Well.....This Stinks

    If y'all don't care about my perils when it comes to fantasy sports, then you need not read this post. If you do care, knock yourselves out. I have a real post, so to speak, coming out tomorrow.

    Coming into yesterday, the last day of the week, I was tied in both of my fantasy leagues. It was the first round of the playoffs. Might I start with my worse team?

    After a last seed championship run last year, I always name my team The Atlanta Scareds come the playoffs.Well, I was losing 13-0 after day one of this matchup, but I closed the gap pretty well. Not enough, I guess. It's the first time I made the playoffs in this league, and not the championship.

    I have too much to say about this matchup. I beat my opponent both times we met in the regular season, and when I signed off Saturday night was up 7-4. Then I got Jacob deGrom on waivers and Riley Greene had an amazing game. Then a few things happened against me, like Josh Jung not being in the lineup, Zac Gallen pitching less than ideally, and a couple other things. But I was up 6-5 at about 8:40 last night. All that needed to happen was Teoscar Hernandez and Tommy Edman stay quiet. Well, they both homered. This put him in the lead in homers, though Riley Greene hit two for me yesterday. Thus, I lost. (I was Super Hot Spicy Squid by the way)

    I thought that I had a chance in both of my leagues, and a chance to win it all with Super Hot Spicy Squid. Well, that's just how it goes. To be honest, I'm not upset though. It was a long season for me, my first time ever with two teams. 

    I apologize for this whole post, but figured my plight was rather interesting. Feel free to come back to the blog tomorrow, where I'll have a real post. Thanks, for reading, happy collecting, and have a great week!

    And in the words of Truman, 'Good morning, good afternoon and goodnight."

Player of the Week 3

     This Player of the Week thing really hasn't worked out the way I thought it would. I mean, there was a particular list of players that I expected to win, and not one of them got the title. After this week, there will be two more Players of the Week, and I can't award them to all the six or seven guys I originally thought would win. But that's the fun in it, right? My own bias has been unable to sway me (except for the part about Walter Pennington; that's on me).

    Before we get down to it, I'd like to announce that both of my fantasy baseball teams are fighting like dogs in this first round of the fantasy playoffs. My worse team is currently losing 10-5, but have made it as close as 8-7, and my other team, boy my other team! I'm playing the third place squad, and it is an all-out nuclear war. Currently I'm up 7-5, but that one could still go either way.

    I bring this up for two reasons. A) I like to share about fantasy baseball to those who both understand it all and who I won't drive insane with it (hence the reason I've done it so many times), and B) well, you'll see.

    There is one prejudice that stops me from keeping this, well, as fair as it could be. Not like it matters, considering it's my personal opinions. Heck, like Walt Pennington would've been the best player in the MLB for the whole of last week! Not even in that one game. 

    Anyway, that prejudice is my team. Since I can sometimes hit a few games and see my guys up close, they tend to grow on me. We'll call that reason C. I didn't go to another Rangers game, but I think y'all know who my next Player of the Week is. Any guesses? I'll give you a moment.....

    Alright. If you've had enough time, you may continue to read.

    

    Of course, as a Rangers fan and a huge fan of this guy, my third Player of the Week is.....

    Okay, here we go. deGrom finally made his 2024 debut yesterday, tossing 3 2/3 scoreless innings and striking out four. My friend actually went to (GTT, please correct me on this when I'm wrong) his last rehab outing with AA Frisco.

    And now for the illusive reason B, why sharing about my fantasy playoffs is at all relevant to this. Well, I don't know how many enemies are out there, so I should probably share this tomorrow.......

    

    Well, I won't. Somebody in my fantasy league (the one I'm barely winning in) dropped deGrom literally the day before his long-awaited season debut. I have higher waiver priority than any playoff member in that league, except for my current opponent. While his addition of him wouldn't hurt my team this week, I really want him on my team as we make a push for the championship. But the waiver period ends tomorrow, so we'll see if I get him.

    Well, now that I'm done rambling about fantasy baseball (and I will most certainly not start on fantasy football), I guess I should go. After all, I've got to be somewhere in half an hour. As for y'all, thanks for reading, happy collecting and I'll see who wins my penultimate Player of the Week title next Saturday. Y'all enjoy your weekend! 

The Guy was Traded for Chris Sale

    In December of 2023, Vaughn Grissom was traded over to the Red Sox from the Braves in return for Chris Sale and cash. 

    Vaughn Grissom came up in August of 2022 after hitting well over .300 on the farms. He played very well in his 41 games that season, slashing .291/.353/.440 with 5 home runs. The middle infielder seemed promising coming into the next season.
    In 2023, Grissom played in only 23 games, where he slashed .280/.313/.347 before being optioned back down due to bad fielding. Then he got traded. For Chris Sale.

    Sale right now is the best starting pitcher in baseball, with MLB best 2.38 ERA, 213 strikeouts, 11.5 K/9, and 2.02 FIP. 
    Meanwhile, Grissom is batting .238 in AAA for the Sox. He has played 23 games in the majors, and is batting .148 in 81 at-bats. I hope he can get back on track by next year, because he is a very talented young player, who I believe can be very good in the near future. But for now, it just looks like the Red Sox made an awful trade.

    The reason I bring this all up is because I fairly recently traded for a Spring Fever Chris Sale card (YES!) and a 2023 Vaughn Grissom parallel.

    Like a lot of my parallels from 2023, this one was numbered to the year. 

    I wouldn't call myself a collector of the Spring Fever cards, but if I can find a good one, I'll take it, as evidenced by one of my previous posts (one of my most popular posts actually).

    The Nolan Jones RC was part of the Spring Fever deal, so I figured I'd put him in anyway.

    Well, I guess only time can tell what the outcome of the Sale/Grissom trade is. Like I said, I have faith in Grissom going forward, but Chris Sale is kind of working on both his first Cy Young award and his Hall-of-Fame case. Of course, Sale will be entering his age 36 season next year, so we'll see how it goes.

    Have a great week y'all! As for me, back to my busy schedule for now. Happy collecting!

Player of the Week 2

     Alrighty folks, it's time for our second Player of the Week. I apologize for being a bit late, but I was really busy today with baseball games and the like. Anyway, the guy I have chosen for today is not one you'd expect, and there's an interesting reason why I chose him.
    My second Player of the Week is......

    

    Walter Pennington.

    In case you didn't know, Pennington is a rookie relief pitcher who was acquired by the Rangers via a trade with the Royals (we traded Michael Lorenzen straight up for him). Pennington is my favorite relief pitcher of all time, so when I went to the Rangers/Yankees game on Wednesday I was really hoping that Pennington was going to make an appearance. I was dismayed when we jumped out to a 10-2 lead (not a high-leverage situation) and saw Andrew Chafin warming in the bullpen.
    But Pennington came on in the eighth nonetheless and fired 2/3 of a scoreless inning against the Brooklyn Bombers, his only flaw being a single to Juan Soto. 
    So that was a really special experience for me, and therefore I had to give him the title of Player of the Week for this week. 

    I took some live video of Pennington throwing to Juan Soto and Jazz Chisholm, but can't upload them on the computer. 

    That'll about do it for my second Player of the Week. As always, thank you for reading, have a great rest of your weekend, and happy collecting!

    P.S. The ninth inning of that game was insane! I was going to mention it in a separate post, but since Pennington pitched that game I figured I'd just post it here. If y'all aren't interested, skip the italicized part. But if you are, go ahead and check it out. It is very long though (😁).

    This is my personal account of Wednesday's ninth inning against the Yankees:

     The ninth inning was probably the most entertaining inning I've ever seen live at a baseball game (which isn't necessarily saying too much). Matt Festa is on the hill for the Rangers, with a more than comfortable 10-2 lead. The first two batters fly out to Travis Jankowski (Janko made a diving catch; they need a cage to contain him!). Then things got......messy.
    Festa walked pinch-hitter Oswaldo Cabrera (yikes) and then Jose Trevino. He proceeded to also walk lead-off man Gleyber Torres before heading to the clubhouse. The new pitcher was Grant Anderson who was set to face 2-3-4. Since they were down 10-2, Trent Grisham came in as a defensive replacement for the already 3-for-3 (with a home run) Juan Soto. So we're thinking it's the end for the Yanks, right?
    Wrong.
    Grisham hit a grand slam, making the game now 10-6. Then the defensive replacement for Aaron Judge, Duke Ellis, comes to the plate. The rookie was 0-for-4 in his career (9 games in 2024) before tonight. So the Yankees are really done this time and we can go home now, right?
    Wrong again.
    Ellis got his first big-league hit, a single to leftfield. Now Jazz Chisholm is batting, and we're starting to break out in a sweat just a little bit. Chisholm hits a 103 MPH comebacker off the leg of Grant Anderson, removing him from the game.
    It's a save situation now, so it's Kirby Yates time. All he has to do is get one little out so we can go home. 
    Well, he's facing Giancarlo Stanton.
    For the first time all night, Stanton decides to battle. The count is 2-2 when he hits an absolute shot to leftfield. Well, it's time to sit back down. It's not a happy house in Arlington yet.
    But gliding through the air like an angel is Wyatt Langford, who leaps the wall and takes a home run away from Stanton to end the game. It's a 10-6 Rangers win, and save number 26 for Kirby.

Shiny deGrom

     I was at the good ol' grocery store, when I saw a package of 29 2023 Topps cards for $7 by the checkout. While certainly not the greatest price in the world, the thing that jumped out at me was the headliner; Silver Pattern Foilboard #48 Jacob deGrom. I couldn't pass up that deal and made the purchase.
    The company selling these cards is able to sell Topps cards for less money than the company itself sells them for, which I found both interesting and economically helpful.

    And here's the foilboard deGrom. Beautiful, isn't it? When I first saw it I thought 'Shiny deGrom,' but I guess theSilver-Pattern Foilboard is more accurate. deGrom should be returning to the Rangers rotation soon, but it seems to be too little too late. Hopefully he'll be healthy for next year as we try to clean things up a bit. 

    I like the Alec Burleson rookie. The 25-year old is having a great season with the Cardinals, slashing .280/.320/.453 with 21 home runs and 72 RBI. 
    Those Athletics uniforms (top right) are......interesting. Not really sure that they got the colors right, but oh well. It doesn't look bad. 
    Also, the highlight of this page, the Topps Update purple foil Dominic Smith numbered 095/799. It's a nice card, but I'm putting it on my trade bait list. If any of y'all want it, go for it. 

    Not much coming out of this page. The Aaron Nola card is nice. I kinda like the Stars of MLB cards as a whole, though I miss reading the stats on the back. Hey, at least it's not Stars of LMB! Otherwise, just a few base card 'needs,' though I don't really try to collect the full sets.

    I like this page a bit more. I got another deGrom card, as well as a Corey Seager parallel. I like the Max Fried card, though I have like fifteen of that same base card. Stars of MLB Shohei Ohtani is cool too. And boy is he having a year in 2024 with the Dodgers. Though unable to pitch until next year, he's currently batting .292 with 44 homers, 109 runs (both league-leading), 98 RBI, and a .993 OPS in 135 games.  

    And these two guys. 

    I notice that I said I got 29 cards, but only 28 are shown. It seems evident that I traded one of these cards before writing the post, most likely a base card dupe, but I don't know for sure. That's on me.

    All in all I'm happy about this purchase. Though most of it was pretty boring, there were a few good points; the deGrom foilboard, of course, as well as Dominic Smith and Corey Seager. I will never complain about some Stars of MLB cards either. I like the 2023 design on them a lot. 

    That'll about do it for this post. Y'all have an amazing week, and happy collecting!

    

    P.S. I know I promised Fuji a post focused on Jackson Merrill, but I'm gonna take a little bit longer than intended because I have been really busy lately and need to do more research (as of right now I only have some stats, but for a post centered on one guy I want more information), but it's definitely going to happen.