You've Got Mail #19: Mark Hoyle

Being a part of the SuperTraders group has afforded me the opportunity to receive and swap cards with people I've only read about in legends. One of those is Mark Hoyle who graciously sent a nice bubble mailer full of vintage cards.

The top three players of the batch, Tony Perez, Dan Driessen, and Pedro Borbon. Driessen was the guy who took over for Perez beginning with the 1977 season, which as far as I'm concerned, is the first post Big Red Machine season. The Perez card will find it's way into a top loader soon and will reside with my "good cards", the other two will go into the Reds binder (which really needs to be organized and cleaned up).

Hal McRae was another good player, but he's best known for his time in Kansas City and for being the dad of Brian McRae. If that Ross Grimsley card looks familiar, it should. Brian from HSCA had sent it as well in a trade pack, except the one he sent was a blank back. This one from Mark is just the regular card. Pretty cool to have two different versions of the same card from two different traders.

Another batch of nice early 70s cards. Kinda strange to see Merv Rettenmund airbrushed into a Reds uniform. The "In Action" cards are pretty nifty too.

Hey! How did this get in there! It's not a vintage card! Even though it's not vintage, it's still appreciated. I love getting these old Post cereal oddball cards, no matter the year. As a kid, I often wondered how they were able to get the player photographed in a logo-less uniform. Later on I realized it was through the magic of photoshop that Post was able to pull this off.

Lastly, a few vintage Bengals cards. My Bengals collection is sorely lacking in vintage cards, so these are extremely helpful. Bob Trumpy is the biggest name in this batch. After his playing days were over, he would have success as a broadcaster for NBC and had his own local weeknight sports talk show on 700 WLW, the show that is today simply known as "Sports Talk".

This was a great first package from Mark and I'm looking forward to many more packages like this. Hope you enjoy the return!

1988 Cincinnati Bengals HuDey Beer

Just a quick post today as it's my wife's birthday weekend and we've got a ton of stuff to do.

Last weekend we were visiting my aunt up in Akron, about 3 hours from where I live. While we were there, for some reason she started rummaging through her liquor cabinet. Along with producing a bottle of Baileys that expired 20 years ago (yes, 20 years ago) there was this, a special "collectors edition" of HuDey beer from 1988 that has never been touched. I immediately snapped a few photos on my phone, loaded them on my laptop, and started researching. 

Judging from what I could find, this was released by the Hudepohl Brewing Company before the 1988 season. As I mentioned in a previous article, Hudepohl was one of the top breweries in Cincinnati, along with Schoenling. This wasn't the first edition of this special beer to be released either. here was a special edition released in 1982 to commemorate the first Bengals team that went to the Super Bowl. Recent eBay sales showed that this wasn't worth much, somewhere in the $6-$8 range but if it was a can from 1982, then perhaps it would have been a bit more.

In and of itself, the can is pretty cool. I like the design on the front, which is pretty reminiscent of the MGM title screen. You know the one, the roaring lion that shows up at the beginning of movies every now and then. The back has the schedule, both regular season and post-season along with a picture of Riverfront Stadium and a Bengals helmet.

Now the big question, did we pop the top on this? That would be a no. No one was brave enough to open it and take a swig of 28-year old beer. That would have been a disaster for sure. I suppose if we really want to try it that bad, we should just wait until the fall when local brewer Christian Moerlein will release it in six-pack bottles.

Mail Call!

We interrupt this programming for a special announcement ...

The first wave of Super Trader packages and a package for a non-Super Trader was dropped off at the post office this morning. If your zip code is listed below, be on the lookout for something invading your mailbox soon:

02766
13669
20904
26505
95119

The next wave will be going out soon.

Back to your regularly scheduled programming tomorrow.