Commercial Break

I am interrupting this week of Bowman's Best cards to bring a card I have been patiently waiting to show off for many many months. 

 You have seen Juan Rosales draw plenty of images of Andrew McCutchen for me over the years, but this image of Cutch has become famous thanks to the photo variant found in Series 2 Topps 2020.

Juan began working on this commission for me back in December 2019 when he told me he would again be doing sketch cards in 2020 Museum.  Long before I knew about the photo variant happening I made arrangements for Juan to draw that image for me.  By early January he had started to work on getting it completed, but couldn't show it to me or ship until the product released. 

Due to COVID19 there were many delayed shipping releases later of 2020 Topps Museum. 

Since the product officially released today I  can finally show it off.

Thank you again Juan!

Time to get my swag and dance on and return to a week of Karate Kid inspired posts.

You're The Best Superfractor

When it comes to chrome cards, very rarely is there any parallels better than a Superfractor.  This 2017 Bowman Best Superfractor is no exception.

I missed putting up a post yesterday showing off a Bowman Best 1/1 so I don't think Mister Miyagi would be very proud of me.  This was a failed week of posts and it's only Tuesday.  Although technically I posted 2 one of ones on Sunday so I'm still on pace.  I'll have to see how the judges rule it...

Time to get amped up for the rest of the week...

Karate Kid Week: a tale of 2 One of Ones

I noticed that I have been showing off a lot of Phillies cards recently.  That makes sense because his current team plays in Philadelphia.  I think I'm not alone in saying this, but I will always remember him for his Pirates days and for making the Pittsburgh Pirates relevant again.

From 2013-2015, the Pirates had the 2nd best record in all of baseball.  Unfortunately the St. Louis Cardinals had the best record in those 486 games and the Pirates were forced to host the one and done Wild Card Game for three consecutive years, winning it in 2013 and losing in 2014 and 2015.

3 seasons.
3 total playoff victories.
3 elimination game losses

2015 was the last year the Pirates would reach the post season.

Just before the 2015 All Star Game, the Pirates walked off the Cardinals to prove they would remain relevant through the season.

This year is a shortened season, but the Pirates have a good shot at staying competitive if their pitching can hold up.

I suspect that in the 60 game season they may only get 20-25 wins though.

It feels like forever since 2015 happened and I was looking at my 2015 cards the other day because of this pair of 1/1 Archives Active Player Signature buyback autograph.

They look very similar and both don a 1/1 stamp on them.  The card on the left is a Refractor and the card on right is the base.  The original card was a 2015 Bowman Best.  I like the design of this set with the bold team logo in the background.

All week long I am going to be showing my Bowman Best 1 of 1s.

This week's posts will be all about the Karate Kid and that amazing theme song. I always associate the Karate Kid as a summer movie.  I remember when I was younger my mom would baby sit my cousins the last week in July and we would always have to take them to their karate lessons.  After their lessons we would eat macncheese and watch Karate Kid, 3 Ninjas, or TMNT.  I never learned karate myself, but for some reason always get nostalgic about karate movies in the summer.

To tie in my sudden memories and nostalgia, I wanted to spotlight a song that to this day I listen to at least once a month at work because it gets me amped up.

I'm kind of in a collecting funk lately because nothing new is exciting to me, but I have what many consider the best Andrew McCutchen collection on the web.  Why not show off a bunch of Bowman Best cards I haven't looked at for awhile?

A Private Issue and a Private Signing

It's been awhile since I showed off a Cutch 22 card.  Today's card that is jersey serial numbered is a 2019 Topps Gallery Wal-Mart exclusive Private Issue parallel.

The Private Issue has a stamp on the bottom right of the card, but I don't see any additional details that seperate it from the base card.

The Private Issue parallels are numbered to only 250 copies. This particular copy is serially numbered 22/250, thus making it a Cutch22 addition.

Speaking of Private Issues, I received my autograph Nike jersey from a private signing with Andrew McCutchen.

Many thanks to Rod of Padrographs for giving me the tip about the private signing.
Be sure to follow Rod if you aren't already following him.

This is my 1st autograph jersey of Cutch.  I chose the Phillies because only Nike jerseys were available for the signing and he obviously never wore a Nike jersey while playing with the Pirates, Giants, or Yankees.

Leading off...

Baseball is back!

The Yankees and Dodgers are both undefeated and could eventually be heading to the World Series.  26 other teams will be competing tonight.

While I am always excited for Pirates baseball, I am most excited to see Andrew McCutchen have an at bat in an official game again.

It has been over 400 days since his injury last year.

He's leading off for the Phillies tonight so I am going to lead off this 2020 Phillies season with my favorite Phillies card featuring Cutch.

2019 Topps Transcendent Superfractor Auto

numbered 1/1

Big Pimpin'

BASEBALL IS BACK!!!!

Nathan at Bucs Stop Here is running a contest to predict the division winners. 

So like Jay-Z said when I was in high school, I'm gonna get "Big Pimpin"

Head over to Nate's blog and submit your picks and you could win a blaster of Series 2 Baseball which may have a chance to win the most swaggy card ever made by Topps.

I'm still in need of the SP from 2020 Topps Series 2, but did receive this 11x14 Topps online exclusive yesterday.

One More Day

The Road to Opening Day stands at only one more night's sleep.

Who's ready for some baseball?

This is the 2019 Topps Now Road to Opening Day autograph edition.  I have 3 of the parallels red/10, purple/25, base/99.

There are 3 parallels that I still need.
Blue/49
Orange /5
Gold /1

What once was old is now new

A few weeks ago I received my COMC order which contained a very awesome buyback autograph numbered 1/1.

Andrew McCutchen was included in the 2018 Topps Archives Autograph Active Player Edition.  Unfortunately there were no cards of his actually inserted into the packs.  They were all redemptions. 

I discussed awhile back how I received one in a group break.  You can revisit the post from almost two years ago here.

Topps Heritage cards and Allen & Ginter make great materials for buyback autographs.

Here is a picture of all 15 of my 1/1 Archives Buyback Autos.

The top corner Bowman Best cards may look similar, but one is a Refractor, the other is a base.

A few small additions

Back before the 4th of July and before the Cutch SP Frenzy and even before Memorial Day I purchased

Not 1

Not 2

Not 3

But 4

new additions to my Cutch PC and they all consisted of Allen & Ginter mini cards.

4 Small Additions that look standard on the front, but flip them over and you see the true awesomeness of these additions.

From left to right the new additions include
2010 Extended Number SP Photo Variant
2010 No Number
2015 Extended Number SP Photo Variant
2011 Bazooka Back numbered 23/25

Finally a $2 card shows up

The 2020 Cutch SP Frenzy is finally consistently under the triple digit mark.  Coincidently the last card I purchased during that frenzy has arrived. 

It took 2 weeks for this card to show up.
It is the 2019 All-Star Game Foil Stamp parallel.

It only cost me $1.98 delivered so it doesn't bother me too much for the slow processing.  Keep in mind all cards purchased from COMC haven't shipped yet.

I will recap everything in a future post along with some of the other items I purchased that weren't card related.

You can revisit all the other items I purchased during the weekend of the frenzy here.


If you aren't familar with my 2020 SP Frenzy Challenge I took the funds available that could have been spent on buying the 2020 SP Cutch "swag" photo variant and instead used it to buy items I needed for my Cutch collection.  The real challenge was I could only buy cards at the height of the SP Frenzy when they were going for $200-$300 regularly.  This all occurred between the evening of June 27th to the morning of June 30th.  Roughly 48 hours was the stretch of this card going for on average $250.  A lot of the purchases were made via eBay, but there were also half a dozen purchases made on COMC.

Gum Swag

A few weeks ago I showed off 3 Matthew Rosen "gum art cards."

I recently committed to buying a unique card back that utilizes imagery from the most talked about Andrew McCutchen card in years.  He made the "Swag" SP card into a gum stain on the back of Andrew McCutchen's 2019 Topps Archives card (1958 design).

For those unfamiliar with Matthew's art you can click here for his website.

He takes a card (must be before 1992 or a card design utilizing a design before 1992) and paints a pink "gum stain" on the back of the card. 

He has done everything from the Simpsons versions on the back of Griffey, Strawberry, or Mattingly cards to drawing a large fries on the back of a Mark McGwire card.

He's made moments found in the sitcom Seinfeld immortalized on the back of Jay Buhner and Ken Phelps ("How could you trade away Jay Buhner?") and has made some Keith Hernandez cards too ("Hey Pretty Boy")

After he has drawn the art on the back of the card he puts it in a One Touch magnetic case and seals it with his own sticker to preserve the card forever. 

His creative designs on these vintage style cards are awesome and I absolutely love the art he creates on the backs.

A complete checklist of his cards can be found here.

Random Rainbow Showoff: 2012 Prizm Baseball

Every once in awhile I like to show off my progress with a rainbow.

Today I chose 2012 Prizm Baseball

Prizm is the "flagship" set that fans of basketball and football collect.  It got it's first release in baseball though. 

Initially the "Refractors" were called Prizms so when cataloging the card on the left you would call it 2012 Prizm Prizm and 2012 Prizm.

Now the refractor style technology is called a silver.

Above are the three retail exclusive colors

Here is my rainbow as it stands 8 years since release.  I am still in need of the Black Finite 1/1 and the Gold Prizm /10

I like that they put the parallel name on the back of the card.  Imagine if they still did that?
You'd see names like the following:
Lime Green Donuts
Cosmic Haze
Burgundy Kaleidoscope
Je2er

A Look Back to The Future

Turn on those flex compacitors and travel with me at a fast speed of 88mph cause we are going Back To The Future.

I've mentioned Back To The Future a few times on this blog before. Here. Here. Here.

Let's look back at what the future of the Pirates had to offer.

The Pirates transitioned out of their former management group in 2007 and hired Neal Huntington to be their General Manager for a rebuild in 2008.

The Pirates hadn't had a winning record since 1992, the last year they would make the playoffs too.

The team was focusing on drafting and developing their own players.

Their four previous draft picks prior to Huntington taking over were

(2004) Neil Walker, a switch hitting local product High School catcher in 2004.  He would later be turned into a utility player before settling in as a Silver Slugger second baseman.  He played in the majors with the Pirates from 2009 until 2015.  He was traded prior to the start of the 2016 season for Jon Norse.

(2005) Andrew McCutchen, a toolsy quick handed outfielder from high school in 2005.  He became the face of the franchise of the resurgent years for the Pirates.  He made 5 All-Star teams, won an MVP, won a Gold Glove award, 4 Silver Sluggers, and was the 2015 Roberto Clemente Award recipient for his charitable contributions and work with the community.  He will forever be an All-time Pirates great despite playing with the team for only 2009-2017.

(2006) Brad Lincoln, arguably one of the top college pitchers in the 2006 draft.  He made his debut with the team in 2010 after having multiple injuries in the minor leagues.  He started 22 games for the Pirates from 2010 to 2012 when he was eventually converted to a reliever.  Lincoln thrived in the bullpen for the Pirates that season, appearing as a late inning guy with a K/9 over 10 and an ERA under 2.25.  He was traded to Toronto for Travis Snider.  Pirates fans will forever be upset that Lincoln was selected in front of former Cy Young Winners Clayton Kershaw, Tim Lincecum, and Max Scherzer.

(2007) Daniel Moskos, a lefty college arm that the team thought could impact immediately at the professional levels in 2007.  This is arguably one of the most controversial picks in the history of the franchise because Matt Wieters, one of the most coveted catchers in recent memory, was available.

Just Minors is known to have produced A LOT of pairings of autograph subjects for minor league prospects.

This is just one of a dozen printing plates I have of Andrew McCutchen from a Just Minors product.  This pairing features Cutch, Jose Tabata, and Brad Lincoln.

Bloggers Blessings

I wanted to take a moment and thank some of the bloggers

Up first is Daniel from It's Like Having My Own Card Shop.  Daniel sent me a PWE of 2 cards and 1 coin he had set aside for me for a long time.

He also sent me the 2016 Heritage Pirates card that shows a celebration between Cutch, Josh Harrison, and Aramis Ramirez.  I just had a conversation with my brother about how good that 2015 team was and if there was ever a need to push the chips all in at the deadline it was that summer.  A pitching staff of AJ Burnett, Gerrit Cole, Francisco Liriano, Charlie Morton, and JA Happ should have gotten more than 9 innings in the post season.  Unfortunately they (again in the Wild Card) ran into someone who was pitching at elite level when they faced Jake Arrieta and his sub 1.00 second half ERA.  The previous year they ran into 2014 Madison Bumgarner.


Next Up is Johnny from (one of his hundreds of new blogs) Johnny's Trading Spot.  Johnny sent me this Honus Bonus Andrew McCutchen in exchange for a trio of Braves cards I had for him (2 Freddie Freeman 1/1s from Honus Bonus and a 5x7 John Smoltz Gold/10).  Unfortunately, Johnny's postmaster never put the package in his mailbox, but marked it as delivered.  Evidently this is an ongoing issue with his address so next time I am going to have send him something big and make sure it's marked as signature confirmation.

Thank you for this card Johnny.  It's odd that it features Kyle Lohse as I also have career Home Run #110 which was hit off of Lohse.  In his career Cutch hit 3HR off Lohse so I will need to find the other to complete the Lohse rainbow. Lol!


Finally we have Marc from Remember The Astrodome who sent me over some much needed Clemente and Cutch cards.

With the orange parallel I now have the complete rainbow from Big League Baseball.  More details about the Clementes will be available soon on my Roberto Clemente centric blog, Chasing 3000.
Thank you Marc for these awesome cards!

A Legendary Debut

Orange parallels make for interesting looking cards.

 The black parallel numbered 1/1 would be my top choice, but I liked this 2019 Inception orange parallel numbered to 10 copies enough to pick it up last year.

This is 1 of about 40+ autographs of Cutch that I haven't catalogued or shown off yet.  Yup, you read that correctly.

 I am considering making a YouTube collection channel to show off because I think it would be easier to say words and show cards under a light instead of scanning and typing.  Would you follow me on YouTube to view my collection?

All Eyes on Florida

The Coronavirus took the entire world by storm, shutting down most businesses for months on end.  Things are slowly starting to get back to normal, albeit with wearing masks.

Baseball and basketball have begun practicing to resume a season.

Many retailers have begun to open their doors again while still practicing social distances.

Movie theatres are planning to open back up at the end of the month.

The big news though is that Disney World, the world's largest theme park is planning to open their doors again today.

Some other theme parks have already reopened, but none of them have the tourist attraction and expectations that Disney World carries.

All eyes will indeed be on Florida today to see how Orlando handles the opening of tourism while housing the entire NBA in a bubble type area.

This is one of the cooler design patches I have of Cutch.  It is a 1/1 from Hits Memorabilia and features the large FL for Florida Grapefruit League worn on Spring Training jerseys.

It has information on the back to see the actual jersey and authenticy via their website.

Day 4 Mailings of SP Cutch Frenzy

I have been showing a lot of mail days relating to my Cutch SP Frenzy Challenge.

There are a few more PWEs that need to trickle in and obviously the COMC cards I purchased won't be here for many months at the rate things are going.

So let's get started with a classic card on CollectingCutch

The 2005 Topps Update draft pick card of Cutch.  I believe that 2005 Topps Update was the last Topps set to feature draft picks in their flagship release and we are all likely aware of what happened the following year with the Alex Gordon "Rookie Card".  I am always on the hunt for more 2005 Topps Update cards looking for them in the $3-$4 range.  The golds are numbered to only 2005 copies and I like to get them for under $20.

$17.98

I took advantage of the frenzy to grab another Big League card I needed.
This came via a PWE so I was able to save on shipping.

$1.99

A 1/1 for under $12?
Yup, I'm gonna do that all day.

Kyle Lohse gave up 3 homers to Andrew McCutchen in his career.  More on this in a future post.

$11.90


I thought I overpaid for this when it first hit eBay, but there were a few things going for it that I really liked.

It had a black border
It's got that great 1985 design
It has a pinstripe on the relic that is centered fairly well
It is numbered to only 199 copies.

As it turns out the average of this card is in the $20 range still with only a few having been sold or currently listed for sale.
$23.98


2020 Topps Series 2 has a great throwback image for Cutch's main flagship card and I went crazy grabbing as many parallels as possible during the buying frenzy for the SP. 

Unfortunately, my scanner doesn't pick up the foilboard very well.

$2.97

This brings the total for all cards purchased during the SP Frenzy in today's mail day to $58.82.  The collection added a limited print run gold prerookiecard, a 1/1, a black border pinstripe relic, and a few parallels.  This collection of cards cost only about 20% what the top rates were for the Cutch SP during the height of the frenzy.

Sales are starting to "settle down" on the 2020 Series 2 Cutch SP and the prices are typically ending up under triple digits.  I will continue to wait it out until they get under $40.