I love being a player collector on COMC. Every day I’ll check the site and pick off cards I want and leave them in my account until I reach 100. At that point I’ll request shipment because when you ask for 100 cards to be delivered, COMC gives you a $5 bonus on the first day of the next month.

So the bonus effectively give me free shipping. And if you’ve ever dealt with COMC as a buyer, you know how Top-notch their packaging and fulfillment is.

Anyway, as usual, I filled by account with mostly Roger Clemens and Clayton Kershaw cards. And while most of it is ho-hum stuff I needed for my player collections, there are some neat pieces that I’ll show off here.

We’ll start with some Clemens stuff, move into some Kershaws, and then round out the post with some non-PC items.

I’m pretty sure I’ve written this somewhere, but when I was a kid I used to love my single 1985 Topps Roger Clemens Rookie Card so much that I actually put it into a Card Saver I and TAPED the holder to the inside pocket of my school binder. That way I could look at it at will, and I always knew where it was at. Fast forward some 30 years and I still fawn over the Clemens Topps Rookie And usually buy them when I find them cheap. This month I grabbed two from COMC when I found them near $2 each. Several others have since popped up but I’ve not bought another. Worth noting that when I place these two on top of each other, it’s clear that one of them was trimmed by some asshat who was hoping to turn it into a monster.

It sucks to see this, but I’m not upset… just part of this cards history, a reminder that people once cared enough about a Clemens to do such a thing.

Hey, Remember when Upper Deck produces upper tier baseball cards? Here are three reminders: A 1998 Amazing Greats DIE-CUT (/250), a 1997 SP SPX Force quad player hologram (/500), and a 2007 Exquisite Rookie Signature’s. Gorgeous stuff.

Here’s a few serial numbered cards, including a 2018 Topps Triple Threads parallel 21/99. Jersey number serial numbers are awesome.

I love the image on the 1991 Topps Roger Clemens Card; I really wish they turned that into a poster or even one of those folders. Anyway? Here are two Gypsy Queen minis from a few years ago, serial numbered /50 and /199. I showed these to my son the other day and he smiled and said he knew where else this picture was used. That made ME smile.

I still buy relic cards if they’re cheap enough or make me feel a certain way. All three of these checked one or both of those boxes.

And I’ll round out the Clemens highlights — like I said I have others that I won’t show here for the sake of tome — with a 1995 Collector’s Choice Gold Signature parallel and a 2004 Topps Chrome Refractor. I don’t have enough Clemens refractors.

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We’ll kick off the Kershaw portion with a BGS 9 Mint 2006 Bowman Heritage Prospects Card. I love BGS and grabbed this for almost as much as it costs to slab a single card these days. That’s a win.

Speaking of early cards, here are two inexpensive early editions I didn’t already own: 2006 Just and 2008 Tri-Star Projections.

Remember what I saw about Clemens relics above? The same applies for Kershaw. I added 7 new relics to my collection, including these three Panini “National” Silver (I think) Pack patch cards, which I scored collectively for about the price of a blaster. I now own 3 of the 15 produced.

The other relics included a Topps Tribute jumbo size relic, a full size Ginter relic and another 2018 Topps Heritage relic. Also, a 2016 Panini National Treasures dual jumbo relic booklet featuring two plain game-worn swatches. It’s almost blasphemous these large swatches are so bland in a product so expensive, but hey …. I’ll take a booklet of MY guy /15 for under $15.

From real used relics to manufactured relics. Here is a Topps MVP medallion Card, which is a type of card that usually doesn’t move the needle for me because it’s big (as in thick) and relatively unimpressive, except this one was cheap and it bears Kershaw’s serial number on the back.

Lets go from big to little … as in minis. The Diamond Kings is /25, and of course that red border Ginter is /40. Love this stuff even if they are a pain to store sometimes.

Speaking of parallels. Sometimes it’s a pain to chase these things for your player collections. But when they’re all together they sure are cool to look at. Here are a few various parallels.

And serial numbered parallels are also fun. I knocked out a few /10, /25, /50, /100 and so on …

Also picked up a pair of photo variations from recent years. Here are 2013 Topps and 2019 Topps.

And let’s round out this Kershaw section with a pair of high-end Topps cards, 2010 Topps Sterling /250 and 2012 Topps Museum Collection /199.

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And lastly here are six cards that either I needed for a set, were so cheap I couldn’t pass or otherwise spoke to me.

That 2018 Topps On Demand Mike Trout reminded me of a dream I have which is to take a photo that winds up on a real baseball card; and that Todd Helton Playoff Absolute has a laundry tag in it. Couldn’t pass for under $10. The Arrieta Topps Update Rookie BGS 9.5 was a steal for under $2. That’s not a typo.