You've Got Mail #42: Highly Subjective & Completely Arbitrary

I've been trading with Brian of the Highly Subjective and Completely Arbitrary blog since last summer. I've sent him a few things, he's sent a few PWEs in return. His latest envelope packed a huge punch.

I'll start with these Tony Perez cards. I was a little confused when I saw them as I thought "wait a minute, why are there two Perez cards from 1977 Topps?" I thought maybe the Expos one was a Traded card but when I flipped them over to verify, it clicked, the Expos card in an O-Pee-Chee! I should have figured, knowing Brian is the master of old school OPC cards. 

1992 Donruss isn't one of my favorite designs but at lot of oddballs used the design that year, from Coca-Cola to McDonalds as is evidenced by the McDonald's MVP logo in the top right. As I mentioned in a previous post, I'm lacking in Larkin cards from his later years but this E-X card definitely fills a nice spot in that void.

I thought this card was perhaps from one of the Archives sets from the past few years but I was wrong. It's a 2014 Topps Chrome 1989 design. I'm not sure if these were inserts but it's pretty interesting. 1989 Topps is one of the most over produced sets ever but the design is much, much better than the bland 1988 and the very neon-y 1990 set.

Unlike the Hamilton card, I knew this was from Archives. Rob Dibble seems to get his fair share of cards from Topps but the other members of the Nasty Boys bullpen, Norm Charlton and Randy Myers, seem to have zero cardboard love from the major card companies. This is a really cool addition to the Reds binder but I have to ask, what is that on the back of Dibble's head? Is that his hair? If so, that has to be one epic mullet.

Micah Owings came over to the Reds as one of the players to be named later in the Adam Dunn trade in 2008. Although he was a pitcher, Dusty Baker used him more as a pinch hitter since he was one of the best hitting pitchers in the league and hung around for a couple years and left after the 2010 season. Until I saw this card, I'd kind of forgotten about his stint as a Red.

Here's a bunch of random Reds cards spanning players from many different times. I personally like the John Franco and the Joey Votto cards from this batch.

Anytime I see vintage in a package or PWE, it makes it that much better. Dave Bristol has that look of an old school manager with the tobacco in the cheek and seems to be a non-nonsense individual.

These old school Expos cards are super cool. The K-Mart Tim Raines is really cool, especially since the closet K-Mart to me is closing at the end of July. Never mind about how the 1985 Fleer card scanned in, my scanner doesn't seem to like that particular set. I find it interesting how Dan Driessen followed Tony Perez at first base with the Reds after Perez was traded to the Expos and then he did the same thing with the Expos after he was traded by the Reds. Speaking of strange players with the Expos, everyone seems to forget that Pete Rose had a brief run with the Expos in 1984. I'm not sure what the Rose card is from but it's a nice Rose Expos card that I didn't know existed. The back is really strange though ...

I'm guessing that this was part of a Pete Rose poster or puzzle. Regardless, it's pretty cool.

I'll end with some always wonderful vintage Expos cards. The 1975 set is growing on me so I'm pretty happy when I see random singles from the set thrown in trade packs. I'm not exactly sure who Chuck Taylor is, but somehow I don't think he's involved with Converse shoes.

With that, another wild PWE comes to an end. Don't forget, check the blog on August 1st at Noon for a big announcement regarding a super cool project I'll be working on this fall.