TTM Success – August 6, 2009

Got home today from being out of town for a few days and had that mysterious envelope in the mailbox. Always a treat to get a nice successful TTM return. I mark my address for both the send to and return address on the SASE I sent out so if it gets lost it will always (hopefully) come back to me anyway, as there is no sense in sending the player back his own autograph.

Today it was the Texas Rangers star center fielder – Andruw Jones. This is exciting as it marks a successful TTM return from an active major leaguer! It is always nice to see a guy take time out of his busy career and give a little back to the fans. In today’s game it is easy to get caught up in all the BS hoopla regarding rule breakers and steroid users, but in the end these guys are getting paid (handsomely might I add) to play a game – something that anyone of us as a baseball fan would love to do, and something all of us dreamed doing as a kid!

Here is what Andruw Jones threw some ink on for me. Andruw Jones c/o Texas Rangers 2/2 in 15 days:

2008 Bowman – #91 – Andruw Jones c/o Texas Rangers

2005 Donruss Classics – #183 – Andruw Jones c/o Texas Rangers

There you have it – another FlippingWax TTM Success – thanks Mr. Jones!

FlippingWax

t t t Throw the Ball

I met a co-worker for lunch yesterday and decided to bring along some wax for kicks. I know he has a few cards, not a collector like myself, but a sports fan in general and I thought he would enjoy busting some packs.

There we were two grown men at lunch with pack wrappers in front of us on the table thumbing though the cards we pulled. We were calling out hall of famers and just anyone that brought back a memory or two when he pulled this card…

1992 Fleer – #515 – Mackey Sasser

Sure, you might have never heard of him, but he was smiling and I could tell he was itching to tell me a Mackey Sasser story. I was all ears…

It seems that Mackey Sasser after a collision at the plate with an opposing player developed some type of psychological problem with throwing the ball back to the pitcher in 1990. He would hesitate or double pump the ball and sometimes had to get up and nearly walk the ball back to the mound, this as you can imagine became an issue for his career. To note, he isn’t the only guy that has had some trouble between the ears when it comes to throwing the baseball – you guys remember Steve Sax, Chuck Knoblauch, Steve Blass and even a pitcher turned outfielder Rick Ankiel – yep all of those guys had some issues at one time in their careers with throwing the baseball.

I am happy to see that Mackey bounced back from this issue after his career was over and was/is a coach at a community college, to note after some therapy he can successfully toss some batting practice to the kids with some type of consistency.

Believe I have a plan for this card, I hope to get a few more of my Mackey Sasser cards together and attempt to have him sign them via a TTM autograph attempt. I will certainly report back.

FlippingWax

Card Show Buys – 8/2/2009

Yes, it’s the middle of the week… yes the weekend is a distant memory in our ever so busy lives, but this is my blog and I can do whatever I want… so that leads us to what we have here – my Dania Beach baseball card show buys from Sunday August 2nd.

I had nothing in mind when I went to the show, maybe I was going to buy a newer box and be on my way home with overpriced wax or maybe I would score some more memorabilia type goods such as a few signed balls or maybe add a bat to the collection…

Generally when you go shopping to anywhere with nothing specific in mind to purchase things could go one of two ways – you will overspend on stuff you don’t need (ever been to the grocery store when your hungry?) or you will just end up walking around for awhile and then just come out pleased but not thrilled about any of your purchases. This weekend was more part B for me – I had nothing in mind and this is what I came out with…

First up was a few packs of old wax – how about some 1992 Fleer, a box of 1992 Score Series 1, a few jumbo packs of 1992 Score Series 2, a couple packs of 1993 Score – looking to get the Jeter RC maybe, a box of 1992 Donruss. This was certainly and impulse buy – I have plenty of early 90s “junk” wax, but what’s better than busting some childhood wax?

A few Don Mattingly and Derek Jeter baseball cards to add to my growing collection, that reminds me, maybe I should make a few dedicated pages to my biggest player collections. It might bore you to see 30, 40 or even 50 of the SAME cards for each player though… maybe for a rainy day. Also, I added a nice numbered Dave Righetti card and put me down for another Bernie Williams card (maybe he will be the 3rd player page). I round out this purchase with a numbered David Cone card, if I send this to Mr. Cone TTM do you think he will keep it? I didn’t want to leave a nice card of a man that the baseball world need not forget about – Cory Lidle who passed away in an airplane crash a few years back.

I killed an hour or so digging through some 3200 count boxes to get some TTM cards or just a few cards of players I am a fan of. Nothing to see here… keep reading…

I ended the day walking out looking for something to drop the last few dollars in my wallet on. I walked the show a few laps looking for something to catch my eye. I thought the show was slower this month than the past month so it was a rather dreary few laps. Then I decided what the hell, let’s get another box and this is what I picked.

A box of 1993 Score, hey there has to be a few Jeter Rookies in there right? I guess we will find out soon in a box break post.

Again, if anyone is looking for any players from the early 90s, chances are I have more than a few of their cards from the various boxes and packs I picked up at the show, just drop me a line and I will send them your way.

FlippingWax