2012 Quarry Unlimited - The Grand Finale

Monday, 21 January 2013

Well here we are at the end.  Thank those of you that voted for your favorites from the 2012 Quarry Unlimited set.  After all the votes were tallied I found the top 10 (12 including ties).  I will be showing them in this post in just a bit.  Before that, I would like to thank all of you for reading through my gibberish and looking at my cards.  Right now money is beyond tight, so custom cards are about the only way I have been able to stay in the hobby.  I'm sure some of my readers have been afflicted with financial woes as well, so maybe my customs helped you sustain your hobby as well.

I have been asked by several people if there was going to be a 2013 Quarry Unlimited set.  The answer to that is yes, I am planning on it.  I have the time right now, so I am working on templates and if I get those done while I have time then I will definitely get a 2013 set completed.  The set I am basing my 2013 design on is another Topps set that is in my all time top 10, 1977 Topps.  It will not be an exact reproduction and I am planning a couple of changes (no facsimile signatures, no 2nd border around the photo), but not many.  You will still recognize the original influence.  I have one team nearly finished and I figured I would show it off after the best of 2012.  However that is about nine months away.  For now, let's take a look at the 12 best cards from the 2012 Quarry Unlimited set in the order of your votes.

 3 votes

4 votes

5 votes

6 votes

7 votes

AND THE BEST OF THE SET WITH 9 VOTES

Cool, that's the first thing the Mets have won in years.  I am beginning to understand why it is so hard to get people into the Hall of Fame, because only one of those cards was agreed upon by 75% of the 12 voters.  I think you guys made great choices and I hope you enjoyed this set.

Here is an unfinished template for the 2013 Quarry Unlimited set.

Thanx for reading.

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2012 Quarry Unlimited - The Traded Set

Sunday, 20 January 2013

I wasn't going to do a traded set because the main requirement for inclusion into the set was playing (or managing) at least 1 big league game for their team.  But when the two-time Blog of the Year winner gives a request, by god you better comply.  Actually, a traded set really does make sense because 1986 Topps, on which I based the design, is more known today for its Traded set than the main set.  There were at least 10 rookies in the Traded set that would have been the #1 rookie in the main set.  The one thing I didn't want to do was wait until Spring Training to make it, but I also wanted to show players in their new uniforms.  I compromised with a very small Traded set featuring new managers and some players from press conferences and photo shoots.  My one rule was that either a uniform was worn OR the new team's logo was easily visible.  Those photos are not ideal, but hey I beat Topps to a Josh Hamilton Angels card by about a week.  Some of them actually do look pretty sharp though.  Lets take a look at the truncated 26 card 2012 Quarry Unlimited Traded set including all 6 new managers.

There you go, the final new cards from the 2012 Quarry Unlimited set.  I will be back tomorrow with the Grand Finale to the nearly 3 month odyssey that was the 2012 Quarry Unlimited set.  Hope to see you then.

Thanx for reading.

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2012 Quarry Unlimited - The Recap Part 2

Saturday, 19 January 2013

Today is going to be the meat of the recap.  I'll be sharing some facts, figures, and opinions and hopefully you will be informed and entertained.   Now here is some trivia on the entire set from David Aardsma to Ben Zobrist and all points in between.

I'll be back on Sunday to wrap up this set along with showing off the top ten cards of the set as voted on by you.  If you haven't voted for your ten yet, please do so on the right sidebar.


Team with the most cards
Boston Red Sox (57)

Team with the fewest cards
(tie) Seattle Mariners & Cincinnati Reds (39)

Total # of cards in this set
1494

Total # of unique players appearing in the set
1284 (1316 including managers)

Total # of players appearing with multiple teams
117

Total # of players appearing on 3 or more teams
6 (all with 3 teams)

Here are all six with teams shown in order of appearance. 

 The 6th is a bit tricky.

This is the order in which Pearce appeared in games, but not the order in which he was on the teams.  Pearce started the year with the Yankees after being released by the Twins in Spring Training, but never got out of the minors.  Then, he was purchased by the Orioles and played in 28 games and was then waived.  Houston claimed him on waivers and he played in 21 games for the Astros.  Then, the Yankees purchased him from Houston (I wonder if his value dropped by half once Baltimore drove him off the lot).  He played in 12 games for New York at the end of the year before being waived near the end of the season.  Finally, he was picked up by Baltimore once again, but didn't play in any more games for them.  All told in 2012, Pearce had 6 different stops with 4 different franchises, but only played games in 3 of those stops.  Whew! 

Total # of players sharing the same name
12

Here are the 6 sets of players that share the same name

There were also two sets of players with the same name that included one traded player.  The first two cards in each threesome are one player and third is a different player with the same name.

The final set of same name players only included one player along with one manager (or former manager)

Total # of players that I was forced to use mug-shot pictures
4

I tried to get updated on-field or in-dugout pics for everyone, but I missed these four guys.  Aardsma pitched in 1 inning of 1 game.  Taylor pitched in 3 games for a total of 2.1 innings.  Solis and Quiroz were both the emergency catchers on their team during the September call ups.  Solis played in 5 games and went 0-4, while Quiroz played in 2 games and went hitless in 2 at bats.  Needless to say, there weren't a lot of opportunities to catch these guys on film.

Team write ups with the most pageviews
1. Miami Marlins Part 2
2. San Diego Padres Part 2
3. Cincinnati Reds Part 2

It is sort of odd that three small market teams, including two without a big blog presence, would get the most pageviews.  I was pleasantly surprised by the turnout.

Team write ups with the fewest pageviews
1. Cleveland Indians Part 2
2. Atlanta Braves Part 2
3. Houston Astros Part 1

I was equally surprised that these three teams made up the fewest # of pageviews.  Both Cleveland and Houston have at least 3 bloggers each and, before the massive Dodger takeover, about half of all blogs were affiliated with the Braves.  Oh well, they will be there from now on in case people ever want to see them in the future.

Total # of teams with color changes from 1986 Topps
7 (including Nationals/Expos)

Total # of people that appeared in this set and 1986 Topps
15 (16 including Jim Leyland who was in 1986 Topps Traded)

Total # of those people I forgot to show in side-by-sides
1

I just totally forgot about Dodgers manager Don Mattingly, which is strange since he was one of the most sought after 1986 Topps cards (after Dwight Gooden) back in the day.  It did work out that one of least favorite players ever that is currently managing my second least favorite team was the one forgotten. but it was still accidental.  I'll make up for it now with Don Mattingly's side-by-side.

As much as I dislike Mattingly, I must say he has aged very well, probably the best of any of the 16 guys.



Don't forget to vote for your top ten, because the voting ends tomorrow.


Thanx for reading.

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