There's Always Room for Chronicles

 

Especially discounted Chronicles.

First card out is the base design. It might not be the most exciting design you could pull, but it does seem more appropriate when this is the first you see.

Exactly what you'd expect - a mix of legends and players yet to make their MLB debut. I do like collation oddness by getting back-to-back cards of St Louis managers. I'm not sure as to why, but Luminance this year made for a really classy looking design for legends. 

Naturally, I do have to show off the "Did You Know?" facts on the back.

Mets content! That Lou Brock is another real nice part of the Luminance portion of the set. Also, with 4 Cardinals and 3 Cubs entries, this particular pack should have been available for purchase in a very different locale. The XR entry of Bobby Witt is slightly thicker than the regular cards. But since the shinier entry does scan nicer than the others, so I won't complain.

But there you have it!

2025 Adventures in Repacks - Part 34 - One of Each

 One 4 card hanger, one Value Bundle from Dollarama to double up for today's repacks.

Starting small with the 4 pack, SPA on the front. 

The opener might have had little going for it beyond "It isn't flagship", but there's a couple nice cards behind it. Klingberg has a little bit of whip on his stick, and I can't hate on anything that shows off the famous roof at MSG.

And the contents of the other repack.

For those that were looking for a hypothesis as to why 1991 Fleer was so yellow, maybe they were inspired by the 1989 OHL releases. I'm not sure why Tomas Tatar is saluting the audience, but it does make for an interesting card. 

More Habs content here, but this time it is a new addition to my Kitchener Rangers alumni collection with Arber Xhekaj. That Luongo H&P card of him with the Titan, even if it was from well into his NHL career, is far better than the usual junk wax entry as the "guaranteed HOFer"

As expected, all early parts of the decade in that pack, but I did get a Kitchener Rangers alum, of which I didn't have the Canadian version of the card, and a card the player that potted the first goal in the history of this version of the Sens. Also French Upper Deck entry!

A few keepers among everything, so a perfectly fine repack session.

There you have it!

2/14s via Michigan

I'm heading back to the TMV mailer today, and going through all the 2/14 content contained within.

I sent the bat signal out for this one, seeing as the only copies of it were located stateside and I wasn't about to pay $20 shipping for a single item. It was part of a goal to get North American cities I don't have represented anywhere in the collection into it. 

I think the biggest needs are something representing San Antonio or Las Vegas. I guess Newark as well, but I'm not sure how to classify teams with state names that have played in multiple locations. A few others get in on technicalities.

Orlando: The Sam Vincent card where Michael Jordan is wearing #12, which happened 2/14/90.

Salt Lake City: The ABA's Stars Wali Jones.

Portland: A Jeremy Obobisse Portland Timbers card where his birthday is erroneously listed as 2/13.

Now back to recapping cards instead of locations:

I'm always surprised when a UD card shows up that I didn't have that I thought I already did. Maybe all the parallels and e-pack cheapness confused me as to why I didn't have this one.

Hockey may have been 2 and out with their count, but Richard Hamilton is the only basketball entry this time around. It is your typical Finest entry, with lots of foil and potential for shininess. 

Baseball also gets just 2 entries. First up is a framed Ginter mini plate of Derek Norris leading the way over an AFL Jays card of Gabriel Moreno. Before he actually ended up full-time in Arizona. 

The gridiron ruled the 2/14 portion of this mailer, and here's all of it!

I remarked when I posted the Woody Hayes entry that Dennis wouldn't be the best source for Ohio State cards, but I guess that doesn't apply to their alumni, as there were these 4 entries from JSN. Being as he's successful in one of the positions card companies love to use in their releases, he might be the one to remove the quarterback stranglehold on the top of the football collection in terms of volume. Alshon Jeffery is the only non-QB in my top 5.

As for Alshon, he got a couple cards as well. The Prestige entry is a Platinum parallel, numbered to just 25.

Jim Kelly remains the king of the collection, both in terms of volume and being my favourite 2/14 baby. The Wild Card entry is part of some strange unlicensed release from Wild Card, a 7-Card Studs set. Appropriately, it does appear to be a /7 parallel, and is a Fire Scrolls Copper Rainbow Foil parallel. Can't you tell?

Steve McNair wins the numbers game this time with 6 new entries. The National Convention entry in the lower corner wins the nod for the best of this bunch for obscurity reasons, even if the Avant entry is numbered to a palindromic but uncommon level of 535.

Let's end with the best of all three worlds. Numbered, with a relic, and with an auto. I especially like the classy script used to add Clowney's name surrounded by the swatches. It even inspired me to look for more TT cards of his at COMC, and while there weren't parallels of this, I did get a nice Transparencies auto on sale.

And Jadeveon was still getting cards this season, showing up Mosaic as a member of the Panthers, despite his moving on to the Cowboys. 

But there you have it! I'll take my usual break and return to the mailer several posts in the future.

Fun With Licensing

 

I amuse easily. I note that Panini was aware enough to realize that they didn't have the license for the Belmont Bruins, so they were forced to Photoshop away the jersey.

Yet the megaphone remained untouched.

As I said, I amuse easily.

In Memoriam

 Up today, just a couple cards that I added  to my COMC order simply because they had the players wearing memorial items as part of the uniform.

It wasn't until after they arrived that I realized both perished in transportation related circumstances.

Stan Humphries has the #22 on his helmet. That's in memory of Rodney Culver, who was killed along with his wife in the Valujet crash in May of 1996. You'd think an active player would at least warrant a patch as opposed to just a sticker by his team.

Pelle Lindbergh got a patch at least. He died in a single-vehicle impaired driving accident in 1985. Nothing like ending up as a cautionary in the form of a memorial patch.

Hopefully, something more upbeat next time.

But there you have it!

25-26 Topps Basketball Blaster Break

Hey! This stuff was actually available at Wally World not long after release. Is that a sign I should try one? Yes. Yes, it is. 7 packs makes it hard to split this into two, so I'm recapping all of them here.

Pack 1:

Here's my first card of the season! Just like would happen randomly in the past, they're recycling from baseball design. 

Every team gets their own team card in this. Are they used for a season recap, or a team checklist?

Well, they're used for a checklist, but just an unrelated 10 card portion of the checklist. This might be the oddest thing about the set.

Inserts and parallels are everywhere in this set. The Anthony is a Season Tip-Off parallel. Ray Allen is also shown on a parallel, a Holo Foil one. They're 1:50 packs in blasters, so I'm guessing that's the closest thing to a hit. There are throwbacks here too, going all the way back to 1980. Disappointingly, not a 3-card perforated salute.

Pack 2:

This was definitely the veteran star power pack, even if it disappointing to see Lebron get such a generic photo on his card. Unfortunately, I'd dupe up on both the Cunningham and Edwards later in the blaster. Although they were the only two dupes I landed, it still is disappointing in a product with only 7 packs.

I'm not sure if Anthony Davis really counts as a Power Player still, but that line of thinking might be influenced by the Dallas franchise at this point. Although this was used in other sports in the past, this is its first basketball appearance.

Pack 3:

Just some more inserts to highlight in this pack. Generation Now is a fairly reliable insert set to show up in Topps releases across all sports, so it is not a surprise to see it here, even if it is somewhat understated in its design.

Pack 4:

There's the Pacers version of "Someone from Montreal is going to get a ring" 2025 NBA finals. That's what the non-shiny version of the 8-Bit Ballers insert looks like.

Pack 5:

My first Raptors card of the box and the season. In terms of teams, the collation was really good, with every team making an appearance on at least one card. Even if Denver's only appearance was on the parallel shown earlier.

Clutch City, an insert set from almost 20 years ago and unseen since then is another returning one.

Pack 6:

Definitely the "big pack" in the blaster, with a pair of inserts featuring the cover boy. And those weren't even close to being the best card in the pack. Not in terms of value, but in terms of being incredible cardboard.

Since this parallel was also in this pack. While watching some of the breaks of this product, this photo immediately stood out as the best in the product, and I just needed to add one of these to my misc collection. Getting a bonus of it being a parallel where the design gives it even more of a 3D look to it makes it even greater. 

This is as good a place as any to note that the text write-up on the back of the base cards is the same as the ones on the 80 throwbacks. Or at least it was the same on both the Anunoby and the AJ Johnson. It's also a little disappointing that the throwbacks use modern back instead of the 80 design.

Maybe I just wanted to see the cartoons.

Pack 7:

Raptors card #2!

And a final tip-off parallel.

If I land a card I'm chasing, even if it is a parallel and not the base version, it's a good break! Thumbs up to the box!

And there you have it!

When a White Whale isn't One

 Much as it seems like this was a White Whale addition to my 2-14 collection, it isn't. Since I didn't even know this card existed until I noticed it while searching around for 2-14 stuff on COMC.

It's also my first RealOne autograph in the collection, featuring Tom Borland. Back when the collection was far more humble, I was thinking that his 1960 entry would be the oldest entry in the binders. Ah, to be so naive about this obsession. This 2010 addition does put me into a tie for the lead for Borland collectors at tcdb. When the 1960 Leaf card from my COMC inventory shows up, I'll take the lead. With 5 cards.

Which I'll stay at, unless someone sends me some of his buybacks or his Oakland Oaks entry.

I'll show the back too. While I appreciate them sticking to the original design and cartoons, I still doubt he won a Little League World Series game in 1958. Although if true, it isn't surprising that he'd dominate the opposition. Being 25 years old at the time and all.

And there you have it!

Playoff Gameday!

Today, the Hamilton Tiger-Cats' road to the Grey Cup starts, with the Eastern Final game against Montreal. I'm not optimistic, despite them winning the division and thus getting a bye. Maybe it is just the lows of the season felt really low this year, and the pessimist in me. Maybe showing off some of the CFL content, mostly of the Hamilton variety, in my latest COMC incoming mailer will improve the mood.

Kenny Lawler has had a highlight reel filled season this year with Hamilton. However, for some reason, he wasn't included in the flagship set this year, not even getting a "now with" card after moving on from Winnipeg. He did show up as one of the Game Dated cards though. So, if I wanted an auto of his, but not from another CFL team, I had to go back to 2016 and one of his draft cards.

Marquay McDaniel had already played his last CFL game by the time this card dropped in 2019, ending a 10 year career as a player. He's still around the league as a receivers coach, and has been in Saskatchewan the past couple seasons. 

Here's  a four-pack of parallels from the 2022 release, the only year I didn't buy a couple boxes of the flagship product. I really disliked the hockey design, but at least that didn't reuse the same image twice on the front. Two bland photos are better than one, I guess. Even if Brandon Banks' entry is technically an Argonauts card, the blue parallel does go nicely with his new team. And he did get a Grey Cup victory out of the deal, and that was nice to see.

Finally, since there is no other place to put it, here's a green parallel from last year of University of Waterloo alum Tre Ford. With there being actual blue parallels in the release (or deluxe, if you prefer the actual name), the result of combining base cards on e-pack had to change. So, Edmonton (and also Saskatchewan) got colour match parallels.  As for Ford, he was named starter going into the season, but struggled and was moved to the second string. 

There you have it!

Decisions, Decisions

Do I add this card of Terrence Long to my penmanship colllection, or to my Mets collection? Seeing as he made 3 plate appearances with the Mets, striking out twice and grounding into a double play in the other, he might seem like a perfect candidate for the latter.

But I  also figure there are more autographed Mets card out there than autographed cards of guys with legible signatures, so I'm going with the penmanship one.

And there you have it!

As Good a Day as Any

 Even with the World Series just a few days in the rear view mirror, it is still a fine day to start digging into my most recent incoming mailer from Dennis @ Too Many Verlanders, and start with the Blue Jays content.

I was certain I had this one already. I did - in my Canadian Content collection. Not in the Jays one. So this fixes that and adds Dasan into the team collection. Even if that looks to be a Team Canada jersey photoshopped into a Jays one.

Time to start digging into the bulk of the content, and leading the way is one of the handful of base cards in this post out of Snapshots. Springer's foil parallel provides the only appearance of the City Connects in this post. Bo's card is my first one of those ASG parallels. Those negative parallels remain nightmare fuel.

The Reactive Orange parallel makes me nostalgic for the rather calm foil parallel in the first group of 9. It is just a coincidence that I started with and also ended the two groups with a base card. It might be look like a parallel, but if it was a standalone set's base card, then of course it counts. 

The only numbered base parallel. As best I can tell, this /499 is a green crackle variation. I miss being able to find out the type of parallel with out having to go to either COMC or TCDB. 

Relic #1. The swatch colour is so similar to the blue in the background, it almost seems like UD forgot to include the actual jersey piece with the card.

Autograph #1: Oh Reese McGuire, you'll never live down your time in a Dollar Tree parking lot.

Especially when you result in a rare W for the Toronto Sun.

And let's end it with the best of both worlds, at least if you want to consider a manufactured baseball piece to be a relic. And since this wasn't the year that they used the E-ZEE Fade ink on the card, it still looks very nice. It's my 6th auto of my favourite player, all of which are Blue Jays ones. I really should try to find a Mets one to keep them company. Or even a Marlins one.

So, thanks for all these additions, and all those still to come in future posts!

There you have it!