My New Favorite Card, Period.

I splurged. I've been browsing eBay for years for the right Andrew McCutchen auto, I've learned one thing. They're expensive as hell. I probably shouldn't have waited until after his MVP season to pull the trigger... but as they say, hindsight is 20/20. 

The important thing is, I bought my first goddamn McCutchen auto! And it's a friggin' beauty.

Judge for yourself:

2005 Topps Chrome. Pretty, right? Here's the back:

And in and effort to better capture the refractor aspect:

If you don't like this card, you're high. Or you just don't like it. That's fine too. What I love about this card:

-It's a rookie. What's not to love about that?

-The design. It hits most of my criteria for a perfect card: A nice theme of team colors, the team logo is displayed well, and the player's name is very distinguished.

-It's a refractor! Better yet, it's serial numbered- which is where my fetish lies when it comes to my PC. It's 220/500... which is, in way, Cutch's jersey number! (22) Nice little touch.

-Since it's a rookie card, it's from back when Cutch used his "extended" auto, if you will. Nowadays, since he signs a million autographs, he uses a more abbreviated autograph:

He's been penning the shortened version for a while now. I still love the new sig, but I also love that it used to be different. It's just another quality that makes my card unique!

The only downfall is that the auto is a sticker. But as far as I know, Cutch doesn't have any hard-signed rookie cards. I'm not a fan of stickers in general, especially the big silver ones that Topps favored for a while. 

Thanks for checking out my new baby, and thanks for checking out the blog!