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 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.
With my grandfather passing I am having so many memories of 1989 Topps, NASCAR, Tetris, Hess Trucks, and Big Bang Theory pop in my head.
The coming days will be tough, but as I get together with my cousins and uncles I haven't seen in a long time I am sure we will all be rediscovering many many great memories.
2017 had a lot of buybacks inserted into their packs including the Rediscover Topps and 70th anniversary Bowman cards.
Since I began supercollecting Andrew McCutchen I have become friends with other collectors of Andrew McCutchen cards. Each of them have their own special market of cards they prefer to collect of Cutch. I go for anything, but also have certain styles of cards I prefer more than others. Some collectors are interested in all teams, some only seek out his Pirates days. Some look mainly for patches, others mainly for autographs. Some prefer certain brands and it is because of that I was able to make a trade for a card that suits both our collections better.
One such collector has the most insane Pirates Topps Heritage collection I have seen including some groovy 1/1 booklets of both Cutch and Gerrit Cole. Topps Heritage is his favorite brand and it's because of that I traded a 2016 Topps 65th Anniversary Buyback of a 2014 Topps Heritage card
For my all-time favorite Buyback series
2015 Allen & Ginter 10th Anniversary Mini Frames are my preferred buybacks. The uniqueness of Allen & Ginter got me back into collecting cards again and through the years I have loved adding any and all Andrew McCutchen Ginter parallels I can get my hands on, especially the framed mini buybacks from 2015.
The original card is a 2011 Allen & Ginter Black Border Mini that has been foil stamped with the 10th Anniversary Logo.
This marks my 5th Buyback Mini from Ginter and 8th overall.
Thanks for the trade Kevin. Looking forward to making another in the future maybe for those Heritage Bell/Glasnow chrome rookies I have for more Cutch cards I need.
On Tuesday night I finalized a deal to trade one of my Andrew McCutchen 1/1s to another McCutchen collector.
The card I gave up was this 1/1 Laundry Tag autograph from 2018 Topps Dynasty.
I have purchased a bunch of cards from him in the past and he is trying to complete the set of 1/1s from Dynasty. After he received my copy that brought him to 3 of the potential 5 1/1s from this product.
I told him I would part with my 1/1 in exchange for another copy of AM3. I have a copy of the other 4 versions and wanted to keep a set of the 5 versions.
So what did the 1/1 gold version land me?
Another 1/1!
(Keeps my 1/1 tracker total complete)
This is a 2018 Archives Signature Series
Buyback 2016 Bunt
If you aren't familar with Archives Signature Series, Topps uses cards from their vault that they label as buybacks. They stamp the card with a year and certified autograph in a corner of the card then get the athlete to sign the card which is placed in a one touch magnetic holder and sealed with a unique tamper proof sticker.
In addition to the Bunt auto, I also got a copy of the AM3 (base numbered to 10 copies) to help keep the set complete.
Quality for Quantity (with Quality)
On a related note, the person I made this trade with won an auction for the 4th of 5 photo variants 1/1s yesterday. Shortly after the auction he sent a text saying he got it. I would love to help him get the missing one.
I interrupt the weekly Scripture Sunday on May 19th to bring you a "This Day in Cutchstory".
Cutch had quite a performance on May 19th, 2012 when he hit a pair of two-run homers to lead the Pirates to a victory over the Detroit Tigers.
So if you are doing the math on this one it's 2(qty) X 2 (two run homers) = (my latest) 1/1. Algebra isn't what it used to be when I was going to school.
The NFL Combine happened this week and we now know that former Oakland Athletic draft pick, Kyler Murray stands in at FIVE feet TEN and one eighth inches.
He also weighed in at 207 pounds.
A bit undersized for the modern quarterback standards.
By baseball standards he was compared to Andrew McCutchen before being drafted last year. This MLB link will bring you to an article written June 1st, 2018 which compares Murray's skillset to McCutchen.
NBC Sports confirmed that he had traits of McCutchen and Jackie Bradley Jr.
Just under a year later and analysts surrounding baseball are still comparing him to Andrew McCutchen. Tim Kurkjian said as recent as January on ESPN that he reminds him of McCutchen with the tools he has to work with.
Did you know that Cutch was actually hoping to play football in college? His father convinced him to stick to baseball though knowing the wears and tear that the gridiron puts on the body. Lorenzo McCutchen was a star running back at Carson-Newman University, but changed his NFL dreams to return to Florida and be with Andrew.
Cutch was also a high school football star with the dreams of carrying on a multisport career. This 2018 Archives Buyback autograph numbered 1/1 of a 2016 Bowman card discusses how if Cutch didn't get drafted by the Pirates he would have played football in college.
Tim Kurkjian is a personality often imitated so it comes as no surprise that many other people share his opinion of Murray resembling Cutch.
But what if I told you that Cutch resembles Kurkjian?
Watch this video to see Cutch impersonate Kurk...
Oh and in case you didn't know, Cutch is a football fan. Here are some pics of Cutch at Steelers games.
When I got home from vacation I had a FedEx package awaiting for me from Topps. Inside was another 1/1 from 2018 Topps Archives Active Player Edition.
I wish the card subject was better than this 2013 Bowman Chrome, but for another 1/1 who am I to complain?
I'm still hoping to get a Heritage or early release of Cutch from these buyback redemptions. I have 3 more coming in and based upon everything else I have seen these are all 1/1s that Cutch signed.
I said I was going to ease up on the amount of cards I was buying and overall I have done very good with resisting the temptation. I had heard that Cutch was a redemption for the 2018 Archives Active Players Autograph release. While I didn't want to waste a lot of money on a redemption (we have all heard the year long process with some of these redemptions) I was willing to take a $9 gamble on a case break.
Boy am I glad I did.
These redemptions have been selling in the $80+ range.
I have no idea what card will be autographed when Cutch signs the buyback, but I am looking forward to it.
In order to enter the redemption, I had to break the seal to scratch off the back. Once entered, I threw the redemption in a top loader and took the 2018 Archives Mag Case to place one of my favorite in person signed cards.
The reality of this card actually being made is a possibility as Cutch, Harrison, and Marte all signed for the 2018 Archives release. If this actually gets produced (likely as a 1/1) I would need to add it to the collection. For now though I am happy with my in person triple auto of the All-Star tandem of Cutch (2011-2015), Harrison (2014 & 2017), and Marte (2016).
I purchased a lot of 135 Andrew McCutchen cards for $25 just so I could get 1 "new" card.
Why the quotes around new?
Well because even though it's new to the spreadsheet, it's just a restamped card I already own.
I have been looking for any and all buybacks of Cutch that I can get my hands on. There's been a few 65th anniversary cards, Rediscover Topps, Bowman 70th anniversary released in the past few years. I wish there were actually more to chase down.
The most plentiful are the 2015 10th Anniversary buybacks of Allen & Ginter. I showed off a post last year begging people to help me locate any of these. Since that post I have seen only one become available for sale. Even though they aren't stamped I feel like the print run on these has to be less than 10 as they infrequently hit the market for any particular card more than once. Hell, they could all be unnumbered 1/1s.
Anyway this new addition to the spreadsheet brings my A&G buyback total to 8. This is my 4th mini of the bunch. I like the framed mini buybacks more because they have the A&G 2015 frame around the card making it seem like a new card.
The other 134 Cutch cards? Well...I'm going to verify that I'm not missing any of them but I am 99% sure I have them all.
This is what I will be cross checking over the next few days.
I found some Bowman Buybacks that I have been sending some of you as part of care packages. One of the cards I needed from a lot of Bowman Buybacks was this
A 2014 Bowman with the 2017 "70th anniversary" stamp
