Back To Sleep

A while back Night Owl Cards and I had a conversation on Twitter where he tweeted me this.

You're fine.

5-6 a.m.: Pre-prospects. Nobody's awake
6 a.m.-8 p.m.: Rookie cards. Everyone's ALERT!
After 8: Base. Everyone went to sleep.

— NightOwlCards (@nightowlcards) June 21, 2017

This is basically Night Owl's way of explaining the insane hype what happens whenever a rookie comes up and has a great start to his MLB career. We've seen this phenomenon the last few years with flavor of the years like Bryce Harper, Mike Trout, Stephen Strasburg, Kris Bryant, Carlos Correa, Gary Sanchez and Aaron Judge. This is essentially the only reason that Topps Chrome is releveant (those rookie card autos!).

This is the kind of insight I expect from the wise owl. He's been in the hobby longer than I have (even if you limit it to after his return), he's seen the rise of short prints, the shift from a single company releasing cards on a national level to a single company releasing licensed cards on an international level, everything.

In the schedule he tweeted, I'm usually in the 5-6 AM group, possibly even earlier :P. If you ever need a tip of who to really keep an eye out for in the lower levels of Yankees' minor league organization, well, I can at least direct to you to someone who can confirm if the guy I'm thinking of is the right one.

Then when the 6 AM - 8 PM group begins to start waking up and clocking into the office, that's usually when I clock out. I collect minor leaguers hustling their way to the top, not major leaguers.

Of course I do have exceptions.

Like my main PC-guy Luis Torrens.

Torrens has been a big leaguer for nearly four months now. I still collect him.

For good or for bad, he hasn't exploded out of the gate ala Aaron Judge. And he's in San Diego so no one cares about his future potential like people do with Andrew Benintendi. Those two factors keep his value very low.

So even if Torrens is a rookie right now and he's a candidate to either get rookie cards in Update, or sophomore cards in Series 1 (or neither as some of you have pointed out to me), no one is awake for him. Only me.

Well okay, maybe me and the rest of you who keep an eye out for him because you know I'm awake for him lol. You're all the best, BTW.

The fact that people never even woke up for Torrens helps me greatly when acquiring rare limited cards the like the one above.

This is from 2013 Bowman Chrome, meaning that my path to completing the master non-auto rainbow begins.

This printing plate was mine for less than a retail rack pack :P.

Will people wake up and be alert when Torrens has his first official card as a big leaguer? We'll see. Make cards of Torrens already Topps! To be honest though, I kind of see Torrens already skipping right past the 6-8 group and already being in the 9 PM group. No complaints from me if it keeps costs down. I wouldn't want the number of 1/1 Torrenses I have to stay at 12 now would I?

As always thanks for stopping by and take care :).

Double Dip

It's been a while since I was able to enjoy a live baseball game in it's entirety. I actually got to do that yesterday when I stayed for one whole game (the first of a double header).

But before all of that, the autographs.

The key for me this time was getting this custom Jorge Guzman signed. Guzman has been nothing short of a beast during his time in Staten Island and given his success, it wouldn't surprise me if he was up in Charleston by season's end. So I whipped up this custom really quickly and got it signed. I love it. Even if Jorge did sign over his face. Also, I dig the autograph, if he ever signs certified autographs for a company, I assume this signature will change quite a bit.

Guzman didn't pitch in either of the two games yesterday (breaking my streak of games I've attended started by Guzman), but I'm still glad I got this. Guzman is one of the prospects that came over to the Yankees in the Brian McCann trade and is a righty with effortless but still impressive velocity that can sit in the triple digits. Like any fireballer, location and command is still an issue for Guzman but you wouldn't think it given his performance thus far this year. Especially the July 3rd outing (the one I went to) where he went 6.2 IP, struck out 10 batters, and allowed zero runs. Eventually I think he'll come back down to Earth a bit and he'll have to make adjustments again, but that's good. It wouldn't surprise me if he went on to really blossom in the Yankees org like Domingo Acevedo has done so far.

Next up is an autograph of top prospect Wilkerman Garcia. I thought I was done for the year with Wilkerman's IPs (until the team set comes out) but I happened to pull this from some retail packs the other day so, why not? Wilkerman played in the first game and got a single, but was also picked off during the game. Still a lot of promise in him though.

Next up is Will Jones, who actually pitched in yesterday's game in relief. Drafted in the 28th round of the 2016 MLB Player Draft, Jones was a utility guy in college but he's been drafted as a pitcher (in relief). He did pitch as a starter before though. Jones came into the game in the fourth and pitched 1.2 IP. He allowed a run and got one SO.

Last but not least is another 2016 draftee, Greg Weissert. Armed with a low 90's fastball, a slider and a work-in-progress changeup, Weissert has pitched in relief as a pro so far since becoming a Yankee. Weissert may get a few spot starts here and there but his future role hinges on his development of the changeup. Good luck Greg.

And those were my autographs.

The first game was started by Trevor Stephan. The Yankees' third rounder this year. He had some rough stretches but manages to work around the jams he found himself in. A lot of the contact made against him in this game was rather weak, and he managed to hold the Vermont LakeMonsters scoreless for three innings.

The Yankees took game one by a score of 3-1. Dom Thompson-Williams singled Ryan Krill home in the third. Catcher Francisco Diaz, who had a heck of a game by going 3-for-3, later had a two RBI single with the bases loaded to give the SI Yanks an insurance run.

Yankees won the game in 7 innings because MiLB double headers only go 7 innings each (unless there's a tie).

I didn't stick around for the second game, but the Yankees lost that one 6-1. Juan De Paula (who came over from the Seattle Mariners in the Ben Gamel trade) allowed four runs in the first and that set the scene for the rest of the game.

Even so, the Staten Island Yankees were a lot of fun to watch today. Stephan's promising pitching, and the lineup that's full of guys worth keeping an eye on. They're also sitting pretty atop the McNamara division in the standings. A hot start can really make or break your entire season in these short-season leagues.

I'll close out this post by mentioning that it was a special Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle themed day. They passed out these special comics/NYC tourism promos, and Michaelangelo and Raphael actually showed up to the game.

Raph especially enjoyed watching the game.

And that was my latest MiLB game. It might be my last for a while as I wait for the team set to come out (hopefully) soon. For now I have the autographs of everyone I wanted, and I'm sitting pretty.

As always thanks for stopping by and take care :).

2017 IP Auto Count: 21

Personalization

For a while now I've been on a personalization kick. I love the idea of in person and through the mail autographs because for that brief interaction, it was a one-on-one request between you and a baseball player (or whoever you asked for an autograph). Personalizations add more to the experience because that card and autograph is now yours (or whoever you had it personalized to). At least to me.

Which brings me to the latest Staten Island Yankees game that I went to (yesterday).

Last time I was too caught up in getting a Wilkerman Garcia autograph to really focus on much else. This time I really tried to nail down this inscription. I've been doing these inscribed Bowman Chrome autograph things for a while now and I'm starting to like them. Anyone can just buy a Bowman Chrome autograph, but unless your name is Kenny, this one won't be worth much to you. I asked Wilkerman Garcia to inscribe this to me and he was nice enough to comply. This is the refractor version too. I love it. An inscribed Bowman Chrome refractor autograph of a top Yankees shortstop prospect. Wilkerman was the leadoff hitter for the SI Yankees in this game and did a pretty good job. Notching a hit and later recording an RBI.

Here's a personalization that went wrong. I tried asking Gomez for an inscription but my fourth grade command of Spanish failed me and he ended up just signing an autograph on an autograph card :P. I still love how this looks, and at least now I know that the original signature was clearly a Nelson Gomez autograph, and yet, I never thought that my very first autograph on autograph card experience would happen like this. Nelson Gomez had himself a great game for the record, going 2-4 with a home run.

One more inscription for me. This one courtesy of Jeff Degano. Luckily my college grad level English didn't fail me and I was able to get an inscription on this Asia exclusive Bowman Chrome black refractor autograph. It's the lowest numbered autograph I have addressed to me so far.

I also asked Jeff to sign one of the base black refractors for me. I had three so I gave him the other two along with a base BoChro auto that I no longer had a use for thanks to the black ref above. Degano made an appearance in the game in the seventh. Relieving starter Jorge Guzman (who we'll talk about later), and going 0.1 innings pitched with a walk and a strike out. Very encouraging to see.

Okay, my haul wasn't just inscriptions and failed inscriptions, it also included regular IPs like this Leonardo Molina. A good three years after picking this card up on eBay, I finally met Leo and got his signature on this beautiful blue ref. I love how it looks now. The blue ink, the blue border, the blue helmet, everything. Leonardo Molina's been overshadowed in recent times by newer and better outfield prospects but he was still one of the top international free agent picks not too long ago. The Yankees have aggressively pushed Molina (who is still 19 years old) by assigning him to Charleston, a level usually for players at least a year or two older than he is now. It's been a mixed bag but Molina has since been able to breathe and develop regularly at age appropriate levels like Pulaski last year and Staten Island this year. Hopefully he really rakes this year and shows massive improvement in Charleston next year.

As for Leonardo in the game, he went 2-4 and knocked in two RBI in the first to put the Yankees in the lead. Another fun start for the blazing hot Staten Island Yankees.

Last up is the only player who didn't participate in yesterday's game, Drew Finley.
Drew Finley is the highest rated pitching prospect on the Staten Island Yankees this year (although Guzman is not too far behind). The SoCal third rounder is armed with a fastball, changeup and wipeout curveball. He was signed overslot for the curveball basically. Drafted out of high school there's still some ways to go for Finley but so far what he's shown in his time as a pro has been pretty good and promising. Finley was shut down early last year due to elbow fatigue but looks ready to go this year.

I got lucky with Finley being one of the autograph subjects on the concourse at today's game. Usually he's behind home plate charting.

I managed to get all three cards I wanted signed, signed. I gave him some cards for him to keep too (of course).

And those were my autographs. Kinda lighter this time, still need some more, but at this point most of the key ones have been nailed down and I've very happy with my progress so far.

Alright, so discussing the rest of game is largely centered around just how good Jorge Guzman was.
Guzman was one of the pitchers who came over to the Yankees in the Brian McCann deal. Guzman's key feature is his fastball which has been clocked at 100+ mph. In fact he went 102 mph in this very game.

Guzman was on cruise control for most of the game but his bid at a perfecto and no-no ended in the fifth. All told Guzman went 6.2 IP with 10 strike outs and only allowed two hits (no runs). All against his former organization, the Houston Astros' affiliate, too.

Jeff Degano and big leaguer Branden Pinder finished off the game after Guzman left and the Yankees went on to win 5-0. Key hits by the big bats like Wilkerman, Leonardo, Cabrera and Nelson backed what was a very fun night for the Staten Island Yankees from a prospecting angle.

With the win the Yankees improve to 10-2 on the season and are on a three game winning streak. Sidenote, they also swept the Tri-City ValleyCats (the Houston affiliate) with those three wins as well. In a short-season, a hot start like this is what can make your entire run to the postseason. Looking forward to the next few weeks of baseball.

As always thanks for stopping by and take care :).

2017 IP Auto Count: 17