Cardboard Cameo: Oh Austin, beeeeeehave

The finish line is in sight.  Thank you all for another fun Save Second Base event.

1 In 8 women will be detected with breast cancer in their life.  Early detection is the key.

Thanks to all the comments made we have met the goal of raising $150 to allow one 1 woman a free mammogram.

With Halloween tomorrow I was looking for some Halloween inspiration and noticed a perfect mix of Devil's Night and Halloween.

Elizabeth Hurley is that perfect mix.

Like a fine wine, she has actually gotten better with age.  Look at that body!

Not sure if it's bedazzling mojo or something else, but it is definitely working.

It seems appropriate to show off a woman who played the Devil tonight since it is Devil's Night.

When she played Satan in the Brandon Frasier comedy Bedazzled she took the phrase "hot" to another level.

It is odd that she played the Devil AFTER playing opposite Michael Myers, a name we all associate with Halloween.

However this Michael Myers was carving up laughs in Austin Powers

Oh Austin, behave...

I want to thank Chris from The Collector for pointing out this cameo appearance.

Anyone know what happened to his blog?  I was enjoying his all time roster series.

In researching the card, I learned that it didn't lead to a catch.

It actually lead to one of Cutch's best games offensively when he went 6 for 7 and hitting a walk off homer in extras

Thanks again to Chris for the tip about this cameo.

I hope you enjoyed this Devil's Day production as we lead into Halloween tomorrow.  Michael Myers will not be making an appearance tomorrow.

However if you say a name 3 times, stranger things will happen.

Wow! The Marlins Are Bad!!!!

I was doing some early season All-Star predictions with a friend at work the other day and was looking at some of the bad teams to figure out who could represent their team at the midsummer classic.

 I was shocked that there isn't even a middle reliever on that team with an ERA in the 3s who could make a case to be included.  Former Pittsburgh Pirate Neil Walker looks like the most productive position player, but he plays the same position as two guys who are making MVP cases (Cody Bellinger and Josh Bell).  Former Pirate Prospect Harold Ramirez may make a case if he continues to rake at the plate, but with less than 30 major league at bats it may be too soon to announce he is the Marlins team All-Star rep.  I guess at this point, the only logical choice (if every team needs a representative) is pitcher Caleb Smith.  He has an ERA under 4 and a winning record for a team nearly 20 games under .500 in May.  He has to be the representative, right?

I mean it's not like the Marlins didn't get great value when they traded away guys like Christian Yellich, Dee Gordon, Giancarlo Stanton, JT Realmuto, Chris Paddack, Trevor Williams, Luis Castillo, Marcell Ozuna, Domingo German, Derek Dietrech, etc.  Oh wait, they're still a bottom third farm system after gutting their team?

Not every team wins every trade.
Then again not every team loses every trade either.

Unless you're the Marlins.

Had they kept their team they would be on pace for 102 Wins and only $110 million payroll.  Details of this super team can be found at The Athletic.

Wow! Are they a bad team!!!!

Above you can see a pair of box toppers that I have featuring Andrew McCutchen historic walk off homerun six hit game versus the Dodgers last year.

Both these feature the same box number.

The Stripling/Tomlinson/Musgrave is the rarer of the two versions.  To date I have only seen 2 sell since it's release.

Each player featured on the box topper back has two versions.  The rarer ones tend to sell for 5x the standard version.

And for those voting for the 2019 ASG, vote for Cutch!

Cutch and the Dodgers

There have been some reports surfacing that the Pirates and Dodgers might make a trade involving Josh Harrison and Cutch to the Dodgers. I highly doubt something like this would happen as the Pirates appear to want to remain competitive after the Ivan Nova signing and still appearing in on the Jose Quintana trade talks.

Thanks to this report and Greg's blog post about the package I sent him a few months back I decided to scan all the Cutch combo cards I have with Dodgers alumni Kershaw, Kemp, Gonzalez, Robinson, and Puig.

Here's the results

 That card above is just an absolute monster. It features some of the best players at each position. The Abreu and Stanton patches highlight my favorites of the card.

I wish there would be more inserts like this that highlight pitcher vs. hitter and how they match up verse each other.

Just another relic combo of some of the game's best players.

2 different versions of Team Pinnacle featuring Cutch and the Bison.

"Superstar" Centerfielders Cutch, Kemp, and Shane Victorino (?)
Really Victorino?

Triple Threads was really kind to Cutch and Kemp pairings in 2010 and 2011.

A pair of All star relics with Puig

My only A Gone relic in my collection.

And to finish it off, I have one of the greatest Dodgers of all time and the man who paved the way for non white athletes in  the US.