2009 Upper Deck Artifacts

A friend of mine had sent me the link on facebook for the new "music video" from The Lonely Island (oddball brainchild musical group of Saturday Night Live favorite Andy Samberg) entitled "I'm On A Boat" featuring hip-hop artist T-Pain. If you've not seen their work, I encourage you to watch this and this. I'll wait, trust me it's worth it. WARNING: ADULT CONTENT - EXPLICIT LYRICS AND SUGGESTIVE CONTENT.

Also, if you haven't seen the movie "Hot Rod", I recommend that as well. It's from the same guys, except on the big screen and plus Danny McBride - who is badassly funny.

So - what does all of this have to do with BASEBALL??? Well, after watching the music video for "I'm on a Boat", i had to go to the store to pick up their debut CD, which has all of these songs, plus a lot of Adam Sandler-esque comedy skits on it. While I was there, I thought I'd take the opportunity to check out their baseball cards, as I haven't purchased any new cards in quite a while, probably a couple months.

I picked up a few packs of 2009 Upper Deck First Edition, which still confuses me as the most poorly named annual baseball card series, because it comes out AFTER Series 1 does. I don't get it. I'll post those in a couple days. I also picked up a pack of 2009 Upper Deck Artifacts, at $2.99 it was just a retail pack. I wanted to get the blaster, but figured if I just got a taste of it, and a few packs of the First Edition, I could also treat the wife to lunch at our favorite Mexican place for the same price as 1 blaster of the stuff. Turns out, I was right and the Tacos Tijuana I ordered were just amazing. Carne Asada, good stuff.

Here are the modest 5 cards in the $2.99 retail pack of '09 UD Artifacts I bought.

#4 Adam Dunn

Adam Dunn now plays for the Washington Nationals, not the D-backs. WTF, Upper Deck? These cards say "copyright (symbol) 2009" on them. Confusion, perhaps? Maybe they were printed before February 11th, when the Dunn/Nationals deal was announced to the press. My guess is Upper Deck just doesn't take the necessary effort, per the usual.

#37 Dan Uggla (red variation)

I like Dan Uggla - he helped my fantasy team to the playoffs last season, where I lost in the World Series to my sister-in-law. Yes, that's right, the woman that married my brother. I can hear your boos and hisses now. She had the best pitching staff possible, so I was sure to invite her last this year to the fantasy league to insure she'd be in the opposite division as me. I'm a schemer. Anyhow, back to the Uggla card. Like the "red" (pink) variation, I'm sure there's a better shad of "red" that UD could have found. This guy is all business, and he shows it here.

#193 "Voyager 2 Records Neptune" Historical Moments

I'm not sure how I feel about this one. I think Heritage does enough for the card collecting public in the areas of History and Nostalgia. Dumb card, and apparently worth $0.60 according to the price of the pack. I could have a soda at work tomorrow for that price. Instead I'm stuck with a "baseball" card of a satellite.

#904 UD 20th Anniversary Retrospective "Dallas Cowboys"

This is a card of a football team. In a pack of baseball cards. I don't collect football cards, I collect baseball cards. Therefore, I only purchase baseball cards and not football cards. I want my money back, Upper Deck.

The fifth card was #20 Rich Harden, but he plays for the team that shall not be named nor pictured in this blog.

All in all, I'd say this 5-card offering from Upper Deck Artifacts was quite weak, but it's just a small cross section of the set that I'm not afforded enough of an experience to come up with an offical decision. I like the cards, The look is very regal and official, and forced me to order the Ryan Braun card on eBay already. I like this set a lot, just bummed about the pack I came away with. That $2.99 could have paid for the 3 beers I had today while watching the Brewers lose to the Astros - the 3 beers that helped me come even closer to trading Rickie Weeks myself, saving the Brewers organization the embarassment of having wasted so many years on a horrible second baseman.

Liquidation Greatness

A lesson for Target and Walmart to learn from their long-struggling counterpart K-mart: in order to move old product, reduce the price. After reading of lonestarr's success in finding reduced price blasters at his local K-mart, I myself ventured into the blue-light special unknown in search of goods. What I found was this:

That's right - a blaster of 2008 UD Heroes for only $7.49. I snatched up two of them, and headed home for some crazy rippin fun. Here's the first of 2 blasters.

Pack 1

#33 Carl Yastrzemski (black parallel)

#184 Bob Gibson/Jake Peavy

#14 Nick Markakis

#30 Dustin Pedroia

#54 Travis Hafner

Pack 2

#9 Mark Teixeira (black parallel)

#YSL-4178 Yankee Stadium Legacy Ron Guidry
#132 Daric Barton RC
#65 Justin Verlander
#77 Hunter Pence

Pack 3

#149 Tim Lincecum

#27 Josh Beckett
#129 Bill Hall
#196 Jeter/Griffey Jr/Ripken Jr/Ichiro (black parallel) #181 Eddie Murray/Prince Fielder

Pack 4

#58 Garrett Atkins (black parallel)
#181 Eddie Murray/Prince Fielder
#115 Alex Rodriguez
#48 Adam Dunn
#72 Josh Willingham

Pack 5

#65 Justin Verlander (green parallel #'d 241/499)


#71 Andrew Miller (black parallel)
#95 Kelly Johnson
#192 Joe Maur/Hanley Ramirez/Troy Tulowitzki
#143 Roberto Clemente

Pack 6

#174 Lastings Milledge (black parallel)

#65 Justin Verlander

#184 Bob Gibson/Jake Peavy

#105 Jose Reyes

#168 Luke Scott

Pack 7 * I hate the Yankees...what the f? Why couldn't I pull a Brewers pack like this?

#125 Don Mattingly (black parallel)
#YSL-132 Yankee Stadium Legacy Herb Pennock
#114 Alex Rodriguez
#2 Dan Haren
#114 Derek Jeter

Pack 8

#126 Dave Winfield (black parallel)
#95 Kelly Johnson
#113 Phil Hughes
#165 Carl Crawford
#130 Freddy Sanchez

Pack 9


#107 David Wright (black parallel)

#38 Derrek Lee
#132 Daric Barton RC
#69 Edinson Volquez
#45 Nick Swisher

Life Before the Strike #14

In celebration of our nice 3-day weekend, I'd like to share a few of the cards I purchased yesterday at the local card shop. I'm a fan of this shop, and am going to miss it when the Navy moves me somewhere else in these great United States in the next 2-3 months. The only downside is the transit time - the Puget Sound has a lovely way of seperating people from things. As the crow flies, it's a 17 mile distance. But using 4 modes of transportation it takes nearly 3 hours from my front door. Because of this, my trips are usually about 2 months apart, which allows for my want list to grow quite a bit, and just as "absence makes the heart grow fonder", my trips to the card shop never lose their "kid in a candy shop" feeling.


Pete is the proprietor of this shop, and in my estimation he's a man of 65 years or so. He knows the name of everyone who steps foot into his store. He recieves a phone call and can tell you immediately whether or not he's got the card you're looking for...and he has millions of cards. To get folks into the store, he runs a fantasy baseball/football/basketball contest (depending on the season) where you pick a few players for the week and track their stats, the winner recieving a $10 credit on their next purchase. Slow economy being what it is, foot traffic has dwindled for this store and so I'm competing with 2 other people this weekend. Say a prayer for Larry Fitzgerald, Willie Parker, and Kurt Warner. Daddy needs a new pair of shoes.


He's a man with an Ivy League degree from Dartmouth, who worked for a number of years recruiting for the University in my old stomping grounds of the midwest, so we chat a while about Wisconsin and how cold it is there, how big the high school football kids are, and how I'm the only Brewers fan he knows. This is great, because nearly every card I go into his shop to find, I'm able to locate with little effort.


On to the cards...


2007 Topps Distinguished Service #DS23 Stan Musial

I'm a little bit of a dork when it comes to the military - both of my parents were in the military when I was young, and I've been serving this great nation of ours for the past six years. These cards are cool because they add to the baseball purest hatred of modern day card companies and the products they produce. As they did in '08 w/ the presidential candidate cards, Topps has a way with creating cards that people still want to collect. At least this one is loosely related to baseball, ya? This next one, however, nothing at all to do with baseball...

#DS28 George Bush

Actually, I take that back. His son (CURRENT president Bush) was a partner in the ownership of the Texas Rangers for a while...he also threw out a few first pitches, so I guess this one counts too. This next card, however, has absolutely NOTHING to do with baseball.

2006 Allen & Ginter #336 Pope Leo XIII

Although baseball had been around in United States in professional form for almost 20 years when Pope Leo XIII was elected to the Papal office in 1878, we have little reason to believe he had anthing to do with baseball. I just like the card.

Aside from the numerous Ryan Braun cards that I snatched up on this current trip, I also found two more Robin Yount cards to add to my Yount binder...

2008 Upper Deck Masterpeices #46 Robin Yount

I didn't know that UD gave Robin a card in the series last year. I was digging for the Ryan Braun and mouth went agape with awe when I saw it. Hmm...great painting? I find it very hard to critique the art of others, as I myself have very little artistic ability. But this looks absolutely nothing like him. To me, the player should be wearing a Cleveland Indians jersey and go by the name Jake Taylor. I wonder if Yount has seen this one yet. I assume there was no approval process when UD came out with this card. Here's how it may have gone, though...

UD: So, Mr. Yount, what do you think?

RY: Really?

UD: What do you mean?

RY: This looks nothing like me. This looks like Tom Berenger.

UD: Tom who?

RY: You know, the guy from that baseball movie, played cather. The Indians?

UD: Don't think I know that one.

RY: Come on, they even had Bob Uecker in it as the announcer, Cleveland Municipal Stadium was actually shot at County Stadium in Milwaukee. Hell, that movie had more to do with the Brewers than it did the Indians.

UD: You know, now that you mention it I think I have seen that one. Is that the one with Bernie Mac in it as well?

RY: No, that's Mr. 3000. This one had Wesley Snipes, and that guy from the All State commercial.

UD: Yogi Berra?

RY: No, that's Aflac. I'm talking about Dennis Haysbert.

UD: I thought he did the US Navy commercial voiceover work.

RY: No, that's Godsmack, the band.

UD: Not the music, the....

As you can imagine, the rest of the conversation stayed somewhat along these lines, neither side acoomplishing much. At the end of this one hour meeting, both sides were so tired that neither thought it important to look at the back of the card. As Thorzul went into depth discussing on his blog once, Robin Yount never did, in fact, win the AL Rookie of the Year award.

I decided to call the fine folks at Upper Deck this morning to find out who did this painting for the card. I spoke with Crystal in their sports card division, and she's going to have the project manager for the 2008 Masterpieces give me a call later today with the artist's name. I'll keep you posted.

1994 Upper Deck Fun Pack #202 Yount/Winfield HES

Besides the really tan mutant arm coming from Yount's side and shoulder, this card seems pretty standard, really. At first glance, I didn't really see that it was a double card, not only with regard to its subject, but it's thicker than normal. See, it's not actually a mutant arm, it's Yount ON TOP of Dave Winfield. Pretty tricky, folks. The card unfolds and becomes kind of a book card. Neato.

Still waiting on that phone call from Upper Deck...