Payback is a Walk down the Plank

Matt of Bob Walk the Plank fame and I trade baseball cards and we trade beer. This is "Perfect World" stuff, folks. I believe all wars and arguments and fights and hatred would stop if more people did this.

Matt sends, always, a very thoughtful assortment of beers both within my wheelhouse (IPAs) and outside of it (just about everything else). When he wrote to say this one featured some of his favorite Stouts I got excited. I used to really love stouts but then broke away to the more bitter (it's a reflection of character and personality, the bitterness) beers.

This beer box package was preceded by a few days two stunningly outrageous Darryl Strawberry cards. But, first the beer.

On the left: The well-traveled box!

And on the right:
Fat Heads Holly Jolly Ale (consumed)
Moo Joos Oatmeal Milk Stout (consumed)
Silent Night Imperial Stout
Founders CBS
Weyerbacher Brewing Sunday Morning Stout

The above features on the left:
Founders Doom Imperial IPA
Wicked Weed Freak of Nature
Fat Heads Hop JuJu
Baby Maker Dbl IPA (With a name like baby maker...)

And on the right:
Big Timber Porter
Oskar Blues Brewery Ten Fidy Imperial Stout (I've had the Pinner Throwback IPA and enjoy that muchly) (in the process of consuming as I blog)
Evil Twin Brewing Imperial Biscotti Break

The beer will be consumed and enjoyed. The baseball cards will be cherished for a longer period of time than any bottle of beer should justifiably last.

First up is the 2005 Donruss Diamond Kings - Heritage Collection Signature SN 03 of 50. If you're like me you're uncontrollably drooling at the sensational glory of this baseball card.

The card says Strawberry "burst" onto the MLB scene but let me tell you I broke out a massive smile when I saw this card.  Divine.

And if you thought the above was remotely nice, check out this sweet piece of paper: 2005 Donruss Greats - Signature Platinum HoloFoil. Cards this beautiful normally feature Bob Walk. It was nice of the real Mr Walk to share his stunning winsomeness with this particular card.

Whoa! Whoa! This card is on the scale of so saucy I, like, can't stand up (if you know what I mean).

I say "Thank you" sincerely but, Matt, it doesn't quite express my gratitude. I've been sidelined recently with other work, travel, and illness.... but I hope after a short visit this week to Chicago to give a talk, your return beer package should be on the way next weekend.

Thanks for stopping by!

Kruk You

Mark H sent me the below two John Kruk cards a while back and this is a heinously overdue post to acknowledge them.

This first card here is a supersized 1994 Donruss Jumbo Diamond Kings SN1000. Didn't know it existed!

The second card here is the 2016 Topps Archives card. A quite welcome addition, too, to my Kruky collection.

Since both cards show Kruk as a Phillies player that's a good thing. I know he was a Padres and a White Sox, too, but it's the Phillies I think you associate him with most.

Thanks Mark!

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2 Sweet Cards

I got these two cards ages ago on Sportlots. I had been showing them off regularly but then blissfully got some cards in the mail from traders to show off, amongst other things. These two cards came from Westlake, who I've bought from before and feel kindly towards.

They are Darryl Strawberry's 1997 Upper Deck Base Set card #444 and his 1998 Bowman Chrome Refractors #256.

As it was ages ago, I think it was our good friend San Jose Fuji who set me off on the 1998 Refractor quest. I'm grateful for this parallel.

With the exception of the Yankees uniforms, they're really nice cards.

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29 Years Later

I waited 29 years to buy this fucking Fuck Face card.

My scanner, which I like, routinely cuts off one side of the border; in actuality the right side of the card is a little wider.

I was not lucky enough, like Kin, to pull one back in the day, but I got this for about $16 including shipping via COMC. I'm very glad to have it.

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Kin Cards

These six John Kruk and Darryl Strawberry cards are from Kin, who needs absolutely no introduction. My scanner, though, unforgivably likes to think its smarter than it is and routinely cuts off the edges. I can assure you that the cards are more intact than the scan portrays (on the right).

2013 Darryl Strawberry Topps Gypsy Queen Mini
1992 John Kruk Upper Deck
1992 John Kruk Upper Deck Team Checklist
1986 Darryl Strawberry Topps
1991 Darryl Strawberry Topps Stadium Club
1992 Darryl Strawberry Fleer

Oh my! That Gypsy Queen mini steals the show, doesn't?

Kin, my sincere thanks for these cards!

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More 1992 Topps

Mike M is sending me two cards to get me closer to my 1992 Topps set... But, in the meantime, Adam K and Marc B recently sent me a some cards as well!

Here we have Mike Timlin, Charlie O'Brien, Jimmy Gonzalez, Dickhead McShutthefuckupalready, David Segui, and John Olerud.  Both guys sent me David Segui, so I have two of them and that's fine by me.

Thanks so much Adam, Marc, and in the future Mike!

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A Christmas Set

I found this post in my drafts folder... it's only nearly 3 months late...

One of the things I had asked for for Christmas a 1980s set of Topps cards. It's part of my goal to have all the set, base and traded. Well, for Christmas I was able to get the 1981 Topps set. I don't know what my father paid for it, but that doesn't matter at all. Looking through it Christmas night, a lot of the cards looked dirty. I'm not sure if it's the photography, or maybe even the cards themselves (they don't feel grimy or anything). Just old.

It was great to get the rookies of Valenzuela, Mookie Wilson, Damasio Garcia, and that other guy Tim Raines. Of course I think the most valuable is card 494.

I've always been a fan of the front of the card design, the baseball cap is just sweet, to me. And the playoff cards are something I wish they did more of...not like Topps Now, but part of base cards. It's funny to me in some ways that there are more teams than there were in the 1980s but yet there are 92 fewer cards issued from those sets of 792.

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