A bit of a flashback…

A bit of a flashback to Upper Deck Premier, which was released quite a while ago.  I didn’t show this one off at the time, because it was right in the middle of my mini flood of Topps M&M cards.

A bit of a short entry today, as I have a new computer, and I am trying to get everything fixed up the way I like it.  With Vista and all that good stuff.  I have my scanner hooked up and working, so that is one of the most important things.

Another Cover….

The hits just keep coming for Josh Hamilton.  Given the way his cards have taken off along with his stats, it was only a matter of time before he was recognized by a hobby magazine as well.  Great picture on this issue of Beckett Baseball.  Looks like I will have to hit up my local shop to add this one to my collection of Josh Hamilton magazine covers.  This will double the size of my collection – I am now up to 2.

Thanks to ejahnke at the Beckett Behind the Scenes Blog for hooking me up with the image of the cover.  Maybe I’ll just print out a bunch of copies, and then Josh can be on the cover of all my Becketts…..

These cards just scream ‘spring baseball’

Upper Deck might not have all the fancy refractor technology that Topps has.  No Chrome to be found in their products either.

With that being said – do they ever know how to pick a photograph for a card.  Hamilton had two cards in the recent Upper Deck Series 2 release.  A base card, and a checklist card.  Both of them feature amazing pictures.  There’s the big follow through on his base card, and then a great shot of him running in from the field on his checklist card.  Both look like spring training shots, and the checklist card especially just reminds me of that big grin everyone seems to get the first few times they take the field for a new season.

Upper Deck has a lot of faults, but base Series 1 and 2 in any sport always look amazing, even if they lack the bells and whistles that are found in a lot of other products.  Its not necessary to give me three patches and two autographs on a card.  Just show me a picture of guy who looks like he is having a great time on the diamond.

This card looks really familiar….

Today’s mail brought what is probably going to be Hamilton’s last card that is issued of him in a Reds uniform, barring the inevitable flashback sets and such.  Or is it the first card of him in a Rangers uniform?  Heck, it appears to be both.

When i was looking at the Topps Series 2 single of Josh, I thought it was weird that his arm bands had #33 on them, as he had spent all his time with the Rangers wearing jersey #32.  With the arrival of this single, it became clear that it wasn’t weirdness I was seeing – it was laziness on Topps part.  To their credit, they did a fine job of airbrushing / Photoshopping Josh into a Texas Ranger.  I just don’t see why they bothered.  It seems silly to not include him in Topps Series 1 (presumably because you don’t have any updated photos) only to include him in two sets later in the year using the same picture in both its original and unaltered formats.

I can kind of understand using the Photoshop for Series 2.  Maybe. Even though Bowman came out very close to the same time, and had a picture (presumably authentic) of him in his Rangers duds, and I am sure the photographer took more than one of him that day, maybe they were all out of focus or something.  I just don’t understand going back to the Reds version of the picture for the Opening Day set.  Its completely and totally illogical.  They obviously had both Rangers pictures, and created Rangers pictures – why not just use one of those?!?  For a set called Topps Opening Day 2008, it seems like a strange decision to revert back to 2007.

Still Going Strong…

Week Three MLB All-Star Voting Stats. Hamilton is still hanging in second place to this Manny Ramirez fellow.  He should easily break 1 million votes this week which is also huge.  Things are looking good for him to get his chance to start at an All-Star Game, but everyone should still max out their votes (Link is at the top of the voting story) just to make sure.  And maybe to knock Ramirez out of the top spot.

He’s been in a mini (2 game) slump, but Hamilton got the day off yesterday to fight off a viral infection.  With an off day for the Rangers today, hopefully he can come back and knock a few more out.

First Rangers Cards!

Today brought my first card of Josh in his (not so new anymore) Texas Rangers duds. Spiff over at his Texas Rangers Cards blog, debuted his first Rangers Hamilton pickup a short while ago with a Topps Texas Rangers issue. I haven’t managed to snag that one yet, but I did receive a package containing some 2008 Bowman singles. I picked up the base, gold parallel and blue parallel (/500) in one fell swoop. This is likely to be one of my first completed mini-projects, as I already have the orange parallel incoming as well. The Red 1/1 will obviously be a bit tougher, but I will be fine showing them off sans 1/1.

A bit of an odd photograph on this one. Looks like he is cleaning up after practice, as by my count, he just released four balls from his hand. Regardless, my collection now has some Rangers cards in it, and some definite focus. I have a few Topps & Upper Deck Series 2 singles incoming, as well as a bunch more Moments & Milestones singles for those ‘sets.’

I like to think I helped out a little bit…

Hamilton Soars In All-Star Voting – Excellent.  He’s a strong second place behind Manny Ramirez (crazy Red Sox fans).

Keep voting!

In other news – my first Rangers cards of Josh should be showing up this week!  Maybe even today!  I have also added a page to the top that showcases my current focus as far as cards go for my collection.  Its mostly cards from the last two seasons, but I have been toying with the idea of going after the entire Topps Tek run of his cards.  It would be insane, but I think it would look awesome if I could ever complete it.  More on that later.  I don’t want to keep anyone from their All-Star voting!