well, hello to dodgers and double plays

i'm in the midst of some plain white envelope swappin' with brian from play at the plate. i sent him a few senators stamps from the 1971 dell's today issue, and he sent me some dodger cards from the present.

2015 bowman prospects scott schebler yellow parallel

schebler went 1 for 3 in his big league debut in june. he's back in the minors now (as of 7/12 when i wrote this post), and was named the pcl player of the week at the end of june. why is oklahoma city in the pacific coast league?  i do not know.

here's a 2015 bowman chrome prospects jose deleon card orange wave parallel that brian also sent

deleon is a starter in double-a at the moment.

brian rounded out the envelope with a couple of cards from 2015 panini prizm - jimmy rollins

and hyun-jin ryu

i doubt we will see much of ryu in 2016 product, which hopefully leaves more room for whichever pitcher the dodgers pick up at the trade deadline to receive more cards as a dodger next year.

thanks brian - be on the lookout for another standard no. 10 in the near future!

i received another return package of cards, this time in a bubble envelope, from justin at mets cardboard.  i'll show more of the cards later, but here are a few double play cards that were new to my collection

2001 pacific adam kennedy

with dodger fp santangelo sliding in. i'm guessing this is the same play showed on kennedy's 2001 topps card

2002 fleer alex gonzalez

stepping on a giants' head

2002 fleer adam kennedy

this guy again?

2002 fleer felipe lopez

a kodak moment

2002 fleer jose vidro

a candidate for the 'nob' collection, if there were such a thing. i'm still not sure.

thanks justin!

an inquiry into the nature and causes of the wealth of giants collectors

i believe economist adam smith would agree that a baseball card is only worth what someone is willing to give up to obtain it.  well, i was willing to send some giant cards to another smith - arpsmith - of arpsmith's sportscard obsession in order to obtain some random dodger cards.  smith also noted that individuals who own surplus stock would generally look to gain from the excess, and arpsmith clearly subscribes to that theory because he sent me some of his collection's excess - mainly these (and a few more) dodger cards.

1967 topps ron fairly

it's always nice to see some vintage in these blind trades.  even better when the dodger is wearing number 6 which means it's either a carl furillo, fairly, or steve garvey card.  those three were the only dodgers to wear the number from 1946 through 1982.

1988 topps traded alfredo griffin

when i saw this card i thought of baseball card vandals and wondered if they had changed this into a nate griffin card yet.

1993 score select henry rodriguez

outfielders that the dodgers kept instead of henry rodriguez (who hit 140 home runs over the five and a half seasons following his 1995 trade from the dodgers to the expos) included can't miss prospects billy ashley, roger cedeno, and karim garcia who between them had 33 home runs for the dodgers (although power admittedly was not cedeno's thing).

2001 pacific shawn green

and 2001 pacific jim leyritz

thank goodness for pacific.  i have plenty of shawn green dodger cards, but only a couple of leyritz in dodger blue - this one and a 2001 upper deck victory card.  i don't know if any others even exist.

2001 pacific private stock adrian beltre

beltre will be inducted into the hall of fame, i have no doubt.  he is 7 home runs shy of 400 and about 450 hits shy of 3000 (just 41 behind steve garvey) and is signed through next season with a vesting option for 2016.  it is likely that he would get his 3000th hit in 2017 at the age of 38 if things stay relatively the same.  if he does it as a ranger, that would mean that he would have played as many seasons in texas as he did in los angeles, and so i would guess that he would be inducted wearing a rangers' hat.  we will have to wait and see what happens.

2013 topps joe blanton gold parallel

smith was a critic of mercantilism which endorsed the keeping of gold reserves as part of a country's economic stability.  i guess i disagree in that i will hoard all gold parallels of dodger cards.  even those of joe blanton, who was 2-4 with a 4.99 era in his 10 games as a dodger.

2014 donruss matt kemp power plus insert

here's a card dealing with surplus - a surplus of talent, a player not one-dimensional, making dodger fans happy, while providing financial gain for the individual to the tune of a $160-million contract through 2019.  i actually already owned this card, so perhaps i will attempt to turn my surplus into gain by trading with a fellow dodger collector…

thanks for the trade adam!  i'll have some excess giant cards headed your way soon!

locally sourced double plays (mostly)

the double play cards just keep on coming…by trade or by card show purchase or by online purchase or even by way of my pre-existing collection.  every once in a while, i will stumble on to a dp turn that was/is part of a forgotten player collection, or my dodger collection, like this 2001 pacific mark grudzielanek card.

these next cards are mostly ones that i found in my collection and extricated from the monster boxes to place into the double play binders.  there are a couple that i went and purchased, however.

1989 score mike gallego

i appreciate that score cropped the photo so that the ball would still be visible, but at first glance the ball gets lost in the shirtsleeves of the crowd.

1989 upper deck jeff blauser (back)

the ball is much more obvious there on blauser's card

1989 upper deck steve buechele (back)

with both buechele and the angels' chico walker looking to first base for the call.  assuming this is the play from the 8th inning of the june 16, 1988 game, buechele was successful in breaking up the double play.

1989 classic juan samuel

leapfrog gone awry

1990 upper deck scott fletcher

1992 leaf andujar cedeno

1994 fleer royce clayton

1994 fleer rene gonzales

pretty standard double play fare on those four cards

the last two cards in this post come from 1997 topps gallery, and they both feature craig biggio.  here's biggio's card

on which he is turning two at wrigley, and here is ryne sandberg's card from the set

on which he, too, is turning two at wrigley.  at biggio's expense.

when in extreme doubt, turn two again

sometime last year, i got in the habit of scheduling two (or more) posts a day on weekends.  not every weekend, but most of them, plus on a weekday here and there.  i feel like i have a lot of cards i want to show and/or write about, so i plan to maintain a greater that a post a day pace this year.  i didn't have much to say for the first post that ran today, so instead showed some heretofore unseen on this blog double play cards.  why not show some more for the second post of the day.

2000 topps stadium club derek jeter

and 2000 topps stadium club chrome derek jeter

and 2000 topps stadium club chrome jose vidro

2000 fleer ultra miguel tejada

and 2000 fleer ultra todd walker

2000 pacific alex rodriguez

2001 pacific damion easley

2002 fleer royce clayton

2005 fleer ultra alfonso soriano

2008 topps stadium club gregorio petit (1st day)

and 2010 bowman kaz matsui gold parallel

two posts again tomorrow, except they will be memorial patch related, not double plays.  stay tuned...

double play stragglers

well, the day is finally here.  i have, after this post, showcased all of the double play cards that i own.  i think.  i haven't gone through all of my sets to make sure, but i am thinking i've scanned and shown them all.  so, it makes perfect sense to start this post off with a non-double play card.

that's a 1997 pacific prism rey ordonez card from the 'gems of the diamond' insert set, and it features tony gwynn on a forceout at second base.  who knows, it might be a double play if gwynn is sliding in to second from the third base side after ordonez snagged a line drive.  sadly, i believe that this is a forceout, and that it occurred during the mets/padres series played in monterrey, mexico during the 1996 season.  in fact, i believe that this is from the ken caminiti 'snickers' game - 8/18/96.  in the bottom of the seventh, after a tony gwynn single, steve finley grounded to second baseman edgardo alfonzo who threw to ordonez to get the out.

believe it or not, i was a fan of ordonez from 1996 through 2000 or so.  i didn't see him play often, but i admired his defensive abilities.  so much so that i had a pc going of his for most of his mets career.  once he made the move to the devil rays, however, i was no longer as enamored.  there were a couple of times playing in my adult baseball league when i successfully imitated his 'slide to the right, plant the foot, and throw to first' approach to a ground ball that might otherwise be backhanded.  and, when i turned double plays, i sometimes looked like ordonez as well - especially as he is depicted on his 1998 score rookies/traded card

here he is on his 1999 topps chrome card looking a little more controlled while turning two

and this 2000 mlb showdown card is pretty standard when it comes to dp turns.

hello, ryan klesko.  as the card notes, ordonez won three gold gloves prior to 2000.  he wound up missing most of the 2000 season after dodger fp santangelo slid head first into ordonez's forearm after being picked off of first base in a late-may game at dodger stadium.  ordonez had a broken arm that required a couple of surgeries and screws and metal plates and all that jazz.  he missed out on the mets' world series appearance, but did return to play pretty much full-time in 2001 and 2002.

this 2001 pacific card is my favorite of the ordonez double play turns.

the confidence and the flexibility to not bother to jump as preston wilson is bearing down on you is pretty awesome.

and now for some jeff kent double plays, including this one which is also from the 2001 pacific set

this was one of the cards that i mentioned i was on the lookout for when i did my 'turns of kent' post a couple of weeks ago.  it's a wonder what sportlots can do for you.

here's the other kent card i mentioned needing in that post.  it's a 2001 pacific private stock 'extreme action' card

with mike piazza sliding in.  the back makes mention of kent and his double play partner rich aurilia and their offensive prowess

here's another kent card that i didn't know i needed.  it's a 2001 donruss retro '99 insert

kent looks sort of reno 911-ish on that card.

here's a 1994 topps stadium club walt weiss card

probably one of his weakest double play cards

and here's a ho-hum 1995 topps stadium club mark grudzielanek card

with another appearance by ryan klesko

alex rodriguez looks to see if his turn was successful on his 1997 pinnacle card

as does marty barrett on his 1991 topps card

a quick look at baseball reference tells me that barrett was successful, as charlie o'brien there was out on the front end of a 6-4-3 double play off the bat of gary sheffield on april 14, 1990.  i'm not sure about a-rod, though.

finally, here is a 1993 upper deck sp mark mclemore card

the front is so nice, that they put a different double play on the back

even though the play on the front is from a spring training game, i really like the background.  i will guess that this mclemore will show up in the 'greatest double play card of all time' tournament.  which might just be a series of posts ranking the top 50 or so.  i haven't decided.

thanks to all for suffering through my seemingly endless flurry of double play card posts.  i am glad that these fantastic cards showcasing my favorite play got their due on the blog, though.