2020 didn’t get off to too shabby of a start in a lot of different ways. To be honest it got started well back in 2019. On a personal note, I got promoted! Officially it wasn’t effective until January 1st, but I knew about it and it was announced back in November/December. It’s actually one of those promotions that’s a bit of a big deal at the company too, a first major step into more senior management.
On the TTM front I think it got started last year too. In October I started stepping up the number of TTMs I was sending out. While I think a lot of those came in last year, I still think some of that is bleeding into this year. On top of that I had done a good push with research and I’m still working to send out those attempts. All of that is still bearing fruit.
The goal I had to try to hit 1.5 successes per day is pretty much on track as you’ll see from this post. Also on track is stepping up the number of total cards I get back this year.
Let’s get to it…
The Monthly Numbers
I put up a couple big numbers to carry the month. First there was a 6 on the 7th. That was after a couple days of nothing and was a good omen for the rest of the month. Then I had seven on the 21st. That was after the three day weekend and feeling like the week prior was a bit of a slow down. I think that seven either is the best or ties the best day I’ve ever had.
I figure I’ll need to hit 45ish a month to be on track for the “one and a half per day” goal. I was right on that number so I am a little behind with January having 31 days. Maybe I can catch up in a short February. Hopefully with some extras going out for Spring Training it will up the numbers as well. Although with some of the discussion I’ve had with others for recent Spring Trainings, that might be hoping too much.
So after some good months with no failures, this month had four. Two of them were bad addresses and one was a PO Box so that was a little strange. The other two were from guys who wouldn’t sign or who are charging. Von Hayes is charging $5 per these days and Juju Smith-Schuster doesn’t sign any longer it looks like.
The heat map definitely swung a bit more into those late 80’s and early 90’s cards. I still have some good spikes in the late 70’s and early 80’s but not like I was having a couple months ago. Plus there’s that little lump for 2018 and 2019, that was a Max Muncy success that came in for my only recent cards of the month. I was kind of hoping for some of last year’s Spring Training cards to come in, but no such luck yet.
I’ve been really concentrating on baseball lately. I am finally swinging back into football a bit so I expect those numbers to jump up. As for basketball I had kind of reached the end of the first swing I was going to take with that. It was pretty successful. I just have to dig back into my cards and find some more that I need to get into for another round.
I also have a goal to get into hockey. The only problem there is it will be a lot of attempts with just one card and it’s hard to get up for that if I am trying to up how many cards I get back this year.
Topps of course is ruling the brands. With less football going out that means less when it comes to Pro Set and Pro Line coming back so they dropped down a little bit.
I corrected my “city” graphic above so you can see the cities a bit better. This month was definitely rules by the bigger cities with multiple teams a bit more. I know for a couple months it swung over to the small market type teams, but the big cities were having none of that last month.
The Phillies killed it this month along with the Padres. They were doing the best they could to keep try to beat out Los Angeles/Anaheim but throwing the Dodgers and Angels at them is maybe unfair. My Mets had a really great showing last month too. That’s probably because I prioritize them for what I’m sending out.
Here are the Top 10 by team for the month:
- Philadelphia Phillies – 15
- San Diego Padres – 13
- New York Mets – 10
- Texas Rangers – 9
- California Angels – 9
- Milwaukee Brewers – 8
- Seattle Mariners – 7
- St. Louis Cardinals – 7
- Montreal Expos – 7
- Los Angeles Dodgers – 6
Getting Trendy
For this month (and maybe next month) I’m leaving the end of last year up there so you can see how I’m trending. If you put the numbers together you can see that my first month this year was as good as my best last year. Hopefully that doesn’t mean there’s nowhere to go but down. Right now, things are trending up since November.
Baseball successes were my best since last March. Given that was Spring Training and I was sending extra out, I think that looks great. But you can see that the other sports are a bit down with my swing back to baseball.
I really thought 160+ was a great result, but I was better than that last October. Just by a little, but still. I really hope that this means things are looking up for this year to be even better than last year.
The Overall Numbers
Last year I ended with 428 successes and 32 failures. While I’m on track to beat those numbers, it’s just one month so I can’t get ahead of myself. But if we look year-over-year (I feel like a finance guy writing that) I’m up 18% from last January as far as my success number goes. And last January was a pretty good month.
As for total cards, I’m at 162. That turns out to be an almost 25% increase from last January. I’ve gotta really keep up my research and keep getting good attempts out.
He’s Making a List
Some of my favorites from last month include Muggsy Bogues, Greg Anthony, Tommy Greene, Del Unser, Max Muncy, and Dana Barros. It’s funny how basketball heavy that is given I didn’t get a ton of basketball back. But my favorites have to be my Mets: Todd Hundley, Keith Miller, and a couple from Randy Neimann.
There weren’t too many really bad stragglers. A couple over 220 and a couple more over 180. Most were no longer than about 20 days at most.
Hope everyone else had a great month too!