Welcome back to our fifth installation of Collector’s Corner, it’s been well over a year since we last had one! In this edition I interviewed John Sharp. Before this interview John and I had never dialogued with one another. It was his #61ToppsForMy61st, his blog and his contest win from Topps BUNT that made me think he was a perfect candidate for the Collector’s Corner. So please, lean back in your seats and enjoy a deeper look into who John Sharp is as a collector!
Q: Tell us a little bit about yourself.
John Sharp himself!
A: I was born in Kalamazoo, Michigan in 1960. My family ended up moving to Muskego in the mid ‘60s and then to Portage, which is just south of Kalamazoo, in the summer of 1970. I attended and graduated Portage Northern High School in 1978 and soon after moved to Florida in December of 1980. From 1985-89 I served in the United States Navy. After my discharge I worked in the restaurant business for many years. In July of 2016 I moved back to Michigan, South Portage to be exact, where I now live with my wife Tracy.
Q: What was the first card you owned?
A: Honestly, I really don’t know, it was so long ago. Likely, it was whatever the first Topps card I opened in a pack back in 1968.
Q: Do you have a specific player or team you focus on collecting?
A: Absolutely! My team is the Detroit Tigers, they’ve been my favorite since 1967 when my Uncle Bob first took me out to old Tiger Stadium in Detroit. When it comes to specific player that would be Detroit Tigers catcher Bill Freehan. Freehan was my hero growing up in the late ‘60s. I have every Topps base card of his, a run of 1965-77 and the cards from 1969-77 were pulled straight from Topps wax packs. Bill Freehan is still my favorite baseball player and forever will be.
Bill Freehan Side Note:
· Freehan won five (5) consecutive Gold Glove Awards from 1965-69, the FIRST big league catcher to accomplish this feat.
· His .993 career fielding percentage was a MLB record that stood for over to decades.
John’s favorite Freehan
A custom Freehan from @GummyArts
Q: Do you prefer vintage or modern cards, why?
A: I’ll always have a special place in my heart for vintage baseball cards, they’re never going to get equaled, not by Topps or any other card company. I do also like new cards, I PC Tigers pitcher Matt Boyd. The reason I became a fan of Boyd is that my middle name is Boyd and that’s all I was called when I was a little boy…both my Grandfather’s were named John, as well as my Uncle and a couple of cousins way back in the day.
Q: You recently posted you won a Topps BUNT contest? Can you explain what Topps BUNT is to those of us who don’t know what it is?
Topps BUNT Screen capture
A: I’ll do my best! Topps BUNT is a digital trading card app. You can download the app, on both Android and Apple. You open the app daily, collect FREE cards, FREE coins and collect digital Topps BUNT baseball cards. There are also apps for hockey, Star Wars, Marvel and WWE. Within the app you can collect as well as trade your cards as if they were truly printed on cardstock.
Q: Follow up, what did you win on Topps BUNT?
A: I won 20,100 DIAMONDS on the app. The contest was run through their social media, I won the Twitter contest, my handle is @freehan11.
Q: Follow up again, what did you do with your winnings?
A: I used a few of the diamonds to open packs. The diamonds you get are actually like money and using these diamonds makes it easier to open packs with special insert cards.
Q: I see that you run your own blog as well, tell us a little about it!
A: I started by blog, johnsbigleaguebaseballblog.blogspot.com, back in May of 2010. I’ve been disabled since 2009 and my I started the blog as a way to give myself something to do. It’s been a labor of love for my favorite sport and, although, its harder now that it was almost 11 years ago, I still enjoy writing about baseball, baseball cards and any other sports related things I can.
Q: Tell us about your #61ToppsForMy61st
One of John’s #61ToppsForMy61st
A: I’ll be 61 years old on February 19th and I thought it would be interesting if I could acquire 61 different 1961 Topps baseball cards this year, in honor of turning 61. Currently, I’m up to eight (8) different cards with a few more on the way. I’m not too worried about the condition of the cards and I don’t need to get all the big names like Mantle, Mays, Koufax and others. Going after those names would be too expensive.
If you want to follow along with John’s #61ToppsForMy61st adventure take a look here!
Q: Lastly, what do you think about the Tigers prospects?
A: Well, I’m hoping all the young pitchers, Casey Mize, Tarik Skubal, Beau Burrows, Matt Manning, etc. are as good as they’re supposed to be. I’m thinking the best of the young position players will be Riley Greene, who I believe will be up sometime after the All Star break this upcoming season.
Q: Follow up, how do you think the Detroit Tigers will do in 2021?
A: I’ve never really been good at projecting these types of things; however, I believe Detroit will win 70+ games this season. This year will be my 54th as a fan; every year since 1967. I will always cheer as hard for them as I did when I was a little boy on the playgrounds of West Michigan all those years ago.
I want to give a big THANK YOU to John Sharp for taking the time to answer these questions for me! I hope everyone has enjoyed this installment of Collector’s Corner! For more please check us out on all of our social media (Facebook, Instagram and Twitter) @DetroitSportsA1 and as always check out the website at www.detroitsportsaddiction.com for more blog posts and a collection of galleries of my card collection!
Let’s not forget to check out John’s blog at johnsbigleaguebaseballblog.blogspot.com and give him a follow on Twitter @Freehand11!