We're just hours away from the start of some college basketball tournament. For all the disinterested people out there, here's something that has nothing to do with basketball whatsoever. This is a pack of 1997 Topps that I got in a repack cube from some evil corporate giant store.
484 - Armando Benitez (I've only seen a few cards from this set and I haven't liked what I've seen. Upon further review, it's not the worst design I've ever seen, but it's certainly not great. I do like how the UV coating only extends to the borders of the picture frame and no further. The giant player names are pretty garish, though. And I always prefer it when cards show a player's position on the front.)408 - Bill Pulsipher (Pulsipher made his way to the Cardinals minor league system but never got through it.)
409 - Jose Rosado (Another observation: these cards are extremely thin. They are thinner than any Topps set I've ever dealt with. I often complain internally that Topps cards these days are thin and frail, but I put this next to a 2009 card and it was noticeably skinnier. Flimsy.)
313 - C.J. Nitkowski (I'd never heard of the guy, but his name came scrolling across the bottom of the screen on ESPN awhile back in connection with Clemens/McNamee/etc. Apparently he plays in Korea now.)
SB15 - Rafael Palmeiro Season's Best Kings of Swing (Quite a shiny insert card we have here. Too bad it isn't someone more likeable.)361 - Bobby Jones
311 - Rocky Coppinger
388 - Dennis Eckersley (I'm guessing a good number of baseball fans did not know that Eckersley pitched for the Cardinals. That's okay, though. It was a hazy time for me, too.)302 - Wendell Magee Jr. (Let's pretend this player is important. His name sounds important.)
391 - Mark Carreon
419 - Jeff Blauser (Unusual for a Topps set - there's a photo on the back of each card.)
Nitkowski had a weird relationship with the Tigers' former GM.
ReplyDeleteThe Tigers essentially traded David Wells to the Reds for him in '95. The next year they traded him (with Brad Ausmus) to the Astros as part of a huge, multi-player deal. In '99 they traded for him and Brad Ausmus. In 2001 they traded him to the Mets for the infamous player-to-be-named-later-and-cash.
If that wasn't enough, the Tigers signed him as a free agent in 2005 and he played a couple months for them until his release.
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ReplyDeleteCJ Nitkowski also runs his own website at www.cjbaseball.com regarded as one of best baseball website because description of his travels and restaurants ate.
ReplyDeleteI remember ESPN did a feature on it along being mention on back of Topps card.
There are also 'green' versions of these cards, but I have no idea what or why...
ReplyDeleteWhat Feng said.
ReplyDelete