RTP #34 - Special Guest Darren from Potch Wheeler and the Cardboard Heroes

Welcome to the latest edition of The Rockie Trading Post.  Tonight's special guest is Darren from the creatively named blog Potch Wheeler and the Cardboard Heroes.  If you haven't met Darren, he collects cards of the Reds, Tigers, and Cubs along with having several sets working.  Darren contacted me about a Heritage trade and since most of you know my immense love for this year's set it was a go.  This is actually a two for one deal because since I am behind, Darren and I completed a second trade before I posted the first.  Here is his post on what I sent him for the first trade and what I received is right below.

Leading off this trade is a 2011 Topps diamond parallel of Ubaldo Jimenez.  This gives me 5 Rockies diamonds now.  The oddest about this card is it is the only Rockies base card I am missing at the moment.  So for now it will taunt me slightly.

Our Todd Helton card of the day is this 1999 Topps Stars Two Star parallel.  I don't know a lot about this set, but I believe the base card is a normal shot and one star is a little bit closer shot up to the four star extreme close up shot.  Rockies are only up to two star cards and I now have 2 of the 3.  Curtis Leskanic is a former Rockie reliever from 1994 Topps, back when non-closing relief pitchers were included in card sets.  I miss 792 card sets with even obscure MAJOR LEAGUERS getting cards.  Now we get 660 and 100 of that is combos or minor league prospects or 2 Stephen Strasburg cards in a 330 card set.  Rafael Betancourt (and others) deserves a card too, Topps.

We'll begin the Heritage portion of this trade with the zombie formerly known as Aaron Harang.  Seriously, that dude looks like he never leaves the house.  How does a baseball player, that literally plays outside for 4 hours at a time, not have at least a slight tan?  I'm sure he is a nice guy and all, but that is a seriously bad photo.  I blame the Padres.

The beard patrol comes up next.  Am I the only one that thinks Jayson Werth is the next Gary Matthews Jr.?  Parlaying a career year into a HUGE free agent contract.  Eh, he might be Adrian Beltre also, sucking for the entirety of the contract except the last year so you can a big contract again.

Here is another trio from Heritage that upon first sight have nothing in common.  Further review proves that these three have nothing in common.  I was grouping the pics and these were the leftovers.  I do like the Adam Jones classic baseball card posed shot though.  It proves you don't have to have amazing action shots or anything else in order to have a great card.

This pair of hatless wonders I just wanted to write about.  I'll start with the oxymoronically (yes, I know it's not a word) named Angel Pagan.  That's a name worthy of the Hall of Fame.  Secondly, I wanted to comment about Dan Uggla.  He looks like a 10 year old bully in that photo.  Then again, maybe I am just remembering my bully from when I was ten, but either way that is a weird haircut for a grown man.

Ubaldo leads off the second trade as well.  This is the black bordered parallel from Heritage, which basically ruins the appeal of the set which is the wood border.  These were just parallels for the Chromes and not the entire set.  Honestly, I think they look much better on scan than in person and I will only be looking for the other three Rockies in the black border.  Perhaps if they had gone with a mahogany or cherry wood rather than black, it would have looked a lot better.

Darren also included two other needed Rox in the second trade.  It is always nice to knock another 2009 O Pee Chee black border parallel off the want list.  Now seems to be the perfect day to showcase Jeff Baker because he played well against the Rockies in the game last night.  Luckily Starlin Castro forgot how to field for an inning and Colorado won the game AND increased their division lead over Broxton and the Dodgers.  Hee hee.


Thanks again Darren for the trades.  Make sure you check out his blog here and trade with him.  He seems like a real stand up guy.  Well that just about wraps up another edition of The Rockie Trading Post.  Tune in next time to find out the (final?) destination of my first pack-pulled 1/1 with a visit from an Orioles collector.  Until then, we are officially signed off.