I’ll say it for the 100th time: Don’t sleep on mid-‘90s Pinnacle card photography.

There are other ways to spend $2, but none are better.

I’ve been an overall fan of Rick Ankiel since 1999 and I appreciate his journey from pitching phenom to castaway to solid outfielder.

In 2013, which turned out to be Rick’s final Major League season, he had a blistering Spring Training with the Astros, going 19-46 with a 1.289 OPS. I attended one of the games in that session and saw him hit two dingers. When the manager replaced him late in the game and sent him back to the team training center, Rick walked up the third base sideline with his equipment bag over his shoulder and a giant smile on his face. That memory always brings me joy.

Now that I’m older and have disposable income, one of my collecting lanes is high-end parallel cards of players everyone was chasing when I was young. That’s why I grabbed this 1999 Upper Deck Encore F/X of Troy Glaus (#’d/125) and 1999 Bowman Chrome Refractor of Corey Patterson. These would’ve been monster pulls when I was 13…today, I grabbed them for less than a sawbuck combined.

Love this 1993 Upper Deck card where Jay Buhner is interrupting a Griffey interview.