Words Fail Me.

Obviously, this card that came up during COMC challenges is some horribly bigoted relic from the 30's, right?

Copyright 1963?

Never mind.

[ADMIN] Resume Fire!

There is a tentative agreement involving the post office, so it should be finally safe to send things my way again. The only way things won't get here is through typical incompetence as opposed to a labour stoppage.

ObCard:

Seems a peculiar choice. Not a mask binder card. Just a typical Bowman card.

The answer is on the back:

This is the only cardboard proof Steve Weeks was an Ottawa Senator. His time with Ottawa was, appropriately, weak. He went 0-5, with a GAA of 7.23 and a save percentage of .792. This was the last he saw of the NHL. But, no matter what the numbers, he still fits into my collection of every Senator ever.

2016 Adventures in Repacks: Part 35 - Forgotten Repacks

I've actually had these sitting around for a few months now, but had yet to get around to posting them. While looking for some other cards, I came across these, which were sitting dormant for at least a couple months. Now seems like a good a day as any.

2014 UD - Ryan Strome

2005 Parkhurst - Mike Ricci - While I'm never a big fan of removing the background from cards, if they background uses the team logo and/or colours, it can save a design. Which it does here.
1990 UD - Larry Robinson

1996 Choice - Chris Terreri - An interesting photo choice with the goalie playing the puck.
1992 Parkhurst - Kevin Todd

1991 Score - Wayne Gretzky - Getting any Gretzky card from a repack is nice.
1991 Pro Set - Ric Nattress

1992 Parkhurst Emerald - Ray Whitney - And Ray was still getting base cards in 2013 and 2014 releases.
1990 Topps - Jets Team Card

1994 Donruss - Markus Naslund - Despite a couple seasons as a Penguin, seeing Markus as anything other than a Canuck on a card is odd.
1990 UD - Bob Rouse

1993 Parkhurst Emerald - Jeff Daniels - A lot of Parkhurst in this pack, including two parallels.

2001 Victory - Joe Thornton - Bruins content!
1990 Bowman - Doug Wilson - As required.

2006 Victory Next in Line - Mike Cammalleri - And the reason I grabbed this was to pad out a future TMM mailing.

Some really nice stuff in this one. Parallels. An inserts. Gretzky. Thornton. No complaints here for the $1 price tag.

2015 Full Force - Jonathan Huberdeau - I opted for this one just since I kinda liked the base design used.
1990 Score - Mark Lamb

1991 7th Inning Sketch OHL - Matthew Mullin - It is nice to add an OHL card from the 90s to my mask binder.
1992 UD - Sergei Bautin

2002 Piece of History - Ryan Smyth - Not the best jerseys in team history, but not too bad considering some other team's 3rds.

1994 Score - Randy Burridge - Awful design. Interesting photo.
1991 Bowman - Stanley Cup Game #5
1993 Ultra - Jozef Stumpel
1990 Score - Keith Primeau
2009 UD - Rick DiPietro

1993 Premier - Neil Brady - WOO-HOO! A Sen!
1991 Topps - Alan May
1991 Platinum - Dave Ellett
1990 Bowman - Bob Sweeney - Again, the required '90 Bowman card.

2013 OPC Retro - And ending on one of the more obnoxious parallel set.

A couple keepers from one of these is all one can ask for. An easy victory for the first repack, but enough interesting stuff in these to still make them worthy pickups.

2016 Adventures in Repacks: Part 34 - More Fleas!

As always, I'll start with a recap what these type of packs are. A brick of about 50 or so recent cards, mostly from mid-range sets, with a hit in the middle. $5 at the flea market.

2014 SPA - Patrick Roy - I grabbed this one for this nice looking card on the top.
2015 SPA - Rick Nash
2015 SPA - Matt Duchene
2015 SPA - Tyler Seguin
2015 SPA - Zach Parise

2015 SPA - Logan Couture - The Sharks cards look really nice with this design. Back-to-back years with nice base cards in SPA.
2015 SPA - Anthony DuClair
2013 Score - Buffalo Leaders
2013 UD - Ryan O'Byrne

2013 UD - Andrei Markov
2013 UD - Corey Crawford
2013 UD - Gustav Nyquist - 3 consecutive interesting horizontal photos. I didn't bust too much 2013 flagship, so getting these are nice.
2013 Showcase - Martin St. Louis

2015 SPA - Mike Hoffman - Sens content! Or Rangers alum content.
2015 SPA - Loui Eriksson
2014 Black Diamond - Dustin Brown
2013 UD - Sami Salo

2013 UD - Justin Faulk - Another nice flagship photo. I love how the puck is still lurking in the photo in the lower left.
2013 UD - Thomas Vanek

2013 UD - Evgeni Nabokov - If I don't have this in the mask binder, it will go in.
2013 Prizm - Martin St. Louis

2015 Showcase - Erik Karlsson - More Sens!
2012 SPA - Doug Gilmour
2011 Artifacts - Ryan Kesler
2014 Ultra - Sidney Crosby - Most of these seem to have at least one Crosby in the mix.
2015 Showcase - Kyle Okposo
2015 Showcase - Nick Foligno

2015 Showcase - Nazem Kadri - Rangers alum!
2015 Showcase - Johnny Gaudreau
2015 Showcase - Joe Pavelski
2015 Showcase - Justin Faulk
2015 Showcase - Rick Nash
2015 Showcase - Anze Kopitar
2015 Showcase - Evgeni Malkin
2015 Showcase - Steven Stamkos
2015 Showcase - Jonathan Toews
2015 Showcase - Jordan Eberle

2010 Elite - Aaron Johnson - The oldest card in the repack.

2015 UD Game Jersey - Tyler Toffoli - Here's the hit. Also nice to get a silver swatch, since that is the least frequent on the basic Kings jersey.
2014 Platinum - Frederik Andersen

2014 Ultra Gold Medallion - Karri Ramo - Some parallels in this repack. Nice. Won't be the last.
2014 Ultra - Mikael Granlund
2014 Ultra - Patrick Elias
2014 Ultra - Andrew Cogliano

2014 Platinum - Jonathan Drouin
2014 Platinum - Andre Burakovsky
2014 Platinum - Anthony DuClair - A pretty strong trio of rookies.
2013 Prizm - Ray Whitney
2013 SPA - Patric Hornqvist
2014 Ultra - Taylor Hall

2014 Ultra Gold Medallion - Mats Zuccarello - Parallel #2.
2014 Ultra - Brian Elliott
2014 Ultra - Cody Hodgson
2014 Ultra - Marek Zidlicky
2014 Ultra - Gabriel Landeskog
2014 Ultra - Ryan O'Reilly
2014 Ultra - Nicklas Backstrom

2014 Ultra Gold Medallion - Eric Staal - And #3.

2014 Ultra - Patrick Marleau - And the end.

Some parallels. Some nice photos. Some PC cards. An interesting hit. That's a pretty good $5.

Pack Sampler - 2016 Donruss

I'm leaning towards building this set for the 2016 season. Hopefully, some retail options will become available on this side of the border. Until then, I'll try a few hobby packs.

Here's one of the four packs I grabbed.

The first card from this set of the season was this one. I'm not the biggest fan of large borders, but for this set, it really works nicely since it is done up in the team colours. This year's cards are definitely inspired by some early 90s Donruss baseball releases. Since I don't hate 1990 as much as some do, I like it.

The colour extends to the back of the card.

The rest of the base cards from the first pack. These would look interesting in a 500 count box of cards with the changing borders. I really like some of the photo choices in these, especially the Riddick and Newsome.

Each pack would contain two inserts parallels. A pair of Texas cards were in this pack.

The final 100 cards are SPd rookies, and they fall at one per pack. At the rate, it is still within the range of building the set, although some luck would be nice for adding the big names. Fortunately, my first pack brought the #2 draft pick into my set.

Highlights from the rest of the packs.

As shown with the appearance of Ozzie Newsome, the base set includes legends. The borders do change with the uniform, so you do get a suitable border for this Elway.

Best photo among the base was this Dez Bryant. A TD photo but cropped nicely to give the stadium a co-starring role.

My only Bills card.

I did land a pair of numbered cards. Myles Jack's is a gaudy insert, while Henry is a stat line parallel, numbered to his rushing attempts.

Book value wise, this was my best pull from these packs, with this /10 black press proof of Mike Evans. It will very likely join my next COMC submissions.

But the best pull of the packs, or at least the most interesting? Fans of the Game makes its return, and I picked up this one among my packs. It isn't quite up with an oddball Ginter base card, but still pretty cool to get.

And there you have it!

Exposing new Expos

Back to my COMC box with a handful of new Expos.

Opening up, this strange die-cut card from 1998 Skybox. The seat portion of this can be pulled down, to show the lower part of Vlad, although mine doesn't align with the top portion at all. The non-Vlad portion of the seat backs are die-cut away. This is your typically odd 90's insert, and a nice addition to my collection.

An Expos card that was on my Top 10 wanted for a bit dropped off, as who wouldn't want a card with Dustin Hermanson and some Tootsie Pops?

O-Pee-Chee! Draft picks of Canadian teams got extra cards in 1988's release. Nate never played a game for the Expos. He got traded to the Braves, and would finally see the bigs with the Red Sox.

Because I didn't have a Gary Lucas card in my Expos binder, and this one was cheap.

Because I didn't have a Wayne Krenchecki (whose last name tries to auto-correct to Kitchenware) in my Expos binder, and this was cheap.

And that's the exposé!

"If you can't stay young, you can at least stay immature."

So sayeth Red Green, and so sayeth I with this post, featuring some silly/funny/strange/cool names from football.

This might the example of the least surprising fact when I turned over the card. Born in Hawaii? I was definitely betting on that general area of the planet when I picked up this card.

Yo is merely a nickname, as his real first name was Llewellyn. I'd probably go for 'Yo' instead. If for no other reason than to make it easier on sports writers across the planet. And he really did play across the planet, as, as per wiki:

Murphy is the only player ever to play in the regular seasons of the CFL, NFL, XFL and NFL Europe, as well as the only player to suit up for the Super Bowl, Grey Cup and World Bowl championship games.

Jaquiski! Tartt!

And one good Tartt deserves another, even though the first card is so much greater, if for nothing else than the Samford Bulldogs logo.

And finally, Happy Feller! He certainly does look pleased with his lot in life. Again, it is a nickname, but Happy is so much better than simple James Patrick. 

And there you have it.