In early March, I sent out some TTM requests in anticipation they would be returned when I finally came home from some overseas travel - one of the requests I sent was to the 90-year old former big league pitcher, with $10 and a vintage 1959 Topps card I fished out of a dollar box last year, like the Whitey Herzog card from the previous post. Maybe the odd thing was the card I sent Pascual pictures him - but is an uncorrected error card, picturing teammate Ralph Lumenti ..read more

In early March, I sent out some TTM requests in anticipation they would be returned when I finally came from some overseas travel - one of the requests I sent was to the Hall of Fame manager, with $5 and a vintage Topps card I fished out of a dollar box last year. While on the other side of the world, I'd read that Herzog had passed and for that matter, another TTM signing great in Carl Erskine - for a moment I was wondering what I would get back, but it looks like I was able to get my request within the window where my card was inked up ..read more

My Top 10 is where I show off my iconic Top 100 gems - it might be cliche to have these cards in such a collection, but it's all fun and games where I have ownership of some of quirky and odd classics. There is a sense of accomplishment where I wrapped up something, but now I'm thinking about the next Top 100 - where I'm eager to consider the cards I have in-hand to see how each might fit in a Top 100, as well as keeping my eyes peeled for Top 100 fuel I might have not seen and/or considered before. FWIW, maybe I'm missing a 1989 Billy Ripken FF error #616, where the copy I ended up picking u ..read more

18. 1939 Play Ball Al Schacht #113 - my oldest card in my collections. 17. 2023 Topps Now Shohei Ohtani #OS-19 - this could have been a centerpiece card for an all-time Angels Top 100 cheap azz keepers collection, but feel it has too much appeal not to be in my main all-time Top 100 cheap azz keepers collection. 16. 1995 Pinnacle Ken Griffey Jr. #128 - I may have this card in my collection, but where it was 'easy,' I saw a copy during a card show rummage and pounced on it. 15. 2021 Topps Stadium Club Babe Ruth #32 - a goofy card with Ruth posing with a big bat. 14. 1989 ProCards Cedar Rapids ..read more

27. 2021 Topps X Sports Illustrated Mike Trout #1 - I figured to get a cool looking Trout SI cover card in at No. 27 as a tribute to his greatness. I originally wanted to tease at least two or three Angels cards in my Top 100, though after thinking about it - what I want to do is have a Top 100 of only Angels players' cards as a regionally focused all-time Top 100 cheap azz collection. 26. 1992 Bowman Chipper Jones #28 - because of the of mainstream choices, this was a $25-$30 card at Chipper's peak MVP year in 1999 and I bought one for that price, thinking I had a key card that was forever g ..read more

As far as my Top 100 collection goes, I wanted cards that are generally recognizable that teases some notoriety or nostaglia - that's probably not a case for every single card, but I want to see where it makes sense to have certain cards in my Top 100 collection, even for more esoteric reasons. 36. 1989 Upper Deck Kirk Gibson #666 - a card I wanted to get into my Top 100 since it captures part of an iconic moment in World Series history. 35. 1990 Leaf Frank Thomas #300 - I had to add his most popular mainstream rookie card, where it would have a centerpiece to my Big Hurt collection during th ..read more

45. 1989 Upper Deck Nolan Ryan #774 - from Upper Deck's inaugural set, I wanted the Houston Astros 3D Ryan from the Low Number Series and the Texas Rangers football Ryan from the High Number Series paired together in my Top 100. I bought back the football Ryan specifically for a Top 100 collection and also had a copy of the 3D Ryan - however since the 3D Ryan was in my decade stars / binder, I didn't want to pull the card and move things around. Go figure I started a dig through some older bubble mailers and did not realize I had both a copy of the football Ryan and a copy of the 3D Ryan - se ..read more

54. 2007 Upper Deck Masterpieces Ozzie Smith #19 - I like cards that depict the unique, timeless moments, like the all time great shortstop doing a backflip. 53. 1987 Classic Update Yellow Travel Edition Joe Niekro #120 - I like this card because it's rare a player is shown caught up in an incriminating moment on the field. I looked up a clip of this incident where Niekro ends up being thrown out of the game for scuffing balls - this actually happened in against the Angels, but this card is firmly entrenched as a Top 100 card and not a card for my stadium collection. 52. 2010 Topps Turkey Red ..read more

The idea for a Top 100 project collection was probably four years in the making, but it never got anywhere - only within the early months of this past year where I was really motivated to put something together Past the pandemic, I had noticed the build up of the different bulk cards I'd rummaged at card shows - while that was great for my assorted mini-collections, I kind of lost my way listing out cards in a spreadsheet and putting cards away for some closure. I got tired of the idea aimlessly collecting mini-collection cards where I needed to see if I can dig from the piles - so maybe I ne ..read more

I am going to be a little preoccupied through March and probably through April - I've been trying to draft posts where I have images and something to say for individual cards listed that covers the rest of my all-time Top 100 cheap azz keepers collection. I hope my Top 100 stuff covers things as far as blog material goes through the rest of the month - where I schedule to drop the posts every three or four days. If the Top 100 posts suddenly stop before running its course - I might have decided to hold things back and resume things in May. If the Top 100 posts does continue to completion, it w ..read more