Winter Warm Up 2011–Name Plates!

I bought these on the last day of Winter Warm Up. They are player name plates for lockers, batting helmet shelves, bat racks and other stuff. These were five for one dollar. I liked the Ankiel and got the others to make five.

Dad – The name plates are on my nook Color. Aside from the baseball card packs and Isaac’s Nintendo DSi, the nook color was a godsend as we waited through all of the lines.

Winter Warm Up 2011–Singles

My dad bought me a few cards too. Some were for autographs and some because they were cool. These are the cool cards.
These will look cool with the Jon Jay autograph from a Target pack.


This matches the Colby Rasmus jersey card I bought at the Flea Market over the summer.

And this one matches a Joe Mather autograph my dad bought at a past Winter Warm Up.

Dad - I'm actually looking forward to catching Ankiel and Mather playing for the Braves this summer when working out of the Atlanta office.

Cardboard Collections: February Group Break - 3 Boxes - Featuring '07 UD Elements

Cardboard Collections announced the February Group Break this morning. The break includes one box each of 1992 O-Pee-Chee, 2005 Topps Total, and 2007 Upper Deck Elements.

Check out the actual post here:

Cardboard Collections: February Group Break - 3 Boxes - Featuring '07 UD Elements

Winter Warm Up 2011–Day 3

This is the first year we went to the Warm Up on Monday. It is only a half day but we still got some cool autographs. I’ve met Pat Perry before at the Cardinals baseball camp last summer. We paid for Allen Craig and the rest were freebies. The Shane Robinson matches last year’s card except this one is on a Target card. I also got my third Rookie of the Year. Eli Marrero was really nice and asked for a picture with me that might end up on the Cardinals website.





Dad – Eli was extremely nice, especially considering we were in the last group of the day and he had been signing for nearly two hours. Still, I’ll remember him most for helping to bring Wainwright to the Cardinals.

Hot Packs and Card Shops

We interrupt the Winter Warm Up post this semi-interesting story from a LCS this week. I stopped by the LCS to pick up supplies and ended up getting a few 2010 Series 2 packs for Isaac. I also asked if they had any packs of 2010 Chrome as Ike likes the shininess. The owner cracked open a fresh box and with a wry, knowing look reached into the middle of one of the four stacks and handed me two packs. He said something about how he thought my son would really like those packs as I paid up.

My first thought was… wow that was a bit strange. My second thought was… I wonder if he just gave me a pack with an autograph? Sure enough, one of those packs had a rookie auto card of Wade Davis.

I got to thinking about this and how easily he could have given me two packs from the top of the box and kept the hot pack for himself… or all the hot packs from all the boxes for that matter. But then I got to thinking about all the nice hits Isaac has pulled out of packs from this guys shop. I remembered how he usually shuffled packs as soon as he opened a fresh box to confuse pack searchers. I thought about his “NO PACK SEARCHING!!!” signs on his counter. And I gave him the benefit of the doubt.

Heck, Isaac and I were in his shop two weeks ago to buy supplies (SWMBO demanded card clean up in Ike’s room) and Isaac was adamant on buying the last, lone pack of Goudey on the counter. A pack that had been sitting there for the better part of 8 – 9 months (maybe longer if you had the time and inclination to carbon-date dust). A pack that I and about every other customer passed over thinking there was no way the last pack of a dealer box could possibly have anything interesting (aside from Cardinals of course). A pack that only an unjaded, innocent kid might want. A pack that ended up having a Yankee autograph… but more on that card later.

Winter Warm Up 2011–Day 2 (The Packs)

My dad let me get more packs to open while standing in line and a few packs to open during dinner that night. The Cardinals had a souvenir booth and had packs on sale. Dad said they were expensive (Dad: Didn't realize they were selling all packs for $2 and $3 instead of the 500000% markup on the stadium price tags.)and were retail packs so I probably wouldn’t be as lucky as the day before. He was so wrong!
From the Retail Packs during the day. They also had 2009 Cereal Boxes for $6! We bought the last one but didn’t get much. The X packs were cool – a Peavy jersey card and some cards for my favorite players binder.

And back to the Hobby Packs at night. Two autos from the Astros and Cubs. Boo!

Winter Warm Up 2011–Day 2 (Afternoon)

We paid for the Adam Wainwright autograph and asked him to sign a jersey card we found over the Christmas break. It matches my Chris Carpenter jersey card autograph from last year’s warm up. I think it looks great! A guy in the Tom Henke line saw it and told me it was a nice card. I saw my friend in the Tom Henke line. His dad is a Blue Jays and Joe Carter fan. I was the last person in line for Hard Hittin’ Mark Whiten! The Matt Carpenter card is from a Springfield Cardinals team set my dad bought on Day 1. Too bad they didn’t’ have a team set for Memphis.

Winter Warm Up 2011– Day 2: Wally Moon

Forgot to include the Wally Moon auto’s in this morning’s post. He was at the Warm Up promoting his upcoming book. In addition to signing in the autograph room, he was also in the vendor room at his own booth signing cards depicting the book cover.

Winter Warm Up 2011–Day 2 (Morning)

The Shelby Miller line was really, really long. I got lucky and met someone who saved a spot for me at the front of the line. Bill Virdon and Wally Moon are my first Rookie of the Year autographs. I got three Adam Reifer autographs so I can give one to my friend who’s dad is going to Afghanistan next month. Hopefully Zack Cox ends up better than Brett Wallace – his line was long too.




Dad – I highly recommend that folks going to next year’s Winter Warm Up to book the package through the Hyatt and not through the Cardinals. Guests who book rooms and passes through the hotel have priority access each morning which means no waiting in the miles long line just to get into the Warm Up (or even inside the building). Guests have assigned line spots on the second floor and are allowed upstairs to the autograph areas before general admission. For us, that meant getting in and out of one autograph line and into a second before most fans ever make it into their first.

Winter Warm Up 2011–Day 1 (The Packs)

During our morning break we went to the vendor room and bought some cards for autographs and 8 packs to open while waiting in line. I got some Cardinals and lots of cool cards. Here are the cool cards.