Trade with Johnny’s Trading Spot and some LCS fun

 A few days ago, I received a surprise package from John of Johnny's Trading Spot. Inside were a whole bunch of Rays to help me out with some of my sets. 

The first 2 were from the 1997 Lykes A Franchise is Born set, of which John sent me a ton of the last time he sent me cards. I have a feeling I am really close to finishing that one. 99% of the non-flagship Topps were new ones to me, including the cards from Upper Deck, Stadium Club, and Leaf which you see here. My Topps flaship run of Rays cards are now complete, but I still want to complete as many Rays sets as I can, and I will be really happy to finish off an Upper Deck set sometime. Those sets are bigger than you think. As for the flagship Topps cards, many of those can be moved to my rookie card binder, or like the 2006 Topps team leaders card, can be filed next to the base card of the player as well as at the end of the Rays set as I display them in my binders. I haven't purchased an Allen & Ginter or Gypsy Queen pack in almost a decade, so all oif those card are new. 

pps team le 

The Bowman's are new to me as well, since I haven't purchased (or see a pack in the wild) any Bowman this year. Haven't seen any Fire, Gallery, or Gypsy Queen in the wild this year either, so most of those are new as well. I love the foilboard Meadows Fire card. I've had good luck with Heritage, but I think 1 or 2 were needs for me. 

It's nice to get spatterings of base cards because for guys who I collect (like Ryan Yarbrough), I put their cards in my Player Collection binder first, but still like to get a 2nd copy of the card to put in my Rays binder. John helped me do that with the '20 Heritage Yarbrough. He also sent some Paul DeJong's to add to his spot in the aforementioned Player Collection Binder. I love the Gold Fire card. Other favorite players represented are Tony Saunders and Ryan Yarbrough. The next 4 cards are ones I have already, but they are lucky enough to go to my rookie card binder. Shout out for sending the '20 Gypsy Queen Randy Arozarena! While I haven't officially started collecting him, I am starting to end up with a ton of his cards, as you will soon see. Thanks, John, for the nice surprise package!  I'm saving up some Braves inserts/parallels, and as soon as I get a decent stack, they will be headed to GA or FL.

I wanted to go to my LCS today because the last time I was there, it taught me a lesson. A few weeks ago, I had some cards I wanted to mail out to some bloggers, and I decided to stop at the post office first, since it would be easier on me while driving (I would be driving past my LCS, but the post office would be on my right, and so would the LCS on the way back, eliminating some left-hand turns into busy traffic). I sent out the packages, and then went to the card shop, digging through 3 .50 cent boxes, and promptly finding a ton of cards I could've added to the packages I had just sent. Today, I decided to go to the card shop first and brave a few left-hand turns in order to add some more cards to stuff I had planned to sent out today. I got there and dug through the usual 3 .50 cent boxes they had, and was able to help out someone with an insert set they are collecting, I found a card for a guy who collects a certain player (which I actually haven't sent out yet), and found a few other cards to add to some envelopes that I have just sent out. A good payoff for deciding to go the the card shop first. 

I even found a few things for me as well. I was hoping to find some Randy Arozarena cards, and I wasn't disappointed. The last time I went, I was mainly looking for refractors and newer Rays cards, so I basically skipped over all of the Prizm stuff, and I missed 3 Randy's. I also missed one from Optic, but I found them today, and I believe I have tapped that .50 cent box out of Randy A. cards, really only skipping over some '18 Topps cards. I was hoping to find some '20 Topps Update cards (I am only 8 cards away from completing the set). I should've looked closer at my list. I picked up the Christian Yelich card, but I didn't need it. Still 8 cards away....I also found some shiny cards for players I collect, and a card of Logan Gilbert that I figured I would get since I don't have many cards of him. 

I'm still on the fence about collecting Randy, just because he is so young and because of the incident he had with his ex. Maybe later this year I'll bite the bullet, but I'll still be on the lookout for his rookie cards just because of how hot they've become.  Here is a picture of all of the cards of him that I've gathered so far.

When you break it down, that’s 4 cards I’ve pulled from packs (Donruss,Red Stadium Club, Topps, and Topps Update), 1 from a Complete set (Topps), 1 from a team set I got on eBay (Update), 9 from the .50 cent boxes at my LCS (Bowman, Optic x2, Optic Lime Green, Prizm, Prizm Red White & Blue x2, Chrome, and Chrome X-Fractor), and 2 sent by nice people in trades (Gypsy Queen x2). 

I would like to point out that it wasn't all luck with these, as if Randy had been a touted prospect like Wander Franco, none of his cards would've got past the flippers, and they wouldn't have found their way into the .50 boxes. I also had the chance to add a dual bat card of Randy in September or so. I was looking at purchasing a few Rays team sets on eBay, and being fairly naive to how eBay works, I was trying to add something from the same seller in order to combine shipping. The seller had a '20 Diamond Kings dual bat card of Randy for 4 bucks, but for some reason, I didn't get it, and it's probably at least 20 bucks now, so I'll have to wait awhile to acquire a memorabilia card of him. 

Before I go, I must say SHAME ON THE RAYS for dumping salary when you were 2 wins away from winning it all!  Stuart Sternberg has the money to spend! After all, he is rich enough to own a baseball team. How can you let down your fans? You put all of the pressure on the GM to make sly trades in order to compete because you won't spend money. You can't expect them to win all of the trades, and eventually, they are going to be cellar dwellers again. Nobody will come to the games, and you are going to be forced to sell the team at a low price, or move them. Everyone loses. The Rays were maybe a #2 starter and a decent hitting catcher away from winning it all and competing for the next few years. If you have someone who isn't a baseball fan who owns a team, they don't care about winning a championship. The team is almost like some idiot who wears the latest Jordan's even though they don't know a lick about baseball. It's just an accessory. Sternberg goes and trades away our #1 pitcher, lets the #2 leave for free agency, and re-signs our weak-hitting catcher. The Rays are never going to compete with Sternberg as an owner, and he needs to sell the team to someone who hopefully keeps them in St. Pete. I'm still going to suupport the Rays, but I won't be expecting them to compete for another 10 years, and I'm counting the days Keven Kiermaier has left with the team. Randy A., you are next...The Tigers will hopefully give me something to watch while Tampa gets it's crap straight. Suck it, Sternberg!!

If you were wondering where the stuff I dropped off at the post office is going, the zip codes they are headed to are 13601, 48105, 61615, 97202, 97230, and 98662. 

Thanks for checking out my latest post.

-Jeremy