Check it out giveaway

 OK, as promised I have a little giveaway for those who were willing to look at my video in the last post and respond with something constructive for me.  

Here are the people who commented, and are eligible at the moment (read on to become partially eligible!):

The Angels In Order
Jon
Jeremya1um
Chris
Crocodile
Johnnys Trading Spot
night owl
Matt
Damien

Now 'constructive' is a pretty vague way to put it, so I will leave it to them to determine if they were constructive in their comments, lol.

Each of those commenters above can pick up to 6 cards from the scans below as their reward.  Use the usual method, scan/page number-card number.  So if you want the "Ron Hunt All Time Mets" in the second scan below, then you would select 2-6.

**Now it's not too late!  If you want some of these cards, but didn't comment on the previous post, you can still go there, watch the video and leave me a constructive comment on that post.  Then you can come back here and choose up to 3 cards from the scans.  Only those in the list above are eligible for picking 6 cards.

The cards will be sent in a PWE, and won't probably go out until mid-next week.  I am going to be out of town for a bit.

Some cards are beat up a little like the Bench in the first scan.  Hopefully the scans show the condition OK.

Page 1

Claimed - 1, 2, 3, 5, 6, 8, 9

I kinda doubt the auto on the Warren Giles is authentic, but you never know.

Page 2

Claimed - 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 7

Syndergaard is serial numbered on the back

Page 3

Claimed - 1, 3, 5, 6, 7

Page 4

Claimed - 3, 6, 7, 8

Page 5 - a little weirdness

Claimed - 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7

Page 6

Claimed - 4, 5, 6, 8, 9

Cabrera is serial numbered on the back

Page 7

Claimed - 1, 2, 3, 5

Page 8

Claimed - 1, 2, 3, 4

Page 9

Claimed - 4

The Sutton is serial numbered on the back

Page 10

Claimed - 2, 5

Check out what I made!

 

Hey guys, I know there are not a lot of folks who read this blog, but I would appreciate a few minutes of your time to check out "The Diamond King - Card Collection Tool" and give me feedback!

Here's the idea:  I love the TCDB concept, but it takes me forever to get my cards in there, and it doesn't give me some features I want. 

Features I want are the ability to quickly search, sort and report on my collection, and to have scans of my personal copy of the card right there.  I also want to be able to customize other things.  And so, I started putting my cards in a SQL database.  That solution had usability issues too, so I have created The Diamond King Card Collection Tool as a front end for that database to make things easier.

In a nutshell, I made my own card collection cataloger.

Now I am not a programmer, and this thing needs a lot of work.  I don't plan on anyone ever using it but me though, so as long as it meets my needs, that's all that really matters.

But I would really, really love your feedback on it!  So I did a short(ish) video that shows the program and it's basic features.  It's viewable on YouTube at this link:

https://youtu.be/JYZ6vdbovFY

I doubt this would be very easy to view on a phone, as the program takes a lot of screen real estate.  A computer monitor would be lots better.  I really tried to keep it short, but the video is about 7 minutes long. If you can spare that time, I would really welcome any and all feedback, questions and especially criticisms!!  Features you think it needs are welcome too.

I imagine there is already something out there that I could download or buy that does all that my program will do and better.  But I have had a lot of fun trying to figure out how to do this, and make my own.

As (hopefully) motivation for some of you to spend the time and give meaningful feedback, I plan on making a post later this week, or next week, with some freebies for people to claim.  But to be eligible for the freebies, you need to comment here with something that you think would be helpful to me on The Diamond King Card Collection Tool.  Just saying "That's cool!" or "You really aren't a very good programmer" is great, but to be eligible for the giveaway, you have to try a little harder.  No deadline to make that comment though, if you see the giveaway post and have not commented, you can come back to this post and comment then.

Thanks!!!

Stuff in the mail

 I went through a bit of a drought on getting cards in the mail.  But that has ended due to three packages in the last week!

First up is a PWE from gcrl.  I had mentioned that I didn't have any Julio Urias RCs, and poof, these just showed up!

These 2 cards had the honor of being the first 2 cards I added to my card database using a new tool that I created.  That's just a tease, I will post about it soon!

Thanks a bunch for filling that Urias sized hole in my collection gcrl!

And I won some stuff from Johnny!  As has been the pattern lately, I got some Diamond Kings.  Good variety and players.

And as a bonus, Johnny sent this!

I love it!!  But strangely, even though I have been all over my home state, Walla Walla is someplace I have never been.  I guess I better listen to Alf and get my butt over there.  Thanks Johnny!

And Night Owl makes an appearance too.  He claimed some freebies from me a while back, and must have felt the need to reciprocate.  And boy did he!

Some great variety here.  Love old Finest, and that Gwynn is wonderful.  And getting McGwires I need in the mail???  That almost never happens!!

On to some shine and some RCs:

Three players I definitely collect, all refractory.  Great stuff.  And we finish off with a couple of PED users, lol!  But RCs I want and need, thanks a bunch Greg!!

Keep em rolling in!!

a show

 Quick card show report here.  This show wasn't great.  Which really stunk, because I was supposed to go bargain hunting for Matt who won my Card Show Cheapie contest.  Don't worry, I found him some stuff, but it was definitely a down show.

Let's go Football, Basketball then Baseball!

Football - These 3 cards make me happy!!

The Taylor is just a BEAutiful card.  And from my research, it looks like this insert set is quite sought after.  As much as I like looking at it, this is one of only 2 cards in the post that is up for trade.... shoot me an offer!   The Sanders caught my eye in a dime box.  Barry is probably my favorite footballer of all time, so it was a no brainer.  And another stunning card, the Wilson is even better looking than the scan shows.  Too bad he stinks now that he's a Bronco.  But that's probably why I could afford the card in the first place.

Basketball - one card, the newly crowned MVP!

This is a card that I don't know much about.  Some sort of Black Prizm Refractor from the 2022/23 Panini Prizm Monopoly set.  The only 2 on COMC.com right now are a LeBron, sale price $107 and a Kristaps Porzingis for $15.  Seems a bit high, but if you are interested, this is the other card that is available for a trade.  Let me know if you are interested.

Baseball - I grabbed about 40 baseball cards at he show.  Here are a few of my favorites.

Sweet shot of Ichiro, even if it is 'just' a base card.  I'd like to get my hands on a refractor of this.  Old Row 0 insert of Boggs was a good deal.  My first Nomo RC!  And three great looking cards on the bottom row.

And I found some more nice Griffeys.  My favorite dealer charged me 50 cents each for these.

Some of them are quite nice!  The Authority Figure is serial numbered /1750, I think.  I've always liked the cool Pacific inserts, and the lightning really looks great.  That Topps Tek is one of the difficult to figure out patterns, but I think it might be one of the little more valuable ones.  Not sure I care enough to put in the effort to find out.  And the one with a map in the background is a "Eyes of the World" insert, and I think it is pretty great.

So for a so-so show, I guess I did pretty good!

Winner of the cheapie hunt

 Thanks so much to all the people who entered the little card show contest!  Super quick post to randomize and select the winner.

As I said in the original post, I will take the entries and randomize them three times.  Here are the results:

Original list:

First randomization:

Second randomization:

Third randomization:

And the winner is Matt!!!

Looks like I will be searching the cheap boxes for Red Sox cards of Pedro Martinez (any Red Sox really), Laughlin World Series cards, cards from the Senior Leagues and Sporting News Conlon Collection sets.

The Red Sox stuff will certainly be the easiest, but I will try for some of the other stuff too!

Again, thanks to all who entered, and have a great day!

Card show cheapies for someone

I'm heading to a card show this Saturday (April 29th), and if you are lucky, it might benefit you! 

This is a quick little contest with a prize that might be good, or might be bad, it depends on the quarter boxes at the show!  Here's how it works:

To enter, comment on this post with the players, teams, sets etc. that you want me to look for in the cheapie boxes at the next card show.

Examples:

"I want you to look for Francisco Lindor, Clayton Kershaw, any serial numbered under /1000"

"Please look for all Diamondbacks, any Panini colored parallels and Bowman cards of young up and comers"

"I'd like any cards from the 1950s, late 90s inserts, Tom Glavine and any O-Pee-Chee"

Feel free to be more or less detailed with your request as needed. Keep in mind that I am looking in cheap boxes, so some requests will be harder to fulfill.  Like the request for cards from the 1950s above!  If you ask for Roberto Clemente, and that is all, I may not find anything, and even if I do, they will likely be modern cards.

You can put other sports than Baseball if you like, but I spend most of my time in the baseball boxes, so take that for what you will.

I will take all the comments and use Random.org to select a winner (randomized 3 times).  For the winner, I will look in the quarter (or less) boxes for you, scanning for cards that fit your request.  You will receive up to 18 cards, depending on what I can find, PWE shipped to you.

This contest will close on Thursday, April 27th at 5PM PST!!

**No promises on what you will get.  I usually have good luck in these boxes, but I am looking for a really wide variety of cards.  Limiting it down to specific requests will certainly make it harder!

I got the BlUes

 For some of you, this may be the most boring post you've read...

I'm in the process of scanning my keeper collection.  It's a slog and will probably take months at the very least.  I store my cards by player, alphabetically.  And that's how I am scanning, in alphabetical order.

I recently got to the end of the B's, and ran into a section of players that I really like, but who just can't stay healthy.  I'm wondering if I should de-emphasize some of these, as these guys are starting to look like they may never live up to their early potential.

Anyway, here are the 30+ scans of the players with last names starting with BU.  Hence the title of this post, I got the BlUes...

Byron Buxton 2012 Elite Extra Edition - Yearbook 20 

Byron Buxton 2014 Bowman Draft Picks & Prospects - Top Prospects Chrome CTP-69 

Byron Buxton 2015 Bowman Chrome - Prospect Profiles Mini Refractor  PP-1

Byron Buxton 2015 Panini Elite - Future Threads 1 

Byron Buxton 2015 Panini Elite - Hype 3 

Byron Buxton 2015 Panini Prizm - Fresh Faces 11 

Byron Buxton 2015 Topps Update Series US136 

Byron Buxton 2018 Topps Gypsy Queen - Indigo 24 #/250

Byron Buxton 2019 Topps Holiday - WalMart Mega Box - Metallic Snowflake HW45

Byron Buxton 2021 Panini Mosaic - Reactive Orange Mosaic 94 

Byron Buxton 2021 Topps Gypsy Queen - Sepia 117 #/99

Byron Buxton 2022 Topps Heritage Chrome - Blue Sparkle 186 

Jay Buhner 1996 Upper Deck - V.J. Lovero Showcase VJ11 - Yes, I know Buhner doesn't fit the theme of this post, being retired, but he is a BU!

Madison Bumgarner 2007 Bowman Draft Picks & Prospects - Chrome Draft Picks  BDPP61 

Madison Bumgarner 2010 Topps Heritage 161 

Madison Bumgarner 2010 Topps Heritage - Chrome C44 #/1961

Walker Buehler 2017 Bowman - Prospects BP82 

Walker Buehler 2018 Bowman 59

Walker Buehler 2018 Panini Chronicles - Studio 16 

Walker Buehler 2018 Panini Diamond Kings 108 – SP 

Walker Buehler 2018 Panini Diamond Kings - Artist Proof Gold 108 #/99

Walker Buehler 2018 Panini Donruss 41 

Walker Buehler 2018 Topps Big League 116 

Walker Buehler 2018 Topps Chrome 71 

Walker Buehler 2018 Topps Gallery 141 

Walker Buehler 2018 Topps Update Series - Legends in the Making - Blue LITM-22 

Walker Buehler 2019 Panini Immaculate Collection 62 #/99

Walker Buehler 2019 Topps Big League - Rainbow Foil 391 #/100

Walker Buehler 2020 Bowman Platinum - Wal-Mart Purple   77 #/250

Walker Buehler 2021 Panini Donruss - Holo Red - Name variation 101 

Walker Buehler 2021 Panini Mosaic - Blue Camo Mosaic 56 

Walker Buehler 2022 Topps Fire - En Fuego - Gold Minted EF-20

So in your oh so humble opinions, which of these players are 'worth' collecting to you?  Any of them?  Are any of them going to get past the injuries and become as great as they can be?