Is this thing still on?

It has been nearly a year since my last post.  Over the past year a lot has happened both personally and in terms of collecting.  

For those of you that follow my ebay page, I have started to sell off some of my McCutchen collection.  At last count before selling things off I had nealy 3,900 unique cards of Cutch (3,876 to be exact).  

Andrew McCutchen will always be my favorite athlete.  I really don't see that changing.  I followed sports and trading cards until I was a teenager (mid 90s).  I stayed out of the hobby and sports entertainment in general until 2005 when I attended a baseball game between the Pirates and Phillies.  You can revisit my origin story here. 

So if Cutch is my favorite athlete and I self proclaimed to have built the largest Andrew McCutchen sports card collection (even getting the attention from Cutch himself by following me on Twitter), why on earth would I start to sell some of it off?

Financial reasons? Yup.  I have had some difficulties over the past year due to health reasons.  I damn near tore my achilles last year mere months after buying my first home and was out of work for nesrly 4 months.  Because it wasn't a work related injury I couldn't return to work until I was able to perform all my job functions (I have a physically demanding job) so yeah...that sucked.  Then I have had not 1, but 2 epic bouts with kidney stones that landed me in the hospital for nearly a week at a time.  So between those two health related financial problems I started to unload some cards.

Pure hobby enjoyment?  Yup, that is another reason why I have started to sell off some of the stuff.  I never attended the National, but would attend small local sports and collectible shows and if I am being perfectly honest I never got much enjoyment of those shows.  Often times I could find the cards I needed of Cutch on eBay for cheaper.  I didn't collect much besides him in terms of the hobby.

Mental anguish with the collection? Yup. Trying to keep up with all of the new releases and the parallels... oh the parallels... was nearly a part time job.  It was several hours a week to catalog what was coming in, still needed, uploading pics, etc to maintain the collection.  It just wasn't fun. It wasn't stimulating anymore.

Change of scenery for what I am collecting? Yup.  I just talked above about my lack of interest in seeking out Cutch cards locally and the frustration with maintaining a digital catalog with what I owned, but I have rediscovered a new collecting adrenaline rush and that is comic books.  When I was out of work and unable to walk for nearly 4 months I spent a lot of time rereading my old trade paperbacks (graphic novels) and it reignited my love for the comic book medium. Same for when I was in the hospital for several days on multiple occasions with the kidney stones.  I love the comic book medium. I have attended a few small local shows and attend a flea market every weekend seeking out stuff for rebuilding a collection of some of my favorite titles and it has been a lot of fun.  Add to it the ease of diginltally cataloging the collection with apps like CLZ and Key Collector and the beauty of not having 27-50 different parallels for each new release every few weeks it is a lot of fun.  Yes comic books have 1-5 variants each month, but I don't feel compelled to grab every variant the way I felt compelled to grab every parallel for Topps Flagship or Panini Prizm.  It's weird in that I am content saying yes, I own Spawn 344 or Daredevil Volume 2 issue 5 cover A and thats good enough for me.  I don't need the B covers or C covers or Virgin (logo less) variants.  

Hobbies should be hobbies.

When they take up too much of your time, they become like jobs and I don't know about all of you, but I am content with having just one full time job.  That's enough for me.

So where do I stand with the Cutch collection now?  I have sold off probably 400 cards and some very big heavy hitters (2009 Rookie Card Bowman Chrome Superfractor 1/1 for example), but I'm ok with that.  Many years ago I received a custom build display case that can hold 100 slabs or roughly 150 toploaders or some combination there of.  My goal is to one day own just enough Cutch cards to fit in that custom case.  I plan to include cards from every team he has been on so it will have basically a greatest hits of his career, but I know it will take a long time to resell what I have bought for the past 15 or so years.  

With that said, if you are still reading this blog, please leave a comment below and I will show off some of the cards I have sold over the past year and talk about the dozen or so cards I have gotten over the past 12 months.  Yes...I did buy some cards over the past year, but it wasn't many at all.  

Collecting Update

Last week I was gifted with a 1/1 Topps Blank Back card in the mail from a longtime Twitter friend and Bryce Harper collector.

Cutch got his 1,000 career RBI that same day.  He did it on a weak infield ground ball fielder's choice that he couldn't be doubled up on. 

Topps honored the event with a 24 hour Topps Now card available which I snagged from apizzo1482 as a preorder for only $5.20

What a career!

He got his 200th stolen base and 1,000 RBI this year.

As of the 1,000 career RBI he was then missing some milestones by just a few marks

56 hits shy of 2,000

9 doubles shy of 400

13 HR shy of 300

24 walks shy of 1,000

I know that many people have come to check out my blog on a daily basis each October, but as with my collecting of Cutch cards I am truly burned out from it.  I may do a few posts, but it won't be the same as years past and due to financial struggles still residing from my torn achilles earlier this year I will not be able to make a donation based on comments left.  I also won't be able to do any contests.

Sorry guys!

Thank you to those still reading the blog.

1 MONTH SOBER!!!

For the first time since 2009 I went 30 days without purchasing an Andrew McCutchen baseball card.  I've gone stretches of 10-14 days before, but I have never gone a full month.  This may sound like a first world problem, but I actually did become addicted to adding cardboard of the former MVP. 

Last year was the least amount of card purchases I made of Cutch in over a decade of "CollectingCutch".

Then this year happened and my purchases are even less (partially because he hasn't been in many products this year so far). 

I used to search eBay 3-6 times a day while also looking at other after market card places like COMC, blowout, mercari, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram etc on a daily basis.  

Now I check out my Cutch searches maybe once or twice a week. 

Collecting cardboard can certainly be addicting and fun, but with Cutch's career coming to a twilight I'm just not as emotionally invested in it as I once was.  Having him join a division rival on a one year deal where the Brewers likely won't make the playoffs isn't helping.  

Here is the very last Andrew Mccutchen baseball card I received in the mail.  

It is the 2022 Select Scope parallel (unnumbered).

I made the purchase on the last day in July and received it about a week later.

Now I can say that it has also been over a month since I last received an Andrew McCutchen card in the mail. 

What is the longest stretch you've gone without adding a card to the PC?

Have you overcome any addictions and been proud after the first month?

Plunder The Lox

I was caught completely off guard when AJ of The Lost Collector hit me up with a message saying "I have something coming your way".

Being the supercollector that I am, it is rare for items regarding Cutch to escape me being aware of their existence ESPECIALLY when it comes to cardboard.  2020 saw me start to limit the number of new Cutch cards to the collection, but I am still adding hundreds of new cards each year.

Where it gets tricky regarding my Cutch collection is his appearance in print media and stadium giveaways (excluding bobbleheads of which I have over 20). 

Included in the many stadium giveaways there are a bunch of T-shirts that Cutch has left his mark on and this is where I could improve the collection the most.

Well, AJ hooked me up with one of the best Sportscenter commercials of all time.

Plunder The Lox.

I love this shirt and have already worn it twice!!!

Thanks for the awesome shirt AJ

Anyone know who the blonde is in the commercial? She could be a good candidate for my October event.

What were some of your favorite This is Sportscenter commercials?

I'll be back

Happy 75th Birthday to Arnold Schwarzenegger!

The most famous line from Arnold's career has to be "I'll be back" from the Terminator franchise. 

Terminator is one of those rare movies where the sequel may actually be better than the original, however the more recent sequels will never live up to the original Terminator or it's sequel T2:Judgement Day.

Topps has featured Cutch in his Pirates gear a lot in recent years despite being a current Phillie or Brewer.  This is odd for me because unlike other stars of the game that have been traded from their original teams (Goldschmidt, Arenado, Baez, Bryant, Lindor, Stanton, Yelich, Miguel Cabrera, Bryce Harper) those active players aren't getting featured in insert sets as Diamondbacks, Rockies, Cubs, Indians, and Marlins unless the insert set is discussing their debuts.  

The most recent example was including Cutch in the 2022 Series 2 1987 All Star set as a member of the Pirates. While he will likely always be remembered as a member of the Pirates (unless he hits a playoff series ending HR with the Brewers this year) he hasn't played for the Pirates since 2017.  Yes he made all 5 All Star Games as a Pirate, but then why is Javier Baez featured as an All Star with the Mets (his "current team" when the cards were produced?  Javy wasn't a member of the Mets when he made an All Star game.  

Paul Goldschmidt is featured as a Cardinal in the 2022 1987 All Star Game set because that is his current team, but he never made an All Star game as a member of the Cardinals (until this year which wasn't known at the time of production and distribution).  The same can be said for last year's NL MVP, Bryce Harper, who never made an All Star appearance since joining the Phillies until this season, which again wasn't known at time of production. 

It's just a very strange situation. 

But for whatever the reason is, I'm happy to see cards of Cutch in a Pirates uniform that I didn't have.

Good to see him back. Lol

Cutch has always gotten a warm welcome in Pittsburgh whenever he "has come back home"

What killed the dinosaurs?

Continuing my posts about Arnold Schwarzenegger we have a line from Batman & Robin where Arnold played the villain, Mr. Freeze.

What killed the dinosaurs?

The Ice Age

Above are my Bowman Platinum silver ice parallels of Cutch 2016-2019. 

What are some other great Arnold one liners you'd like to see?

It's Naht a Tooma

Continuing the theme of showing cards that relate to famous Arnold Schwarzenegger movie quotes comes a suggestion from AJ of The Lost Collector.  

The former California governor and star of many of the most iconic action movies of the 80s and 90s will be turning 75 this week.  

AJ's suggestion of "It's Not a Tumor" comes from the film Kindergarten Cop.

Here is a police card given out by Pittsburgh Police and Pirates Charities.

The back if the card reminds us all that every choice has a consequence.

I will be continuing this Arnie theme all week. I have a personal favorite tomorrow for it's pure ridiculousness.  I will also feature at least two more from your suggestions.