Pack Sampling: 1998 Collector's Edge 1st Place

Earlier this year, Andy, from Stadium Fantasium, ran a contest in conjunction with the Rose Bowl. It was a multi-tiered affair, which allowed for multiple winners (these are the best kind of contests IMO). I didn't think that I would do too well, what with the not paying much attention to current sports happenings and all, but it sounded fun, so I entered, and wouldn't you know it... I actually won something!

I don't remember what place I came in, but I did do well enough to get one of the main prizes, as well as two picks from the long list of secondary prizes, one of which was used to get today's pack of 1998 Collector's Edge 1st Place.

I hadn't ever heard of the 1st Place line before, and still don't know anything about it, but I saw "pack" and "Collector's Edge", and that was good enough for me.

1998 saw the big Leaf/Manning draft, so I would imagine that a pack like this could yield plenty of interesting things, although with only six cards in the pack, one has to work a little harder to find said interesting things. From a personal standpoint though, when it comes to a pack like this, I'm just happy with getting the opportunity to open one -- especially since I have never done so before, and the odds are pretty low that I'll ever come across any more.

The first card out of pack... and I've never heard of him! A quick search of the old interwebz tells me that he was drafted by the Oilers in 1990, made a Pro Bowl in '96, and played his final season in 1998, with the Carolina Panthers, which just so happened to be their inaugural season.

Not a hit per se, but I always enjoy coming across Jeff Blake cards. He was one of the few players that I actually tried to keep up with during the 90's, and if he didn't have so many darn cards (well over a thousand), I'd probably actively seek out his cards more often.

The backs certainly have a lot going on, but I like it. The notes here mention Neil O'Donnell's signing, which is a bit funny because, well, you'll see why in a second.

If hadn't been for series of injuries, David LaFleur probably would've been a more familiar name, but as most of us know, things don't always go as planned.

See! The pack told me what was coming #PropheticPack. Unfortunately Neil was stuck to the back of David LaFleur, the results of which can be seen at the top of the image, but no worries...

... because there was another Neil right behind the damaged Neil! It's been long time since I last pulled two of the same card from a pack, I don't really mind it in this instance though, as I was a fan of his, and now I can add the undamaged copy to my team binders.

Woot? This is kind of a weird looking card, to me it would've been a little more visually appealing had the logo been centered properly, the logo being bigger wouldn't have hurt either, but no matter, I'll still be keeping it. Don't know if anyone cares or not, but flipping it over reveals that it's a...

... checklist! Even after a brief search, I still don't know if this is supposed to be an insert, or if it's just part of the set? I did see that COMC has individual cards with this number that feature both the Chiefs logo, and the Seahawks logo, but again, I don't know if that was intentional, or if it's an uncorrected error of some sort.

This wasn't too bad of a pack overall, ended up with three keepers, and had fun opening a pack from a set that was new to me -- can't ask for too much more than that! Many thanks again to Andy, not only for the fun contest, but also for adding this pack to the list of prizes.


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