A Homer's Humble Pie, A Blogday and a Contest...

I wanted to offer a little contest to celebrate Dallas Braden’s perfect blanking of the Tampa Bay Rays. It was the 3rd time that the Rays have been no-hit in their short history and the second time in as many years that they were on the wrong side of a perfect game.
Since all of my Dallas Braden cards have long been traded away, I thought I would offer up this autographed postcard of Vida Blue. Blue won the Cy Young Award and MVP in 1971. He was also the Sporting News Pitcher of the Year that year and won the Award again in 1978. He was a 6-time All Star and won 3 World’s Championships over his 17 year career. He won 209 games and he pitched a no-hitter for the Oakland A’s in 1970. He missed having a perfect game however. In the 4th inning he allowed a baserunner. Name that baserunner, his team and how he reached base in the comments. I will randomize the correct responses and announce a winner on Friday.
I have 2 copies of this signed postcard. One will be a prize, the other is up for trade. I collect Rays autographs, Topps Heritage SPs, 1965 Topps, 1964 Topps Giants, Buck O’Neil, Carl Crawford and Danny Tartabull. Make me an offer if you are interested. These were signed at a card show in Hernando, Florida in 1999.
Oh, by the way... The other reason for a contest is this. On Saturday May 8th the blog you are reading, the Collective Troll turned 1. I wanted to thank those of you who emailed me congratulations. I had totally forgotten about it, so thanks for the reminder! The contest thus becomes a birthday contest, along with some humble pie for a homer... Thanks to everyone who has read this blog over the past year, y'all rock! Also, I have got many trade packs in the last week that I need to post, but I have updated my wantlists, so check em out! Good luck to all in the contest. I will probably include some other oversized cards as a bonus for the winner. Perhaps something from this set or an unopened pack or two.
Don’t forget to check out a Pack to be Named Later and the Nitty Gritty for more Trolly goodness. Go Rays! Troll out.

Congrats to Dallas Braden and Some More Overdue Stuff...

I didn't get to watch the game, I wish I did. Watching a perfect game is unforgettable even when your team is on the losing end. No Rays pitcher has ever thrown a no-hitter before never mind a perfect game. I would love to see that someday, but for now I am pretty happy that my team has the best record in baseball. As long as the Rays are winning more often than they lose, I don't really care if they get blanked every now and then... So a huge congrats to Dallas Braden and the Oakland A's. I don't think anyone expected the A's to be sitting in second place in the West at this point, I am really happy for the team. I love seeing over-hyped teams lose, but I love to see the underdog rise up. Congrats to Oakland and Dallas both!

Onto a different topic... An update for those who are in for my long-overdue group box break. It was supposed to be "Spring Break-Packs Gone Wild", but the spring is passed and I missed it. I am not going to make excuses, but I will apologize. I feel horrible about this and it is weighing heavy on me. Time has been hard to come by for me. The break WILL happen. It will start this week. An extra push came this weekend when I found this collection on my doorstep when I got home from work on Saturday. On top of the hundreds of packs already slotted for the break, I think we can add a few more... The plan remains to one of each for A Pack to be Named Later. I still plan on doing that. Many of these new packs are non-sports, football, basketball and soccer. These will have to be claimed when I post the breaks of each. Anyway, keep on checking back with A Pack to be Named Later and I think you will see some posts from your friend the Troll. Thanks to Mission Mary Position, Kelly and Frank, y'all rawk!!! Go Rays! troll out.

Defeated? Yes. Bitter? Hardly.

Wow… What a game yesterday. I am talking of course about Mark Buehrle’s perfect game. It’s never fun to be on the losing end, but from a fan’s perspective, it’s awesome to watch no matter what team you root for. The shear speed in which he worked the game was amazing. He had control from the first inning on. I think they said that the average at bat in the game was less than 60 seconds. There were inning halves that were seriously shorter than the commercials in between innings. I think that by now everyone has seen the highlights of both Buehrle and Dewayne Wise’s (card is created and borrowed by White Sox Cards blog) amazing catch. There isn’t really too much more that I can say other than congrats and thanks! Thanks to Buehrle for making history and showing that the best games aren’t the ones where home runs are flying all over the place. I had a vote on this blog last week for the mid season Cy Young Award. Around 30 people placed votes and Roy Halliday won the vote on the AL side with Zach Greinke and Justin Verlander at 2nd and 3rd. Mark Buehrle didn’t receive any votes. Maybe his ERA is a little high, maybe compared to those other 3 his strikeouts are down. I wonder if I had the same vote tomorrow, how many people would go with the lefty from Chicago? After this start his record has improved to 11-3 and his ERA has dropped to 3.28. He has struck out 76 batters in 134 innings. It was the first perfect game for a White Sox hurler since 1922 when Charlie Robertson blanked the Tigers. It was the first in the Majors since Randy Johnson blanked the Braves 5 years ago. It was the 16th Perfect Game since 1881 and Buehrle became the 6th pitcher to have both a perfect game and a no-hitter in the Majors. The other guys? Cy Young, Jim Bunning, Sandy Koufax, Addie Joss and Randy Johnson also had the ultimate pair of dominant games. Not too shabby for a 38th round pick out of Jefferson…
I was planning on doing a post about Tom Seaver today. My wife found this picture of him and a terribly goofy looking kid, circa 1985. Tom Terrific never threw a perfect game, but he did throw a no no in 1978. He also managed 12 trips to the All Star game, 3 Cy Young Awards, a Rookie of the Year Award and a World Series ring. Oh, he also won 311 games and struck out 3,640 batters in his career, but he never pitched a perfect game.
Congrats again to Mark Buehrle and the Chicago White Sox! Nothing like a perfect game to throw in some positive momentum for a pennant race.