Gifted by Gavin

A few weeks ago, I idly mentioned to Gavin of Baseball Card Breakdown fame that I had a card on his want list that I was willing to send his way, not really expecting to hear back.  I had never had direct contact with him before and I didn't think he'd seen the message; so, I forgot about the proposal entirely.

Well, silly me, not only did Gavin receive my message, but he had been trying to contact me and simply could not locate my e-mail address.  Turns out I have made my contact information quick difficult to locate - d'oh!

Thankfully, he finally tracked me down and we executed the proposed trade... well, he did.  His part of the deal arrived promptly; however, I'm still trying to get his return package in the mail.  You see, a torn hamstring makes it really difficult to go through my storage and gather the cards needed for his haul.  I promise I haven't forgotten Gavin!

In the meantime, let me show off Gavin's goods:

This was the centerpiece of the deal.  Seeing as I'm a cheap-ass and I don't like harassing people, I don't have a lot of autographs in my collection.  That said, that doesn't mean I don't like to have them,  So, even though he amounted to squat in the Bigs, I'm happy to swap this Signature Series beauty into Orie's spot in my CATRC binder.

Meanwhile, I'll be making a more conscious effort to add inexpensive John Hancock's to said binder.

Here we have a couple of hurlers who failed to deliver on their immense promise.  Even so, both players hold a soft spot in my heart for being a part of the team that really cemented my Cubs allegiance - the 2003 squad.

I love the firework motif on the Woody card - too bad I didn't have this one around for the fourth!  Also, I wonder if Prior received a certificate and a pizza party from UD for making the honor roll, like I did way back when?

Two players for the price of one!  Neither one of these players really delivered on their promise either, I'd say the scales for each were exceptionally different.  Pie was a prospect flameout from when the Cubs were fascinated with "toolsy" athletes and Sori was never, ever going to live up to the expectations cast when he signed his mega-deal in 2007.

A couple of new Sosa's for my player collection.  Though I was only a casual fan at the time, living in Chicago during the '98 season made it impossible for this kid not to be fascinated with Sosa.  I was too young to understand the implications of steroids; so, I'm immensely grateful that I got to experience the home run chase with that purity.

Fleer Emotion seems to be a cult favorite around the blogosphere.  I'm not as big of a fan as others, mostly Fleer Adjectives would have been a more accurate name for the collation and that annoys me more than it probably should.

Also, speaking as a mass media student, I quite like the filmstrip set-up of the "Fame Game" insert.

Gavin closed off this package with a 2012 gold parallel of Shawn Camp.  Campy looked like a golden pickup and a surprise workhorse for the Cubs bullpen that season, leading the league with 80 appearances.  This workload weighed heavy on him in the season's second half, though he still posted a 3.59 ERA in his 77.2 innings.  But, it caught up to him the next season, with that ERA ballooning to over 7.

This card gets bonus awesome points for the sweet 1912 throwback jersey they sported against the Giants that June.  It's a good thing they didn't turn out "Camp-y!"

N'yuck, n'yck, n'yuck.

Thus concludes Gavin's generous trade package.  It's my first trade in several months, maybe even close to a calendar year, so it's nice to shake off the cobwebs and communicate with people.

Gavin, I promise to have your stuff in the mail by the end of this week; I'm now off of my crutches and raring to dig through my trade box.  Thank you for your patience!