Smattering of Pickups

After many botched attempts at trying to make a blogpost with a coherent narrative with some cards to accompany it, here's instead a bunch of pictures of cards with words to accompany them because I bought them sometime this summer.

Starting with the first Luis Torrens card made in 2021 that I added to my collection. This is also my first card of Torrens as a member of the Seattle Mariners org, as well as him as a first baseman. This may be shocking to hear but Torrens showed that he was mortal earlier this season by having a slow start to the season after a promising September in 2020. It was enough that he was sent down to the triple-A affiliate for the M's and after a few weeks he was back up with the big league club and has proceeded to look like Mike Trout. Well okay not really. but he's been good enough that I embarrass myself on Twitter every other day by going apeshit whenever he hits a dinger. The M's also have firmly tried to keep Torrens' bat in the lineup but shifting him to the DH slot as they give catching reps to their catching prospect Cal Raleigh. Which is fine but that's a total waste of an elite talent. With roster management like that it's no wonder the Mariners have never accomplished anything and never will. Anyway, will Torrens finally get a card as a Mariner in this year's update offering? I don't know and I won't care until I notice eBay listings pop up. In the meantime I just hope Torrens dominates in the ALW and gets traded to a real winner by the trade-happy Jerry Dipoto so he doesn't waste his prime in Seattle like every other Mariners superstar who came before him and will come after him.

Also decided to go after Thairo Estrada's first card as a member of the San Francisco Giants organization. The Giants are not a very well run team so they yo-yo Estrada up and down the minors when they should be keeping him at the MLB ranks instead of continuing to go with unrecognizable no-names. I hope they lose the division to the Los Angeles Dodgers just for that.

The games I went to see in Brooklyn made me a fan of Anthony Seigler, on par with my fandom for Torrens and Estrada, so much so that I decided to nab a Bowman Platinum autograph as I begin to round out some kind of collection. Unfortunately Seigler's injuries have led to him being removed from the most recent top 30 New York Yankees prospects ranking from MLB Pipeline, but hopefully that eases the pressure off and Seigler can really begin to make huge strides going forward as an underdog. He's still incredibly talented and has enough time to have a monster comeback.

Luis Severino has been on the shelf for most of the past three years due to injuries and recovering from Tommy John surgery. Despite that the current card bubble has managed to keep his prices inflated just enough that his autographs are still double-digit territory, a little above the number of innings he's pitched at the MLB level since 2019 (12). I snagged this Topps Finest autograph for a fairly reasonable $15 (though who knows, it could be like $4 in like four years) since I do like the Finest design, and I wasn't going to pony up for a BoChro. Still, Sevy is a former top Yankees prospect and with this I finally have all of the top MLB Pipeline Yankees prospects from 2014 in autograph form, I'll have to revisit that project one day.

So while I didn't get a Sevy BoChro, I did get Anthony Garcia. Garcia is one of the more recent names to join the top prospect ranks for the Yankees. He was signed out of the Dominican Republic in 2017 and he's already made it stateside. Garcia's key weapon is his power, he has the kind of power where you'd think he could legitimately hit a baseball out of every baseball stadium ever. Garcia's been slowed down a bit due to leg injuries ruining his 2019 season and there being no 2020 season period, but he's making up for lost time in the rookie ball ranks and making a lot of noise with his bat. If you're a fan of absolutely clobbered dingers, Garcia is a must watch when he connects.

The 2020 Bowman Chrome class for the Yankees was an absolute goldmine for IFA talent folks, Raimfer Salinas got overshadowed by bigger names in the checklist but he's an interesting prospect in his own right. Salinas was signed by the Yankees as an IFA out of Venezuela back in 2017 and was considered to be one of the top international prospects of that draft class. On the whole Salinas is a solid all-around prospect who is very much a long term project, but if that clicks he could be an incredible MLB talent. Salinas defensively has been said to be a capable center fielder with enough speed to cover a lot of ground and an incredibly strong arm. Offensively Salinas has a lot of adjustments to make in order to capitalize on his power and make steady contact, but as an amateur he was noted for his keen batting eye and his ability to be very patient. Fingers crossed things go well in his development and he piles onto the Yankees logjam at centerfield.

The 2021 Yankees Draft Class was an anomaly in that their first round pick Trey Sweeney didn't have any cards already on the market. Of the other 19 draft picks the Yankees selected and signed to pro contracts only a handful had cards. Which is probably how it should be. One of those few was Chandler Champlain, who the Yankees took in the ninth round of the draft. A right-handed pitcher out of USC, he's armed with a fastball, changeup and a curveball (which has a lot of spin on it as the Yankees tend to like pitchers with an insane amount of rpm on them). Interestingly enough around the time of the draft all I could find were already autographed cards of Champlain, no unsigned ones.

Brock Selvidge was drafted by the Yankees in the third round of this year's draft and is the highest draft position to already have a card. Selvidge is a lefty handed pitcher out of Arizona high school. Armed with a low 90's fastball, a slider and changeup, Selvidge impressed many scouts at the MLB Draft Combine (yes, baseball got one of those too) and became one of the notable players who participated in the combine and improved his draft stock tenfold. Selvidge is still young that there's a long ways to go but if all goes right he could be a very solid MLB starter.

Took me an incredibly long time but a Jonathan Loáisiga autograph is finally mine. Loáisiga's bloodline is chock full of baseball talent as his father was a minor leaguer in the Montreal Expos organization and his brother was a minor leaguer in the Los Angeles Dodgers organization. Initially signed by the San Francisco Giants as an international free agent, two injury filled seasons led to him getting cut and eventually scooped up by the Yankees. With the Yankees he continued to get hurt and needed Tommy John surgery but shortly after he enjoyed a meteoric rise through the minors and made his MLB debut in 2018. Loaisiga was brought up as a starter but as of 2021 he's enjoyed most of his success in the bullpen thanks to his ability to throw absolute heat.

Next up is a fancy shmancy mojo refractor autograph of Alexander "A&G" Vargas. Hailing from Cuba, Vargas was seen as one of the top IFA prospects and the Yankees made sure to nab him by even trading away MLB assets to get IFA bonus pool money to get him. Vargas is a solid shortstop with lots of exciting potential with both the glove and the bat and given how he's already made it stateside it should be fun to see him start to tap into his power in the coming years.

Another autograph that took a long time to fall into my grasp, Deivi Garcia. Garcia's been on my radar for a few years now but I never pulled the trigger and got myself an autograph until recently. The reason why is simply because I was worried what's happening to him now would happen. Deivi had a fast rise through the Yankees farmsystem since being signed out of the Dominican Republic in 2015. His curveball and changeup were practically unhittable during his rise and hopes were high that he'd be able to handle a key role as a starter for the Yankees' big league rotation. Unfortunately 2021 has not gone that way at all. The rest of the farmsystem's arms are wracking up insane numbers of K's but Deivi is going in the opposite direction, he gets hit hard and hit often. He's fallen off Top 100 lists and dropped significantly on the Yankees' top 30 lists as others like Luis Gil usurped him. Why he's having such a down year appears to differ, mostly delivery issues that lead to command and control issues. Leading to runs, lots of runs. That said there is hope that Deivi can regain some form and bounce back next year. Lord knows the Yankees always need whatever rotation help they can get.

Believe it or not this is my first certified Bowman Chrome auto from 2019. Michael King's been in the NYY system for so long that I kinda forget he was originally a Miami Marlins prospect who was acquired in the Caleb Smith and Garrett Cooper trade. King made his MLB debut in 2019 and eventually became a member of the Scranton shuttle/taxi-squad being yo-yo'd up and down triple-A and quad-A whenever the Yankees needed an arm. King's 2021 season started off shaky but he eventually came into his own a few weeks into the season, he has an immaculate inning to his name after all. Unfortunately a finger issue put him on the IL back in July and he was transferred to the 60-day DL not long after, injury bug's at it again.

There were a few more acquisitions I've made but I'll end it here since this is getting far too long. The key note is that now I've filled in the gaps for many holes in my Top 30 MLB Pipeline NYY Prospects project. 2014 and 2020 are effectively done and many others are within my grasp (blasted Garrett Whitlock having a good year in Boston). But this scattered splurge finally accomplished what TTMs and IPs weren't going to be able to do (or at least serve as a placeholder until they do).

As always thanks for stopping by and take care.