February 2019 Trade Recap

Another good month of trading!

The first trade arrived on February 5th, and was with frequent gifter C2Cigars. This was, in fact, our first actual trade! He sent me most of the cards I needed from his Database set.  I can't scan them, because I don't remember which box I put them into, so here's the scan of myself again (which he sent me more copies of)

(I have a very limited number of copies of my own card available for trade now)
[edit to add: I found the missing cards. But you get me anyway.]

The second trade was with Database member Flyers4Life, arriving on the 8th, which is cool because he had never done a trade before. I was his very first. I included some bonus cards to both welcome him to trading and to the Database, and he sent me 10 cards- when I only expected one! Three of them were new people for my hockey Names Project, including the one card I actually asked for-

Arriving on the same day was a 9 card trade with Database member John5150, and all but one of the cards were from the 2001-02 season, with 4 from Hardcourt, 3 from Topps Chrome, and one from Topps Pristene- a set I have not traded for in years. I am not sure if I've EVER traded for any of that set to be honest. The final card was from the 1999-00 Topps Gallery set.

The third package to arrive on the 8th was a trade from Greg of The Collective Mind, (link takes you to the post about my return package) which was mostly vintage drag racing! While my racing love goes mostly to NASCAR, I love all forms of auto racing and was very happy to add these- I didn't actually have any from the 1973 AHRA set from Fleer before then.

This is #69, Jim Nicoll. Note the El Camino! Based on where it is, it was surely the push car for one of the drag racers. Back in those days they tended to push them to the line instead of drive them. I'm not entirely sure why they did that, but my theory is that it's because racing fuel was too expensive to waste on lining up to wait your turn.

The fifth trade of the month arrived to me on the 9th and was with Database member Wadeol1. It was only his second trade and it was totally lopsided and I'm fine with that. He had three Nets hits I wanted- spotlighted by the autograph below, a player I really became a fan of until the Nets stupidly cut him- so I went big with my offer. I offered 50 cards for the three Nets, and I ended up pulling more than that, and sent them all. I couldn't decide which ones to not send. And I'm totally OK with that!

I never saw Hoops Winter available here so I didn't feel too bad about trading for another, though I did take a risk with the Contenders card- my first from the set- as it just came out recently. It's actually my only card from the set.

February 15th saw the arrival of a very lopsided trade, but this time in my favor. Trading Card Database member gregpaa asked for one moderately hard card to find, and sent me back 16! All of which were people missing from my NBA Names project- and it got me down under 300 people missing from my collection for the first time ever! It also brought the D-League players from 2005-06 Topps Chrome down to just 5 people missing- when I made the chart, those players were almost 1/3rd of it.

 this one's a Refractor

I discovered that whoever had entered the checklist of 2007-08 Topps Chrome onto the Database had put somebody else in place of Wallace. I had to fix most of the parallels, as well, of which there are several.

On February 19th, a trade arrived from Dave Switzer, which focused on this autograph card:

but included a surprise for my error collection as well!

Not only is it off-center, it's also crooked! That's not a bad scan- the card is really at an angle, but it's perfectly square, not diamond cut. Cool, two errors on one card is pretty rare. 

The second trade to arrive on the 19th was with Database member Dan Sorek, and we swapped duplicates of our cards from the C2 Cigars Trading Card Database set.

The third trade to arrive that day- actually, they all arrived together, but the third I opened- was from Database member FiresNBeers, and included 6 cards, even though I was only expecting 4. 

It was mostly Non-Sports cards from Allen & Ginter, something I really love to get but don't really chase as much as I should. Every one of them in my collection has come from a blogger or the Database. 

On February 22nd I got a quick trade with Database member mrrosado. I sent him my empty Card Savers (I was planning to throw them out) and he sent me two cards, one I was expecting-

 and one I was not, this Babe Ruth reprint. I don't know where it is from- it's probably unlicensed- but the quality of the card itself is high.

The Jay Cutler autograph is IP and he said he's not sure it's legit, it came in a lot he purchased. Remember when I said I'd take anything in trade? Well, here's proof. I actually have a small collection of Cutler cards already, he's diabetic and Chuck- C2Cigars- has sent me a few cards of him. I think this is # 4 or 5 in my collection, which is a lot for a football player. 

On February 22nd, a trade arrived from mrmike, a 1-card each way trade. But, I can't show it because it's very NSFW. Full frontal nudity...Even though I'm not a huge fan of the model (Jenny McCarthy) it was the only card on his tradelist that fit into my collection. 

The final trade of the month arrived from Database member PapaG321, and it was also the largest trade of the month- 50 cards arrived to me, and they were ALL NHL players I needed for my Names project! The eras covered a wide variety but the vast majority are early 1990s. 

The biggest name in the bunch is probably Dave Keon, from the 1991 Ultimate Original Six set,

 although I'm more familiar with a few other people, but not from their playing days- also included are my first cards of:

 current Blue Jackets GM Jarmo Kekalainen and

NHL Network broadcaster Stu Grimson. Also included was my first card of current Flyers head coach Scott Gordon, but I have not gotten him scanned yet and can't push this post back any further. 

Overall, February saw 12 trades for 146 new cards added to my collection, another really fantastic month of trading! I don't know if it is my all-time record, but it's the most trades I've completed in a single month since at least 2009, which is the farthest back I can research using my feedback forms on currently active websites. March has been fairly slow by comparison- we are on the 14th as I finish typing this post up, and I just mailed out my first on Tuesday. I did mail 5 of them, all at one time though to 5 different people, and one Database member has specifically stated to wait until I receive before I send, so I will have enough for a post next month. When they arrive, it will push me past 100 documented trades on the Database- while not a specifically set goal for the year, it's nonetheless something I was specifically working for, and would have been the goal of the year if I didn't specifically have no goals.