2025 Card-vent Calendar: December 23

December 23, 2025:

1995 Upper Deck SP Championship Series #36 Barry Larkin

Sometimes, a card featuring a great player making a great play in the field is all you need to get the job done.  Good work today, Card-vent Calendar
 

2025 Card-vent Calendar: December 22

December 22, 2025:

1994 Upper Deck Minor League #49 Rick Greene

Rick played in exactly one baseball game in his career, a 10-1 loss to my Milwaukee Brewers on June 19, 1999.  After Reds starter Ron Villone got rocked for 6 runs while recording only a single out, Greene put in 5.2 innings of serviceable mop-up duty, giving up two home runs (Jose Valentin, Dave Nilsson).  One game isn't much of a career, but it's more than most of us ever get.

 

It doesn't give you license to dance around like an asshole, though.

2025 Card-vent Calendar: December 21

December 21, 2025:

2018 Topps #FP-15 Bill Withers First Pitch

If today goes as well as I hope it does, it's going to be the loveliest day I've had in quite some time, followed by a string of even lovelier days.

 

One day last year my wife got sick and I went to Target to pick up her prescription.  The pharmacy wasn't set to open for another ten or fifteen minutes, but this song came on over the in-store speakers, and it made all the frustration and hassle of waiting just go away.  Bill Withers is the man.

2025 Card-vent Calendar: December 20

December 20, 2025:

1997 Fleer #10 Andy Pettitte Team Leader Die-Cut

It's an odd choice to cut the border of a card to match the outline of a player's face.  I can't find any more of these in my collection, so I'm assuming each is sculpted a little differently?  These are the questions worth asking.

 

By the way, I had a female roommate in college who once remarked that Andy Pettitte looked like a child molester.  Not sure where that came from, but I'm going with that it's "no news is good news" for Andy in 2025.  By all accounts, he's a decent guy.

2025 Card-vent Calendar: December 19

December 19, 2025:

1994 Classic Mortal Kombat #96 Story Line: Sub-Zero and Scorpion

My Mortal Kombat gaming experience is limited to the first console game.  Probably Genesis-only, if I remember correctly.  My buddy Jason, whom I knew since first grade, then started to pal around with around 8th-11th grade, had the system, so we would spend a lot of time playing that, watching Beavis and Butt-Head, and just enjoying the little commercials and interstitials that MTV still played at the time.  (Remembering some guy talking about a "bum wing" while taking the bus, maybe?  Riding in cabs?  Just experiencing hints of vapors of that bygone time in my middle age.)

Mostly, though, I would just watch him play.  And I was fine with that.  He wasn't greedy, he would've given up the controller if I had asked, but I just enjoyed providing the commentary to his gameplay.  We would throw on "Alapalooza" or Dennis Leary's "No Cure for Cancer" and just have a great time.  All of those other games in the franchise that have come since have no meaning to me.

 

My favorite character was always Sub-Zero.  Freezing an opponent with an icy blast and then smashing him to pieces was utterly satisfying.  "Get over here!" is the more famous line, but I preferred freezing a motherfucker.

 

Who was your favorite Mortal Kombat character? 

2025 Card-vent Calendar: December 18

December 18, 2025:

2009 Topps 206 #82 Randy Johnson Gold Border Parallel

I like how there's two things going on in this card.

First, there's Johnson's "I know something you don't know" smirking expression, an underused photo trait in this hobby.

 

And then he's throwing the ball as hard as he fucking can directly at your head. 

 

Yeah, the two are related. 

2025 Card-vent Calendar: December 17

December 17, 2025:

1987 Pacific #43 Victor Nogueira

 

It's a shame that this guy is probably unknown outside of the cities in which he played.  Victor Nogueira is, bar none, the best indoor soccer goalkeeper of all-time.  He helped the hometown Wave win their first three championships, as well as a few more earlier in his career.

 

Here's something I found when looking up the consensus opinion of Mr. Nogueira:

Langdon, we'll never forget you.