PC-ing

 

(I actually wrote this post before the Ramirez/Anderson Donnybrook)

I have to admit something.

            Maybe I’ve admitted this before.

            …sometimes…I still don’t think I know what I’m doing in this hobby.

            At least not since I returned four years ago.

            Sometimes I know what I’m doing.

            Other times, I still collect like I did when I was a kid. 

            I knew what I was doing as a card collector as a kid. Collect Pirates cards. Check. Collect star cards. Check. Try and build sets?

            NOPE.

            I guess this blog post is about having a PC, i.e., Personal Collection. I like having a PC, I honestly do. Most of the players I collect are Pirates, or are players associated with the Pirates. Like my recent, and strangely much maligned online, purchases.

            Who knew there was Ed Ott vitriol?

            And why?

            Last post I talked about this guy.

            And now Pittsburgh is barely a blip in his career.

            But I keep his cards anyway.

            Still…what could’ve been had there not been another Pirates trading deadline fire sale.

            Sigh.

            I enjoy collecting players from other teams. Thankfully, the Pirates have a day or so off during the week to rest and put their fans our of their misery, and I use that opportunity to watch some other teams that I’m interested in. This past month of July, the Pirates played two road trips out on the West Coast and, because I’m old and wake up to sling words at 4:45 in the morning, I did not stay up to watch any of their games.

            I watched a lot of Orioles games.

            You know, these two guys.

            I get it now.

            Guess where they’re heading?

            But I watched a lot of Cleveland Guardians games during July as well. I even got to see them come to Pittsburgh and beat-up on the Pirates for three games. I have a strange history with the Cleveland ballclub, in that, I don’t have much in the way of history with them at all. I sometimes think maybe I should. Cleveland is only 2 hours and 10 minutes from Pittsburgh. The Guardians (then Indians) were in the American League, back when the National League and American league met twice during the regular season. They wouldn’t have interfered at all with my Pirates fandom.

            The Indians were pretty bad in the 80s.

            At times, worse than the Pirates.

            Maybe I just didn’t want to root for two crappy teams.

            Maybe the sour taste of the Cleveland Browns infected everything.

            The Cleveland team didn’t even have a player that I liked, until this guy came around.

            In fact, before I even saw a Major League baseball game in Cleveland, I saw a NBA one.

            And I don’t even like basketball.

            But I got to see…HIM.

            I digress.

            So, with my brief respite of all things Pirates in July, I got a chance to sit back and watch a little bit of Cleveland Guardians baseball. And you know what?

            I really like this guy.

            Guess where he ended up.

            In my humble opinion, Jose Ramirez is one of the most underrated players in all of Major League Baseball…unless you live in the fine city of Cleveland, of course, where they know how great he is on a daily basis. At 30-years-old, Ramirez is a four-time all-start and four-time Silver Slugger award winner. He should be in the same conversation without all of the other big deal baseball players us collectors go on and on about. Except Shohei. No one is in the same conversation with Shohei. But I’m certainly more willing to listen to fans and collectors, when the time comes in three or four seasons, start to make the case for Jose Ramirez being a future Hall of Famer.

            They do that with Joey Votto.

            And I fail to see why with that one.

            So, why not Jose?

            Adding someone to your PC; it kind of forces you to look at your PC…especially, if it’s all in one big monster box like mine is for both retired and current players. I wouldn’t even really call this a PC box. There’s maybe a handful of guys in there that I actively collect. But, like when I was a kid, I just sort of lump all of the star cards together. More so now, because, as an adult collector, I don’t really have anyone to trade cards with on the regular. Yes, you probably spied Ronald Acuna Jr. in that box. I think Acuna is a great, exciting player. But he’s a Brave. And there’s no way in hell this 31-year-grudge holding Pirates fan is collecting a goddamned Brave.

            And because card collecting is speculative, while adding Adley, Gunner and Jose to the PC, I found myself removing players who, just a few short years ago, I held some high hopes for.

            Yet I still hold out hope for Jo Adell.

         Point is, Jose Ramirez, Jo Adell, even a Lewin Diaz; sometimes my PC makes me feel like the most hapless collector around. It feels schizophrenic. It makes me wonder why I try and collect anyone other than Pittsburgh Pirates.

            I have them in a separate box, by the way.

            I’m not envious of other collectors and what they PC. I’m actually more in awe of a dedication they have, that I don’t seem to. Those collectors who just collect their team guys. The ones who can throw the Vlady Jr. and Pete Alonso cards in with the junk to focus on their Braves or their Astros. Those single-player super collectors, and the dedication involved there. I’m in awe of those collectors who PC 600-guys and are able to do so diligently, while I’m throwing Kyle Lewis cards in with my commons now.

            Oh God…am I a speculator?

 Thanks for reading! Happy collecting!

This Saturday: I get to be THAT guy