Meet up with Johnny’s Trading Spot

 My oh my, where do I start?  A few Saturdays ago, I met up with John from Johnny’s Trading Spot, and had the chance to dig though his trade boxes. It was neat getting to finally see in person where he stores all of his collection right now (I was expecting a huge warehouse), and hearing him talk about his plan to put up a shed and place some bookshelves. 

Before I started with the digging for gold, John presented me with my prize for getting a question right in his 2022 Finest Flashbacks post. 

A Rays lamp!  Actually 2 of them. Turns out he knows the other Rays fan in the world and got the 2 lamps and now I have a lamp to put in Kylers room and one to put in my man cave eventually when I get a room for it. 

As for the cards, John was right in his post the other day, I went home with around 4,000 cards, mostly my known weaknesses, Rays, Tigers, favorite players, and highlight cards. I also tried to get Topps cards from sets that I knew I haven’t completed and that I knew weren’t doubles. Trying to complete every Topps set means I have a ton of needs now and that I was able to take a decent amount of stuff off of John’s hands (don’t worry. There is plenty left over).  

I don’t know how to even start, so I figured I would post just the Tigers, favorite players, highlight cards, a few rookies, and some parallels, as it gives a pretty good sample view of what I was able to find. 

While not actual 1953 Topps cards, these reprints will serve as 1953 cards in my Topps quest. There were a number of these cards for each team, and serve as an inexpensive alternative to getting a real 1953 Topps set. 

While a 1987 Donruss Highlights card, a 1987 Fleer card, and a mini Alan Trammell  snuck in, the main highlight of this photo are the Fleer Box set cards. I got 5 different sets, 3 from 1987, 1 from 1988 and 1989. 

The best part?  All of the sets came with team logo stickers!  

A number of sections of the boxes contained cards that got me close to finishing some sets. There were a few 1992 ToppsGold cards, some 1995 Collectors Choice cards, and 1997 Coklectirs Choice cards. I know someone who is collecting ‘97 Collectors Choice, and I was able to almost knock their wantlist down to single digits. 

These cards spoke to my heart. I had many of these cards and got them signed at spring training games over the years, but lost them after selling my signed cards 10 years ago. Now I got them back. I remember getting the Cody Ross card, the Bobby Higginson, and the Chad Petty signed pretty vividly. Ross was always recognizable because of his shaved head. I had a game used bat card of Higginson, and got it signed along with the Bowman as he was walking to his car after a game. Petty was involved in one of the best pitching matchups I’ve ever seen. Petty and the Lakeland Tigers faced Matt Smith, a lefty, and the Tampa Yankees. Petty pitched 6 no-hit innings, while Smith pitched 7. I think the Yankees won it, but I got Petty to sign his Bowman card, and Smith to sign a foul ball that I caught during the game (you would be lucky if 300 people showed up to Lakeland Tigers games back then, so the chance at catching a ball was pretty good). 

The 2015 Topps cards were a highlight of the boxes for me. I stuck a Buck Farmer Prism card in just because it looked so cool. There were a number of regular, Gold, Purple, and Opening Day Blue cards in the boxes. I think what I am going to do with the 2015 Topps set (and any other one with parallels) is take any version of a card that I need (whether I have it in base, parallel, Chrome, or even Opening Day version), and use it for the set of I have it. Sort of like a frankenset, or to use another bloggers idea, what Gavin from Baseball Card Breakdown is doing with the 2011 Topps parallel set. 

A number of favorite players were represented, from more recognizable beamed like Corey Kluber and Dee Gordon to lesser know guys like Rolando Arrojo and John Axford. A recent addition to my collection is Daron Kirkreit. My friend Jim lives about a mile away from my house and collects St. Louis Cardinals cards and is a big autograph collector. He is trying to get an autographed card of every St. Louis Cardinal possible and is only missing like 5% of them. He was getting his knee rehab after having an operation, and the therapist was none other than Mr. Kirkreit. Jim got a few cards signed by Daron, and let me know about him, so I made a custom 1994 Topps Draft Pick card, and gave it to Jim, as well as the minor league card of Daron that I had. Daron signed the cards for us, and was really impressed with the customs I made. I might try to see if he’s still working in Daytona and make him a few more. 

Pat Neshek is a favorite of mine just because of how fan friendly and happy to sign autographs he is. Kind of the opposite of Zack Greinke. I found a cool 13 cards of homer machine Richie Sexson, and a nice first year Bowman Platinum of Jamison Taillon, a guy from my hometown, Lakeland,FL. 

Onto some of the rookie and shiny/special cards, I originally picked up the Astros rookies card because I know I needed it, but if I’m not mistaken, I believe it is the rookie card of potential Hall of Fame manager and new Rangers skipper Bruce Bochy. The ‘93 ToppsGold Tim Wakefield rookie would’ve been so hot in 1993, as the Matt Harvey rookie debut would’ve been in 2012-13. I’ve always liked Trevor Story, so I was happy to find a 2016 rookie of him, and although I’m not a fan of the White Sox or bat flippers, you can’t deny the greatness of Tim Anderson. 

I found a low numbered Ryan Howard, a Bowman Ice Chris Davis, and a Topps Gold Tim Beckham. I found a few refractors, including a sweet ‘98 Finest (the 2nd best Finest set besides 1994) one of John Burkett, 2014 Purple ones of Mets Wilmer Flores and Curtis Granderson, a 2015 Sepia one of Troy Tulowitzki, and a 2018 one of Lewis Brinson. Last was a Gallery parallel of Sean Doolittle. 

Last up are a spattering of highlights cards. 

John also sent me these for winning one of the daily contests a few days ago. I would’ve been floored by that ‘72 League Leaders card and the ‘74 Kaline, but check out that 3rd card. Yep. That’s a ‘78 Topps Lou Whitaker rookie!  How amazing is that?  If you don’t follow John’s blog by now, definitely do so. He is a great guy who tells interesting stories and always has a huge selection of cards to show off and has one of the biggest card collections I’ve ever seen. Thank you so much John for letting me dig through some of your cards and for the prizes you’ve hooked me up with. I can’t wait to come over to your place again. 

Before I finish, just had to show a bad choice I made the other day. Walmart had 2023 Topps blasters and 2022 Topps Chrome blasters. Guess which one I chose. Guess who didn’t get an Aaron Judge or Nolan Arrenado. Guess who didn’t get a Wander Franco. 4 boxes and nothing. I need to just pay the 5-10 bucks for the Franco and be done with it. I did pull a few Tigers and a Javier Baez refractor, but this is what I get for not getting the 2023 Topps that my gut told me to get. I got a few rookies and a few sunset cards, but I was a tad disappointed with the box. Most of these are up for trade if you like anything. 

I did get 1 other Sepia refractor, and I thought it gave me a shot at a rainbow, but unfortunately, it was a dupe. 

Along with the other inserts I pulled, check out my 2023 Topps Chrome Jarren Duran collection. 1 base, 2 Sepia refractors, and 1 Blue Wave refractor. The extra Sepia Duran is up for trade as well. 

Thanks for checking out my latest post. 

-Jeremy