I’ve busted all of the boxes from Blowout Cards’ awesome Black Friday sale as well as a couple of others and am getting ready to post the results. How did I do? Some of the cards were Epix… er, epic. Some were sketchy. There was a Partridge, but it wasn’t in a pear tree. I got a numbered card of a player whose last name still makes my wife giggle. Brains and brothers were pulled. What did I open and what did I pull? Stay tuned to find out.
Tomorrow I hope to have some cool pictures to share. We’re off to Gillette Stadium to have my daughter’s picture taken on the field with Santa. Should be a very cool experience.
Also, anyone out there buy Beckett? I’m looking for the Beckett values for this year’s Finest Baseball redemptions. I just got the e-mail stating that replacements could be requested and I was wondering what Beckett listed these cards for. If the book value is high, maybe it’s worth taking a shot and seeing what I might get as a replacement. I’ll probably be able to get most of the redemption cards for a buck plus shipping anyway.
Whilst getting our Christmas decorations out of storage, I came across my folder of checklists. I’ve been looking for this ever since finding out about Sportlots. Nothing like finishing off some sets from around 15 years ago.
One final note: I’ve bashed them enough concerning this so it is only fair that I give them credit where credit is due. I wrote Upper Deck one more time about the 40 cards I was shorted from my 2009 Baseball Series 1 box and included my new address. The e-mail got bounced back and listed off a bunch of different departments that now have their own e-mails instead of everything going to one customer service address. I wrote to the new address included in the e-mail and got a reply stating that replacement produce was being sent out and will arrive in 1 – 3 weeks. I’ll update once the shipment arrives. Thank you Upper Deck for ending this frustrating exchange.
Saturday, December 5, 2009
A Preview
Sunday, November 29, 2009
1995 Leaf Opening Day
I just moved recently and in the process of moving, I went through boxes of cards that had been sitting neglected for years. Doing so uncovered some cool things that I had forgotten about. One of those things is the 1995 Leaf Opening Day set.
The Opening Day set was available to collectors by sending in 8 Donruss, Leaf or Studio wrappers along with $2 for shipping and handling. This is something that you don’t see these days. Heck, until a couple of years ago you had to pay in order to get your redemption cards. Card companies giving away cards is a thing of the past. Heck, it’s a pretty common occurrence these days that you don’t even get all of the cards that you’re supposed to in a wax box.
This eight card set featured the following players: Frank Thomas, Jeff Bagwell, Barry Bonds, Ken Griffey Jr, Mike Piazza, Cal Ripken, Jose Canseco and Larry Walker. Each player was pictured on Opening Day from the 2005 season and contained a factoid about that game in the back.
The pictures on the cards aren’t the greatest that you’ll find, but that’s because there was only one game to select pictures from. Depending on how long it took for Donruss to send these sets out, these could have very likely been the first cards of Jose Canseco with the Red Sox and Larry Walker with the Rockies.
Sets such as this one used to be fairly common. Topps started the whole thing with their Glossy All-Star send away sets. I’ve got sets from Topps, Donruss and Fleer that I’ve mailed away for. Donruss combined this with the redemption card in 2001 at the very least. In order to get the 2001 Donruss The Rookies set, you first had to pull a redemption card from packs of 2001 Donruss, but that alone didn’t get you the set. From there, you had to pay for the set as well as shipping and handling. Any other year, that offer may have been a bust, but 2001 was the year of Pujols and Ichiro. I’m not aware of any other redemption cards of that type, but I’m sure there were probably others.
Saturday, November 28, 2009
Box Break: 2009 Topps Chrome
Just like a lot of the collecting world, I’m a big fan of the 2009 Topps design. Blowout Cards had a special on boxes and so I picked one up. There’s a decent rookie crop this year and refractors aplenty. I got caught up in all of the positives about this set without considering any of the negatives.
The main negative, and it’s something that plagues a lot of releases these days, is the low number of cards that you get in a box. These days, set collectors seem to be outnumbered by player collectors, prospectors and Joe Collectors. It’s usually cheaper to just buy a complete set on eBay from someone who has busted cases, but there’s no fun in that for me. It’s getting to the point where putting sets together is losing its fun as well. I guess it is the old fogey in me talking. I liked it when most of the set came out of a box and the insert sets were what you chased. Getting less than half of a set out of a box isn’t all that great in my book.
So, I’ve got what I need for the set up on Google Docs (link above) and would love to trade any of the non-Red Sox pulls from this box for some cards from the set. I’m also open to other trades as well so drop me a line if you see anything that you like.
Here are the refractors that I got in the box. It seems a little vanilla to me. I thought I would have pulled more than just one numbered refractor. Heck, I pulled a red Troy Tulowitzki out of packs. I think all of my numbered refractors ended up being inserts.
World Baseball Classic refractors are numbered even in the plain variety (out of 500). I pulled two of those as well as a blue Dice-K (numbered to 199 like the blues from the main set). I could have done without this many WBC cards since I have no interest in them at all. 2007 - 2009 were the years that collectors had inserts forced upon them that they had no interest in. A-Rod and Mantle’s home runs, Yankee Legacy, UD 20th Anniversary, etc. Thank goodness for the 2% of collectors putting these sets together.
Here’s my first autograph out of the box. Ricky Romero had a decent rookie season posting a record of 13-9 with a 4.30 ERA, 141 K and 79 BB. Romero was the early favorite for AL Rookie of the Year until he hit the wall in the second half of the season. He started the year 7-3 with an ERA of 3 before going 6-6 and an ERA of 5.54 in the second half. If he can put together a full season like his first half of 2009, he’ll be one of the top pitchers in the AL and the Blue Jays won’t miss Halladay as much once his inevitable departure occurs.
My second autograph was of Cardinals third baseman David Freese. Freese missed most of the 2009 season due to ankle surgery and rehab, but he hit very well in the final six games of the season. He was only hitting .158 before the surgery, but finished the season at .323 in 31 total at bats. If all goes as planned, Freese should be the every day third baseman for the Cards this season and may end up bringing home 2010 NL Rookie of the Year honors.
Here are some refractors that I have lying around from packs. I’m posting these mostly for potential trade kindling. For less likely trades, I’ll also post my extra WBC cards.
Even though I may never finish it, I do like this set. I got the box for a great price so I really can’t complain. If companies are going to include low cost autographs, I’d much rather get autographs of rookies who have a chance to be something big than minor stars who most likely won’t ever be anything. I love the fact that there aren’t any bland relic cards to pull. If those disappeared overnight I wouldn’t shed a tear.
The set itself is loaded. You’ve got the top stars in the game and a very good rookie class. If I ever get caught up on the boxes that I want to purchase, I could see myself buying another box of this. I give the set an A- and this box a B.
Lucky then unlucky and then lucky again
Way back in this post here, I wrote about puling a redemption card from 2009 SPx Baseball. These were inserted two per case and were one of the hottest cards going at the time. Everyone knew that Matt Wieters would end up having a card in this set and that was what most people were hoping to get. I redeemed my card to find that I would be getting RR6. I waited while the first five cards were announced. I wouldn’t be getting Koji Uehara, Colby Rasmus, Andrew McCutchen (who by then may have been the most desired card), Matt Wieters or Chris Tillman. My card was announced to be Josh Reddick. Fuck. Well, it’s a card for my Red Sox collection at least. He’s a mid-level prospect who had decent numbers down in the minors, but he’s not even Boston’s top-rated OF prospect. He just happened to be someone who got called up to the majors when Upper Deck needed players to fill these slots.
The card arrived at the beginning of this week and I got excited about the card again. First off, Reddick has a decent signature. The signature is a little squished on this card because it has the added inscription of “MLB Debut 7/31/09.” Unfortunately, the inscription runs off of the sticker a little (Curse you sticker autographs!), but I was pretty excited to get one of the 25 autograph variations that they did with each of these redemption cards.
From there, I started thinking about how I felt about the card before it arrived in the mail. There are a couple of wax boxes out there that I want to pick up including HTA jumbo boxes of 2009 Updates and 2009/10 Basketball. So, I decided to put the card up on eBay. Someone else will enjoy this card more than I will and I’ll be able to add something to my collection that I want. I’ll be able to add another Reddick auto collection if I want one.
I’m hoping some of my other redemption cards arrive soon. I’ve got Daniel Murphy coming from 2008 Topps Red Hot Rookies, Tommy Hanson, Colby Rasmus, Kyle Banks and Tommy Hanson autographed version from 2009 Topps Finest and Mat Latos from 2009 Topps Red Hot Rookies. According to Topps, the Latos is on the way which seems strange since the Murphy from 2008 is still pending.
Wednesday, November 25, 2009
Box Break: 2009-10 Upper Deck Basketball
First off, I’m not sure how Upper Deck put together the various checklists in this set. I’m not going to go through the whole set, but a glaring omission to me is that of Glen Davis. In his place, Upper Deck included Celtic Bill Walker. Walker only played in 29 games, averaged 3 points and totaled 29 rebounds, 13 assists, 6 steals and 2 blocks. Davis, on the other hand, stepped up when Kevin Garnett went down with an injury and finished the season averaging 7 points and 4 rebounds a game. This move completely blows my mind. Why would anyone want a Bill Walker card? Davis does have an autographed card in the set though. Why give him an autographed card, but no base card? He’s also got a couple of jersey cards. This makes absolutely no sense to me.
Speaking of autographed cards, here’s my pull from the box. Who? Shannon Brown. Who? Well, let me check his stats and see how good he is… Strange, there doesn’t seem to be a base card of Shannon Brown either. Instead of dumping these sticker autographs into this product, Upper Deck should have dumped them into that same landfill where thousands of E.T. Atari 2600 cartridges are supposedly buried. This is an utter and absolute waste of cardboard. Suddenly, this purchase doesn’t look so good after all.
It doesn’t stop there though. Upper Deck is dumping memorabilia as well. Check out this Game Materials card that I pulled of Shawne Williams. Who? Another bum who is most likely going to miss this entire season. Why did I open this stuff again? I must be an idiot.
Here’s basketball’s equivalent to the Yankee Legacy and 20th Anniversary cards in baseball. The only positive is that Jordan is pretty popular. I think that I’ll most likely send these to CheckOutMyCards.com (COMC) and see how they do on there. I’ve had some luck with the Yankee Legacy cards.
These cards are alright. Some are better than others. The idea of doing movie posters is original so I’ve got hand it to Upper Deck for that. I’d rather have pulled 8 of these than the Jordans.
The 3D Stars cards are great. They don’t really look three dimensional to me, but the players do pop and the cards look nice. I used to be a huge fan of Sportflics and seeing them sort of return here is nice. I’d love to see Sportflics make a comeback since lenticular technology has gotten better these days an you could have animation that’s a little smoother.
These cards here are the best thing about this set. I should have just foregone the box and purchased a set of these inserts. I’ve already grabbed a couple off of COMC including a great Larry Legend. I’m pretty sure that there’s also a card in this set of KG with the championship trophy.
This card isn’t bad, but isn’t not a serial numbered card so there’s got to be a buttload of them out there. I’m not really a fan of either of these guys so this card will most likely make its way to eBay or COMC.
This card is definitely headed to eBay. Kobe has to be the one athlete that I despise the most. This card is serial numbered and the Artest swatch is a nice gold one. Lakers fans should eat this one up. They can pretend that’s a golden Lakers swatch rather than a piece of a Rockets jersey.
That does it for this box. I have all of the base cards, a good amount of the rookies and hardly any of the Immortals. I got what I was promised which is a big deal for me when it comes to Upper Deck boxes since I got shorted on the last two boxes of their product that I opened. My “hits” leave a lot to be desired. Topps did a great job this year of showing just how much value can be put into a flagship set and Upper Deck just falls short especially when you compare to a Topps jumbo box. This isn’t terrible, but it’ll be a much better buy when boxes drop $10 - $20 after a year or so.
To sum things up, there’s a nice design to the set. The player selection leaves something to be desired. For all of the junk autos in this set, there should have been two or three per box. There is more value than usual for typical boxes of Upper Deck flagship since you get 4 “hits”, but if it is all junk auto and patches does it really matter? The Masterpieces are awesome and the 3D Stars are fun, but I don’t think that they can save this set. Combine that with the fact that it’s going to be a pain in the ass chasing down the rookies and immortals and I’ll give this box a C-.
Thursday, October 22, 2009
Moving on up… to the East Side
No takers on that printing plate? Guess I’ll have to take it with me to the new place. Just a heads up to those of you out there who I’m in the middle of trades with, I’ll be at a new address as of this Tuesday so if you’re going to mail something please contact me for the new address.
To those of you who I owe stuff, I’m going to have to mail out what I have for you now and if I need to send you more, I’ll do so once I get things unpacked and set up in the new place.
I’m about to shut down the computer for the last time until I’m in the new place. I’ll still be able to get online and check my e-mail though since there will still be one computer set up.
I plan on having a lot of fun here on the blog once I’m in the new house. I’ve pretty much got a whole floor to devote to my collections and things like that and I’m thinking of documenting the whole process of getting it set up from the start to… well, the finish will probably be years away, but hopefully you’ll all get to follow me every step of the way.
Also, once I’m set up I want to put together my own little trade database. I want to know who out there collects which players and which teams so that I can set those cards aside for trades. All of this moving has shown me that I have way too many cards that don’t add anything to my collection and I’d much rather send off those cards to happier homes. I need that space for things like my Kid ‘N’ Play, Beavis & Butthead and Ren & Stimpy comics. (Yes, Marvel published series of all three of those duos.)
Wish me luck!
Saturday, October 17, 2009
And there was much rejoicing… yay
Is it still exciting to pull a 1/1 card when that card is a yellow scrap metal “one-of-a-kind” collectible of Rob Mackowiak? Anyone interested in trading for this? Any of his family members reading this? Thanks Pacific, or whoever first put printing plates into their product, for creating this ridiculous “collectible.”
Monday, October 12, 2009
Mail Day: The pile was getting out of control
I haven’t posted one of these in forever. For now, I’m sticking to mostly to cards that I’ve picked up through eBay. I’ve also done a couple of trades and want to get those posted as well, but the upcoming move might throw a monkey wrench into those plans. At the very least, I’ll make sure to get a post out there about who I traded with along with a summary of the trades.
This first card here isn’t an eBay purchase at all. This is the card that Upper Deck sent me along with the damaged Timelines cards that they replaced. They didn’t have a replacement for the Chris Smith card that I sent and the letter that came back with my cards stated that they sent a replacement of equal value in its place. How this Albert Pujols card is of the same value as that card I don’t know, but I’m not complaining. It’s a shame that Upper Deck Customer Service never came through on the 40 cards that I was shorted from my 2009 Baseball Series 1 box because they’re done well when they actually decide to follow through. The company also has a bit of an attitude problem and has no qualms about deleting comments from both their blog and Facebook pages that don’t leave the poster with a brown nose.
Next up is another Pujols card. This was thrown in as an extra card by an eBay seller. I’m pretty sure that I posted the card that this came with already, but I never got around to posting this bonus card.
You can’t complain about a bonus Pujols card. What he’s done at the plate so far in his career is ridiculous. If he stays healthy, he should rewrite all kinds of records. I don’t go out of my way to acquire new Pujols cards, but when I pull his cards they go right into my collection.
This card here was a redemption that I pulled out of the box of Bowman Sterling which I got when I sent in my damaged Dwayne Wade mini that I pulled out of a rip card from a 2008-09 Topps Basketball jumbo box. This card is numbered to 218. One of the cooler cards that I pulled out of the box just so happened to be another Dwayne Wade card. It’s a mini in the style of 80-81 Topps that comes in a folder that seals magnetically. Both the folder and the card are numbered to 999. I’ll have to post pictures of that card on here because I’ve searched and searched ever since pulling the card and haven’t been able to find another one online.
Speaking of redemption cards, this card was a replacement for a Murad redemption that got the shaft once Topps knew that they weren’t going to have an NBA license in 2009-10. I responded to the e-mail that they sent asking if I could get a Celtic in return and not another Spud Webb since it looks like those were held out of the packs specifically to send out in place of Murad redemptions. This card is certainly of a Celtic, but they got the names reversed (and spelled slightly wrong). This card will go into my collection unlike the card that I would have gotten if the redemption had been processed so I guess that’s a plus. Another case of Topps Customer Service coming though. At the very least they listen and try to make an effort unlike Upper Deck who sometimes don’t even reply to e-mails sent to customer service.
Gimme an H!
It’s funny how I couldn’t stand pulling these darn things in 2009 Topps and couldn’t wait to sell them off, but jumped at them on eBay once it was a player that I liked. I’m not going after the entire player name and so far have only seen one “H” on eBay that went for some ridiculous amount of money.
You might wonder how a kid in the 80s who spent his entire life in Massachusetts ended up a fan of Kent Hrbek. One day, I decided that I wanted to collect a player who wasn’t on the Red Sox. I went through the cards that I had and I had a few of Hrbek and decided to start collecting him. It was a good choice because he was good enough to be included in a lot of the oddball sets that I loved in the 80s. Now that card companies are including Hrbek in sets again, I’ve resumed collecting him.
Back then I collected Dwight Evans and Kent Hrbek. There are a lot of similarities between the two players. They were never amongst the biggest stars in the game, but they were faces of their franchises for long times. Both players have very devout fan followings and played the game the way it was meant to be played.
Gimme a ?!
Hopefully this will someday spell out “Hug it out,” but I’ve kind of stalled out at the moment. When Icons came out, I picked up a couple of these right away for a price that I was comfortable paying. Since then, the price has steadily increased as more people have started chasing them. That’s good news if I wanted to sell these, but bad news for ever collecting the whole phrase. If you ever want a good laugh, check out one of these that Piven has autographed. He printed his name vertically down the letter and it looks like something his niece "Pearl the Landlord" would have written. Huge fan of Piven, but I wouldn’t even be excited if I pulled one of those out of a pack.
Speaking of lame autographs, here’s exhibit B. RR? Are the 10 letters in Rajon Rondo really too much to write out? I stumbled into this card as an additional bid from the same seller. I missed out on the first card, but I got this one cheaply and now have Rondo’s initials in my collection.
I’ve yet to buy a pack of 2009-10 Topps because I’m waiting until I can afford a jumbo box. I’ve had great luck with them in the past two years and want to see what I can pull this year. I have picked up some singles though; most of them for less than what you’d pay for a pack. Here’s a gold version of Big Baby tossing Brad Miller to the floor. Most likely this is Miller flopping like he did all through last year’s playoffs.
I love that I can still pick up unnumbered Big Baby autographs for about a buck a piece. I’m excited that he’ll be back with the Celtics this season. He was supposedly going to get an offer from another team that the Celtics couldn’t match, but the outrageous offer sheet to Gortat which the Magic matched ended those plans. Davis will now be a part of the best bench in the NBA and since they just might be backing up the best starting 5 in the league, the Celtics are a good bet to bring another NBA Championship to the rafters of The TD Bank (fake) Garden. Davis showed that he can play at a high level when Kevin Garnett was injured last season. He and Rasheed Wallace will let Doc Rivers give plenty of rest to Kevin Garnett and Kendrick Perkins to save them for the playoffs.
What can I say, I’ve got a problem. It’s tough to pass up any Davis autos when they are this cheap. I think he signed this one with his foot. This one has Kevin McHale’s number on it so if Davis wins the Sixth Man Award I can sell it on eBay as a 1/1 Super Mojo Hit.
Whenever I scan a card with a piece of Celtics jersey in it, I wonder if a brown jersey swatch will show up green. Hmmmmmmm.
Here’s another card from 2009-10 Topps. While the basketball die cut gives the card an interesting look, I wish that they had just cut out the whole circle for the swatch to show through. These things are small enough to begin with and now you barely see any of it.
It looks even worse when there’s a patch involved. I just want to tear off that piece of cardboard going over the middle of the patch.
This card is numbered to 50 and super thick. I’m surprised there isn’t a sticker auto on it. If they had put autos along the bottom and put the name elsewhere, they could have had a nice looking set. On card would have been beautiful.
I really like that Topps put Chrome cards into the base Topps set since they weren’t going to have time to do a stand alone set. This here is a shiny refractor of Paul Pierce.
The refractors from this set are numbered to 500 which could make for a challenging set to put together.
Here’s a different type of relic card from 2009-10 Topps. Although the set is called Championship Materials, it doesn’t say anything about this swatch being from a jersey worn in the NBA Championships. In fact, it’s probably from a jersey worn years ago.
Topps kept the die cut basketball thing in this set as well. According to some clueless eBay sellers, the die cuts would make this a dual swatch card. Heck, I’ve seen some cards labeled as quad cards from the manufacturer that have four windows showing the same swatch.
Got this Pierce Bowman Sterling jersey card for a buck plus shipping. I like the designs used in some of the Bowman Sterling sets, but it’s a shame that the value that you get out of the packs usually doesn’t come anywhere near what you paid. It’s worse in basketball due to all of the top names being exclusive to Upper Deck.
The one exception to the value that I’ve seen is 2007 Bowman Best baseball. The value has even gotten better as more and more names from that set have emerged.
It’s no secret that I absolutely loved the Murad basketball set. It took a while, but I finally tracked down a Pierce auto from this set at a reasonable price. It’s not one of the numbered versions, but that’s fine by me.
The sticker detracts from the look of the card a little, but it is still a beautiful card. This is right up there with UD Glass as my favorite Pierce autographed cards.
More Murad Madness. I also had to track down the Pierce silk card from the set. When I first saw this auction, I expected some ridiculous selling price because it was #1, but that wasn’t the case at all. It’s a good thing too because if that had been the case then this card wouldn’t be in my collection.
I’m going to end with some of the blue parallel Celtics that I pulled out of Bowman ‘48 basketball. The rest of the cards will be another post.
Sunday, October 11, 2009
Real bowling
There’s many things to love about living in Massachusetts. Even with the early exit of the Red Sox in this year’s playoffs, we’re still got 3 Super Bowl trophies, 2 World Series trophies and 1 NBA Championship Trophy this decade (and are the early favorite for the 2009-10 Championship if everyone stays healthy). I’m going to stray from the more mainstream sports in this post on focus on a regional sport that most of you probably have never seen before and that is Candlepin bowling.
Candlepin bowling is a lot more challenging than ten pin bowling. While perfect games in ten pin bowling are frequent it has never been done in candlepin bowling. The highest sanctioned score in a candlepin string is 245. Throw a ball right down the middle of the lane in candlepin bowling and you’re very likely only going to take out the middle two pins. Throw that same ball so that it hits between the head pins and a neighboring pin and you’re likely to get a good pinfall. It can be frustrating, but the added challenge brings added fun.
I’ve been bowling since I was a kid and in bowling leagues almost as long. Now that I’ve been doing it all of my life, I wouldn’t ever want to live somewhere that doesn’t have candlepin bowling. If this has caught your attention and you’d like to find out a little more about candlepin bowling you can check out this link to the International Candlepin Bowling Association or check out this YouTube video of one of the best televised performances ever. There are a ton of YouTube video out there of candlepin bowling from nearly impossible shots to breaking pins.
Tuesday, October 6, 2009
Moving sale! Everything must go!
The main reason that this blog has become so neglected over the past 4 months or so was due to me moving. It was just a temporary move and due to that the majority of my collection is currently in storage. I also have a longer commute and less time to devote to things such as writing about sports cards. The good news is that we’ll be moving again at the end of the month so the collection will be coming out of storage and my commute will be shortening. I’m not the only one that will benefit from this. All of you reading this can potentially benefit from this as well. I’ve got a few piles of things that don’t necessarily have to be in my collection. Instead of packing them up again and taking them with me, I’d rather find them better homes.
In the grand tradition of multiple blogs who have done similarly, I’m looking to trade the following cards for stuff that will have a home in my collection. What might that be? Well, it could be cards that I need for sets. You can find my want lists on Google Docs by clicking on the link right under the site header. I’m also looking for cards to add to my player collection. Have any baseball cards of Mike Piazza, Dwight Evans, Kent Hrbek, Clay Buchholz or David Ortiz floating around that you no longer want? What about basketball cards of Paul Pierce and Glen “Big Baby” Davis? Drop me a line at michaeltravers@gmail.com and we’ll work out a deal. The pictures here should link to larger images in case you aren’t able to make the players out. If you know of any collectors out there who may not read this blog, but may be interested in any of these cards send them on over. I’ve got plans for the cards if they don’t get traded, but I wanted to offer them up here first. Without further ado, here’s the cards:
