Friday, March 3, 2017

2017 Topps Heritage #93 Aaron Nola

Phillies 8, Blue Jays 8
Spring Training Game 7 - Thursday Afternoon, March 2nd in Dunedin
Record - 3-2-2

One Sentence Summary:  Aaron Nola returned to the mound after a seven month absence, throwing two shutout innings.

What It Means:  The Phillies finished with their second tie in as many days.

What Happened:  The big story from this game was Nola's return and the hope is that the young prospect is 100% healthy for the 2017 season.  He allowed a hit and struck out a batter in his two innings of work.  Pedro Beato coughed up a three-run lead in the ninth, allowing five Blue Jays hits.

From the offensive side, Brock Stassi continued swinging a hot bat adding three more hits and raising his spring average to an impressive .636.  Freddy Galvis, Tommy Joseph and Jesmuel Valentin each knocked in a pair of runs.

Featured Card:  My wife and sons made it their mission yesterday afternoon to track down packs of the new Topps Heritage cards after school.  Visiting their second Target in the area, they achieved their mission when Jenna spotted an unopened case of what she assumed were baseball cards in the baseball card aisle.  After tracking down an associate to request the box be opened, she snatched up 10 packs and brought them home to me.  Mission accomplished.

I find it telling that I'm much more excited each year to open my first pack of Topps Heritage than I am to open my first flagship pack.  These feel like baseball cards and the only thing missing is a stick of bubble gum.  Topps once again did a decent job replicating a design from their past, and their annual Heritage set is all the way up now to celebrating the 1968 set.  Nola looks a little creepy in his photo here, and the original 1968 Topps cards didn't use this type of moody photo, but I'm not complaining.

Camp Head Count:  62

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