Special card...captures a personal family memory...

[Harliduck]

Ok...something happened to me today that transcends card collecting for me.

This last year I took my young son to his first Baseball game at Safeco park. He is an avid Mariners fan and Kendry Morales and Raul Ibanez are his two favorites. The game was AMAZING...Raul hit a 2 HRs in the game, and Kendry hit a 3-0 fastball out to deep center for the walk off win in the bottom of the 9th. My son FREAKED out and we stayed about an hour after the game, he simply didn't want to leave. I actually had all 4 of my kids there (3 daughters!) and I couldn't have dialed up a better game to go to. It also happened the week before my second oldest daughter left for Europe to play ball (she is a Fastpitch player who is on Team USA). Just perfect timing, a perfect day for my family...and Baseball/Softball is huge in our lives. We were actually not even planning on going to game, but we were picking up our daughter from the airport (she was playing in Arizona) and on a whim pulled into Safeco.

So today I see in our local online paper a story on the new 2014 Topps cards. I don't do "new"...but my son does like to get packs. In the story, they talk about the new Kendrys Morales card...about how cool it was the Mariners didn't let him celebrate his walk off HR like he did when he broke his leg while playing for the Angels, and it was captured on the card. THE GAME WE WERE AT!!! I took my son down to the store...bought some packs...and BAM...pulled the card!! Now my son has a card of his favorite player with a picture taken the day he was 100 feet from where the action took place! I can't believe it...




Sorry to post a "new" card...but I consider this forum my community and I wanted to share. So cool...memories forever and captured in cards. THANKS TOPPS! That's a card pull he will NEVER forget, and now has a front row picture to remember the game. Unreal.

[CW]

Great story and a cool card! Thanks for sharing it here.

[Samsdaddy]

Wonderful story. Thanks for sharing!

[ALR-bishop]

Great story and great post.

And, I "do" new

[Zach Wheat]

Originally Posted by Harliduck

Ok...something happened to me today that transcends card collecting for me.

This last year I took my young son to his first Baseball game at Safeco park. He is an avid Mariners fan and Kendry Morales and Raul Ibanez are his two favorites. The game was AMAZING...Raul hit a 2 HRs in the game, and Kendry hit a 3-0 fastball out to deep center for the walk off win in the bottom of the 9th. My son FREAKED out and we stayed about an hour after the game, he simply didn't want to leave. I actually had all 4 of my kids there (3 daughters!) and I couldn't have dialed up a better game to go to. It also happened the week before my second oldest daughter left for Europe to play ball (she is a Fastpitch player who is on Team USA). Just perfect timing, a perfect day for my family...and Baseball/Softball is huge in our lives. We were actually not even planning on going to game, but we were picking up our daughter from the airport (she was playing in Arizona) and on a whim pulled into Safeco.

So today I see in our local online paper a story on the new 2014 Topps cards. I don't do "new"...but my son does like to get packs. In the story, they talk about the new Kendrys Morales card...about how cool it was the Mariners didn't let him celebrate his walk off HR like he did when he broke his leg while playing for the Angels, and it was captured on the card. THE GAME WE WERE AT!!! I took my son down to the store...bought some packs...and BAM...pulled the card!! Now my son has a card of his favorite player with a picture taken the day he was 100 feet from where the action took place! I can't believe it...




Sorry to post a "new" card...but I consider this forum my community and I wanted to share. So cool...memories forever and captured in cards. THANKS TOPPS! That's a card pull he will NEVER forget, and now has a front row picture to remember the game. Unreal.

Very cool! Thanks for sharing.

Z Wheat

[Zach Wheat]

Originally Posted by Harliduck

Ok...something happened to me today that transcends card collecting for me.

This last year I took my young son to his first Baseball game at Safeco park. He is an avid Mariners fan and Kendry Morales and Raul Ibanez are his two favorites. The game was AMAZING...Raul hit a 2 HRs in the game, and Kendry hit a 3-0 fastball out to deep center for the walk off win in the bottom of the 9th. My son FREAKED out and we stayed about an hour after the game, he simply didn't want to leave. I actually had all 4 of my kids there (3 daughters!) and I couldn't have dialed up a better game to go to. It also happened the week before my second oldest daughter left for Europe to play ball (she is a Fastpitch player who is on Team USA). Just perfect timing, a perfect day for my family...and Baseball/Softball is huge in our lives. We were actually not even planning on going to game, but we were picking up our daughter from the airport (she was playing in Arizona) and on a whim pulled into Safeco.

So today I see in our local online paper a story on the new 2014 Topps cards. I don't do "new"...but my son does like to get packs. In the story, they talk about the new Kendrys Morales card...about how cool it was the Mariners didn't let him celebrate his walk off HR like he did when he broke his leg while playing for the Angels, and it was captured on the card. THE GAME WE WERE AT!!! I took my son down to the store...bought some packs...and BAM...pulled the card!! Now my son has a card of his favorite player with a picture taken the day he was 100 feet from where the action took place! I can't believe it...




Sorry to post a "new" card...but I consider this forum my community and I wanted to share. So cool...memories forever and captured in cards. THANKS TOPPS! That's a card pull he will NEVER forget, and now has a front row picture to remember the game. Unreal.

Very cool! Thanks for sharing.

Z Wheat

[frankhardy]

Very very cool. That is something you will always remember.

I have a similar story. I hope this doesn't hijack the thread. Back in 1998, I had just got married to my gorgeous bride (I had to throw that in there!) My wife really was not a baseball fan at all, but when we got married and realized what I Cardinals fan I was, she started watching games with me. She became a Cardinals fan that summer and probably knows more about the Cardinals than the average fan. The fact that Mark McGwire was in the middle of a riveting HR chase didn't hurt in pulling her in either.

We were married in June. We wanted to get tickets to hopefully see a McGwire HR. We really wanted to see McGwire set the record, so we decided to get tickets on the next to the last game of the season, thinking it might be a possibility. Well, we all know that he broke the record early in September. Then, I got to thinking that we just might see the LAST HR he would hit that season and that would be the permanent record right? Turns out that he hit 2 HR's that Saturday game (#67 and #68). Then, he turned around and hit 2 more (#69 and #70) during the last game of the season the next day.

So, we drove up to St Louis on Saturday, September 26, 1998. Every time McGwire came to the plate, I had our camera ready. I think I snapped a picture with every pitch. He hit number 67 early in the game. I got a decent shot of it, but it was nothing like the picture I took of HR number 68. I took the picture right after McGwire's follow through. I have always been proud of that picture.

A few years later, I ran across this 1999 card produced by Pacific. It was a Pacific Private Stock card featuring the McGwire's HR chase. This was the card for HR number 68. The picture was taken less than one second after I took my picture, only from a different angle, obviously. I have posted both below.

[bosoxfan]

WOW! How cool is that?