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The Big Trade
Baseball card collectors make a big trade of Hall-of-Famer cards.
April 16, 2007
By clue 1, no two boys ended up simply exchanging cards. By clue 2, four of the baseball card traders are Brent, the Ford boy, and the ones who started with and ended up with the Robin Yount card and the Eddie Murray card. By clue 10, the boy who finished with the Wade Boggs card never had the Eddie Murray card at all, so he isn't Brent or the Ford boy and didn't have the Eddie Murray card to start. If the one who acquired the Wade Boggs card were the fifth boy to the four in clue 2, then the boys who started with the Robin Yount card and the Eddie Murray card would have simply exchanged cards, since Brent and the Ford boy did not finish with those two cards--but that contradicts clue 1. So, the boy who ended up with the Wade Boggs card started with the Robin Yount card. Then the one who finished with the Eddie Murray card would have to be the fifth trader to the four in clue 2, and the boy who started with the Eddie Murray card ended up with the Robin Yount card. The boy who finished with the Eddie Murray card didn't start with the Wade Boggs card, or Brent and the Ford boy would have simply exchanged cards. Therefore, since the Robinson boy got Ian's card through the trading (clue 7) and since Ian isn't the Ford boy (8) and the Robinson boy isn't Brent (3), Ian started with the Robin Yount card or with the Eddie Murray card. If Ian had started with the Eddie Murray card and the Robinson boy ended with that baseball card, by clue 5, David would have traded away the Robin Yount card and gotten the Wade Boggs card. Then by clue 11, the Banks boy would be Ian--no (8). Therefore, Ian started the trading with the Robin Yount card and acquired the Wade Boggs card, while the Robinson boy got the Robin Yount card and gave away the Eddie Murray card. By clue 11, the Banks boy got David's double. David isn't the Ford boy (5). If he had gotten the Eddie Murray card in the trading, the Banks boy would have to be Brent. But there is no way for the Carlton boy to have gotten the Perez boy's card (4) with this arrangement. David is the Robinson boy, and the Banks boy went home with the Eddie Murray card. The Ford boy got the Ozzie Smith card or the Kirby Puckett card and thus can't be Chad (6), who is the Banks boy; the Ford boy is Tony. Since the Carlton boy ended up with the Perez boy's card (4), Ian must be the Carlton boy and Brent the Perez boy. Therefore, Brent Perez started with the Wade Boggs card that Ian Carlton acquired in the trading. Brent Perez did not get the Ozzie Smith card (9), so Tony did; and Brent finished with the Kirby Puckett card. Tony must have brought the Kirby Puckett card to trade. By elimination, Chad Banks started with the Ozzie Smith card. The boys therefore started with and after the Big Trade ended up with Hall-of-Famer baseball cards as follows:

  • Ian Carlton, Robin Yount - Wade Boggs
  • David Robinson, Eddie Murray - Robin Yount
  • Brent Perez, Wade Boggs - Kirby Puckett
  • Tony Ford, Kirby Puckett - Ozzie Smith
  • Chad Banks, Ozzie Smith - Eddie Murray

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