The last two posts I have made have been Brian Roberts cards courtesy of Roll out the Barrel and a plethora of Ginter minis from Democratic Roadkill. I am gonna kill two birds with one stone and post up a few of the other cards they sent my way… First off a fun-sized Goodwin’s Champions card of former Rays Ace, Scott Kazmir. The blog-o-sphere has been very, very kind in sharing their Goodwin’s Rays cards with me. Beardy, Cobb and Halladay, Democratic Roadkill, My Past Time, JDs Wild Cardz, Padrographs and Roll out the Barrel have all hooked me up with Goodwin’s a plenty… In fact, other than funky variations that I don’t really know about, I think I have every card except Evan Longoria and Carl Crawford. I have every regular mini except for CC, Pena and James Shields, but, thanks to CaH,
I have sweet foil cards of them. Not too bad considering that I haven’t ripped ANY Goodwin’s at all… Anyway, here is the cloudy Kazmir
and if anyone has Carl Crawford or Evan Longoria to spare, send em my way! These two Aki minis came from Democratic Roadkill. He knows how much I love the Rays speedy second baseman.
I think I have shown these minis before, so how about a shot of the back of the card?
He didn’t stop with the minis though, he added along a Goodwin’s full sized card for good measure.
I do like the look of these cards. It is weird to me because that is a really old picture of Aki used in the rendering and the background, although cool and old timey, just doesn’t make sense for a player who plays in a dome. Anyway, Aki Rules and these are fancy and cool looking cards. Speaking of fancy-Duane added in a 4th Goodwin’s Aki card in the package! This one is from the memorabilia series and has a sweet gray swatch in the shape of an M on the front. I guess that the M stands for memorabilia?
It obviously doesn’t stand for Aki or Rays, maybe TaMpa Bay? I don’t know, but I like it! I am terribly nervous that the Rays are not going to resign Iwamura, which would be tragic. He was a huge part of their rebuilding effort and their success in 2008. He is unmatched defensively at both 2nd and 3rd base, he’s just too valuable an asset to let slip away and I know the Dodgers, Marlins and Mariners are all seriously interested and so are their fans. I can’t go a whole post without including a Carl Crawford card and I do LOVE these Carolina blue Bowman’s!
This is a 2009, card #149 and is serial numbered 437/500. Okay, I am going to show one last card from Duane for now. I still haven’t unveiled the surprise he sent in the last package and no one has guessed what it was, here is the hint again.
With all these awesome cards I am showing, you would think these are it, but it actually gets even better! I had horrible luck with 2009 Allen Ginter. I had fun putting together the set, but I bought way too many blasters and didn’t pull many relics at all. I didn’t even realize that BJ had a relic in there, but here it is!
I really liked his base card this year with the yellow background, but it is very cool that they had a totally new pose for this relic. Thanks so much Duane, your kindness is mind-blowing!
Now, back to Ed… This last trade we did he sent me stuff that I was just getting to pass along to someone else. I asked him for Grady Sizemore cards to use as trade bait and he delivered! Having so many cool and different Grady cards I almost thought of keeping them and starting a new collection, but I did the right thing and moved them on to a proper fan… He did include something awesome for me, though, so this greedy card hoarding Troll was happy. It was actually my first ever Matt Garza relic, from Upper Deck X.
It is one of those cards where it says he is on the Tampa Bay Rays, but shows him in a Twins uniform. I really don’t care much for those, but I was still excited to add a Garza relic to the old collection. I know have relics of three of their current starting five (Shields, Niemann and now Garza) which means I will be on the lookout for David Price, Wade Davis and/or Andy Sonnanstine. Anyway, Garza isn’t my favorite Ray on the team. I think it’s because of all of the spitting. I don’t care for that. He had a rough year this season in the win loss department, but actually pitched really well. His ERA was 3.95 (16th in AL) and his 189 strikeouts were good for 9th in the League, but his 8-12 just didn’t look too good. He did much better on turf this year (7-5) than he did on grass (1-7) and after the All Star break he didn’t have too many decisions, but was 2-5 when he did. He’s like BJ Upton though, you know he’s capable, you just wait for it.
Last year Garza was the ALCS MVP and was untouchable against Boston. He was 2-0 with a 1.38 ERA in that Series and he Ked 25 Sox in 25 innings. I hope come Opening Day that the 2008 version of Matt Garza shows up to play. If that Garza is out there, I could almost excuse the spitting… Okay, that is all for now. I still have a number of things from DR that I still need to post and I probably have more from RotB, too. As often as I trade with both of these guys, I could conceivably have something in my mailbox tomorrow from either one of them. I will end this post with a little begging… If anyone has Aki cards from this year’s Goodwin’s Champions that I didn’t list here, I want them! I want to be an Aki completist for that set cuz I am so close. Also, my Carl Crawford list is up and is up to date. I seriously thought I was at 200 different cards of him, but unless I have card gnomes stealing them while I sleep, I only ever actually had 129. Much of what I am missing is base cards, so help a Troll out! The list is here:
http://collectivetroll.webs.com/crawford.htm Speaking of links... I have started posting regularly on my ’78 Topps blog so please check that out and add it to your blog rolls if you would -
http://1978topps.blogspot.com/ 
I promise to catch up on new acquisitions one of these days. I still have some really awesome stuff to post from JDs Wild, My Past Time and Cobb and Halladay, plus more from Democratic Roadkill, plus my take on the World Series and a profile of young Wade Davis, so stay tuned! Thanks again ED and DUANE, you guys ROCK!!! Oh, and if you wondering about the card on the top of the post, that falls into the category of a wishlist card...Go Rays! Troll out.
It isn’t typical for your friend the Troll to devote an entire post to just one card, but I think I am going to start doing this more often. I have so, so many trades to catch up on and part of the problem is that I am so wordy that a twenty card trade post might take me several hours to type up. This card came from my friend to the south of me, “Wicked” Don Alfredo Ortega. He has been spoiling me with all kinds of awesomeness for several months now. There is something about this particular card that I absolutely love and felt the need to post it by itself. Wicked had put up some trade bait cards and even though I still owed him, I saw a few Carl Crawfords that I needed, so I laid a claim on them. Wicked obliged and had them in the mail the next day. Well, I saw the CC cards and decided that I wanted them, but I missed something really awesome in the photo, something shiny, something great. This card came before the Aki trade. I have written about it a few times, here and here so my feelings on that have already been stated and I won’t rehash them. He was a leader on the team and I don’t think that they will recover quickly from the loss of his glove in that infield. I also don’t think he is going to be in Pittsburgh too long either. What I do think is that this is one of the coolest Aki cards I have ever seen! Aside from my autographed rookie card of Aki, 
which came from GCRL and is posted here .This is my favorite Akinori Iwamura card ever! I have said this over and over again, but even though I have never even seen a pack of Bowman Sterling before, everything I have from this product is amazing! 
This may be the nicest example so far… Folks looking to get a group break together might consider a little Bowman Sterling-maybe? Anyway, the card is a rookie from the 2007 Sterling set, it is card #BS-AI and most importantly it is a REFRACTOR!!!! I love me some shiny, I really, really do! It is serial numbered 116/199 and is wondrously shiny. I love everything about this card, starting with the shiny, but also the silver, grey and black color and the way that Aki’s crocodile mitt stands out being the only red on the card. 
The back of the card is plain and boring looking in contrast to the front, but holds a fun fact called a “Bowman Sterling Rookie Revelation”. It says: It was a successful debut for Iwamura who came from Japan as advertised-a smooth infielder and professional hitter. It took him only until his 3rd game to put up a 4 for 4 performance in the books, as the third baseman singled three times and homered in a win over the Toronto Blue Jays. The back also lists his 2006 stats, from the Central League in Japan where he starred for the Yakult Swallows-he batted .311 with 32 homers and 77 RBI. Not too shabby Aki! Did I mention that I love this card? Did I mention that the Rays suck for trading this guy away? Did I mention that Alfredo is the coolest trader in the blog-o-sphere? I should… You can find Alfredo’s high quality blog right here, go check it out right now! Thanks again Wicked! Go Rays! Go Aki! Go Bucs! 
Troll out.
and Edwin Jackson-two proven starters. Don't get me started on them showing Adam Kennedy, Jonny Gomes, Erik Hinske and Rocco Baldeli the door either. The Kazmir trade was mainly about dollars, but they shouldn’t have offered him that contract if they couldn’t afford to pay it. If I work at Taco Bell and my boss gives me a 50 cent raise and then fires me because I make too much is along the same lines. The Rays offered him the contract, he signed it, and then they complain that they can’t afford him and ship off a frontline starter without getting big league talent in return. I don’t see the log-jam in the infield so much. Ben Zobrist has been amazing filling in wherever needed and doing a decent job defensively, but he is not a great fielding second baseman long-term, his future is in right field. Reid Brignac is a very talented shortstop, not a second baseman. 
The other two second basemen in the organization just aren’t ready for the big leagues just yet. Aki is part of the anchor of that infield, without him it is just an average infield. I saw the writing on the wall, too. I didn’t want to read it, but I knew that his time was limited, I don’t agree with it, but I knew it was coming and I saw a lot of teams interested. I had actually hoped, deep down, that he would go to Baltimore and revert back to third base and replace Melvin Mora and help Roberts at the top of the order to set the table for Markakis, Scott, Jones and Reimold. I also saw Florida being very interested and willing to give up real pitching in exchange for him. Another possibility seemed to be Los Angeles and there he would at least be playing for a contender. I would be very surprised if he is in Pittsburgh on opening day and I think that Pittsburgh will get more in return for him than the Rays did. If they keep him through the All Star break and he stays healthy, then his stock will rise even more. Either way, it seems a dumb move, unless somehow that Pat Burrell is the player to be named later, then it would be fine with me, but I really doubt that the Pirates would be that dumb. I agree that the Rays have talent within their organization to replace him next year and even save a few pennies, but I don’t want to see the defense drop off. I am interested to see what Aki's final destination is, if he starts the season in the Burgh, I really feel for the guy... I am still way too irked to make a sensible argument and I have much to do today, so I will end this with my latest awesome Aki card. It is the first card I have got of him not in a Rays uniform, the first of many I am sure. 
It came from Master Mike of JD Wild Cardz and it is refractor-fiffic! A 2009 Topps Chrome WBC REFRACTOR! Card #W89, serial numbered 207/500.
Thanks Mike, this is one Aki trade I like! Oh, the super awesome 2007 Bowman Heritage Signs of Greatness Certified Auto of minor league second baseman Elliot Johnson is another new card for me and this seemed like a good time to post it. I like Elliot's upside and at 25 years old I still think he can be a big league player, but I don't think he is a starter for a team that is going to contend, not yet. He's still a personal fav of mine, but I don't wanna trust second base to him just yet... This is another great 'graph from New York Joe of the Cobb and Halladay blog, thanks Joe! Thanks again Mike! Go Rays or whoever… Troll out.
Well, I can’t freaking believe it, but it does seem to be true. The e-mail from the Bucs didn’t say who they gave up; I tried to calm down and thought to myself, well if we got Zach Duke or Ross Ohlendorff that might not be a bad deal. Well, they didn’t get Duke or Ohlendoff. 
They got Jesse Freaking Chavez, a 26 year old middle reliever with limited stuff and no proven track record. A guy who in 6 years in the minors had a 21-30 record with a 4.36 ERA, a guy who came from Texas for Kip Wells and did a whole lot of mop-up work for the Bucs this year. He isn’t a bad pitcher, he eats innings and gets the ball over the plate, he doesn’t have spectacular stuff, but on a last place team he had a job as a middle reliever. He did pitch in 73 games last year, mostly short appearances; he worked a total of 67 innings and served up 11 homers. He was 1-4 with a 4.01 ERA; he had 15 holds and 4 blown saves. Like I said, he aint awful, but he’s nothing to write home about. 
He is no better than Chad Bradford or Dan Wheeler or Grant Balfour. He isn’t an upgrade, he’s just a body in the pen with little upside or potential to go much further. In other words, he isn’t what the Rays needed and when and if they find what they actually need, I wonder if there will even be room in the bullpen for Chavez. Akinori is one of my favorite players and I hate to see him go, but I understand the reality of the business side of the game, too. On the business side, Aki was one of their most valuable, tradable assets. Had the Rays used him in a package to unload Pat Burrell’s ridiculous salary, I would understand, had they gotten a closer or a legit starting catcher, I would have understood, but to get a right handed specialist middle reliever is a joke. 
I’ve been sitting here staring at this screen and cussing off and on for over an hour. I typed a lot of things about Aki, positive stats and reasons he was one of my favorite players. He is a winner and he brings a lot to the table, he didn’t single handedly bring a pennant to Tampa Bay, but he was a huge part of the team that brought that flag here and to lose him a pretty severe loss. His defense mainly, but his offense, his leadership, his work ethic and his winning presence will all be missed. I chose not to bore you all with his stats, or my favorite memories of him in Tampa Bay, or how I think that the Rays front office is ruining this team. I will say that the Pirates suddenly don’t seem so crazy for trading Freddy Sanchez and although I still think they are a horribly run organization, too, I really hope that they intend on building a winning team around Iwamura because he deserves to part of a competitive team because he is a competitor. 
I will always and forever bleed Rays blue, but since they hung that banner calling themselves 2008 AL Champs, they have gone downhill instead of up. It all started with the Burrell signing and each move since has been reactionary to that mistake. They went into the off-season with a whole lot of good pieces to the puzzle; they needed to sure up the bullpen, get a legit closer, chose a starting right fielder and perhaps get a starting catcher. What they have done so far was fire their exceptional hitting coach and trade away their Gold Glove caliber second baseman and not address any of their needs. It makes me wonder, did the Pirates not want Crawford? Couldn’t they thrown together a package and shipped Bartlett, Pena and Zobrist to Pittsburgh, too? Maybe throw Wade Davis and Jeff Niemann in on the deal as well… 
Since this is a business and all players are products, I imagine that they will sell every product that they can, which will leave the Rays with Pat Burrell and a bunch of third rate prospects. Then, we can change the team's name to the Tampa Bay White Elephants... I promised not to swear on here, but this is freaking bull… This really stinks and I am not happy. I know baseball is a business, but I don’t think this move is good business. I am freaking pissed. It is way past my bedtime; maybe after 12 hours of sleep I can tell you all how I really feel. Best of luck to you #1, hope things click for ya in the ‘Burgh, you will be missed in the Bay! Go Rays-Dismantle the team, not a happy troll out.
None of the Rays in this set are too fascinating to me in terms of being prospects, but I didn’t even know this guy was in the set. This is my first card of the potential catcher of the future for Tampa Bay, Jake Jeffries. Jake is still a few years away, but I got to watch this former 3rd round pick a lot in instructional league this year and he has serious potential. The card is number BDPP55. Gosh, Bowman cards have some looong numbers…
He also included some Heritage Rays which are always welcome as well as my first look at Ticket To Stardumb. I haven’t read anything positive about this set and I don’t have much to add. The cards are flimsy and if you don’t put them in a sleeve and top loader immediately, the silver ink on the front of the card wipes off. Not a great job Topps. 
I do like the “Star for a Day” game recap on the back, though. When I saw a Pat Burrell card in here I wondered when he was a star. Of course, when he was with the Phillies…
I have had success with Aki TTM style, he is a great signer, and this graph is no different, except that he adds his number 1 on his TTMs. It is a sticker graph, but isn’t faded at all and it went right into a screw down holder that went into a team set bag and then into the Rays display case. I am confident that it will stand the test of time! The card has the rookie card emblem in the top corner, but I wonder if Aki appeared on any 2006 issues. Is this his rookie card? That would just be an added bonus. Anyone who reads this blog knows that I am a huge fan of the man they call Japanese Lightning. I think he is a huge part of the Rays offense and defensive attack. He missed a lot of time this year with a torn ACL and the team suffered considerably without him there. Ben Zobrist was an offensive surprise and did quite well in Aki’s absence, but Zorilla didn’t come close to providing the defense that Rays fans had been accustomed to with Aki. He played for the Tokyo Yakult Swallows of the Central League in Japan from 1998 till 2006 when the Rays signed him. During that time he was a 6-time Gold Glove winner at third base and a huge offensive threat. In Japan he was a power hitter, in 2004 he batted .300 with 44 homers and 103 RBI. It was those kind of numbers that had MLB teams interested in him when he made himself available to be signed. The Red Sox had just signed Dice-K and paid a ridiculous amount for him, but Aki was obtained at a bargain price. 
The Rays signed him to a three year deal for 7.7 million. That is about 2.5 million per year. They have a club option for 2010 for 4.5 million. The rumor is that the Rays aren’t going to re-sign Aki. This would crush me as a fan and I think it would hurt the team quite a bit. Four and a half million is a ton of money, but considering the Rays paid Pat Burrell over 7 mill last year to do nothing, 4.5 is nothing. If he was a free agent, I think Aki would command even more than that on the open market. His injury cost him much of the season in 2009, but when he returned, his glove was still there. He also hit a home run in his first game back with the Rays against Detroit. Thanks so much to Jim of GCRL for everything, but especially the Aki autographed card. Here is to hoping that the Rays do the right thing and bring Aki back!!! troll out.
I have stacks of trades that I am slowly scanning to get them ready to post. On Monday I received a package from Rod, author of the Padrographs blog. It was great stuff, but it was filed away in a team bag on the dining room table on Tuesday morning. I noticed the Aki card, but it didn’t click that it was the card I was waiting for to finish this bad boy off. Last night, Duane from Democratic Roadkill blog pointed out that card #222 was Akinori Iwamura. When I got home, I searched my Aki book, searched my Aki cards in the display and nothing. I was pretty bummed because people have sent me this card. I have the mini of it in all 3 flavors...
I will probably also have an extra cup of coffee, too. The Troll knows how to party! As a note of interest probably only to me-the back of the Aki card was my 500th scan in the month of October. Woo hoo! Thanks Rod!! Set is done!! Go Angels! Troll out.
The move just doesn’t make any sense at all to me. When your team has its best year at the plate in team history, you don’t celebrate by firing the guy responsible-the hitting coach. Henderson has been a part of the (Devil) Rays staff since day one and has spent the last 5 years as their batting coach. I haven’t done many, but I have read a number of interviews with Rays hitters and when their success at the plate is brought up, generally they attribute much of their success to their coach, Steve Henderson. Up until this year, Ben Zobrist was a light hitting, back up utility infielder, but this season he blossomed (erupted) into Zorilla, a power hitting monster, a full time player and an All Star. Last year Jason Bartlett was known for his glove, not his bat. This season, he too was an All Star, and he finished 6th in the American League with a .320 batting average while setting career marks in hits, extra base hits, home runs and runs batted in. When asked about their success at the plate this year, both Zobrist and Bartlett give Henderson all the credit. According to both of them, Henderson helped them with their approach, their swing and showed them how to find their power and use their size and athletic ability to become better hitters. Before coming to Tampa Bay, Carlos Pena was not one of the league’s elite power hitters, he is now and he credits Steve Henderson with helping him find his swing. Henderson seems to make everyone on the team better and I have yet to read a negative word about him. So why fire the guy?
The Rays have been an offensive power house this year. They have been shut out very few times and have scored 10 runs or more on many occasions. They were on the wrong side of a historical evening when they were the victims of Mark Buerhle’s perfect game, but that was just one game. Carlos Pena led the league in home runs and Evan Longoria wasn’t too far behind. They had two players finish with over 100 runs batted in and two guys bat over .300. They had five different guys on the All Star team and they were all there because of their hitting. To me hitting is the one area that they don’t need a ton of work on. This move, the firing, doesn’t make one bit of sense to me and it is really pissing me off. Todd Greene, the Rays 1st year Quality Assurance Coach was also fired and his position eliminated. The rest of the Rays staff is under contract for 2010. 
I will love and support this team no matter what and I will support Henderson’s replacement, too, but damn, this really pisses me off! This just seems such an off the wall thing to do, there has to be a reason and I need to know it. If there isn’t a reason, then what the hell are you guys doing Tampa Bay?
And what does the trade do for the Rays? Well, it saves them money. That is what baseball is all about, right? That’s what the fans come to the ballpark to see, right? A team that is really good at saving money. That packs them in like nothing else. You hear the clichés “You’ve got to spend money to make money” and “you’ve got to pay to win”, but I think the Rays need to coin a new one. “Saving money is the best method to guarantee to not field a competitive ballclub”. Its not that catchy is it? I loved what the Rays accomplished last year, they made it to the World Series with one of the lower payrolls in baseball. That was awesome and I did take pride in the fact that they didn’t buy their way in, ala the New York Yankees. But as soon as the series was over, what did they do? They got rid of 7 of their lowest paid players (and 4 of those guys are in the playoffs now) and they replaced them with a useless, White Elephant, Designated Hitter who can’t hit and they rewarded him with a gigantic contract. 
With that huge contract, there is no other team in baseball that would be willing to touch Burrell and because of that front-office flub-up, we lose one of our top starters. I don’t think that Pat likes playing in Tampa Bay, either. I know I don’t like watching him strike out (I mean play), but my complaint is that his signing doesn’t follow the Rays money-saving mantra. Okay, I am off track a bit now. This tirade began with me being pissed beyond belief that the Rays would fire their awesome hitting coach, Steve Henderson and now I am dredging up old news, Pat Burrell stuff. Maybe that is how Henderson failed. He couldn’t teach a 7 million dollar man to hit a baseball. Maybe its just that all roads lead to the dead end signing of Pat the Bat. When I finally did check my work e-mail I saw quite a few rumor mill, insider info type messages that say the Rays aren’t planning on picking up Akinori Iwamura’s option for this year. That would be mother f-ing stupid. Signing Pat Burrell was f-ing stupid. Firing Steve Henderson was really f-ing stupid, but letting Aki walk would be really, really mother f-ing stupid. Do the right thing Tampa Bay. Think of your fans, think of your team and think about winning. Troll out.
Anyway, within a week of that post, there was a manila envelope from Duane in my post office box. I had previously just used the box for our record label (Bacon Towne Rex) and zine (Sink Hole Zine), so this small padded envelope was an unfamiliar sight in the box. I had gone to the post office on my lunch break, when I came back, my friend Kevin asked what I had got. It isn’t unusual to get record orders from Malaysia, a demo from the Ukraine or a zine from Columbia, the PO is always full of surprises. Today, the surprise was a package from Duane.
All I could say was wow! This was my first care package from a fellow blogger, and the first trade I had ever done where I had not first sent the trader something from me. Uncharted territory.
First and foremost, my FIRST Evan Longoria card is a 2008 Upper Deck Masterpieces card #7. This is also my first UD MP card. Its all canvasy (sp?) and neat. It shows a portrait of Evan warming up before taking BP. It has the same pic on the back and states that he has no MLB experience, which wasn’t true because the paragraph above talks about his first MLB hit and home run. The hit occurred, list it in the stats!
Next up is another UD MP, this time of second baseman Akinori Iwanura. His masterpiece painting shows hit batting from the left side against the Yanks with a watercolory crowd behind him, cool. His card back also says no MLB experience; I guess it’s from 2007, but still has the canvas goodness. So before the next card, which is also of Aki, I should say that the Rays second baseman was enjoying the start to another great season when a road trip to Miami left him with torn leg components that will leave him on the sidelines for the year. I got this package in the mail three days after that. So, here’s the next card, another Aki. 
This one is a 2009 Upper Deck series 1, UD Game Jersey / Dual Swatch card which is numbered on the front 33/86. This is my first game used Aki card and it’s awesome, but seems bitter sweet with him on the DL. I would much rather have on the field every night and have no cool cards of him. It’s still pretty awesome.
Then a strip of 2008 Allen & Ginter. These are the only ’08 A & G cards I own, what else do I need? 
Next is another cool card from someone on the DL. Unlike Aki (.310, 0, 16) who was having a great year when he got hit with a fluke, 
Scott Kazmir (4-4 7.69) was having a horrible year when a right quad sprain became a good excuse to get some rest. This card, a 2007 UD Ultimate Collection, is pretty sweet though. It shows Kaz in his days of grandeur (Ks leader in '07) and is serial numbered 279/450 on the front.
Next up is a card of someone who can still walk, run and hit home runs, he’s tied for the league lead in long balls in the AL, it’s a 2008 Upper Deck series 2 Starquest card of Carlos Pena!
Some 2009 Topps like this Carl Crawford and some Heritage and Studio, also.
Were these the only 2 Rays cards in the series? Were they that bad 2 years ago?
I also like the really pretentious way that they spell out all the stats on the back. Snobbiness in baseball cards is cool. It’s also cool that Evan’s batting average was three hundred four last year! I love it!
and multiple SP cards with the same picture. I’m against it. But, I did find some stuff from his list. I told the card shop guy, whose name is Frank, “Hey, I got 23 SPs here, what do I owe ya?” I thought it would be a simple response like “Cool, give me 20 bucks and we’ll call it even”. It wasn’t, instead he went for the Beckett. That is never a good sign. He totaled it up, and told me where we at and I nearly fainted. These cards are expensive! Those 23 cards totaled nearly $300. in book value. Yikes. Some were put back and he gave me a really good deal (THANKS Frank!) on 10 cards. I regained my composure and headed home confident that we would be (close) to even. I mailed the cards out a few days ago, so I figured it was finally safe to make this post without feeling like I had ripped a blogger off. Thanks for my first trade, Duane. You are awesome and I really dig your blog. Thanks in advance to anyone else with orphan Rays cards; they will always have a home in the Troll house! Oh, I nearly forgot the lone non-Rays card he sent along in the trade. It is another A & G featuring Andrew "William Ocean" Litz, 
the winner of the 2007 National Air Guitar Championships. Sweet! I guess I owe Goudey an apology for having "weird" cards in their set, but is this a short print? Go Rays! Troll out! 
