All I've Got of Him: Fergie Jenkins

I have player collections for two of the '69 Cubs, Ernie Banks and Billy Williams.  From the remaining players on that team, I probably have the most cards of Fergie Jenkins.
A couple reasons:

• Fergie had a return stint with the Cubs in the early '80s, so his total gets boosted by Donruss and Fleer.
• Fergie is a Hall of Famer, and has been included in many of the modern sets.  Other than Santo, the rest of the '69 Cubs are rarely seen in modern sets.

My Fergie total is 102 cards.  The oldest is his first Topps Cubs card in 1967.  The most recent would be a couple from this year. Archives and the Wrigley Field insert set.

Five Random Cubs Cards

I've got 14,267 Cubs cards from 108 different brands listed on a spreadsheet. A random number generator picked five cards, one each from the past several decades.

1900s - 1970s: 1966 Topps Rub Off Billy Williams This comes from the PSA Master collection.  These rub offs are a bit more scarce because when kids got these in 1966, they rubbed them off!

1980s: 1983 Fleer #483 Bill Campbell  He appeared in more games than any other National League pitcher in 1983, 82 games.  His ERA was under 3.00 at the end of July,  but then exploded over the last two months.  All the work took a toll.  He ended the year 6-8 with an ERA of 4.49.

1990s: 1991 Team Issued #47 Shawn Boskie  This set was given away by the Cubs to all fans on August 14, 1991. Greg Maddux started that day against the Expos and gave up two runs in seven innings.  Unfortunately the Cubs didn't give him any support and lost the game 2-0. 

2000s: 2004 Leaf #288 Sammy Sosa  Sammy hit 35 homers with the Cubs during the 2004 season, his last as a Cub.  

2010s: 2011 Topps Gold #309 Cubs Team This came from the days when I collected all the different parallels.  The card features Tyler Colvin, Geovany Soto, and Starlin Castro.

All I've Got of Him: Albert Almora

Albert Almora was the Cubs first round draft pick in 2012. That makes him the first pick by the Theo / Judd regime.  Almora was called up to the Cubs last week when Jorge Soler went on the DL with a hamstring strain.  It took Almora a little longer to reach the majors compared to some of the other recent draftees, but he picked straight out of high school.  The others came from college.

Despite a MLB career of just two games, I've already got a mini stack of Almora.  Bowman, Heritage Minors and Pro Debut have been the contributors.  In all, I've got 14 cards of Albert Almora.

2016 Pro Debut Inserts

Pro Debut will typically have a few inserts sets and the Cubs were represented in most.

This is the Eugene Emeralds card from the Promo Night set.  They went with the Simpsons...d'oh!

Ian Happ was included in the Distinguished Debuts set.  He hit safely in his first five pro games and hit home runs in the second and third game.

The mascot patches are back again and this year the Iowa Cubs mascot Cubbie was included.  

2016 Archives Super Cubs

The 2016 Archives set included an insert modeled after the 1969 Super set.  The Cubs netted three spots on the 30 card checklist.

The posed shots on these have a definite 1969 feel to them.  Well done, Topps!

Four Years...Forty Games Better

I saw this little factoid yesterday.  Yes, the Cubs are getting better!

The tile has the 2012 Cubs position players.... Soriano, Campana, DeJesus, Valbuena, Castro, Barney, Rizzo, Soto.

It was not a very good team.  In 2012, it took the Cubs 96 games to win 40.  They won their 40th game on July 24 and had a record of 40-56.

The 2016 team is much better. They won their 40th on June 6, raising their record to 40-16.  It took them 56 games to get to 40, which is a 40 game improvement over the 2012 team.

I like the improvement!

2016 Pro Debut Cubs

Well, their not quite Cubs yet, but they hope to be some day.

The 2016 Pro Debut set features 11 different Cubs prospects.  Topps keeps up the misnamed set because of the 11 players, only two made their pro debut last year.   One player, Willson Contreras, has been a pro since 2011, which means his pro debut was five years ago.

The players represent three of the Cubs minor league teams.

Rookie League Eugene Emeralds

 

 

High A Myrtle Beach Pelicans

 

AA Tennessee Smokies: