Bills! Bills! Bills!

While I didn't get a hit from my two latest group break Bills team purchases (Prestige & Classics), I'll still off the latest cards to fatten the Bills binder.

Here's the base cards. With rookies SPd at 1 per pack, it is disappointing, yet still not an incredible surprise that I didn't land at least one. Any chance to add a new Bruce Smith card to the collection is a good one.

I think I can answer the trivia question on the back of Andre Reed's card without going to card #203.

2 unnumbered parallels and inserts. The Kelly seems more like a Bills binder card than a 2/14 card, so there it is.

And a numbered, red-back parallel where I was too lazy to scan the red back.

Prestige did land me the three rookies that should probably be in most of the sets this year, as well as a base card of the already-departed Gillislee. I had no beef with his stay in Buffalo, but he wasn't getting paid what the Pats were offering.

And the final card is a (checks COMC) gold parallel out of 50. That's it.

Nothing too big, but any Bills content is good Bills content.

One Card Only: Masked Monday

If you're like me, your attention is not with the thick swatch on the card (although that piece of a Manitoba Moose jersey is pretty nice), but with the side of Drew MacIntyre's mask, and the Mr. Potato Head there. If you're wondering why there is a Mr. Potato Head on the mask, the answer is quite geographical. Drew is from Prince Edward Island. PEI is famous for potatoes. Simple. As for the pirate get-up, Drew was with the Milwaukee Admirals at the time.

I guess if you want to salute the province, it is that or having Anne of Green Gables on it. And face it, Pirate Anne would rule. Gilbert ain't pulling her hair a second time.

Mucho Mets from BWTP

Time to recap one of the two envelopes that showed up last week. I'll start with the easier of the two with a quintet of Mets.

A simple relic starts this off. But you get a little more as this includes a nickname to go along with a plain gray swatch.

With all the teams Rickey played for, at least this includes a nice pinstripe to make it more likely than not that this is a Mets swatch.

And three more Mets swatches to end the relic portion of the envelope.

Only one autograph among the 5 cards, but it is of someone still on the team. That's no mean effort this season with all the injuries. If you throw out the first pitch and you get it to home plate with two or fewer bounces, you might find yourself on the depth chart this year.

And a great way to end a post is a 1/1 plate. And it is of the ol' perfessor! Now, since this is unlicensed, it doesn't specify which New York he is with at the time, but the photo looks like it might have been recycled from his 1962 Mets card. That's close enough for me!

Thanks for all these goodies, Matt. I've been reloading, and should have something on its way by month's end.

2017 Adventures in Repacks - Part 17 - My Repack Has Fleas!

Quick recap before I start one of these - a cello-wrapped brick of cards, with a hit in the middle, for $5.

2016 Tim Horton's - Erik Karlsson - Tim Horton's - Like I'd pass on a repack with both a Timmies card visible, and that card being a Senator.
2016 Platinum - Jonathan Quick

2016 Platinum - Alex Ovechkin - Usually at least one of him, Crosby or Gretzky in one of these.
2016 Platinum - David Backes
2016 Platinum - Steven Stamkos
2016 Platinum - John Tavares
2014 Showcase - TJ Oshie
2014 Showcase - Zach Parise
2014 Showcase - Jeremy Roenick
2014 Showcase - Adam Henrique
2014 Showcase - Brett Hull
2014 Showcase - Matt Duchene
2016 Showcase - John Tavares

2016 Showcase - Brett Burns - Too much gold. Too much beard.
2015 Contours - Jordan Staal
2016 Trilogy - Daniel Sedin
2016 Trilogy - Filip Forsberg
2016 Trilogy - John Klingbeg

2014 Artifacts - Brett Hull - The 2nd appearance of Brett in this repack
2014 Artifacts - John Leclair
2014 Showcase - Kyle Clifford

2015 Upper Deck Game Jersey - Taylor Hall - And there's the hit.
2014 Showcase - Glen Murray

2016 SPA - Jonathan Toews - This is my first SPA card outside of some group break Bruins. I really do like the slight, but not overwhelming, colour on the background.

2016 Showcase - Same gold. Even more beard.

2016 SPA - Claude Giroux
2016 SPA - Nikolaj Ehlers
2016 SPA - Jamie Benn
2016 SPA - Mats Zuccarello - More of the SPA's nice clean design, including a new 2-14 baby for that binder with Ehlers!

2016 Tim Horton's - Dustin Byfuglien - More Timmy content!
2016 Tim Horton's - Rasmus Ristolainen
2016 UD - Checklist #1

2012 Artifacts - Jaromir Jagr - The oldest card in the repack, and it features a nice look at an All-Star uniform.

2014 Arifacts - Erik Karlsson - More Karlsson! And a nice alternate uniform appearance as well.

2016 Team Canada Juniors - Nicolas Hague - He was a second round pick by Vegas this past draft.
2016 Team Canada Juniors - William Bitten
2016 Team Canada Juniors - Anthony Beauvillier
2016 Team Canada Juniors - Haydn Fleury
2016 Tim Horton's - Bryan Little

2016 Tim Horton's - Jarome Iginla - The Avs colours work nicely with this design.
2016 Tim Horton's - Joe Pavelski
2016 UD - Brooks Orpik
2016 UD - Mikko Koivu
2016 UD - Brandon Dubinsky
2016 UD - Matt Niskanen
2016 UD - Robby Fabbri

2016 UD - Jeff Skinner - A rather lacklustre photographic group of flagship, but it did end nicely with a Rangers alum.
2016 SPA - Aaron Ekblad
2016 SPA - Jiri Hudler

2016 Team Canada Juniors - Sam Steel - Most porn name in the pack.
2016 Team Canada Juniors - Marcus Phillips

2016 Team Canada Juniors - Natalie Spooner - Runner up for most porn name in the pack.

2016 Team Canada Juniors - Tara Watchorn - Fin.

Nothing mind-blowingly great, but a satisfactory $5.

Help A Brotha Out!

Time once again to go begging to my stateside trading partners. Something has shown up on ebay, and while I would want it for my collection, and would be willing to overpay for a simple one-colour relic, the seller doesn't appear to ship to Canada.

A 2/14 baby, whose only previous card appearance was on a base card, and its parallels in 2013 National Treasures, has finally got himself another card.

He's also made appearances in 2017 Majestic with a patch card, but the only one I can find on ebay is priced way beyond what I would pay, or expect anybody else to pay.

So, if someone wants to make me feel like a happy king, here's your chance!

Thursday Jays

Time to knock off the Jays portion of my "to be posted" container.

I was proud of my ability to avoid the Topps Now thing last season. Then I saw Chris Coghlan's Superman leap and just knew I would be unable to resist it if it managed to show up as a card. It did, so I picked it up. There's free shipping on it within the States, so I shipped it off to my COMC mailbox.

At least 846 others shared my weakness.

And here's the back, in all its shinier-than-the-front glory.

And the rest. The Delgados were from the recent TMM mailer, and the rest were from the my COMC shipment, when I tried to add some new names to my 'Every Jay Ever' collection. Yup, Gosling is listed as a Jay, despite never playing a game for them.

And there you are.

One Card Only: Birthday at Tiffany's!

The first Topps Tiffany card in my 2/14 collection, in all its glossy glory!

For some reason, I still don't have the regular one of these.

All about the Penmanship

Seems like a good day to show off the 4 newest cards for that binder.

I'll start with one I fell in love with as soon as it showed up on Too Many Manninghams's blog. Every letter legible, and quite similar to how I sign things, with a very noticeable difference in size with the upper and lower-case letters. Rodney, despite playing WR, wasn't a rookie premiere guy this season, which was somewhat surprising even for someone in the 5th round. That might mean his future cards will remain legible.

Going back a few years for a hard-luck player in Dennis Weathersby. Just days before the draft, he was shot in a gang-related incident of mistaken identity. That limited him to 4 games in his rookie year. Then he was in a coma after a car accident next off-season. He never played again after that. His wiki article says he was then training to become a teacher and had taken firefighter tests. And he has a really nice signature as well. I love the bottom part of the 'y' stretching back to cross the 't'.

Aaron Murray's autos are a bit of a crapshoot. Mostly, they're just initials but fortunately COMC's look-before-you-buy allows me to hunt down a more legible one. My only complaint is that the #7 can look like a question mark.

Lew Ford's was pretty consistent across his autos. I wonder if he was on the receiving end of a Harmon Killebrew admonishment early in his career.

And there you have the 4 new names.

New Expos!

Not feeling too chatty post-Canada Day, but I'll keep the theme going with some small-in-number additions to the Expos collection.

I'll start with a card that falls under the always fun category of "I had no idea this existed until it came up during COMC challenges". Although he is a Marlins announcer now, and was when this was released in 2012, the back of the card is pretty much all Expos. Please savour his most famous call before the cards part of this post resumes.

El Presidente! El Perfecto! But if you want another version of it, enjoy his fellow Cooperstowner calling the final inning.

Sounds great from both sides.

Not a lot of variety among the rest, but 5 new Vlads are welcome. The Platinum and Heritage are from COMC, and the rest are from the recent TMM mailer.

Still, a really unique auto makes for a great post.

Canada Day Raptors

I didn't have any really patriotic cards in my to-be-posted file, so a team posting with Raptors from several sources.

I'm starting with a big addition to my quest for a card of every Raptor ever. Despite picking up the 6th man award during his tenure, he didn't get base cards in any sets until the later releases, and those were all high-end sets. So, much like with JJ Wilcox and my 2/14 collection, National Treasures was the source for my first Williams Raptors card.

And to follow that up, some Raptors that never got a Raptors card.

And their tenure:

John Long - 32 Games
Robert Archibald - 30 games
Alexis Ajinca - 24 Games
Hassan Adams - 12 games
Negele Knight - 6 Games
Brad Lohaus - 6 Games
Tim Kempton - 5 Games
Walter Tavares - 0 games, but played most of the season with their D-League team, before signing w/ Cleveland

Random Vince Carter! The Legacy card is from Dennis @ TMV/M. Everything else so far is from COMC.

Here's the team set from a group break of Panini's Studio release. Both the game and posed shots make up the base set.

A couple shiny inserts.

And a die-cut to wrap things up. This is probably the closest thing to a hit in this post, as these fell at a rate of 2 per case. Maybe by the time this post goes live, Lowry will no longer be a Raptor, or he'll have re-upped. Either way, there's another post to start a new month.