It's Good to be King

King Felix, that is.  Not as good to be the Mariners organization, I suppose?  I read today that the Seattle Mariners only gained a profit of less than $5.9 million in 2012.  You can check out the same blog post at Yahoo! Sports' Big League Stew here.  With that kind of profit margin, they could sign... an NBA player that never plays!  $5.9 million is less than a third of Felix Hernandez's yearly salary under his hefty new contract.  This card definitely did not cost anywhere near those numbers:

2005 Series 2, Felix Hernandez rookie autograph.  On card!  Sweet scrawl there.

I purchased the above card a few months ago at a very reasonable price, almost exactly a month before Hernandez signed that massive contract.  It sure took me a while to post!  The prices for Felix's signatures seem to have risen gradually yet substantially since then.  Now, if only that elbow anomaly or what ever they found in his physical does not become something serious or detrimental, then the "King" will live long and prosper indeed.

There was a moment when I was concerned that the card actually depicted someone named Hernandez Felix and not the Seattle ace as I expected.

The Awesome, and Possibly Disgusting, Card I Pulled Today

I purchased a hobby box of 2012 Upper Deck Goodwin Champions with some of my tax return money.  I really like Goodwin Champions and I have pulled a monster hit out of it before.  After today, make that two big hits!

I pretty much did this when I pulled it from the pack.  So, I've already redeemed the Entomology card.  I hope it gets shipped to me soon, safely and undamaged.  I am also really hoping the card I receive does not contain a spider.  I truly dislike spiders.  Hell, I even detest butterflies.  Nevertheless, I'm sure it will look awesome!

Besides the Entomology Redemption, this box of Goodwin Champions was very good.  I managed to get four hits - a Matt Packer autograph (who?), Maryeve Dufault auto, Thurman Thomas jersey relic, and a Hakeem Olajuwon (The Dream!) jersey.

Two Morrows

After many tries to acquire a Brandon Morrow rookie or prospect autograph card, I have finally obtained one!  Well, two actually:

2006 Tristar Prospects Plus, Farm Hands Brandon Morrow signatures.  The one on top is a gold version, #'d 02/25.

As you can probably see, I was overzealous when bidding on these two cards.  My perseverance paid off two-fold.  Morrow is a good pitcher, with high heat and strikeouts, though if he could only stay healthy...

Los Angeles Catchers

Here are your two Dodgers catchers for this season:

Yaaay!  On the left: 2012 Update, Golden Moments, A.J. Ellis autograph.  On the right: 2011 Heritage Minors, Tim Federowicz auto, #'d 210/861.

I tried to acquire the Ellis signature the moment I realized it existed.  It took a long while, but I have obtained one!  Now I jealously hoard it away, as I return to Valhalla, to slumber and feed.  (Bonus points if you guess that reference.)  Tim-Fed's mustache makes him look kind of creepy, but I'm really just sullen and vexed because I can not grow one of my own.  Super catcher team, go!  Go Dodgers!

COMC Pickups

There was some confusion for me at the switch from CheckOutMyCards.com to COMC.com.  I was certainly unaware of any major differences at first.  Did this happen to anyone else?  I bought a few cards from CheckOutMyCards then switched to COMC for my second half of purchases.  To my dismay, I discovered that there are different shipping and handling costs associated with either site.  So, make sure you are using only one site or the other when making purchases!  You can't get the $3 flat rate shipping on COMC if you have items in your order from CheckOutMyCards.  I feel like COMC could have made more of an effort to communicate their changes to their customer base.  Or maybe I just ignored them.  That is entirely possible.  Here's what I got:

I love Flair cards!  If I get a job (ugh, taking forever), maybe that will be my new collecting project - making a Flair set or two.  This is a 1995 Flair #155, Mike Piazza.  Those are quite some faces you are making there, Mike.  I met Piazza not too long ago.

Here are two MMA (mixed martial arts for the uninitiated, though I can't imagine anyone not knowing about the sport by now) autographs.  On the left: 2012 UFC Finest of Dustin "The Diamond" Poirier.  On right: 2010 Leaf MMA base auto of Gabriel "Napão" Gonzaga.  Poirier, a Louisiana native, is one of my favorite up-and-coming fighters.  "The Diamond" has an excellent ground game and technical striking, and he just had a barnburner of a fight with Cub Swanson at UFC on Fuel TV: Barao vs. McDonald.  Gonzaga is a one-time UFC heavyweight championship contender.  "Napão" has been on a tear of late because he is finally using his considerable, world-class grappling skills to finish fights.

Jordan Hill!  He was doing a meet-and-greet and signing in Glendale this past Saturday.  I originally planned to attend, but I got lazy and just drank beer and played Halo 4 instead.  Besides, I already have these two autographs of him.  I would have missed out, yes, if Hill was like, "Arno, the Earth needs us, we must take my rocket ship to space and blast some fucking asteroids."  Then, yes, I would totally have driven to Glendale for that.  Top: 2009-10 Limited #157, Jordan Hill rookie jersey auto, #'d 80/299.  Bottom: 2009-10 Timeless Treasures #107, Jordan Hill rookie auto on white ball leather, #'d 240/299.

Left: 2007 Upper Deck Inkredible, Zach Miller autograph.  The Seahawks have underutilized Miller as a receiver, mostly using him as a blocker.  Right: 2010 Panini Ceritifed, Mirror Gold Signature rookie auto of Riley Cooper, #'d 03/25.  Cooper turned down the Phillies and Rangers at different times to play football.  We'll leave it at that.

On left: 2012 Chrome Purple Refractor rookie card of Wei-Yin Chen.  Chen had a nice season last year.  Also, his arm did not fall off nor did he have some other crazy injury that Taiwanese pitchers in the MLB tend to develop.  Here's hoping Chen stays tip-top!  Seriously, these Taiwanese pitchers are already beat up and damaged by the time they hit the bigs because they are likely being handled irresponsibly with a heavy workload when younger.  I can't tell if the purple and orange combination on this card is hideous or not.  I guess it works for the Phoenix Suns?  On right: 2011 Lineage 1952 Matt Harrison autograph.  Both of these dudes will probably end up on my fantasy baseball teams this season.

Finally, more Dodgers.  Left: 2011 Donruss Elite Extra Edition, Chris Reed prospect auto, #'d 103/500.  Reed is a top-five Dodgers prospect and the 16th overall selection in the 2011 draft.  He went to Stanford, which is a shitty, garbage school (fuck Stanford, go Bears), and should be at very least a serviceable starter in the future.  Right: 2012 Heritage Minors, Joc Pederson Real One Autograph.  Top-ten prospect Joc has a cool name and should be a serviceable outfielder in the future.  Fuck Stanford.

Not pictured are the Brandon Morrow rookie autograph card (I have been trying to get one to no avail for the past two years) and Scott Baker auto I bought because they were damaged and I returned them to COMC.  My only problem with some cards from COMC is that occasionally they have damage you can only see side-on and not in the scans.  That said, COMC does have great customer service and are always friendly and patient when I make crazy requests of them.

I also purchased the second to last card I needed to finally complete 2009 Allen & Ginter, an Aubrey Huff SP #349.  I only require the Jordan Schafer RC SP, #339, to finally complete that set.  You will be mine, Schafer card.  Your fate is inexorable!  So yea... let me know if you have it.  Cool beans.

A Lifetime Supply of Cuban Sammiches...

...is what it would take for me to trade this card (or a Koufax, almost any card for a Sandy Koufax signature):

2012 Panini Signature Series Baseball, Rated Rookie manu-patch autograph of Yoenis Cespedes, #'d 177/299.  He has a cool scrawl.

Because it took so damn long to get a Cespedes rookie auto at a reasonable price.  Hell, I still think I overpaid a bit.  Nevertheless, done and done deal.  I alluded to this card in my previous post.  Ain't she a beauty, Fuji?

A Bob Feller Cut Signature

I obtained a Bob Feller cut signature card about a month ago.  I was bidding on a Yoenis Cespedes rookie autograph on ebay (which I won and will post about eventually), and while perusing the seller's other items for sale, saw this sweet Bob Feller autograph:

 

2012 Panini Prime Cuts, Bob Feller Souvenir Cuts, #'d 82/99.  I thought that a serial number of 99 seems a bit high for a cut signature, but I guess Feller signed a good amount of stuff.  The back blurb on this card mentions Sandy Koufax.

It is always interesting to read about Bob Feller, a World War II veteran and one of the greatest pitchers of all time, who by all accounts was a level-headed and honest workhorse, gentleman, and all around stand-up dude.  Feller was a teammate of the pioneering Larry Doby, the American League's first African-American player.  Doby was elected to the Hall of Fame on this date in 1998.  I think I will try to acquire a Larry Doby signature so that he and Feller can hang out together in my collection.