Which Came First, the Want List or the...

I don't know where I was going with the title, but the long and short of it is after getting packages from A Rookie (Baseball) Card Collector and Grand Cards this week with unfamiliar looking Tampa Bay Rays Topps cards in them I decided to dust off the old Rays team set binder for the first time in a few months. Beyond that it has been a full week since a Troll post. I get the shakes if I don't post twice a day so you know this is driving me insane. For now I decided to ease back in by creating a new WANT LIST for my Rays team sets. It turns out that both ARBCC and GC did send me much needed cards. In the past couple months Stale Gum, Cards on Cards, Play at the Plate, Jacob Marley, Joe L. and a score of others have torn into my team set needs even though I hadn't updated my want list in months. Well, I got out the stacks and stacks of cards, got the binder, the LIST and a highlighter and went to town. I created a new wantlist which is pretty well up to date. I literally have thousands of doubles, but can't seem to finish the sets off. I don't know how it is possible that I have (seriously) 39 copies of Jose Guillen's card from 2001 Topps, but I don't have a single copy from 2000. Mind boggling. If Bipping was still the rage some of you would be shaking with all of the dupes that I found. 46 Toby Hall cards in your mailbox could be terrifying and I have the juice to do it! I would rather find a friendly Rays collector who is trying to do the same thing and looking for some starter lots. Any takers? Anyway, out of 14 seasons that the Rays have appeared in Topps sets I have completed the entire base set of 9 years. The Traded or Updates and Highlights series are what is killing me. 2004 and 2009 are the only years that I have finished those off. All in all I need 41 cards to complete all of the Topps sets to date. That means I am about 90% of the way there. If anyone needs 6 team sets from 2002 (not including traded) I am your man. Anyway, you can find my fancy new list with scans from every year from '97 till 2006 right HERE. Now for the two packages that spurred this undertaking. First off is a wonderful Blogger Kindness package from the always awesome McCann Can Triple of the A Rookie (Baseball) Card Collector blog. The package came with an awesome drawing of a snowman made of baseballs which I didn't scan yet. Use your imagination-it is rad! Anyway, that was the best part, but she included some great cards too. This one doesn't factor into the wantlist theme, but I love this Carlos Pena insert from 2008 Upper Deck X. I have been going crazy exponentiating logarithms in school, so this X Ponential card made me smile. Now onto the wantlist crushing cards. This 2006 UandH card of Big Game James Shields has eluded me forever but now I can cross UH147 off of my list. This 2007 Updates card of JP Howell made it onto my Most Wanted list, but now its all mine! Card #UH297 of the Rays reliever. The last card I will show from her package comes from 2009 Topps Updates. I finished this series off a while back, but I don't think I ever posted this card and I really like it. It's Carlos Pena from the All Star Home Run Derby. CP didn't fare too well in the derby, but ya gotta love his swing and the fact that he paced the American League in homers even though he missed the last month (nearly) of the season. The next couple of cards came from Grand Cards. He sent a note saying he hoped that I could use some of the cards and that hopefully they weren't all dupes. Little did he know the HORRIBLE luck I have had with 2007 Updates. I ripped 2 hobby boxes of this back in 2007 and also bought a few blasters, plus folks have been sending me Rays cards by the pound for the last year. All that and I still had hardly any cards from this series. Now I am down to needing just one more to finish it off. Card #UH4 of Josh Wilson is the last card I need. Funny thing is that I have 3 copies of that card in Gold plus several with the red back but I don't have a single copy of his regular base. Some of the goodies from Grand Cards are these bad boys from 2007 Topps Updates-#UH171 of Andy Sonnanstine and #UH324 of Dan Wheeler. I have autographed copies of both of these cards, plus like Josh Wilson I have the GOLD and red backed versions, but now I finally have regular old unsigned base cards for the team set binder. The last card he sent (thats a lie-he sent about 30 cards) from '07 UH is this card of my favorite left-handed hitting first baseman Carlos Pena. Card #UH91 has been on my Most Wanted List for a while. I had just got a copy before my infamous robbery and the Pena card was in the box. This baby is safe in my binder now! Another card he sent that I have been coveting for a long time now is this Wal Mart trading card history insert of Akinori Iwamura. If Aki is still a Pirate next spring this one will be on top of the pile of cards that I try and get signed. I love it!!! One last set of cards to show comes from legendary reader Largo Frank. Frank has been hooking me up with great packages of Rays cards on a monthly basis. He sent me a stack for my Jared Sandberg and Joe Kennedy collections and fortunately he sent multiple copies because this 1997 rookie card of JS was the final one I needed for the 1997 team set and this card from 1998 brings me to within one card of finishing off 1998 Topps. He also sent the Chrome version of the '98 which is one of the final cards I needed for that set. Next on my list of things to do is making wantlists Topps Chrome, Bowman and Upper Deck. Someday. Unrelated to this post, but super rad anyway... He also included 3 certified Rays autographs. One of the Devil Rays first ever draft pick, the super flop Paul Wilder and 2 that were pretty awesome! My second Jared Sandberg certified autograph from 1999 Bowman and my first ever Joe Kennedy autograph!!! Thanks so much Frank!!! Thanks to McCann Can Triple and Grand Cards, too! All you guys and gal rock!!! Once again my new and improved team set wantlist is here. Out of 14 seasons of Topps cards I need just 41 more cards to have them all COMPLETED. I will be in Port Charlotte, Florida tomorrow night for a LIVE inning by inning blog extravaganza of the Stone Crabs game. Oh, by the by... If you were a winner of any of the Troll or Nitty Gritty contests your prizes should have either just arrived or will arrive shortly-except for my friend in the Great White North-I am sure they are hung up in customs and you probably won't see them till 2018. Thanks again to all who entered the contests-please let me know when you recieve your prizes cuz I worry alot. Thanks again! WAIT! This just in... I just got home from work after posting this. I figured I would get going on my next post and not a wait another week and I grabbed a pile of goodies from Jacob Mrley and blammo, amongst all of the GREAT stuff he sent were these 3 sneaky little Topps cards. Now, just like that I am done to needing just 38 cards. The 2007 set is DONE and the 2008 set is DONE. F-ing SWEET! Thanks so much to Jacob Mrley!!! I can't wait to post everything else from this amazing package! $1300.00 for a roll of tape isn't cool, but trust me-this package is the stuff. Thanks again for reading and following my quest for team set domination. Thanks Jacob Mrley, Sarah, Grand Cards and Largo Frank!!! Go Rays! Troll out.

Miguel Cairo, An Original Devil Ray...

In a post several days ago I called Randy Winn the only original Devil Ray to still be playing in the Majors. I was wrong and he is not. The player that I had overlooked, that is until I was watching the replay of the Marlins vs. Phillies game late last night/early this morning and I saw this guy come to plate and knock one out of the park off of Josh Johnson. He is an original Devil Ray and he is the ONLY Devil Rays player in the starting line-up for the inaugural game that is still in the Major Leagues. He is Miguel Cairo and if he makes their postseason roster, he will be in the playoffs this year. These two autographs of Miguel Cairo are examples of the very autographs I have from the 1998 D-Rays team. At the time (back in ’98) I probably had autographs of the whole team, but quitting collecting several times and dabbling in e-Bay for a while, few things from back then are still part of my collection. Currently, I have Larry Rothchild, Bobby Smith, Kevin Stocker and Cairo. Miguel Cairo has had a long career, playing for 14 seasons for 8 different teams. He broke in with the Blue Jays as a 22-year-old second baseman. Since then, he’s been traded, selected in an expansion draft, released, re-signed and played in AAA. He keeps on hanging on and keeps finding jobs with big league clubs. He has played every position except catcher and pitcher over the years, but came up as a second baseman and can still play the position. Now he is more of a pinch-hitter, reserve infielder-with the Phillies this year, he wasn’t called up till late August and has only played in 27 games this season. Most of his games have been solely as a pinch-hitter, but he has seen time in the field at SS, 2B and third. He is batting .267 for the Phillies and his home run last night was his first. That is pretty much on par with his career numbers-over 14 seasons Cairo has played in 1227 games and is a career .266 batter. His best years were with Tampa Bay where he was their starting 2nd baseman for their first 3 years as a ballclub. Over those 3 years he played in 389 games, hit 9 homers and stole 69 bases. He was a superb fielding second baseman and in 1998 he and Kevin Stocker turned 109 double plays. After leaving the Rays he was mainly a utility guy, except for 2004 when he was the Yankees starting 2nd baseman. That year he played in 122 games in the regular season for the Yanks, he hit .292 with 6 homeruns and 42 RBI. Cairo has never made it to the World Series, but he has playoff experience with the Yankees and the Cardinals. He has played in 19 postseason games and hit one homerun, drove in 6 and has a career playoff batting average of .328. I always root for the Ex-Rays and there are quite a few of them still alive for the postseason. I plan on profiling them, one by one, once it’s determined who will be in the playoffs. I don’t dislike the Tigers-Edwin Jackson is still one of my favorite players (and ex-Rays) ever. I am a fan of Curtis, Brandon, Porcello and even Verlander. Bobby Seay is an ex-Ray, too, but not so much of a fan of his. I still have to root for the Twins in game 163. Their comeback has been amazing; I am caught up in the Kirby Puckett nostalgia of the Twins and will always root for Delmon Young no matter what team he is on. Denard Span is a Tampa native and is high on my list of fav non-Rays. The offense that Kubel and Cuddyer have put up of late is amazing and I think everyone loves Joe Mauer. The fact that the Twins have gotten this far without perennial MVP candidate Justin Morneau is pretty amazing, too. I finally have the night off and I will be watching and rooting for the Twinkies. I am still undecided on what team I will back for the playoffs-I can promise that it won’t be the Yankees or the Red Sox. More on that later. For now, I have to go and fix or replace my radiator. Wish me luck. Oh, by the way... The cards are both 1998s which seemed appropriate. Miguel signed these TTM while playing for Lehigh Valley earlier this year. Oh, and all of my wantlists have been updated as I am slowly chipping away at my needs. Go Rays! Go Miguel Cairo! Troll out.