An Update on my Trade Stacks (After 10 Completed Stacks)

As many of you know, I'm a math guy - so I thought it'd be fun to tally up some statistics in regards to my first ten completed trade stacks!  You can find all the old trade stacks here.

First, a little background:

I conceived the trade stack idea as a fun way to rid myself of cards that I don't necessarily want while slowly being able to acquire cards that I do want.  I figured it was a fine trade (from my point of view) if I was turning trash into the proverbial treasure.  I also figured that most stacks wouldn't get claimed with only one card on them - and thus I'd automatically be sending out more cards than I would have incoming.  As it turned out, many of the claimed trade stacks have resulted in larger, more inclusive trades (which is awesome) - and 20% of the trade stacks were actually one-for-one trades since the stack was claimed with only a single card on it.

How I determine what goes in the trade stack:

Honestly, there is little planning on my part.  I have a small pile of cards that I think would make for fun additions to the trade stack - but mostly I've tried to vary the sets, teams, and years represented.  I also try to sprinkle in regular base cards, insert cards, and the occassional "good" card (serially numbered, autos, etc.).  Up until the time I decided to write this post, I had not bothered to figure out which teams were or weren't represented a fair amount of times.

Trade Stacks #1 - 10 Statistics:
Below, you'll find a table which shows the number of cards from each team.  I've had a couple of cards feature players from more than one team but those have not been included in any of the individual team totals.

Trade Stack Statistics
Team	Base Cards	Inserts	Final Card
Braves	1	1	2
Nationals
Marlins
Mets	1
Phillies	1
Reds	2		1
Cardinals	2
Cubs	3		1
Astros	2		1
Pirates
Brewers	1
Dodgers	3		1
Diamondbacks
Rockies	2
Giants	2	1
Padres	1
Yankees	2	3	1
Red Sox	3
Orioles	2
Rays	1
Blue Jays	1
White Sox	1
Indians	1
Tigers	1	1
Royals
Twins	1	2	1
Athletics	3	1	1
Mariners	2
Rangers	2	2	1
Angels	2

Judging the results above, there are a few things that I can see are true.  Number one, I've managed to mix up the teams fairly well without keeping track in any way.  Only the Nationals, Marlins, Pirates, Diamondbacks, and Royals are without at least one card in a stack.  And, seeing how I don't know of anyone who collects those teams exclusively on the blogs, that's not bad.  Second, the amount of inserts seems fairly high - but again, they are at least mostly spread out amongst the teams.  Finally, the column labeled "Final Card" represents the last team represented by the card that "caused" the stack to be claimed.  It's not a fool-proof way of determining which teams are most popular, especially since it's possible a Red Sox fan missed the post when I posted a Red Sox, happened to catch it a day later when a Dodger was added and then claimed the stack right away (thus giving the "point" to the Dodgers).  However, I do believe it's a decent way to see which teams are more likely to cause the stack to be claimed.

So far, I've had a blast with my trade stack - and I'm going to continue the idea for as long as the interest appears to be there.  This is your chance to voice your opinions - want to see more cards, different teams, more inserts, more base cards, more variety, more new stuff, etc. etc.  Or, would you rather the entire thing go away and stop cluttering up your blog roll?  Let me know in the comments below!