A True Feel-Good Collecting Story

A few years ago, I decided that I needed to have one complete set from every year that I have ever actively collected cards. Since my collections have always had a football-first focus, I was looking for football card sets from 1988-1999 and from 2012 carrying up to the present. It was just a few months ago that I acquired the last cards I needed for a complete 1998 Fleer Tradition set and completed that run.

If anybody is interested, here are the sets I chose to retroactively finish for each year of my youthful collecting days:

• 1988 Topps
• 1989 Topps (and Traded)
• 1990 Action Packed (and Rookie Update)
  
• 1991 Pro Set Platinum
• 1992 Fleer
• 1992 Ultra
• 1993 Fleer
• 1993 Skybox Impact
• 1994 Collector's Choice
• 1995 Collector's Choice
• 1995 Upper Deck
• 1996 Donruss
• 1996 Select
• 1997 SPx
• 1997 Upper Deck
  
• 1997 Zenith
• 1998 Fleer Tradition
• 1999 Pacific Paramount
• 1999 Upper Deck HologGrFX

I wasn't a huge baseball collector back in those days, except for 1991, when the convenience store (the only one in my town) stocked Topps and Fleer cards. I would pick up a few baseball packs here and there as a kid, but my money typically went toward football. But after completing my youth years run of football, I thought it would be fun to do the same for baseball.

Which brings me to my story.  Last month, I visited Platinum Sports and Music in Provo, Utah. I don't typically use the names of card shops in my blog, but this one deserves a shout-out. The owner, Steve, is a pretty good guy. He knows who I am and we talk when I come in. When I have my kids, he gives them quarters for the gumball machine.

Anyway, I stopped by in June and noticed a stack of 1993 Topps factory sets on the shelf. He told me they had found a case of them in a storage unit and I asked how much he was asking for them. He had me look up the prices on recently sold sets on eBay, and we found a range. He offered up a price that was about $5 lower than the low end of the range. I had sort of decided that I wanted to complete Upper Deck for my 1993 set, but this was a good price and it kept me from having to chase down a Jeter rookie for that year. I took it.

I noticed the box he gave me wasn't factory sealed, but I didn't think too much of it. I took it home and put it on a shelf, waiting to crack it open as a Father's Day activity. There were 10 Gold cards and 3 Black Gold cards included, so there was a little bit of surprise involved. Of the three years that Topps made a gold foil parallel in the early 90s, 1993 was always my favorite, so I did want to see if any fit into my collection.

I was disappointed when I opened my box. I should have taken a picture, but I didn't. But when I opened the box, it was obvious that it was not in its original factory state. There were about 50 cards that were not in the brick of cards going through the box. Instead, they were perpendicular to the other cards and shoved into the gap between the ends of the other cards and the box. I pulled them out; all of the Gold and Black Gold cards were there. Some commons and some prospects were there. Derek Jeter was there. And ALL of them had severely dinged corners.

My best guess is that somebody discovered this unsealed and searched through it to make sure it contained the Jeter rookie and the special cards before they sold it. But then they carelessly put the cards back in the gap and they jostled around and got damaged. 

So now I had a problem. I bought the set, but I opened it. It had been close to a month because I had saved the box before opening it. I was considering taking it back, but I knew that many people would say, "You've had it for three weeks and you've opened it and you want to return it now? With the most valuable card in the entire set badly damaged? Get lost." Knowing that they had an entire case of factory sets in the store, I thought it was worth trying my luck to get this one replaced. I took it back in, but Steve wasn't there. I explained the situation to one of his employees, who got him on the phone. Steve told him to replace it. So he grabbed another set off the shelf and handed it to me.

Happy ever after, right? Well, the story doesn't end here.

The new box was factory sealed. It had a different seal on it, too. It had a stamp saying it was "Exclusive to the Colorado Rockies Baseball Club." I didn't think much of it until I opened the set.

There I found, in perfect condition, the Jeter Rookie Card.

And I noticed the gold stamp. These were part of a special, parallel set. I looked it up on eBay. The factory set of this version was selling anywhere between $250 and $800. I had paid $40. I didn't feel right about this, so I went back in the next day. Steve, the owner, was there and saw me enter with the box. He said, "Now, I know that one was factory sealed." I explained that, yes, I was the one who brought back the other set the day before. Now we had a completely different problem. If he had been the one to pull the set off the shelf and hand it to me, I would have been okay with it. But it was his employee, who I could tell knew nothing about cards (not unusual because the larger portion of the store is a music store) who gave it to me. I showed him my discovery and said I appreciated his trying to make the damaged set right, but I didn't feel good about such a discrepancy in value in my favor.

He said, "Oh, you know those usually sell for a lot more?" Well, yeah, that's why I was there. He replied, "I'm sorry about the damaged cards. I appreciate you coming in, but I can't think of anyone better for that set to go to."

So instead of the 1993 Topps Flagship set, I ended up with the 1993 Topps Colorado Rockies Inaugural Edition set. And this card--the real Jeter rookie in the set (not Shawn)--which has had recent eBay listings sell for $120 to $300, is somehow in my collection.

As for the extras in the box, here are the Gold and Black Gold included. Barry Larkin was the best gold player, but my favorite gold card was the bottom left of the top photo, Bernardo Brito. I remember watching him play for the old Salt Lake Buzz when he was a prospect for the Twins. "Brrrrrito!" was by the AAA team's best slugger, but he never had much of a Major League career. After hitting .219 in 40 games over 3 seasons in Minnesota, he took his bat to Japan. I don't know how his career went after that. The Black Gold cards were a bit more interesting; I pulled a ROY collection fit in Eric Karros and the Redemption card for all four parts of the Black Gold set. (Most of the redemption cards were for parts A, B, C, or D. This was the ABCD redemption card.) I wish I could still redeem this thing. The stated odds on the box for an ABCD redemption card were 1:25 boxed sets.

I appreciate Steve for being willing to let me exchange the damaged set in the first place, let alone for allowing me to keep the harder-to-come-by, more expensive set. He says, "It's all about Karma here." Whatever the reason, I feel like he went above and beyond in customer service and I became the beneficiary of an unexpected boon.

I Received 5% of Night Owl's 5,000 Card Giveaway

And it was pretty great. Actually, I don't really know how accurate that number is, either. To tell the truth, I didn't count to know if there were exactly 250 cards. And I don't know how many he sent other people. All I know is that I received a large envelope from upstate New York and I enjoyed going through it immensely.

There was a good variety. This pic shows the cards divided up by decade, plus some football and non-sport cards. I think Night Owl was glad to have someone like me who would gladly accept some random football cards in the package. More on that later.

Greg made sure to include some Cubs for my collection. There's a nice Coca-Cola food issue there and my first Topps Super 70 on-demand that I particularly love.

Here are some hits for my All-Star MVP and Rookie of the Year collections. Dustin Pedroia on the bottom is a box bottom cut out from 2009 O-Pee-Chee.

Speaking of 2009 OPC, N.O. sent a handful of those to me, but none were base cards. They were all the black-bordered parallel. I didn't have any of these before, so it was kind of cool to see them come in.

These six were just what I needed for my All-Star project. I now have cards of 1190 of the 1909 players who have been MLB All-Stars through the years.

These two made nice additions to my Frankenset. I couldn't NOT include Patrick Mahomes, Sr. in action.

Of all the football Night Owl sent, these two best fit in my collection: a Press Proof parallel of a former BYU Cougar and a shiny insert of All-2000s running back Curtis "My Favorite" Martin.

These cards didn't quite fit in my collection but were notable anyway. Those Panini Black Gold cards are THICK. I have a few of them and I think the shadow box effect is really cool on them.

Here are some interesting cards that just didn't quite fit in my collection, but I was still happy to receive them. The A&G Thunderlips (AKA, Hulk Hogan) and Fishing Lures cards already had TCDB offers before I even finished putting all of these on my tradelist.

Finally, some entertainment cards that Night Owl sent my way. These are the first Musicards I've ever owned. None of these are artists I have ever really listened to and some I've never even heard of (I'm looking at you, Bonham.). If I had to choose a favorite artist from this bunch, I'd have to go with Huey Lewis.

So thank you, Greg, for letting me take part in your massive 5,000 card house-cleaning giveaway. I don't know how many other lucky bloggers received football cards in their packages, but I was happy to take some on. I am sure, however, that everybody who got something enjoyed it as much as I did. A great variety of great stuff here, indeed.

Rookie of the Year Spotlight: Justin Verlander

 

Some of the collections I have been working on over the years are starting to get filled out and my goals are being reached. As a result, I'm starting to slow down a little when it comes to acquiring many cards for some of my mini-collections. Now that the collection is feeling more and more complete, I wanted to start showcasing the cards I have, player by player.

One such collection is my Rookie of the Year collection. I love collecting players who have won the award as the top newcomer in each league. This wasn't born of hot rookie hype and the desire to prospect. Rather, I became fascinated thinking about the careers of guys like Eric Karros, Jerome Walton, and Tim Salmon, who experienced varying degrees of success but may not have become superstars. I thought it would be fun to have a collection that chronicles the individual career journeys of rookie stars--whether they burned bright and flamed out quickly, regressed to the mean, or wended their way to Cooperstown.

 

My goal has been to fill a binder page for each player who won the award in my lifetime and to fill a row for older players. I may expand that later as I expand my vintage collection. The ultimate goal of my binder is to show a card from every different uniform the player wore, from fresh-faced rookie to grizzled vet. This series is to commemorate each Rookie of the Year's career and show my collection of their cards. I have a randomized list of winners that I use to determine the order of these posts, but for the second time in a row, I'm going away from that order. Today we highlight

Justin Verlander

Justin Verlander's Major League career got off to an inauspicious start in 2005. He started two games for the Tigers, pitched 11 innings, and allowed 9 earned runs. He came back to Detroit's rotation in 2006 to strike out 124 batters en route to winning 17 games and posting a 3.23 ERA (good for 7th in the AL). He ran away with the AL Rookie of the Year award, taking all but two first place votes (Minnesota's Francisco Liriano and Baltimore's Nick Markakis) and finishing 70 points ahead of second-place finisher Jonathan Papelbon, who saved 35 games for the Red Sox. Besides winning ROY, Verlander finished 7th in the AL Cy Young balloting and even garnered some MVP votes.

Since then, Verlander has put together a first-ballot Hall of Fame career as a generational starting pitcher. During his time in Detroit, he received six All-Star nominations. In 2011, he took home the AL pitching Triple Crown with a 2.40 ERA, 24 wins, and 250 strikeouts. He also led the league with a minuscule .920 WHIP across 250 innings. He won the Cy Young Award unanimously that year and became just the 10th pitcher to win the Cy Young and MVP in the same season (the first to do it since Dennis Eckersley in 1992). 

He was traded to the Houston Astros in 2017 as part of their pennant push, and saying it paid off would be an understatement. After arriving in Houston, he pitched in five regular season games, going 5-0 with a 1.06 ERA and 43 strikeouts. He posted an incredible 8.6 SO/W ratio for the Astros before winning ALCS MVP and helping the team win the World Series. Then he just seemed to get better, finishing second in the Cy Young voting the next season before winning his second award in 2019. Tommy John kept him out all of 2021, but he has come back strong in 2022 with a 2.03 ERA and an AL-best 10 wins as the All-Star Break approaches.

This is the first spotlight that has come up of an active player, so this career wrap-up is incomplete. Incomplete, yet impressive. As of this writing, he has led the league in ERA once, strikeouts five times, WHIP four times, innings pitched four times, and wins three times. He is the current active leader with 3,103 strikeouts and currently sits and #16 on the all-time leaderboard.

The scans above don't show all of the Justin Verlander cards in my collection, but the ones I didn't show are all part of set builds. These are the ones that are part of my Rookie of the Year collection, enough for a nice, even, double-bagged page.

Rookie of the Year Spotlight: Todd Worrell

Some of the collections I have been working on over the years are starting to get filled out and my goals are being reached. As a result, I'm starting to slow down a little when it comes to acquiring many cards for some of my mini-collections. Now that the collection is feeling more and more complete, I wanted to start showcasing the cards I have, player by player.

One such collection is my Rookie of the Year collection. I love collecting players who have won the award as the top newcomer in each league. This wasn't born of hot rookie hype and the desire to prospect. Rather, I became fascinated thinking about the careers of guys like Eric Karros, Jerome Walton, and Tim Salmon, who experienced varying degrees of success but may not have become superstars. I thought it would be fun to have a collection that chronicles the individual career journeys of rookie stars--whether they burned bright and flamed out quickly, regressed to the mean, or wended their way to Cooperstown.

 

My goal has been to fill a binder page for each player who won the award in my lifetime and to fill a row for older players. I may expand that later as I expand my vintage collection. The ultimate goal of my binder is to show a card from every different uniform the player wore, from fresh-faced rookie to grizzled vet. This series is to commemorate each Rookie of the Year's career and show my collection of their cards. I have a randomized list of winners that I use to determine the order of these posts, but for the second time in a row, I'm going away from that order. Today we highlight

Todd Worrell

 

Todd Worrell saw his first Big League action in 1984. He made 17 relief appearances and recorded a solid 2.91 ERA with a 1.11 WHIP. With his rookie status still in place in 1985, Worrell became the Cardinals' closer. That season, he pitched 103 2/3 innings in 74 games. He led the NL with 36 saves and lowered his ERA to 2.08. Not only did he beat out a loaded NL rookie field that included Barry Bonds, Barry Larkin, Will Clark, John Kruk, and Kevin Mitchell, but he absolutely ran away with the award. He received all but one 1st-place vote. (The lone straggler vote went to Kevin Mitchell, who finished fourth.) Worrell was by no means a bad pick, but in hindsight he was a surprise. Using today's metrics, he might not have one. His 2.6 WAR was good, but was fourth-best behind Bonds (3.5), Robby Thompson (3.4), and Bruce Ruffin (3.2).

Over the next six seasons with St. Louis, Worrell kept his ERA under 3.00. from 1986-1989, he remained the Cardinals' closer. He earned his first All-Star bid in 1988 en route to a 32-save season. Tommy John surgery and a torn rotator cuff kept him on the shelf for all of the 1990 and 1991 seasons. He returned out of the bullpen in 1992, but not in the closer role. Still, he was solid. He signed with the Dodgers as a free agent and served as a middle reliever in 1993 and 1994. In 1995, he regained the closer role, which he would hold through the end of his career after the 1997 season. As the Dodgers' closer, he saved 32, 44, and 35 games from 1995-1997. He made two more All-Star teams in 1995 and 1996, and his save total in 1996 led the league. 

 

In 11 Major League seasons, Worrell pitched 693 2/3 frames, finishing 456 games and earning 256 saves. His career ERA was 3.09. He struck out 628 batters to 247 walks and held opponents to a .235 batting average. He even received MVP votes in two seasons (1985 and 1996) and finished fifth in the NL Cy Young voting in 1996. A good career, to be sure, but far from elite. In 2003, his first and only year on the Hall of Fame ballot, Worrell failed to receive a vote.

Since he spent his entire career with just two teams, it was easy enough to complete the run for Todd Worrell. The first page shown was all I needed for my binder. The second scan is just gravy. I'll keep any Worrell cards I come across, but I'm no longer actively seeking them now that his portion of my binder is complete.

Rookie of the Year Spotlight: Tommy Helms

Some of the collections I have been working on over the years are starting to get filled out and my goals are being reached. As a result, I'm starting to slow down a little when it comes to acquiring many cards for some of my mini-collections. Now that the collection is feeling more and more complete, I wanted to start showcasing the cards I have, player by player.

 

One such collection is my Rookie of the Year collection. I love collecting players who have won the award as the top newcomer in each league. This wasn't born of hot rookie hype and the desire to prospect. Rather, I became fascinated thinking about the careers of guys like Eric Karros, Jerome Walton, and Tim Salmon, who experienced varying degrees of success but may not have become superstars. I thought it would be fun to have a collection that chronicles the individual career journeys of rookie stars--whether they burned bright and flamed out quickly, regressed to the mean, or wended their way to Cooperstown.

 

My goal has been to fill a binder page for each player who won the award in my lifetime and to fill a row for older players. I may expand that later as I expand my vintage collection. The ultimate goal of my binder is to show a card from every different uniform the player wore, from fresh-faced rookie to grizzled vet. This series is to commemorate each Rookie of the Year's career and show my collection of their cards. I have a randomized list of winners that I use to determine the order of these posts, but for the second time in a row, I'm going away from that order. Today we highlight

Tommy Helms

 

In 1964, Tommy Helms got his first cup of coffee, appearing in two games for the Reds after his call-up. The next season, he made 21 more appearances. In 1966, he was in the Big Leagues to stay as the Reds' primary 3rd baseman. During his first full season, he batted .284 and showed the most pop that he would show for his entire career: 9 HR and .380 slugging. His fielding percentage at the hot corner was .961, good for fourth in the Majors. It increased to .969 when considering his time at SS. Helms defeated Houston SS Sonny Jackson in the Rookie of the Year voting, gaining 60% of the votes.

 

The next year, in 1967, Cincinnati moved Helms to 2nd base. The move seemed to pay off, as Helms made the NL All-Star teams in two consecutive years, 1967-1968. Then in 1970-1971, Helms won the Gold glove at 2nd base. 1971 was his best season; he finished second in the MLB with a .990 fielding percentage and posted a 2.7 WAR. Following the season, Helms was sent to Houston as part of the trade that brought the legendary Joe Morgan to Cincinnati. Helms was the Astros' primary second bagger for the next three seasons, but by 1975--his fourth in Houston--he was settling into a part-time role. He spent 1976 in Pittsburgh after being traded for a player to be named later (Art Howe). After one season with the Pirates, he was traded to Oakland along with Phil Garner for six players, including Tony Armas, Doc Medich, and Dave Giusti. A year later he was released by the Pirates, signed with Red Sox, and his career came to after a year in Boston.

 

During his career, Helms was a slick fielder who finished in the top 10 in fielding percentage in eight of his nine seasons as a starter. He won two Gold Gloves and received two All-Star nods. His bat was somewhat weak, as he finished with a career OPS of .642. His career WAR was 8.6.

 

After his playing career, Helms entered coaching. He returned to Cincinnati and managed the Reds in place of the embattled Pete Rose for 64 games in 1988 and 1989. He won 12 of 27 in 1988 and 16 of 37 in 1989. He failed to obtain the full-time job in 1990, when the team won the World Series under skipper Lou Piniella.