Nacho Nacho Man

I was blessed by a surprise gift from Chris at the blog, Nachos Grande.

I am not sure if Chris is aware of this, but whenever I see his blog title pop up in my reading list I think of this:

Anyway, Chris sent me this package in exchange for the prize pack and Cutchmas gift I sent his way.

 Chris sent me a lot of cards ranging from the 90s to current team.  Brian Giles was acquired for a relief pitcher (Ricardo Rincon) on the downside of his career and went on to have a very nice career.  Aramis Ramirez could be a 1st ballot Hall of Very Good candidate next year.  Jose Lind won a gold glove the same year he committed an error in the 9th inning of Game 7 of the NLCS.  The error ultimately lead to 20 years of losing records.  Carlos Garcia was with the organization for nearly those 2 decades of futility.

 I completely forgot about Don Kelly playing for the Pirates.  He just got hired to be the Pirates bench coach for the 2020 season.  The most notable thing I know about Don Kelly is that he married former Pirates 2nd baseman's sister.  Carrie Walker, sister to Neil, became a professional womans basketball player.

2 new Roberto Clemente cards?!?!!!!
Um yes please!!!

And to wrap things up an octaset of Cutch cards including a 2009 WalMart black card.  I stated I wanted to get more copies of Cutch's 2005 Topps Update and 2009 Topps Update cards for 2020.  Chris gave me a head start towards that goal.


Thank you for the surprise return package Chris.

Cardboard Cameos #7 : Unsolved Mysteries

When I saw the opportunity to purchase this gold /10 5x7 Topps Online card for under $8, I knew I had to act quick.

I don't buy many of the 5x7 cards except for a few of the Golds that I really like and any that are exclusive to the site like how Fire was in 2014.

Something about this card screams to me Unsolved Mysteries.

I can imagine Robert Stack's voice discussing how the Pittsburgh Pirates were celebrating another playoff berth and for 3 seasons (2013 - 2015) they had the second most wins in all of baseball.

It would go on to discuss how guys like Lance Berkman, Carlos Beltran, and Matt Holiday regained their form to become pivotal players in the deaths of all Pirates fans dreams.  How a young man, Michael Wacha, would become a hero in a city the same day he became a villain in another.  It would discuss how two men single handily killed 80K Pirates fans (playoff hopes) in 2 years by shutting down the team (MadBum and Jake Arrieta).

It would talk about how these 3 Pittsburgh fan favorites would all but disappear shortly after this image was caught.

Yes the team who had just won 98 games in 2015 and had 4 prospects in the top 100 entering the 2016 season (Meadows, Taillon, Glasnow, Bell) would go on to have a pair of losing seasons before the face of the franchise, the man simply known as Cutch, would leave westward the same as the last Face of Franchise we had.

So this Unsolved Mystery ends with the simple question
WHAT THE F**K HAPPENED?

I think David Freese said it perfectly the other day. 

I will leave you with this image once more.