Sorry, I have been gone!

I know this is not a baseball card but this is in memory of my father in-law James Skocy that passed away Tuesday.He is on the Right.
For the first time in almost three years, the Skocy broth­ers. Pfc. Richard L. Skocy 22, and Corp. James A. Skocy both of the ma­rines, met recent on Okinawa. The sons of Mr., and Mrs. Antone Skocy, Route 1, Joliet they had promised their moth­er, a picture of themselves together the first time their paths crossed, so they enlisted the aid of a marine corps combat photographer to record the occasion. .'James is shown trying a.Jap soldier's cap on his brother. Although both participated in the Okinawa fight, it was- not until hostilities had ceased that they met. James, with the headquarters battalion, first marine division, fought at Cape Gloucester and Peleliu, while Richard participated in the landings on New Georgia and Tulagi. He is with the sixth marine division. Both enlisted in the ma­rines in September, 1942, with the Joliet unit. James has been overseas two years and Richard, two and a half years. (Official U. S. Marine Corps photo)

Joliet Illinois Newspaper 1945

Obituary James Anton Skocy SR.

James Skocy, departed naturally from this earth, on September 23, 2008, at the Missouri Veterans Home in Mount Vernon, Missouri.
He is pre-ceded in death by his parents Anton & Juliette Skocy, one sister Juliette Homan, two brothers George & Robert Skocy, the beloved mother of his children Anna Mae (Williamson) Skocy and one son Allen Skocy.

James Anton Skocy Sr. was born January 30, 1922 at Silver Cross Hospital in Joliet Illinois. James served in the Civilian Conservation Corps, the United Stated Marine Corps during WWII and the Korean War. He took the oath to serve his country in the Joliet Township High School with 164 other men from the Joliet community. He served in the 1st Marine Division 9th battalion in New Guiness, Peleliu, Okinawa and Rukyu Islands. After completing his military service James married Anna Mae Williamson and raised twelve children. He worked as a Lead Man at Seneca Petroleum Corporation in Lemont, Illinois until he retired in 1987. James was a life-long member of the Illinois VFW.

He is survived by his brother Richard Skocy of Rich Hill, Missouri, 11 Children: Mary (Andrew) Helgeson, Pittsburgh, PA. James (Ronna) Skocy, Rich Hill, MO, Chris (Kathy) Skocy, Marine City, MI. Dan Skocy, Channahon, IL. Diane (Kenneth) Kassner, Rich Hill, MO. Nancy Skocy, Tucson, AZ. Robert Skocy, Rich Hill, MO. Greg (Rachel) Skocy, Rich Hill, MO, Kenneth Skocy, Rich Hill, MO; Lynn (Bart) McClaughry, Rich Hill, MO, Amy (Neal) Mitchell, Rich Hill, MO; Twenty-eight grandchildren and ten great grandchildren, and numerous nieces and nephews.

Services for James Anton Skocy Sr. will be held at 10:30 A. M. on Saturday September 27, 2008 at the Carlson-Holmquist-Sayles Funeral Home in Joliet with an Interment at Woodlawn Cemetery. The family suggests memorial contributions to Missouri Veterans Home or the Illinois VFW c/o Heuser Funeral Home, PO Box 42, Rich Hill, MO 64779.

Cards For Eric

Eric I will be sending your cards out tomorrow! I sure appreciate the contribution you made towards my Royals collection. I only hope I can contribute to your Yankees Collection with the same effort.
Baseballcardman

Allen & Ginter's 2008

It is amazing how sometimes it is so easy to blog and other times it is so hard. Right now, I am in the hard stage. Tonight I am posting another one of Eric's cards. This is Allen Ginters just like Upper Deck I haven't bought any Allen Ginters card this year. So, I really appreciate this card from Eric too.

I have reached the half way point on my most memorable trades of all times. But don't think I have forgotten I still have 5 more to go! I want to thank all of you who do read my blog.

Baseballcardman

Trade with Eric

About two weeks ago I got an e-mail from a guy named Eric stating he wanted to make a trade. Eric wanted to trade Yankees for Royals. He told me he had a Gil Meche Jersey card. I e-mailed him back and told him to keep it because I didn't have anything to trade him for it. He said he was thinning his collection and he would rather a Royals fan have it that would appreciate it. I definitely appreciate it! I am still going through the cards he sent me over 100 cards. I will probably do some more post on his cards later on. Another thing I enjoy in the cards he sent me are the 2007 & 2008 Upper Deck card. I haven't broke open any 2007 or 2008 Upper Deck packs trying to get Royals cards as I was hoping to trade for them and he sent me some. Thanks Eric! I am trying to gather Yankee cards to send to you.
Also, I haven't blogged lately as I have been on vacation. So, it is back to work tomorrow!
baseballcardman

1991 Topps Cracker Jack II - 2 Carlton Fisk

What a rare collectable of BASEBALL GREAT CARLTON FISK!!! I got this card on a ebay auction! This is a tiny 1991 CARLTON FISK TOPPS CRACKER JACK CARD. It only measures 1 1/4 inches by 1 3/4 inches. AWESOME!! I have to get it in my collection fast before I lose it.

Checklist of TOPPS CRACKER JACK 1991 Series 2

1 Eddie Murray
2 Carlton Fisk
3 Eric Anthony
4 Kelly Gruber
5 Von Hayes
6 Ben McDonald
7 Andre Dawson
8 Ellis Burks
9 Matt Williams
10 Dave Stewart
11 Barry Larkin
12 Chuck Finley
13 Shane Andrews
14 Bret Saberhagen
15 Bobby Bonilla
16 Roberto Kelly
17 Orel Hershiser
18 Ruben Sierra
19 Ron Gant
20 Frank Thomas
21 Tim Wallach
22 Gregg Olson
23 Shawon Dunston
24 Kent Hrbek
25 Ramon Martinez
26 Alan Trammell
27 Ozzie Smith
28Bob Welch
29 Chris Sabo
30 Steve Sax
31 Bip Roberts
32 Dave Stieb
33 Howard Johnson
34 Mike Greenwell
35 Delino DeShields
36 Alex Fernandez

My 5th Most Memorable Trade of all Times

This trade happened when I was actually a dealer. A friend of mine whom I a have known for a long time, said that Preacher Roe was going to be at card show in Joplin Mo. He asked me If I would go along to help him because he was going to have his own table at the show. At first we were worried because the weather was really bad as it was icing outside. So, there was a chance the Preacher might not even show up. The Preacher was a little late but eventually he showed up. My friend ended up spending most of his time over at Preachers table getting signatures. Anyway I sold a lot of baseball cards for my friend. This one guy showed up at his table, and he had a lot of good cards that were on my want list. Several of them I have already listed on this blog and on previous blogs that I have done. He had a 1966 Catfish Hunter, an 1989 Fleer Ripken F Face,

and some other cards i traded him out of which I can't remember right now. I had also been wanting the 1989 Jim Abbott Topps Traded another guy walked up to the table with it and we made that trade. I left that particular show really happy because I had never made so many trades on cards that I really wanted before.

I Can't Quit!

I am taking a break from my blogs on my top 10 Trades to comment on Houston Card Collector article "I Quit!" As for me personally, I can't quit. I love collecting baseball cards. I have tried to quit several times throughout my life. However, collecting baseball cards just keeps coming back to me as a hobby. I get real joy when I read blogs or e-mails where guys say I quit collecting but I have started back up again. For the hobby to remain healthy we have to have collectors returning back to the hobby. I think we have to learn to adjust to what the hobby is doing. I would love to ride my bicycle to the local quick stop and buy cards for 15 cents a pack as I did when I was a kid. But the times have changed, you can see that clearly when you go to any gas pump or grocery store. Houston card Collector talks about in his article that the card companies are charging 100 dollars a pack on some products. Apparently people are buying them at 100 dollars a pack or the card companies wouldn't keep charging that much. I know that the major card companies have tried to market a cheaper pack of cards in the past but they just don't sell! One thing I do agree about with Houston cards collectors article is I wish cards were in the local stores more.

I would like to see as many baseball card collectors come back to the hobby that I love. Because unlike those collectors that have quit collecting I can't quit!

My 4th Most Memorable Trade of all Times

I am changing this blog from best trade to most memorable trade of all time because some people wouldn't consider these good trades but they are the most memorable to me. In 1989 my wife and I had just moved back to our home town and the baseball card boom was on. I couldn't hardly believe it but the little town that we grew up in now had a card shop. Anyway I packed up several of my cards from the 1970's and headed to the card shop to do some trading. It is funny but I still remember looking around the ladies shop and it was like my dream of being a collector and having a card shop to go to trade at. I told they shop owner that I would trade her several cards from the 1970's for a complete set of 1988 Topps. I remember her picking out a 1977 Johnny Bench and a Pete Rose and a 1976 Dave Winfield. I remember walking to my car thinking what a good deal. I traded just a few cards for a complete set what a good deal. But now as I look back on it I would have rather have kept my old cards. The ladies husband passed away so she closed the shop down after just a year. The building she had her card shop in is now condemned and has a fence around it. Sometimes when I drive buy the old building I think to myself that there used to be a sports card shop in this town.

My 3rd Best Trade of all Times

My third best trade is all of the trades I have made on the Internet building up my KC Royals collection. I actually wasn't trying to build my Royals collection until I started my Baseballcardman Blog. Steve at White sox cards and David at Indian baseball cards always looked liked they were having great fun collecting their team players so I decided to start building mine too. Once again, thanks for inspiring me guys! Since I have started trading on-line I have built my Royals up to about 1500 of course not all of my Royals came through trading but quite a few of them did. It has been great fun to come home and see what is in the packages! I really enjoy being surprised by the cards people have surprised me with. So, if you happen to be one that I have traded with THANK YOU and may we have many more trades in the future! Baseballcardman

My 2nd Trade of all times

During the summer of 1990 I was in between jobs and kind of hurting for cash and I wanted a Catfish Hunter Rookie Card really bad. So, I took my 1977 Steve Largent Rookie and headed to Kansas City to a Tri-Star Show. It was a lot of fun taking the Largent card around to the dealers and seeing what they would give for it. Then I would go around to all the dealers to find out who had a Catfish Hunter Rookie. This one dealer had a Catfish Hunter and he wanted me to give him some cash to boot along with my Largent Card. So, I went to another dealer and sold him the Largent card and I ended up with the $10 to boot and my Catfish Hunter Rookie card. I miss the big card shows/ sports memorabilia of the past. I sure do wish that I could have went to the national show this weekend, I always really enjoy bartering with the dealers.
Baseballcardman

Top Ten trades

I was watching the NFL channel tonight and they had the top 10 draft trades of all time. This made me think, what are my top 10 trades of all times? I am going to list my top ten although not in order. Tonight I am going to talk about one of my best trades the "Official 1966 Kansas City Athletics Score Book." A guy I work with came by the scorebook by accident. Since the guy I work with didn't care about baseball he decided he would trade it for some football magazines I had. I tried not to act to anxious. However, it was very difficult for me not to get anxious as not only was it an Official Scorebook with 6 signatures on it, the best one being Billy Martin, Al Worthington, Cesar Tovar, and Ted Uhlaender and a Minnesota Twins pin attached to its cover. I now keep my prize trade locked away, and protected in a black case. More of my top ten trades in future posts as I think of them.
Baseballcardman

Another card from Whitesoxcards

I waited then I almost forgot to post this card! Steve and I are alike we both collect Carlton Fisk cards. Upper Deck 2001 The National Pastime Card
The Back of the cards Says: Fisk was one of the Game Premier Catchers for nearly two decades and set the standard for durability among backstops.
He Owens the records for catchers in games(2,229) and home runs (351). Fisk is perhaps best known for his 12th-inning Home Run in game six of the 1975 World Series between the Red Sox and the Reds. The game-winning Homer capped one of the most remarkable World Series contests in history. Fisk was the Al Rookie of the year in 1972 and was an 11-time All-Star.He was elected to Hall of Fame in 2000.

Thanks to the baseballcardblog

Now that the dust is settled on Ben Henry, the writer of the baseballcardblogg who had a button that bloggers could make a donation thru their pay-pal accounts. I thought I needed to just tell him Thank you, because he is the one who got me started on baseball card blogging. You see, about a year ago, I kept looking into building a web-site so that I could share my experiences with collecting baseball cards. I even tried building a site on free webs. I didn't like trying to build the site, it was too difficult, and I didn't know how anyone would possibly ever find my site to read it. Then one day I was typing in google and it took me into Ben Henry's baseball card blogg. I thought to myself, alright! this is what I have been looking for! Baseball collectors sharing their experiences. So, I just wanted to take a moment to tell Ben Henry, Thank You.

The Beckett on-line

I have been looking through my old Beckett's again. This time I picked out the August 1995, issue 125, with Frank Thomas on the cover. I sold several Beckett's at garage sales through the years. Apparently this one never sold as it looks like I had a price tag on it. In 1995 I was going through a stage if the baseball card wasn't a 1979 or older, I didn't even consider it a baseball card. I would usually buy one Beckett a year to keep track of baseball card prices. This issue of the Beckett had good stories about the careers, of Nolan Ryan, George Brett, Carlton Fisk, Robin Yount & Dale Murphy. The story that caught my eye the most was on page 4, where Dr. Beckett announces that they now have "The Beckett" on-line now. I had almost forgotten the day when "The Beckett" first came on-line! We didn't have a home computer in 1995 so, I would have to go to other places that had a computer. I would go to friends houses, and the library to see what all Beckett had on-line. Just the other day, I bought the new Baseball Card Plus Beckett, as I still like to keep track of the prices. Now, they don't even have the "Baseball Card Monthly anymore. But I still enjoy reading the Beckett on-line at http://www.beckett.com/. It still amazes in order to keep up with my card collecting I have had to evolve with the times and new resources. Baseballcardman