TTM autographs received: Bartolo Colon

The longtime MLB pitcher and fan favorite signed my trading cards I sent back in August c/o the Texas Rangers - even as he has labored through the past two seasons, it's still a thing to see the 45-year pitch for a big league team.

Who knows who is going to pay him to be on their team in 2019 - but it would be nice to see him have one more good run before he finally calls it quits.

2018 Topps Now Jose Briceno #780

With another so-so season for the Angels, my emotional investment tends to meander towards apathy, even though I've still kept up for the occasional Shohei Ohtani / Mike Trout highlight - I picked up this card because it features a more rank-and-file rookie, someone who [for now] might not have that many big league cards out.

I liked the picture in particular though Briceno is sort of obscured with a butt shot - there are several random cameos on the card, with the most obvious and notable being Ohtani.

TTM autographs received: John Kruk

The former MLB player signed my trading cards in about a month c/o the Philadelphia Phillies - the particular card isn't the ideal card to get signed with Kruk wearing a dark jersey top, but it was a random card I plucked out of a card show monster box 'just because.'

Getting the card eventually inked up justified the $0.25 purchase - regardless of how it ultimately looked.

Since he worked for ESPN for 12 years, I've had Kruk's cards in my 'media guys' box for seemingly the longest time - then moved the cards over to my Philadelphia Phillies box when he was hired as part of the broadcast team.

Because I was never able to get the chance to get Kruk in-person, he became a 'scratch the itch' guy for me - especially when I saw some TTM successes posted this past season.

When Kruk was on ESPN, particularly on the Sunday Night Baseball crew, I may have seen him in-person a grand total of one time and he didn't feel like signing - the same time, I think I did end up getting former teammate Curt Schilling, so regardless of everything else, the former MLB ace was a slightly better get than the slick hitting, portly fan favorite.

TTM autographs received: Alfonso Soriano

As far as through the mail autographs go, after seeing at least several 'good' Soriano successes posted this year, I was eager to put together a request [I added $5 as I've seen others doing] to see if I could get some of my own cards signed - admittedly Soriano hasn't been a typical TTM guy collectors have had luck with and sometimes you can only believe so much as far as any particular player [active or retired] actually signing.

I was out of the country for the last couple of weeks and when I came home, it was a pleasant surprise - to get my SASE back in about a month with my cards signed in blue Sharpie.

2018 Topps Fire blaster recap

This was probably my best pull out of a random blaster box of 2018 Topps Fire - this is from the 4-card Gold Minted bonus pack included in each blaster.

I've tried to stay away from blaster box purchases, because they seem like a tease of miscellaneous cards rather than something relatively fulfilling - as is, I kind of liked what these cards looked like, particularly the parallels that seem to pop.

Impulsively, maybe what I’m looking for is a product that reflect the here and now - I want something that looks a little different, a little spacey as opposed to a product that uses a retro design [Topps Heritage, Topps Gypsy Queen, Topps Allen and Ginter, Topps Archives] and/or a product that doesn't really stray from what a baseball card looks like [Topps Flagship].

Topps Fire will never be the product of the year or anything - but maybe worth at least a couple of more looks.