Monday 30 April 2018

2018 Score Jumbo Box Break - Part 2

All inserts! All the time!
With a lower end set, one can expect a nice variety of insert sets, and this box delivered that at a rate of about 5 per jumbo pack. My fave this season is Celebration, which highlights the most unique TD celebrations. Here's 2/14 baby Alshon Jeffery and the Eagles with a bowling themed one. I also got the Packers' bobsled one. At only 10 cards in the set, I can see myself picking up the singles to complete this.
For great action photography, there's the All-Hands Team. A nice combination here of amazing receptions, and the unexpected nature of pulling a Josh Gordon insert in 2018.
A rainbow background highlights an insert set for the draft, which is just another excuse for there to be some more rookies in the release.
A QB-themed insert set sometimes uses the horizontal medium perfectly, sometimes not so much.
I guess you can't have a "lined up and awaiting the snap" card without a huddle card as well.
Here's a colourful insert set that highlights individual performances.
As is this.
Color Rush! I'm kinda torn on this insert set between "Hey! Alternate uniforms!" and "Some of these combinations were really ugly."
Horrible cropping notwithstanding, the Sidelines set covers off-field hobbies and interests of the players in some cases. In others, it is just them on the sidelines. Gerald McCoy gets the former, with his comic book love getting the mention.
Captains? Exactly what it says. This is a nice farewell insert card for Joe Thomas.

And the autos. I seriously thought I was busting this box exclusively for my trade partners.
Here's the first one I pulled. An Oregon Ducks card? Perfect for Kerry at Cards on Cards. Freeman was a third round pick of the Broncos.
Another third rounder (Jags), and this one is for Tide-collector Wes!
Even the redemptions fall in favour of my trade partners. Another Tide alum, this time in redemption form. He was a first rounder and will suit up for the Falcons.
At least I don't know any Toledo Rockets super collectors. So at least one won't be traded out. So far.

And there's a box of football cards! From a hobby box to a retail repack tomorrow.

Sunday 29 April 2018

2018 Score Jumbo Box Break - Part 1

Football season's here! At least for releases for the 2018 season! I'll get an early start on the set build with a jumbo box of the first NFL release of the year.
Here's the base design. Pretty basic for the photo choices, but things to pick up on the inserts, which I'll get to tomorrow.
While I'd like career stats on the back, I do like the design. It is nicely done up in the team colours with a reused photo. At least they use some of the space that could be taken up with stats for a short bio.
With an early release, there isn't too much in terms of updated rosters. But there is at least one. And they smartly chose a photo where the Chiefs logo isn't visible.
Bills content! I got 8 of their ten cards in the base set, missing out on McCoy and Taylor.
There isn't much difference in the rookie portion of the set and the regular cards, excepting the extra logo and the extra corner in the fame. This is probably my favourite photo among the base cards as well.
You can also play the fun game of "Which schools aren't included in the Panini license?"! This year, South Dakota State, UMass and Notre Dame get their logos zapped. They probably should have paid a little more and got the UMass background guy's logo photoshopped away as well.
2 new Bills! I'm typing this up on Friday, so I've yet to see how many others will be represented in the 110 card set. Which means this might be updated before I post this.

Edit: I did remember. Here's 2 of the 3 other Bills draftees that were in that portion of the set:
A third rounder, and a guy who was one short of being Mr. Irrelevant. There's one more to come among the parallels.
10 packs. 10 parallels. Here's the unnumbered Scorecards.
Golds in most Panini releases are /10, but they're /50 here. But, /10s are a more appropriate first down parallel orange.
1 /50 parallel, but 2 /35s. Sure thing.
My lowest number parallel is of a guy name Ray-Ray. All is well. Edit: Even better, he was a 6th round pick of the Bills! That also means my lazy self won't need to find the base card for scanning purposes. WOO-HOO!

And there you have it. Inserts and autographs tomorrow! I did pretty well in the latter, at least when it comes to my trade partners...

Saturday 28 April 2018

Too Much Variety

Part 2 wraps up another envelope from Dennis. A little bit of everything to wrap it up, except all the 2-14 stuff I posted earlier.
I'll start off with a surprising Delgado card, which was surprising to me because I'd completely blanked on Brian McRae being a part of the Jays roster at any point in time. He was there for about a month, and batted .195.
Delgado can at least segue nicely into the first hit of this post.
This card might have overdone the blue with the background/design combination. It looks more like a card that would come in a box of cereal. Looking like a cereal freebie is always a plus, BTW.
Obscure Met alert!
Not so obscure Met alert!
Framed Vladdy! And we contrast an old school feel with Gypsy Queen with a photoshop job of a uniform.
A drive so pivotal that 2 of these 3 players are no longer on the team. At least McCoy is still around for 2018 releases. But my Bills team collection can always use some shininess.
Some classic masks for that collection.
I was sorta hoping that Crown Royale plates would be die-cut like the cards. Oh well.
More plate goodness to end this.

Thanks for this great envelope! I've dropped you a pre-Expo envelope, which will hopefully arrive before I stock up yet again at the Expo this Friday.

Friday 27 April 2018

2018 Adventures in Repacks - Part 16.2 - The (New) Dollarama Usual

And now, all 80 cards from the baseball hanger. Because I have other stuff to get to.
Here's the first 8. The horribly photoshopped Brian Mundell was the visible card. I'd also picked up that Rodney McCray card previously from COMC, since the back of the card mentions his infamous run through the fence during a AAA game.
The first of my team hits makes its appearance.
An interesting photo on the Cabrera is easily the highlight in this group of 8. I've also gone back-to-back with scans that include a Joe Hesketh card.
The Carlos Castillo is the interesting one in this group, as it is one of the bilingual cards. I wonder if Pacific collectors learned Spanish the same way I learned French.
That Will Middlebrooks chrome rookie would probably have been a good pull at the time, even for a base card. Today, it is a visible repack card. I don't think I could have told you he's in the Phillies organization on a bet.
Heritage is always a good way to start off a repack. Being able to follow that up with an Expos card and a play at the plate card is even better.
Now that is a card with a background worthy of a Diamond Kings card from 1989. Unfortunately, this one is from 1998.
Mets content! Jays content! And my second 1989 Brady Anderson.
Jim Sundberg's card is the oldest one in this repack. Gregg looks like he's about to get beaned by the Fleer Ultra logo.
That's the end, and the team card is a really nice way to wrap up the scans. But I figured that the back of the Chito Martinez was amusing enough to scan.
That might be the vaguest hometown ever listed on a card. I guess there are no cities in Belize. Just a country.

And there you have it!

Thursday 26 April 2018

2018 Adventures in Repacks - Part 16.1 - The (New) Dollarama Usual

The two-step is my usual card purchase when I head into the Dollarama. One 15-card hanger pack. One surprise bag. And lately, one 80-card baseball hanger. I'll start with the hockey, and then the baseball tomorrow.

As usual, I start with the hanger.
2016 Platinum - Shane Doan - And we're off. This was the first visible card.
1990 Bowman - Jimmy Carson
1991 UD - Petr Nedved
1992 OPC - Nelson Emerson
1990 Pro Set - Scott Thornton
2001 MVP - Brendan Morrison - Did I just send a mailer off to TMM and then pull this card? Of course I did!
2004 Heroes & Prospects - Alexandre Picard - He's quite blurry. I'm not sure that translates well to the NHL game.
1992 Premier - Pat Falloon
1990 Score - Pat Verbeek
1992 UD - Jeff Beukeboom
1995 Parkhurst - Valeri Karpov - Very 1995 Fleer on the design.
1991 Pro Set - Dean Evason
1989 OPC - Clint Malarchuk
1996 Slapshot - Alexandre Volchkov - The back of this card hypothesizes that he could be a #1 draft pick. He actually went #4 overall. 4-1 is three, and that's the # of NHL games he appeared in. Blurry Mr. Picard played in 250 more games.
2010 Score - TJ Oshie. And that's the last, and other visible card.
All cardboard content for this surprise bag!
Not much of not in the Score pack, as expected. Still, I did get this new Wolanin for my Rangers alum binder.
Good mask binder candidates in the goalie pack, but a great view of the classic Belfour eagle wins!
The 2000s pack also adds a card to the mask binder with this very patriotic entry from Kim St. Pierre.
The guaranteed HOFer is sorta from the expected junk wax era, but it does hit a cool set in 1994 Parkhurst Missing Link. And you also get an appearance of my favourite OHL jersey in Sudbury's. No complaints about this!

And there you have another repack!