Wrapping up the year with a Too Many Manninghams trade

Since I've posted the results of many trade envelopes this year, it seems like an appropriate way to wrap up the year. I'd posted a few cards from this envelope so far with my 12/25 Raptors post and my most recent episode of Bills! Bills! Bills!, so it is time to wrap things up with the hockey and baseball.

Let's open with one that dropped off my most wanted list. A standard base card to most that come across this, But if you read this regularly, you'll know that not only is Damaso Marte one of the honoured members of the 2/14 collection, but he's one of three perfect matches in the binder. Furthermore, this makes it so I am only one base card away from completing his base card collection - his 2005 MLB Showdown card.

Team sets! These aren't going into the respective team binders, but will stay in their containers. I did make a slight adjustment in moving the most interesting photo to the front of the holders.

More Mets! Including a swatch of Carlos Beltran's pants! YES!

More Blue Jays! All the Jays are numbered except for the Carter and Baker. The Shannon Stewart has a texture similar to recent Panini 'Kings' releases.

Only one card for my Expos/Vladdy binder, but it is a nice card limited to /66. Strangely, there are about two dozen different parallels of this card. This particular one is the "Made By Donruss" parallel. I think I'll be happy with just 1 of the 20+ variations in the binder.

That's it for the baseball. Onto the hockey!

3 perfect matches in the 2/14 collection, and the second one picking up an addition in this post. If I remember correctly, Upper Deck actually got some grief for letting out an autograph that was just initials at the time. And now, nobody would think twice about pulling an autograph that was just initials. For some folks, it would be an upgrade on what they offer. Rudy Gobert. Trent Murphy. Mike Davis. I'm looking at you.

2/14 autograph #2.

And a whole bunch of Alphiegraphs to wrap this trade up. These are cards 3 through 5 featuring autographs of Alfredsson to enter my collection. All but one have come in envelopes from TMM.

And there you have it. Thanks for the goodies! I've already started to reload for the return package sometime next month!

Just one Pack...of 2015 Bowman Draft Jumbo

Time to bust a pack featuring recent draft picks and horrible photo shop jobs. And while I could bust a regular pack, when I'm only doing one of them, it might as well be a jumbo.

And the first card is:

Ryan McKenna - And here it is! This is a good start to the pack. I'm not an Orioles fan, but there's a big reason I like this card...

A new 2/14 guy! He also knocks 2-14-96 babies Nikolaj Ehlers and Ryan MacInnis as the youngest person in the binder, having been born in 1997. Also, there's something called the Area Code Games.
Jeff Hendrix
Triston McKenzie
Christian Stewart
Taylor Ward

Ian Happ - Probably the worst of the Photoshops in this pack. But at least the brick background creates an illusion of Wrigleyness.

Dansby Swanson - I guess this is the base card you want.
Brett Lilek

Carl Wise - Blue Jays content! And another contender in the bad Photoshop competition.
Chrome - Cody Poteet

Chrome - Ryan McKenna - WOO-HOO! A base and a parallel of the new 2/14 guy on the same pack. Sadly, he doesn't have autos in this so I can't chase hits of his.
Chrome - Jeff Hendrix

Refractor - Blake Trahan - Shiny card!

Blue Refractor - David Thompson - Shiny Mets card!

Refractor - Willy Adames - And my last shiny card!

Initiation - Andrew Benintendi - While I didn't end up with an autograph in this pack, I did land a pretty tough pull. These fall at a rate of about 1 per case and are thick inserts with a nice high-end feel to them. Unfortunately, this does mean that the "packs with a special insert contain fewer cards" comes into play as this was only a 27 card pack.
Chrome - Jose DeLeon
Chrome - Alex Jackson
Chrome - Braxton Davidson

Manuel Margot - And paper cards to wrap it up. Interestingly, the first group of base cards before the Chromes were all 2015 draft picks, but nobody from the second grouping was.
Blake Snell
Josh Bell

Yoan Lopez - Although he was a 2015 free agent signing out of Cuba, everybody else is from previous years.
Grant Holmes
Albert Almora
Raul Mondesi

Zech Lemond - And that's the pack.

No autograph in the pack, but when you land a 1-per-case card, 2 new guys for your team PCs as well a new guy for my 2/14 collection debuting with a pair of cards, I'm very happy with the results of what might be my only pack of '15 Draft.

What's In A Name?

In this case - lots of letters. I'm not a big fan of abbreviated signatures, but Pierre-Luc Letourneau-Leblond is in the company of folks like Kentavious Caldwell-Pope who get a pass on having a shortened signature since they are blessed with a moniker that, should they sign in full would likely result in severe cramping 10 signatures in.

2015 Adventures in Repacks: Part 52: 52 Repack Posts. 52 Weeks in a Year. Coincidence?

Well, probably.

My final repack post of the year goes back to the card show from before Christmas. I saw someone that had $3 repacks there. The visible cards on each side of the team bag were either relic cards, a Young Guns card, or an insert. I limited myself to one of the options, since I envisioned a pile of Pro Set cards in the middle.

I was wrong in that regards and pleasantly so.

But, I'll start with the card that made me opt for this particular team bag of goodies.

A new 2/14 relic! This is my 8th relic of Marian Gaborik in the collection, and it is now an even split between New York Rangers and Minnesota Wild relics in the binder.

And here's the other relic. Bouwmeester seems like one of those guys that has been active in the NHL for ages, but he is only 32 years old. Which makes me feel old.

And the rest of the cards?

Some inserts from 2009-10 Series 2. The Draft Day Gems was one of my favourite recent insert sets, highlighting late round draft picks that panned out. My favourite player in Daniel Alfredsson was also part of this insert set as a 6th rounder. Panini did something similar in last year's Prestige with Draft Day Standouts. Among the rest, I get a new Mike Richards for my Kitchener Rangers alumnus collection. That Toews will be heading stateside in an envelope larger than 2*3.

And the rest? Base from 2013-14 Series 2.

Since I didn't build the set this year, this actually is a rare chance for me to thumb through some of these cards. There's some nice mask binder cards, two more Rangers alum cards with another Mike Richards card (and the best photo in the group) and 1/3 of a Kadri. Plus, a new Spezza for that collection.

I wish I'd bought more than 1 of these!

Nothing Beats Cheap Wax!

For those that didn't think Hoops was low end enough for a basketball release, Panini issued Complete. The configuration is very much like Upper Deck MVP hockey, minus the SPs.

5 cards in a pack. 4 base. 1 silver parallel. Gold parallels fall one to a box, as do inserts. There are hits, but the autographs fall at a rate of one per case. I grabbed two packs of this.

Here's the first pack. Out of 5 cards, landing my first one of DeMarre Carroll in a Raptors uniform, and some CanCon in Robert Sacre is a good way to start. It is also nice to see they didn't scrimp on quality photos, as the Ebanks is a pretty nice shot .

Card backs are actually a little colourful with the team logos. In retrospect, maybe I should have scanned one with more than just a hint of red on the team logo.

Pack 2 isn't quite as interesting for me, but I do like adding the rookie card of Brandon Ashley. He didn't make the team with the Mavericks out of the pre-season and was waived. He's in the D-League now, so this might end up as his only card in any sort of NBA uniform.

My only complaint about this is that the stock used is really thin. 1988 Donruss level thin. But for a set like this and at a low price point, that's a minor beef when one gets a fun, inexpensive break.

Bills! Bills! Bills!

For the second time this month, another time to show off the Bills that joined my collection. Seems like a good day to do so, as they work their way to the end of another mediocre season. Yay to not making the playoffs since Clinton was President. 

The first two are from a COMC purchase. The rest are all part of a trade w/ Dennis @ Too Many Manninghams.

From one of the Deadspin "Your Team Sucks" season previews of the Bills.

The best moment they have had in the last decade was when Kevin Everett DIDN'T DIE in front of 70,000 people.

Sounds about right. Either that or Drayton Florence's pick 6 against the Patriots.

Contrasting with the Guy Whimper card I posted yesterday is this far more appropriate football name - Tank Carder. Carder was released before the season started, and moved to the Browns, where he has been a back up the past several seasons.

And now, the trade cards!

Glenn only played one season with the Bills but he does have his jersey retired, albeit at his alma mater of Virginia Tech.

I'm getting pretty close to having an entire T.J. Graham jersey in my collection in Jonny Cash-esque One Piece at a Time form.

As for Marcell Dareus, I have no complaints about how his performance this season. The defensive schemes in general, on the other hand...

And how about a pile of numbered cards to wrap ths up. 9 cards, all with different print runs. In order: Johnson - 400, Smith - 500,  Reed - 599, Evans Score - 600, Moulds Prestige - 1000, Moulds Collector's Edge - 2000, Fletcher - 2006, Evans Topps - 2011 and Price - 3850.

And there you have it! Posted just in time for kick-off for Week 15.

A Boy Named Sue Syndrome

With a name like that, it is not surprising he grew up and became an OL in the NFL.

12/25 with the Raptors

Although today's NBA schedule doesn't include a Raptors game, I can still use this as an opportunity to keep the theme going by showing off Raptors cards from several sources - trades, COMC, Listia, group breaks and the local card show.

Tomorrow is Boxing Day in Canada. Sales-wise, this is basically Black Friday. Last year, Panini had Boxing Day packs for 12-26. Nothing this year, but Terrence Ross was part of last's release, and the only Raptor in the base set.

My goal to get at least one card from everyone who had one issued as a Raptor gained two new faces, both zero year cards (tm. Nick @ Dime Boxes), of guys who got cards where they were listed as a Raptor, but never played a game for the team. In fact, Tyson only played one more NBA game than I have. Nut that little 'Toronto' font in the upper corner is enough for me.

Alonzo Mourning was part of the Vince Carter deal. He didn't report to the team and was bought out. This trade was easily the worst move of the Rob Babcock GM era for the team. That includes drafting Rafael Araujo. As best my COMCing can tell, this was the only card where Mourning was listed as a Raptor.

Speaking of Vince Carter, here is a nice shiny card of his. It has a rather trippy bulls-eye theme for its background. That fits a basketball theme rather nicely.

This card, from the Treads subset in Past & Present has a slight textured feel to it.

Black and white photo for a retro set = good. Chrome = not so retro.

A group break knocked off the entire team base set out of the new Prizm set. The base players in Hoops also showed up here, along with James Johnson, Norman Powell, and the additional Lowry cards.

Shiny Silver Prizms!

Shiny Purple Prizms! Both of these are /99, and the lowest numbered hits I picked up. The Biyombo is a re-used photo(shop) from Hoops.

Only one Raptors base card from the Prestige box, but I really do like the design with no borders and a full-bleed in-game photo. It is a shame this is a Target only release, since I could see myself busting a blaster or two.

This /199 Norman Powell was the other card. Rookies get this design, which isn't too bad since there were no in-game photos available for this set. You do get a nice shot of the new logo though.

Some college themed cards also came my way. Of course these are Raptors cards for the Raptors binder! Why wouldn't they be?

And finally, it wraps up with a dual relic from Listia. This one was numbered 49/49, but I note that seller didn't put this up as a "Listia 1/1?"

And there you have a Christmas post.