RBI (59) My foray into 2012 Topps was a hit...

That's right folks. I went to my local card shop and bought 2012 Topps. I highly doubt I'll buy any more now that I've wet my taste buds and have been pleasantly surprised but honestly not all that interested in the set.

Not only did I buy 2012 Topps, but I invested in a hobby box of 36 packs. I know some of you may be surprised seeing as the pack hits I've always shown were blaster, jumbo, or even rack pack hits, but I decided to live a little. With 2012 being so mixed and me already being able to secure a few Angel cards to work on this season I decided if I were going to get a taste I may as well invest in something that would leave me happy. The major selling point for me though was not only the Gold Rush Wrapper Redemption going on, where I was pretty intrigued in the design and autograph possibilities, but my card dealer offered to give me the final 14 hobby wrappers I'd need to finish my required 50 for FREE.

I scored a fair amount of parallels to try and get in person or mail out and went right on the average with the redemption cards online. I was able to get a nice pair of cards out of the box.

A Detroit Tigers Ryan Rayburn black parallel number 57/61.

And more importantly a Jordan Zimmermann Golden Moments autographed card. I'm big on Zimmermann in general and I think the card is a pretty nice looking one as far as the inserts go. Jordan is a key part of the Nationals' resurgence into relevance providing a strong 1-2-3 punch with Strasburg and Gio Gonzalez. Last year was his first season back from Tommy John surgery and he posted a respectable 8-11 record with  3.18 ERA before he was shut down to watch his innings. I'm looking forward to big things from the former second round pick.

Not a bad pair of items to find in my box. I'm pretty pleased with them both and fairly sure I'm done buying series 1 of 2012.

RBI (58) The 365's 6th TTM signer has been busy...

Oh yes A's General Manager and partial owner Billy Beane has been quite busy this off season. The popular General Manager and former player is credited as one of the driving forces for modernizing the game of baseball into it's current incarnation of stat and metric savy front offices.

Beane's story is a famous one in part due to his unusual transition from player to successful front office member and the bestselling book turned film Moneyball. Billy was taken with the 23rd pick in the first round of the 1980 Draft by the Mets who also drafted Daryl Strawberry in the first round. Despite receiving a full scholarship to Stanford Beane signed with the Mets. Believing Beane to be an advanced player the Mets put him in Class-A ball while Strawberry got to take a slower approach to develop into a more complete player. Beane struggled with the level of competition, and would never be given the opportunity to fully develop before being forced into the Majors.

From 1984-1989 Beane was essentially a quad-A player for the Mets, Twins, Tigers, and A's. Being brought to a higher level of play each season only to falter and be sent down to the minors where he would show he was starting to harness his abilities and be rushed back up to the Majors for a few games where he wouldn't be able to stick. Finally Beane walked out of the clubhouse and into the front office where he became an advanced scout for the A's and never left eventually becoming General Manager and a part owner.

As GM Beane helped popularize "Moneyball" throughout baseball. Using metrics to determine players' true values based on statistics such as OBP, SLG, and advanced defensive statistics. With one of the smallest payrolls in baseball Beane found success in the early 2000's setting the American League record of 20 consecutive Wins and 4 strong appearances in the playoffs. Since his success other front offices such as the Red Sox, Angels and the Blue Jays have strongly invested in the principles of sabermetrics and the landscape of the game has rapidly been changing.

Beane signed this 1987 Topps card sent to his office at the Oakland Coliseum in only 7 days. Interestingly it was postmarked and sent back at the same time Beane is to have been signing Cuban outfielder Yoenis Cespedes. I guess since Beane got Cespedes' autograph on his contract he decided to give out a few of his own.

RBI (57) 5th TTM return of the 365 and it's a nice one...

I know part of the first wave of 365 send outs were current players, but I did reach back a bit for this one. I wrote to former Mets pitcher Craig Anderson, a member of the inaugural 1962 Mets team. Having secured Eli Grba's autograph the first player ever to be an Angel, I thought it was important to recognize baseball's other child of the 60's the Mets.

Craig Anderson was signed by the St. Louis Cardinals as an amateur free agent before the 1960 season and made his MLB debut for them in 1961. Anderson was then taken by the Mets as their 8th selection and the 16th selection overall in the 1961 Expansion Draft. Anderson played in the MLB for 4 seasons before leaving baseball behind. He would retire with a 7-23 record, 5 Saves, and a 5.10 ERA.

What Anderson does have is a special place in Mets history beyond just being a member of their inaugural team. Anderson collected the first Save ever for the Mets franchise. He was also the losing pitcher for the last baseball game played at the Polo Grounds.

Mr. Anderson was kind enough to not only autograph this 2011 Topps Heritage News Flashback card but also answer a few questions:

How did you learn you were taken in the 1961 Expansion Draft?
In todays digital world it's pretty easy for teams to communicate with players and agents, but occasionally you still find a story with Twitter breaking news of a trade before the player is even told. In the 60's players found out they were being shipped out in the draft at the same time as everyone else by picking up a "St. Louis newspaper".

What was your favorite memory playing in the Mets inaugural season?
With only 7 career Wins every one must have been special but Anderson was remarkable by picking up a pair by doubling down and "Winning a doubleheader on 5/12/62" over the Milwaukee Braves.

What was Red Ruffing like as a pitching coach?
During the Golden Era of the Yankees Red Ruffing was a pitching stalwart and for the first year the crosstown rival Mets existed they reached for an ace to teach their staff to set the tone. It wasn't quite effective but the players all got to learn from a Hall of Famer who was an, "Easy going, nice man".

How do you think the game is different now from when you were in the League?
Playing in the 60's is definitely different than now in many regards but in Anderson's view the biggest difference is, "more speedy players".

Mr. Anderson was kind enough to autograph my card and reply to my letter sent to his home address after only 11 Days.

Balk 7 Fantasy Baseball preseason thoughts

Today was a big day for me in the world of imaginary baseball, today I made my selection of players for my 2nd season in a keeper league. Seeing as I won the league last year I'm feeling big pressure to repeat my ring. I'm not sure how the pros do it, because it's the off season and I'm already wondering about my selections and draft strategy.

Anyways, I'm now in the mood to talk a little fantasy baseball.

Hanley, how you burned me last year Mr. Ramirez. For being my first round pick last year your production left me less than pleased. With Jose Reyes joining the Marlins and Hanley being slid over to 3rd will this be a bounce back year? I'm hopeful but not quite so sure. Hanley's a historically fickle player and there are no reports that he's in love with Reyes being on the team and taking his position. The Marlins hitting coach has already said Hanley looks healthier but there is still room for improvement. The advent of Mike Stanton and Logan Morrison do however make this a sneakily good line up. The trick to Hanley will be determining his true value. If he was a pure 3rd baseman I'd probably have him in the top 8, but as a shortstop eligible he's still top at either position. I'm predicting a .293 90 Run 95 RBI 20 Home Run 25 Steal year from him. Not a bad year but I'm going for Tulo before Hanley, but Hanley still above Reyes.

There are a few players I'm going to be trying to target this season and am expecting nice years from.

Gio Gonzalez is someone I've always been high on but never been able to snag. With him out of Oakland I'm thinking people will be less confident in him but essentially his numbers are the same on the road. Leaving the AL and going to the NL where his career starts are essentially lights out I think is going to make him an undervalued ace to steal.

Josh Reddick formerly of the Red Sox and now of the A's is someone I'm going to be keeping my eye on. He's being given the starting job in right for the A's due to the complete lack of other options and he has a history of struggling in his previous looks, but last year he was more than serviceable with the Sox. With no other real challenges for a high batting order spot and Coco Crisp and Jermile Weeks hitting ahead of him, I think Reddick has the chance to be a sneaky pick up for some cheap rbi numbers and a little pop. I'm not sure about his year long numbers being spectacular but I can see him being an undervalued Hunter Pence still in Houston type player.

Casey Kotchman with the Indians. The Indians are a solid club with good young players that play for a team expecting bounce back years from several key players so he should come cheap. Even better the revival Kotchman had in Tampa is supposedly due to him having a corrective eye surgery. I'm not seeing it as a fluke and if Jason Kipnis, and Grady Sizemore can be even marginally productive the contact hitting Kotchman should find a nice spot to drive in the runs. I'm not thinking he's going to be top of his position because of his lack of power, but when the DL bug bite or you have an extra utility spot needing use I'm reaching for Kotch.

RBI (56) 365 Returns are rolling on in now...

I was able to get another score in the mail this week, though I was kind of sad when I opened up the return envelope. I have a good mental track of what areas I send cards out to, and typically I try to avoid sending cards out to the same area so to help my organic organizer. I actually thought the post mark meant it was a certain pitcher I'd been hoping to get but instead it was a excitingly fast reply from Second baseman Danny Espinosa.

Danny is another local talent from Southern California who was taken in the 3rd round of the 2008 draft by the Washington Nationals. He sped through the minors and was a September call up for the Nationals in 2010, and became the regular starting second baseman in 2011. Espinosa is part of the Nationals hopefully less expensive homegrown core that will provide run support for Strasburg, Zimmerman, and Gio. If he follows up his rookie campaign with another solid season it's not unreasonable for him to put up a 20/20 season.

Despite a .232 average between the season and his 2010 call up, he crushes the ball when he makes contact with 27 Home Runs and 33 Doubles in only 186 games. When on the base paths due to a remarkably steady eye that has given him a .323 OPB despite the low average he's proven to be a surprising nuisance to opposing pitchers with 17 steals. He's actually proved to provide a reasonable glove though I'm not sure he will be winning any Gold Gloves anytime soon.

Espinosa signed this 2008 Razor Signature Series card for me from his home address in only 5 Days. I think it's an awesome card and especially like that he signed across the light part of the card though I think it would have been beautiful in blue.

You can find Danny Espinosa's twitter here.

3rd batch and a theme for the 365

That's right folks I was hit with some inspiration this week as I pondered over what letters to write. As I was browsing through the blogs I saw the first few breaks of 2012 Topps. Don't worry I know the controversy the set has caused and am far from pleased with the gloss' effect on test autographs, but there was a little inspiration in it.

I'm sure some of you have already guessed it. The 1987 mini inserts just look too sweet, so I went to a local card shop and bought an unopened complete 792 card 1987 Topps set. I won't be sending out the 1987 set exclusively, but I will be including a fair amount of them in my mailings and saving some for in person attempts this coming season. The cast of characters in the '87 set is just right and the tie to the 2012 release is too good to pass up.

Here's the 3rd batch:

1. Bill Buckner, That's right. A Red Sox fan writing to Billy Buckner and I don't even mention the World Series. Buckner wether you forgive him or not put a big stamp on the franchise so I had to try.
2. Billy Beane, Since I wrote Hatte I decided to write the guy who signed him and is making so many high profile moves this offseason. With his latest extension it seems like he's going to see if he can outlast Pujols in the AL West.
3. Terry Francona, Most people send Tito things related to the Sox and the World Series championships, but I wanted something from his playing days. As fas as I'm concerned 2011 collapse or not Tito can do no wrong and will be great in the booth this coming season.
4. T.R. Bryden, I've actually got a fair amount of the '87 Angels cards signed from the 50th Anniversary events the Angels ran so I decided to keep working on the team set.
5. Marty Barrett, the '86 ALCS MVP who was a fixture in the Red Sox lineup throughout the eighties as a scrappy contact hitter with strong defense I like to think of him as Pedroia without the pop.
6. Jeff Reardon, I think Reardon was one of the original closers of the eighties to make you fear the beard...and his pitches. Anytime your card is the lone image for a almost 800 card set on Wikipedia you know it's a pretty sweet card that needs to be sent out.
7. Charlie Leibrandt, With George Brett in the news recently, I decided to look through his teammates from the lone World Series Championship he won in '85 and Leibrandt was a key name that caught my attention.
8. Turner Ward, I'm not really a fan of just card searching but while looking at all the 2012 Topps inserts I browsed my '91 Donruss and saw the "Rated Rookies" inserts. Ward caught my interest as a rookie worth making an insert with who eventually made his way through the Majors to a Minor League Managing position. 

A VERY puzzling 365 challenge return

I'm going to break my normal format and ask a question to you fellow collectors. Today I was thrilled to come home and see on my table one of my return envelopes post marked from Massachusetts. I knew the only letter I currently had out from that area was to Jim Rice. Needless to say I was incredibly excited to have a return from him, especially since he was the first letter I wrote for the challenge.

I grabbed the envelope only to see it had already been sliced opened. I found that curious and spilled the card out from it. My correct card was there. With no autograph. No letter. No notecard. Nothing.

I'm not really sure what happened. Here are some scenarios running through my head, what do you think happened.

Did he open my envelope, read the letter I wrote, decide I didn't deserve an autograph but decided to mail my card back? Did he mail it back in my envelope even after accidently slicing the return envelope to open the letter? Did he have no tape if he had cut open my envelope? I honestly have no idea how he'd expect an open envelope flying across the country to manage not to having the card fly out.

Did he read my letter and answer my questions but not autograph my card? Did the letter fly out during the mailing process instead of the card if he had cut the envelope by accident?

Did he answer my letter, mail back the card unsigned, and someone opened my mail but left the unsigned card but took my letter?

Did someone open my mail and see the card was unsigned so they left it?

I feel like if Jim Rice didn't feel like answering he would have just sent it back RTS on the original envelope. Why open the envelope if that's the case?

Does this mean he actually reads all his mail and I fell short of the mark? Nice try, thanks for playing kid but hit the bench.

If that's the case I feel horrible. Horrendous and crushed. I wrote a full page, down to the last line, sincere letter to him explaining my passion for the sport and the Red Sox. I was proud of the finished product, the only letter that may have been more meaningful would be the letter to Pedroia explaining I worked hard and took extra shifts at my job in college specifically to afford his jersey when I was in Boston, and how much it meant to make it to Game 1 of the 2007 World Series to see him play in it. I'm tempted to write him again and ask what happened. If Jim Rice, a member of the pantheon of my Red Sox idols decided my sincerity and thoughtfulness wasn't worthy of his autograph...well I may as well just give up this hobby all together because I don't know what else I have to offer in my letters.