40 years...

40 years is a long time. 40 years ago today, The US participation ended in Vietnam.

Many were drafted, sent to a foreign land to fight in a war for which they did not understand. So many did not return home. Many of our brave men and women were spit on if and when they returned home. Very few were welcomed in the manner in which they should have been.

I just wanted to say, "Thank you for your Service!" I will not forget your sacrifice!

And you are WELCOME IN MY HOME ANY DAY!! 

Dawgbones

In Defense of Night Owl

Night Owl had an interesting post recently, in which he made a few statements that I just can't help but clarify.

My dad is from New York, his sister still lives there. His parents lived and passed there as well.
Many summers growing up were spent on the trek to see my grandparents. We'd even go further during August and attend the McDonald family reunions. I only mention this because my grandmother's family (my dad's mom) is from Watertown, NY, which I believe is where Night Owl currently hails from.

Now, you're thinking along the same lines as several friends did when I mentioned this:

What did you see and do in the city while up there? most folks automatically think of the big apple when you say New York:

I honestly do not know what New York City is like! Honestly! The closest I've come to big city life was here:

or more specifically:

2221 South 3rd Street, in Philly. That's where my mom's family is from, and consequently, where yours truly was born, which let's you know where my love for most things Philadelphia comes from.

But I digress, this is about the Night Owl (also a very cool song from the Little River Band).

When he says, "Not that New York..." I know exactly what he is talking about. See, this is the New York we know:

or this New York:

and here:

or here:

Yep, that's the New York we've grown up knowing, and loving.
So, when he says upstate, I'm jealous! but I also know exactly where he's coming from.
Thanks for the trip down memory lane there Night Owl!
and thanks for reading everybody!

I hope to be back to some more baseball cards soon, I've got a line on some opening day.
Have a GReat weekend! and Happy Easter.
Dawgbones

People ask me why I live in the southeast?

and I tell them it's because of beautiful afternoons like today. Which I get just often enough all winter long to go get lost!!

have a GReat night!
Dawgbones

Happy St Paddys...

Top 'O the afternoon to ya!!

Hope your day is Awesome!
thanks for reading!
Have a GReat day!
Dawgbones

Another round of Heroes...

the little military type:

still cool.

and an over head shot:

thanks for reading,
Have a GReat weekend!
Dawgbones

I Dare you

The devil made me do it...

more little super-hero figures:
First up is the Daredevil:

and Thanos:

not among my favorites, but not bad.
thank for reading.
Have a GReat day!
Dawgbones

Another Rack...

Rack pack numba three... did we get a Phillie yet?

Oh no, it's a beard, a Met, and two nationals!! and a green shrub is attempting to de-vour DeJesus!

three more red bordered Target exclusives, but no Phillie... and another S.F. beard!

and three more Chasing History cards. Can't go wrong with a Ripkin, and the Killebrew is truly Killer!

and for the last card in the pack...










it's another Calling Card insert...










and it just so happens to be a relief pitcher...










from one of my PCs...















and the first Phillie card for 2013 belongs to:

I really like these calling cards, they look sharp.
thanks for reading,
Have a GReat day!
Dawgbones

P.S. and no Mr. Jones, I did not the pull #105 (Freddie Freeman), but I'll keep you in mind if I run across one.

More 2013 Topps

Back with another rack pack

I guess since we are almost done with the red sox, we'll start on the D-Backs...
I do like those emerald Oz sparkles this year. Not to crazy about the Wal-Mart blues, I know Spankee like them, but I prefer the Target reds. The blue just isn't blue enough. Now, I could really diggem if they were more of a royal blue...

I really like the chasing history inserts, but what's the deal, some are all shiny refractory, but others aren't?
Even managed to pull a Gold bordered Met!!

And I really need to look at the checklist, cause I've got to be close to a Red Sox team set now. Braves, Nationals, Mets... Marlins, Former Phillies, but still no Phillies!
thanks for reading,
Have a GReat day!
Dawgbones

One... MILlion packs of baseball cards!

Said in the sing-song, pinky held to the lips, palm turned outward, voice of Dr. Evil from the Autin Powers franchise...
Last season, Dave, over at Indians Baseball Cards and Random Wax, held a season-long break last year in which he must have busted the afore-mentioned million packs of cards. I entered, asking for my Phillies and a few extras for my PCs.
Well, last week, my loot from his absolutely FREE break showed up.

 Old school, new school. His blog header says random...

and he is not kidding...

I've joined his Break from Outer Space thingy this season.

He's running it a bit different this year, but that's fine by me, cause he's charging us the same as last season.

which is still FREE!! which is awesome. Thanks for all the GReat cards Dave! Looking forward to seeing what you've got in store for us this season...

thanks for reading,
Have a GReat day!
Dawgbones

Ole Ross Comes through again!!

with a tremendous amount of help from Matt Wilson.
Ross, who runs all the contests over at Sports Card Info, was having a dual-contest a couple weeks ago, in which the first contest was for a football player relic. And everyone knows ole Dawg doesn't do football, but enters all the contests anyway. I've even started giving away my entries in a few of them. This week was no different, except it was...

The other card up for grabs was a Michael Waltrip dual-material relic. Mikey is my boy! I've rooted for him since meeting him back some ten years ago. I offered to trade my entries for the football contest for extras in the Mikey contest. Well, Matt Wilson, of the blog Tenets of Wilson, accepted my offer. He won the Waltrip contest and quickly pointed Ross, and the relic card, in my direction!!

The card showed up earlier this week, and it looks AWESOME!! A very nice addition to my Waltrip stuff!!

The multi-colored glove swatch is too cool! I wonder how an autograph would look on the front if this one?

Thanks for the contests Ross. and a BIG thanks to Matt Wilson for the trade! Let me know if you see any contests you're particularly interested in Matt. I owe you big time and would gladly throw a few more entries in your direction as payback.

thanks for reading,
Have a GReat weekend!!
Dawgbones

A quick Trade post...

James (a few may recognize him as chunter), from Chipp 'n' Dale recently claimed a card from the GQ blaster that I busted.
He sent me a few cards from my want lists... (slowly chipping away at those lists)

a few Phillies for those binders...

love the Ashburn. My uncle Bill got me an Ashburn jersey last spring, here. The Carlton and Abreu are both CMT version, Cards Your Mom Threw Out.

The Wagner is NOT. It is a very fine example of the '68 Topps and will look very nice with the rest of my vintage Phils in that binder. And I think the Manuel will complete one page of Charlies in that binder!!

and a manu-patch card for a Braves relic that I sent his way...

Now let me preface this next little rant by saying that I do like this card, I agreed to the trade and even said that I hoped the card looked as good or better that the scan from my email. It does look better in person. I love my "star and stripes" jersey and this card reminds me of that. Topps has been 100% honest with it's "created exclusively" statement on the back of the card.

With that said, the mini-rant is for "manufactured relics" in general. Do you consider them hits? I would put this particular card just above a base card as far as value. If I ran across one in a "dime" box hunt, I'd consider picking it up, but as it is purely manufactured, I would NOT willingly pay a premium for it. Nor would I pay more for one team over another. Taking an embroidered logo and slapping a player's name on it screams "gimmick". I do admit this particular design is much better than the "throwback" logo manu-patches from the series 1 blasters. There is no "cardboard" showing behind the logo on this card and it adds a very refined "finished" look to the design where-as the manu-patches glued to the cardboard in the window approach from series 1 just looks somewhat cheap in my opinion.
What do you think?
and I have actively hunted other manufactured relic cards:

and

are two of my favorites (I would not mind adding this year's MVP version of the Schmidt to my collection),
and I'm still on the hunt for:

but unfortunately have not found one at a price my wife wouldn't kill me for spending!!
Thanks for the trade James, it was well worth it from my end. Hope you enjoy your cards as much as I like mine.

Thanks for reading,
Have a GReat weekend!
Dawgbones

The last card, for now...

Let's take a look at the last card in the rack-pack:

yep, it's a hit, though not from any specific game, event, or season! Not bad for 6 packs into the season, but still no Phillie!!

I would be interested in turning this relic into a Phillie relic, if anybody is interested, let me know.


thanks for reading,
Have a GReat day!
Dawgbones

Let's try a Rack Pack...

Let's take a look at the first rack-pack:

The Red-borders are nice, but still not a Phillie! and with the Matsuzaka, I'm probably closing in on a complete Sox team-set now...

Another Calling Card, and a Yankmee at that! Yep, really like those.
Chasing History, Chasing the Dream, but I don't think I'll be chasing the minis this year! Still have not finished the Kimballs minis from '11 yet!

and another million dollar thingy...
I did not look at the rack-pack wrapper yet, wonder how many cards I've been shorted for all the inserts in this sucker!

thanks for reading,
Have a GReat day!
Dawgbones

More '13 Topps

Let's take a look at the fifth pack:

Brewers, Mets, Nationals, even a Pirate... but still no Phillies!
don't know whether I'll try out the Million Dollar Chase or not... I'd rather hit my local Mega-millions, if you know what I mean!

thanks for reading,
Have a GReat day!
Dawgbones

another few cents...

Let's take a look at the fourth pack:

Another 11 card pack! Apparently, gold bordered parallels are an insert!
Ok, if that's the case I wonder what the "red bordered" parallel packs in the Target blasters contain? If each red-bordered parallel is an insert, How many cards are you gonna cut those packs short by?? Don't know if I like this trend...

and 4 packs into the year, no Phillies yet...

thanks for reading,
Have a GReat day!
Dawgbones

More pennies for Topps...

Let's take a look at the third pack:

oooo!! I really like the die-cuts! Even though it's a Cardinal! Still no Phillies!
Hey, we are 1 card short!!?? Yep, wrapper says 12 cards,

but wait, what's that?

Apparently not! If you get an insert card, you get fewer cards in a pack! Could be a crock!?!? Way to go Topps!! Guess I got lucky with the second pack! Two inserts and a total of 12 cards!

thanks for reading,
Have a GReat day!
Dawgbones

2013 Topps.. another 2-cents

Let's take a look at the second pack:

mmm?? Two packs, two Dustins. Pedroia in the first, Ackley in the second. Always good to get a home-town player in the mix. Verlander went to college here in the Tidewater area.

I'm really liking the Calling Card cards. And my apologies beforehand, but Jeurys Familia sounds more like a specimen or a legal term than a baseball player!

thanks for reading,
Have a GReat day!
Dawgbones

2013 Topps... My 2 cents...

So I've managed to buy a few packs of the new stuff here and there and figured I'd throw my two cents out there, for what it's worth.

The first pack:

Is it me, or have we seen this picture of Ryan Braun before, and again even before that...


I am really digging the Wizard of Oz trip Topps has embarked on this year... Those green emerald cards really pop. And though I only have 1 for reference at this point, the red from the Red Sox really looks good on that green back ground, I'll definitely be hunting down the Phillies version of these cards this year.

So, not too bad for the first pack of 2013 Topps. 3 cards out of 12 (2 Red Sox and 1 Yankmee) for my PCs ain't bad at all. (4 if you count my fledgling Braun/Brewers collection)

thanks for reading,
Have a GReat weekend!
Dawgbones