Four random Mets baseball cards

C-3PO is helping me show off a few baseball cards that arrived in my mailbox this Saturday. I finally wrapped up my 2015 Topps Series 1 Mets team set thanks to some help from Lonestarr, Phungo and a birthday gift from my friend Greg… now I just have to decide how much energy to put into chasing down the inserts for it.

I like the concept of the “This Date In History” cards, whatever their official name happens to be. And how can you go wrong with a Tom Seaver card?

Well, you can stick him on the front of a card commemorating a game that he didn’t pitch in, I guess. July 20th, 1969 is significant because it’s the day Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin became the first men to land on the moon, and the Mets won the second game of a double header against the Montreal Expos on utility man Bobby Pfeil‘s bunt single. Don Cardwell started for the Mets, Jack DiLauro got credit for the victory, and Tug McGraw, Cal Koonce and Ron Taylor also pitched in relief… Seaver presumably watched from the dugout.

But it’s still a cool card, AJ, – it will get added to my Mets team set.

Speaking of Koonce, my friend Greg gave me this beautiful copy of his card from the 1968 Topps set. I still need six cards to finish my 1968 Mets team set, with Gil Hodges being the most notable name and only one high number on the list.

Back to the cards from AJ, we’ve got one of the few college baseball cards that has found its way into my collection. Paul Wilson was the number one overall pick in the 1994 amateur draft and he made his MLB debut two years later with the Mets. He never achieved the level of stardom people predicted for him, but Wilson was able to battle through injuries to pitch in seven major league seasons between 1996 and 2005.

Finally, we have a sparkly red parallel of Travis d’Arnaud from last year’s Topps set. These are pretty nifty.

Thanks for the cards, gentlemen.

Later this week, C-3PO will help me update you on how my spring training autograph requests have been turning out. (As of Saturday, I’d sent out 50 letters and gotten back 8 autographs and two “return to sender” envelopes because the Atlanta Braves spring training camp apparently does not accept USPS mail.)

I’ll probably have something to say about actual baseball at some point this week, too.