigley Field stadium giveaway set (good luck finding one, Dime Box Nick!). 

I wouldn't mind if Topps had a 'rookie card' emblem like that again. 

Best I could do with Mike Judd was a Dodgers hat. 

Prieto was easier with a hatless photo and a Tigers uni. Just had to airbrush out the 'D' logo on his undershirt. 

Rose had a minor league card for the Rockies that was my only option. I sent him an e-mail care of his baseball school asking if he had any Rays photos of himself, but no response so far. 

The guy who got us Scott Kazmir and did nothing for the Mets. 

I went to a decent amount of Rays games in the early '00's, and I must've missed Daulton as a Rays coach, because I was away at college in Mobile, Alabama in starting in the fall of 2001, and although I went to one of the games in Cal Ripken, Jr.'s last series that year, I just don't remember Daulton being there, because I would've brought along one of his cards to get signed. I believe I could've looked up the roster online back in 2001. Showing my age. 

2002 Topps/Topps Traded 

This set was a doozy with the curved nameplate, but I figured it out by just rotating the name by 11 degrees either way. The worst part was actually making the template, as well as getting the lettering on the side right, because I had to outline it pixel by pixel not only around the letter, but inside it as well. 

Rusty was a class act. Saw him 2 times in 1996 Spring Training when the Royals came to Lakeland and played the Tigers. He signed autographs for everyone in the bullpen, and him, Jason Jacome, Sal Fasano, Mike Sweeney, and Mike Magnante were great. Not sure who was the person who started it, but once, I had a baseball, the first player signed it, then passed it to the rest of the bullpen, and I had a ball with 10 signatures by the time it got back to me. I’ll have to grab a picture of it sometime. That whole team was great with autographs. Tom Goodwin, Bob Boone, Johnny Damon, Mendy Lopez, and Jeff Grotewold were all great signers at Spring Training that year. 

Boggs sunset card

Daulton sunset card if anyone cares. 

I found a better pic of May, so I might have to re-do this one later. 

I'm pretty sure this is a photo of McCarty. I tried to find it again when I made the 2003 card of him, and it was gone. 

A card that really should’ve made the Traded set. CC was a great player during his prime. Had the cheap Rays re-signed him, he could be a retired number. 

2003 Topps/Topps Traded

Wilson Alvarez sunset card 

Lee told me he grew his goatee for his 2001 Royal  Rookies card, almost like he knew he was going to get on a card so he wanted to look good. 

Sturtze almost gave up as many HRs as Esteban Yan and Dennis Springer 

This was the McCarty I had to do since I couldn't find the first photo. One of him with the Giants, and the small photo with the Red Sox. 

Ther wasn’t a manager card for the Rays in the 2003 Topps set. McRae finally gets his due

For some guys, like Carlos Reyes, they only had 1 photo as a Ray, so I had to repeat it for the smaller one.

Rocker is a d-bag, but was always nice signing autographs for fans. 

Another missed chance for Topps. 

Absolutely nothing in a Rays uni for Adam Piatt. 

That wraps it up for the Rays customs. I’ve tried to outline a photo in GIMP earlier today, and it got halfway right, but I’m not all the way there. Perhaps I will see if a YouTube tutorial can help. Depending on what happens, I’ll start the 2004 set, or just go on to the 2005 set. 

I’m off on Friday, so I’ll be hitting customs and perhaps putting some cards in binders. 

Thanks for checking out my latest post. 

-Jeremy