Elf Week: Santa's Coming? I Know Him!!!!

My absolute favorite line from the movie, Elf, is "Santa's coming! I know him"

This was an easy association for a recent pickup.

I missed out on the unnumbered autograph version but did grab this serially numbered to 10 player worn Santa Hat relic.

It's almost time to put out some Oreos and hang the stocking by chimney with care.

Santa's Coming.......

The Holiday Season Is Upon Us

I am preparing for another wave of cards to go out to people this weekend or early next week.  In addition to my Secret Santa package officially being sent out I have 3 other packages en route to new homes for the holidays.


This pair of 2018 Holiday Bowman cards are meant to represent ugly sweaters or wrapping paper, I'm really not sure.

I actually like parallels like this for holidays.  The green is numbered to 99 and the red is numbered to only 10 copies.

This pair joins the turkey parallel I showed off for Thanksgiving which was numbered to 35 copies.

I still need the /50 snowflake parallel.

2018 Bowman Holiday Box had some fun(ky) parallels to chase.

I hope Topps keeps doing cool parallels like this to chase for years to come.  They're fun and the hobby should have some holiday fun too....

The next two weeks will have specific themes to them.  I am really excited about the week leading into Christmas week. It will be the most fun I've had creating posts since my yearly Save Second Base events.

1st Day of Christmas: 2011 Tier 1 Auto

2 posts, 1 day?
Why not?

My family always managed to screw up what I thought was reality.  ALWAYS!

It wasn't until this year that I discovered the 12 days of Christmas began on Christmas day.

My family managed to convince me it started 12 days before Christmas.

History proves it's not.

So in the tradition of my family's backwards ways of doing things I will be showing off an Andrew McCutchen card numbered 12/25 beginning today through Christmas.

Here we have a 2011 Topps Tier 1 On The Rise on card autograph gold parallel.

The On The Rise autographs featured many of the young players in 2011 that were on the verge of breakout seasons and careers.  Of course there were a few duds in there too.  The checklist has names ranging from Madison Bumgarner, Brandon Crawford, Mike Giancarlo Stanton, Zach Britton, Max Scherzer, Freddie Freeman, Chris Sale, Craig Kimbrel, and Anthony Rizzo.  It also has names like Alexi Ogando, David Cooper, and Tyler Colvin.

They were right in that Cutch holds the Pirates record for most consecutive 20-20 seasons.  He also has hit 20 or more Homeruns since 2010.  No other active player can claim that same mark.  It mentions his back to back seasons of .286 and Cutch's current blcareer batting average after 10 years in the bigs is .287.

Cutch has displayed a model level of consistency since breaking into the big leagues and I think he may return to an All-Star level this year.

The Finest Generations (Christmas Edition)

Most of the family on my mom's side of the family lived in various parts of the United States while I was growing up.  I had aunts and uncles in Texas, California, Kentucky, and Florida.  One thing I always remember was getting a phone call on the 11th hour every Christmas Eve from my aunt in California with her asking "Is it Christmas yet?"

I don't know if her kids will continue that trend when speaking to any of our east coast family or not (likely not), but it's one of those memories I've carried for an entire generation.

I bring this up because my latest Cutch addition is a Christmas card (12/25) of 2015 Finest Generations.   These rare refractors are super tough to get despite just being regular refractors.

They're so rare in fact that I already had the base, Superfractor, and red highlighted on this blog.  This was the missing link to the rainbow family.  Yup, only 4 cards to chase on this insert set rainbow.  It feels nice to check this one off.

To refresh your memory, here's the red and super

Today my brother and I will be attending a sports show in Virginia.  It's the first time I will have seen him since Christmas time.  Should be fun times.

A Christmas message and a Christmas card

I recently purchased a Topps Mini Orange from eBay and it arrived in a bubble mailer.

This wasn't any average bubble mailer though.  On the back it had Acts 2:38 written.

This biblical verse is important to remember why we celebrate the holiday.

Upon review of the actual card I noticed it was a Christmas card.

Sorry Gavin, this one is staying with me.

Merry Christmas to all of you.

Christmas Contest

October is National Breast Cancer Awareness month.  Visit the official site here.

Breast Cancer will be detected in one of eight women in the US each year.
It is the second leading cause of cancer death among women each year.
On average every 2 minutes a woman will be diagnosed with breast cancer and every 13 minutes one person will die from breast cancer.
There are currently 33 million breast cancer survivors in the USA.

It's important to support the research for cancer.  Breast Cancer is often associated with the color pink so I will be showing off some pink Cutch cards.

In addition, you can expect to see some boobs with each post.  Who doesn't love boobs?

So let's start with what we're hoping to save!

"I thought Christmas comes just one time a year."

Denise Richards might be the most overly sexualized Bond girl ever.  I haven't met any nuclear experts before, but if they looked like Denise Richards circa 1999, I want to meet them just to say "How you doin?".

Why do I bring up Christmas Jones?

Because on Collecting Cutch, Christmas comes more than once.  As evidenced by the card above, it's a Christmas card (12/25)  In the Spirit of Christmas and giving, I am offering up a contest.  Simple and easy.

The Prize which ties in with Breast Cancer Awareness...

The Hit King!
Now, how do you win it?
Leave a comment which player will hit the first double in the 2017 World Series.  Only 1 entry by blogger.  You must be a follower of this blog already.  Comment early if you think you know who could hit the first double.  The first person to correctly identify the individual to hit the first double in the 2017 World Series gets this card.

Additional rules:
Contest closes at noon Eastern Time the day of Game 1 of the World Series.
If the first double is hit by a player not commented on I will randomize the card off to anyone who pimped this contest on their blog.

Comment early and pimp it!

Finding Value in Lil Lots

My girlfriend and I sometimes go to Big Lots to get value for our dollar, but I have been getting pretty good value on purchasing little lots of Cutch cards on eBay recently because of Cutch's continued struggles at the plate.

Often times lots of Cutch cards don't do me much good as I normally have 75% or more of the cards listed in the lot.  This lot was for 3 cards all of which I needed.

You can see the 3 new additions to the Collection below.

2017 Bowman Green /99
2016 Optic /199
2016 Optic Diamond Kings /25 (Christmas edition)

I won the lot with a winning bid of $5.  The Black Optic Diamond Kings is a card I have seen go north of $15.

The announcement of the winner of my contest will be held tomorrow.