Tiny, Tuffy and Taiwanese Cards: Part II

        Thanks to the greatness that is the Internet, NPB Card Guy went on vacation to Japan and I got souvenirs!  He'd asked me before he left if there was any thing special (aside from the elusive 1994 Chiba Lotte Marines menko set) he could look track down for me, so I just said anything from my Tuffy Rhodes want list.  Well, somewhere in the dozen or so card shops he hit while in the greater Tokyo metropolitan area, he and Ryan (from This Card is Cool and Chaos and Kanji) tracked down 13 hits from my list!  Thanks guys!

2000 Upper Deck Hitter's Club Autographs DW

     Major score on eBay last week and it finally hit the mailbox today. Thanks to a poorly labeled auction ("1967 NY YANKEES signed DAVE WINFIELD upper deck authent"; it was included in a scan with a 1967 Topps card that was a separate auction), I managed to snag this nugget for just under $5!

     As I've probably mentioned a time or two in the past, I'm not the world's biggest autograph hound, but even I couldn't pass this one up. And after missing several other autographed cards in the past week (I held to my $10 max, but some people still got really good deals thanks to my restraint) I was really surprised to win this one, even with the poorly chosen title. This is #805 in my collection out of the possible 1930 different Dave Winfield cards deemed worthy of recognition by Beckett.

     Oddly, the seller found it necessary to include his own certificate of  authenticity, as if that provided on the reverse of the card, printed there by the manufacturer, weren't assurance enough.  Though, considering the credibility of the gentleman who's name is found on the back of the card, perhaps it was warranted.  As the U-2 folks say, "In God We Trust.  All Others We Monitor." Thanks, Mr. Zippo!

     Once I build up enough credit in my CheckOutMyCards account, I'll pull the trigger to ship the 7 I have waiting in my account there, but until they're in my hands and in my Winfield binder, they're not officially part of my collection. So #806-812 are "to be announced" to quote TV Guide.

If they didn't make endless parallels, they'd just make endless perpendiculars...

Is there a parallel set for the 2008 Upper Deck Yankee Stadium Legacy box set?

The top card is what comes from the dime-a-dozen 100-card boxed set. The bottom card I finally received today after watching it on eBay for the last year. It sat there at $2.99 for the longest time, and I didn't really want to bother since shipping was another $2. Just last week, though, I got about $50 from my Sportlots sales at the same time that the card was on sale for $1.49 with free shipping, so I had to pull the trigger.

After a bit of research, it turns out the bottom card is from the "Final Season" boxed set that was exclusive to QVC.

The main differences are the obvious gold-tinge to the whole front. All of the foil is gold, rather than silver, the upper background is the muted instead of dark blue, and the lower area has a cream colored background with gold pinstripes instead of the blue/grey. The main differences on the back are the lighter text and the absence of "BOX SET" under the set name at the bottom.




The seller, loret2154, doesn't have the other Winfield from the set, but she does have another 28 cards from the set.

Here's someone selling the complete set, with lots of extra details:

2008 UD YANKEE STADIUM FINAL SEASON BOX SET

Hideki Matsui Home Run Collection

To take a brief break from the March of Meulens, here's set I've started chasing after a couple of big deals with a collector in the Philippines, as well as some work on Yahoo! Auctions Japan. So far, I've managed to pick up 237 of these.

From his debut in NPB, NTV & Toho (and later Upper Deck for his MLB home runs with the Yankees) issued a card for every one of Hideki Matsui's home runs....as he hit them. So all of the photos are from the actual home run or game, not like Topps and Upper Deck (in the US) where they issue a set of 500 cards and employ like 5 different photos.

The cards are all about the size and shape of a phone card, with rounded corners, and I'm guessing a description of the situation of each home run. They're pretty much broken up into a set for each season he played, as the year is listed on the front, and the actual date of the home run on the back. Here's a not so random sampling:

 

 

 

 

Lots of bats flying through the air, lots of home plate congratulations, but I think my favorites are those where you can see the ball leaving Matsui's bat.

And somehting you might notice about the Giants' helmets that separate them from every other team I've ever seen is that they aren't glossy and shiny. They have a very cool matte-style finish that seems to make them almost glow on the card as if they were added later as a digital effect. You'll see it a lot more in some of the Tuffy Rhodes cards when I get to them. I think the Yankees should adopt that style of finish on their helmets for a year. it would have been awesome had they done it when Godzilla joined the team.

In 1997, the cards got an upgrade and they added color to the backs:

If you notice just above the photo, this was home run #2 of the 1997 season.

Starting with #100, every multiple of 50 was a special card. I don't have 100 or 150, but I do have 200 & 300:

  

Blogger/teacher/Marinerd Deanna Rubin paid a visit to the Hideki Matsui museum in Japan about 2 years ago, and the museum (run by the Matsui family) actually has what look like 8x10 versions of many of this set on display as a part of the museum. Have a look:

Deanna at the Hideki Matsui Museum

And while you're there, browse around Deanna's great site. She takes the absolute BEST photos during the hundreds of baseball games she attends each year.