MidWest Cardboard

Trade Bait

2011-05-22T00:34:00.009-05:00

Hey to all of you that survived the rapture! So here is the follow-up post I talked about earlier this week. It's going to be nothing but trade bait pictures. (Click on each set to see them full sized.) If you see something you like leave a comment or shoot me an e-mail with your offer(s). I'm mainly looking for Royals and Vikings cards for sports and will entertain any non-sport offers as well. I will cross trade as also (sketch card for sports card for example) Don't be shy about any offer the worst thing I can say is no and I probably won't say that too much! I just have stuff that doesn't do me any good but others might like. Thanks again for stopping in and until later.... ciao!

Any questions just ask as well!

Recent Additions

2011-05-18T00:13:00.010-05:00

So I haven't had anything to post here recently and I don't know if anybody still stops by but I finally have a few updates to share. After not being able to purchase much in the last couple months I finally got a few extra funds and spent some of it on cards. I stopped at "The Rookie" and grabbed several packs of SP Authentic basketball, Press Pass Premium and his last box of Star Wars Galaxy 6. I did well, the worst of the lot was actually the one I had hoped would be the best, the Galaxy 6. As I mentioned before a lot of the boxes were yielding two or more sketches, mine did not. I had only one sketch, a nice ink sketch of a Dianoga by Brent Engstrom.

The Press Pass included one of the 3-D cards and one autograph of Juan Pablo Montoya numbered 48/161. (THis is a really bad scan as the card is mainly foil)

The SP Authentic came out of a fresh box and I got two hits off six packs. Firstly was a By the Letter of Devin Ebanks and second was one of the North Carolina Michael Jordan floor pieces. It's the common version but looks really cool next to my Jordan autograph. All told not a bad day at the shop!

I have won several card off E-bay as well. The first is an Artist Exclusive from the 5finity Sheena set by one of my favorite artists Amber Stone.
I also picked up a couple Royals autographs. One is a 2007 UD Exquisite rookie of Alex Gordon and the other is a UD Premier of Alex Gordon and Luke Hochevar. Both were under $20 and I feel were great pick ups. Alex has been playing better since being switched to the outfield and Luke has been a bright spot on the pitching staff this year after being the opening day starter.

The last card was a pick up from Jeff at I Am Joe Collector and his Masterpieces case binge. Alex was a short print autograph and at one time was selling at over $60. I didn't pay nearly that much and thank Jeff for passing one my way.

I also got into touch with my favorite Star Wars artist Shea Standefer and was able to purchase two of her return cards. One each from Galaxy 5 and 6. The Galaxy 5 card she's had finished since the set came out and I'd been bugging her from time to time about getting it. It's a beautiful full color of Star Wars Legacy character Deliah Blue.

The Galaxy 6 card was a blank and Shea let me pick my own character and scene. One of my favorite Extended Universe series is the Republic Commando series by Karen Travis. These books focus mainly on the clone troops but have a few Jedi that they work with one of them being Jedi Etain Tur-Mukan. Shea has a couple sketches of her floating around somewhere but I wanted one for myself and had her do a full color of her holding her son Kad and protecting him with her lit lightsaber. It came out better than I could have hoped for.....

I'll have another post going up in the next day or so with a bunch of cards for trade. I'll mainly be looking for Royals in return so if you have any be on the lookout for that post. Hope somebody is still checking in here every once and a while, if you are thanks and until the next post ciao!

Way to go Rook!

2011-04-03T12:50:00.002-05:00

Congratulations to the Royals rookie reliever Aaron Crow on getting his first win of the season!!

Groups Break Pimp

2011-03-28T09:38:00.004-05:00

Dimwit is holding a group break of two boxes of the upcoming Topps Gypsy Queen. Click here to see the remaining teams. If all teams are taken he is adding an extra box of something. These last few teams are also discounted to $10.00 each. Join the fun and help us check out this new product!

A New Opportunity

2011-03-27T15:07:00.003-05:00

As some of you may have noticed my banner as changed recently. This is due to a recent opportunity given to me by the web site and design company Build a Sign. Since I don't get the chance to open free boxes for review I took the offer and made three different designs sponsoring the blog in different ways. I was able to create a 3'x6' banner, a regular bumper sticker and a magnetic bumper "sticker" that will allow me to give some away.

The design process was really fun. I just had to remember that when layering pictures and text to start from the bottom up! For the banner I wanted something that I could possibly use a local card shows as I've been thinking about setting up to try and get rid of some of the thousands of singles I have. I wanted to show what types of cards I collect the most and think I accomplished this in the different pictures on either side of the picture of Iowa. The blog name and the web address are, of course, at the top and bottom and the star in the middle of the state show approximately where I'm located. You'll see this on one of the other designs as well. I think the banner looks great. It's heavy duty and has metal rings on the corners to help with the displaying.

The bumper sticker I did was partially taken from a design that was already on the site as a template. The only things I changed were the colors and what I'd rather be doing. It's a simple saying that has SOOO much truth to it! I have several of these to give away so if you're interested let me know.

The last item is the bumper magnet that once again features my home location but also gives you an idea on how long I've been collecting. These magnets are really nice. Thick and strong magnet makes them perfect for the back of your car and the printing is easy to read. I didn't get too many of these but have a couple to give out if you like this design better, so give me a shout.

Build a Sign is a great company to work with. Looking at their prices they seem very reasonable and I may have to go back and see what else I can mock up for future use. The design template is fun to work with and you can use clip art that they have on site or you can import your own pictures for use. If you have questions I worked with Megan and she is great. I had her look at all me ideas and she made one change but that was to conform the design to a different template. Thanks again to Build a Sign for their sponsorship!

Pick-Ups Off A Tip-Off

2011-03-18T00:22:00.005-05:00

While reading Dennis' blog recently he mentiond that one of his favorite sellers on the Blowout Forums was having a great sale on his game used and autographed cards in his $2.50 folders. This sounded like it might be promising and I proceeded to see what I could find. There wasn't much in those two folders that interested me but I did see he had some really nice breakdowns of higher end cards. I dove into the folder containing the Vikings and went broke. Well maybe not broke but it would have been really easy!! I limited myself this time to some nice PC stuff. I started with the 1st round draft pick from 2006 who is quickly becoming one of the best linebackers in the NFL Chad Greenway. And for those who don't know Chad attended the University of Iowa so that makes him a great home state player to collect. I picked up three rookie autographs for my collection.

Playoff Contenders Rookie Ticket

SPX #32/1299

Bowman Sterling #1/900

All three great cards. My favorite is probably the Contenders as it's the best picture but the Sterling is a close second. It's kinda fun to own the very first autograph in the series and the gold card looks great with the Vikings uniform.

The last card I picked up is a 2009 Certified of Percy Harvin. It's a bit of a gimmick and I won't deny that one bit but I really like it and got it at a great price.

#22/25

I have a couple of the stamp/patch/autographs in my collection but this makes my first Percy Harvin jersey or patch card. The Vikings stamp is a nice touch as well. So there you have it, short and sweet. I'll post the link to the Blowout Forum for those who would like to try and make a deal as well. For now enjoy March Madness..... ciao!

Mdskyhawks Buy/Sell/Trade Thread

Star Wars Galaxy 6

2011-03-14T14:06:00.006-05:00

Topps recently came out with its newest offering in the Galaxy line, number 6. When it was first announced there was a lot of skepticism about what most of the collectors go after, the sketch cards. Some of the cards for Galaxy 5, ESB 30 and the Clone Wars were shall we say less than stellar. This happens with a fair share of releases and not just with Topps but history has shown that buyers can get burned from time to time. However when people started getting their Galaxy 6 cases and boxes and started opening them we quickly realized that Topps wasn't fooling around this time. A normal box has one sketch and case will include one or two die-cuts and maybe a printing plate. What people were finding was two or three sketches a box and as many as 18 or 19 hits a case, WAY more than normal. Prices immediately went through the roof. Boxes went from $50 up to over $100 and cases that pre-ordered at $500 pushed $1000. I wasn't able to pre-order anything but this time wanted to save my money and just buy the cards I wanted, hopefully saving me a little money in the process. The main cards I'm after are by one of my favorite artists Shea Standefer. She continued her depiction of Extended Universe characters for Galaxy 6 and I can't get enough. Here are a couple of my favorites I've picked up so far.

I did find that my card shop owner had ordered a case and this last weekend I bought two boxes from him hoping to get a good card or two. I'll let you guys decide.......

Box 1:

Darth Vader by Bob Stevlic

2-1B die-cut by Martina & Frank

Aurra Sing by Lawrence Reynolds

Box 2:

Qui-Gon Jinn by Otis Frampton

Me personally, I'm thrilled. Box one was the killer box as the Vader was in the very first pack I opened! My original goal was to sell any sketches I pulled to buy one I really want but I'm having a hard time as these are some of the best I've pulled from a Star Wars product. I may have to track a few prices and see what I might be able to get, and if someone makes me one of those offers I can't refuse I won't say no. But for now I'm going to hold onto them and see what happens.

New Stuff

2011-03-01T20:30:00.004-06:00

So since I haven't been lucky enough to get any free boxes to review I stopped by the card shop today to pick up a couple boxes. I just got a new computer and don't have my scanner running so no pics but if something strikes you in the description let me know and I'll try to get a pic to you. I wanted something a bit different then my normal fair so I decided on Upper Deck World of Sports, 2010-11 Upper Deck SPX Hockey and 2011 Playoff Contenders Patches.

I'll start with the SPX Hockey and beg for your help as it's one of the sports that I know the least about. I purchased a box that had been opened but still had 18 packs and the Bonus pack included. This means I had no idea how many hits there were going to be. The bonus pack had an Ice rookie card of Jared Cowen #405/999. The box itself actually ended up with five hits! The first was a dual jersey of Sidney Crosby, dual white pieces but still "Sid the Kid," good start. Second a rookie jersey of Marcus Johansson. Third an autographed jersey of the Bruins Zach Hamill #35/799. Forth another autographed jersey this time of Flyers keeper Sergei Bobrovsky #191/799. Fifth a single jersey of rookie Zac Dalpe. I feel really good about this box. A normal box only gets four hits and looking at a breakdown it appears that I got an extra autographed jersey rookie card. I like the base cards but won't be collecting the set or anything. There are a few cards I'll keep of some of my favorite players but if anyone is collecting I can help out.

Upper Deck World of Sports seemed like a good idea when I first heard about it but some of the box breaks have been less than stellar. I took a chance and am very pleased with the results. The box states that there are two autographs in each but most have been producing three, including mine. Autograph one is of pitcher Andrew Liebel who was drafted by the Blue Jays in the 3rd round of the 2008 Amateur Draft and is currently playing A+ ball in the Florida League. The second autograph is staying in the personal collection as it's U.S. National Team member and Colorado Rapids midfielder Pablo Mastroeni. The picture is from his college days as a member of the NC State Wolfpack but what a great pull for a soccer fan. The third autograph followed the same line but as one of the Athletes of the World subset that has an autograph only and no picture of the athlete. Mine is, again, U.S. National Team member and Hannover 96 midfielder DaMarcus Beasley. Beasley has been hampered by injury recently but is an excellent player and will hopefully get the chance to play for the MNT in the coming years. I also pulled a relic card from the box and have to wonder if it could have gotten much better. The swatch itself is solid red but comes from a jersey worn by Team Canada's own "Great One" Wayne Gretzky! Two boxes and jerseys of two of Canada's greatest hockey players...... frak...... Captain Canuck is going to drive down here and steal both of these if I'm not careful!

Now on the the basketball. I choose Contenders Patches because I love the look of the autograph rookie patches. I know that they are manufactured and that there is a "gimmick" of home and away logos and truthfully I don't care! They look even better in person. All four of my autographs were of the rookie persuasion which is ok but it would have been nice to get one of the other autograph types that you can pull. No real big numbered diecut hits except for a Rookie of the Year Contender of Blake Griffin #37/99. As for the Rookie Patches they are as follows: Spurs gaurd Gary Neal with a black patch, Lakers forward Derrick Caracter with a yellow patch, Wizards forward Trevor Booker with a blue patch (Crap wrong Wizard! Oh well) and the hit of the box, Kings center DeMarcus Cousins with a gray patch. The base cards are very similar to the football Contenders so if you like that look, as I do, then you should like these as well.

Recent E-bay pick-ups include two 2008 Razor Letterman cards to finish Royals first round draft pick Aaron Crow's last name. I also received a great package from Eric at Manupatches & Chrome Scratches that had a stack of Royals cards along with Letterman patches of Eric Hosmer #1/5 and a Jeremy Beckham #13/20 that we had agreed to trade. Off E-bay I also now have autograph number six for my Harry Potter art and autos set that I'm working on, Natalia Tena as Nymphadora Tonks is now in hand. Also picked up a 2011 Topps 60th autograph of Alex Gordon cheap. This will make a nice addition to my Royals collection and the blue card with the white and blue Royals jersey looks really nice! Hopefully I'll have some pictures to show you guys soon. Thanks again for reading, ciao!

Recent Pickups

2011-02-22T22:51:00.005-06:00

So with the NASCAR season starting this last couple weekends I've been on a bit of a bender picking up some new cards. This first one is from my local card shop where after I pulled the previously mentioned Danica Patrick the owner ripped the other two boxes of 2010 Showcase. A really nice looking autograph and firesuit card numbered to 25.

Kasey is currently driving for Red Bull Racing for the year and will join Hendrick Motorsports at the beginning of next year. I also picked up a handful of base cards that he had of some of my favorite drivers.

The rest of these cards are all e-bay wins. First the two that came in the mail today....

Yeah so they kinda look similar don't they. I actually didn't mean to win them both but as Smoke is my favorite current driver I'm not going to complain a whole lot! The top card is firesuit/sheet metal/shoe numbered 26/45 while the bottom one is shoe/firesuit/sheet metal numbered 20/25. Lastly are two cards to add to my Darrell Waltrip collection.

First a Press Pass Legends Family Relics dual sheet metal card of Darrell and baby brother Michael. Second an autographed firesuit Showcase card numbered 24/25. I was thrilled to get the Showcase card as is looks great next to the sheet metal version I already have. Now I have to watch for any other versions on this card to try and pick up. Thanks for reading and ciao!

Diamonds

2011-02-18T21:58:00.005-06:00

This afternoon while wondering around one of the local Targets I picked up another blaster of 2011 Topps to see what I could find. Out of this I pulled four of the Diamond Giveaway cards. I know it's a rehash of the Million Card from last year but I think it's fun to see what Topps has to offer. One of the interesting add-ons this year of course is the Diamond Dig. For each card you unlock you get to dig a spot on a baseball field to collect rings and for each different ring you work your way up a ladder that offers prizes up to a 60th anniversary ring. SO after unlocking my four cards today, the best of which was a 1967 John Buzhardt, I went to the ball field and dug my four spots. On the fourth dig this showed up

TOPPS 60TH ANNIVERSARY
COMMEMORATIVE SET
AN EXCLUSIVE 60TH ANNIVERSARY EDITION COMPLETE SET

HOLY FRAK I just won a prize from Topps!! Now what I wonder is 1. How much will the shipping be and 2. is this the shiny foil set Dayf is trying to put together by Hand? From the note listed in the prize section I won't be able to even think about getting this until August 15th so I guess I have some time to figure it all out! I wonder what other prizes are out there to be dug up? Ciao!

Recent Stuff

2011-02-18T09:52:00.008-06:00

So as I mentioned earlier this morning I was able to stop by my favorite card shop and pick up a couple boxes. The first was a box of the new Playoff Contenders. I had seen some nice autos come out and I really like the design of the base cards. My box yielded five autographs: three of the sticker version and two on-card. Sticker wise I pulled Antonio Brown, Devin McCourty and Derrick Morgan. For on-card I found a Marcus Easley and Eric Decker. Not sure if either one is a variation or not but still pleased with both pulls. I also pulled the Suh rookie I showed before, that was numbered 9/99 and an Otis Anderson Super Bowl Ticket numbered 3/100.

The other box I picked up is something I've been wanting to try for a long time but needed some extra cash to be able to afford. Well with my tax return coming in I was finally able to buy a box of Press Pass Showcase racing. I've always liked NASCAR and there are some amazing cards to be pulled from this. Three packs and three hits. Pack number one gave me an autograph and sheet metal card of a driver that is in the top ten of all-time winners, Former driver of the #2 Miller Genuine Draft Pontiac Rusty Wallace.

The scan doesn't show it very well but the sheet metal piece, even though it's all white, is really dirty and scuffed and the autograph is most defiantly on-card! Numbered 5/45 this was a great way to start a box. Next pack was super heavy and led me to think I had another sheet metal piece and I wasn't wrong. I pulled a jumbo piece of the #42 Target car driven by Juan Pablo Montoya that includes part of a sponsor sticker and is numbered 12/45.

The last pack wasn't as heavy and I wasn't sure what it was going to yield. As I peeled back the top couple cards I got to the one clear card in each pack and could see part of the hit behind it. That small piece was colored bright green and my heart started racing just a bit. See each six box half-case promises to have one autograph or race-used card of a certain NASCAR rookie and I was hoping beyond hope that I might get lucky. Well ladies and gentlemen here it is.....

That's right I pulled a triple race-used card of Miss Danica Patrick! Sheet metal, tire and fire-suit. With my scanner the green doesn't show up very well but it's much brighter than this is showing. The tire piece is cool as it appears to have the number 5 and a rubber "hair" on it and the dual colored sheet metal is a plus. I really like this product and may have to save up for a couple more boxes. I have three other Showcase cards coming in the mail that I won off E-bay and I'll show those when they get here.

I also picked up off E-bay part of a Battlestar Galactica collection that a seller was getting rid of. The best this I got were six of the Shelter Poster cards. These came six or so boxes and are the only numbered cards to be included in the sets. So for the cost of just over one box I actually got the complete sets for seasons 3 and 4.

I also got the complete insert set of the Razor mini-series for less then $10

The last couple cards I got were an autograph of Leah Cairns who played pilot Margaret "Racetrack" Edmonson and a costume card of Sharon "Boomer" Valerii. The costume card gives me all of the variations of the Boomer cards from all five sets. So all in all it's been a pretty good couple weeks card wise for me after not liking anything new and kinda getting down on the hobby it's nice to find some cards I actually like. I'll hopefully be back later in the week with the rest of my E-bay wins but until then....... ciao

P&P (Plug and a Preview)

2011-02-18T00:56:00.004-06:00

Discovered a new blog through several contest plugs tonite called Crinkly Wrappers and he's holding a great contest for some free Topps cards. Head on over and get in on the fun!

Also went to the card shop today and picked up two boxes. Here's a one card preview of one of the boxes..... I'll post the rest of my pulls in the next couple days. Ciao for now!

Group Break Winnings and a Couple Mail Days

2011-02-04T23:00:00.006-06:00

As many of you know Dennis over at Too Many Grandersons did a second case of 2008 Razor Letterman and I was able to join this time. I love the way he does this break as he opened everything and then we drafted the cards we wanted. We pulled some really nice cards including a 1/1. My draft spot was in the middle of the group and the first card I choose was Eric Hosmer "R" numbered 17/20. I also was able to pick up a Chris Carpenter, Ryan Flaherty, Pedro Alvarez and Roger Kieschnick and one other card that I can't remember I think it was a Tiger. We then went into a trading session where I was able to use some of the previous Letterman cards I had gotten to work out a trade for two Aaron Crow cards to add to my collection. Dennis also threw in an extra auto for me of Jared Mitchell from Bowman Sterling which was a great touch. Thanks again to him for having a great break!

I also helped out artist Brandon Kenney in a huge project he had going called Art for Smarts to help him raise money for his schooling. Brandon was raffling off spots for several prizes and each spot also included a sketch card of his random choosing. The raffle was done over a month ago and I ended up winning a 4x6 Legends & Lore artist proof with one of the four spots I bought. Brandon has been working hard to finish all the different sketch cards and mine finally came in the mail yesterday. I was lucky enough to get Legolas from The Lord of the Rings, Jayne Cobb from Firefly, Darth Maul from Star Wars and a full color Batman. Thanks again to Brandon for all his hard work!

The last thing I received in the mail this week was a PSC by Tim Proctor of my favorite girl Boomer/Athena from Battlestar Galactica. I commissioned this card a couple months ago and Tim finally had time to get it done and out to me. And let me say I don't mind the wait!! I know he was hard at work on several projects including Star Wars Galaxy 6 and the wait was well worth it. What a beautiful card I've added to my collection.....

Hope everyone has a GREAT Super Bowl weekend!

Recent Additions

2011-01-20T17:59:00.005-06:00

Hey all still around but haven't had much to write about recently. I can honestly say that in the last month I've only opened one blaster box of cards. NOTHING has been interesting to me at all when it comes to new releases. What I'm going to show today is a few new sketch pick-ups and some really cool swag from Steve at 5finity.

So back during the March of Dimes donation period 5finity not only offered The Female Persuasion dual sketch pack but let it be known that if we wanted to donate directly to his MoD account he would send some sweet swag depending on the amount donated. So I sent in my amount and waited. The good/bad thing is the donations were more then Steve expected and he ran out of the original pages for the Betty & Veronica to give and had to ask for more which delayed some of us getting our packages. Me being towards the end of the alphabet I was one who had to wait. Not a big deal to me but I did contact Steve to see when I needed to start watching the mail. Steve wrote me back apologizing for the delay and added that there would be a few extra things since I had to wait so long. So a few weeks ago this HUGE flat package shows up leaning against my door. I got it inside and carefully opened it up and here is what awaited me inside.........

Two pages of original art from Betty & Veronica
A limited edition (1/10) print from Zom-B-Com
Two copies of Zombies vs. Cheerleaders #1 (covers A and C)
Three copies of Zombies vs. Cheerleaders Geektacular #1 (covers A, B and C)
One copy of Zombies vs. Cheerleaders #2 (cover E limited to 200)
All signed by Steven Frank!
One sketch pack of Hack/Slash that was a sketch of Cassie by Daniel Campos
One sketch from Moonstone Maximum by Anthony Hochrein
Promo cards from several 5finity releases

I was also in a group break over at Too Many Grandersons for a case of 2010 Elite Extra Edition. We got to pick our first team and then drafted two others. I wasn't able to make the live break but I picked the Cubs and had the White Sox and the Twins but somehow only ended up with ONE auto!!!! However this got worked out in the end with the teams that weren't taken and the auto's that were pulled for them. I ended up with seven total auto's of guys I've never heard of. I'm not a big prospector except for Royals' players and I know some of the guys for the Iowa Cubs of course. I haven't scanned these guys in but I got Josh Harrison (Cubs), Kolbrin Vitek, Raymond Fuentes (Red Sox), Adrian Sanchez (Nationals), Hayden Simpson (Cubs), Josh Rutledge (Rockies) and Chevez Clarke (Angels). Plus I got almost the complete base set and a nice stack of inserts. If you ever want to get in a great break Dennis does a fantastic job.

I also just bought a couple more Sadlittle produced cards off the Scoundrel Art site. Both cards are by Remy "Eisu" Mokhtar. The first is the Grim Reaper from Dreamers of Darkness

and the second is a Bathtub Angel from the Rantz Angels set

There are a few things coming out in the next couple months that have caught my eye but most of them fall in the non-sports area. I'll try to update here more often and maybe get into some of my cards that I've had since before I started the blog. Hope everyone has a great Championship weekend and as a Vikings fan this kills me to say but..... Go Pack! Until next time.......

Fun Video

2010-12-31T21:55:00.003-06:00

Ran across this on the Extra Mustard page at Sports Illustrated and had to share. Neat video on how Wilson makes every football for the NFL and for retail stores.

Merry Christmas!!

2010-12-25T00:00:00.001-06:00

Merry Christmas to all!!!

(And thanks to Steve and 5finity for the amazing card)

Pictures

2010-12-13T22:08:00.010-06:00

Finally got my scanner up and running so here are some pictures of recent pulls and purchases.

If you see something you like let me know. The Philly Edwards is already spoken for.

New Link

2010-12-10T16:01:00.003-06:00

Wanted to let you all know that I have a new link over to the left. It leads to my CheckOutMyCards page and what I have up for sale there. If you see something you'd like and it seems to be high shoot me a (reasonable) offer and I'll take a look. I have baseball, football, hockey and basketball up right now and will be restocking from time to time.

Break Results

2010-12-04T03:02:00.005-06:00

So UPS delivered my two boxes of cards about 15 minutes before I left for work on Thursday morning. I had an event at church that evening after work and didn't get home until 8:30 which means I didn't start breaking until close to 9:00 that night! My scanner is still down but I wanted to post some results tonight. I'll have a post coming soon that will be NOTHING but pictures to go with the post that I've previously made.

2008 Razor Letterman

Five packs of one autographed manufactured letterman card. Possible numbered cards of /1, /5, /10 and /20.

As I mentioned before I got two boxes of each product. In Letterman I was looking for a Hosmer or two and whatever else I can use as trade bait. I don't think I did too bad in the long run here. The non-numbered cards are single colored while the /20 have a dual blue border with a red letter. I got six regular and four numbered to 20. The best one I pulled is probably Pedro Alvarez of the Pirates. I did get one Royal, but not the one I was looking for. I pulled a Tim Melville #1/20. Also got Yonder Alonso (Reds), Michael Inoa (A's), David Cooper (Blue Jays), Justin Smoak (Rangers), Brian Matusz (O's)....I'm looking at you Beardy!! Jeremy Beckham #19/20 (Rays), Bobby Lanigan #7/20 (Twins) and Carlos Gutierrez #2/20 (Twins). The only two going in the PC are the Melville and the Alvarez (for now) and the rest are available.

2009 Razor Ink Vault

One unopened Inkworks box and three sealed Inkworks autographs.

I LOVE this product. The main problem is I can't justify spending $55 a box to get it. At $30 a box I wish I could have ordered a case. My two inner boxes weren't the best but were fun to open. I got Journey to the Canter of the Earth 3D and 4400 Season 2. I opened both and got from JttCotE a pieceworks card of Anita Briem as Hannah. From the 4400 box I pulled a Jeffrey Combs auto and a pieceworks of Sean Tyson as Gabriel. The Combs is a great pull as he has appeared in every Star Trek series and the Re-Animator movies. However I already had one so this one is again some nice trade bait and is already spoken for. My six sealed autos were the highlight by far. I got two from Smallville of Sheriff Nancy Adams (A17) and Jerry Wesserman (A45), one from Charmed of Dorian Gregory as Darryl (A2) and one from The 4400 of Natasha Gregson Wagner as April Skouris (A15). The last two are for the PC.... from Firefly and Serenity I got a Gina Torres as Zoe and the hit of the boxes Jewel Staite as Kaylee! The Gina is the Serenity version and the Jewel is the Firefly version. Firefly is one of my all-time favorite TV shows and I now have half of the main casts autographs. The Jewel Staite is actually a double for me but I'm hard pressed to put in on the trade block. If I was offered say a Nathan Fillion in return I wouldn't turn that down but it's going to have to be a good offer for me to think about parting ways.

2009 Upper Deck Philadelphia

Got two of the 5x7 box toppers like I was supposed to. The second box actually had a case hit! An autograph 5x7 of Malcolm Jenkins. Not a bad start. I pulled 31 SP's and should have only pulled 30 so got an extra one there. I got the correct amount of the mini cards at 8. My jersey cards are nice as well. Philly at least used some color in their swatches. The only white one is of Brandon Edwards. I also pulled red jersey pieces of Tony Gonzalez and Lee Evans and a purple swatch of Chester Taylor. The first autograph I pulled is actually a redemption. This made me a bit nervous since the last one I tried to redeem had to be replaced. Upper Deck won't have to replace this one as they still have autographs of Brandon Marshall in stock. The second autograph is even better since it's another case hit! I managed to get a 1935 National Chicle rookie autograph of Darrius Heyward-Bey. OK so not the best rookie but still a hard pull. If you're keeping track that means I pulled BOTH case hits out of the same box. The 5x7 and the 1935 autograph! Thank you Blowout Cards!! Everything but the Taylor is available out of the Philly.

I'm still waiting for my sketch packs from Sadlittles but that's not a bad thing since I don't have a scanner right now and it's hard to just describe a sketch card! Hope everyone has a great weekend!

Group Break

2010-12-01T22:17:00.003-06:00

Hey guys, I know most of you probably already read Dennis' blog Too Many Grandersons and know about this but I'm putting in a plug for his group break. We are doing 6 boxes of 2010 Donruss EEE. One slot in $38 and gets you three teams, one you pick right away and the other two to be drafted right before the break. Click HERE and see all the details and teams available.

Thursday....or Friday Preview

2010-11-29T22:27:00.003-06:00

So I'm here this week with a quick preview of what I'll have later this week. I managed to take advantage of some of the Black Friday sales on both Blowout Cards and D&A Card World and have six boxes of cards coming. From Blowout I grabbed 2 boxes of 2009 Philadelphia football and 2 boxes of 2008 Razor Letterman. From the Philly I'm hoping to get some of the shortprints that I need after the case split I did over on IAmJoeCollector and I would love to pull a mini-autograph, or two! With the Razor I saw a recent break on Blowout boards and for the price it looks fun. Hoping for an Eric Hosmer auto as he has an exclusive deal with them. Over at D&A I had 4 boxes in my cart and decided to dump two at the last minute. I dumped the 2008 MLS boxes that were $10 each and kept the two boxes of 2009 Razor Ink Vault. These have been a great deal as they come with 3 autographs and one sealed box. On Friday these were almost $20 off and I couldn't pass them up. I've gotten extremely lucky with these boxes before and we'll see how I do this time around. I also have a few E-bay winnings coming in and four packs from Sadlittles own Black Friday sale. Hopefully I'll have a working scanner soon that way I can actually show you some of the cards I get!

Hope your Thanksgiving was as great as mine! We'll see you later this week.......

Problems (A Public Service Announcement)

2010-11-17T00:45:00.004-06:00

Thanks to our friendly Captain from the north I just realized that the e-mail connected to my profile was an incredibly old address that isn't in use any more. I have updated this to the correct address now. If you have tried to e-mail me in the last oh... month or more and gotten it returned I apologize. Please resend anything you would like or if you had any offers that you were interested in. Now back to your regularly scheduled blog reading!!

Finally Something New

2010-11-12T20:40:00.017-06:00

Hey guys, and gals, out there in blogger land! Finally got some cards in to show off and a couple boxes to review. Gonna apologize for the bad pictures right away as well. My scanner fried today so I had to go to my backup camera and it just isn't the same! I'll start with the saga that was my Philly redemption. After calling UD and waiting for only a couple minutes I talked with a customer service rep who verified that my redemption was out of stock and asked what my favorite team is. I replied the Vikings and was told a like valued would be sent. In less than three weeks I already have my replacement. A 2009 SP Authentic on card autograph of the former Vikings lineman Ron Yary. I honestly can't complain, Yary was the first player selected by the Vikings in 1968 and played for 15 seasons becoming a starter in his second. He was voted into the Hall of Fame in 2001.

I also picked up a card form the now retired Sadlittles set Essence of Fairyland. Artist Mel Uran did several fairies in a steampunk style. Now I'm not a huge steampunk fan but these cards looked great and when one came up in Nathan's clear out sale I had to try an get it. My luck held and here she is in all her beauty......

Now on to a couple loose packs I grabbed. I wanted to see what all the hype was about with the Topps Update and I love the 2010 Topps football so I got a jumbo of each. No hits out of the Update but did manage to get one of the SP variations of Reggie Jackson. Out of the football I got a player worn jersey card of the Browns rookie Colt McCoy. Nice thing is I can sell both and get most of the money back on the packs.

So now onto the boxes. The first is actually a mini box from the new Press Pass Legends racing. Not much to tell here but oyu do get one auto and one memorabilia card per mini box. Plus a numbered card in the other packs. I did pull everything I was supposed to. My memorabilia is a super thick race-used firesuit of Dave Marcis and the autograph is a on-card of Dave Pearson. My favorite two cards were actually regular pulls, with one being numbered. I got a Motorsports Masters of Darrell Waltrip, has a UD Masterpieces texture to it, and a Make & Model #11 Mountain Dew numbered 92/99 which is Darrell's old car. Darrell is my favorite driver and I love listening to him call races. My overall thoughts on the Legends is it's a great product for a decent price. An actual full box is three of the mini boxes and will net you three autographs, three memorabilia cards and a bunch of numbered cards. I've seen some really nice stuff pulled on other forms and if you like racing it's a good product to get behind.

The last box is something from last year. I wanted to try a maximize my hits for my money and also try something new. I finally settled on 2009 Topps Chicle. Now there have been remarks about how the players look due to the fact that it's an entirely painted set. But it offers some good autographs at two per box and has a subset that I've been trying to complete through E-bay and the like. The base cards were done by 11 different artists including Brian Kong, Mike Kupka and Dave Hobrecht. I have a sample of what I think are both the good a bad here. One of my favorites has the be the Roy Williams and the Jerry Rice. The Jacobs show amazing emotion and Montana looks ready to play. Several of the artists did old throwback uniforms on the players and they just look strange, like the Sanchez. Trent looks way to happy to be passing the ball and I'm not real sure what Moss is thinking!! But for all the fact that I make a little fun of the cards I wish I had a tenth of the talent these guys do.

Each pack also has a mini card in it. The regular version is gold bordered while the SP backs have white borders with three different backs: Chicle, Bazooka and Topps Umbrella. I pulled four Chicle backs, two Bazooka backs, Matt Ryan and Percy Harvin, and one of the Topps backs numbered to 25 of Pierre Thomas.

I actually did excellent on the hits, I was supposed to get two autographs and one relic. Instead I got three autographs and a one in six box relic hit! Even though I got three autographs none of them were huge, I pulled a Pat White first, then a Ramses Barden and lastly and probably the best auto of the group Hakeem Nicks. Like I said nothing to get too excited over.

The final hit is a great card for my PC. A year or so ago I found on the bid board at my local card shop an Amelia Earhart Authentic Stamp Relic card and got it for something like $5.00. I looked up the set and decided that I wanted to put it together. According to the outside of the box there are seven different cards to get. I've picked up four of them cheaply and today out of the VERY FIRST PACK I pulled the Franklin Delano Roosevelt version B!! Couldn't believe my luck in pulling a stamp card let alone one that I needed!! This leaves the FDR version A, which I can't seem to find a picture of anywhere, and again according to the box one of Fort Knox which I haven't seen a picture of either. The Topps website doesn't even acknowledge that this set exists so I don't know if the last two cards were ever made. If anybody sees wither one please e-mail me, I'll throw together a package of your favorite team or something as a reward!

I don't think I would buy another box of Chicle but it was fun to open and I'll see how much of the set I actually have when I sort it in a day or two. The packs mentioned SP's so I'll have to try and find those as well.

I should be getting a package from Steve at 5FINITY for a March of Dimes promotion that he had going sometime in the next week or so and I'll show that off when it gets here. In the meantime take it easy and start saving room for Thanksgiving dinner!

Big (Art) Love

2010-11-03T23:45:00.002-05:00

I wanted to show off my newest piece of large, 8x11, art that I was able to commission. Over on Deviant Art one of my art friend last month did a special where for $20 he would do a full sized ink 8x11 for you, if you managed to get in on it on the day he offered, 24 hour window only. Well as luck would have it I missed out the first time but promised myself I would watch in case he did the offer again. So this last month Randy put the offer back up. I jumped in and requested two pieces. The first I can show you and is of my girl Boomer from BSG. The second is actually for the Scoundrel Secret Santa so I'm not going to show that one off right now. I mentioned the artists first name is Randy or Randy Kintz also known as rantz. Some of oyu may recognize the name from the last Sadlittles release of Rantz's Angels, same guy. He does great work both in color and in inks only. I've been getting more larger pieces for my collection. Some original art but mostly prints as they are usually cheaper. I hope ot get most of them matted and framed and up for display soon. In the meantime here is Boomer.

More cards coming later this week....

Contest from the South

2010-10-28T23:53:00.002-05:00

Check out this contest over at Georgia Mindset... you could win a box of Topps Chrome Baseball.

Redemption Update

2010-10-24T22:38:00.002-05:00

As I mentioned in the previous post I received a redemption out of our Philly case split for Joey Porter. Well today I put in the code to see when I would get my card. Scrolled down and see the infamous words..... "Inventory depleted. Please contact customer service for exchange." So now I get to call UD in the morning and see what they can offer me instead of Mr. Porter. I'm going to shoot for a current Viking, maybe Allen, Greenway or Gerhart. I'll keep you guys updated on the progress.

The Week In Review Cardboard Style

2010-10-23T21:38:00.008-05:00

So this has been a fairly fun week for me with all the stuff I've gotten. I had my three boxes of the new Star Wars release that I had pre-ordered get here on Friday. I got my packs of the new 5finity release Hack/Slash on Monday and today I got my box from I Am Joe Collector with the results of the Philadelphia case split. Good Lord I'm not even sure where to start.... ok, let's go from today backwards.

Philadelphia case results. As I'm sure many of you saw we got an amazing case of Philly. It included autos of Harvin, Allen and Sanchez. Unfortunately in the randomization process I didn't end up with any of them, oh well. I did get the 5x7 box topper auto of Brandon Pettigrew and regular autos of Matt Forte and Jerry Porter, who is a redemption for some reason. No huge names on the jersey cards but I did get one of the buybacks. A 1964 cards of the Giants Dick Lynch. It's not a valuable card by any means but I love buybacks. I'm hoping to either get in another case split or save up enough to get a case for myself sometime. I really like the design of the '09 Philly, and I have a bunch of short-prints I still need to finish out my set.

So now on the Friday. I had pre-ordered three boxes of Star Wars The Clone Wars: Rise of the Bounty Hunters a couple months ago and they finally showed up. The cards to look for are the one per box sketch cards and if you're lucky you might get an extra hit of an animator sketch. I pulled everything I was supposed to and no extra cards. My sketches were all nice but I would have liked more color in them. I pulled a Shelli Paroline, a Lawrence Snelly and a Brent Engstrom. Brent's card was my favorite but was also damaged by the infamous roller at Topps. No damage to the sketch itself but something like that should NEVER happen. I'm not sending the card in to be replaced instead selling it as is on E-bay. I might pick up a few favorite cards but I'm not planning on any more boxes of this. I'll be saving for the Galaxy 6 release coming in 2011.

Now back to Monday and Hack/Slash. This is 5finity's newest release based off of a comic series. It's not a series I'm very familiar with so I actually picked up a couple back issues last month to see why Steve and 5finity chose their subject. The main characters are Cassie Hack and her partner Vlad who hunt slashers, click here for more info on the comic. I ordered five packs and pulled five great cards. 5finity gets some of the best artists and work out there for their sets. I pulled cards by Mike Norton, Josh Flower, Jon Riggle, Robin Thompson and rare artist Tony Scott. The Thompson and the Scott are my favorites. The Riggle made me laugh when I pulled it since Jon is know for his female drawings more then his male. I mentioned this to him the other night and he commented back that he figured he'd get that response to the Vlad's that he drew. It's a great card either way and I can't wait to see more of his work for official sketch card sets.

I also picked up a few more of the Topps Chrome football value packs and a couple blasters. Nothing real huge in the value packs but do now have a completed page of the orange refractors. In the blasters I got all kinds of x-fractors and managed to pull a purple refractor of Percy Harvin then in the last pack I got a great surprise, one MOJO should be familiar with, an Aaron Hernandez autograph! Can't argue with that at all. Hernandez is playing well and I got a hobby box hit at less then half the price. Here's a look at the auto and a couple completed pages of joy from Chrome.

Hope everybody else had as good of a week as I've had this past one. Now if the Giants can finish out this last half inning I'll even had the World Series I want to see. (Thanks to the Rangers for beating the "Best Team Money Can Buy"!!) Oh.... and GO VIKINGS!!

Boxes 'O Chrome

2010-10-17T21:43:00.007-05:00

So my LCS owner had a bunch of boxes of Topps Chrome and gave me a deal on two of them. I love Chrome this year especially with the Lineage and the Rookie Reprint inserts. I wish that Hobby boxes had more color in them. To me it's the second biggest downfall of buying the Hobby boxes. The biggest complaint for Hobby is the fact that for the price you only get one autograph. And it may be like one of my two boxes where you curse the day that player even agreed to sign for Topps. I had my son help me open the packs and he by far pulled the best card. My box had this beauty-

That's right people I pulled a SIXTH round draft pick that has yet to see the professional football field. What a FRAKING WASTE of cardboard!! Ok...... deep breath..... back to the actual good stuff. My numbered card I actually missed the first time through and had to go back for. It's a Gridiron Lineage Refractor of Emmitt Smith and Felix Jones numbered 4/99.

As I said earlier these are some of my favorite cards from Topps base and Chrome. Some of the match-ups are kinda silly but the design is really nice.

My sons' box was much better autograph wise so I'll show that last. His color came in the form of a Panther. A blue refractor of Jon Beason numbered 180/199.

His autograph is out of the "A" column and has a similar theme as his color for the box.... it's also a Panther. This time it's Jimmy Clausen. I like these autos and the way that Topps put the team name under the sticker. At times it makes things hard to read but overall I'm going to give it a thumbs up.

As for the Rookie Reprint subset I'll show off two of my favorites I've pulled so far. Gayle Sayers and Peyton Manning. They just look spectacular "chromed" and I'll be looking for more of these for my collection.

I also picked up a couple singles for my PC. The first was a Topps Chrome Refractor of the KC Royals rookie Kila Ka'aihue and the second being one of the Topps UFC Nickname SP's. I went through all of his UFC singles and managed to find one, Marcus Davis "The Irish Hand Grenade."

Both the autographs and the Blue Refractor will be on E-bay soon if anybody is interested. Or you can make me an offer and we'll talk. Looking at this week I have several packs of 5finity's newest sketch packs, Hack/Slash, coming and three boxes of the new Star Wars The Clone Wars: Rise of the Bounty Hunters should be here sometime as well. I'm hoping to pull some nice sketches from both to fund some other fun stuff. Hope everyone had a good weekend, With the Vikings winning mine sure had an up side!

Recent Additions

2010-10-08T13:41:00.011-05:00

So I've been gone awhile but that hasn't stopped me from picking up a few things in the mean time. Starting on E-bay I was able to get a costume lot from my favorite TV show Battlestar Galactica. These are from the premier set that came out back in 2005 and I haven't seen any boxes for a long time. I was mainly after just two of the cards, the Number Six red dress card and the Boomer card. I've seen the Boomer card go for $30-$40 just by itself so I was glad to get a good deal on the whole lot. I'll end up keeping three or four for my collection and probably resell the rest. The Starbuck card is a piece of her flight suit and has a leathery feel to it.

I've also bought a few boxes of the Topps 2010 UFC release and am working on a complete base set now. My two latest boxes were quite good and produced extra hits for me. All told I ended up with five autographs of Wanderlei Silva, Keith Jardine, Nate Diaz, Dan Hardy and an Ultimate Fighter of Josh Bryant. My relics were just ok until I got the last one which is a three color fight mat from an Anderson Silva match. The last hit was probably my favorite. Topps pulled thier usual "hidden treasures" and replaced 25 fighter names with their nicknames at a ratio of 250 for each, basically a case hit. I was lucky enough to pull one.... Chuck "The Iceman" Liddell. This is staying with me for awhile. These are easy to miss if you're just opening trying to find your hits so if you've opened boxes of 2010 UFC you might want to go back and see if you missed any.

I also have a few new sketches that I've added to the collection and have a few others that haven't reached me yet. First off I bought another box of Star Wars Galaxy 5 while I'm waiting for the new Clone Wars cards to come out. I was fortunate enough to get a nice sketch from Jason Keith Phillips of Darth Bane.

Then this last weekend Nathan at Sadlittles offered up a special. For $20 he was selling triple sketch packed sets of the Essence of Fairyland, two color sketches and one test sketch from the preview sets. I hit him up for two and got them yesterday. My favorites are the Axebone test sketch, the Michael "Locoduck" Duron and the Kathryn Layno Lewis. I also received sketchs from j(ay), Nestor Celario and Scott Zirkel.

As I mentioned I have more sketches coming and I'll post them when they arrive. I was also in a group case break of UD Philadelphia football and will show those as well when they come in. If I don't talk to you before everybody enjoy your weekend! And don't forget the Randy Moss makes his BIG comeback with the Vikings in prime time on Monday night. How will two of the best players ever get along??? I personally hope REALLY well!

Today at the LCS

2010-09-29T21:15:00.014-05:00

So with a little extra money burning a hole in my pocket I decided to stop by my LCS and see if I won anything off the bid board last week and see what was new and looked good. As it turned out I did win the two cards I bid on. I now present pin-ups of the 1890's......

Both of these cards have the Sweet Caporal Cigarette logo on the back. I don't know if they are real or reprints but either way I think they are great.

I actually had gone to find a box of the new Topps Finest football but the owner said he had gone through all 4 cases he had ordered already and was getting some tomorrow. Nothing else in sports really caught my eye box wise so I checked out his non-sports area. He had a bunch of the Empire Strikes Back 3D boxes still so I talked him down $10 on the cost and put that in the pile. I pulled the one per box sketch out of the very first pack I opened. A really nice color sketch of R2-D2 by Jennifer Mercer who did 100 sketches total.

I did pick up one other box but I'll get to that in a second. The next thing in the pile was three packs of 2010 Topps Jumbo football. Got the standard inserts and such so nothing special until the last pack....

SWEET A CASE HIT! And he's even the starter now!! Not sure if I'll keep this or throw it up on E-bay yet but gotta say it's cool to finally get one of the rookie variations.

Now on to the last box I bought. After watching a bunch of breaks on You Tube of this I decided to take a chance on 2010 Topps UFC. You're supposed to get four hits, two relic and two autographs, in each box plus an insert in each pack and another numbered card of some sort. The base cards look nice and show either a fighter or a specific fight from one of the UFC Pay-Per-Views. The inserts are all holo-foil cards but I really like the looks of them. They range from UFC 2010 video game cards, Pride and Glory, fight poster cards, Octagon of Honor and my favorite Bloodlines. Here is a sample of all of them,

I got all four of my promised hits. My numbered card of Rafaello Oliveira 156/188

The relic cards were both just ok. One was a fight mat of Amir Sadollah numbered 83/188 and the other was fighter worn gear of Chris Tuchscherer.

The first autograph is one of the normal autos in the set and it's of UFC Lightweight Jim Miller. Miller has an overall record of 18-2-0 with eight of those fights being in the UFC. His record there is 7-1-0.

The last autograph was defiantly the hit of the box. A short-print autograph of welterweight Josh Koscheck numbered 3/8! Josh has an overall record of 17-4-0 with 17 fights in the UFC and a record of 13-4-0 record there. Josh is also one of the head coaches for the current season of The Ultimate Fighter vs. George St. Pierre.

Overall I would say this was a productive day at the LCS. Now I just have to start saving for the next time!!

Million Card Givaway

2010-09-26T18:55:00.002-05:00

This is courtesy of the Beckett Blog:

By most accounts, Topps‘ Million Card Giveaway has been a resoundingly popular promotion this year with countless baseball fans and collectors from the past and present redeeming their codes for their MCG account, trading (electronically) their cardboard like the days of old.

However, I noticed something in the official rules that I wonder if many a collector noticed. (I hadn’t even after redeeming more than 30 codes.) Once a promotion’s deadline hits in March 2011, undelivered cards in your account vanish.

As in your mom threw them out electronically.

Here’s what the rules say:

Warning: Giveaway ends 03/15/2011. After 03/15/2011, Option (iii) will no longer be available and all Accounts will be closed by Sponsor. Once closed, the contents of Accounts automatically revert to Sponsor and Accountholder waives and releases any and all property rights in Account and its contents without compensation of any kind. Participants may not receive any further notification prior to Account closure on 03/15/2011.

Delivery of the cards in one’s account costs $2.92 for the first card and 53 cents for each additional card claimed in the same sitting.

That means we all now have a deadline to decide whether we really want our 2007 Xavier Nadys along with our 1967 Chris Zacharys and 1966 Ron Swobodas. For the most part, the promotion yielded many a card I already have and probably don’t need, but for me anything before 1970 might need to be claimed. (And, of course, if you pulled some money card, the answer to the question is obviously “yes, it needs claimed.”)

It should be obvious that Topps can’t manage its MCG database forever — and of course the code cards themselves do have a 2011 expiration date — but the aspect of having an account to store a virtual collection is something that many collectors probably enjoy more than then hassles of digging through cardboard boxes to find one of their cards.

I’m just not sure how many MCG collectors — even ones who have entered hundreds of codes — know about that deadline yet.

This item is the first step. Pass the link along to those who you know use the MCG.

Count me as one of those who didn't know about the deadline. I don't have many cards in my account but do have a few that I wouldn't mind keeping. Guess I'm gonna have to break down and have some sent to me. Thanks again to Beckett for pointing out the expiration date

Sketches For a Cause

2010-09-08T17:24:00.004-05:00

One of my favorite sketch card companies out there right now is 5finity run by Steve Frank. 5finity is different from most companies as all they produce is sketch cards, no base set to collect. They also focus mainly on non-mainstream comics. They started out with their first sketch set based on the Archie comics for the March of Dimes. After this release quickly sold out many other sets followed, Greatest American Hero, Dean Yeagle's Mandy, Zombies vs. Cheerleaders, Moonstone Maximum, Voltron, Dead@17, pin-ups and puppies, The Pro, Mixtape and Pulp Girls and the latest offereing The Female Persuasion. I've purchased several packs and love the quality of the art that is produced. I was able to get two packs of The Female Persuasion. This was also a March of Dimes charity set with at least two sketches per pack. My pack were numbers 4 and 5 of the total run. I received one rare artist sketch of Sabrina the Teenage Witch by Amy Clark

Sabrina is the face of The Female Persuasion and I also got a card of her done by Remy Mokhtar

The other two cards fall under the "female" part of the release. I'm not sure who either character is or if they are based on actual characters. The first is by Patrick Finch

and the other is by Jason Worthington

The next release for 5finity is based on the Hack/Slash comic and is due out October 15th followed by Lady Death in January of 2011.

Contest

2010-09-04T21:57:00.005-05:00

Hey guys, check out this great contest on a fantastic blog, DrewsCards. He's giving away several lots of cards from the new 2010 Obak release. Click on his blog name to get there.

Also want to mention another new blog out there, Too Many Grandersons. The box breaks are really well done and the Simpsons references make the reading well worth your time.

Art and Autographs

2010-09-03T13:56:00.007-05:00

I recently commissioned one of my favorite artists to do a couple new 5x7 drawings for me, Beck Kramer of Beckadoodles.com. She has a great flexibility and can do cute kiddie stuff and also amazing pin-ups. You can see both styles at her website above. Earlier this year she had a sale trying to get rid of some 5x7's that hadn't sold and I picked up a couple, Alice from Alice in Wonderland and Hermione form the Harry Potter series.

After getting the first two pieces I talked with Beck about doing a couple more pin-ups for me. I love the Harry Potter series and decided to have a couple more of my favorite characters done. I first went with Harry's future wife Ginny Weasley and then with a character that I wish was in the books (and films) more, Nymphdora Tonks.

As Beck was working on these I came up with another idea. For the Harry Potter pin-ups I wanted to try and add a little something to tie them into the movies. The best way I came up with is to try and get autographs of each of the actresses from one of the multiple card sets that are out. Now this may take a while and I don't think it will come real cheap as Emma Watson's (Hermione) autograph is always limited in each release. I'm please to say that as of today I've got one down and, at the moment, two to go!

I'm going to get other characters done as well including the Patil twins, Bellatrix, Fleur DeLacour and Cho Chang and match them up with autographs also. The pieces that Beck did for me are matted but I'm looking around and seeing if there is a good way to display a 5x7 and a trading card together. I hope I can find a nice display and use it for each of the drawings I have done. Thank you so much to Beck Kramer who does amazing work. If you need great work done at a good price don't be afraid to talk to her.

Brand New Wood

2010-08-30T13:35:00.007-05:00

Now on to the last subject from my little teaser I gave a week or so ago. One of the best things about my LCS is the weekly bid board. He'll have everything from cards to sets to autographed pictures, some with certification and some without. and a couple weeks ago he had this bad boy.

One Louisville Slugger autographed bat. Some of you may know that here in Des Moines we a lucky enough to have a AAA baseball team, the Iowa Cubs farm team for the Chicago Cubs. In the course of a game if a player breaks his bat a lot of the time it will end up in the souvenir shop where you can buy it. I'm guessing that's what happened in this case. The bat itself has 30 signatures on it but as I'm going to guess, again, that it was signed at the game no authenticity with it. Some of the guys already have certified autographs in sets so I used that to see if the autos matched. It's also a good thing that several of the players sign with their number as well, it really helps when trying to figure out who they actually are! So let's see who I have of the bat, not going to do all 30 signatures here but just some of the ones I could find. Who knows some of these guys might be playing in the bigs this next year and some of them already are.

#16 is catcher Chris Robinson. Chris is hitting .231 with 2 HR and 25 RBI in 62 games this season

#37 is pitcher Jeff Stevens. Jeff has been called up this season and has appeared in 18 games for the Chicago Cubs. With Iowa he has appeared in 32 games, has 7 saves and is 0-2 with a 3.58 ERA.

Here we have Micah Hoffpauir. Micah has been called up several time this year and is currently playing for the big boys in Chicago. In 7 games this year he is only batting .077. I know that doesn't sound great but he was doing MUCH better in the minors.

#20 pitcher Jay Jackson. Jay is 11-8 with a 4.28 ERA this year.

#1 2nd baseman Matt Camp. Matt has appeared in 122 games and is hitting .274 with 1 HR and 35 RBI's this year.

Taking a bit of a guess here but this looks to be #36 pitcher Hung-Wen Chen. Chen is from Taiwan and with the Iowa Cubs is 2-3 with a 5.70 ERA.

I saved the best autograph for last. As most baseball fans now know the Cubs organization has been grooming a new manager over the last few years and this year he came to Des Moines to take over........

Hall of Fame 2nd baseman, #23 for the Chicago Cubs, Ryne Sandberg. Ryne has been nothing but great to the fans this year. He takes the time to sign before each game and we love him for it! This year with the Iowa Cubs Ryne has coached them to a record of 77-58 and has them headed for the playoffs (not something the Chicago Cubs can say is it!)

There are many other auto's on the bat including Sam Fuld, another player that is spending time with Chicago. But these are just highlights for you. One thing I didn't mention at the beginning of the post was how much it cost me. Well, I think I got a great deal $15.00. I know, no certification.... not a big deal to me. I know how easy it is to go down to Principal Park and have these guys sign. It's the first autographed bat that I own and will be a great keepsake for me in the future.

The Joy of Completed Pages

2010-08-27T11:02:00.010-05:00

I'm borrowing this idea from other bloggers as it's fun to do and it really is the best way to show off what I've done.

My LCS is a great place to shop, lots of selection and the prices aren't off the wall crazy like some I've heard about. One of the best things is he keeps a nice supply of older boxes and sells them at just over his cost. Last year one of the boxes caught my eye, 2008 Upper Deck Goudey. I had bought several packs of this when it first came out and liked the design so I bought a box and tried to see what I could get. Hit wise it's not overly great, you get one jersey and one on-card autograph per box. If you're lucky that autograph is a Sports Royalty version or one of several SP's. You could also pull original 1933 Goudey buybacks, these fall one per case. After I got my first box opened and sorted I decided to try and put the set together. The base set was no problem as I had most of it in one box. However, the last 130 cards were short-prints and you only got 8 or so per box. So almost every time I went into the shop I bought a new box. I probably bought a case worth of Goudey trying to pull the SP's to complete my set. Along the way I pulled several of the Sports Royalty autographs including my favorites Kerri Strug and Kerri Walsh. For regular autographs I pulled a Don Mattingly and a Brooks Robinson. I got a couple of the Yankee Stadium Legacy jersey cards and I managed to get one 1933 Goudey buyback of Lew Fonseca.

I finally got to the point where I had only five or six cards to go and I decided to quit buying boxes as I was getting too many doubles of the SP's. I had pulled three of the hardest cards: Tiger Woods, Sidney Crosby and Jack Nicklaus and started looking for singles online. This last month I finally got down to two cards I needed, Kerri Strug and Terry Bradshaw. After some searching I found both on E-bay. The Strug was an auction that I ended up winning for $.99 and the Bradshaw I actually found on a buy it now/BO. I offered the seller $3.00 and waited. The offer was accepted and I never heard from the guy again. I had to open a case and get my money refunded. So I started looking elsewhere for the card. In came Check Out My Cards and the one seller on there that had my Bradshaw. I again made an offer and less than a week later I got the last card I needed for my fully complete 2008 Upper Deck Goudey card set built by hand. Now I know some of you will look at the first scan and say it's not a complete page, well, you're right. It starts with card 200 as I don't have the regular base set in pages yet. I put that part of the set together months ago and it's stored in a box that I need to pull out.

If there is anyone out there that is trying to put this set together and needs some of the Sp's please hit me up. I have a stack and will gladly work something out with you.

Mixtape

2010-08-25T23:20:00.003-05:00

Today's post is short and sweet. I recently won a 5finity Mixtape sketch card off E-bay by the amazingly awesome artist Rhiannon Owens called "Shuriken Throwing Dart" From the info I've seen Rhi only did 25 sketches for this set and all of them are amazing.

Such a Tease

2010-08-24T23:21:00.002-05:00

Hey guys, wanted to say I haven't forgotten the blogger world! I have a couple posts in the works. One about a recent e-bay win. I'm going to rip-off Dayf and do my version of "The Joy of a Completed Page." and one really cool win from the LCS bid board. That's it, 'laters all!

.....But I'm not dead yet!

2010-08-19T11:18:00.005-05:00

So it's been a while since I've put anything here. Just wanted to let you know I am still alive. Went on a family vacation and when I got back my computer had died...FRAK! So I don't have a whole lot of access to any new pictures or scans. So time to show off an old favorite or two and leave it at that.

Here is one of my favorite female wrestlers that is being horribly misused in the WWE currently. Gail Kim is one of the most athletic if not the most athletic females and good old Vinnie Mac has her doing jobs nite after nite. Gail has been in several of the Benchwarmer sets and this is one of my favorite cards of hers.

And secondly I'll show off an Ultimate Collection Signatures numbered to 10 I picked up last year. Living in Iowa we don't have any pro teams to call our own so we adopt from the nearby states. For basketball I have followed the Chicago Bulls the closest since the Jordan years. This meant I was thrilled when in 1989 the Bulls drafted the point guard from the Iowa Hawkeyes B.J. Armstrong in the first round. He went on the be a three time champion and an All-Star once. I remember writing to him and sending several cards I had to try to get them autographed when I was a kid but never got a reply so it's nice that I was able to pick up this low numbered auto cheap.

Hopefully I'll have my computer fixed soon so I can get some more recent stuff posted. I have some new art by Beck Kramer to show off and a couple of purchases from the 'Bay to reveal as well.

Getting the Fun Stuff

2010-08-09T16:48:00.008-05:00

So, two posts in one day. Boy are you guys lucky!! Actually I'm going to post today's mail that I got about an hour or so ago. This isn't going to be a regular feature or anything but when I went down to my box and opened it I found five packages waiting for me including a couple that I've really been looking forward to. So lets start. First off i got my monthly group break cards from I Am Joe Collector. Nothing too special here, no hits this month but did get a nice 2008 Bowman Chrome rookie refractor of Luke Hochevar. Luke is 5-4 with a 4.96 ERA. Not great but nobody on the Royals staff this year has great numbers.

Next in the stack is an Essence of Fairyland sketch off E-bay by Andrew MacLean entitled Captured #1. As you can see some lucky collector has caught and labeled the Fire Fairy in a dome, not that the fairy seems too happy about it. I imagine he's using some sort of word we will not repeat on this blog to express his displeasure.

Next I have a double purchase also off E-bay by the fantastic duo of Jason Potratz and Jack Hai. These are two amazingly talented artists that combine their skills into wonderful sketch cards. I was lucky enough to win two of their latest works from the Harry Potter series. One card of Ginny and one of Hermione. I love all the detail they put into the cards every time.

Next I opened an envelope that I've been waiting on for six months or more. Artist Leah Mangue offered last school year to draw a PSC if you donated money to her son for a school fund raiser. This seemed a perfect way to get a card done and I sent the funds on the way. Leah soon realized that she may have bitten off more then she could chew as she was apparently overwhelmed with requests. I wasn't overly concerned either way if I got my sketch or not as I know the money went to a good cause but today it finally came. I now have another PSC Boomer from Battlestar Galactica to add to the collection.

Lastly is a card I've been wanting since the set came out. The set is Press Pass Showcase 2010. Cards from these boxes have been nothing short of amazing and not only does it include current NASCAR drivers but has legends as well. My favorite driver of all time is the current Fox announcer Darrell Waltrip. Darrell has several cards in this set but I was kinda picky on what I wanted one in my collection to look like. I wanted an autograph, of course, and a multi-color relic piece. I didn't care if it was a firesuit or sheet metal but leaned towards sheet metal if I could. Well the card came today and it looks even better in person! A beautiful on-card autograph with a 3 inch by 1 inch hunk of three colored sheet metal. The card weighs a ton and the colors are great. This is now one of my favorite cards in my collection. Right up there with the Jordan auto and the Peterson NT.

Thanks for letting me share my mail day and here's to hoping the rest of the day is just as good!!

Gint-A-Cuffs Box 2 Packs 17-24

2010-08-09T13:37:00.011-05:00

Well it's time to end the pain and finish out posting my second box. I've had all three hits so unless there is a surprise waiting I'm not expecting a whole lot here.

Pack 17

Orlando Hudson
Jayson Werth
Curtis Granderson Yankee -1
Tim Lincecum
Felipe Lopez
Kelly Kulick
Mini Dustin Richardson
This Day in History Ian Kinsler +1

Pack total: 0, that's right 0!
Total box score: See previous post total

Pack 18

Shawn Johnson
Erick Aybar
Carlos Carrasco
Alex Rodriguez Yankee -1

Mark Teixeira Yankee -1

Clayton Kershaw favorite player +2

Mini Monsters of the Mesozoic Allosaurus +3

This Day in History and Yankee Curtis Granderson +0

Pack total: +3
Total box score: +151

Pack 19

Yovani Gallardo
Gordon Beckham
Tiago Della Vega
Shin-Soo Choo
Nick Johnson Yankee -1

Mini Allen & Ginter back Tony Hoard & Rory +2

Sketch Card DeWayne Wise +3

This Day in History Justin Upton +1

Pack total: +5
Total box score: +156

Pack 20

Josh Thole
Aaron Cook
Johan Santana
Elvis Andrus
David Blaine
Ryan Braun favorite player +2

Mini Ricky Romero
This Day in History and favorite player Adrian Gonzalez +3

Pack total: +5
Total box score: +161

Pack 21

Ryan Ludwick
Torii Hunter
Ian Stewart
Rafael Furcal
A.J. Burnett Yankee -1

Carlos Pena SP +2

Mini Allen & Ginter back Ian Desmond +2

This Day in History Pablo Sandoval +1

Pack total: +4
Total box score: +165

Pack 22

Jeff Francoeur
Michael Dunn
Juan Francisco
Anne Donovan
Revolving Door
Chone Figgins SP +2

Mini black bordered Pedro Feliz +3

This Day in History and my favorite team Kosuke Fukudome +2

Pack total: +7
Total box score: +172

Pack 23

Colby Rasmus
Scott Feldman
Russel Martin
Daniel Hudson
Trevor Hoffman
Jim Zapp Negro League player +2

Mini World's Wordsmiths John Milton +4

This Day in History Chipper Jones +1

Pack total: +7
Total box score: +179

Pack 24

Ryan Zimmerman
Mark Reynolds
The Parthenon
Mike Cameron
Hanley Ramirez favorite player +2

Michael Young favorite player +2

Hiroki Kuroda SP +2

Mini Hubertus "Master of Hellfire" Wawra
This Day in History Andre Ethier +1

Pack total: +7
Total box score: +186

Total for box number two......... +186
hey check that out, I actually beat my box one score...... by 5 points. Not the top score and not even in the top three. Oh well there's always next year!

Box Break: Harry Potter Heroes and Villains

2010-08-08T00:49:00.008-05:00

So I hit up my favorite LCS today while I was running around. He just moved to a new location that gives him a lot more room. He does a good job of keeping all sports in and also the non-sports as well. I saw he had the newest Artbox Harry Potter release, Heroes and Villains, in and decided to try a box. Looking a\on the bottom of the box I see I bought #181/3000. Your standard hobby box is 24 packs of 8 cards. The base set is 54 cards and 18 clear cards. There is a box topper inside as well as a 9 card foil puzzle to try to put together. The box also says to look for costume, prop and autograph cards.

The base cards look good with gold foil stamping on the front. The first 36 cards are characters and Artbox did a nice job covering characters from the first movie, the Sorcerer's Stone, to the latest, the Half-Blood Prince. The good guys have a blue border around them while the bad guys have red. The rest of the regular base set is comprised of scenes from the movies. These aren't quite as comprehensive and I wish they had added more of the scene cards to the set and made it a bit bigger. The backs of the character cards have a brief description of each person and also tell what organization they belong to if any. Such as: teacher, Order of the Phoenix, Death Eater, etc. The scene card backs give a very short synopsis of the picture on the front. I haven't gone through to make sure I got a complete base set but I'll go out on a bit of a limb here and say that I did. I saw a bunch of doubles and it wouldn't surprise me if I actually came close to two base sets when all is said and done.

The insert cards for this set are nice. As I mentioned before the end of the base set is actually comprised of 18 clear cards. These are good looking cards that have a major flaw...... they get scratched very easily. Most of mine have some scrapes on them straight out of the pack. Fortunately it doesn't really take away from the overall good look of the cards. I pulled 12 of these with no doubles! Guess this means I have a bit of E-bay scouring to actually finish the SP set. The other insert is the typical 9 card puzzle. The front of each card has different characters and when put together the back will create a picture. I have four of these cards and will hazard a guess that it will form the picture form the top of the box when completed.

Finally we get to the hits. There are 14 costume cards and 13 prop cards with several variants of each depending on what "piece" you get. My first hit is a costume card of Kingsley Shacklebolt from the Order of the Phoenix numbered 82/460. As you can see it's a nice three color swatch but I'm going to have to watch the movie again to figure out what it's an actual piece of.

My second hit came in a pack with only one other card. As in it's the thickness of seven base cards, I didn't even realize I had a hit in my hands until I opened the pack and saw it. It's a prop card and numbered 38/190. Actually it's a double prop card! I managed to get card containing a piece of a quaffle or bludger and bristles of broom from the Sorcerer's Stone.

I'm going to guess that between the quaffle and the bludger I got is actually a piece of bludger. It has a real leathery feel to it and appears to be darker then the quaffle is. No telling what broom the bristles come from, though I'll use some imagination and say they are from the broom that Harry flies to rescue Neville's remember-all (ha ha.) Now I didn't pull and autograph and was a little disappointed until I did some research. Seems that for this release autographs fall one per case, hmmm, don't feel quite so bad now but sure would have been nice. The costume cards are 10 per case or one per box and the prop cards are said to fall 4 per case. If those numbers are correct I don't think I did too bad overall. Final impressions have me thinking this was a fun box to open. Both hits are going to stay in my PC for now and I think I'll try to finish the SP and puzzle sets as well.

Gint-A-Cuffs Box 2 Packs 9-16

2010-07-31T23:18:00.011-05:00

So it's been over a week since I've posted, sorry 'bout that got busy with life. Let's continue the challenge and see how short I come up here.

Pack 9

Henry Rodriguez
Jon Lester
Tommy Manzella
Raul Ibanez
Juan Pierre
Scott Sizemore SP +2

Mini Allen & Ginter back +2

This Day in History and favorite player Roy Halladay +3

Pack total: +7
Total box score: +89

Pack 10

Prince Fielder
Zach Greinke
Jason Bartlett
King Tut
Grady Sizemore favorite player +2

Jonathan Broxton SP +2

Mini black Bordered Rickie Weeks +3

This Day in History Jim Thome +1
This Day in History Jose Reyes +1

Pack total: +9
Total box score: +98

Pack 11

Derek Lowe
Magglio Ordonez
Johnny Damon -1
Drew Stubbs
Mini Michael Brantley
Alex Rios SP +2

Mahlon Duckett Negro League +2

This Day in History and favorite player Adam Dunn +3

Pack total: +6
Total box score: +104

Pack 12

Luke Hochevar
Rick Ankiel
Jay Bruce
X-Rays +1

Adam Jones favorite player +2

Carlos Gomez SP +2

Mini no-number Alexei Ramirez +10

This Day in History Miguel Cabrera +1

Pack total: +16
Total box score: +120

Pack 13

Buster Posey
Chris Davis
Carlos Lee
Brad Kilby
Drew Brees
Max Poser
Mini Sailors of the Seven Seas Christopher Columbus +4

This Day in History Brian McCann +1

Pack total: +5
Total box score: +125

Pack 14

Chris Young
Eric Byrnes
Gavin Floyd
Jordin Sparks
Sacagawea
Daric Barton SP +2

Mini Allen & Ginter back Rick Porcello +2

This Day in History Zach Greinke +1

Pack total: +5
Total box score: +130

Pack 15

Yunel Escobar
Howie Kendrick
Miguel Tejada
Tyler Flowers
Adam Dunn favorite player +2

Akinori Iwamura SP +2

Mini National Animals Chihuahua +2

This Day in History and favorite player Ken Griffey Jr. +3

Pack total: +9
Total box score: +139

Pack 16

Jason Marquis
Adam Wainwright
Stuart Scott
Cole Hamels
Mini Koji Uehara
This Day in History Felix Hernandez +1
Hit #3 Ryan Zimmerman Jersey +8

Pack total: +9
Total box score: +148

Gint-A-Cuffs Box 2 Topper and Packs 1-8

2010-07-20T18:15:00.003-05:00

So now that the score has been set by a "cheating" Beardy :) Let's post my second box and see how it doesn't stack up to the rest. Did scores in my head...real fast....and don't think this is going to be close. (I don't have pictures for the topper or first pack and a half. If you don't trust me let me know and I'll go back and rescan for you!)

Box Topper N43 Mark Teixeira Yankee +5-1=+4

Pack 1

Meb Keflezighi
Lance Berkman
Brad Hawpe
CC Sabathia Yankee -1
Javier Vazquez Yankee -1
Brett Meyers SP +2
Mini National Animals Cow +2
This Day in History Hideki Matsui +1

Pack total: +3
Total box score: +7

Pack 2

Rajai Davis
Neil Walker
Matt Kemp
Derrek Lee favorite team +1

Joey Votto favorite player +2

Sketch Andre Ethier +3
Mini Monsters of the Mesozoic Triceratops +3

This Day in History Torii Hunter +1

Pack total: +10
Total box score: +17

Pack 3

Ken Blackburn
Tony Hawk
Cristian Guzman
John Lackey
Ryan Dempster favorite team +1

Adrian Gonzalez favorite player +2

Mini Lords of Olympus Athena +3

This Day in History Lance Berkman +1

Pack total: +7
Total box score: +24

Pack 4

Madison Bumgarner
Johnny Strange
Chris Carpenter
Joel Pineiro
Mini Randy Winn SP Yankee +3-1=+2

This Day in History Magglio Ordonez +1
Hit #1 is cooler then the other side of a pillow..... Stuart Scott shirt piece +8

Pack total: +11
Total box score: +35

Pack 5

Carl Pavano
James Shields
Pedro Feliz
Matt Garza
Mini Sherlock Holmes Allen & Ginter back +4

This Day in History Justin Verlander +1
Hit #2 is my final answer.... Regis Philbin autograph +15

Pack total: +20
Total box Score: +55

Pack 6

Josh Johnson
Brandon Inge
Nolan Reimold
Ian Kinsler
Judson Laipply
Asdrubal Cabrera SP +2

Mini SP Brad Lidge +3

This Day in History Jay Bruce +1

Pack total: +6
Total box score: +61

Pack 7

Chris Johnson
Chris Coghlan
Jesus Flores
Ben Sheets SP +2

Hank Presswood Negro League +2

Roy Halladay favorite player +2

Mini National Animals Lion +2

This Day in History and favorite player Grady Sizemore +3

Pack total: +11
Total box score: +72

Pack 8

James Loney
Andrew Bailey
Cliff Lee
Hans Florine
Koji Uehara
Troy Glaus SP +2

Mini black border and favorite player Evan Longoria +5

This Day in History and favorite player Ryan Braun +3

Pack total: +10
Total box score: +82

So first eight packs and two hits already. Nice total so far but can it keep going?????

Celeb-o-graphs

2010-07-18T03:36:00.008-05:00

One of the things I've been trying to do since the unfortunate demise of the Inkworks company is to pick up autographs from various actors and actresses from the show they produced cards for. Some of the bigger shows that they originally did cards for are Buffy, Lost, Smallville, Firefly and Alias. When the company went out of business Razor bought a lot of the stock that was left, single cards and boxes, and made "Vault" boxes for collectors that included 3 sealed autographs and a sealed box for 2009 and 4 sealed cards and a sealed box for 2010. This led to a bit of a glut of good autographs available and I've been having fun trying to buy and trade for cards I want. I'll start with one of my favorite shows Firefly/Serenity.

I've been in a couple group breaks for the "Vault" boxes and was lucky enough to get one of the rarest cards they had inserted. In fact I've never heard of another one being pulled. It's a red ink autograph of the late John Ritter from Buffy season 2.

A few others I've picked up are favorite actors that have been been in other shows. Jeffery Combs from The 4400 but I like him from the various Star Trek shows.

Robert Piccardo from The 4400 who was in Star Trek: Voyager.

Tahmoh Penikett from Smallville who was in my favorite show Battlestar Galactica.

Adrian Paul from Alias who played Duncan McCloud in Highlander.

For the 2010 Vault release Razor has included sealed autograph cards that were not produced by the Inkworks company which is kinda nice but to me defeats some of the purpose. Still I was able to find this card to add fairly cheap, Peter Wingfield as Methos from Highlander.

If there were any autographs you had thought about picking up now wouldn't be a bad time.

Gint-A-Cuffs Packs 18-24

2010-07-13T18:55:00.010-05:00

So in honor of the All-Star Game I'm going to finish box one and get a total score posted for everyone (Beardy) to beat.....

Pack 18

Scott Baker
B.J. Upton
Kanekoa Texeira
Delmon Young
Regis Philbin
Mini Jordin Sparks
Brett Gradner SP Yankee (+1)

This Day in History and favorite team Alfonso Soriano (+2)

Pack total: +3
Total box score: +133

Pack 19

Edwin Jackson
Jose Reyes
Paul Konerko
Gary Stewart
Travis Snider
Jason Heyward favorite player (+2)

Mini Lords of Olympus Apollo (+3)

This Day in History Carlos Lee (+1)

Pack total: +6
Total box score: +139

Pack 20

Clay Buchholz
Randy Wolf
Issac Newton
Wade Davis
Andy Pettitte Yankee (-1)

Orlando Cabrera SP (+2)

Mini black bordered Lucy (+3)

This Day in History and favorite player Grady Sizemore (+3)

Pack total: +7
Total box score: +146

Pack 21

"King" Felix Hernandez
Ricky Romero
Miguel Cabrera
Tyler Bradt
Francisco Rodriguez
Carl Crawford favorite player (+2)

Mini Lords of Olympus Aphrodite (+3)

This Day in History Magglio Ordonez +(1)

Pack total: +6
Total box score: +152

Pack 22

Barry Zito
Manny Ramirez
Rich Harden
Robinson Cano Yankee (-1)

Nick Jacoby code breaker (+1)

Sketch Card and Yankee Mark Teixeira (+2)

Mini World's Wordsmiths Edgar Allan Poe (+4)

Pack total: +6
Total box score: +158

Pack 23

Andre Ethier
Justin Verlander
Brian Roberts
Anthony Gatto
A.J. Pierzynski can't spell (-1)

Roy Oswalt SP (+2)

Mini National Animals Green and Black Streamertail (+2)

This Day in History Jim Thome (+1)

Pack total: +4
Total box score: +162

Pack 24

Kyle Blanks
Josh Willingham
Lucy
Ian Desmond
Mini Derek Holland SP (+3)

This Day in History Jose Reyes (+1)

Final Hit! Autograph Daniel McCutchin (+15)

Pack total: +19
Total box score: +181

So there you have it.....box one is totaled, hopefully correctly, and I came out just shy of 200 points with a grand total of.....
181
Guess now I'll wait and she where it stacks up.

Gint-A-Cuffs Packs 11-17

2010-07-13T12:08:00.011-05:00

Pack 11

Daniel Runzler
Victor Martinez
Yadier Molina
Jason Bay
Brandon Webb
Wandy Rodriguez
Mini Sailors of the Seven Seas Sir Walter Raleigh (+4)
Says he plotted against King James and lost his head....but you can thank him for bringing tobacco to the UK!

This Day in History Chipper Jones (+1)

Pack total: +5
Total box score: +97

Pack 12

Brandon Inge
Ian Kinsler
Judson Laipply
Mini David Price
Alex Rodriguez Yankee (-1)

Mark Teixeira Yankee (-1)

Clayton Kershaw favorite player (+2)

This Day in History and Yankee CC Sabathia (+0)

Three Yankees in that pack just KILLED me! oh well....

Pack total: +0
Total box score: +97

Pack 13

Carlos Carrasco
Erick Aybar
Cliff Lee
Shawn Johnson
Hans Florine
Ricky Nolasco SP (+2)

Mini Jason Heyward favorite player (+3)

This Day in History and favorite player Chase Utley (+3)

Pack total: +8
Total box score: +105

Pack 14

Nelson Cruz
Mark DeRosa
Migual Montero
Ubaldo Jimenez
Geovany Soto favorite team (+1)

Derek Holland SP (+2)

Mini Jonathan Broxton SP (+3)

This Day in History and favorite player Joey Votto (+3)

Pack total: +9
Total box score: +114

Pack 15

James Loney
Andrew Bailey
Alex Gordon
Koji Uehara
Alan Francis
Sketch and favorite player Chase Utley (+5)

This Day in History Hunter Pence (+1)

Pack total: +6
Total box score: +120

Pack 16

Josh Hamilton
Andrew McCutchen
Carlos Beltran
Matt Carson
Avery Jenkins
Mini Erick Aybar
Kevin Youkilis favorite player (+2)

This Day in History Josh Johnson (+1)

Pack total: +3
Total box score: +123

Pack 17

Adam Lind
Eric Young Jr.
Chris Tillman
Captain Nemo
David Wright favorite player (+2)

Kelly Johnson SP (+2)

Mini Allen & Ginter back Chad Billingsley (+2)

This Day in History Brian Roberts (+1)

Pack total: +7
Total box score: +130

Shameless Promoting

2010-07-11T00:21:00.002-05:00

I'm selling several non-sports and sports cards on E-bay right now. If you want to take a look just go here. And thanks in advance if you bid on anything. If you win and mention that you read my blog I'll ship your winnings for free!

Essence of Fairyland

2010-07-09T00:31:00.004-05:00

I wanted to show a couple of the sketch cards that came with my sets of the newly released Essence of Fairyland card set that Nathan of Sadlittles produced.

Lance Sawyer

Chad Cocconi

If you get a chance to support this great company please do. You can get there by clicking HERE.

Gint-A-Cuffs Packs 7-10

2010-07-08T12:08:00.007-05:00

Pack 7

Preston Pittman
David Price
Aaron Hill
Joe Mauer favorite player (+2)

This Day in History and favorite player Joe Mauer (+3)

Mini Allen & Ginter back Tony Hawk (+2)

Hit #2 Autograph Michael Bourn (+15)

Pack total: +22
Total box score: +78

Pack 8

Chad Billingsley
EDIT:
Johannes Gutenberg (+1) Forgot to look at the "special" cards the first time through!!
Kevin Millwood
Albert Pujols
Chipper Jones
Brondon Phillips SP (+2)

Mini National Animals Ostrich (+2)

This Day in History Zach Greinke (+1)

Pack total: +6
Total box score: +84

Pack 9

Jim Thome
Jimmy Rollins
Kurt Suzuki
Brandon Allen
Hubertus "Master of Hellfire" Wawra
Mariano Rivera Yankee (-1)

This Day in History Ian Kinsler (+1)

You might have noticed that I didn't list a mini card....yep, that's right, no mini in this pack for Todd...stupid Topps. This happens a couple more times but I'm not sure what I got shorted....probably the Strausberg!!

Pack total: +0
Total box score: +84

Pack 10

David DeJesus
Tommy Hanson
Martin Prado
Ervin Santana
Tom Knapp
Casey McGehee SP (+2)

Mini Monsters of the Mesozoic Protarchaeopteryx (+3)

This Day in History and favorite player Roy Halladay (+3)

Pack total: +8
Total box score: +92

Not quite halfway through the box and I'm almost to 100 points, not gonna compare to some of those guys who got 4 or 5 hits in a box but I'm fairly happy with it!

Gint-A-Cuffs Packs 4, 5 and 6

2010-07-06T23:10:00.007-05:00

Pack 4

Tyson Ross (+0)
Bobby Jenks (+0)
Michael Brantley (+0)
Mini Tiago Della Vega (+0)
Nick Swisher Yankee (-1)

Stephen Drew SP (+2)

Robert Scott Negro League (+2)

This Day in History Hideki Matsui (+1)

Pack total: +4
Total box score: +41

Pack 5

Mike Leake (+0)
Daniel Murphy (+0)
Alexei Ramirez (+0)
Luis Durango (+0)
Ken Griffey Jr. favorite player (+2)

Ryan Theriot SP and favorite team (+3)

Mini National Animals King Cobra (+2)

This Day in History Jason Bay (+1)

Pack total: +8
Total box score: +49

Pack 6

Ben Zobrist (+0)
Jules Verne (+0)
Jair Jurrjens (+0)
Jason Kubel (+0)
Joba Chamberlin Yankee (-1)
(though it should be noted that since he's not actually shown pitching this card should not be counted as a negative!!)

Huston Street SP (+2)

Mini Black Bodered Andrew McCutchen (+3)

This Day in History and favorite player Kevin Youkilis (+3)

Pack total: +7
Total box score: +56

Gint-A-Cuffs Packs 2 and 3

2010-07-03T21:44:00.006-05:00

Gint-A-Cuffs Pack 2

Machiavelli (+0)
Rickie Weeks (+0)
Hunter Pence (+0)
Todd Helton (+0)
Michael Cuddyer (+0)
Kosuke Fukudome my favorite team (+1)
This Day in History and Yankee Mariano Rivera (+0)
FRAKING YANKEES!
Mini Monster of the Mezozoic Protoceratops (+3)
Pack total: +4
Total box score: +24

Gint-A-Cuffs Pack 3

Jorge Cantu (+0)
Craig Gentry (+0)
Adam LaRoche (+0)
Evan Longoria favorite player list (+2)
This Day in History Torii Hunter (+1)
Mini Allen & Ginter back Dan Haren (+2)
And Hit Number 1!!!

Authentic Shirt piece worn by Marvin Miller (+8 for now. May be changed)

Pack total: +13
Total box score: +37

Let the Fight Begin.......

2010-07-03T01:02:00.005-05:00

So I'm in this years Gint-A-Cuffs contest and rather then explain all the rules and such just click here to see what it's all about. I've opened both my boxes and had some really cool cards so far. No I didn't get any Nationals pitchers and if I had I'd sell it and put my kid through college. So let's begin.

N43 Box Topper and favorite player list Joe Mauer (+10)
Dang nice start if you ask me!

Pack 1:
Camron Maybin (+0)
Daniel McCutchen (+0)
Matt Cain (+0)
Billy Butler (+0)
Trevor Cahill SP (+2)
Ron Teasley Negro League (+2)
This Day In History and favorite player Adam Dunn (+3)
Mini Felipe Lopez (+0)
Mini X-Rays A&G Back (+3)
Total points for pack one and box topper: 20
Total points for box score:20

So there you have it my first pack posted and totaled. Have to say that Allen & Ginter has always been my favorite Topps set and I'm glad I could have fun with it this year. Thanks to Mark for being this year's commissioner and getting all the rules and scoring together. Here's to winning the fight!

Auto-matic Contest

2010-06-28T09:33:00.000-05:00

Check out Auto-Matic for the People for an easy contest.

Nothing But The Best For You

2010-06-28T00:04:00.004-05:00

Don't feel like writing much tonite but I will show you what I consider to be one of the top three cards I own. I'll pass along the story at a later date!

2008-09 Upper Deck Radiance

More scenes from the Galaxy

2010-06-24T19:17:00.010-05:00

I opened almost a case of the Star Wars Galaxy 5 and was able to pull some great cards. I also bought several off E-bay and traded for a few more. Here are some of my favorites.

Brent Engstrom

Rhiannon Owens

Michael "Locoduck" Duron

Tim Proctor

Die-cut by Appro Nation

I was also lucky enough to get the opportunity to purchase two artist returns, cards that the company allows the artists to keep and sell on their own.

Stephanie Yue

Rhiannon Owens

Extended Sketches

2010-06-21T23:43:00.006-05:00

Back in February of 2010 the Topps company came out with the much anticipated Star Wars Galaxy 5 card set. The base set consisted of 120 cards numbered both for the individual set and the total Galaxy set. Within the base set there were several subsets including commissioned art, some of the best of Star Wars art and manga. There are several inserts also including silver, bronze and gold foil cards, drawn by Randy Martinez, Lost Galaxy, autograph, printing plates and everybody's favorite sketch cards. This year within the sketch cards there were several subsets as well. You had the regular sketches, manga sketches and shaped sketches. The regular sketches came one per box with the other two types being an added bonus in boxes.

The base cards are beautifully done with several cards being done by well known artists. Some of the funnest cards had to be the propaganda posters that Topps asked some artists to do. Several favorites being shown here.

The sketch cards again are stunning for the most part and I'm going to focus one of my favorite new Star Wars artists Shea Standefer. Shea focused her sketches on the Extended Universe mainly from the books and comics. One of the first cards I was able to get was a sketch of Asyr Sei'lar the Bothan pilot from Rogue Squadron.

Other cards I've been able to find of hers include Luke and Mara Skywalker's son Ben and Boba Fett's granddaughter Mirta Gev.

She also focused at least one card on the Extended Universe books showing a pivotal moment from that book. The one I've been able to find is from the New Jedi Order book Invincible showing the death of Anakin Solo and the reaction of his girlfriend Tahiri Veila with his twin siblings Jaina and Jason in the background.

One of the nicest cards I've been able to get is one of the few full color cards that Shea did. this is Tahiri Veila after the failed attempt of the Yuuzhan Vong to "shape" her and left her forehead scarred. This is an amazing card and I'm very glad it's in my collection.

I do have one more card coming in the next week or so that is part of a puzzle showing four of the Rogue Squadron pilots: Wedge, Tycho, Wes and Hobbie. I'm receiving the Tycho card and will be looking for the rest!

Shea was asked back for the new Empire Strikes Back Widevision 3D set and has some great cards for that set as well. Hopefully she's able to get back to the Extended Universe in future sets as not many artists will take on the challenge.

Happy Father's Day!!

2010-06-19T23:48:00.004-05:00

Well I'm still steaming about the US soccer team getting SCREWED out of 3 points by a ref that has never been in a big game situation and apparently doesn't know what a mugging looks like. But I digress a bit here and really want to say Happy Father's Day to my dad and all dad's out there! Thanks for being around when we need you. Here is a picture of three generations of the Shipler men from this last Christmas

Small and Growing

2010-06-11T15:15:00.006-05:00

One of the things that I discovered on the Scoundrel Art is a small company run by artist Nathan Ohlendorf called Sadlittles. Nathan has a fun back story that you can find on the site and explains that his drawings are crap! Nathan's company produced it's first preview card set in March of 2009 called Legends & Lore. The only requirements that he put on the set were the character has to be "public" and no nudity. Artist soon started being added including some of the industry greats such as Axebone, Sanna U., Ingrid Hardy and Locoduck. There were also newer artists looking to break into the ranks.

The preview set included 10 cards and each set was numbered out of 750. The full 50 card base set appeared August 1st, 09 and included one sketch card and one collectors blank. The run was limited to 1000 sets and of that 10 were JAM sets that included sketches by Tony and Eleina Perna and Soni. I ordered several sets and eagerly waited hoping to find some great stuff. When the cards arrived I wan not disappointed. Full color sketches and beautiful base cards with a brief history of each character on the back made for a great buy. I decided to focus my collection on sketches of the legend of King Arthur and also by artist Cassie James, as I liked her style. The first Arthurian sketch I pulled was by Doug Riggsby of the man himself
I soon started trading with other collectors to get the cards I wanted as well as scouring E-Bay for those that might show up there as well. One of my best finds came from the auction site as I was able to, on a best offer, get one of only 20 cards done by Sanna U. showing Guinevere and Lancelot.
Nathan also provided the artists with over-sized Artist Proof cards to sell and I have had Cassie do two of them for me.
After the success of the Legends & Lore Nathan now has several sets in the works or already out including his first fully licensed set the AC Comics Femforce. The other sets that he is working on are Rantz Angels, Damsels and Dinosaurs, Dreamers of Darkness, Essence of Fairyland and Crap Dude!. The Damsels and Dinosaurs set is the first that is a sketch card only package and has seemed to be a hit. I've bought several and had some great looking cards come out including this one,
I can't wait for the other sets to be published as I've seen lots of previews. It's awesome to see, in a market of the big company, that one independently run can succeed that way Sadlittles and Nathan have. Keep up that great work Nathan!!

2010-06-10T00:13:00.005-05:00

Tired.....of the day.....of Topps and it's crap.....only a picture today, enjoy!

Topps Clone Wars Widevision Sea.1 Michael(Locoduck) Duron

More sketchyness

2010-06-07T16:03:00.009-05:00

So in the continuing story of how I started my non-sports and sketch card collection I soon was trying to find any Galaxy cards packs at every Target store in the area. I was only able to get luck one more time but she was well worth it!
I found this beautiful Padme by the artist Leah Mangue. The scan isn't great but the card appears to be in colored pencil and is stunning in person. As I was spending more time on the Scoundrel Art site I discovered that a lot of the artists offered commissions at varying prices. This meant that I could have any character that I wanted on a personal sketch card (PSC.) One of my favorite shows of all time is Battlestar Galactica and my favorite character off the show is played by Grace Park (not the golfer!) her name on the show is Sharon Valerii also known as Boomer or Athena depending on what season you're watching. I wanted to try and get several different artists to draw her for me and give their interpretation of her. The first artist I contacted was Terry Tibke and I got this back.....
I love the hentai style that he chose and the full body with the nice background was a plus as well. I didn't give any instruction to him for a style or pose and normally don't with any PSC I commission. I think it's more fun to see what the artist has in their own mind. For Boomer I do have to find references for the artist at times but that's not hard to do at all. I have now amassed a collection of over 20 different Boomer sketches. It may not sound like much but it can be an expensive venture depending on the artist! Here are a few of my favorites and the artists who did them

Michael "Axebone" Potter
Cassie James
Sanna U.
Rhiannon Owens
John Watkins-Chow

Non-sports start

2010-06-03T22:19:00.006-05:00

So I have slowly been getting away from the sports collecting as a lot of the new sets are just boring or too expensive for me. I have gotten more into the non-sports cards in the last two years and amassed a nice little collection since then. My first sketch card I got was also one of the rarest. I had stopped at Target on the way home from my job and saw in the card aisle a new item, Star Wars Galaxy 4. I picked up six or seven packs to see what they were like and like most barely made it to the car before I started ripping into them. About halfway through the packs I found a card with it's back to me and it had a 1/1 in the corner. I flipped it over and found this beauty.
I knew the character was Darth Nihilus from the Knights of the Old Republic video game but nothing else. I started researching the next day focusing on the artists signature. I soon discovered the artist is Grant Gould and from there located one of my favorite web sites now, The Scoundrel Art Community.

On this message board there is a listing for just about every set that includes sketch cards. I discovered I had pulled a rare Target exclusive red sketch card. Grant only did 25 red cards to be inserted. I soon was stopping by Target any chance I had to see if they had more Galaxy 4 cards in. The odds of a red sketch were 1:48 or every other box which led to some frustrating rips but was worth it to try to find more of these rare cards.

I'll talk more about getting to know artists and collectors on Scoundrel later and also show off a lot more of my collection in the coming weeks. I have loved trying to find these 2x3 pieces of art and am waiting for some new sets to come out in the next few months including Rantz Angels, Marvel Heroes vs. Villains and Empire Strikes Back 3D.

So Long Kid

2010-06-02T22:58:00.005-05:00

As I'm sure most have heard Ken Griffey Jr retired today at the age of 40 from the Seattle Mariners. Griffey started his career in 1997 at the age of 19 and came full circle back to the Mariners to finish. He ends up 5th on the all-time home run list with 630 in 22 seasons. He collected 10 Gold Glove awards and one MVP, but sadly no appearance in a World Series. He's the one true home run hitter of this era not to ever be questioned if he cheated or not. I'm sad to say I never had the privilege to see Griffey play and sadly won't get the chance now. This may not have been a good season for him but it will on no way tarnish his stellar career. So Mr. Griffey...enjoy your retirement and thank you for all the great memories you've left behind and we'll see you in the Hall.

Old Box Break of National Treasures

2010-06-01T16:05:00.002-05:00

So I thought for today I'd share an older box break that I did for myself of 2007 National Treasures. I don't normally break expensive boxes like this but when I get my tax return each year I buy something I normally wouldn't and a couple years ago I went for the Treasures. I decided that since I spent so much on it I would also video it so I could share. So it is in all it's glory, enjoy!

And a few pictures of some of the better hits.

And the granddaddy of them all!!!
The National Treasures set has some great cards in it and to me the base set is just as fun. Hopefully Panini can re-tool from the last years set that looked so bad and come out with another killer set in 2010.

Old Man River

2010-05-30T14:30:00.000-05:00

So this blog isn't going to be about new cards only. I'll be doing a lot a highlighting of cards that I already own as well. This happens to be about the oldest card in my collection, and by old I'm talking over 100 years. It's an 1888 Allen and Ginter N10 Roumania Flag of All Nations Series.

As you can see the card has defiantly seen better days. It has creases across the top and from the top to the side. All four corners are rounded and it's so badly off center you kinda have to chuckle about it. But it's a beautiful card all the same. The colors are fantastic and the price was right..... I paid $5 at the local LCS on the Bid Board and very happily shucked out the money. It's just cool to say I own a card that was made BEFORE my mom's dad was born.

Have a good Memorial Day weekend and thank you to all those who have and are serving!

2010 MLS Box Break

2010-05-28T19:36:00.000-05:00

So I figure if I'm gonna start start kinda big with a box break. I got this box of 2010 Upper Deck MLS. 20 packs of 12 cards each. 5 total hits in a normal box, one autograph and four jerseys including one multi-player and one patch numbered under 50.

The base cards look really nice with full bleed to three of the four sides. the fourth side is a colored swoop that includes the UD logo, player name and team logo. The back of the card gives the regular stats, a quick write up on the player and has the player's number on the bottom left. The base set is 175 MLS players, 15 Super Draft Picks and 10 WPS (Women's Professional Soccer) All-Stars. I haven't had the chance to sort the cards I received yet but eyeballing it I would say I got and entire base set.

I got all five inserts I was promised on the outside of the box. A bright orange single jersey of Luis Angel Landin of the Houston Dynamo. A single jersey of WPS star Heather O'Reilly from the Sky Blue FC. The multi piece is of Luis Angel Landin (again) and Brian Ching of the Houston Dynamo numbered 60/65 and the patch I got is Dave Van Den Bergh of FC Dallas numbered 8/35. A really nice red and blue patch.

The last hit is the autograph. I pulled WPS All-Star Lori Chalupny of Saint Louis Athletica and of the U.S. National team. This card is numbered 76/100 and even though it's a sticker autograph it doesn't look bad.

Overall this is a really nice set, probably the best Upper Deck has put out for the MLS since they started making soccer cards. I might have to look into getting some more singles and have seen some patches and autographs going for over $100 on E-Bay. I expect the prices to stay fairly high with the World Cup Finals coming up starting June 11th in South Africa and maybe cool a little after that. Don't forget to cheer on the U.S. as they open up the competition against England on June 12th at 1:30 CST on ABC!! USA2010

Away we go......

2010-05-28T17:34:00.000-05:00

So after reading and commenting on several blogs over the past couple years I've decided to start one of my own. I will be focusing on cards that I collect mainly and not so much on the industry though I will put my thoughts out there on a bit of everything.

A little about myself and my collecting habits. I'm a single dad of a great 9 year-old son and live in central Iowa. I've been collecting cards since 1987 and now I mainly focus on football and non-sports cards but I enjoy trying out a bit of everything if it looks interesting. My favorite players to collect are George Brett and Adrian Peterson. I have slowly, in the last year or so, been turning more towards the non-sports side of things and started collecting sketch cards and the sets that surround them. I hope anybody that ends up reading this blog enjoys it, I'll do my best to keep you entertained with packs, boxes and purchases. Thanks for stopping by and I'll have the first real post up soon!

As a teaser here is one of my favorite George Brett cards.....