Robbie Grossman Auto

Robbie Grossman was traded to the Houston Astros at the 2012 Trade Deadline along with Colton Cain and Rudy Owens for Wandy Rodriguez and cash.  Grossman made his MLB debut in 2013.

In his 257 at bats, Grossman was respectable at the plate with a .268/.332/.370 line as a leadoff man who played the majority of his time in CF and LF.  He committed 1 error in CF in 56 chances with 1 outfield assist.

He was the only prospect the Pirates have parted with in the past 3 seasons that I was genuinely upset about leaving the organization.  Even still, I was happy with the return of Wandy Rodriguez and cash.

It looks like Grossman will have to battle to find a place in the future Houston Astros outfield as many of their top outfield prospects will be coming up soon.

Regardless, I couldn't pass up this $2 auto of the once Pirate Prospect.

Lots of Autographs from Pirates vs. Phillies game

So the Pirates may have lost 7-2, but I left in the middle of the 5th inning because I had to travel back home for work.  At that time the Bucs were up 2-1 thanks to one of my favorite prospects to collect Robbie Grossman. 

Before the game started I saw Robbie out on the field warming up with the Bucs and he seemed extremely happy that someone recognized him and asked for his autograph.  He signed a baseball for me on the sweetspot and thanked me for his support. 

Also before the game started I was able to add to my sign I started in Spring Training a few weeks back.  This wooden sign is turning out great.  I added Matt Hague, Pedro Alvarez, Neil Walker, Jeff Karstens, and team president Frank Coonelly. 

I also managed to get a few other balls signed between the two game series.  Joel Hanrahan, Pedro Alvarez, and Matt Hague all contributed to my solo signature balls collection.  The Hague was a game-used ball with some small dirt marks on it.  Matt actually tossed me a ball after the 4th inning when the Bucs were coming off the field, but I gave the ball to a little kid sitting behind me. 

I got a few cards signed as well.  Cards are a pain in the ass to get signed at games in Philly because you can't get near the dugout to seek out autographs.  I rarely bring cards unless I know that the player is very fan friendly and will accept a card being thrown at them like Gambit from the X-Men.

 2012 Topps Heritage Clint Hurdle

2011 Topps Opening Day Stadium Lights Pedro Alvarez

Former Dodgers Top Prospect and current Pirate Prospect Andrew Lambo
2010 Bowman Chrome Topps 100 numbered 82/499

The absolute best thing that my girlfriend and I got signed though was this 8x10 photo below.  We attended the Monday night On Deck game and the Red Philly Phanatic was taunting Pirates slugger Garrett Jones before the game.  Jones was trying to avoid him and shuffling back and forth.  My lady took a picture of the incident and printed out the picture before the Tuesday game in hopes that Garrett would sign it.  When he saw the photo he started cracking up and said this is the best thing he ever signed.  We prepared for that and gave him his own copy to keep as he signed ours.

Here's some other pictures that she took from the game.  For those wondering how close we were, try row 1 behind the Pirates dugout.  With pictures like this, she might have a job at Topps right?

Pirates Future Outfield pt2

Continuing where I left off yesterday, I'm going to take a look at another young outfielder that could join Starling Marte in the future outfield for the Pirates.  That individual is none other than Robbie Grossman.  While many suspect that his upside isn't that high, Grossman's continued progress throughout his minor league career suggests that he has huge upside when developed properly.  Keith Law ranked Grossman 86th overall while MLB.COM didn't have him ranked in the top 100.

Robbie Grossman was selected in the 6th round of the 2008 draft out of high school.  He began his career in A- ball and showed that he was outmatched striking out 164 times with only 28 extra base hits and 75 walks.  The following year, he began in A ball for the Bradenton Marauders.  While not great numbers he showed improvement in all areas especially plate discipline.  In 2011 he repeated in Bradenton as a 21 year old which as an age appropriate level.  He thrived and became the first player to have 100 runs scored and 100 walks in a season since Nick Swisher.  We all know that Swisher is one of the better OF in the game now so that's a great sign for Grossman.

Here's a look at his development over the past three seasons
2009- 164 K/ 75 BB/ 28 XBH
2010- 118 K/ 66 BB/ 36 XBH
2011- 111 K/ 104 BB/ 49 XBH

He also shows signs of a smart baserunner swiping nearly 20 bags each season in the minors.  20/20 potential is certainly within his limit at this pace. 

2012 will be a huge year in terms of understanding what Grossman's ceiling is.  He will receive a non roster invitation to Spring Training this year so the Pirates front office heads were obviously turned by last year's numbers.  In addition to dominating in Bradenton, he continued to mash in the Arizona Fall League.  I suspect Robbie will begin in AA and earn a promotion to AAA if his numbers are strong enough.  He may become a useful bench player for the Pirates come September as Grossman is also a switch hitter.

Only time will tell what Grossman is truly capable of on the field.

I want to be &%$@ing Batman too!

You're probably asking yourself, what the hell am I talking about?
Well I went on COMC about a week ago looking to buy a good size lot of Pirates Prospects cheap.  I find that I can find the cards on eBay, but most sellers overcharge for shipping.  If you do it right on COMC, you can pickup a lot of cool cards from the same seller, which I guess you can do on eBay too, it just takes longer.
Anyway, enough of blah blah blah.  Here's some of the cards that I manged to pick up for the price of a blaster and rack pack (about $30 shipped).

I really like that Colton Cain card a lot.  Here's why:
1) Colton Cain is a cool name and his signature is legible
2) Colton has a 3.64 ERA in 106 IP in A ball this year.  He also has a 81:31 strikeout to walk ratio.
3) I want to be Batman too

The second card on the top is a USA Jersey card of Robbie Grossman.  I've talked a lot about Robbie over the past couple weeks and yesterday he made minor league history.  He was the first minor leaguer to have 100 Walks and 100 Runs in a season since Nick Swisher in 2004.  Best of all he hit a game winning home run last night too.  Robbie is going to be an amazing athlete if he can continue this success in AA and above.

The Jordy Mercer auto is my first Jordy Mercer card I actually own.  I've seen Jordy play a couple times this year with AA and AAA.  I also got to see him play in Citizens Bank Park during an exhibition game between the Pirates and Phils before the season opened.  I think Jordy has the potential to be a very solid utility ballplayer with some pop in the future.

The dual bat relic of Robbie Grossman and Quincy Latimore is really neat especially since it was less than a $1.00.  Numbered 61/250

I didn't have any Jarek Cunningham cards other than the Bradenton Marauders team set card.  This card is a numbered parallel 83/199.  I got this card for $0.55

Also on this scan is 2 Tony Sanchez Bowman cards for the PC.  

At the top of this scan are 2 Daniel McCutchen autos and a Jeff Clement auto. These on card autos were all had for $5.08.  How could I pass that up?  Daniel McCutchen has been pretty solid as a long swingman throughout the season.  He has also been used as a setup man from time to time.  Jeff Clement was part of the deal that sent beloved Jack Wilson to Seattle.  Jeff was selected by the Mariners as a power hitting catcher, but he was never able to live up to the hype that made him such a desired prospect.  After struggling for most of last season and then getting injured twice last year, Jeff is back in the Pirates AAA Indianapolis Indians.  In 13 games he has a .342 average with 4 extra base hits.  Yesterday he went 1 for 1 as a pinch hitter. 

On the bottom row is an autograph of pitching prospect Colton Cain and utility man Steve Pearce.  I like how Steve is blowing a bubble while running.  Really classy there Steve.  I also decided to pick up a Mark Buehrle jersey card.  I used to enjoy watching the ChiSox play when they had the Big Hurt, Ventura, and Black Jack together in the early mid 90s and still watch their games from time to time on MLB network.  This card of Buehrle is nice looking though because he's wearing a throwback uniform.  I love throwback uniform cards.

Last but certainly not least is another Robbie Grossman card.  This 2009 Donruss Elite Throwback Threads features a piece of Robbie's high school uniform and is number 7/250. 

There you have it 14 cards for $30 shipped.  Of that 14 I got 7 Autos, 4 relics, 2 player PC, and a numbered parallel.

Stargell Printing Plate 1/1 and 1/1 Bat

I just received my first Willie Stargell printing plate in the mail yesterday.  As I've said before I really like the quirkiness of a printing plate.  They're very unique, as proven by their 1 of 1 nature. I always prefer getting the black or yellow printing plates of the Pirates just because I think they look cool being in the team's colors.  This is now my 6th Pirate Printing Plate.  I will share another one with you tomorrow.

Earlier in the year, the Bradenton Marauders were auctioning off a bat signed by the entire team for charity.  Some of the notable signatures include FSL All-Stars Aaron Baker (recently traded to Baltimore for Derrek Lee), Kyle McPherson (promoted to AA), Jarek Cunningham, and Robbie Grossman.  This is a 1/1 collectible and I could not be more happy to be the winning bidder and help a good cause at the same time.  

On another note, I received the autographed Robbie Grossman card I bought off eBay last week that I had highlighted in a previous post.  The card is sweet looking, but Robbie's got to make that signature better.  LOL!

There's a really interesting article about Robbie's progress this year here.  I expect big things out of Robbie and suspect that he will emerge as a top prospect in the coming years.

When you get knocked down, get your ass back on eBay

6 straight losses! 1 game under .500 and 6.5 games out of first place. YUCK!

I thought last night's game would go much better for the Bucs.  Charlie Morton was sensational on the mound and the right guys were up at the plate when there were key run scoring opportunities. Unfortunately none of them could get the job done and the Bucs lost to the Cubbies 1-0 thanks to a solo HR by Starlin Castro off Chris Resop in the top of the 8th.  Another tough loss for the Buccos.  When Ryan Doumit came up to pinch hit, I felt like he was going to have a walk off HR, but reality had to settle in as he struck out in the 9th to end the game.  I've always liked Dewey, but he's always getting injured.  If he could stay healthy for a full season, he could be a top catcher in the NL.

I have recently added Ryan Doumit to players I collect so sell or trade me your Doumits.  Here's my only relics I have of Ryan.  I have some base cards, but need a whole lot more.

TRADE ME YOUR DOUMITS!!!!

Anyway, after the game ended last night I decided to get on eBay and try to win some CHEAP auctions of future Pirates stars.  I gave myself a $20 budget and 20 hours to try and get some autos, relics, parallels, etc.  BTW, my $20 budget does not include s/h.  This is what I came up with, starting with the 2011 Draft Class.

Up first is an Alex Dickerson 2010 Topps Chrome USA Auto that I won for $5.75.  Alex was a 3rd Round pick of the Pirates in the 2011 Draft and signed for slot money early.  He's currently in low A ball playing 1B/OF for the State College Spikes.  He's off to a very good start despite a small sample size of only 16 games.  His slash line is .287/.358/.467 and he has 1HR, 1 3B, and 6 2B of his 17 total hits.  Even his K:BB ratio (7:5) is looking good so far.  Alex was ranked one of the top 50 prospects in the draft prior to draft day.

Up next is one of the future aces of the Pirates. It would be very hard for Gerrit to turn down all that #1 overall pick money, so I'm assuming he's going to sign.  Gerrit's stuff is simply electric and he's built for 200+ innings.  There is no pitcher in the draft that projects better than Gerrit does and that's why the Bucs selected him number 1 overall.  This 2010 Bowman Sterling USA jersey card of Gerrit Cole was purchased for a whopping $1.26. 

From the 2008 draft class and my favorite of the Pirates prospects to watch play is Chase D'arnaud.  I got a chance to watch Chase play a couple games when he was with AA Altoona last year and saw him play one game this year while in AAA.  I knew he was going to be in the majors before the end of this season.  The guy flat out plays hard.  He may have struggled with MLB pitching and made a few mental errors in his time with the Pirates last month, but there's no doubt in my mind he's the shortstop of the future for the team.  This 2011 Topps Pro Debut Double A All Stars card of Chase was won for $1.00 (with free shipping) I realize I may have over paid for a base card, but the free shipping of a player I really enjoy for a buck was too tough to resist.

That brought my total to $8.01 so I wasn't even half way through before I came across this 2011 Bowman Chrome Matt Hague Autograph which I snagged up for $3.99.  Matt wasn't considered a top prospect in the organization until this year and probably still isn't.  The reality is that the Pirates just don't have a lot of quality depth at the 1B position in the immediate future.  Personally I think Matt Curry may be the answer, but that's probably another two years away.  Matt Hague was drafted by the Pirates in the 9th round of the 2008 draft and is currently playing for the AAA Indianapolis Indians.  He's got 9 HR on the year and is batting a solid .314.  He has been consistently near .300 for his minor league career so if he were to bat .275 or so in the majors that would be a great improvement on what the Pirates have sent out in the past.

I'd say with $8 still left to spend, I've already got a good collection of cards for the budget, but you're probably thinking, where's the representation of the 2009 and 2010 draft classes though?  Without further ado I present to you a blue parallel from the 2010 Topps Pro Debut of Brock Holt which I won for $1.50.  I'm not a huge fan of parallel cards as I often forget which versions I have when collecting, but the blue border on this card goes really nice with the State College Spikes uniform.  Brock was selected in the 9th round of 2009 out of Rice University.  He's currently in AA Altoona hitting .277 with 15SB. He can play 2B and SS and could be a good utility player in the Pirates future.  This card is numbered 35/259.

After winning the Holt with a Best Offer almost instantly, I tried my hand at Pirates #1 prospect going into the 2011 season, Jameson Taillon.  Jamo has pitched much better then his numbers indicate for the 2011 season.  There has been a few games in West Virginia where his defense has taken bad routes to fly balls which has lead to earned runs that should have been caught.  As proven in the Adrian Gonzalez trade this past offseason, numbers are practically meaningless to minor league development.  So although the numbers may not represent it early in his career, there's little doubt that in a few years Jameson will be leading the Pirates rotation with Gerrit Cole.  This 2011 Bowman Platinum XFractor was won for $2.00. Jameson is the type of player that I will probably collect when a good opportunity presents itself, but I won't ever consider myself a super collector of his because of the high price tags often attached to his cards.

With just a minute left on the auction I saw this 2011 Bowman Platinum Jameson Taillon AUTO with only 1 bid. I took a stab at it and won it for $6.99.




That brought me to $22.49, which was over my budget.

I still had a bid on this Robbie Grossman 2009 Bowman Sterling AUTO which I won for $1.75.  Robbie was drafted in the 6th round of the 2008 draft out of Cypress Texas High School.  He projects to be a very athletic center fielder with some pop.  He's currently playing for the Bradenton Marauders where he has scored 102 runs in only 107 games.  He made a commitment prior to the season that he was going to score at least 100 runs and be more aggressive on the base paths.  I'd say that philosophy has worked so far.  He's batting .287 with an OBP of .427.  He's struck out 85 times but has 94 walks.  He's also got 23 SB on the year so far.



Well, I went over budget by $4.24 but let's recap what I bought: 4 autos, 1 jersey relic, 1 numbered parallel, and 1 base insert.  Not a bad haul.  Factor in $7.75 s&h and I'd say I did fairly respectable.  I hope you all enjoyed this little budget planning experiment and hopefully learned a little about the Pirates prospects.  Next time I will hit the budget and use S/H as part of the budget.  Taillon autos are just too good to pass up for $7.