2006 Upper Deck Ovation Andre Ethier (RC) #125

I had an image of this card saved for at least the past 10-15 years and wanted to see if I could buy it outright - it looks like Ethier doesn't have much bat left after being sawed off, so it's was a neat broken bat shot I could slot into my themed mini-collection.

I assume this serial #'d (RC) of a longtime, if now retired Los Angeles Dodgers fan favorite is not hard to find - presumably I could have bought it at any time, but it might be a case where there might not be as many copies posted on sale at one time.

It was only during one random eBay search, where I remembered the card - did I feel comfortable paying a couple of dollars for the card and another couple of dollars to have it shipped to me, where I was able to scratch the itch.

2021 Topps Chrome NPB Nippon Professional Baseball Roki Sasaki #194

A little bit of FOMO got me pulling the trigger on picking this card up for roughly the price of a blaster box - there will likely be countless rookie-year MLB issues released soon enough, especially Sasaki can build on the hype he has generated over the past five years in Japan.

On the other hand, where I'm not a Dodgers collector - maybe a non-MLB card ends up more as a novelty, where I'll wait to see if he is healthy to withstand the rigors of a MLB season, to decide whether I'll softly scoop up his MLB cards as I find them.

TTM autographs received: Sid Fernandez

I have not kept up with TTMs through the past year, but occasionally see a success posted [on social media] that intrigues me - especially when I do not have either TTM or in-person history with getting a former player's autograph, like the former MLB pitcher from the 1980s through the mid 1990s.

I realized that Fernandez had 1984 Donruss #44 RC and 1990 Leaf #66 cards that I did not have in-hand - I needed to hold off sending out to him until I was able to get the two particular cards.

I ended up picking up the cards online and once received, sent them off along with an oddball Dodgers issue I pulled apart from a perforated sheet and a 1991 Upper Deck #242 - it looked like the responses from 'El Sid' were quick and I got my cards back signed in a week.

Shohei Ohtani marches onto greater heights

He's not a ride-or-die guy for me anymore, but I had to get a copy [on eBay] of Shohei Ohtani's Topps Now card commemorating his 50 home runs / 50 stolen bases feat - understanding he just wasn't going to end up anywhere with his old team, a little part of me will be real excited in a couple of weeks when he is playing in the postseason for the first time in his MLB career.

I was passing through the duty free shops at an airport earlier in the year - here is some 'signage' of Ohtani being a face for a skincare product in Japan.

Thank you Shohei Ohtani and good luck

I did not want to get caught up in the news cycle of Shohei Ohtani signing with the Los Angeles Dodgers on social media - because in my own little way, I tend to want to share my two cents, interjecting my thoughts, where it ends up like trying to cope after he's left my home team.

It was a business decision on his end and strangely, I'm kind of glad he is still in So. Cal, where I wonder if the fandom for Ohtani supersedes the idea he is a Dodger - ideally, maybe it was better to see him in some far away place like Toronto, where he maybe he gets to be out of sight, out of mind.

I could understand where it was just about inevitable and logical - where it was always going to be the Dodgers or bust.

I’m probably not collecting his old team cards for one year where they are now dated, while my existing PC ends up being off cards from his old team - I can see where my interest in collecting Ohtani ends up being muted, until things settle down where softly remains one of those universally popular, easy guys to collect.

I abruptly cut the cord on the company that broadcasted Angel games late in 2022, where just before one of Ohtani's pitching starts, I found out there was no Angel channel to watch games anymore - the current streaming TV package that replaced the old cable TV one has the company that broadcasted Dodgers games locally, even though I barely ever tuned in through 2023.

Going forward, I’ll probably be glued into more Dodgers games due to Ohtani alone - even though the Angels are my team.

1.) Maybe said I would cease to be an Angels fan if and when Ohtani leaves - that probably won’t be the case, but losing this larger than life megastar it’s a whole new deal to process.

The Angels have been a bad organization for the past decade where as a fan, I can be a free agent too - but maybe I need to chill with my one lousy team and hope Ohtani defecting to the Dodgers ends up forcing the Angels to be more creative, where they need to do something radical.

2.) $700 million for a DH in the foreseesable season is ridiculous, but while I've always believed in the talent to come back - it softens the blow where Ohtani is only going to be doing one thing [and not two things at once].

3.) There is no reason to think that Ohtani will not have at least multiple seasons where he is pitching and hitting to his full capabilities - but maybe there is a part of me that wants to believe his first MLB team got his best three seasons ever.

2023 Topps Series 1 hit - James Outman auto

Go figure, I finally get lured by a mass email to finally buy something through Larry Fritsch Cards, which was a hobby box of 2023 Topps - maybe I was worried about not getting their print catalogs again, but I know I'm still on their mailing list and browsing through the actual catalog goes over my head real fast.

While flagship Topps is pretty basic, there is a curiosity to see what the new cards are about for the current year - maybe blasters are $25 now, so to change things up, a lone hobby box [rather 3-4 blasters for the year perhaps] might have been a viable purchase for now.

Admittedly, there is no tradition where I bust a personal box of anything each year, though there might be a curiosity to be able to do so - especially a hobby version of flagship Topps, where I'm hoping on that slim chance to pull something nicer, something unexpected.

Bracing myself for some one color relic action of a minor star or rank and file guy, I was glad my hit was an autograph - Outman is unfamiliar to me, but coming up through the rich Los Angeles Dodgers farm system, he has put up numbers and might be a serviceable big leaguer for the next 5-10 years.

My card was apparently the black parallel of the 1988 Topps Baseball autographs inserts - my copy was serial #'d 099/199.

TTM autographs received: Rick Monday

The former big league outfielder and longtime broadcaster signed my cards in about a couple of months c/o Los Angeles Dodgers - he is known for saving the American flag from being burned by a couple of protesters when he was at Dodger Stadium as a member of the Chicago Cubs back in 1976.

Besides his flag saving heroics, Monday was also the first ever MLB draft pick in 1965 and had a 19-year big league career - hitting 241 home runs with a .361 on-base / .443 slugging and an OPS+ of 125, which meant he was about 25 percent better than the average MLB player.

TTM autographs received: Manny Mota

The former big league outfielder and one of the all-time great pinch hitting greats signed my cards in about a week or so - I like how the coaches' cards came out, which came from a couple of team sets.

TTM autographs received: Mark Grudzielanek

The former big league infielder signed my cards in about a month back in April - I don't really think Grudzielanek was a player I paid attention to regularly, where he was more rank-and-file than a star outright, but his seemingly unique last name kept him relatively familiar.

Grudzielanek could hit for average and collected over 2040 base hits in his big league career - looking at his Baseball Reference page, maybe his numbers come off as more modest [.289 batting / .332 on-base / .393 slugging / 90 OPS+].

However, it might be a fun thing for me to break things down and see where Grudzielanek had a run of good, serviceable big league seasons - especially when he seemed more like a grinder from day one, rather than a guy who came into big leagues with any sort of pedigree as a top prospect.

My experiences with some junk boxes of doom - box 4.2

I think these are complete L.A.P.D. / DARE Los Angeles Dodgers sets from 1995 and 1996 - maybe at least a couple of cards from the perforated sheets have been damaged due to the natural conditions, but most cards are fairly clean and if I wanted to separate them, I don't need scissors to do so.

These oddballs are not worth anything but maybe after a certain number of years [25 years] - cards like this end up starting to be old-school curiosities, where it stirs up some sort of faux collecting nostalgia for cards I've never hand in-hand before.

More junk wax era singles in semi-rigids holders - I want say these cards wouldn't look out of place in card magazines from the era, even though the players pictured on the cards never had that lasting power in the hobby.

Maybe I'll set a number of these cards aside in a collecting time capsule of sorts - where I'm reminded that many of these cards were coveted as 'here and now' material from the years I really started collecting.

Finally there are these Topps stickers from 1986 - they are odd sized, flimsy and not something I'm familiar with at all.

I'll try and sort them out just to see if there is any more star power - but this might be it with Robin Yount, half and half combo of Goose Gossage / Jack Morris, half of Pete Rose, Wade Boggs and Jim Rice.

I don't know if I'll bother looking up who's who on these random stickers - like one showing a pair of longtime, shortstops who won Rookie of the Year awards [Alfredo Griffin and Ozzie Guillen] or another picturing Dan Gladden and Dwight Evans.

TTM autographs received: Reggie Smith

After putting together a paid request with $30 to Smith’s promoter, who has handful of former LA Dodgers players signing for TTM for a fee - I got my pair of cards signed in about a month.

Though he is an old-school / vintage era guy, Smith has a couple of coaching cards in sets [2004 Upper Deck USA 25th Anniversary and 2013 Panini USA Baseball Champions] - I'm still trying to get as many signed to this day.

While I wasn't familiar with Smith's MLB playing career, he was a fantastic player from the mid 1960s through the early 1980s - finishing with over 2,000 hits, slugging 314 home runs with a lifetime OPS+ of 137.

TTM autographs received: Alejandro Pena

The longtime big league reliever from the 1980s through mid 1990s signed my cards in about a couple of weeks for $3 per card - unofficially I might start building the 1984 Donruss and 1990 Leaf sets minus the cards I might already have, just so I have cards I can send out for TTM requests and perhaps have a signed / unsigned hybrid in-hand.

I doubt I'll ever pay any sort of premium to get any particular card from the sets signed, but I'd like to see my progress after a couple of years - there is something 'classy' about the sets that appeal to me, even 30-40 years after the fact.

Whenever I think about losing a card somewhere...

I start to hate myself because my claptrap is just a mess - my collections consist of loose unsigned cards, loose signed cards; boxes and boxes of stuff I can’t figure what to make of.

At times, I get this itch to dig out a random card, but don't know where it ended up and I worry it's lost to oblivion - most of the time, it's not some high valued PC card I'm freaking out about, but a card worth a quarter or a dollar at most.

This time, I was trying to figure out where a 2014 Ogden Raptors Victor Gonzalez card ended up - maybe the Mexican lefty didn’t just come out of nowhere, but to reach the big leagues in 2020, Gonzalez took the scenic route through the Los Angeles Dodgers system.

I bought the Raptors team set years ago because it had what I think was Cody Bellinger’s first minor league team set card - I wanted to have an early pro card of the hot rookie back in 2017.

I didn’t know who Gonzalez was, but took note when he was at Rancho Cucamonga for part of the 2019 season - most minor leaguers from a minor league team set end up being cut and five years after the fact, it was funny to have a card of a guy still jugging along.

In a closet, I looked through my assorted bags that made up my 2019 spring training trip - the card wasn’t there in my main Los Angeles Dodgers binder.

I always try to believe any card I'm missing at the moment isn't really gone - but logically somewhere relatively safe, even if I don't have it handy.

I thought must have the Gonzalez card a tiny loose pile somewhere on the dining room - where it was obscured by the other cards that accumulated.

I dug around through the boxes I’d brought to my room from the dining room - servicing as other temporary places I’ve squirreled some team related cards away.

I decide to dig around through the closet again because sometimes I don’t take the time to look through things - go figure, the card was in a binder I’d prepped for some Dodgers backfield action, specifically the day when Corey Seager was playing in one of the minor league spring training games.

I probably looked through the binder at least once already but missed seeing the Gonzalez card the first time around - I took the card out of the photo corners and placed in a plastic sheet in the binder, so the surface is protected a little bit as opposed to being left as is for probably a few more years.

TTM autographs received: Jeff Shaw

The former big league closer signed my cards in about three weeks - including a 2001 Fleer Tradition, a set I'm still trying to get as many cards signed from, even after all these years.

TTM autographs received: Billy Ashley

The former big leaguer signed my cards in about a couple of weeks - the thick Sharpie Ashley used was good enough and bold enough for the cards I sent him, including the 1993 Upper Deck where teammate Eric Karros makes a cameo.

Ashley had big time power potential, but unlike some of the early 1990s era Los Angeles Dodgers prospects who would have big league success - Ashley never was able to put things together in parts of 6 seasons with the Dodgers.

He was a random guy for me to send to, but I needed to scratch that itch and not have to worry about my cards unsigned - if and when all or some of the cards I sent made it back to me.

I want to say he lives in the So. Cal area, where he has showed up for Dodgers alumni events / signings over the past decade - I set his cards aside a couple of years ago but held off on mailing them out.

1997 Bowman’s Best Adrian Beltre RC #117

I wanted a Beltre rookie card and grabbed this as an impulsive purchase to squirrel away - the 1997 Bowman Chrome RC #182 is the one to have, but maybe I’ll wait a little bit before seeking that one out.

This maybe a condition sensitive card as chrome cards from the 1990s tend to ‘hulk’ when exposed to the weather conditions - the copy of the card I picked up doesn’t appear to be discolored, though I have to account for when it happens.

Admittedly for the longest time, up through when the retiring Beltre was gunning for his 3,000th hit - I didn’t think much of him as having the numbers to merit any sort of serious consideration for the Hall of Fame.

I’ve always thought he was a minor star at best who lucked into a flukish season in 2004 - after collecting his 3,000 hits in 2017 and passing Rod Carew in 2018 as the all-time Latin American hits leader, Beltre's baseball playing accomplishments have the substance as he looks to become a first ballot Hall of Famer in five years.

Accounting for his all-world defense, the hitting numbers and the quirkiness he’s occasionally exhibited, Beltre has become a fan favorite to be goofed on in good fun - he didn't he like his head touched by his teammates and he had one of the most exaggerated follow throughs on his swing.

He and Texas Rangers teammate Elvis Andrus never get tired of messing around with each other - Andrus seems to be Beltre’s best friend on the field, but also his main antangonist.

My decade stars collection - quirks

While baseball card collecting leads itself to being a hoarder, with the sheer number of cards - I see building up a book of decade stars is something I do with leftover cards and not a priority.

Maybe I get a little jealous at the binder guys who seem to have cards that pop like parallels and wonder if I should seek them out as well - as is, what I pull or find is basically what I end up with.

Jason Heyward and Joc Pederson are not 'highlights' of my collections - but they take up a page or two since they were hyped up prospects.

While basically 'meh' players who might be considered disappointments - they still have their moments of usefulness and I'll display their cards, hoping they still have potential to have an all-star season or two.

I don't have a particular order where cards are laid out on a plastic page - though I like to make it where the cards on a plastic page [pockets 1, 3, 4, 6, 7, 9] are facing into the center.

On the image posted, the Heyward cards displayed are on the center of a page, so whether or not a cards face a certain way doesn't matter - on the Pederson cards, they are all facing away from the page, which is a 'no-no' in my book, but what can I do when I don't have enough cards to make it where cards in pockets 3, 6, 9 are facing inward?

I guess technically, I can make things work, though it requires a bit of a mental stretch on my part - the Bowman Platinum card [pocket 3] has Pederson's image actually looking towards the corner border of the card, while the minor league card [pocket 6] has Pederson's image staring squarely towards the Hardee's logo and the Diamond Kings card [pocket 9] has Pederson's image looking away from the page, but there is a border on the card that sorts of 'boxes in' the image.

Featured autograph - Jeren Kendall

I like the look of these 2018 Bowman Atomic parallels and picked up a couple to see how they would look signed - after the fact, any particular signed card is just another I can add to my collection, but I like how this one shines and reflects.

Kendall is a prospect in the Los Angeles Dodgers farm system - in 42 games so far at the Class A Advanced level, he is hitting .232 with 19 stolen bases and a .333 on-base percentage.

Andruw Jones - a borderline HOFer?

I have this 1995 Bowman rookie card [#23] in a miscellaneous binder and I recoil whenever I see it - I remember buying it for something like $30 at the 2000 National Sports Collectors Convention and thought it was going to be a 'money card' of a superstar for years to come.

Maybe card values of any number of random cards probably declined over the past 20 years as players come in and out of collectors' consciousness - but Jones accelerated the dip in values by how his playing career fell apart after leaving the Atlanta Braves.

He got fat when he joined the Los Angeles Dodgers for the 2008 season and then bounced around for years - even playing in Japan for two seasons before wrapping up his playing career.

After the fact, the most interesting thing is that Jones was probably the best center fielder of his generation and may actually have an argument that he's one of the best to play his primary position of all time - this Sports Illustrated story spells out the idea that he's unlikely to get to the Hall of Fame, but pores over his numerous achievements as well as his decline.

TTM autographs received: Tom Niedenfuer

I was able to round up some junk wax era cards for the former big league reliever and he signed them in about a couple of weeks - Niedenfuer was a serviceable pitcher who spent 7 years with the Los Angeles Dodgers through the 1980s.

Unfortunately, despite his success, he was on the wrong end of a couple of big league home runs - hit in the 1985 National League Championship Series by Ozzie Smith and Jack Clark.

After pitching for the Dodgers, he had stints with the Baltimore Orioles, Seattle Mariners and the St. Louis Cardinals - before leaving the game for good at age 31.