We start in Hagerstown at the world's most decrepit ballpark with the Hickory Crawdads (Rangers) and Lexington Legends (Royals) hitting the Hub City.
The Crawdads featured two interesting pitching prospects in first rounder Collin Wiles and Yohander Mendez along with another first rounder in shortstop Travis Demeritte and super toolsy outfielder Jairo Beras.
Three players with potential returned to Hickory for a repeat season in Lewis Brinson,Ronald Guzman and Nomar Mazara.
All signed their various cards,but the best catch for me was former big leaguer Bobby Rose,who signed two of my favorite cards in 1990 Score and 1992 Fleer Ultra along with his Yokohama Bay Stars card from his days in Japan.
Thanks to Bill Cover for his help with Rose,who was a two per....
The Legends were a less than inspiring bunch after a strong prospect squad last season,pitchers Cody Reed and Luke Farrell (Thanks to Kendall Morris for his Prism card) along with outfielder Alfredo Escalera and catch Cody Johnson were the best of the bunch,but the coaching staff featured two former major leaguers in former Pirate Abraham Nunez and former Brave Glenn Hubbard.
Nunez was excellent all three days,but I did not have any advanced scouting on Hubbard.
I would be told later that Hubbard was a less than earnest signer,but on day one,he signed all four cards that I had (of five),after skipping the middle game,I returned for the final games and watched Hubbard sign multiples for Kendall and his daughter Molly,who had missed the other games,but told me no for one card.
I suppose Hubbard is a once a series signer,which is his option.....
In between,some thanks to Bill Cover for getting Christian Lopes while he was in Florida for his son's diving meet and former Padre and Indian Bob Owchinko arrived through the mail...
Next up was a rainy and crazy Saturday in Altoona for the Akron Rubber Ducks.
Between a scheduled doubleheader,a rain delay and even more rain,it looked like a bad night on the horizon (I would have a bad one in Altoona down the road) for the Quackers.
The main reason for doing Akron was getting another one of my seemingly endless pile of Francisco Lindor's finished and Lindor did do his first Bowman card.
I just never seem to drop the pile of the Indians future prospect down any!
Lindor does seem to be much more happy and easier to deal in AA than he was in High A,he'll joke around and talk to you,but it's still one unless you really get happy Lindor for a two spot.
Lindor was an extra on this night as the player I really wanted was former Cub Bryan LaHair,who had a few strong months with the Cubs a while back,and was returning from Japan.
I really wanted LaHair on two of his Japanese cards and I was able to those done as well as reliever Kyle Crockett on his Mahoning Valley and New York/Penn top prospect cards.
Crockett would shortly skip Columbus and go straight to the Indians for a brief time before returning to the minors in Columbus.
Former Brave and Royal Kyle Davies is attempting a comeback with Cleveland and was so nice in signing his 2011 heritage card that he thanked me for asking him!
Thanks to Derreck Chupak for getting me a signed Bowman of Mookie Betts,who set the Eastern League on fire before being promoted to AAA Pawtucket earlier this week....
The final stop on this signing front featured the Richmond Flying Squirrels for a morning game in Harrisburg.
The game saw Clayton Blackburn throw five perfect innings before fielding miscues and a few bad breaks saw Harrisburg drive Blackburn from the game and hand him a loss.
Consequently,Blackburn was in an less than wonderful mood after the game and signed just one card.
Kyle Crick was the other super addition as he signed his 2013 Top 100 card (Yes!) among others as Hank helped me out on this day by getting me two more and almost catching me up on the Giants top prospect.
I also got Ty Blach on his California League All-Star card to wrap up the day...
Still plenty down the road from the signing front,but with luck,I'll be back later today with a cleaning of the inbox....
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