Just One Pack...of 2015 Contenders Football

I did so well in my case break with the Bills, I guess I had to see if my luck would continue with a single pack purchase.

I really like how colourful the set is this year. Condition Sensitive will likely see that Kirk Cousins in the next package I send to Rider Country. If I could have found a retail option for this, I could see myself putting together the base set.

No hit in the pack, but at least the insert wasn't too bad of a pull. And these pennant inserts are kinda cool. I'm just glad it wasn't a LeSean McCoy, I didn't need a 4th one of him.

And that's the pack.

COMJC!

If I can use COMMC for my Mets cards, I can use COMJC as I encourage you to check out some of my latest COMC Toronto Blue Jays additions.

Sure, this might be a team USA card, but seeing as the 1992 World Series MVP doesn't have any hits with him in a Blue Jays uniform,  so I have to look for something else. I really wouldn't want a MLB card that isn't a Jays one, so this one will suffice. And it will be in my Blue Jays collection. At least until one of his autographs shows up in something like Archives.

I really love how Carlos Delgado has finally started showing up in products again, and especially with autographs. This is my third Delgado auto in his binder, all of which are on Blue Jays cards. Now I need to add a Mets one to the collection, or even better for my oddness, a Marlins auto.

Picking up a Bowman card because of a photo choice on the card? Yup! I've also added the Edwin Encarnacion card from Bowman's Best to my inventory, as it shows him taking the parrot for a walk.

Next up, a 1995 issue from Upper Deck highlighting the trade that brought Alomar and Carter to town. Considering one of the major parts of the trade was back in a Blue Jays uniform in time for the second championship, it definitely counts a steal of a deal.

And a Diamond King! Or a Canadian Great. Either way, it is a Dick Perez drawing, so I'll call it a Diamond King.

And there's the new Blue Jays content.

More Raptors!

Time to get caught up with some of the Raptors group break goodies that have shown up over the past week or so. Both of these are from mojobreak, as usual for me.

The Court Kings break was a great chance for me to start a PC of the latest Raptors top draft pick. Surprisingly, I didn't land any Raptors base cards in this break (or maybe I did, read on), but I did get some inserts and parallels. Last year, the black and white parallels were numbered to /49 and came at a rate of about one per case. This season, they are /175 and a little easier to land one of these beauties for your collection.

And if I add a numbered card to my collection, a numbered relic is the perfect thing to go with it.

And even better, my first autograph of Delon Wright also joins my collection. Not memorable penmanship, but it is a nice looking on-card autograph and it the design does work nicely to allow for a large space for the auto.

And here came the problem. There was only one non-numbered, non-hit card among the cards, and it was this. And the problem is quite visible in the lower corner of the card. Yup. This was one of those packages that came wrapped in the "Sorry, we screwed up" plastic wrapping from the USPS. The package had a nasty encounter with some sort of gouging device at the post office. This card got a nasty corner and also has an imprint down the left side that is more visible in hand than in scan. The back was also torn off the hard top loader that the relic card was in. Fortunately, that had no noticeable damage to it.

But, at least the package didn't go to New Zealand.

When it comes to Totally Certified, I did much better in terms of base cards:'

The etching on the silver doesn't show up in the scan, but it does look nice in hand.

I only got one hit out of the product, but it was a nice one.

Since Court Kings included an auto from the Raptors most recent #1 draft pick...

what better way to contrast it than with an on-card auto from their first ever draft pick? This is a Camo Mirror parallel, and is #'d to just 25.

Some beautiful new Raptors cards in my collection, and I'm really happy about the Stoudamire since one of his would easily be one of my top wants in the team's relatively short history.

Another Masked Monday

Seems like the perfect alliterative option for showing more cards from the COMC "to be posted" file.

While this 2014 card will not be the oldest card in the mask collection, it will likely be the oldest picture in it. The description on the back traces this to 1929, when Clint Benedict became the first goaltender to wear a face mask during a game in the NHL, albeit only on a temporary basis.

Up next, a very patriotic mask from John Davidson. This is one of those scratched-off 1980 Topps cards, which was the worst gimmick for cards ever. Damage a card to find out who the player is? I'd take hideous 90s designs over that any day.

Gotta love an appearance from Godzilla!

This one wasn't picked up as much for the mask photo as for the snowy spectacle of the photograph. I'll easily agree with Shane @ Shoebox Legends in that these subsets are just amazing.

Of course, baseball masks with great paint jobs from the 00s also qualify for the binders. Why wouldn't they?

And to wrap this up, a nice orange relic that I got only because it was the cheapest option that showed this mask's paint job. For the Winter Classic, Ilya's mask saluted memorable members of Philly's 4 teams. On this side, Bobby Clarke and Dr. J. Mike Schmidt and Reggie White are on the other side. But, one more snuck on, as the Philly Phanatic is onto the chin on it. I love mascot themed cards, and even this cameo is enough for me to count it as a mascot card.

And there you have it - more chances to check my cards out.

The Sens Army

My COMC to-be-posted container is almost full. Plus, I have another 100 cards on the way. Fortunately, most of those are of the set builder variety and will not be scanned for this blog. But I really need to work through this backlog before the next package arrives.

And by backlog, I mean there are still Black Friday cards in there that I haven't been arsed to post.

Black Friday 2014.

So, why not start with a two-card post of Ottawa Senators cards?

And, to fit the title of this post, this one's dedicated to the enforcer types, but lacking any cards from any of the Enforcers sets. Fisticuffs rarely make an appearance on hockey cards, so this addition was a must for me. Although Tim never reached the NHL with the Sens, or any other team, I'm still adding this card to my Sens collection.

And I can work out where this fight is from. The opposing player is from the Hershey Bears, and is wearing #33. That's Patrick Wellar. They did not scrap during the 09-10 season, but had a pair of fights in 2010-11. The second one has video, but they are wearing opposite colour jerseys in the video. So, that traces the photo of this encounter to October 15, 2010.

Detective work!

And, looking at some of the information on the back of the card, the choice of photo seems very appropriate.

And the other card:

How about a member of the 2000 club, and by far the active leader in PIM? The autograph is on card, which is nice, but I really do like how the script on the "Yours Truly" contrasts against the style of play that Chris Neil plays.

2 down, well over 100 more to go.

2016 Adventures in Repacks: Part 3.5 - And The Rest!

I really had no way to group the final 3 packs of this, so they get grouped together here. This group did contain my favourite single pull of the break, which seems like a perfect way to wrap this up.

Black Diamond 1999 starts off this group. There are some strange choices for a small numbered set in this group. But, as I said with the first pack of these, the design is so much better with some colour involved in the base design. The Dafoe is a really nice photo for a set not really known for them.

At least the Victory pack landed me a couple new cards for the mask binder.

Starting off with the Donruss pack was a trio of trade bait cards. There's a new T.J. card for when I send another PWE to the Junior Junkie and a pair of Wolverines alum for my next TMM envelope. Actually, the next to the next one, since I've already got an envelope taped up and ready to go in the meantime and in between time.

And the best card (at least for me) in the break. How about a Rated Rookie card of a Kitchener Rangers alum, and an interesting photo as well? When I looked this up on COMC, there are both white box and non-white box variations of this. This is the former, and seemingly the scarcer of the two. I thought this was meant to be autographed, but there is no indication of that anywhere else on the card.

And there you have another repack posted.

2016 Adventures in Repacks: Part 3.4 - All Aboard The Flagship

Continuing on with the box, and 3 packs from Upper Deck's flagship set await this time.

And with this group, at least I know how much at least one of these was originally going for. I'm not in the most verbose of moods today, so just some of the highlights from each pack.

A nice start for me from the 09-10 pack. I'd probably not be too mad grabbing a pack for $4.99 at 7-11 if I'd pull a Senators card from the insert set, and a Young Guns card of someone who is still active in the NHL. That's also it for YG cards in the 3 packs, but things still worked out nicely.

This pack felt a little thicker than the others, but not too thick, so I assumed a canvas insert awaited me within. I was right! Although the photo choices on canvas usually are an improvement over the base, but not really here. The vote here probably would go to the original base card.

No YG from the Double Rookie Class season, but a couple mask binder cards are nice. Note that Joey MacDonald is still wearing his Red Wings mask while in goal for the Flames. And that insert is pretty nice as well.

3 packs left to go and this box will be done.

2016 Adventures in Repacks: Part 3.3 - Being S-Pacfic

After a short break, back to the repack box. Another 3 packs this time, hitting the 3 packs of Pacific brand cards in this box. And to keep the theme of 3s, each pack had 3 cards each in it.

I didn't really plan to scan the packs this time, but liked the fact that Patrick Lalime made the packaging this time around. The other packs besides this Adrenaline are Titanium and Atomic, both from the same release year.

Here's the adrenaline cards, and I'm really happy to bat 3 for 3 with these cards. A pair of mask binder cards and an Ottawa Senator. I haven't really done counts, but Rick DiPietro is a contender for the guy I've got the most cards of in all the binders combined.

While I'm usually happy to see a Milan Hejduk appear, this one is a dupe for the 2-14 collection. I really love this design, and wouldn't mind seeing something like this make a return where the die-cut is done with the team's logo.

And the Titanium 3-pack. But this Milan Hejuk was a need, and is card #102 of his for my 2-14 collection.

No complaints about getting a new Milan Hejduk card for the 2-14 collection.

My first must-have card of 2016

I saw this doing COMC challenges, and couldn't resist adding this card:

I'm not an Ekblad collector. I'm not a Panthers collector. Why this card?

Oops.

The Bills Are Contenders!

When I said I was expecting mail that might put a slight delay in the posting of my latest 16 pack repack, this was one of them. I picked up the Bills in a case break of 2015 Panini Contenders last week at mojobreak.com, and for once, the post office actually did a pretty good job with these showing up less than a week after the packs were busted last Wednesday. Let's take a look at the cards!

From the 100 card base set, the Bills got 3 cards in the bunch. This is my first card of the latest QB saviour in Orchard Park, and based on the first season, Tyrod Taylor might be the answer to what they're looking for. But, I've felt that way before post-Jim Kelly, so I won't get too excited yet. Considering this team will see 4 Presidential terms go past without a playoff appearance, I can't get too excited.

And for those wondering how the boxes collate, here's the count on base cards. 12 boxes in a case. 12 each of Tyrod, LeSean and Sammy. So that does bode well for a set builder that grabs a box of this stuff.

No stats on the back of these cards, but at least they have more details than one saw in last year's release.

And now, the inserts:

Probably the most prevalent for the Bills was the pennant, since I got 3 of these. This was it for dupes the rest of the way home. The dupe of this, as well as 1 each of the base cards, is already packed up for whenever This Way to The Clubhouse gets a new mailing from me.

The backs for this are pretty bare, but given the pennant look to them, that actually makes sense, since there really shouldn't be anything of important on the back of something meant to be displayed.

More Bills running back love with this die-cut Thurman Thomas insert. Legendary is a great way to describe him and his place in Bills lore. I like the B&W photo, although it makes it tough to discern which team he's burning on yet another great run.

And the back of this card.

Back to the ticket motif with this Karlos Williams insert. I sure didn't expect what we got from this 5th round draft pick, but he looked really good when given the chance, as the two-headed monster at RB changed from Spiller and Jackson to McCoy and Williams. And perhaps Mike Gillislee providing a third head of the monster.

Karlos also makes an appearance on this Round Numbers insert, alongside fellow 5th round pick and Seminoles alum Rashad Greene.

But, you pick up this set for the rookie autos, and this set really delivered.

First up, this stickergraph of Dezmin Lewis. The playoff ticket autos are generally numbered to 199 or 99, but this is a variation that is shorter-printed than the regular. If you get a helmet logo on the card, it is the standard version. Get the logo only, and that's the SP. Meaning this is numbered to 49.

The variation also appears here with this Karlos Williams. Championship tickets, depending on the player, are to 99 or 49 for the regular one, or 49 to 25 for the variation.

But, I won't be keeping this card, and will likely send it off to COMC to recover some of the money from this break.

After all, this Cracked Ice numbered to 23 (regular and variations are both the same) is a far nicer addition to my Bills collection. A beautiful looking card in hand, and an easy keeper in lieu of the Championship ticket.

Some great additions to my Bills PC in this break! And I have Raptors to get to with a later post.