A Chi-Town Package from P-Town Tom

A couple weeks back, P-Town Tom from over at Waiting 'Til Next Year posted his Kerry Wood checklist. After going through my dupes, I found a couple to send his way. I really didn't expect anything back, but as is the way of the blogosphere, Tom was quite generous in return. As he noted in his post, it is not always easy trading with a fan of your own favorite team. 

First up, we have a little tit-for-tat as he sent some Kerry Woods back my way. There were more than just these two, but the others were real shiny and didn't scan real well.

I had several Cubs cards from this Fleer Game Time release but the Wood has so far eluded me. The Talking Sports is an oddball as you may have noticed the lacks of logos and team name. Usually, with two teams in Chicago, they will refer to the Cubs as Chicago (NL), but for some reason, this card has a  C in parentheses. I guess for Cubs? 

Protip: If you type (C) in Microsoft Word, the copyright logo shows up instead. You can (R)egister your (TM) too, FYI.

But I digress. I found the back of the Talking Sports card interesting too.

The card is from 1997, when Wood was still in the minors. The last line of the blurb mentions that Wood started both of his teams's no hitters. Is a minor league no hitter like kissing your sister or something? Are they truly about developing the pitcher and don't care that you have a no-hitter going? I know there have been a couple of multi-pitcher no-hitters in the Majors but usually that involves an injury or a lot of walks. Once maybe, but getting pulled twice? Seems odd. I have questions.

Tom also threw in a couple of autographed cards. Bob Dernier played for the Cubs when I first joined the bandwagon and aside from Ryne Sandberg, has always been one of my favorites. And while I didn't start collecting sets until a couple of years later, 1985 Topps were some of the first packs I remember walking down to the gas station to buy. 

Dave Otto probably spent more time announcing the Cubs than he did playing for them, but since he did radio and I was outside the Chicago area, I remember the player more. Here, Otto is shown with the Tacoma Tigers, the Triple-A affiliate of the Oakland A's at the time. 

But wait, there's more!

How did this South Sider get in the package? Tom must have checked my Want List at the top of the page because Adam Dunn was one of the cards I needed from this long forgotten set from 6 months ago. I have to wrap this set up as any Cubs fan knows at this time of year...we're just a couple months away from next year!

Thanks Tom!

Signature Saturday - Bob Dernier

A couple of seasons ago, the Cubs came to town to play the Nationals. Lou Piniella had just left and Mike Quade replaced him. This moved Ivan DeJesus from first to third base coach and Bob Dernier took over as the first base coach. If I remember correctly, this was his first series.

I took my family to a game, not really thinking about getting autographs, but kind of hoping. I did bring a couple of cards and some of those 3x5 custom W flags I mentioned earlier this week but didn't really expect to come away with anything since I had heard the cubs weren't a great signing team.

We showed up as the gates were opening and made our way towards the third base line (visitor's side at Nats Park). This was a middle of the week game, Cubs vs. Nationals, pre-Strasburg and Harper hype, so it wasn't very crowded. Lots of players walked by, none of them stopped. We tried to be respectful of their pregame routines and stretching and waited til they were heading back towards the dugout but no luck.

Eventually, Bob Dernier walked by and he stopped to sign for us! He signed one of the W flags for each of my kids and 2 old Unocal prints for me.

Showed this off the other day, but here it is again!

Bobby D!

Cubs Gold Glove Winners as of 1984

When I showed him my prints, he said, "Wow, you dug up some fossils!"  He signed the sliding one first and then took a look at the Gold Glove Winners print. He commented that he was in good company on that one and pointed at Ryne Sandberg saying, "Rumor has it he'll be joining us soon."


Now at this point, Quade was still interim manager and there was a lot of speculation that Sandberg would be called up from AAA Iowa to take over. I didn't know whether this was insider information or he was just speculating like everybody else. Well, two years later, I think we all know how that played out. No playoffs for the Cubs and all Sandberg does is win.


Nobody else trying to get autographs seemed to know/care who he was but they still lined up behind me to get his signature because he was a Cub in a uniform. He kept talking to me as he was signing for others which was pretty awesome.


I am left-handed so as I got older, aside from the occasional pitching appearance, I was pushed out of the infield in Little League to center field. While Sandberg was still my favorite player, the other half of the Daily Double, Bobby Dernier was a close second. (And no surprise that Tony Campana is my favorite current Cub!)


We didn't end up getting any current Cubs autographs but that 5-10 minutes with one of my childhood favorites was obviously much better than a few seconds of silence from a current Cub!


I obtained this separately and I've also shown this off previously but here it is again:

Bobby Dernier Ice Cream Helmet

Tab Tuesday

Small tab update today but I'm working on something bigger for next week's Tab Tuesday post.

As I mentioned yesterday, I made a trade over the weekend so I have removed a few things from my Trade List. I know some of these pages are still a work in progress so I will update them as soon as I can.

The Archives case break is coming up fast so let me know if you are interested in any of the remaining teams. I would be willing to make some deals on multiple team purchases so check out the tab to see who is left.

I've also decided, for now, to move my ATCRCS card of the day feature to the Facebook page. My original plan for the blog was to be a place to showcase this collection. However, I have come to realize I have much more than in my collection than just these to talk about and still wanted a place where I could prominently display these cards. I will link to the FB page at the end of a post when I have loaded a new photo so you don't miss any or you can "Like" the FB page and get the updates in your newsfeed.

If you disagree with this decision and would rather see them on the blog, let me know. Today's card of Bob Dernier is already posted so check it out here.