Johnsons in San Diego

Benjamin Joseph Johnson was traded from the Cardinals to the Padres for Carlos Hernandez in 2000.  He made his major league debut in 2005 for San Diego, he played off and on in '05 and '06.  He was then traded for Heath Bell and Royce Ring, after that he has played up and down in the Mets organization.  I got this signed through the mail several years ago. 

Brian David Johnson was the backup to Gary Payton at Skyline High School, where the great Bip Roberts attended and is now the coach.  From there he went on to be the quarterback at Stanford University before he was drafted by the Yankees in 1989.  The Padres drafted him in the minor league draft in 1991, and he then played for San Diego for three years starting in 1994, before being traded to the Tigers.  I picked up the Leaf certified autograph from ebay.

Jerry Michael Johnson was a pitcher in the major league from 1968-1977.  He played for the Padres from 1975 and 1976 before being traded to the Jays for Dave Roberts, who had just been purchased from the Padres.  I got this card from the Bay.

TTM sucess and a surprise

In just 10 days Drew Macias returned the Padres team card above and the individual card below.  I had watched him come up through the Padres system and was disappointed when he ended up with the D'backs.  This was the first year that I can remember him having a major league card.  I would have like the card above more if Topps had said who everyone on it was.  Or if an 8x10 version was available.

Today when I got home from work I had an envelope with my handwriting on it and a package from GCRL.  The card below was in the envelope. GCRL had sent me an autographed copy of Steve Garveys autobiography, along with a bunch of Padres cards including several copies of a Bip Roberts card I needed for my PC.  Thanks, Jim, I have some GCRL and OPC stuff accumalating for you.

Jestadt, Jimenez and Jodie

Garry Arthur Jestadt  was drafted by the Cubs in 1965, drafted by the Expos in the expansion draft, traded to the Cubs for Jim Qualls, and then traded to the Padres for Chris Cannizzaro.  He played 167 games for the Padres in 1971 and 1972.  After that he played off and on in the minors through 1980.  I got this signed through the mail several years ago.

D'Angelo Jimenez was drafted by the Yankees in 1994 and was still playing professional baseball.  He is only 32 years old so could still make a comeback.  He played for the Newark Bears and two Mexican League Teams in 2009 and is signed to play for another in 2010.  He played  for the Padres in 2001 and 2002, he came in a trade with the Yankees for Jay Witasick and left to the White Sox for Humberto Quintero.  I think the card was signed through the mail.

Brett Paul Jodie pitched in 8 major league games, all in 2001.  1 for the Yankees and 7 for the Padres.  He was traded from NY to SD for Sterling Hitchcock.  His ERA in one game with the Yankees was 27, and with the Padres it was 4.63.  In his 7 games with the Padres he seems to have been used in a variety of situations, he started three games and then seems to be some sort of middle relief.  I stumbled across the card on eBay and then sent it to Brett to sign and it came back within a week or so.  He is currently the pitching coach for Somerset of the independent Atlantic league.

James Jarvis Jefferson

Donald Chris James was traded for some big names during his career.  The Phillies traded him to San Diego for Big John Kruk and current Padres hitting coach Randy Ready in June of 1989. Then in December of '89 the Padres packaged him with Sandy Alomar, Jr and Carlos Baerga to get Joe Carter from the Indians.  There must of been a perception that there was an upside to James.  I got this card back in the mail, just after I had picked one up on eBay, because the return was taking so long.K

Kevin Thomas Jarvis was a starting pitcher for all three years that he was with the Padres from between 2001 and 2003.  He signed as a free agent with the Padres in 2001 and was traded to the Mariners in January of 2004 in a multi player deal.  I got this Keebler card signed through the mail.

Stanley Jefferson was on duty as a member of the New York City Police Department on the morning of September 11, 2001 and worked on the recovery effort at Ground Zero.  He was of many members of the NYPD who suffered health problems as a result of working at Ground Zero and had to retire from the department in 2004.  What Stan Jefferson did between 1986 and 1991 pales in significance to what he did between 1997 and 2004 as a member of the NYPD.  I do not know how I acquired this card

The Jackson 3

Damian Jacques Jackson had a longer major league career than I thought.  He played 4 seasons in San Diego, which was just a third of his major league career.  He is currently playing for the Orange County Flyers of the Independent Golden Baseball League.  I got this Keebler card signed through the mail.

 Darrin Jay Jackson played 4 seasons in San Diego from 1989-1992.  He also played in Japan, besides playing for both Chicago teams, Toronto, Milwaukee, the Twins and the Mets.  He has been either a TV or radio analyst for the White Sox since 2000. He says that Chicago is home even though he is from California.  I believe that I got this signed through the mail.

R

Roy Lee Jackson was one of the first autographs I got, back in 1986.  I tried to get the entire '86 team Topps team set signed, I got 90% of the set signed.  He only played one year in San Diego, he also played for the Jays, Mets and Twins.

Iorg & Ivie

Dane Charles Iorg played for the Padres in 90 games in 1986 and was released after the season.  He didn't play anywhere in 1987.  He had been playing in the major leagues since 1977, mostly with the Cardinals.  He went to the World Series in 1985 and got the hit that took the series to a game 7, which the Royals won to win the series.  Dane had played against his brother Garth in the ALCS leading up to that series.  I am not sure where I got the card, either eBay or ABC unlimited.

Michael Wilson Ivie was a catcher in the minor leagues who developed a case of the "yips", he was unable to throw the ball back to the pitcher or the second baseman, his throws often were closer to the center fielder than the second baseman.   He was moved to the infield where he played for 5 years in San Diego, before going on to play for the Giants, Astros and Cardinals.  I got this SSPC card signed through the mail.

Iguchi Inman

TTadahito Iguchi was the first everyday Asian player to win a World Series ring, which he did with the White Sox in 2005.  He came to the states in 2005 from the Hawks in Japan, played 4 seasons with the White Sox, Padres and Phillies and has returned to Japan to play with the Chiba Lotte Lions.  He appeared in 77 games for the Padres at 2nd base, hitting .231.  I got this Heritage card signed through the mail.W

William Luis Inman came to the Padres in a trade from the Brewers in 2007.  He hasn't made it to the majors yet, but appeared in 12 games for the AAA Beavers last year.  I got this certified auto card from eBay.

Hyer and Hyzdu

Timothy James Hyers drafted by the Blue Jays in 1990 and the Padres accquired him in the 1993 Rule 5 draft.  During 1994 and 1995 he played in 58 games for the Padres before being sent to the Tigers as part of a conditional deal.  He spent time at 1B and in RF for the Padres, although during that time they had an HOF right fielder.  I am not sure but I think I got this signed through the mail.

Adam Davis Hyzdu went to Moeller High School in Cincinnati where he broke Ken Griffeys' home run record.  He did not have the major league career that Jr. has.  Adam played 17 games for the Padres in 2005, during spring training of 2005 he was traded from the Red Sox to the Padres for Blaine Neal, in July of 2005 he was traded back to the Red Sox for Scott Cassidy.  I have two copies of this card signed, this one I got off of ebay, the other one Adam signed through the mail with the orange Sharpie that I had sent him.

Good Night Pumpsie Green

Shut Out, A Story of Race and Baseball in Boston by Howard Bryant; 278 pages; 2002; Routledge, New York; 0-415-92779-X; Interlibrary loan from Willamette University Library; 3/11-3/19This is much more than a book about baseball, this is a sociological study of race relations and sports in Boston.  All four of the major sports teams, the Sox, Bruins, Patriots and Celtics are at least touched upon and their relationship to the black population.  The author traces the history of race relations clear back to pre civil war times.  This is a book that should, I think, be used for anyone studying sociology.  The baseball portion of the book starts with the farcical tryout held for Jackie Robinson and Sam Jethroe in 1945, illuminates the attitudes of Pinky Higgins, Joe Cronin and Tom Yawkey, highlights the integration of the Sox in 1959 by Pumpsie Green and continues through Jim Rice, Ellis Burks and Mo Vaughn. Pumpsie Green had it even tougher than Jackie Robinson in a way, Jackie had the backing of the team and the front office, whereas Pumpsie Green got no support from the front office, Ted Williams was his friend on the team.  I will be looking for more by Mr. Bryant, I really enjoyed reading his work.  Grade-A+

Jantzen Beach Card Show Recap

I went to a card show and this is what I came home with.  A Dwight Eisenhower First Day Cover, 3 packs of James Bond cards, Jesse Owens and Josh Gibbons and a 1990 Young Superstars Set with a Bip in it.  There were maybe 12 or 15 guys there with stuff, all though one was all coins, several were nothing but NBA (which Madding will probably hit), lots of old boxes, lots of 10 cent boxes.  One of my complaints is that much stuff isn't sorted at all, and that much of it is unpriced.   I saw several things at Beckett prices, and several dealers referring to the magazine. I didn't want to stand and go through lots of cards I don't want, especially when all sports, all years and all makes are lumped together.  I saw a couple of things I wouldn't minded having, an etopps Ted Kennedy and a Jerry West autograph but they were overpriced.  I won't bother going again, unless it is to meet people there. 

Baseball in San Diego, From the Padres to Petco, Images of Baseball by Bill Swank; 2000; 128 pages; Arcadia Publishing, Charleston, SC; 0-7385-3261-4; Interlibrary Loan from the California State Library; 3/9-3/11
I have been trying to find books about the Padres to read and I have been fruitlessly searching all over for titles.  Then all of a sudden about a week ago it was like some one hit me in the head and said Hey Dummy why not look in the card catalog at the San Diego Public Library, it's online you know.  So I went and looked at the catalog, printed out the list of Padres books available and started putting them on hold through interlibrary loan.
The is another volume in the Images of Baseball which makes it the third one I have read along with Baseball in Portland and Baseball in Fort Wayne.  Once again this is an impressive collection of photos which traces the Padres from 1936 at Lane Field with Ted Williams to Westlake Park, to Jack Murphy Stadium with the 1984 Cub Busters to Petco Park with Tony Gwynn.  Really good captions keep the action moving along. Grade-A-

Beyond Cooperstown

Baseball's Other All Stars, The Greatest Players from the Negro Leagues, The Japanese Leagues, The Mexican League, and the Pre-1960 Winter Leagues in Cuba, Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic by William F. McNeil; 2000; 240 pages; McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers, Jefferson, NC; 0-7864-0784-0; Checked out from Multnomah County Library,  Central; 3/7-3/9William McNeil has done some awesome research to name all time All Star teams  in many different leagues outside the borders of Major League Baseball.  He has assembled some of the greats of all time and made separate all star teams for the different leagues and then assembled them into one giant All Star team.  Here is the starting nine for the Non Major League All Star team.  Catcher-Josh Gibson; Pitcher-Satchel Paige; First Base-Sadaharu Oh; Second Base-Martin Dihigo; Shortstop-John Henry Lloyd; Third Base-Shigeo Nagashima; Outfield- Oscar Charleston, Cristobal Torriente, Francisco Coimbre.  You may disagree with some of his choices, but he backs them up very well.  Grade B

A minor (league) Bipping and TTM sucesses

It has a busy week, busy at work, busy trying to refinance our house.  Busy with all that goes with being an overly involved person.  I ordered some minor league Bips from Dave over at minorleaguesingles.com , which is a great resource for player collectors, state or college collectors, or any thing where you don't want to buy the whole team set.  I got 5 Bips from the minor leagues.  Padres, Pirates and Indian minor league cards. 

The three Vegas cards I have owned before but I have never seen the others before.  Nashua is 1985, Vegas is 86-87 and Toledo is from1997.  I plan on cataloging my Bip cards this weekend so I can see what I have and start making a list of what I need.  This week I received cards back from three more players that I sent cards to.  This week I got cards back from Ryan Webb, Aaron Poreda and Tony, Jr.  Gwynn and Poreda each sent back three and Webb one, but that is all that I asked him to sign, since he only has one Padres card.  I was really impressed with the signatures of all of them.  That puts me at 4/9,  they took 14 days which is pretty good.  I will use the 2010 Gwynn for my one per year collection and use the 2010 Upper Deck for the player card.,  I haven't decided which Poreda to use yet. 

A weeks worth of Bip!

This week I went through my stuff and found 25 different Bips to start my player collection with, I have multiples of the iconic 1987 Topps.  I am trying to see how many different Bips I can acquire I got a checklist off of Beckett.  However it doesn't have anything before 1986 on it.  I have even managed to trade some of my cards from the Topps Million Card Giveaway for some Bips.  Also I will be the latest to sing the praises of checkoutmycards.com, I got out almost 20 Bip Roberts cards for $13.  I will be going there more often to get Bipped, most of the cards I got there were with the Reds, but I got one Indians card, and one Royals card.  I also got a set of minor league cards from 1984 of the Prince William Pirates.  Bip is in the set as is Joe Charboneau and Felix Fermin, two batboys getting their 15 minutes of fame and some guy named Scott Borland who is identified as Rep.  What the Rep?  Also Craig "Crash" Brown, I wonder if he is the inspiration for Crash Davis in "Bull Durham". 

Triple H, Not Paul Levesque

Cedric Scott Hunter played in Portland in 2007 and I didn't get to see him play the three games he was here for.  For some reason he went back to high A and AA the next two years.  Maybe he will be in Portland for more than three games this year.  I got the card from a store in Tualatin, OR called Heaven Sent Sports.

Stephen Michael Huntz had an interesting career in major league baseball.  He played 3 games for the Cards in 1967, 71 games for the them in 1969, 106 games for the Padres in 1970, 35 games for the White Sox in 1971 and then in 1975 he played in 22 games for the Padres.  I got him to sign this 1976 SSPC card through the mail.  This is one of my favorite sets, portraits mostly but there was something about them that makes them stand out from the Topps cards of the same year.

Bruce Vee Hurst had 8 RBI and hit .113 in a career that got him inducted into the Red Sox Hall of Fame.  He pitched about two and a half seasons for the Padres although a chunk of that was spent on the DL following rotator cuff surgery.  I got this signed through the mail years ago.  I like cards of pitchers smiling, one of my all time favorite cards is the 1972 Topps in Action card of Tom Seaver.

Huffman and Hundley Squared

Chad Daniel Huffman was drafted by the Padres in the 2nd round of the 2006 draft.  He has worked his way up to AAA and played all of last season here in Portland.  I got his signature through the mail last year because it is a pain to get signatures in person.

Nicholas John Hundley is no relation to two other catchers, Randy and Todd Hundley, but maybe there is something in Hundley genes.  Nick is expected to be the Padres starting catching, with Yorvit providing back up.  One of the things that strikes about a lot of the Padres Bowman cards is that the photos seem to have been taken at Eugenes' Civic Stadium, where the Padres rookie league team the Emeralds, or Ems, as they are known play.  The graduation ceremony for my high school class was held there.  We, the graduates sat in the first base box seats, a platform was built over the first base line for the dignitaries and for us to walk across to get our diplomas.  We walked up stairs at home and descended stairs at first, some kind of metaphor for life, perhaps.  I got this card signed through the mail as Nick was working his way up the minor leagues.

Cecil Randolph Hundley is supposedly not only the father of Todd Hundley, but the father of fantasy camps.  He played for the Padres for 74 games in 1975, he played mainly for the Cubs and that is how most people remember him.  I got this card off of eBay.

 

First 2010 TTM Success

Ten days ago I sent out nine cards to various persons to be signed, some of them were licensed Topps cards, some were unlicensed Upper Deck cards and two of them were unlicensed Padrograph cards.  Since the cards were unlicensed I did not use the Padres name, simply putting the city of the cards.  Tuesday in the mail was an envelope with my name and address in my handwriting.  Enclosed inside was this 2010 Padrograph card which had been signed by the Padres new general manager, Jed Hoyer.  He was thoughtful enough to wrap the card in a 4x6 index card to give the envelope some stability.  I am looking forward to seeing what he can do with this team, it will take a year before it can truly be considered his team, he is still working with many of the pieces that longtime General Manager Kevin Towers had assembled.  I hope that Jed can take the Padres to the Series as his mentor Theo Epstein took the Red Sox to the Series.  Thank you Mr. Hoyer

Oregon Bloggers Summit

Spring has sprung, baseball is being played in the southeast and southwest.  The kids are playing in the backyard in Hood River.  The Padres have the same record as whoever won the World Series last year and Tim Flannery is back at third base.  March 13 there is a card show at Jantzen Beach SuperCenter from 11AM-6PM.  I thought that  some of us Oregon baseball card bloggers might want to meet up.  I will be there at 11, cause I have stuff already scheduled for the afternoon.  I know that Cards on Cards, Pack Addict, JD's Wild Cardz and maybe even I am Joe Collector live close enough and anyone else interested.  Let me know if you would be willing to meet.

Spot the Sig-Winter Edition-Wrap Up

The signature is of Master Sergeant Donald Malarkey of  Easy Company.  He is one of the soldiers portrayed in the HBO miniseries "Band of Brothers", he was played by Scott Grimes, who also played Dr. Archie Morris on ER.  The signature is on a mini "Saving Private Ryan" mini poster, because of a story Malarkey told Stephen Ambrose that became the basis for that movie.  I met Sgt.  Malarkey last year at the annual Wordstock Book Festival, where he read from his book, Easy Company Soldier, and signed copies and other things.  He told me that he had an affidavit from Captain Winters that stated that the idea for Private Ryan came from Sgt Malarkey.  He was quite an amazing gentleman, and it was fun to talk with him.  This was one of two signatures of him that we got that day.  S

Ryan from Trader Crack's got the autograph and one of the bonus questions, Ryan from I <3 Halos got another bonus question, and the spastikmoos from Great Sports Name Hall of Fame got the last bonus question.
So after 9 inning the standings are;
Ryan-Trader Crack's-2 runs scored and the bases loaded WINNER!


Phungo-Phillies-Run Scored and men on first and third FIRST RUNNER UP!


Zach-Wichita Wingnuts-Bases Loaded
SpastikMoos-Nationals-Bases Loaded
Ryan-Angels-Bases Loaded

Lauren-Angels- Man on Second

Marks Epherma-Man on Second

Adam E.-Red Sox-Man on Second

BA Benny-Man on First

Brian-Rangers-On Deck

Dan-Indians-On Deck

Ryan-Orioles-On Deck

oopowham-On Deck

dkwilson-Diamondbacks-on deck

Thanks to all who played, it was fun trying to find signatures that might be hard to decipher.  If all of those who scored or had men on base will send me your hoody and t shirt size, the name of a favorite player or team I will eventually get something to you as a prize, sometime before the All Star Break.send your info to me at padrographs at live.com