Jack Cust, 2004 Topps Total Silver #326

It must be an off-day if Jack Cust is the best I can muster. At age 33, the Three True Outcomes slugger is back in the minors, plying his trade for the Yankees' AAA Scranton/Wilkes-Barre club. He's still doing unmistakably Jack Cust-type things. There's the batting line of .281/.429/.494 with 9 homers and 29 RBI. Through 47 games, he's walked 41 times and struck out 64. So if Andruw Jones or Raul Ibanez pulls a hamstring, ol' Jack the Hack could be swinging from the heels in the Bronx. I'd make light of that situation, but Miguel Tejada, Joel Pineiro, J.C. Romero, and Lew Ford are all lurking at Norfolk in the O's organization.

Kurt Ainsworth, 2004 Topps Total Silver #599

Major case of writers' block today. I decided to reach into a box of cards and pull one out at random. As a result, you are looking at Kurt Ainsworth posing in Fort Lauderdale with his personalized Nike glove, which has three distinct Swoosh logos visible. Very subtle, Nike. What you can't see is the duct tape that is undoubtedly holding Kurt's right shoulder and elbow together. By 2005, that stuff gave out for good. Such is the life of the endangered species known as the pitching prospect.