Earlier this year, right before the COVID Pandemic kicked off in full force, I was able to pick up the majority of Brandon Laird's 2008 Bowman Chrome Red Refractors #ed/5.  Sitting in my collection are #s 1, 2, & 4.  Fast forward 8 months to today and I am now the majority owner of Brandon Laird's 2011 Bowman Chrome Draft Red Refractors #ed/5.  My scanner still stinks picking up slabbed cards, but here are the 3 that are now sitting in my collection:  #s 3,4, & 5!  Wondering if cards #1 and #2 will ever show up one day.  Brandon did not have as good of year as in past while playing in Japan, but the COVID-shortened season definitely did not do anyone any favors.  Here is hoping next year will bring more success to him.

A month or so ago I was updating the Brandon Laird section of the Trading Card Database with photos and cleaning up a few other odds and ends.  I noticed the empty photo holes for the 2008 and 2011 Superfractors and figured they would stay empty for a long time.  A few weeks ago, however, eBay worked its magic and the 2011 Bowman Chrome Superfractor popped up.  The seller and I worked a deal and now I finally own a graded card.....my first ever....although I will likely crack it out of its plastic prison soon.

The good news is that I have far exceeded my #11 collecting goal this year with this purchase.  Maybe I'll add a few inexpensive Yuta Tabuse cards and call that goal complete.

By the way, Brandon moved teams in the offseason and will now be playing for the Chiba Lotte Marines.

Unfortunately my scanner really sucks with graded cards, but it is on our list of new things to purchase this year so maybe I'll get a better scan at some point

I have many "1 of 1s" in my sumo card collection....older cards that I am pretty sure only one card has ever survived.  However, I have never owned an actually modern-day, serial-numbered 1 of 1 until just a few days ago.  I picked up this Yellow Printing Plate of Brandon Laird's 2011 Bowman Chrome card.  In fact, I have never owned a printing plate either so I have killed two birds with the proverbial stone.  Now the challenge will be to find the other three (3) colors.  Wish me luck!  Thanks for stopping by!

I think Fuji has pushed me to the Brandon Laird supercollector status with a recent care package from San Jose.  Totally unexpected, but much appreciated, was a care package packed with Brandon Laird cards, autos, serial-numbered goodness, and unique Japanese "odd-ball" inserts.  Thanks for the care package.  Readers, send a shout out to Fuji to let him know he is definitely one of the most generous bloggers out there.

For those that aren't following Brandon, he is currently playing with the Nippon Ham Fighters in Japan after a few short stints with the Yankees.  Here is a huge 8" x 10" auto photograph of Brandon signed in 2009 when he was playing in the New York Yankees minor league system that Fuji sent.


Next up are some base and serial-numbered cards of Brandon from his 2009 and 2011 playing days with the Yankees.  Apparently Bowman believed that his 2011 Bowman Chrome card was also his "1st Bowman Chrome Card" in addition to his 2009 Chrome card.  Raz won the contest I had a few weeks ago to see if anyone could find the 2011 error.  This lot of great cards I need and are some really beauties!

The interns were at it again at Bowman.  Maybe this is a known problem or this has been discovered before with these 2008 and 2011 Brandon Laird cards, but can anyone tell me what is wrong with the 2011 card?  5 free packs of Japanese baseball/basketball for the first correct answer.  Come on Topps!

Brandon is in his 4th year with the Nippon Ham Fighters over in Japan and is doing a fairly well with the team through the 3/4 of the season mark.  It'll be interesting to see what he does as I believe his contract extension is up at the end of this season.

Another quick update to my Brandon Laird collection.  The Nippon Ham Fighters continue to struggle, but the struggle is less than earlier this year.  If they keep their win percentage up like they have recently, they might be contenders.  Here are the three I have for the 2011 Topps Pro Debut:


This is the checklist for this series:

- #138 2011 Topps Pro Debut
- #138 2011 Topps Pro Debut Blue #ed to 309
- #138 2011 Topps Pro Debut Gold #ed to 50
- #138 2011 Topps Pro Debut Red #ed to 1
- #138 2011 Topps Pro Debut Printing Plates - Black/Cyan/Magenta/Yellow #ed to 1

I've been following Brandon Laird since he went over to Japan in 2015 to play for the Fighters.  Fuji got me started on my Laird collection last year and I have been going nuts these past few weeks rounding out holes in my collection for his American cards.  Soon I'll be diving into his Japanese cards.  I never was one for autos, refractors, or parallels, but to be honest it has been fun chasing these down.  I am a rookie when it comes to all this so if there are any errors or holes in my story, I'd love to know about it so I can get it fixed.  I'll show the set collections as I "finish" them....can you truly ever finish some of these with all the 1/1s floating around?

Here are Laird's 2011 Bowman Draft and Draft Chrome cards that I have accumulated so far.  If I am reading the Trading Card Database correctly, here are all the cards available in this series:

- #26 2011 Bowman Draft
- #26 2011 Bowman Draft - Blue S/N #ed to 499
- #26 2011 Bowman Draft - Gold
- #26 2011 Bowman Draft - Red
- #26 2011 Bowman Draft Printing Plates - Black/Cyan/Magenta/Yellow #ed to 1
- #26 2011 Bowman Draft Chrome
- #26 2011 Bowman Draft Chrome - Purple
- #26 2011 Bowman Draft Chrome - Red
- #26 2011 Bowman Draft Chrome - Superfractors
- #26 2011 Bowman Draft Chrome - Blue #ed to 199
- #26 2011 Bowman Draft Chrome - Gold #ed to 50
- #26 2011 Bowman Draft Chrome - Orange #ed to 25
- #26 2011 Bowman Draft Chrome - Gold Canary Diamond #ed to 1
- #26 2011 Bowman Draft Chrome Printing Plates - Black/Cyan/Magenta/Yellow #ed to 1


After writing the checklist out it seems I still have a ways to go.