Is it possible to be surrounded by too many generous people? Or, in other other words...
... is it possible to be on the receiving end of too many neat things? Before this year began, I probably would've said no, but looking at my scan folders, and seeing how far behind I am in giving public thanks for the (too) many(?) packages that have been sent my way, I can't help but start to wonder if...
... I'm getting too many Griffey's? Or things like...
Should I be focusing more on Bo baseball, or Bo football? Or does he have too many cards out there for someone to even bother focusing on either, and just try to get what I can, no matter the sport?
Did I wait too many years to start collecting...
... Steve Young?
Will a day ever come when I change my mind, and start to think that the 90's produced too many inserts and parallels?
How many times is too many for a person to be blown away by a card that was made from acetate?
Wow!
And finally, is it possible for me to say thank you too many times to the person who sent me this awesome package?
In case you couldn't tell, the questions in today's post were rhetorical, well, all except for the last one, as it's not possible to thank someone too many times for sending you something -- so many thanks, again, to, Dennis, from Too Many Verlanders, for sending me this wonderful assortment of cards a couple of months back. It was clear that a lot of thought went in to this package, and I was/am very grateful for the effort that was put forth!
I don't know if Chris, The Collector, feels the same way or not, but it seems like we have been exchanging cards for years now. I'm sure that if I took the time to go back and look, I would find that we've only been doing so for maybe a year, or a little more, but it sure does feel like it's been a lot longer than that.
The most recent mailing between us came from Chris in the form of a PWE back in December, and if there's one thing that I've learned about Chris over the last year (or more), it's that his PWE's always pack a punch, and this most recent envelope was certainly no exception!
Being a big fan of any 90's Prism cards, I was all over this John Elway after Chris made it available to any interested party. I actually thought I already had this one, but didn't mind getting another. Turns out that I had the Taraus Technologies version of this card, so the Prism was new to me -- I keep forgetting that were two different versions of the five-card Elway insert set from that year's Edge.
If you were collecting basketball cards in the early 90's, you undoubtedly remember how big of a deal the first couple of Beam Team insert sets were, well, at least the first two year's worth, they kind of dropped off in quality after that. I've seen people arguing on message boards about which set was better, 1992-93 or 1993-94, it seems a little silly to me for someone to get all riled up over such a trivial thing, but they do. For the record, I like both year's BT sets equally, while certainly different in appearance, I just love them both so much that it would be impossible for me to choose which is "better".
I was surprised to find that I didn't already have this '93-94 Penny, and it looks like I only need a couple more now to complete the set, although one of those is MJ, so I might not be finishing it anytime soon.
Here's another card that Chris made available to whoever on his blog, if memory serves, this Prizm insert came out of a repack. I wanted this card for two reasons, a) It's a pretty die-cut, and b) I actually know who Cameron Wake is, and have seen him play, which is something that's becoming rarer and rarer for me when it comes to players on modern cards. Did you know that Cameron is #2 on the list of all-time sacks by an undrafted free agent? I certainly didn't! He's 39.5 sacks behind John Randle, and at age 36 I don't think he'll be able to take that top spot, but being #2 in that category is still pretty darn impressive.
Oh, and sorry about the partial fingerprint on the card, I didn't notice it until after it was scanned. The question is, who's was it? Mine? Chris'? A Fairfield employee? Since it has since been removed, this will be one mystery that is going to have to remain unsolved!
I knew that the first three cards in this post would be coming, but Chris really surprised me with this 2018 Classics orange Charlie Joiner (which I should have went the photo route with btw). This is only my second orange from the set, and was my first Charlie Joiner parallel. I actually bid on a blue one not too long after the set came out, but didn't end up winning it, little did I know that just a couple of months later I would be the recipient of this awesome consolation prize -- which in all honesty, is much than the blue that I didn't win, if only because someone thought enough of me to send it my way :)
Thanks a bunch for the cards, Chris! At the rate we're going, I can't imagine that it'll be too long before a another package shows up in your mailbox with my name on it.
As I mentioned in the beginning of the previous post, this past Saturday was a card show day, and not just any old card show day, no, this was one of the twice a year card show on steroids days... featuring 180 tables of pure cardboard nirvana. Oh, and the Beckett grading people were there, as well as the JSA folks, and for the third time in the last year and a half, Denny McClain was there to sign stuff.
Having not been to a show since the last big one in September, I had been looking forward to this day for quite a while now, and thankfully the show didn't disappoint (not that I thought it would).
As far as getting there goes, it was pretty uneventful, got up at 3am so that I could hit the road by 5am in order to get there at/or before 7am. Although I did see two bunnies and a deer practically right after I got out of the driveway, so that was nice, and it must've been a good omen as the rest of the drive there ended up being quite pleasant.
I was surprised to see how many people were already there when I arrived shortly before seven, as the main crowds don't usually arrive until an hour or two later. It seemed to be rather crowded the entire time I was there, thankfully though, I left a little earlier than normal (ran out of money) so my anxiety didn't get as bad as it usually does by the time I leave. And as always, I enjoyed seeing where everyone was coming from via the license plates in the parking lot. I lost count, but I think this show beat the old record of 12 different states being represented, including an Arizona and a New York (he was a dealer, his accent gave him away) this time. Maybe it's just because I hate long drives, but I couldn't imagine driving to Nashville all the way from Arizona... that's just crazy!
As I mentioned in the last post too, since everything I bought pretty much fits into six different categories, I'm going to make these recaps a little easier by separating them into six different posts. Since the vintage stuff seems to always be the most popular, I had fully intended to start with that, but apparently the lighting wasn't good enough when I did pictures, so all the whites look yellowish... and just won't do, so instead I'll be starting with all of the glittery/sparkly stuff, aka the polar opposite of vintage.
I hit a bit of 2011 Topps Platinum Diamond Anniversary mother lode while going through my favorite seller's (Jim) quarter boxes, and I guess before I get too far along, I should probably mention that everything in this post came from two different sellers, and nothing was more than 25 cents.
If anyone's interested, the J.J. Hardy and Joel Pineiro were duplicates.
In terms of star power, the MadBum was by far the best of these Platinum Diamond's. 26 of these cards were new to me, and they almost doubled the amount of cards that I now have from this set.
Also from the 2011 Topps set, I found a couple of the Cognac's. The Banks and Sandberg are variations, of the legends variety, so it was pretty cool to find those for a quarter as they usually go for a couple of bucks apiece. The Ernie Banks is also my favorite card in this post.
Even though the scans don't show it, these cards (in my opinion) are more sparkly than shiny, which I feel need to mention because the next post is reserved for shiny cards, and I spent a couple of minutes trying to figure which cards should go in which posts.
Ooh, more Platinum Diamond's, this time from the 2011 Topps Lineage.
I love this set so much, but like everything else, I didn't know of it until a couple of years after it came out.
Of all the Topps parallels, I think the 2012 Golden Moments is the set that I have the most of. I really like the active AL batting average leaders, the base card's cool too, but it's just so much better in glimmering gold. This is another set that, in person, seems more sparkly than shiny.
I bought this Piazza mainly because of it's sparkly nature, and also because I couldn't recall ever seeing a card from this set before. I have since found out that it's a Nth Degree parallel from the 1995 Score Summit set. I don't know if I'll end up keeping it or not, but for the moment I sure do enjoy looking at it.
And finally, another card from a set that I don't recall ever having seen before. From checking COMC, I have been able to ascertain that the 1993 Collector's Edge had a five-card John Elway insert set, which came in three different versions. This one that I found is of Taraus Technologies Prisms variety, and under the right conditions, could seriously mess up your eyes. I was torn on which post this one should go in, I guess if anybody reading this has one, you can tell me which category you would've put it in. This is also another one that I don't if I'll be keeping or not, but either way, it sure is cool looking.
If you still haven't gotten your fill of gaudy cards, you'll want to come back for the next post, as it too will be full of brightly coated pieces of cardboard.
