Cutch and His Amazing Phriends

I am so excited for the new Spider-Man movie coming out next month.  Because I used to collect comic books and the original art used to produce them, I have started buying singles from those mid 90s Fleer (Metal, Flair, Masterpieces) cards of characters I grew up loving.  Daredevil, Gambit, Iron Man, Venom, Wolverine, and Ghost Rider were some of my favorites.

Over the years Spider-Man has become one of my favorites too, but it is mostly because of his villains.  I have gravitated towards liking Spider-Man in my adulthood because of the villains he faces off against and has to overcome all having rivalry with both Peter Parker and Spider-Man.  That to me is a fascinating story and one that I am really enjoying more than just the visuals of a guy with his head on fire (Ghost Rider) or a dude who essentially throws playing cards like they're bombs (Gambit).

I am learning to enjoy the characterization of these fictional characters more than ever before and the characters that Stan Lee, Steve Ditko, John Romita, John Romita Jr, Todd McFarlane, Jack Kirby, etc all created are becoming fascinating to me.

I bring this up because of the Pirates and Reds rivalry that is getting a bit out of hand this year and has been ongoing since the 70s.  When Cutch was in his prime 2012 to 2015, the Reds were also very good.  I hated the back and forth bean balls between the teams and it is shocking that no one got greatly injured because of them. 

Since those 2015 years both teams had been on the downward slope and the rivalry started to die off as the teams were rebuilding and restocking farm systems. 

The Pirates traded away Andrew McCutchen, Gerrit Cole, Charlie Morton, and Neil Walker and they let Pedro Alvarez go via wavers and AJ Burnett retired.

Meanwhile Brandon Phillips, Todd Frazier, Aroldis Chapman, Jay Bruce, Homer Bailey, and Devin Mesorroco have all changed teams.

Along the way, my favorite player has had to team up with some of these guys that once were heated rivals.

Let's take a look at some former Reds and what they are up to in the past week.

AROLDIS CHAPMAN
The guy who used to own the record for fastest pitch thrown (against Andrew McCutchen no less) was a key part of the rivalry between the Pirates and Reds between 2012-2015.  He became a teammate of Cutch last year when Cutch was traded from the Giants to the Yankees late August 2018.  He leads all American League closers in strikeouts and after early concerns about him in that role, trails only Shane Green for the American League in saves. 

I got a bunch of Yankees autographs I will be showing this year. A BUNCH!!!

JAY BRUCE
News just broke today that the Phillies are set to acquire Jay Bruce from the Mariners.  Details of the prospects heading to Seattle or the amount of the Phillies absorbing the nearly $20+ million left on the contract remain unknown.  This is probably a sign that they are planning on moving on from Odubel Herrera after his recent Atlantic City arrest for domestic violence.

I just showed off a pair of Jay Bruce autos a little over a week ago.  It was called "Thanks For Being A Loser, Greg Maddux".  It looks like these two former back to back 2005 draft picks will now be teammates for the Phillies.

TODD FRAZIER

I love pancakes.

Who doesn't?

Evidently Todd Frazier is some kind of weirdo that thinks the edges of pancakes aren't any good.

What? Why?

The story broke a few days ago.

Does anyone know if he signs TTM?
I would love to send this out to him with the hopes of one day getting Cutch to sign it at a Phillies game.  The two were teammates for the 2015 National League All-Star Game.

This post was brought to you by the awesome soundtrack of Venom.

Sometimes it's ok to shake hands and celebrate with an old enemy.

National High Five Day

Did you know there was a day dedicated to the art of high fiving?

Me neither.

While it doesn't get the Hallmark treatment of other nationally celebrated days, it is a tradition baseball fans should all celebrate.

During the summer of 1977 Dodgers slugger Dusty Baker celebrated with his teammate Glenn Burke after crushing a homerun.

Today many players have done away with the traditional high five for more show worthy celebrations.

Bryce Harper actually has a different celebration for each of his Phillies teammates.  Harper's celebration with Cutch is much different than this high five he gave him at the 2015 All-Star Game.

Hopefully Topps can release a high end card of Cutch and Harper celebrating post Home run.

I need something to take the place of this 2011 Diamond 1/1 celebration of Cutch, Ryan Doumit, and Garrett Jones.

The card is awesome, but man 2010 was terrible year for the Pirates.  Need proof? Look at the back.

105 losses!!!!
The pitcher with the most strikeouts was Paul Maholm with 102 punchouts.
I'm surprised there was anything worthy of celebration that year.

We Got Archer!

We have heard the Chris Archer to Team X for the past few trade deadlines and offseasons.

The cost for acquiring the 2015 All Star and Cy Young candidate was steep as the Pirates traded away one of their top prospects, Austin Meadows, right handed pitcher Tyler Glasnow, and a PTBNL.  Meadows and Glasnow both have All-Star potential, but have had struggles early in their youmg careers.

Most of the early reports say the price for Archer was too much to give up.  While I wish that only one of Glasnow or Meadows was required to get Archer, the Pirates got a cost controlled pitcher for the next 4 post season runs.  The best part of the acquisition is that they were able to keep Archer away from Chicago, Milwaukee, and St. Louis.

If Archer can return to his 2015 All-Star season, the Pirates have a feature ace for a Wild Card game.

In other trade news, Andrew McCutchen wasn't traded by the Giants today.

Cutch hit a HR off Archer in the 2015 ASG.  It was Cutch's last plate appearance in an All-Star Game.

I feel like the Pirates got the golden ticket and a true difference maker in this year's trading deadline.

I still need a few more parallels from the 2015 Update Series where Cutch is coming home after his laser shot to left field.

The most notable need is the pink parallel which I would love to get for my October Pink month.

So far I have the base, sabremetric back, foilboard, gold, snow camo, and the black.

What do you think about the moves your teams made yesterday?

Do you think the Pirates gave up too much for Chris Archer?