Stuck On You

This place is going to be trade post central for a while, now that the Starchives set is finished and has been printed. I’ve still got just over a dozen to post that came in last year, and I’ve already been quite active as a trader this year. The trusty trades spreadsheet says that I’ve already sent out over 2000 cards in 2019, and it’s only mid-February. All of a sudden that 10,000 card stretch goal for the year isn’t looking out of reach. There are a couple Twitter sales, the recent card show, and a fall trip to a not-so-local card shop to break up the monotony, but it’ll be mostly trade posts until I can get done.

I’ve raved about it here plenty, but the Transaction feature at Trading Card Database certainly makes swapping a bit easier. Sure, blind trades offer a bit more fun and surprise, but when you can send a guy 200 assorted base cards and pick up 120 Panini stickers in one swoop? Well that’s fun.

Of course, all 120 stickers were not for me – you’ve probably already seen that I doled out most of them in trades. I did, however, pick up a full Astros team set (and several other full team sets) from the 1992 Panini Stickers issue, thanks to this swap with Mark G., who is HookedSince68 at TCDB. I still have a few strays hanging out around here to send. Who was it that started up a John Olerud collection? I have a few to send you, including this Panini sticker.

Each team in the 1992 Panini set gets a shiny prismatic logo sticker – which is (a) totally awesome and (b) reminds me of the 1995 Pacific Prism cards – along with 9 players, so this is the full team set. Some teams also have an All-Star or two – I didn’t check, but I think it corresponds to the starters for each league. Houston did not get an All-Star in the set, so this here is your full Astros run: Biggio, Bagwell, my man Casey Candaele, Cami, Andujar Cedeño, Mike Simms, Steve Finley, Gonzo, and Pete Harnisch. If I had to pick a favorite on looks, I think it’s honestly the Harnisch. 

Here are individual scans of the two big names. This is a really fun design! Sure, the positioning of that blue diamond could be improved, but as far as stickers go these are neat. Oh, and they’re on a nice heavier weight backing, unlike the flimsy stickers Topps issues now. 

I did pick up a few extras for myself in this trade, including these of Cal Ripken and Rickey Henderson. These are the All-Star stickers, in the same prismatic glory and without nameplates. How can you not love that outrageous Rickey Henderson? Rickey Henderson has to remind you that Rickey Henderson is number one and Rickey Henderson will wag his finger at you if you think otherwise about Rickey Henderson.