A Lovely Addition to the 2/14 Collection

It is my second card of Kristen Dalton's (both from a Dead Zone themed set), but my first autograph of the actress. The 2/14 baby uses the provided space nicely to create a great signature, and this might be an example of an autograph that isn't off-sticker, but off-card. But I'll definitely prefer that to bare-minimum squiggles that are out there. And her imdb page indicates that she's keeping busy, so good for her!

There you have it!

The Perils of PCs

The worst thing about my 2/14 PC is that I'm willing to pay stupid amounts of money for a single card for my collection. Case in point:

$15 to add my first Ryan Johnston card into the 2/14 collection.  He's playing overseas this year. And that's not including shipping. Hyman's probably the most successful of this foursome, with both he Troy Stecher having full-time NHL gigs. Buddy Robinson has moved on from the Sens, and is now in the Jets organization. Like with Johnston his also appears to be his only NHL level card.

$15 for a card /399. No auto. No swatch.

I must have brain damage.

One Card Only: Timing

In retrospect, I should have picked up this autograph ages ago, and not finally gotten around to it after he passed away last month. But, since it didn't really cost me too much more that it would have beforehand (likely due to the ebay auction ending at 11:00 in the morning), I'll take it.

Guilt

Guilt hits that moment when you buy a card with free shipping, but end up paying less than the cost of a stamp. So, I made this seller's auctions into a 5 for $2 bin and got a few more cards.

This was the card that started this. A gold parallel from Prime of Alshon Jeffrey for my 2/14 collection. This is my 51st Alshon card in that collection.

And joining it will be this Marian Gaborik card that I was certain I had before, but my zistle list told me otherwise.

In a card I picked up someone else, this card from a magazine of an Oregon alum will be bound for Cards on Cards at some point in the future.

Golden Alfie!

And you really can't go wrong throwing a Satchel Paige card on the pile.

I feel less guilty now.

Just Two Envelopes

Each containing a card I was hunting for from this past year's hockey releases.

I'd wanted to pick up this card featuring the artery-clogging awesomeness that is poutine, but struck out on my packs and boxes. I'd been waiting for one to pop up somewhere at a reasonable cost with reasonable shipping, and this one finally did.

Poutine gets associated with Ottawa in this as opposed to Montreal, since the latter also got Montreal Smoked Meat Sandwiches as their food.

2/14 baby Nikolaj Ehlers' autographed cards started out high and pretty much stayed there. I finally stopped waiting for a reasonable price and did what anybody who wanted one for under $10 would do in the situation.

Snipe an ebay auction.

And the hat trick photograph from portfolio is probably the most interesting photo of his to receive the sticker auto treatment, so that's a bonus as is how the blue ink pops on the B&W photo.

The Raptors Might be Done for the Season

But instead of being two years away from being 2 years away, Bruno Caboclo is now just two years away.

Raptors Maildays

Time to spend a Sunday post recapping a pair of Raptors envelopes that have shown up over the past week. One batch from a group break of Select, and one from Ebay featuring (mostly) Gold Standard.

Only one base card among the group of Gold Standard cards. I really like the design this year. I'm just a huge fan of cards with the team logo in the background. If you're going to eliminate the background from the photo, that's the way to do it.

Next up, an AU parallel of the card, numbered to 79. I do like that numbering scheme, since the atomic number of gold is 79. As always, the logo in the background matches the Stoudamire era. Despite scanning a dull yellow, this one is brighter than the base card.

Delon Wright auto/relic #1.

Delon Wright auto/relic #2.

And although this wasn't advertised as part of the ebay lot, this was in there as well. Not a bad haul for $6.00 on the whole with shipping.

Continuing on to the second envelope - now we've got some group break goodies from a case of Select. Here's the base cards. Nice to add a new card of DeMarre in a Raptors jersey - now let's see him get healthy for the playoffs.

Select

means

shiny

parallels.

And this break added these 4 cards, of varying levels of shininess and abrasiveness to my collection. Only the blue of Delon Wright is a numbered card, coming to /249.

But wow.

That Bosh.

That is amazingly bright.

So, let's end the post with a more sedate copper parallel of Delon Wright. That's my third auto of his in this post, which jumps the total autos of his in my collection to 4, all of which are on card.

And that's the best way to post recaps of envelopes - fitting two into one post.

Just One Card: My first Turris-graph

Although his signature isn't the most aesthetically-pleasing, I'm still happy to add this to my Sens collection.

I just wish somebody had realized that the gold ink didn't work with a logo with a lot of gold on it.

Insomnia Special! Masked Hits!

I can't sleep, so why not use this time to post some scans of cards on their way to the hits portion of the collection?

Let's start with an auto of one of my favourite masks in recent times. Any Mike Smith mask featuring Wile E. Coyote is a sure thing for my collection. Surprisingly, this is my first hit of his in my collection. I was certain I had a relic out of the Towering Defenders subset, but I guess I was mistaken. The 41 on his mask is his jersey number. The actual US Route 41 goes from Michigan to Florida - nowhere near the Coyotes home.

The rest come from an ebay lot of goalie hits I picked up. There was a 6th card, but it really didn't fit into my collection, so I passed it along to a better home. Going clockwise from the top, Eric Hartzell starts it off. He never played a game for the Penguins, but his time as backup goalie earned him a card. The mask is interesting to me, as he is still wearing his University era mask of the Quinnipiac Bobcats. Next door is Pavelec. It is always nice to get a card where the relic isn't one of the usual shades of blue for the team. Olaf's card is from the 90s decade set, and a look through COMC shows the Godzilla mask with the stars on it appears on cards in the 1998 release. so the photo matches the set. As I've said before, all Red Wings relics should be red in colour. The Rinne is probably the worst card for my mask collection, but it will still be a welcome addition.

And there you have it. One more envelope to recap!

Best Binder Page

I was going to recap my second mini box of 2013 Select football today, but decided to do this instead. Why? I knew I wouldn't forget to finish up my blowout break, but I might forget to do this. So, here it is.

I took it literally, and am going to use the first page of my 2.14 binder as the best page, but there are 4 cards which probably would make it if not for various other considerations. My Jim Kelly auto /25 isn't stored in a binder, but inside a magnetic holder. The 1962 Parkhurst of Bernie Geoffrion is just a bit too tall for the binder, while my 1932 Film Fotos of John Barrymore and my 1949 Bowman of Red Garrett are too small to be in the binder.

So, that leaves these as the cards one would see when opening my binder:

And away we go.

Leading off, an auto of Viktor Kozlov. It seems like a strange choice, but Kozlov is one of three people in the collection that match up perfectly with both date and year. Received in trade.

This one is in the front solely for patch quality. How can you not love a card that comes with a hint of jaguar head? That sounded wrong, but some of my previous attempts at sentences were much worse. From COMC.

My Senators love comes through with this card. Ilya only played 11 games for the team, but I don't really care about such frivolous factoids like that when if comes to building this collection. Via trade.

There are three #1 draft picks in my 2/14 collection. Sadly, Jadeveon might be more Courtney Brown than Drew Bledsoe, but there's still plenty of time to fix that. A nice thick patch distracts from the jumbly auto. Via a group break where I was randomed Houston.

The only thing better than one multi-coloured patch is three. Via COMC.

One of my favourite cards in the collection. It is a dual relic, with Gaborik and Hejduk on the front and Hejduk on the back. Both are 2.14 babies, and that is the only connection between the two that I can find. It is like Upper Deck created a card that only I would chase. Ebay card.

A very red card in the lower left. This one adds my love for the artistry of the masks into the 2/14 collection. I'm not a Family Guy viewer, (neither is/was Mrazek, apparently) but I love the fact that the mask is from his days with the Grand Rapids Griffins, and his name is Petr. Group break card from when I bought the Red Wings slot.

I needed a basketball card in the front, and opted for this one for Candice Wiggins. I was going back and forth between this one and the glorious penmanship of Darius Songaila but went for this one so the distaff portion of my would make the front page. From COMC.

To wrap up the four sports in my collection, a nice combination of a card from a higher end set accompanied with an on-card autograph. Another card from COMC.

And there's the page.

1400th Post: Reunited and It Feels so Good

And what better way to celebrate 1400 posts than with something for my 2/14 collection? Perhaps something that incorporates both the numbers 1 and 4?

There you go! 4 1/1 printing plates for 1 game NHLer (still one more than yours truly) and honoured member of the 2/14 club, Matt Campanale! The complete set! Although I don't have the actual card that was produced by this plate, it is currently sitting in my COMC inventory, waiting for me to hit the ol' ship button on it.

And here's the back of them, in all their 1/1 glory. These might not make their way into the 2/14 binder, though. I'm going to see if there are any holders available that showcase all 4 printing plates, with the actual card in the middle.

Now that's a rainbow to celebrate!

A Good News, Bad News Kinda Day

Bad News: Blue Jays down 0-2.

Good News: Mets up 2-0.

Bad News: Election Day! And my political poll may have had the most incompetent poll clerk that this nation had to offer.

Good News: No more election commercials!

Bad News: Mail day included a summons for jury duty.

Good News: Mail day included some very desired cards!

Starting with a '4 if by Sportlots' envelope. I'm not the biggest fan of manu-relics, but sometimes they just are perfect for me.

Since I was there for the Wright home run debut. I'd completely forgotten about this happening until this subset was included in '15 sets. The mind blank was probably influenced greatly by seeing Eric Valent hit for the cycle later on in the series.

And yes - I am willing to add baseball cards to my mask binder. The disallowing of any sort of creativity on catchers that employ the hockey style mask is one of my minor peeves about baseball. But at least that gives me some chase cards from the 00s.

And just before 2015 Update hits the LCS, here are the last two cards I needed to finish that set. It was annoying to try to figure out what the last card was I needed. Zistle showed I needed just one, but the box seemed two out. Then I realized I'd grabbed the Derek Norris single for the 2/14 collection, and added it at zistle, without adding the necessary card to the set build.

That's the 4 cards via sportlots. Howzabout one from ebay?

My first Karlsson graph!

If jury duty mails are offset by card mails like this, then keep the former coming!

4 for the price of 2

This has happened before. There's a couple of autos I'd like in my PC, but they're part of a lot. So, I grab them, and send the others to my COMC account. Although I did have a home planned for one of the leftovers, it was a dupe for my intended target.

All of the cards were Champ's minis. That's another plus, since that means they'll also all be on-card. This was my first of the wants, adding an auto of former Kitchener Ranger Walt Tkaczuk. He spent his entire NHL career as a member of the New York Rangers, meaning that, except for a few games in the minors, he played his career with teams named 'Rangers' (There's no affiliation between the Kitchener and New York squads). Out of the 1076 games listed at hockeydb, only 8 were played wearing a uniform other than a Rangers one.

Second up, howzabout an on-card autograph of a Hall of Famer? The more affordable half of the Hull and Oates duo.

I had planned to ship that Bobby Ryan off to Greg @ P,TSiA, but I searched beforehand and found out that it would be a dupe for that collection. So, it joined the Mike Iggulden in my COMC mailer. I had never heard of him before, but he played 1 game for the Sharks and 11 for the Islanders, thus explaining the uniform not matching the team name on the card.

And there you go...

5 For the Price of 2!

I had a pair of players kinda on my radar when it comes to adding autographs of them into my collection. It turns out both of them showed up as part of a lot of sticker-graph cards on ebay. As a bonus, it was based in Canada, so I wouldn't get soaked on shipping.

Hey! First up is one of my favourite lunatics in Dave Manson, who created almost 2800 penalty minutes worth of fun over his career. While I think of him more as a Blackhawk before thnking of him as an Oiler, I won't complain about which team the sticker is attached to when this goes into my collection.

Not so much a lunatic, but a pest, but one with more than 1700 minutes worth of sin bin time over his career, here's The Rat. Again, Edmonton isn't the team I think of him as being with first, or even second, behind Philly and Boston, but he did pick up a Stanley Cup ring there. And since Ken's actually got a Stanley Cup ring from the time there,  it isn't bad that he represents Edmonton on my auto card of his.

And the 3 that I got along with the other 2. They'll probably be on their way to my COMC account sometime next week. That has become really nice to have as an excuse to purge my collection. And hey, if you want to check out some of my cards, click away!

But wait, there's more! The seller added some random base cards for protection in the package, and two of them were pretty nice.

A really nice mask from the Between the Pipes, as Brandon Hope features a vicious bear to go along with the one on the Owen Sound Attack jersey, and a great photo on the Larionov card from the junk wax era that I completely forgot about.

So, it is almost like 7 for the price of 2.