#79 - Adam Eaton

What’s that Turtle doin’? Oh just runnin' one down out here by the warning track before a nice smooth landing for the 2nd Rookie Card to appear in the set.

Here, Eaton just makes this running catch look downright easy, but the distance he is airborne, and the bit of blur around his shoes indicate how fast he is running to make this catch — he might have got a late break on the ball, or had been playing a weaker hitter a bit shallow.

Not too many baseball cards show the warning track; usually a player photographed this deep in the outfield is closer to the wall, attempting to steal a Home Run away from a batter, and then photographed up in the air, from the ground, which in turn cuts the ground (& the warning track) from the picture. This card looks like it was shot by a drone camera, or a 2nd baseball sent out to follow the first one, or something. It does make the viewer feel like they are up in the air, too somehow, along with that fly ball.

The photo composition works very well. An odd thing about that is the way his right leg and shoe, extended back upwards in the running motion, help draw the eye to the top of the card, where the baseball appears just as it plunges into the glove. That then draws the eye downwards & following his left leg and the whole result conjures up that nice smooth landing idea I just mentioned. And yet the rotation of Eaton's body so he can see the ball perfectly presents himself to have his live action portrait taken.

Really one of the best motion capture cards in the set, and one more that would make a final countdown of my favorites in the set were I to compile one. Though I'm not sure I would really want to start picking one over another for such a list.

+Bonus points for one of the coolest sunglasses-on-baseball-card shots I can ever remember. How often do you ever get to see The Sun, on a baseball card?

Uniform Hero? Not even close. Though the image on this card might make you think that @ #79, that would make a great # for a Wide Receiver, those uniform #s don't actually start into the 80s range, and #79 is traditionally a defensive lineman so this whole thought now has absolutely nothing to do with this baseball card.

Where’d the egg hatch? Adam was drafted in the 19th round of the 2010 draft by the Diamondbacks.

How about the migrations? Eaton would then debut quickly in Arizona in September, 2012, only a few months before this card was composed. 

Don’t flip over real Turtles.

Here the card back text really kind of battles with the official Rookie Card© stat format with that refusal to acknowledge any MLB stat production before the magical logo was applied to the front of the magical Rookie Card. Which of course these days, is no longer quite a Rookie Card anyway considering how players can have a dozen or more base baseball cards created for them before they reach the Topps Baseball set.

All I can say on the single stat line here is that Mobile and Reno must have some mighty big ballparks for Eaton to have hit only 7 Home Runs with a .523 Slugging % - that, or he was really good at stretching out singles vs. minor league outfielders. I will go with the latter idea there I think. 

So I guess you can gleam something from that weird, one year, multi-team stat line officially created for all Rookies© on the back of their big card. But I will still never warm up to this ever so weird back-of-baseball-card format.

Can the Turtle Catch the Rabbit?

CAREER CHASE: With 2 stolen bases, Eaton is 1,404 away from Rickey Henderson's all-time record of 1,406.

It has been many, many cards since we have seen the Henderson record. I think Jesse Orosco is probably beating out Rickey on this card back line so far.

In the 2010s it is nice to consider players known for stealing bases, when The Data strictly controls the Go sign probably more than the Manager does at this point. So it is nice to see this comparison, but I am slowly realizing that the vast majority of players drafted out of College have lesser chance at baseball immortality in the record books or eventually Cooperstown, given the way counting stat comparisons and age and career length all work, particularly in this century.

Eaton would move on from Arizona to play in Chicago after a 3 team trade (can Arizona participate in a trade any other way? I sometimes wonder), and then in Washington after another high leverage trade, where he had a very nice performance in the 2019 World Series after a couple injury shortened campaigns in '17 and '18. He is signed with the Nationals through this coming (I hope) 2020 season, with a team option for 2021.

However in MLB action he has never stolen even half as many bases as he did in that 2012 minor league campaign. As games commence in 2020 (I hope), Adam Eaton has stolen 81 bases.

Subspecies? Fortunately for checklist completers everywhere, another Adam Eaton wrapped up an MLB career in 2009 so we have never had to deal with 2 Adam Eatons on one checklist. Topps more generally manages to do that with 2 cards of one player usually.

This is such a champion baseball card image I am a little surprised it does not appear on the Opening Day Checklist. But then the Diamondbacks aren't exactly a team with a long baseball card tradition, so I would expect their portion of the Opening Day checklist is rarely very long.

However given those exciting AA&AAA stats compiled on the back of this card, it is not surprising that this one was chosen for inclusion on the Topps Chrome checklist. And as a Rookie Card© there, that means there is an autographed version and that means there is an image variation for those cards. And that means I am collecting that checklist, although the Eaton card will have to be added here, someday.

Bling That Shell For such a sweet sunlit action card I wanted to go with maximum shiny; I suspect the Topps Chrome parallels of this would make a nice 'rainbow' effort. I am working on one of those for this card, though so far I only have the tough Black /62 parallel.

But given the varying tones and the strip of green grass, I picked up a Blue Sparkle copy of this card pretty early on:

#78 - Dylan Bundy

What’s that Turtle doin’? Tryin' to hide the red rosy cheeks of a fresh-faced Rookie, perhaps?

But of course Rookies are always (err, well, almost always) clearly identified in a Topps Baseball set these days. And here after lo these many Hero cards: our first Rookie Card© in this Topps Baseball set. I seriously doubt any other set of the 2010s makes collectors wait this long on the checklist before the Rookie Card fiesta gets started.

This particular float in the Pitcher Parade created by the official photo style of these sets - live baseball action sourced photos - is little different than the last Orioles Pitcher card in terms of pose and zoom level.

Here, the flowing Orioles script of the uniform nicely leads the collector viewer nicely off into the future of this probable four-seam fastball Dylan is about to throw here. Thoughts of the future are very apropos for a Rookie Card.

The basic sheen at several points on Bundy's skin, and the dark portions of the background, suggest this is probably a night card. Though when a player image is cropped/zoomed this tightly, that matters little.

All in all, a nicely captured live portrait of a brand new Major Leaguer, and not a bad card at all to hang a career on. Which is very important in the world of baseball cards, as for so many, only Rookie Cards are actually baseball cards. 2nd year cards and beyond could be effectively invisible for many who participate in The Hobby.

Uniform Hero? 49 is not even divisible by 78, so, no.

Where’d the egg hatch? Bundy was drafted in the first round in 2011 by the Orioles; and notably as the 4th player selected. Also notable was that he had just finished High School and received heavy baseball media coverage as the top 18 year old draft prospect in the country.

Adding to the excitement was the 4th player selected in the 2012 draft, also by the Orioles, another young Pitcher named Kevin Gausman, who's Rookie Card we will see on the Update Checklist. Baltimore had high hopes for bringing out a brand new young rotation (to also include Bud Norris and Chris Tillman) all right about the same time.

How about the migrations? Though some Rookie Cards can feature a player drafted by another team before putting on the official RC uniform, Bundy did come up through the Orioles system, and came up fast...

Don’t flip over real Turtles.

A bit of a disjointed effort there in the 3rd sentence - what leather? - but if you read the whole thing twice, it does come together.

I like how it didn't take long to find another Switch-Hitting Pitcher after the #74 - Kenley Jansen card. 

This is the official format for a Rookie Card now - a single stat line from the previous season, and featuring only the MiLB stats, even when MLB stats also exist. This has never made any sense to me, at all.

Nevertheless Topps was so impressed by the 30 scoreless innings in A ball they created an insert card to memorialize it. Or, more accurately, they used that baseball feat to shoehorn a Bundy card into the "Chasing History" inserts which were part of the official theme of the Sea Turtle set: "The Chase."

Hmmm, haven't we seen this picture somewhere before?

Of course the real point of that card was to serve as a bed for an autograph sticker; it was more than a little incongruous to find an insert for a 2 Innings Pitched Rookie amidst an insert set chock-a-block with legendary Hall of Famers. But that's the way she goes in the Topps Baseball set.

Can the Turtle Catch the Rabbit?

CAREER CHASE: With 0 strikeouts, Bundy is 5,714 away from Nolan Ryan's all-time record of 5,714.

Well that didn't take long, i.e. for Topps to write one of these comparisons for a Rookie that created the greatest possible spread of any of the possible "counting" stats.

The irony of this one is something only hinted at on the card back text, and also something unknown as the card was being composed somewhere in Brooklyn. Bundy did debut in MLB in September, 2012, however he never appeared in a game during the year this card was for sale as he had Tommy John surgery in June, 2013. Perhaps his dominant High School success was built on throwing too many high quality breaking balls at very young hitters, which can certainly work for very young pitchers, but at that certain cost for so many of them.

Bundy would not return to MLB action until 2016 (and get his first K) after experiencing and rehabbing other injuries after the Tommy John surgery recovery process. And then it is worth remembering he had to pitch at home in Camden Yards, something not terribly unlike trying to be a young pitcher at Coors Field in Colorado.

When the 2020 season hopefully gets under way, Dylan Bundy should break camp, however that will work this year, with a new team - the California Angels, who traded away four very young pitching prospects to get him from Balitmore. Early Spring Training results have been quite promising and perhaps we are about to see Dylan Bundy 2.0 this year, eventually.

After the 2019 season, Dylan Bundy had thrown 602 Strikeouts. 

Subspecies? With all the basic great prospect hope hype surrounding Bundy, this card was a natural fit to be included in the Chrome checklist. But that hype power was also strong enough to land this card on the Opening Day checklist as well, where Rookie Cards are generally scarce, or, well, were at one time; the 2013 Opening Day set had only 8 RCs in it, a # which has since tripled despite the checklist shrinking by 20 cards. 

There is also a photo variation for this card #, of the "Fan Interaction" type which is probably an SSP, as opposed to an SP; that card did not appear until insertion in packs in Series 2. A copy of that one has not reached Sea Turtle HQ yet however, so you will have to check back here in a year or so to see that one.

There is also a Sea Turtle-esque card of Dylan Bundy that I hope to share with you eventually; one I only very recently discovered.

Bling That Shell I thought I saw a Purple Oriole? I did, I did: