My buddy Max sent me this in the mail yesterday.

Why you ask? Max asked and answered the same question.

Al Oliver had a pretty decent career. He played for 18 years and retired with a .303 batting average, 219 home runs and over 1300 rbis. He spent most of his career with the Pirates, winning the World Series with them in 1971. He was a 7-time All-Star. He bounced around a bit the last few years of his career, coming down for 28 games at the end of 1984 with the Phillies. He was traded to the Phillies on August 20, 1984 by the Giants, who got Kelly Downs in return. Although he played for the Dodgers and the Blue Jays in 1985, he appeared as a Phillies in the 1985 Fleer, Donruss and Topps sets.

I wonder what happened to his men's cologne collection?

2011 Topps Stickers

I started collecting baseball cards in 1985. There were Topps and Panani stickers available then but I don't remember seeing them for sale. I've acquired a few of them in repacks but I'm not a big fan of the concept. Perhaps if I was 10 I'd like them better.  But, I gotta have some. I picked up 10 packs at Target the other day. At only a dollar a pack it was hard to resist.

I don't know that I really like the foil cards. I had bought this Schmidt card previously on eBay. It looks like the foil cards are all past stars. I pulled Jackie Robinson and Babe Ruth from the packs.

The design is simple, which is good on a smaller format.  It has an '80s retro feel to me. The photography is good but there are no photos that really jump out at me. All though, here's one of a guy with glowing orange eyes.

Of the 80 stickers I got, only 2 were pitchers. Curious. Has anyone seen this?

Here's Ryan Braun of the Brewers for no other reason than that I'm rooting for the Brewers in the NLCS.

The team logo stickers, also done on foil, are pretty nice. There was a foil sticker in every pack, 6 were the logo stickers.

I don't have all of the 80 stickers in my database yet but I did find a couple of Topps Stickers/Gypsy Queen Photoshop Twins.

And...

Book Club - Flashback by Dan Simmons

This book started off as a kind of scary future history, just 20 years from now. Although I thought it was pretty well written, and a pretty good story, the reason the author gives for the world being in such a mess was a bit hard for me to take.

Please read my review on Amazon. I'm currently reviewer #103,435 on Amazon. Please click the box which says my review was useful and help me to crack into the top 100,000 reviewers.

Song of the Week - My Body Is A Cage by Arcade Fire

Economist Paul Krugman's favorite band. What's not to like about a live performance featuring two french horns and people singing into megaphones?

Cardinals advance

I hate sports postmortems. Let's just say that it doesn't matter how good your pitching is, you can't win if you don't score.

And it's going to be a long postseason with this image of Ryan Howard to remember.

Good luck to the Cardinals but I think I'll be rooting for the Brewers.

Song of the Week - Voices Carry by 'Til Tuesday

I wanted to post something by Aimee Mann and this came up. Aimee Mann from a long time ago...

2011 National League Division Championship

It's a Phillies fan's favorite time of the year. Here are the match-ups for the NLDS series against the Cardinals.

The Phillies have got their starting pitching just where they want it. Roy was 19-6 with a 2.35 ERA in 2011.

Both of these guys shine in the postseason. Yadier has a postseason BA of .315 in 32 games while Carlos is .280 in 41 games.

 Ryan has 7 home runs and 27 RBIs in postseason while Albert (does anyone call him Al) has 12 ans 36.

Chase has a lot of postseason experience and hit 5 home runs in the 2009 World Series. Skip has only 2 postseason games under his belt.

Jimmy only has a combined .226 BA in 41 postseason games, but has 15 RBIs. Ryan has much less postseason experience.

Placido has a combined .273 postseason average with 13 RBI. I'm guessing that the right handed David will get the start against Halladay. He has no post season experience at all. He finished the 2011 season with a .297 average however.

Raul had a down season, sometimes being super hot and sometimes being super cold. Matt hit .296 for the season with 22 home runs.

Shane has scored 23 runs in 41 postseason games. Jon has no postseason experience but batted .297 this season.

Hunter came to the Phillies from the woe-begone Astros in late July and had an immediate impact. He drove in the winning run in the Phillies franchise setting 102nd win. This will be his first postseason series. Berkman, another former Astro, may be the comeback player of the year. He hit .301 for the Cards with 31 home runs. He is also a .320 hitter in postseason play with 32 RBIs.