2015 Topps Royals Outfielders - Same Pose

2015 was a charmed season for the Royals.  Seven players on the All-Star team, the AL Central Division Championship, and, of course, WINNING THE WORLD SERIES.

A big part of that team was the dynamic defense, particularly in the outfield.  Apparently Topps predicted this at the beginning of the season, as they decided to portray each one of the best KC outfielders in a similar pose -- making a diving defensive gem.

LF - Alex Gordon :  Winner of four consecutive Gold Gloves in LF, he was the winner of both the Platinum Glove and Hutch Award in 2014.

CF - Jarrod Dyson : 1.1 Defensive WAR over only 560 innings in 2015.  He lead the league in Double-Plays turned as an OF.  People thought he was just a burner, but he has a fast, accurate arm, too.

RF - Lorenzo Cain :  2.3 Defensive WAR in 2015.  This was good for 4th in the AL across all positions, and was actually a decrease from 2013/2014 when he was 2nd in the league.  He was also chosen as the "Wilson Defensive Player of the Year" in CF.

The "Superman" poses from all of them make for a neat set when seen as a group.  Are there any other sets you know of that have teammates in a similar pose?

A Repack Surprise

I like to keep a few sealed packs on-hand for times when I really want to open something, but don't want to head all the way to the store to buy something.  I've found one of the best ways to do that is to get the 20-pack Fairfield repacks from Target.  I've been gradually working my way through one of those for the last month or so, and was down to two packs left...neither of which particularly excited me:  a 2016 Leaf Babe Ruth pack and one remaining pack of 2015 Topps Series 1.  First I opened the Babe Ruth pack and got....cards of Babe Ruth (yawn).  Next was the Topps pack.  There had been about 4 packs of Series 1 altogether in here, and I hadn't received anything to write home about.  I wasn't expecting much from this one either, and it didn't start out promising as I read the card names from the back...

Tony Sipp.

Bryce Berentz.


Tom Koehler.




You can see where this is going...dullsville.
Brandon Belt.
Clayton Kershaw. -- Well, at least he's somebody I know I can trade.  It's the #100 card.

Eric Young.

Mets Team Card.
....

Etc.  Another boring pack.  However, I flip the cards over to look at the pictures on the front, and am pleasantly surprised.  The Mets team card has an interesting camo-uni photo...and the Clayton Kershaw card looked...different.

It wasn't this card #100 that I was expecting:

It was this card #100:

The "bubble-gum" variation.  I had forgotten this was a thing...but knew I hadn't seen this card before.  It was definitely a nice thing to see out of a Fairfield repack!

So the question to my Dodger-collecting friends is....Does anybody need it?

Fernando Rodney's Checkup

Hi Fernando,
Dr. Blogger here.  Thanks for coming in for your annual examination.  We're going to be testing your knowledge of body parts today... specifically one particular part.  Let's get started.

Fernando, could you please point to your left shoulder for me?

Great job.  And this time, how about you point to your left shoulder?

Excellent.  Everything seems to be in order here, so I think we're done.  Get yourself dressed and make sure you stop at the desk on the way out to handle your copay.

A Foolish Decision Pays Off

To get a particular card for your collection quickly,  you really should just find it online and click buy-it-now.

It's never smart to buy packs looking for one particular card.  The vast majority of the time you end up several dollars poorer and holding a stack of cards you don't want.  Plus, there are probably Giants and Cardinals in that stack (ewwww....).

There are still blasters of 2015 Topps Series Two floating around out there in retail-world, and they each contain one of the "First Home Run" medallion manu-relics.  I was at Target with my son, and we were looking for something fun to bust together.  The side panel of the blaster box had the checklist for the medallion cards, and there were THREE Royals on there.   Alex Gordon, Bo Jackson, and Carlos Beltran -- A, B, and C.  Getting a "Gordo" would be ideal, but any of them would be great to pull from the box.

I put the Series Two blaster and a Fairfield Repack -- the six-year-old LOVES Panini Triple Play -- into the cart and we headed home.

The first thing we opened was the Blaster.  The guaranteed hit comes in its own opaque wrapper.  We cracked it open, and found this:

2015 Topps - First Home Run Relic - Alex Gordon

 
There was lots of screaming and giggling between us.  I won't say who giggled more.

So there you have it -- sometimes a foolish decision turns out to be the right one.  :-)

Favorite 2015 Topps Card - David Cone

2015 Topps - Free Agent 40 - #F40-13 - David Cone

What makes a good card?  Photo?  Color?  Design?  Subject?

I think it's a little of each of those, which is why my favorite card thus far this year is the David Cone  "Free Agent 40" card shown above. 

David Cone is a guy who isn't really "on-the-map" for current cards, so it was great to see one of him in this current release, especially in a Royals uni (rather than a Mets one).  The scan does not do justice to the colors on this one -- they are very saturated, and the glossy finish plus the foil make it really pop.  And it's all in delicious Royals blue. 

Last-In, First-Out

When dealing with inputs/outputs, you have to decide how to process them.  You can process them either as First-In, First-Out (FIFO) or Last-In, First-Out (LIFO).  FIFO is used by grocery stores to stock their shelves so that you buy whatever is oldest before you buy the new stuff.  LIFO is what you use for stacking plates in your kitchen cabinet...whatever you just cleaned gets put on the top of the stack and used first the next time.  Selling stocks can use either method, depending on what you want your basis to be.

Why am I talking about this?  I think most bloggers (myself included) try to use a FIFO method for posting our trade packages.  If someone sent me something 5 weeks ago, I want to show that off before I show the stuff I got today.  However, I am hopelessly behind (I have a 1-year-old....it's been a crazy year) on a bunch of the stuff that has been sent to me (including the JBFJ "Ton of Bricks" that he sent me WAY LAST YEAR and I still need to show off), but I still want to post some of the recent stuff in a timely manner. 

I won a recent contest run by Arpsmith.  He and I are neighbors.  Well, not next-door neighbors, but with our recent moves, we now live in the same 'burb.  We haven't met yet (I can't be friends with a Giants fan after last October ;-)), but we are card buddies.  From his contest he sent a bunch of 2015 Topps and some Royals goodies.

First of all, a bunch of 2015 Topps base:

Next, he gave me the two relics from his box that were NOT Nolan Ryan:

Finally, he tossed me a package of  Royals that I needed...my favorite of which makes me want to go for a sprint:

How happy did all this make me?  Very happy.  Like....SALVY-HAPPY.

Thanks, Adam!