quien es mas macho? a puzzle edition

did any of you get a jigsaw puzzle for christmas? we used to get one every year when i was a kid, and we'd put them together with our grandma. good times.

a year or so ago, one of my most wanted cards was this 2002 fleer ultra card

it features kevin brown and luke prokopec, and it completed my team set. it might even be a short print for all i know, and i didn't know the card was designed with interlocking puzzle pieces until it arrived in my mailbox. 

for those that may not recall, many baseball card sets in the late 90's and early 2000's were issued late in the year prior to their designation. ultra was one, so the back of this card has a copyright of 2001 even though it is a 2002 card. this has caused me a ton of frustration over the years as i try to date some cards through copyright dates on the back. thank goodness for the internet and the resources available these days!

while brown and prokopec were team mates (and i suppose, "team players") in 2000 and 2001, prokopec was traded to the blue jays in december of '01, right around the time this card was released. about eight years earlier, another trade took place that became the subject of another puzzle-design bearing card:

ah yes. the infamous delino deshields for pedro martinez trade that occurred in november of 1993. this card is from 1994 topps traded. the puzzle part of the design reminds me of how sometimes i would try to force two pieces together even though the images on them weren't a match.

i am on record as being optimistic of this trade when it happened - deshields was 24 with four seasons under his belt and seemed to be a solid, all-star type player. pedro was 21 and had turned in a very promising rookie season in 1993, but the odds of any one pitcher developing in to a generational talent like pedro are low and fred claire rolled the dice. kudos to the expos brain trust who landed pedro in return for deshields. in the end, i still blame jody reed.

ok, quien es mas macho?