McCovey Monday #14

  My favorite player of all time is Hall of Famer Willie McCovey.  I have amassed a collection of over 1100 different  McCovey cards since I started collecting him in the late 1980s.  I will show off one of my favorite cards every Monday.  Stretch was one of the most feared hitters of all time and I am excited to show off my collection.

Thought I would share some of my recent McCovey pick ups from the 2012 releases.  All have these have come via eBay over the past couple of weeks.  First is the Canvas Collection card from Museum Collection.

 I bought 4 packs of this stuff which is equivalent to one box but they were part of 2 different open boxes.  I ended up with 3 GU and 1 Auto but fortunately the auto was a Ken Griffey Jr. Auto redemption that I quickly flipped on eBay to recover the cost of the cards plus some surplus Paypal.  I also got a Carlton Fisk Canvas Collection card which I thought was a nice looking cards.  Not a huge fan of the McCovey.  The Giants' uniform looks pretty good but the facial likeness is off to me for some reason.  Willie isn't the prettiest man but this card doesn't seem like an exact likeness to me.  I am still a fan of this insert set and glad to have this McCovey in my collection.

The back shares probably the most commonly told story about Stretch, his amazing first game against HOFer Robin Roberts.  I like the career stats showing on the back and the other info included, nice job on the card back.

Next up is a Gypsy Queen Gold framed parallel.

 I think both these gold cards from the retail packs and the blue framed parallels from the hobby boxes are great inserts.  The framing makes the cards look classy and special and I really enjoy this picture used on the McCovey card.

Another card back, this one seems to waste quite a bit of space. However, I like the stat they highlight for Willie.  In a way, his reputation as a hitter was similar to Barry Bonds, both were so feared they were pitched around quite a bit.  Those walks lead to impressive stats such as hitting a HR in 6.5% of his at bats.  The difference of course is the method to which they became a feared hitter, for some reason I suspect Willie came by his power a little more naturally.

Finally, I nice relic pick up out of this year's Tier One.

 Pretty good design this year although I always appreciate an action photo over a pose.  A nice single bat relic (although you will see on the back there is no guarantee it was used in any specific game or season or event).  It is serial numbered out of 50 and I got the middle one, any chance this is some sort of eBay 1/1???

The back of the card shows a 3rd different highlight on the back.  McCovey was the first player ever to hit 2 homers in the same inning twice in his career, including a record breaking grand slam for his final HR in the second game. I really like that Topps sought out several different comments to place on the back of the players cards and didn't settle for just one common stat or accomplishment to focus on for such a prolific player.