First Post

Where to begin?

I am a huge baseball fan, always have been since my first time watching games in the early 80's with my dad. I remember watching a game and being in awe of the talent of Dave Winfield - The Hall of Fame Outfielder. He made an incredible catch with the Yankees - reaching back into the 3rd or 4th row. From that moment on he was my favorite player. In the mid to late 80's I started collecting baseball cards. By the age of 12 I had a NYS sales tax ID and was selling cards at local shows. I did it mostly to be able to afford more cards! In 1995 I graduated High School and went to College at the University at Albany. My favorite team - the Yankees - had just completed a 7-10 year period of mediocrity, I had no money for baseball cards - and although I was still a huge fan - I stopped collecting.

In 1998 I was turned on to internet fantasy baseball - on a now defunct site called smallworld.com. We had a lot of fun! The next year we moved our league to sandbox.com and we haven't looked back.

Sometime in this area I began collecting again - although not as fervently as I had as a child. Combine this with my addiction to fantasy baseball, and I started to root more for players instead of teams. The yankees are still my favorite team - but I need my players to do well - so I can win my league.

In 2002 a 19 year old rookie was promoted to the majors for the San Diego Padres - and based on his monor league performance and his age, I took a shot on him. Throughout the end of 2002 Oliver Perez made me a fan. He struck out 16 rockies in one of his first games! I started collecting his cards then, but just a little.

In 2004 after being traded to the Padres - Oliver looked like the next greatest thing. Players compared him to a shorter Randy Johnson - Barry Bonds said he was the hardest to hit against in the league. I bought a bunch of his cards at this time.

In 2005 and 2006 - I followed him pretty strongly as he remained on my fantasy team - but I didnt really buy anything. If you look at his record you will see why. It seemed to me like he was a flash in the pan. A Steve Avery of the 2000's. That kid that pitched too much too early and was going to fade into history as a could have, should have, didn't.

In the second half of 2006 - a pitcher for the mets (Duaner Sanchez) was in a taxi cab accident - and the mets needed a reliever for their post season run. The mets almost instantly made a trade with the Pirates for Roberto Hernandez. Omer Minaya being pretty shrewd - asked the pirates to throw in Oliver - whom they had given up on and sent to the minors.

This gave Perez the opportunity to get a fresh start, and work with "The Jacket" - Rick Peterson, the mets pitching coach famous for working with young pitchers (sich as the big three in Oakland in the late 90's). Oliver made progress - and showed much poise in a few post season outings - including the game 7 of the NLCS that the Mets lost to the eventual World Series champ Cardinals. Oliver pitched well enough to win giving up only 1 run - but the mets bullpen blew the game. This strong outing convinced me that he would succeed in NY, that Rick Peterson could turn him back to what he was before, and made me start heavily collecting his cards again.

This Blog will be updated everytime I have something to say, about anything really. It will mostly focus on Oliver's performance. It will provide links to articles about him. I will show off my collection of his cards, and talk baseball in general.

Since I am a Yankee fan you will see posts on that subject as well. My Fantasy addicition will sometimes have me post on other stuff happening in baseball. Following Oliver makes me follow the mets, so Mets fans may find some interest as well. I work in the wireless phone industry so some technology stuff might be thrown in as well.

I like to type fast, and I probably will not be spell checking - so expect typos. If those bother you - then don't read the blog!

I hope everyone enjoys reading my thoughts as much as I expect to enjoy posting them!

Bill