Team Phungo Wants Your Best Post of 2011!!!

Could this card be related to the Phungo Best Post of 2011???



1959 Topps Willie Mays

Could the above Willie Mays card be related to the Phungo Best Post of 2011???

Team Phungo wants to know what YOUR Best or Favorite post of 2011 was.

I want to collect all of the favorite posts from 2011 into a digest and publish the together.

for more info click here

Swag from Nachos Grande - Tier One plus A&G nno

Still catching up on postings - Last month Nachos Grande ran a Tier One Group Break.  Here is the good stuff.     

2011 Topps Tier One Tony Gwynn (Base #d to 799) 
2011 Topps Tier One Hunter Pence (Base) 
2011 Topps Tier One Cole Hamels (T4 #d 199)
2011 Allen & Ginter NNO Roy Halladay

Tier One as the name states is a Tiered product with several parallels.  The break was of the 15 team variety where you get a team you choose plus one at random.  My random squad was the Padres - Tony Gwynn is about as well as I could do personally for a Padres base card as he is one of my favorite players.  The Pence Base card may be my first of him as a Phil.  The Hamels was my best pull from the Tier One portion of the break. 

2011 A&G NNO Roy Halladay

Nachos Grande had won a box of 2011 A&G and he through cards from that box that he didn't need for his PC into the break.  Fortunately one of those cards was arguably the best card in the box.  A No Numbered Roy Halladay Mini.  This is only my 2nd nno mini.  I have a Cole Hamels from a different break I was involved in a few years back. 

Chris also gave each participant a team set of 2011 Topps Lineage, so in addition to the above cards, I also picked up the Phils and Padres Topps Lineage cards.

Right now over at Nachos Grande a group break featuring 5 turn of the century products. Phils from that era aren't not nearly as exciting as the current crew - maybe pick up a couple of cool Scott Rolen cards.  

Swag from Tomahawk Chopping - catching up

Happy New Year! - good last wk of the yr for Team Phungo - hope the beginning of 2012 finds everyone well. 

Now I have some catching up to do.


Way back in the beginning of November Derek over at Tomahawk Chopping ran a different kind of a Box Break.  Well it wasn't really a break.  It was a draft - of Cards.  TC had a lot of nice cards that were in midlevel products that Team Phungo really doesn't get to pick up.  The Draft had 15 rounds I think and guaranteed an Auto and a Relic.  Here is Much of the Team Phungo draw: 

click to enlarge

Lots of Chomey stuff here - I went after Phils and former Phils, HoF and some favorite players.  The Relic is an All-Star GU card of Placido Polanco in the bottom row.   I am holding the Auto (might be subject of a future Phungo STS!) 

Some of the chrome and parallels of stars in the lot include Chase Utley, Roy Halladay, Ryan Howard and Cole Hamels masterpieces,  There is a Chrome Flashback of Dom Brown near the top right

Francisco Liriano, a Fine looking Joe Mauer card (bottom right),  Strasburg, the Freak, Pedro Alvarez, Gio Gonzalez, Nice Pat Burell Chome Parallel,  and  Kyle Drabek are among the non-Phils in the lot. 

Just want to mention one more time that the Topps Photography was real sharp in 2011 and I hope they continue to keep it up in 2012. 
 
This was a fun idea and I am glad Derek put it together.

 

What Was Your Best Post of 2011??

Every Newpaper, Website, and Magazine seems to have some sort of list of best of 2011 in Sports, Music, Movies, Books, Trends, Viral Videos, Reality TV, Celeb Marriages/Divorces, Garbage Gossip etc etc.

Well I think it is time we do this for Trading Card Blogging.  (If somebody is already doing this and I missed it, let me know)

I would like to collect your favorite columns from 2011 and put the links into a single posting so that anyone can refer to them at anytime in the future.   I see something similar to the books that you may see in stores that are "The Year in Sportswriting 2011" edited by some sportswriter and contributed by about a dozen others.

A couple of ground rules - 
- one Submission per blog, I would like to highlight as many different authors as possible.  (exception for series - if you put together a summary of a series on your own blog and prefer that entry to be your submission that would be great)

- send a link to my email address (in my profile) - that way I can copy the link directly into the index posting
- I would prefer posts from 2011, perhaps we can put together a separate entry for pre-2011 columns.
- I am also welcoming nominations of posts by authors other then yourself.  perhaps some folks have forgotten or didn't see the beauty of their original posts.
- beyond that I would like to keep things relatively wide open - by Best I really mean favorite - don't fret over it your piece is brilliant etc.  - it is just good enough that you liked it or enjoyed posting it. 

I envision grouping the postings loosely if you could also let me know which of the following categories your posts fits that would be helpful.  Some of the categories I have come up with are:

- Cardboard Appreciation - Posts dedicated to a single card
- Player Collecting - posts for a single blayer
- Team Collecting
- Reviews - including Box/Case/Group Breaks.
- Vintage
- Autos/Relics
- Sets Apreaciation - A look at a certain Card Set from the past.
- Value/Pricing - Post dedicated to the $$ cards are being bought and sold at.
- Baseball in General
- Sports in General
- Pop culture
- Series if you want to go to the trouble of summarizing anything that you have done in a series into a single post I would like to dedicate a section to the favorite series of 2011.    
If you have any other categories let me know - if your post fits more then one category that is fine as well. 

Let me know in comments of what you think and if you have any additional ideas or suggestions. 

I was thinking of publishing something around 1/16/2012 so if you could get submissions to me by 1/9 that would be great. 

Thanks

Team Phungo

Disappointment - Bill Conlin

How is it that people we really don't know at all can cause us such unhappiness.

This afternoon the news broke that Philadelphia sports columnist Bill Conlin has been accused of sexually abuse of four minors who are now grown.  The charges are quite damning - Philly.Com story here.   

For all involved this is all awful.


I find it personally devastating because I really respected Conlin as a writer. 


This is a baseball related post because Conlin was recently inducted into the writers wing of the Baseball Hall of Fame.  Conlin's Baseball Hall of Fame Page. 

I don't want to spend time championing Conlin, but did want to relate a few things I remember him (as a writer) for:

1) He was the man that Steve Carlton first stopped talking to - quickly Carlton would go mute on all reporters.
2) Conlin is credited as being the first media person to project the 1993 Philllies (last place in 92) as NL Pennant winners.

Worthless Stuff

Almost 15 years ago I went to a booksigning for Conlin's book "Batting Cleanup".  There were maybe 20 people.  Conlin answered questions and talked baseball until the bookstore closed.   The signing took place within days of my 30th birthday.  Conlin personalized it "Happy #30"

The collection of Conlin's columns used to reside on a shelf of prized autographed books.  Now I don't know what to do with the book.  I thought at some point, it would be a fun tricky auto for Spot the Sig, but that would neither be fun nor appropriate anymore. 

If I am going to take anything positive away from this it is that it is another reminder that our heroes and idols should be our family and friends that get us through our daily trials bringing light to our days while sharing our joys and triumphs.

Now I am going to go start celebrating Christmas early with my wonderful wife.  No Blogging till after the Holiday.

TODAY ONLY: Lindros and LeClair sign to Benefit CHOP

This afternoon (12/16) Eric Lindros and John LeClair will be signing autographs at the Granite Run Mall near Media PA to beneifit Children's Hospital of Pennsylvania. 

Only 500 Autograph Tickets will be available.  Tix go on sale at 4pm for the 6pm signing.  I suggest you get there early if your interested in the signing.  I think it could be a little crazy.

If I read the info correctly.  the Tix are $25 for both signatures all proceeds go to towards CHOP.   

More info click here

Great signing, great cause. 

Card Show Report 2011 12 10 - Bucks Technical High School

This was my first show at Bucks Technical.  After going to a pair of more larger regional shows over the last month the Bucks show was a little disappointing.  There were many 10-15 dealers with a decent variety of items.  There wasn't much of a selection in the cheap vintage category, which hurt my day a bit.

Still Team Phungo was able to bring home some cool items:

2007 Topps Finest Ryan Howard ($4 #d to 50)

I try and collect cards that relate to games I have been to, so yeah I am the one guy that is interested in annoying stuff like UD Documentry or Moments and Milestones.  Trouble is, I am only interested in specific cards in those set.  Howard actually hit a pair of homers in this game as I remember.  The Philllies pummeled Matt Cain.  I think Moises Alou took out his knee running into a wall. 

2007 Topps Finest is actually pretty decent as far as these cards go.  The Description on the back is actually particular to the game specified on the card and the player pictured on the card is the one talked about on the reverse (unlike documentry and M&M)

More Phils

83 OPC Mike Schmidt
89 Topps Mike Schmidt Special (Card Number = L)
06 A&G Ginter back mini Chase Utley
75 Topps Mini Greg Luzinski
87 OPC Mike Easler

The OPC Schmidt, Utley Mini and Luzinski cards all went for a buck each while the remaining cards were dimers, I believe.  The Easler is a bit of an oddity in the OPC Phils collection as it isn't part of the Topps set for 1987.  The Utley card is a mini from the first issue of A&G.  A buck is typically higher then I would go for a 75 mini but the bull is worth it.  The 89 T Schmidt card appears to be a box bottom, I haven't bothered to find out where exactly this card originited.
 
Noteworthy

2007 A&G Box Loader N43 Joe Frazier ($2)

Couldn't lett this one got for $2,  this is the 2nd A&G boxtopper I have picked up pretty cheaply in the last year.  Kind of a pain to store, but nice to have a few.

Hall of Fame

All-Star Stand Up Ricky Henderson
2000 Topps #44 Hank Aaron

These were both dimers - Henderson is a popout/stand up card made by Leaf in the mid 80s to commemorate the All-Star game.  These are similar to the 60s era standups that were homaged in 2011 Lineage.

In 2000 card #44 in the Topps set was dedicated to Hank Aaron, ala #7 for Mickey Mantley both prior and since.  As far as I know this is the only year which Topps reserved #44 for Aaron.  2000 Topps is a minimalist design, which I like and consider a hidden gem in the Topps Pantheon.