It's Shaq Week, I mean Shark Week

Yesterday saw a familiar face return to Shark Week.  Shaquille O'Neal was the host of Shark Week a few years ago and he returned this year for a special called Shaqattack.

Shaquille O'Neal is best known for his Hall of Fame basketball career and big (no pun intended) personality.

He was born in 1972 in Newark, New Jersey.

In his 19 year career he was a 4 time NBA Champion, winning the NBA Finals MVP Award 3 times. He made 15 All-Star Games and was selected the game's MVP in 3 of those contests. He won the Rookie of Year Award in 1993 and MVP in 2000. His number is retired by both the Miami Heat and LA Lakers.  

He has starred in movies, video games, and even has had his own rap album and ice teas.  

Shaq is larger than life!

I will finish with showing off this 2013 Topps Archives 1972 Basketball design (Shaq's birth year) of Andrew McCutchen.

I like that Topps has used the other sports designs from their old catalog to make unique inserts like this.

Man vs Shark

Every year Discovery teases us of these heavyweight matches between human and shark.  

We've been teased with fights of Rhonda Rousey and a mako shark.  We've been teased with a swimming match between Michael Phelps and a Great White Shark.  Due to sharks not being trained domesticated animals, a lot of imagination and CGI has been used to simulate these feats.  

Last night was THE MATCHUP OF SHARK WEEK 2020!!! 

Mike Tyson would attempt to Knock Out a shark.  After training with Shark Week regular Paul de Gelder, Tyson swam with sharks in a cage then open water.  

It ended with Paul de Gelder, who has had his arm and leg bitten off by a bull shark and has prosthetic limbs, training Mike Tyson how to put a shark into a hypnosis state by turning the shark upside down and putting it into tonic immobility.

Tyson KO'd the Shark.

Did you know that there are a few shark inspired Minor League Baseball teams?

The Jupiter Hammerheads are a minor league A ball affiliate of the Florida/Miami Marlins.  Prior to 2002 they were affiliated with the Montreal Expos.

So how would Andrew McCutchen do facing a (former) shark?

Let's take a look at how Cutch has done in the largest sample size of Cutch vs former shark...

Jake Westbrook was originally drafted by the Colorado Rockies, but was traded to the Montreal Expos in 1998.  

In 1998  went 11-6 with a 3.26ERA for the Jupiter Hammerheads.  

He eventually would get traded to the Yankees where he made his debut in 2000.  Westbrook didn't have great results in New York for his three games, but was part of the package sent to the Cleveland Indians for David Justice.

It was in Cleveland that the sinker ball pitcher took stage and would become an All-Star in 2004 and helped to lead the Indians pitching staff in the early 2000s.

Westbrook would later join tye St. Louis Cardinals where he won a World Series with them in 2011.

This 1999 Team Best ON CARD autograph of Westbrook is available if someone wants it.

Cutch has hit Westbrook at .357/.438/.429 clip over 28 at bats.  That's good for an OPS of .866.  He has struck out 5 times, but walked 4 times.  He has 2 RBI and 1 SB versus the former Hammerhead.

Why did the ChickenMan cross the Swamp?

There is 1 week every year that I am committed to my TV more than any other week.  It's not sports related , has nothing to do with politics, and is the most Jawesome week of the year.  

I am talking about Discovery Channel's Shark Week.

Shark Week has officially kicked off, but I began my shark watching obsession last week by watching some of the SyFy movies about sharks that were available to stream online. 

I started it off with future SaveSecondBase representative Kristy Swanson (I am already in the process of working on my annual event October posts) and a movie she starred in called Swamp Shark.

It's a pretty terrible yet amazingly bad SyFy movie about a fresh water shark that is eating the gators at the nearby Gator Shack restaurant.

Things get out of control and police are looking to stop the sharks as well including....

Deputy Wade Boggs?

Yup, the Hall of Famer has a cameo in the movie.

If you have been following my blog for the past few years, you are probably aware that I consider myself a Super Collector of Andrew McCutchen.  

I have shown off A LOT but nowhere near everything in my collection over the years.  A few months ago I showcased my Andrew McCutchen 1/1 cards that relate to the 1983 Topps design when I celebrated what would have been Tony Gwynn's 60th birthday.  You can revisit that post here.

Tony Gwynn's 1983 Topps rookie card was released the same year that Topps released rookie cards of other Hall of Famers Ryne Sandberg and Wade Boggs.

You can see the acknowledgement on the back of this Superfractor

I have both the autograph and "base" Superfractors of this 1983 Silver Pack exclusive cards.

I have shown off my rainbow of the autograph versions in the past

But I don't think I ever showed off the nonautograph parallels that I am looking to build the rainbow of

I have the green, purple, blue, and base.  I am still in need of the red and orange.

The backs show Wade Boggs, Hall of Famer and Actor listed on the back.

If you enjoy seeing other people's collections like I do may I suggest you check out a pair of Wade Boggs Supercollectors on YouTube

First up is Richard who has the most amazing basement bar setup I have ever seen and it is devoted almost entirely to Wade Boggs.  

He has even called it The Boggs Tavern.  You can click here to see a tour of the Boggs Tavern

Another supercollector of Wade Boggs on YouTube is John who goes by Wade Boggs Fan on YouTube.  You can see John's Boggs Room Tour by clicking here.

Got that Swag

I have shown a lot of sketch cards in the past.

I have discussed my love (and financial hate) for the 2020 Topps SP photo variant "swag" card of Andrew McCutchen found in Series 2 Topps.  

I have shown my 11x14 poster from Topps.com exclusive.

Well, let me show the marriageof all those things with one simple photo.

This is the 11x14 Topps Poster with 3 artistic interpretations sketch cards.

How will the stats this year be valued?

A lot of people have been talking about the statistics for this shortened season and asking how will we look back at this season.  

Stats are an endless talking point for all baseball fans from the casual to the hardcore fan.  

Andrew has lead the league in a few stats over his decade plus long career.  In 2012, he lead the league in hits, collecting 194.

It is virtually impossible for a player to collect that many hits in a 60 game season.  A player would have to get over 3 hits a game for the entire season to get to a mark like that.  That would result in a batting average of likely over .700.  Like I said, virtually impossible.  Getting the "counting stats" will be tough this year.

However what about the percentage stats?

Now the talks of averages and ERAs can be discussed.  And they should be.  

The 3 best consecutive months of McCutchen's career were May, June, and July 2012 when he was the NL Player of the Month twice.

With 77 games played in those three months Cutch hit 22 HR, 59 RBI, and collected 112 hits while walking 33 times.  To say he was the hottest player in baseball during that three month stretch is an understatement.  

Even with all that hot hitting it was still "only" a .392 batting average and .450 OBP.  

With the season about a fifth of the way done for most clubs people I work with in the Philadelphia area are looking at Phil Gosselin and Adam Haseley and their above .500 batting averages wondering if they can keep it up all year.  The short answer is NO, they can't.  

It is hard to hit at a .400 clip for over 2 months.  The last guy to do it had his head cyrogenically frozen.  A few guys have come close, but I don't think there will be a .400 hitter with 55+ games played.  I just don't see it happening.

I bring up these stats facts because I recently picked up a "Refractor" like Prizm card from 2013 Select.  

This is the prizm parallel as identified on the back.

I already had the gold prizm

I still need the base. Anyone have one? 

Cross Another Off The Want List

I am attempting to figure out this new blogger format. Please let me know if anything doesn't look right.

Last year I listed some cards that I claimed were some of my top wants for the coming years.  Among them was a 2010 Topps Chrome Gold Refractor /50.

Well, you can cross another off the want list.

I recently picked up this 2010 Topps Chrome Gold Refractor /50 off eBay.  It was listed for $20 BIN or best offer.  I wasn't going to mess around with negotiating for it to save a few bucks and immediately clicked the Buy-It-Now.

A New Cutch22 and complaint about technology

I haven't posted in a week and am trying to figure out to work around this "upgraded" version of blogger on my phone.  

I am not a fan.

I have no clue how to quickly access drafts using tags or how to add tags to my posts as I am drafting them.  This frustrates me as I have hundreds (Yes you read that correctly) of rough drafts ready to go when an event may pop up.  

This technology is not helping me show off my collection of Cutch.

This 2019 Topps Tek was purchased last November and I have had it saved for awhile as a draft, but I have no idea where it is on the new blogger loading screen.

I rescanned it to show this purple parallel numbered 22/99