7,492 Tigers on the Wall

Over the summer this 1910 Standard Caramel wandered into my possession, mine is much more "well loved", clearly my oldest card to date!  This may be a small area of focus, gobbling up some tobacco.

The spectacular spend boosted me well over my yearly goal to reach 6,000 Tigers cards.

1995 Upper Deck  - Special Edition

It came right at the perfect time with school starting again so that I can sort my way through all the new stuff.

Trammell of the Month: Exactly 250 Trammell's to date, here are a couple that were added, mostly twilight editions

1997 Score - Alan playing first?

1994 Score

Team Sets: An area in need of serious updating.  At last count, sitting around 153 team which I think is  a soft number, here is the most recent completion piece...

Topps American League All-Stars

I can't believe August is already over! I guess time flies when you're collecting Tigers.

Keep it Hot on the Corner, pat

Traits of the Collector

We're celebrating an anniversary of sorts here at the Hot Corner.  About a year ago I stumbled back upon my card collection that had been untouched since at least 2000, and not seriously thought about since 1994. What has transpired over that time frame has been truly enjoyable.

Recently, I picked up a copy of the regular Beckett Monthly dedicated to the Super Collector.  This edition has sparked some post ideas and even a potential Hot Corner contest for the month of September.

I wrote one of my earlier poss regarding "Collecting Guidelines" to outline for myself how I would approach my new hobby and have found that the parameters of those were quite true in terms of enjoyment and reaching a point of being overwhelmed.

An article in the Beckett included  "10 Tricks of the Trade: Try these things when focusing your collection", (in Bold-Italics are the topics ; in regular text I reflect on my year back in the hobby.)

1. Focus!

I knew going in that burnout could become inevitable should I chase every set, card, subset, parallel, 1/1, you know I could go on, and on.  So I chased the Tigers, new and old, and has been a glorious chase!

2. Network

The blog - o - sphere has been awesome!  It started by reaching out to $30 Habit and 2x3 Heroes and progressively sending out multiple PWEs, mailers, bubblers, and all kinds of benefit of cards, but just as valuable, people who care deeply about the hobby.  Also, developing a good relationship with a few LCS owners. Group breaks from O No!, and contests from Jaybarker, set building w/ Swing & A Popup insight and experise from Night Owl, and the pure joy of collecting from Dime Box, Backstop, and Clubhouse, finding new trades with Nachos Grande and Nomo Sushi, genorosity from Wrigley Wax & Red Sox in Nebraska, and countless trades with all kinds of people. These relationships have brought greater value to the hobby.

3. Get Organized
This has actually been an area that I thought could be another downfall, I am guessing my allowance these days is a bit greater than when I was 14 and can properly store my cards with toploaders and shoeboxes.  I have even broadened to binders and pages.

4. Document & Display

The blog has been thriving in my opinion with all kinds of Tigers on the Wall.

5. Go Hunting

This may have caused the most crunch on the budget  ---- searching on eBay, splurging at LCS' near and far, but loving finding the local shows and searching for great stuff.

6. Work the Rooms

This talks about chat rooms and message boards, not there yet.

7. Expand your focus

Another fun thing has been the emergence of game used, autos, relics, mini's, oddball, and other items related to the Tigers.  I had no idea what a Frankenset was, but now I have one.  Be it a autographed baseball from It's Like Having My Own Cardshop, a framed painting of the All-Time Greatest Tigers, these items keep it fresh.

8. Be Diligent

Find a routine and stick to it.  Know your limits.  This will be a "to work on" in terms of spending, but almost 8,000 Tigers later, I would say I've been persistent.

9. Be Polite & Patient

This talks about not making enemies?  Umm, Ok, next.

10. Start Over

Beckett reccommends to "Look for new players or ways of collecting within your interests" ultimatly stating that if you're just now starting to collect all the Derek Jeter cards you may be late to the party. Miguel Cabrera, Prince Fielder, Victor Martinez, Torii Hunter, Verlander, Scherzer and company sure have distracted me from catching every Trammell card, oh well!  But with additions to the team like Iglesias it makes for new avenues to continue collecting.

Thank you Chris Olds for the outline to recap my year back in the hobby.

From the Hot Corner, thank you for reading,

Keep it Hot on the Corner, pat.

Twilight Tigers: Gregg Jefferies

This post is a tad late, but nonetheless, the weekly installment of star players finishing their careers out with the Tigers has arrived.

One of the hottest rising stars was a Mets player by the name of Gregg Jefferies

Jefferies would play 14 major league seasons, spending his final two in Detroit from 1999-2000.  Five years spent in the Big Apple, finishing 3rd in the ROY voting in 1989 stealing 21 bases, hitting .258 with 12 Hrs and 56 RBIs during that campaign.  Represented the St Louis in the All-Star game twice in 1993, 1994.  Career .289 hitter.  I am sure This Way to the Clubhouse would be able to give a closer insight to the lore of Mr. Jefferies.

Jefferies would appear in roughly 110 games over two season w/ the Tigers hitting 8 HRs, batting .238, and knocking in 32 RBIs.

We had this guy?

Keep it Hot on the Corner, pat.

"O YES!" Mini Tigers

Ryan over at "O No!" Another Orioles Blog, quickly sent me the spoils of his triple box break of the new Topps Mini version.  As you may have guessed, I swooped in a chose the Tigers and also randomly  was assigned the A's (who happen to be kickin' the livin' crap out of the the real Motown Kitties this week)

Here are some highlights ---

My man Ryan also sent me some regular Tigers, which I will get to another post.

Thanks Ryan! As always a great transaction!

Keep it Hot on the Corner, pat

Down to 2 - Heritage Base Set

Callin' out for a set completion....

I need Number 2 and number 414 (UPDATE: thanks 2x3 for pointing out the error) for the base set of 2013 Topps Heritage....

Hook me up!  You will receive a wonderful, fabulous return!

Keep it Hot on the Corner, pat

'13 Update: My Wish List

Let's set the pace here on the Hot Corner, as no one has yet to tackle this topic!

Since I made a HUGE Tigers team set purchase and obliterated my card spending budget until 1/1/2014, I am just going to look forward to seeing these wonderful cards (maybe in a charity PWE?) and hope Topps includes the freshest faces to the Detroit Tigers or those left out of Series 1 or 2.

"Jose Iglesias" --- They didn't give him jersey No. 1 for no reason, the kid can play defense. Jhonny who?

"Brayan Pena" --- great team player, loves to play, sprints on home runs, filling in for Avila just great!

"Matt Tuiasosopo" --- All he does is hit Home Runs, solid platoon fielder, awesome!

Jose Veras  --- not many cards exist of Veras, why not?

Bruce Rodon -- fireballer, with over 200 fastballs thrown to date, averaging 99.9 MPH, slick

Jeremy Bonderman -- returns to the Tigers to help down the stretch, great story, hopefully a great finish

Don Kelly  --- always underestimated, traditionally comes through with a way to help the team win.

Just a few hopes for the upcoming set, as most others will be looking for Puig

The players marked with "quotation marks" are cards I do not own and would gladly accept them in part of a trade or PWE.

Keep it Hot on the Corner, pat.

Motown Kitties

I have to admit, after my spectacular spend,  I wasn't expecting this in the mail yesterday.

This is the back of an envelope that a grandparent would send out

I had forgotten I had ordered these two 1982 Topps Traded cards off eBay to finish my team set.

Other than the fact I purchased this item on August 9th, it provided a solid chuckle.

I really wish Topps had made at least one of the Tigers in this year's Archives set in this design.  There are three 1972, but I suppose you can wish in one hand and buy junk wax in another and see which hand fills faster, right?

Keep it Hot on the Corner, pat.

Cashed Out

So I went on vacation for a ten day stretch to Northern Michigan....not a rough life.

At some point the lack of routine and all my cards being away from my fingertips starts to drive me crazy!

Plenty to write about Pudge later.

When that breaking point is reached, I race down the state highway to the Not So Local Card Shop.  I like it quite a bit (or I am so desperate don't mind certain things).

I don't know what it is, but I am digging all cards navy blue...
1993 Score Select Traded Team Set

I had already brought a 1600 shoe box of all the unsorted Tigers in my collection to sort out; chopped up an empty case of Diet Dr Pepper and made dividers, so I had a better idea of what I was or was not in need of.

Breaking Point 1 came on a Wednesday ---- Headed to NSLCS and I spotted Tigers binders and took a peek.  These binders were loaded with just Tigers and were in sorted by year and then alphabetically by brand. (Not intended to insult your intelligence) Bowman, Fleer, Score, Topps, Upper Deck, you get the idea.  So I asked the owner to quote me per binder.  Most of these jokers were from the 1990s-2000s --- the era in which I walked away from baseball cards altogether.  Some even had "official" team pictures placed in to seperate the seasons (if you're in to that kind of thing...)

Justin Verlander RC

My thought process kept swirling --- instead of doing the nickel and dime show on eBay or card shows, I had the opportunity to knock it all down it one (or two) swoops.

1993 Topps - Inaugural Rockies team set

I picked one up and took it back to the vacation place and sorted through it.  Some special stuff (at least to me).

2005 Topps Total team set

Went through and cross referenced my shoe-box and my memory and weeded out the dupes

I named my pet turtle Mike at the age of 6 for my favorite reliever

After about 24 hours I had reached another Breaking Point and negotiated the card budget to not purchase any more cards until 1/1/2014 (and entering a slower time for new product) should I get the two other binders that I "had to get, and NOW!"

RIP Lima Time

All in All, I added close to 700 new cards, I was hovering around 150 team sets prior to August and I haven't updated my list, so another task to tackle before January!  Besides stacks of pages and three new binders that will allow for new ideas.

It wasn't all good....

So, I have plenty of work to with these cards, organizing and such.  I am sure with the added time I can make a serious spreadsheet of the cards I have (and then need).  All kinds of other projects will benefit too, like the Nothing But Tigers binder (Tigers in order 1 - 792), or giving the Alan Trammell page some much needed upkeep.

Don't be surprised to receive a mailer in the next few months of all the other 29 teams out there, or for me to plea to the blog-o-sphere to send me their Update Tigers & dupes until the New Year.

Things may be slower here, but will be sure to...

Keep it Hot on the Corner, pat.