Giancarlo Stanton remains an enigma on field and with autographs

With Giancarlo Stanton‘s six homers in his last six games, he’s helped everybody re-focus on players who aren’t those two rookies with all those home runs and he only needs two homers in his next two names to tie a major-league record.

The Miami Marlins slugger has an MLB-leading 44 homers on the year — a pace that’s actually right with Roger Maris‘ pace in 1961 — and that’s a career-high as well as a Marlins franchise record with plenty of games still left to play. (Yet, ironically, Stanton reportedly just cleared waivers — so some of those games left could come in a different uniform.)

But that’s not the only enigma that is Stanton, and it’s something that you can see on his earliest cards like this one from 2008 Donruss Elite Extra Edition when you compare them to today. What is it?

Board Buzz: Must-read threads on the Blowout Forums (Dec. 24)

The Blowout Cards Forums are where thousands of collectors converge daily to discuss, well, a little bit of everything. Here are five threads about collecting and more that you should check out right now.

What’s Buzzing Today: Holiday gift-giving, The Bambino, Totally Certified & Crown Royale breaks.