Trade Bait: Restocking the Stockings with Game-Used Stockings

Cards for trade. Take a look and let me know if anything strikes your fancy.

Joe Morgan: 2012 Topps Historical Stitches

Rick Hague: 2009 UD Signature Stars USA Star Prospects Jersey Autographs #ed 154/399

Michael Young: 2008 Allen & Ginter Relics

Esmil Rogers: 2010 Topps Chrome Rookie Autographs

Jerry Sands: 2011 Topps Pro Debut Materials (some creasing around swatch)

Adam Lind: 2012 Allen & Ginter Relics

Jim Thome: 2004 Ultra Turn Back the Clock Jersey

 

David Ortiz: 2010 Topps Heritage Clubhouse Collection Relics

Johnny Damon: 2012 Allen & Ginter Relics

Cole Rohrbough: 2008 Playoff Contenders Season Ticket Autographs

B.J. Upton: 2012 Topps Golden Moments Relics

Martin Prado: 2012 Topps Golden Moments Relics

Nomar Garciaparra: 2003 Sweet Spot Swatches

Ruben Sierra: 2005 Bazooka Blasts Bat Relics

Justin Upton: 2009 Upper Deck Goodwin Champions Memorabilia

Duanel Jones: 2011 Donruss Elite Extra Edition Franchise Futures Signatures #ed 616/890

Ian Kinsler: 2010 Upper Deck Game Jersey (crease around swatch)

Scott Rolen: 2004 Flair Diamond Cuts Game Used

Cole Hamels: 2007 Sweet Spot Sweet Swatch Memorabilia

Chad Billingsley: 2009 Topps Heritage Clubhouse Collection Relics

Kosuke Fukudome: Allen & Ginter Relics

Leave me a comment or send me an email (dustinhoff86(at)gmail(dot)com) if you want anything here and make me an offer. I'm looking for similar cards for my player collections, or other things off my want lists. And don't forget to check out the trade bait page for other cards. Thanks for looking.

Early Cootmas: Discount Heritage Blaster

The wife and I already had our Christmas, before we headed up north to see the rest of the family. She gifted me a blaster of 2012 Topps Heritage, which actually means I found a discounted blaster I wanted at Target, wrapped it, and then put her name on it. Happy Cootmas to me.

As far as book value goes, this was the big score of the box. I guess these are somewhat rare. I could really care less about the BV, though, of course. This is a really cool card. I'm a Kennedy fan, watch any documentary I can find on the Kennedy family, yet I don't think I recall seeing a photo of him from his college days looking this young.

Next up, a foursome of rookies. Pretty cool that Lawrie scores both the rookie trophy and the logo.

A gaggle of floating heads. Or perhaps the proper term for a bunch of floating heads is a herd, a flock, a murder, a decapa-party?

I snagged a few nice inserts. I especially dig the Koufax, though I'm pretty sure it will end up in a trade package eventually, with all the Dodgers traders out there.

And here are the short prints. You could certainly do worse than this for a group of SPs, as far as players go.

Overall, it was a fun box to open, besides the fact that there wasn't a single Tiger in here. Before this, I'd only opened one pack of this year's heritage, and I have to say I dig the design. I'd only buy it at discount, and I wouldn't collect the set, but it was fun. This made for a good start to a Vealtones Cootmas.

No Average Trade, No Average Verlander

At this point, most of you probably know all about Jason and his great blog Joe Average Collector. I was lucky to chat with him and trade with him early on in his blogging career, and we've had some amazing trades since. And they all started with one card Jason originally offered me, a card I still can't believe I own:

What an extremely stunning card. This is my first Verlander patch card, and that's about the primest patch one could get. I think this is my favorite Verlander card I own, and one of the shiniest gems in the collection.

 

And with this trade, Jason, being the super generous guy he is, threw in a bunch of sweet extras:

 

 

More Verlanders, including a 2006 rookie.

 

 

We also traded for this very cool All-Star Avila card.

 

So, that was our first trade, and since then, Jason just keeps sending me awesome cardboard:

 

Such as this dynamic duo of vintage and new, well-loved and manu-patched, all-star and hall-of-famer. This was our second trade, which leads to our most recent one.

 

For this most recent trade, Jason dug into his vintage and found a bunch of great gems. Here we have a quad of my favorites, '68s and '58s. This Charley card might be the most unmanly card of a Tiger ever, which makes it perfect.

 

He also sent a woodgrain '55 Bowman Tiger I needed. Zuverink only started a couple dozen games for the Tigers, but his vintage visage was one I needed for my vintage Bowman Tigers team sets.

 

To wrap up this vintage trade, here's a complete work of baseball card art. I absolutely love this card, Gray's portrait, his somewhat sneaky-looking smirk. The background is so cool too. Man, this is one of the best cards I've seen in a while. Good luck, modern cards, in trying to compete with this.

 

Oh, yeah, there is that. Sorry, '53 Gray. This card is a bit more thrilling.

 

Thanks, Jason, for an amazing trio of trades. Be sure to check out Joe Average Collector's Blog for tons of great writing, and if you're lucky enough to get to trade with him, you won't be disappointed.