The Braves Aren't Rockin' but I Won't Stop Choppin'

The Braves are in trouble.  They aren't producing runs and their strong pitching from earlier in the season is starting to slip. The current Braves are clearly a step below the best teams in baseball and without a turnaround in the near future, making the playoffs would be difficult.  With some tough teams coming up with the league's best A's and the Pirates on the road after that, the Braves need to figure things out quickly.

Freddie Freeman, though, has emerged from a slump and has been hitting well as of late.  With 2 All-Star appearances under his belt already and an 8 year contract, Freeman should be a mainstay at first base for many years and someone the Braves can continue to build their lineup around.

And just because the Braves are slumping doesn't mean the Braves cards stop coming.  In fact, this card from 2014 Topps Archives is the first Freddie Freeman card in my collection.

I am a fan of this simple design, modeled after 1971-72 Topps Hockey.  I've always liked this type of card, the Heritage/Archive/Retro type sets, and picking up this card of one of my favorite current players is a great start. One thing I always envied about baseball yearly releases when I was collecting basketball was the mainstay of Topps Heritage, only released by Topps for basketball in 2000-01 and 2001-02.  I look forward to picking up Braves and Orioles from these releases.

I picked this up off ebay from an auction that let me select a card I wanted from a dropdown for a particular set.  This type of ebay purchase was new to me- I ended up spending a bit of time browsing the seller's other insert sets for singles.

You might be thinking- Ryan, it looks like a lot of Orioles cards should be showing up on your blog! What's with the Braves posts?  Well, I am an Orioles fan, but a Braves fan as well.  Growing up I had the Richmond Braves (AAA) close by, and saw some great players pass through on their way to Atlanta.  Some of my favorite players are current and former Braves and so a good number of posts will show up on this blog that relate to Atlanta players.  

Check out my What I Collect page for a list players I collect.  I'll also be chasing some team sets of the Orioles and Braves and will compile a list of some cards I have for trade.  A big part of this blog will hopefully be interacting with other card bloggers and helping each other out with our collections.