Allen & Ginter Box Break Part 3: Packs 9 though 16

Still no official word on SP's from anyone in authority, so I'll run with the bootleg list and go back and fix it later if there are any mistakes. EBay is usually my number one source of information if I want to find any hard info about new sets, but sadly it's useless for short prints. I did a search on 'Allen Ginter SP' and found out pretty much any card out of the set is listed as a short print by one dealer or another. I suppose the rationale is that any product that was printed less than 1990 Donruss is by definition 'short printed'.

Here's my pulls from the 8 packs in the center of the box.

Pack 9:
161 Manny Ramirez
229 Eric Chavez
330 Bob Geren SP
Mini A&G 264 Aaron Rowand
Dick Perez 15 Andre Ethier
36 Kevin Kouzmanoff RC
237 Kelly Johnson
208 Chipper Jones


Not a bad start, two Braves, a rookie, an SP and Manny. I don't understand why the media continues to freak out over Manny's antics just because he acts mildly bizarre at times. Manny has his share of odd behavior but he's never hopped into the crowd to hit on some chick or spontaneously started playing racquetball against the Green Monster in a game as far as I know. And who's more entertaining than Manny? His fielding in the 8th inning of Game 1 of the 2004 World Series is the best moment from that series. If you can do that and still go on to win MVP, you're a damn fine player. Maybe too fine a player, perhaps Bud Selig installed a Harrison Bergeron-style concentration zapper in Manny's brain to keep him from completely destroying the rest of the league.

You have to wonder how ESPN would react if Rube Waddell was playing today. I suppose Steve Phillips would hand-wringingly explain how chasing firetrucks in the 6th inning when pitching against the Yankees was a mockery of the game and would ultimately lead to the decline of western civilization while John Kruk stares blankly into the teleprompter telling himself that the paycheck is worth all this crap. I really respect Kruk, he's the only one on Baseball Tonight that actually looks uncomfortable with some of the drivel that gets spewed on that show. Sure, it might just be gas, but he always looks like he feels my pain. Plus I'm a big Willy Wonka fan, and John looks just like Augustus Gloop with all that studio makeup on.

I want to know who chose the list of players for these Dick Perez sketches. Seriously, Andre Ethier? Over Schmidt, Kent, Garciaparra, Martin, Penny, Furcal... If you had to sketch a prospect why not Delwyn Young at least. I'm not a big Dodger fan though, so maybe he's a bigger deal than I realize.

Pack 10:
181 Joe Borowski
134 Garrett Atkins
Mini black 156 Brian Roberts
Dick Perez 27 Delmon Young
111 Scott Hatteberg
232 Gregg Zaun
96 Dontrelle Willis
192 Stanley Glenn

Well, I got my Gregg Zaun card, and I guess I don't really prefer it more than the ARod card. It's not blindingly shiny at least. Delmon gets a sketch card. I guess Delwyn should have thrown more bats. This pack nets a black border mini that is actually a player. The Braves almost traded Adam LaRoche for Brian Roberts last offseason, but Lord Voldemort Peter Angelos meddled and kiboshed the deal. I wonder how things would be different if they had pulled off that trade. I guess Kelly Johnson would be in left field, Mike Gonzales would be on the Pirates' DL and LaRoche would take away Aubrey Huff's strikeout opportunities for the Orioles.

I also get my first Negro Leaguer in this pack, Stanley Glenn. The bio on the back of the card states he was signed to a minor league contract by the Boston Braves! Stanley 's card is going in my Braves team set. Stanley wrote a book about the Negro League experience and I need to scrounge up a copy, it looks pretty fascinating. I love his quote, "I never made much money, but I had an awful lot of fun." I wish someone would issue a new Negro League set soon while we still have some of these players around.

Pack 11:
259 Tony LaRussa
194 Francisco Cordero SP
Mini 104 Jeff Kent
Dick Perez 20 Nick Swisher
3 Austin Kearns
64 Brett Myers
312 Chris Duffy
275 Bobby Abreu

Yawn. I guess not every pack in a box can be interesting. There are at least two future Hall-of-Famers in this pack and it's still mind numbingly boring. I wonder if the BBWA will just let Kent in right away or if they will force him to linger until fanatics start complaining as loudly about his omission as I do about Santo, Blyleven, Dawson and Goose. I guess this pack isn't that boring, the Nick Swisher card is pretty I suppose. The Cordero is short printed, maybe, so someone out there probably needs him for their set. Austin Kearns looks like he's 14 years old in his picture. And I gather Bobby Abreu is in one of the set's 20 'action' poses. That's some really actionless action right there. Ya know what, this pack really is boring. Even my scanner agrees it's boring, it refused to scan this as anything other than a black and white photo no matter how many times I tried.

Pack 12:
41 Lyle Overbay
254 Chris Stewart RC
Mini A&G 58 Mike Mussina SP
Dick Perez 17 Joe Mauer
94 Charlie Manuel
136 Edgar Renteria
14 Kei Igawa RC
29 Sean Casey

Halfway through the box and we're hitting a lull. Yeah, the Edgar card interests me, but your average Met, Dodger or Red Sox Fan would be stifling a yawn on this one. Mauer is a nice pull, but in a few weeks when we all have quadruples of every Perez card (except that one rotten card we need to complete the set) it won't be so special. The rookies aren't special either, Stewart is in Oklahoma City after batting .243 and just got bumped one more slot down the depth cart now that Saltalamaccia is a Ranger. Igawa's rookie card is playing So Taguchi to Matsuzaka's Ichiro this year and Okajima might be pitching better than both of them so far. I guess I could have done a lot worse than Mussina for the mini though, especially since I live in the past and still see him only in an Orioles jersey. While looking over his stats on Baseball Reference (245 wins? wow) I noticed he somehow managed to come in 6th in the Cy Young voting in 2000 despite a 11-15 record. That was Pedro's award hands down so I guess some Baltimore voter figured what the hell since Moose did pitch very well that year despite the record.

Pack 13:
273 Jorge Posada
104 Jeff Kent
320 Barry Bonds SP
Mini 15 Jeff Francouer
Dick Perez 26 Jim Edmonds
15 Jeff Francouer
39 Brooklyn Bridge
42 Brian Fuentes

Now this is more like it! Two Frenchys, short printed Barry and the Brooklyn Bridge to boot. The Edmonds card is the one that really jumped out at me however. Jim's no Brad Pitt, but this card is just, well, dang. Howard Finster is great when he paints like Howard Finster, but when Dick Perez does it, not so much. I probably shouldn't criticize though, didn't Topps insert the original sketches inside rip cards? It's hard to do a portrait on something teeny enough to fit in one of those things and Dick did a really good job on some of the other cards.

Pack 14:
242 Bobby Jenks
179 Matt Cain
Mini nno Ireland Flag
Dick Perez 1 Brandon Webb
126 Curt Schilling
293 Omar Vizquel
117 John 'Mule' Miles
337 Randy Winn

Woot! Irish eyes are smiling. I'd like to know what castle that is there, and if they already have a Grail. Dick Perez does a great job on the Brandon Webb sketch so I should probably stop making fun of the Edmonds. But those eyes... they haunt me... Poor Matt Cain. He's not pitching that much worse than he did last year, but he can't buy a win. His stats aren't much worse than Curt's and Schilling has twice the wins. John "Mule" Miles is the second Negro Leaguer I've pulled so far. His claim to fame is hitting 11 home runs in 11 games for the Chicago Giants. That is damned difficult to do, just ask Barry and Alex who can't manage even one in one game right now. Anyone interested in more Negro League info should check out this great blog I stumbled across looking up info on Mule. This one's going in the sidebar.

Pack 15:
156 Brian Roberts
333 Pedro Martinez
203 Justin Verlander SP
Mini 314 Yadier Molina
AGR-MC1 Miguel Cabrera Jersey
123 Tadahito Iguchi
183 Groundhog Day
211 Orlando Cabrera

Well, here's the second hit of the box... no rip cards, press plates or DNA for me. I can't complain though, I pulled jersey cards of a Cy Young winner and a potential MVP or even Triple Crown winner. It's not like I pulled Coco Crisp and Rich Aurilia or something dreadful like that. Besides, I didn't buy a box for the jerseys, I bought it for the cards and I'm doing pretty well so far. If that list is correct, I'm hitting short prints every other pack and Bonds and Verlander are pretty good ones to pull. Plus I just got a trading card of Punxsutawney Phil, how cool is that? Now next year when that little rodent pops out of his hole on February second and South Florida gets hit with thundersnow the next day I can pull out my A&G set and yell at his card. "YOU!!! You're the little bastard responsible for all this climate change! It's 86 freaking degrees in February! Two days ago there was a blizzard in San Diego! A Cat 4 Hurricane just hit Iceland for God's sake! Cut it out! I don't give a damn what Al Gore says, it's all your fault so knock it off!" Just kidding, folks. I don't actually yell at trading cards. I did point and laugh at a Rick Ankiel rookie card with the $200 price tag still stuck on the top loader once, but I would never yell at it. That would just be mean.

Pack 16:
18 Mariano Rivera
225 Raul Ibanez
Mini 75 Troy Tulowitzki
Dick Perez 6 Jermaine Dye
228 Jack The Ripper
169 Louis Pasteur
125 Gil Meche
253 Michael Cuddyer

YESSSSS!!! I GOT JACK! Forget about the ballplayers, screw the dude who de-bugged my milk, I got Jack the Ripper! My scanner knew better than to screw this scan up, lest it get punted out the window. Now, there are plenty of people who don't like the idea of boxers, horse breeders, presidents or scientists in a baseball card set at all, but you have to remember that Allen & Ginter originally put out dozens of trading card sets with hundreds of subjects and only a tiny handful of cards were of baseball players. Ok, fine, you say. We'll deal with a few historical figures in the set, its not like they are inundating us with quadrupeds, fruit or girls with parasols, but why include a serial killer for crying out loud? Well, Allen & Ginter World's Champions second series was released in 1888. Saucy Jack took his first victim in, you got it, 1888. See, Topps has this all figured out.

Ok, fine, you say. We get the whole synergy of it all. But why the hell are you so happy to get a trading card of someone who committed some of the most horrible crimes in history? (warning: don't click that link). It's pretty simple actually, I've been kind of fascinated with serial killers and True Crime nonsense due to an incident when I was a kid. (Warning: don't click that link. When you click that link, for the love of Pete don't click on the 'victims' link) My grandfather got us cable TV pretty early on, in the late 70's or so, back when a lot of the programming was one step above the local access channel. (WARNING: I'm serious. Do not click that link. When you click that link and then click on the 'victims' link, whatever you do, do not stare at the mugshot of Mary Kelly) We had HBO and they had all manner of cheesy programming on including a bizarre documentary series of such subjects as unsolved crimes, famous spies and infamous serial killers featuring Ed Gein, The Zodiac Killer and Our Friend Jack. (WARNING: Do NOT click that link! When you click that link and then click on the 'victims' link do NOT stare at the mugshot of Mary Kelly for five minutes and wonder why they chose a picture that didn't include her face) Of course my impressionable curious young mind was drawn to such things and I ended up watching most of the serial killer show late one night, staring at the screen in bug-eyed fascination before my mom realized what I was watching and made me turn it off and go to bed. (WARNING: DO NOT click that link!! When you click that link and then click on the 'victims' link do NOT stare at the mugshot of Mary Kelly for five minutes and wonder why they chose a picture that didn't include her face before it suddenly dawns on you in a moment of terrible, horrible clarity that OHDEARSWEETJESUSTHATISHERFACE!!!) So I went off to bed, in my dark, dark room, with those images emblazoned upon my mind. (warning: don't blame me, I tried to warn you) Now you have a little insight into just what the hell happened to make me turn out like this.

Still, it's not like serial killer trading cards are anything new. (these links are ok. what, don't you trust me?) This one is positively tame, it just shows a guy wearing a fedora and a Dementor's cloak. The back is a cop out too, Topps doesn't even name who did it! Everyone knows it was totally Lewis Carroll. He practically confesses in The Walrus and the Carpenter. If there is an Allen & Ginter series three, hopefully Topps will include a card of the Zodiac Killer. There's already a bunch of movies and books about him, so why not? Plus it would be the perfect opportunity for Topps to show just how committed they are to providing innovative relic cards to the hobby. Forget dog autographs and presidential haircut clippings, isn't the hobby ready for a card featuring a certified cipher cut from one of the Zodiac's letters to police, or an official Paul Stine evidence swatch relic card? Ok, I crossed way over the line with that last one, I'll stop now.




Two thirds of the way through and this box is dead, dead, dead. How will I pad out one more post when everything left is commons and short prints that I still can't positively identify? Find out in our next installment: Packs 17-24.