Odds and ends

I've been on a bit of a roll lately.

At times, I can flip through one of my binders a dozen times and not come up with anything to write about. As most bloggers will tell you, that feeling is a bit aggravating.

Luckily, though, I've found myself coming up with post ideas left and right lately. I know it's going to end sometime, but I'm enjoying the ride thus far.

Hopefully, I didn't just jinx it.

I've had a few things happen within the last couple weeks that just didn't fit in with anything else.

Some "odds and ends", if you will, ones that will serve as the basis for this post.

It's pretty much old hat by now, but I'm sure most of you are aware of Adam Greenberg's dramatic comeback to the bigs. A comeback that landed him an appearance in 2013 Topps.

I saw Greenberg's tragic first at-bat live back in '05. I remember it pretty vividly.

While I was ecstatic to see the Marlins give him an official at-bat in the bigs, I couldn't help but wonder what was stopping the Cubs, Greenberg's original franchise, from doing so.

It's not like they were playing for anything in October.

Unsurprisingly, I fell victim to another "impulse buy" once the news of Greenberg's one at-bat with the Marlins broke.

Up until a couple weeks ago, I hadn't had a card of his in my collection. I needed to rectify that.

Immediately.

I nabbed a copy of Greenberg's 2002 UD Prospect Premieres "extended rookie card" (whatever that means) on Sportlots for under a buck, including shipping.

Safe to say, I'll be chasing his 2013 Topps issue.

Even though its release is about five months away, I'm already looking forward to it.

As luck would have it, the A's got eliminated from the playoffs after I confessed my "bandwagoning" to the franchise.

It wasn't the end of the world, though.

I could still root for the Nationals and Orioles.

Then, the O's got knocked out of the postseason, much to the dismay of quite a few bloggers around the blogosphere.

As a result, my hope was with the Nationals.

Before I had to leave for a school project last night, I caught the Nats' three-run first inning.

That was a good sign.

Once I got home, I saw that the Nats were holding onto a 7-5 lead. (Only later did I find out that they blew a 6-0 advantage.)

Most of us probably know the rest. Daniel Descalso and Pete Kozma are my new least favorite big leaguers.

By booting the Nats from the playoffs, the Cardinals virtually made this postseason worthless to me.

I don't have much interest in seeing Tigers-Yankees or Cardinals-Giants matchups. I guess I'll be rooting for the Giants by default.

There's always next year, I guess.

But enough of my rambling about the playoffs.

Let's get back to cardboard.

Some of my readers might remember my promise of a "Top 100" list from a few weeks ago.

It's been a blast going through my collection and listing cards that I'll be considering for the "Top 100". However, I've still got a ways to go before I trim the list down to a hundred cards.

If I had to guess, I'd look for the "Top 100" to debut on the blog around this time next month.

Today, I thought I'd update a few of the "ground rules" for the project.

Initially, I said that no player will be able to make more than two appearances in the countdown.

That won't necessarily be true.

Multi-player issues will not be counted towards the standard "two-card rule" that I mentioned. Should the above masterpiece make the "Top 100", it will not count toward Berra's or Robinson's other two spots.

I'd say there's a decent chance that you'll see this one on the list.

As I stated before, this "Top 100" list will only be comprised of cards from 1981 to the present.

Otherwise, vintage would make up about 95 percent of it.

One fairly obvious conflict I overlooked is the topic of reprints. Most of those are post-1981, after all.

Still, it wouldn't be fair to the rest of the "competitors" if reprints were allowed in.

If they were, I'd have to put all of the neat little tobacco reprints I've accumulated over the years somewhere on the list.

As a result, I've decided to completely omit reprints from the countdown. Most recent issues can't be expected to compete with something as awesome as this reproduction of "The Georgia Peach".

Don't worry, though...

Fan Favorites are still fair game.

While they may look and feel like reprints, they are nothing of the sort. I'd bet that you'll see a few of these in the "Top 100", whenever the time comes.

I'm glad that I decided to take on the endeavor of creating this countdown. It's always nice to be working on a little project off to the side.

It'll be quite the display of "odds and ends".

My collection is pretty much based on them.

So is this blog, for that matter.