Stacks of Wax - July 2017 - Part 4 - Absolute

I wanted to break out Iron Eyes Cody for this, since there was a lot of packaging in this. One main box, with four mini boxes each contained one pack worth of cards. Each one was 3 regular base, 1 numbered base card (retired or rookie) and a hit. The one benefit is that it allows me to post the cards based on the player pictured on their respective mini-boxes/packs.

#1 - Marquese Chris

The three base cards. Players on new teams (or teams with new uniforms) get posed photos - otherwise, they get game shots. Both have the background wiped for the team's logo, which if they're going to do, is my favourite choice of background.

The /999 card isn't that bad. McCaw's stuff got a nice bump during the playoffs. A GSW hot pack.

And the hit. A Raptors card! WOO-HOO! Although I've been a Siakam magnet this year, getting plenty of his stuff during group breaks, but have yet to land a Poeltl hit of any kind. The basketball looks filthy for something that was just used during a photo shoot.

#2 - Kris Dunn

Not quite the star power of the opening portion, but at least I know somewhere I can send the Cousins off to.

Another WOO-HOO on the /999 card. I actually picked up the 15-16 version of this. Shareef seems to make at least one appearance per year as a Vancouver Grizzly in some set. Here's this year's.

There's one auto per box - and this is it. Not too bad here as well. Ulis had a couple moments this past season, including a buzzer-beating game-winning three. That's above expectations for a second rounder.

#3 - Buddy Hield

Your base cards. In a reverse of yesterday's High Tek, these scan worse than in-hand.

My /999 is Bill Walton from his totally-baked era. Love the classic logo on the card as well.

And my hit. Why it is everyone's favourite flat earther!

#4 - Brandon Ingram

The base. Another Kings card for a future C:S. They're the only team I picked up dupes of with unnumbered cards.

A Celtics card, sorta. He was a second round pick of Boston, he never played a regular season game for the team. He played a few games with the Mavericks, and is in the D-League now.

And a simple relic ends it.

Nothing too blow-away great in this, but a good consistent box. Next up, I'll start the Score Box.

Stacks of Wax - July 2017 - Part 3 - High Tek!

Jumping forward to a 2015 release, and an entirely acetate group of cards. Only 8 cards per box, but one will be an on-card autograph. And pretty much every card in the set is some sort of parallel over various patterns, and there really isn't a base set.

First out of the box is Tom Brady and the grass pattern, and a card destined for the next TMM mailer.

Only 100 cards in the "base" set, with a nice mix of current players, rookies and legends. This fits into that category, with a with an old school photo mixed with current card technology. This is the Spiral pattern.

You're promised one parallel (parallel in a set of parallels?) per box, and here's that, with this grass/waves tidal diffractor.

This isn't a guarantee. In fact, these Low Tek Diffractors fall at a rate of 1:50 packs/boxes. The acetate background here looks really bland in hand, but these scan beautifully, much like most of the set.

3 numbered cards in one pack/box is definitely a good thing. Crowell is also 25/25, and it joins the 1/249 Brendan Gallagher as my second ebay 1/1 of this Stacks of Wax series. Crowell was undrafted, but seems to be the #1 RB for the Browns now. If I get a hit of a player that's still on the team and not on the practice squad from a product thats a couple years old, I'm happy with the pull. The subset for this is the grass/waves clouds diffractor.

And a trio of rookies end this. Johnson is the Circuit Board parallel, Perriman is the Dots parallel, and Grayson is Waves.

And that's a lot of parallels. Next up, a product released in the past year - 2016-17 Absolute basketball.

Stacks of Wax - July 2017 - Part 2 - And The Rest!

Pack 6:

Looks like there's a pattern as both posts started with a Luxury Suite insert. This one's not on par with the Mario, but it does have an auto to go alongside it. And Rakell is still active in the the NHL - always a plus with rookie hits.

Pack 7:

And here's an auto/relic of someone not active in the NHL. He is in the Red Wings organization, having been traded this past deadline so the Panthers could rent Thomas Vanek.

Pack 8:

It is a Dylan McIlrath hot box! This was the only shiny card in the box.

Pack 9:

At least Leivo can go into my Rangers alumni collection. It was only a half season, but if Mike Hoffman (6 games) counts, so does he.

Pack 10:

Last pack with the last hit. Joonas managed 2 more games in the NHL than me, so this box really went in like a lion and went out like a lamb.

And there you have a box. Next up, some 2015 High Tek Football.

Stacks of Wax - July 2017 - Part 1 - A Super (Mario) start!

When picking up the hobby box of 2017 Score FB with my latest COMC credit to blowout credit cash-in, I threw in a few other boxes with it. You'll see those over the next few days.

I'm going to go through this group of boxes chronologically, and that means I'm starting with my comfort food, a box of 2013-14 Rookie Anthology. 10 packs - 5 per post. Let's go through the first half of them, skipping the base cards.

Pack 1:

It is always strange when the first pack contains what will likely be the best hit of the break, but that seems like the way it is going to be with a friggin' Mario Lemieux stick coming out of the first pack. If I had the desire, I could probably search Mario cards and see if I can find out approximately when the card is from, given the portion of the CCM logo visible on the front.

Pack 2:

As expected, a step down, but at least both of these guys are still in the league. In fact, Raanta seems likely to be the #1 guy with the Coyotes this season.

Pack 3:

The second thick pack of the break produced this draft position rookie of Zach Trotman. He wasn't the 100th pick, that's just where the numbering maxes out here. He was 210th, which really means that any playing time in the NHL is a bonus. Both guys also sport #42 in the photos, which seems to be an odd collation quirk.

Pack 4:

At least I gained another card to fatten my next TMM mailer.

Pack 5:

Hey! That's another pretty good card from this box with the 1 per Rookie Selection. I pulled a Galchenyuk when I busted a case of this stuff, and this seems like the perfect card to pair with it.

Excellent start to the box. The remaining 5 packs will have a hard time matching this.

2017 Adventures in Repacks - Part 20 - The Waiting is the Hardest Part

I'm still waiting for  my order which includes the Jumbo box of 2017 Score. So, here's a Surprise Bag in the meantime.

Your contents:

And the clockwise contents, starting from the Victory.

I built the base set, so all I can hope for here for me is a needed insert - and that Luongo is one the inserts I didn't yet have. As for the rest, there's some trade throw-ins on the left for Dennis @ TMM, and a Roy that would fit nicely into my Rangers alum binder if it wasn't a dupe.

The 2000s might be the best of the bunch in terms of content, with 2 of the 3 cards featuring Hall of Famers. Poor Lukas Krajicek.

I have yet to reach a level of maturity where I don't find Grant Clitsome's name amusing.

And the 1000 pt pack. Holy crap. Dale Hunter was a 1000 point guy? I guess playing in the defense-optional 1980s can due that for even a guy who spent more than 3500 minutes in the sin bin. That's a nice looking card with him modeling the then-new Caps jersey for my Rangers alum collection, but the mask binder certainty is the big winner. Not the Biron - the Sullivan. There aren't too many cards with Brian Hayward's famous Sharks mask on them, and that in the background is enough to make it the favourite.

Pretty good repack. Now, back to wait by the door for the magical brown truck.

Commence Set-Build

I've decided that I'm going to build the Score 2017 football set for my football set build this season, since I really wasn't too crazy about the Donruss design this year. So, I ordered a hobby box from blowout, and picked up a blaster from Wally World to do a little more damage to what I've already got. All this should put me within striking distance of the base set. The former should arrive tomorrow, so I'll breeze through the highlights of the 11 packs contained within.

Pack 1:

First out is a highlight of this pack - a CFL alum with Cameron Wake! Definitely a Dolphins hot pack with another card for that team among the rest - but that is offset by a gold parallel of Tyrod!

Pack 2:

There is one promised relic per blaster, and here it is. Böhringer was probably the one you didn't want to pull as a guaranteed hit last season, seeing as he was on the practice squad last year. I just had to wait a year for the disappointment. I really do like the photo on the Sprinkle, with the stands in the background filled with fans in the team colours.

Pack 3:

Again, a great shot in the theme of the Sprinkle in pack #2.

Pack 4:

The Bills card here is the unsurprising highlight for me. It is really nice seeing Lorenzo Alexander get some base card love this season after having a great year on the Bills line.

Pack 5:

WOO-HOO! While the relic may have been blah, the parallels aren't. First up a Tyrod, and second up is a member of the 2/14 club with Jadeveon Clowney. No compaints about this.

Pack 6:

Pretty boring - so here's the highest overall draft pick among this year's rookie class so far in the blaster. #6th overall to the Panthers.

Pack 7:

More Bills/Lorenzo Alexander love in this pack, as he also makes an appearance on an insert card in this year's set.

Pack 8:

There are three rookies per pack in this, (along with 2 inserts and 7 veteran base) so the most interesting thing in this pack was the collation putting a pair of Volunteers beside each other. Sutton was a 3rd rounder to the Steelers, with Malone being a 4th rounder to the Bengals.

Pack 9:

Bills content. Bumblebee unis. A guy named Taco. That's well-rounded content!

Pack 10:

Nothing really much of note here, so I'll give the most interesting card nod to this David Njoku, and his "Omigod! They actually passed me the ball" facial expression.

Pack 11:

As dull as pack 10, so I'll highlight one of the few cards without a college logo on it, since Kizer's Notre Dame isn't part of Panini's licensing.

And there you have it.