Cub #41

It seems like I've been writing several of these posts lately, and I'll probably have another on on Thursday.  The Cubs added a big name pitcher, but today's subject is a small name.

Reliever Alec Mills was recalled from Iowa over the weekend.  The bullpen was short and needed a fresh arm.  Mills got some action on Saturday, pitching the last two innings.  He retired all six batters, two via the strikeout.  He was sent back to AAA the next day.

Heritage 2010's Wall

With one of yesterday's five random Cubs cards I showed how Heritage 2006 posed many of the players in the same spot.

In 2010 they were at it again.

It was, at least, in a different spot. 

Instead of getting everyone at the batting cages, they got many of the players on a spring training practice field.  The wall from the field is visible in seven of the 13 Cubs cards.  And in three more (Fontenot, Lee, and Soriano) I'd bet they're in the same spot, too, but the card was cropped too close to tell.

Five Random Cubs Cards

I've got 15,905 Cubs cards from 133 different brands listed on a spreadsheet. A random number generator picked five cards, one each from the past several decades.

1900s - 1970s: 1975 Topps #153 Rick Reuschel Big Daddy does not look very happy.  Perhaps he knew that the 1975 season would not go well.  He was 11-17 despite an OK ERA of 3.73.

1980s: 1987 Topps Stickers #64 Jody Davis  By the looks of his dirty pants it seems that Jody has been a busy boy.

1990s: 1990 Team Issued Andre Dawson  One nice thing about the Cubs team issued cards is that they used pictures from the current season.  This 1990 card has a picture of Dawson from 1990.  The Cubs gave these cards away on Friday, August 17.  The Cubs beat the Braves 7-0 and Dawson was 1-4 with an RBI.

2000s: 2006 Heritage #289 Aramis Ramirez  Almost every Cub card in this set has the player posed in front of these nets.

I get that they wanted to pose the players like they were posed in 1957.  But vary the background, please.

2010s: 2018 Stadium Club #286 Addison Russell  What a nice guy, signing for the fans!  And he looks happy to do it.

The Binder is Ready, Just Waiting for the Cards

Besides the flagship, Allen & Ginter is the only set where I'll get the entire set, not just Cubs.  My Ginter run goes back to its start in 2006 and it's going to continue this year.

I got the binder ready to go, just waiting for the cards to arrive.  As I have for all the other years, I make a cover that uses the Ginter logo for that particular year.  I've used the same template for all the years, giving the binders a consistent, yet different look.

Rizzo!

Yesterday Anthony Rizzo played in his 1000th major league game.  He celebrated the occasion  in style by hitting a walk-off home run, bringing the Cubs back from a 6-1 deficit to a 7-6 win.

While he has played in 1000 games, my collection has just about ¼ that number of cards, 241 to be exact.  I'm not a Rizzo collector.  They are just what I've got from my various Cubs team sets.  That is still a pretty big number, averaging around 40 per season.

Yu Can't Pitch But He Can Follow the Rules

So far it looks like Yu Darvish has been a big waste of big bucks.  He hasn't pitched much and when he has he hasn't looked good.

But he can follow the rules!

This is the only 2018 Ginter card I have so far (I'm waiting for a package from Brent with all the others).  This is a framed mini-relic and it follows my relic collection rules - Darvish has played for the Cubs in the year the card was released and the card shows him as a Cub.

He is the 87th Cub to follow my rules.

Arismendy Alcantara	Dexter Fowler	Fred McGriff
Albert Almora	Kyuji Fujikawa	Bill Mueller
Moises Alou	Kosuke Fukudome	Jose Nieves
Jake Arrieta	Nomar Garciaparra	Mike Olt
Javier Baez	Matt Garza	Corey Patterson
Darwin Barney	Mark Grace	Felix Pie
Francis Beltran	Mark Grudzielanek	Juan Pierre
Kris Bryant	Jason Hammel	Mark Prior
Damon Buford	Ian Happ	Aramis Ramirez
Marlon Byrd	Rich Harden	Anthony Rizzo
Jeimer Candelario	Brendan Harris	Addison Russell
Victor Caratini	Kevin Hart	Jeff Samardzija
Andrew Cashner	Jason Heyward	Kyle Schwarber
Welington Castillo	Bobby Hill	Jorge Soler
Starlin Castro	Rich Hill	Alfonso Soriano
Aroldis Chapman	Todd Hundley	Sammy Sosa
Hee Seop Choi	Brett Jackson	Geovany Soto
Tyler Colvin	Jacque Jones	Matt Szczur
Willson Contreras	Eric Karros	Ryan Theriot
Juan Cruz	David Kelton	Josh Vitters
Yu Darvish	Bryan LaHair	Darryle Ward
Wade Davis	Junior Lake	Todd Wellemeyer
David DeJesus	Derrek Lee	Randy Wells
Ryan Dempster	Jon Lester	Rondell White
Blake DeWitt	Ted Lilly	Jerome Williams
Jason Dubois	Kenny Lofton	Kerry Wood
Jim Edmonds	Greg Maddux	Carlos Zambrano
Carl Edwards	Carlos Marmol	Ben Zobrist
Mike Fontenot	Gary Matthews, Jr.	Julio Zuleta

Cub #40

Over the past weekend the Cubs had their 40th different player make an appearance.

Veteran reliever Jesse Chavez was acquired from the Rangers.  He's pitched a couple times now had had looked pretty good.

Last season the Cubs had 47 players suit up.  With 40 and it being late July, they could surpass that number in 2018.

2018 Cubs Media Guide

I was given tickets to Sunday's game against the Cardinals and had a great time watching the Cubs come from behind (again!) and defeat the Redbirds 7-2.

While at the Friendly Confines I was able to pick up the 2018 Cubs media guide.  My collection goes back to the first year the Cubs put out a Roster Book, 1958, and now is up to 61 books.

Over the years the Cubs have put out guides with three different sizes. Due to that, the tile has them in three different pieces, the small books (1958 - 1967), medium (1968 - 1999) and large (2000 - 2018).

Parallel Billys

Billy Williams was included in the Instant Impact insert set.  The set includes the usual parallels and I've picked up three of the five.  The two I skipped are the red (/10) and platinum (1/1).  None of either has shown up on Ebay yet and I doubt they will.

The Blue is unnumbered

Black comes in at /299.

There are just 50 copies of the gold and I got mine for 99¢.  I guess Billy doesn't have a very large collector base.

Five Random Cubs Cards

I've got 15,904 Cubs cards from 133 different brands listed on a spreadsheet. A random number generator picked five cards, one each from the past several decades.

1900s - 1970s: Topps 1972 #61 Cubs Rookies  Hooton was good, Hiser and Stephenson were not.  Hooton was in the majors for 15 seasons, Hiser has a career average of .202 over bits of five seasons, and Stephenson was 4-5 over parts of four years.

1980s: 1989 Fleer #436 Jeff Pico  Pico spent most of the 1989 season working middle relief for the Cubs.  He did not make the Cubs post-season roster.

1990s: 1995 Illinois State Police Ozzie Timmons  The RNG gives us an unknown player from an unknown set.  Making his MLB debut in 1995, Timmons hit .263 in 77 games

2000s: 2001 Topps #17 Joe Girardi  Is this a card of the future manager of the Cardinals??

2010s: 2016 Topps Chrome #55 John Lackey  Another ugly looking grunt-face card.

Wanted No More

My Most Wanted Cards list had six cards listed.

 

The list is down to four cards now. 

I was recently able to pick up these two, from the 2006 and 2007 Sports Illustrated for Kids sets.  I'm not sure why these two were so difficult to find.  One Ebay seller listed a whole bunch of SI for Kids cards and I snagged both of these.

With these two I've now completed the run of Cubs in SI for Kids.  The sets run from 1989 to now.  Despite the long span, the set is made up of athletes from all the different sports, not just baseball, and the Cubs total is just 14 cards.

2018 Allen & Ginter Team Checklists

2018 Allen & Ginter cards have been out for a couple days.  I'm waiting for mine to arrive via Brentandbecca.

As far as the Cubs go, I'm going to be getting 17 cards.  Three of those are Hall of Famers, Ernie Banks, Andre Dawson, and Ryne Sandberg.  The rest are the active players.

The complete set has 350 cards.  Among them are 34 "champions."  That leaves 317 baseball players.  In a fair worlds, each of the 30 teams would get around eleven players.  The Cubs with 17 have exceeded that.

However, the team card leader would be....surprise, surprise.... the Yankees.  They come in with 27 cards.  That is crazy lopsided.

At the other end, the Rays have just three players and the Tigers just four.  In fact, if you pile up cards of all of the Rays, Tigers, Royals, Blue Jays, and Padres in 2018 Ginter, your stack of cards would be shorter by three cards than a stack of Yankees cards.  I do not like lopsided sets.

Here's the set divided by teams:

Angels
Parker Bridwell	258
Kole Calhoun	46
Zack Cozart	188
Ian Kinsler	284
Shohei Ohtani	100
Albert Pujols	187
Garrett Richards	267
Andrelton Simmons	58
Mike Trout	1
Justin Upton	62
Astros
Jose Altuve	10
Jeff Bagwell	221
Alex Bregman	140
Gerrit Cole	219
Carlos Correa	30
J.D. Davis	59
Marwin Gonzalez	26
Yuli Gurriel	81
Yuli Gurriel	243
Dallas Keuchel	177
Brian McCann	125
Lance McCullers	247
Josh Reddick	214
George Springer	186
Justin Verlander	275
Athletics
Franklin Barreto	266
Paul Blackburn	206
Jose Canseco	271
Matt Chapman	310
Khris Davis	181
Dennis Eckersley	337
Dustin Fowler	311
Jonathan Lucroy	38
Sean Manaea	27
Mark McGwire	212
Matt Olson	160
Stephen Piscotty	129
Blue Jays
Josh Donaldson	137
Randal Grichuk	61
Kevin Pillar	142
Justin Smoak	194
Marcus Stroman	292
Richard Urena	322
Braves
Hank Aaron	50
Ronald Acuña Jr.	207
Ozzie Albies	116
Freddie Freeman	191
Luiz Gohara	63
Ender Inciarte	344
Chipper Jones	162
Greg Maddux	131
Sean Newcomb	343
Lucas Sims	103
John Smoltz	123
Dansby Swanson	47
Brewers
Orlando Arcia	244
Ryan Braun	80
Lorenzo Cain	336
Zach Davies	333
Josh Hader	348
Jimmy Nelson	122
Domingo Santana	274
Travis Shaw	246
Eric Thames	270
Brandon Woodruff	304
Christian Yelich	75
Cardinals
Harrison Bader	319
Matt Carpenter	71
Paul DeJong	278
Jack Flaherty	28
Dexter Fowler	45
Bob Gibson	159
Carlos Martinez	318
Yadier Molina	112
Marcell Ozuna	235
Tommy Pham	108
Ozzie Smith	67
Adam Wainwright	234
Luke Weaver	49
Cubs
Albert Almora	291
Javier Baez	119
Ernie Banks	138
Kris Bryant	5
Victor Caratini	91
Willson Contreras	180
Yu Darvish	37
Andre Dawson	25
Ian Happ	115
Jason Heyward	70
Jon Lester	126
Anthony Rizzo	32
Addison Russell	283
Ryne Sandberg	213
Kyle Schwarber	249
Jen-Ho Tseng	350
Ben Zobrist	165
Diamondbacks
Archie Bradley	141
Paul Goldschmidt	66
Zack Greinke	150
Jake Lamb	273
A.J. Pollock	98
Robbie Ray	52
Taijuan Walker	296
Dodgers
Cody Bellinger	120
Walker Buehler	147
Kenley Jansen	197
Matt Kemp	101
Clayton Kershaw	280
Sandy Koufax	200
Kenta Maeda	88
Joc Pederson	31
Yasiel Puig	68
Jackie Robinson	42
Hyun-Jin Ryu	303
Corey Seager	174
Chris Taylor	6
Justin Turner	302
Julio Urias	335
Alex Verdugo	293
Alex Wood	87
Giants
Will Clark	316
Brandon Crawford	215
Johnny Cueto	166
Ryder Jones	330
Evan Longoria	239
Willie McCovey	277
Andrew McCutchen	184
Joe Panik	185
Hunter Pence	143
Buster Posey	172
Indians
Yonder Alonso	158
Trevor Bauer	134
Michael Brantley	231
Carlos Carrasco	342
Mike Clevinger	169
Edwin Encarnacion	156
Jason Kipnis	78
Corey Kluber	117
Francisco Lindor	210
Francisco Mejia	9
Jose Ramirez	263
Jim Thome	114
Bradley Zimmer	170
Mariners
Robinson Cano	35
Nelson Cruz	72
Edwin Diaz	328
Dee Gordon	183
Mitch Haniger	317
Felix Hernandez	262
Ichiro	189
Randy Johnson	113
Mike Leake	288
Kyle Seager	17
Mike Zunino	53
Marlins
Sandy Alcantara	334
Brian Anderson	237
Justin Bour	56
Lewis Brinson	305
Starlin Castro	339
Garrett Cooper	199
Cameron Maybin	4
Mets
Jay Bruce	347
Yoenis Cespedes	242
Michael Conforto	22
Jacob deGrom	105
Todd Frazier	331
Dwight Gooden	346
Steven Matz	294
Mike Piazza	97
Amed Rosario	203
Dominic Smith	217
Darryl Strawberry	338
Noah Syndergaard	21
Nationals
Sean Doolittle	118
Erick Fedde	323
Gio Gonzalez	252
Bryce Harper	250
Daniel Murphy	64
Anthony Rendon	324
Victor Robles	95
Max Scherzer	40
Andrew Stevenson	257
Stephen Strasburg	93
Trea Turner	39
Ryan Zimmerman	76
Orioles
Tim Beckham	230
Chris Davis	276
Austin Hays	16
Adam Jones	299
Manny Machado	164
Trey Mancini	24
Cal Ripken Jr.	60
Brooks Robinson	261
Jonathan Schoop	79
Chance Sisco	232
Padres
Eric Hosmer	74
Manny Margot	48
Wil Myers	96
Hunter Renfroe	155
Christian Villanueva	315
Dave Winfield	223
Phillies
Aaron Altherr	227
Jake Arrieta	256
J.P. Crawford	127
Maikel Franco	136
Rhys Hoskins	211
Scott Kingery	167
Pat Neshek	238
Aaron Nola	248
Carlos Santana	312
Nick Williams	313
Pirates
Josh Bell	102
Roberto Clemente	107
Corey Dickerson	320
Tyler Glasnow	345
Josh Harrison	329
Starling Marte	224
Gregory Polanco	314
Jameson Taillon	298
Honus Wagner	110
Rangers
Elvis Andrus	326
Adrian Beltre	73
Willie Calhoun	255
Joey Gallo	282
Cole Hamels	325
Nomar Mazara	321
Rougned Odor	171
Nolan Ryan	124
Rays
Chris Archer	192
Anthony Banda	69
Kevin Kiermaier	327
Red Sox
Andrew Benintendi	168
Mookie Betts	245
Xander Bogaerts	295
Wade Boggs	289
Jackie Bradley Jr.	254
Roger Clemens	233
Rafael Devers	216
Craig Kimbrel	14
J.D. Martinez	51
Pedro Martinez	99
David Ortiz	106
Dustin Pedroia	121
Hanley Ramirez	253
Chris Sale	135
Ted Williams	190
Reds
Johnny Bench	133
Luis Castillo	236
Adam Duvall	77
Billy Hamilton	146
Raisel Iglesias	154
Barry Larkin	92
Tyler Mahle	196
Jackson Stephens	285
Joey Votto	20
Jesse Winker	241
Rockies
Nolan Arenado	173
Charlie Blackmon	251
Carlos Gonzalez	54
Jon Gray	178
German Marquez	349
Ryan McMahon	272
Trevor Story	36
Royals
George Brett	94
Bo Jackson	300
Whit Merrifield	301
Mike Moustakas	89
Salvador Perez	281
Tigers
Miguel Cabrera	297
Nicholas Castellanos	86
Ty Cobb	290
Michael Fulmer	104
Twins
Jose Berrios	268
Byron Buxton	163
Brian Dozier	111
Zack Granite	193
Max Kepler	332
Joe Mauer	306
Fernando Rodney	209
Eddie Rosario	12
Miguel Sano	279
White Sox
Jose Abreu	11
Tim Anderson	195
Nicky Delmonico	33
Avisail Garcia	90
Lucas Giolito	226
Yoan Moncada	19
Carlos Rodon	265
Frank Thomas	286
Yankees
Miguel Andujar	201
Dellin Betances	128
Greg Bird	182
Aroldis Chapman	309
Clint Frazier	65
Brett Gardner	308
Lou Gehrig	225
Sonny Gray	109
Didi Gregorius	41
Rickey Henderson	341
Aaron Hicks	44
Reggie Jackson	264
Derek Jeter	2
Aaron Judge	7
Roger Maris	229
Hideki Matsui	307
Don Mattingly	151
Jordan Montgomery	23
Andy Pettitte	340
Mariano Rivera	85
Babe Ruth	3
CC Sabathia	144
Gary Sanchez	130
Luis Severino	148
Giancarlo Stanton	15
Masahiro Tanaka	132
Gleyber Torres	240
Champions
H. Jon Benjamin	29
Scott Blumstein	34
Bomb Cyclone	259
Genie Bouchard	145
Bullpen Car	18
Phil Coyne	269
Cryptocurrency	83
Theo Epstein	220
Sean Evans	260
Sonny Fredrickson	13
Bill James	157
Ben Lecomte	152
Tyronn Lue	179
Marine National Monument	84
Biz Markie	55
Christopher McDonald	218
Method Man	82
Champ Pederson	43
Kelsey Plum	208
Michael Rapaport	139
Lincoln Riley	175
Austin Rogers	161
Scott Rogowsky	205
Samesong Park	204
Tom Segura	198
Ryan Sickler	8
Steve Simeone	149
Claire Smith	176
Paige Spiranac	287
Sloane Stephens	153
Stugotz	202
Total Solar Eclipse	222
Lindsey Vonn	57
Tommy Wiseau	228

2018 Stadium Club Cubs

I'm still catching up on things that came while I was on vacation, like the 2018 Stadium Club Cubs. 

Fifteen of the 300 cards feature Cubs players.  The cards have an odd design.  Topps made sure you would know what position they played, but didn't make it easy to read their name or team.  Usually position is the third most important piece of information, but with 2018 Stadium Club Topps made it #1.

The two cards of the fifteen that don't belong are Dillon Maples and Jen-ho Tseng.  I'm tired of them popping up in so many releases.  Albert Almora, Kyle Hendricks, Pedro Strop, or Ben Zobrist would have been better inclusions.

Topps 2018 Cubs By the Numbers

With my look at series two now complete, I'd like to wrap up Topps 2018:

Cubs cards in the base set:  26
The base set includes:

• 1 team card
• 1 checklist card
• 1 multi-player card
• 4 players that have not seen any action this year as Cubs (Alex Avila, John Lackey, Drew Smiley, Koji Uehara)
• 5 starting pitchers (Darvish, Hendricks, Lackey, Lester, Quintana)
• 6 relievers (Edwards, Maples, Smyly, Tseng, Uehara, Wilson)
• 3 catchers (Avila, Caratini, Contreras)
• 4 infielders (Baez, Bryant, Rizzo, Russell)
• 5 outfielders (Almora, Happ, Heyward, Schwarber, Zobrist)

Cubs Inserts: 78

• 1983 - 8
• 1983 All Stars - 4
• 1983 Rookies - 2
• Future Stars - 4
• Home Run Challenge - 3
• Instant Impact - 1
• Legends in the Making - 5
• Longball Legends - 4
• MLB Awards - 2
• Opening Day - 1
• Salute - 11
• Superstar Sensations - 3
• Kris Bryant Highlights - 30

TOTAL NUMBER OF CUBS CARDS = 104

How crazy is it that there are triple the number of inserts compared to the base cards!

Saved the Best For Last

I have just one series two Cubs insert left to show and it is the best, at least to me.

Billy is the lone Cub among the fifty players in this set that made an instant impact.  Winning the 1961 Rookie of the Year makes it hard to argue that he didn't have an instant impact.  

It's shocking, though, that Kris Bryant wasn't on the checklist.  He too was a Rookie of the Year, and he also was an All Star his rookie year.  Topps always keeps you guessing, don't they.  Keeps me scratching my head, too.

The set has several parallels and I'll be chasing them for the Billy Williams collection.  Stay tuned for more.

2018 Series Two Salute Cubs

Salute returns in series two and included five more Cubs.

Because Topps loves inserts that include the word "Legend" (Longball Legends, Legends in the Making) we have a Salute card of Cubs Legend Ernie Banks.

Two Cubs were saluted for their throwbacks, which they wore on June 17, 2017.

 

It was a nice touch that the Cubs wore black helmets instead of their usual blue.  Often when teams wear throwbacks they overlook the helmet and then end up with a real mismatched situation.

Here we salute a 16.88 ERA

Addison Russell gets saluted for his glovework.  The picture was from a game last year in St. Louis when he dove into the stands for a foul ball.  He got the ball but destroyed a fans nachos tray (you can see the nachos just to Russells right). 

Later in the game Russell brought the fan a new tray.