Baseball Card Tournament: Second Round - West Regional

First round's over, time for these cards to prove they belong in the Sweet Sixteen. Make sure you vote for the best cards, you will decide which ones make it to the Finals.

Note - I'm too wiped out to finish the post but I'm going to post it anyway so people can vote. I don't want this tourney lasting till May. Updates are in italics.

West Region

#1 1955 Harry Agganis

This is one of the first vintage cards in my collection. It's also one of the most egregiously abused.
I got this card when I was about 8 or 9. My mom used to go to an antiques place off I-85 in Norcross looking for furniture and she's bring me along sometimes. There were a couple of dealers there who sold cards and I'd get a couple when we went. One guy was selling this card and boy, did he sell it. I got the full life story of the great Harry Agganis, how he was a college marvel at Boston University, he signed to play baseball with his hometown team and was tragically taken in the prime of life... Long story short he sold me this beat to hell card for probably 3 times what it was worth in the condition it was in. I don't think I minded though because it was an old card with an amazing story and it was a rookie card, back when that was an exotic term. Not only is this a rookie card it's an only card, as Harry fell ill in the middle of his second season with the Sox and died of a pulmonary embolism. Thousands of Bostonians attended the Golden Greek's wake and Boston University's arena is named in his honor.
vs.
#8 1988 Score Reggie Jackson Tribute
Reggie in an Orioles uniform? Can you imagine the conversations with Weaver?




#5 2007 Bowman Chrome Draft Yunel Escobar Refractor
Watching Yunel in Spring Training is giving me Rafael Furcal flashbacks. Oh yes, this is a good thing. A very, very good thing.
vs.

#4 1995 Score Don Mattingly Platinum Team Set
This is my second-favorite Score set and it kills me that it's totally ignored. I got this redemption-only parallel card out of a dollar grab bag. No respect. No respect at all.
I really like the '95 Score set although it's not very well regarded nowadays. I think it's the most attractive design of all the Score sets, the beige and green just work for me. The set had a foil parallel that was typical of the time, but Score threw in a twist. the also inserted a coupon that would allow a collector to trade in a set of the foil cards for this Platinum team set. Now you could only redeem the set if you had the coupon and a complete team set. so who knows how many of these actually hit the streets. I've only actually seen a couple of these card and never a set, so I was really surprised to find this as a throw in to a grab bag. It's a star too, not some scrub. Ok, so it's kind of obnoxious looking. It's an obnoxiously rare Mattingly card, that's worth more than a throw in, right?





#11 2006 Upper Deck All Time Legends Jimmie Foxx

X is the first
Of two x's in Foxx
Who was right behind Ruth
With his powerful soxx. — Ogden Nash

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#14 1980-1981 Topps Rudy Tomjonovich, Eddie Johnson and Doug Collins
The other half of the triple card bracket features Eddie Johnson in a coach sandwich. I bought a vendor's box of this stuff for 7 bucks back in the 80's. I got a complete set out of it, too bad it's a separated complete set.





#10 1993 Upper Deck Robin Yount Glow Stars
What a beautiful, beautiful mess this card is. Back when companies actually put some effort into the cards they marketed towards kids.
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#2 2002 Fleer Greats of the Game Tony Oliva Autograph
Tony was one of the absolute best hitters of his time, but since he hasn't made the Hall yet no one knows who he is anymore. Thank goodness for ignorant collectors chasing rookie 'graphs looking for the 'next big thing' that allow me to pick up an auto like this for 5 bucks.