USA wins GOLD in overtime

 Congratulations to both USA hockey teams! GOLD! It's been awhile. Great day for the US.

1952 Topps

 How often does one get in the mail a couple of 1952 Topps cards? I for one certainly don't get many, especially unannounced. A total surprise for sure. They came with a note stating: "A couple of "mini's", but I hope they can be place holders for you." 

The cards themselves cover the "mini" angle. They certainly will serve as place holders, but I won't be stressing over "UPGRADING" them. For the immediate future and then some, they'll do just fine.

Have a great weekend!

Sport Lots all in one post.

 The last Slots order came in a couple of weeks ago. It wasn't a super large order. I wouldn't even call it a big one. I only scanned the Braves. Half of the order were set builds.

Okay, so I did leave one set build need in the batch. But it was a vintage Laughlin.

Have a great night everybody!

Wacky Wednesday

 Hump day! I am working hard trying to get those "P's" caught up and I am nearly done with the players. The biggest ones remain Piazza, Pucket, B. Posey, and Pujols. I'm updating Sal Perez right now. And have begun the sort of Mr. Piazza. I'll be glad to get back to the sort of the R's (roughly 15-20K) yeah that's a lot especially with the S's and T's right behind them. Looking forward to closing out this 2 year update because going forward won't take half as long and probably half of that as I haven't been buying a "ton" of bulk cards. Pun intended. 

Now let us peer at a few baseball cards that I found interesting at one time.

That top row is TOP NOTCH! 

Enjoy the last half of the week.

Guess what? Yep, I went and did it again.

 Yep, I done messed up again. No..... I didn't piss anyone off (at least not that I know of). No, I thought I finished updating my P's with my PC's including updating TCDB too. In fact, I started going through my PC boxes and pulling out the R's, S's, and T's to eventually sort them and when I got down to that last three boxes, I decided to grab the "R" boxes that were already separated from a year ago when I found 2 more shoe boxes full of P's. UH OH. 

I like to make lemonade when given lemons, so the positive takeaway is that I hadn't started the MAJOR sort with the R's yet. That would have eliminated any available space for sorting the P's now. So that is a good thing. Another good thing is for Night Owl,  several Dodgers in them there P's. I just sent a package loaded with Dodgers, and I mailed another one today..., Yes, Greg, there's another one coming. LOL, plus whatever I pull out of this batch of P's. The player with the most cards in these 2 boxes just happens to be Piazza (25% of all), then Pujols (who does have Dodger cards), then Puckett, Posey and Palmeiro so those last few are clear but might find a Podres dupe or two. 

Otherwise, I had an awesome long weekend. Started by picking up Elijah (my grandson) Friday after school, grabbed some dinner to bring home and wait for his mama to get off work. They spent the night and all day Saturday. The little guy and I went and got our hair cut which was cool. After they left is when I decided to start going through the PC boxes. Took all night, and all day Sunday, and Monday just pulling the r, s, and t's. Back to the drawing board with the P's...get it done and move on.

Here is a couple of scans of some baseball cards. Braves needs from and E-Bay purchase.

 It was the complete team set (I already had a few so I pulled those out).

I have a Sport Lots order to cover yet and more incoming cards too. besides the package to Greg, I've sent many more out Mark you have a box a PWE, Tom T, Mike D., Bo you have an interesting package coming at you.....LOL! RJ, Dennis, and Matt as well. Plus a PWE or two heading out to Gavin, AJ, and I think a couple more. 

Happy President's day!

 For those of you that have been following this blog for years, you've seen me on this day unload my entire Presidential collection. It is huge (tons of scans---several hundred maybe a thousand), and I love it. Doesn't matter left or right, it is a very nice collection.

 This year in fact recently, I received a packaged from our buddy Mark (Fuji). This was perfect timing, and I feel it worthy to be the sole representation this year. 

The first item from Mark was the deck of playing cards. I didn't scan these as the box covers the face cards which are the only ones with pictures.

Now the other item was an OVERSIZED complete set that I didn't own.

This is what that backs are like. That last line should also show that LBJ was also 6'4". Our current President is in third at 6'3".

That is where the set was printed. 

I included the card backs for person in case some of you wanted to read up on them.

God Bless the U.S.A.

Thanks mark, greatly appreciated.

Customs from The Villages

 My first purchase came from a seller who had a quarter box (5 row) that I dug through and as I did so conversed letting him know that I would be pulling a stack or two. Along the way I mentioned i should just buy the whole box. That got his attention. He kept trying to get me to make an offer which I didn't. He came out out with very high number and lowered it several times as I said nah, I'll just thin these out and keep a handful. Once I was done with the box I had about 500 cards pulled out. We kept talking the whole time, it was great. Then I looked at his other stuff, not for me, but then he had a display of his customs. He had sold out of a few, but I grabbed one of each that was left. Eight total. He had them at $10.00 each. I asked how much and he said with the box he'd take a hundred bucks. That meant I got him down from $150.00 to 25.00 on that 5K box. That made it work for me.

I should have removed these from the brand new magnetic holders before scanning. The cards look good, and are thick cards, not flimsy at all. You may recognize the use of  the Jordan rookie and Messi cards. The Dodger card will be heading north. Santa is staying with me.

I did remove the cards from the cases except for Jesus which are gifts for my sister Kathy. Caitlyn is staying with me. Who says you can't mix politics and religion, I just did. 

I've already used one of the cases for another card that I gave as a gift. I know that I need to clean my scanner bed. I did a lot of scanning this past week especially getting a whole bunch of the Maddux cards scanned really did a number on the imaging. I'll try to remember to do that before I scan anything else.

The Villages card show: In reverse.

 I only made two purchases at the show this time. The first purchase has two political items among a total of 8 custom items I bought (tomorrow's post) and a 5K count monster box that was basically 3/4 full of mainly Topps Chrome in gem mint pristine condition. Those I didn't scan as they were mainly 2021 and 2021 Update. There were also apx. 1K 2025 football cards in the box which I have donated to one of the members (Jared) of my trivia team (The Gang half) who will be distributing them to his PE students. Now the customs are great at least to me. One of them will be heading north, three are going to my sister Kathy (Jesus). The rest (4) are for my collection. Head's up tomorrow's post is a short one with just 4 scans.

Tonight is the second or you could say the last purchase made. A few tables down from the seller with the first purchase was a dealer who had several .25 boxes and dollar boxes. I grabbed up a bunch of Braves and other cards from him and made a deal on the price paying roughly .50 a piece. 

Yes, scooping up all of the Nick Kurtz at fifty cents (obviously these were in the dollar boxes).

The sky blue Fried, Pink Riley, and green Minter were needed Braves. 

This batch was set build needs.

High end sets and Holiday SP's and relics are always a steal @ fifty cents. I had a total of about 80 cards from those boxes.

The last thing from the seller was a Braves jersey they were originally asking $40.00.

I paid $40.00 for everything the 80 cards from there dollar and quarter boxes plus the jersey.

Now, I know this isn't a high end jersey (it was a stadium giveaway), but it was my size and I liked it. I was happy with the deal.

More good news to close out with is that Margie's Boys and The Gang (our trivia team) won last night. We started out strong leading the pack in round 1, and 2. Kind of stunk in round 3 but still tied for 1st, totally stinking in rounds 4 and 5 (where those two rounds had us sitting in 5th place going into the championship round). Those rounds are where we usually excel and separate us from the rest.....not last night. However, we nailed the final question (apparently the only team that did) and we bet everything and came out on top. Great night! 

Wacky Wednesday

 Trivia tonight with a full house. All six of us are expected, yea!!!!

Now for tonight's interesting cards.

It's hump day so enjoy the rest of the week!

Call me late to the PARTY! Padrograph surprises!

 Let me get this off of my chest (it doesn't need any aggravation). The 2026 checklist for Topps series 1 is out, which makes sense because release day is tomorrow. The Braves have 1,211 spots. NUTS. 12 cards in the base set each having ANOTHER 56 variations.

57 versions of the same card.......AGAIN.....Thanks but no Thanks Topps. Add in Holiday will use probably the same image too, plus others like 582 MONTGOMERY, and the "special event/holiday" variations. This might be the final straw for me, certainly reducing how many cards I buy this year. Beyond the base Braves, not sure I'll be seeking any. I'll take them, but I won't be looking for them. Here is the link to my 2026 Braves needs

Johnnys 2026 Braves needs

Now for some GOOD STUFF: The last couple of weeks the blogosphere has been posting up the goodies from the surprise mailers from Padrographs (Rod). I too received a glorious package and have included the highlights below. Thank you Sir Rod!

Kick starting the package are two autographs. My brother got all mushy over it today when I finally showed it to him. Trebek was his hero, lol. The Other will fit nicely into my USA Olympians.  The rest are new to me Braves.

I did have that Holiday Harris in my Slots box, that also came in the same day as Rod's package. I opened Rod's first and the other will go into that set build which should be almost complete by now....not sure. I completed the A & G set build, and had many Braves in that Slots box too, and still need a couple, but these were needs.

Update Braves needs in addition to the Slots cards.

Closing out the highlights with some Update inserts/parallels and some Chrome Udpate.

Thanks again Rod... Absolutely a wonderful surprise that did that TCDB quest some GOOD!

I'll finish the week with a couple of posts to wrap up The Villages card show after YES a Wacky Wednesday tomorrow (trivia night- we haven't played in a long while).

Just Another Maddux Monday

 I promised several weeks ago that once I ended the Shadow Shots that I would kick start the Maddux Mondays. Tonight is the first edition. The second edition will be in 2 weeks and most Monday after that. 

This is a GIVEAWAY post (all of the Maddux posts will be). Rules are simple. Be a follower of this blog and a US or Canadian resident. Just comment (once below on this post) by Friday midnight EST. I will randomize the entrants and the winner gets all 18 cards posted.

Here are tonight's cards:

I sorted the cards to give a good range of products and years. This one has a rookie! I scattered a few more Maddux rookies throughout the run of this theme. There should be a total of 30 of these Monday giveaways.

Later folks!

More from the Tampa show

 I still need to get some scanning done from The Villages show, Sport Lots, Rod package, Grand slam, and even Ebay. I'll be doing that over the weekend.

Here are the last cards that I scanned from the Tampa show. 

Some needed Braves. I bought a monster box from this dealer, mainly set builds and PC cards, but you know I was happy to add these Braves.

Have a great weekend folks!

TCDB monthly update along and a room with a view

 Before I get started with the numbers, while I was vacationing at one of my Local hospitals I took some pictures. I previously mentioned that the room was nice or rather equivalent to a hotel room. You decide.

The door was not your normal door. It was an oversized sliding glass double door. The curtain was for my privacy.

Here you can see a mini window, the sink, and a piece of the t.v. LOL.

Much better view of the t.v. and a board. You can't read it but that board shows that "I like baseball cards". The lady(tech) that did the echo cardiogram wrote that on the board.

That is the bathroom door which behind it was a large bathroom with a nice size shower (wish mine at home was like that one), and another window that looked out behind the hospital.

Same window here but from a different angle. This should be the last post containing my recent health drama. At least until something changes.

Now let's get to the January TCDB update.

Atlanta Braves: (as of today): 32, 975 still #2 behind that "other guy" he is at 33,616 putting me 691 behind him. No matter what I don't believe his numbers!

Total all cards: I jumped up one spot to #24 with 414, 133 unique cards listed.

Basbeall cards: I held at the #12 spot even though I added over 11K cards to it to get to 372, 757.

Gaming: I added none and dropped 2 spots to #100.

Non-Sports: I jumped 2 spots hereby adding 3,200 cards to get to #25 with 28, 662 cards.

I will be putting a regular baseball card post tomorrow as the Saturday posts are done for now.

Later Gators!