New Additions and a Bold Claim

First, the claim.
Give this maybe 2-3 months. I've been seeing a trend in conversation, facebook comments, news interviews and so on. First off, it was kind of funny. Then it was being taken slightly more seriously...

But here it is. By the end of the summer,

ascots will be IN.

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Anyways. The extreme lack of new options (in the North) in baseball and hockey cards (the newest release up here is '10 Heritage Baseball.) has me doing pretty much nothing but sniffing around for some more trades and snapping up singles off of eBay. I did purchase a blaster of '09 T206 today, but it was a waste.

As many/none of you may know, I am working on putting together one of the hardest memorabilia sets of all time (seeded 1:288 pack back in the day); 2000 Metal Base Shredders. If you're unfamiliar with the cards, they're fully holo-foiled out game used base pieces of players who "shred the bases". And no, it does not mean fast players. Apparently it was a set more for hitters, and, well, Eric Munson.

For $2.24 Shipped, I picked up this beauty:
Big Mo Vaughn. Rumble, rumble, rumble. How sweet would a patch card be made from that jersey?

Next up, everyone's favorite 20-something who has not pitched in the Bigs for almost 2 full years, Dustin McGowan. The only reason McGowan is my #1 collecting interest is, well, Shaun Marcum's cards suck. Poor photos (except '06 UD), only 2 autos with a few variations, and pretty much allllll base cards. Just not worth the effort. Maybe if he wins 15 games this year that will all change.

First up, 2004 Bowman Autograph:
Not bad. But green? Maybe the Oakland cards looked good in '04.

Next, 2006 Topps Chrome Red Refractor s/n #30/90. Nice, rare, refractory goodness.
So that's red, blue and black complete for this rainbow. Still need base, refractor and xfractor. Doable.

And now, what you've all been waiting for.
My new favorite card.
All the glory of the CN Tower.
Bright eyed and bushy-tailed young Blue Jay form Georgia.
Oh, and inked:
What a glorious card.

**There is currently 0:35.8 second remaining in the Eastern Conference Finals. Mike Richards, the one player I would rather have on my team than ANY other NHL player, just set up a tap-in for Jeff Carter. This team is nasty, nasty, nasty. Chicago is gonna have a bit of a challenge on their hands.