Rod roundup

Rod at Padrographs has been distributing cards around again and I was fortunate enough to have him swing by the other weekend with a stack for me. I've pulled out a few highlights for blog post.

Here's a big Devers, a regular Devers, and a big (but not as big) Gunnar Henderson RC. 

Some additions to the Bryce Harper PC, including another of those awkward to store Master Photo cards.

A few standouts of the several Padres cards in the lot.

More rising stars of the NL.

This book about baseball movies looks interesting, and it pulled double duty by keeping the oversized cards safe during transit.

Lastly, a fresh pair of Sheets. Gavin's 2025 cards have to this point still featured him in his Chicago duds, making me wait for the personal double-bullseye of a Padres-Gavin card. But Rod whipped up a terrific custom to tide me over until an official version hits the market.

Thank you muchly, Rod!

Kerry on my Cardboard Blog

Met up with Kerry downtown Friday afternoon for a quick swap of cards. He metaphorically dunked on me and the team bag of cards I handed off to him by giving me a very impressive box of cards.

The Vlad Jr. hype is intense! On mlb.com the other day, the top 7 or so news stories were about him and his debut. A bit over the top, but like most baseball fans, I'm interested to see how he turns out as a big leaguer.

The gold standard, Mike Trout!

More Trouty.

Reining NL MVP Christian Yelich. Good stuff here! The mini is /99.

Reigning AL MVP Mookie Betts. Sure, sometimes I feel like a "basic bitch" of a card collector, turning my head for any hot rookies and MVPs. But hey, I also collect guys like Travis Taijeron and Matt Ginter, so I feel I've got well-rounded wants.

Mookie's teammates Rafael Devers and Andrew Benintendi.

Rhys!

Alex Bregman!

More Astros. Love that Correa Heritage refractor.

I've lived in Portland for over a decade now, but have yet to really jump on the Blazers bandwagon. But after that epic playoff-advancing buzzerbeater the other night that had all of Portland bumping, I was like, "Damn! I need to collect Damian Lillard cards!" And Kerry, a big Blazers fan/collector, was kind enough to get that PC started with this lot of dupes he had.

As I add one new name to the short list of active b-ball guys I collect, I lose another, as Dirk retired after the regular season.

Most of the guys I collect in basketball are greats of the past, like Wilt and Dr. J.

...And Dikembe, Kareem, and Manute.

Back to baseball, with plenty of shine here.

And some old-timer favorites. Dave Henderson cards always make me smile. And I hope Bartolo gets an opportunity to pitch this year, but it's not looking likely at this point.

I just sorted out my George Brett PC the other day, seeing if I had hit the 100-card mark yet.. but fell short, around 90 cards. Keep creepin' up, though.

Current Padres representing. Almost May and we're still in contention!! LOL

JOY OF A COMPLETED SET!!!

I got a factory set of '90 Score for Xmas back when it was current-- that and a cheap '89 Topps from the Sears catalog were my first ever complete sets-- but never had a Rookie & Traded set to complement it. Some great cards in here!

Some nice Nats.

And a hit to take us home! Sweet!

Big thanks, Kerry! Great stuff. I'm in your debt and will try to balance the scales soon.

Harper's Blast-aar

I've made it the first couple months of the year without buying any retail. I'm trying to cut down on buying packs of modern cards this year. I'm gonna try to stay away from it all besides probably some Archives, but we'll see how it shakes out. The thrill of a rip is fun, but a big part of why I buy packs is to get fresh trade bait, but I haven't been trading much in recent months. And when I do trade, I often have to rely on making customs for the other person since I don't have much else available they'd want. A few weeks ago, I heavily thinned out my unwanted "for trade" cards in a large flat-rate box to Billy Kingsley for him to deal with and add some names to his big list of people he has a card of. I thought getting active on TCDB would spark some trading action, but it hasn't (though a lot of that is my fault because I never really added that many cards into my account). Add into that ever-rising postage rates, and like a lot of other collectors, I've been cooling it on trading lately.

But I've got this box of 220 (pronounced "2nd to none") a.k.a. Bryce Harper's online exclusive Topps set from 2018 that I threw in with my Black Friday shopping. I had been waiting for a good time to bust it open, and then figured I'd wait till Harper signed. And now that he's agreed to his big deal with the Phillies, I suppose I should open it now.

Ok, having just now opened the box, looks like it's one of those deals where you get a mini box with a "complete base set" (+ insert sets) and then a separate mini box that includes a hit and a parallel.

So not exactly a blaster, but close enough. (The title of this post is a failed attempt to be clever-- a play on words with Harper's Bazaar / Harper's blaster.) Actually, this was the price of 3 blasters. Probably not among my wisest purchases, but I was curious, plus it helped my order get over the threshold for free shipping.

I guess this is the "base set" since there are the most of these cards (14). I don't hate it. Bryce was involved in the design, though I assume he probably just gave some broad suggestions and later signed off on the finished product. But it's a funny thought to picture Bryce in front of a computer tweaking fonts in Photoshop.

Similar to Topps Now cards with the glossy backs and Topps hologram sheen.

Here's a 5-card insert set featuring dudes who've each got a big, flowing mane of hair. I'm all for quirky card ideas, but I'm not sure about this one. lol. I've got a little Andrew Benintendi PC going, though, so I'll happily add a distinctive card to it. The design seems to be a takeoff on 1992 Topps but with the "totally radical 90s" vibe cranked up. These are on Heritage-style stock.

This is an insert set called Harper's Heroes. (What, no Jonathan Papelbon card? j/k.) These are kinda cool. Nice to see Josh Gibson getting some love. I wonder if Bryce's dad signs TTM. And does his position listed as "FA" mean he is a Free Agent? (lol, no, it's probably for Father).

I know Bryce was a big Mickey Mantle fan growing up. That must've been an awkward conversation when he was like, "The Mick definitely has to be there among my baseball heroes!" And the Topps people had to sheepishly lower their heads and whimper out that his likeness isn't under contract.

The last insert set is called Look Good, Feel Good, Play Good, focusing on the man of the hour. Best of luck to him in Philadelphia, though I think it was a dumb deal for both parties. I'm sure I've got well over 100 Bryce Harper cards at this point and I should probably retire the PC to the Hundred Card Club one of these days.

So those were the cards promised in each box. Now here are the two chase cards I got in there...

A Benintendi parallel #'d /10. Sweet! As I mentioned, I collect him, so I'm happy to add a low-numbered card of his to the PC.

I assume each box is guaranteed a hit, and I got an unnumbered Bryce bat relic. Looks like that's probably among the most common hits available to pull, but I'll take it. Better than a plain white or grey swatch, at least. And it looks like all the autos available in this product are stickergraphs, so they're not all that attractive to me anyway.

So anyways, there's that. Some decent cards for my collection here. Not sure exactly how involved Bryce was in designing these cards, but I'd say he did a fine job.

Thanks for reading and have a great weekend!

Card Show Comfort

Bill, my "usual dealer", was back at the monthly card show today after missing the September show. So it was back to my old routine and I spent the whole show going through his bins.. some were 7-for-$5, and some were 50¢ each (He also had some quarter bins out, but they were pretty packed and I didn't feel like elbowing myself in.)

Oh yeah! These Trouts were probably my best finds of the day. The cheapest "Ginter rookie" (his 1st A&G card) on COMC right now is $9.15.

I don't mess with football much, but when I came to a stack of Pat Mahomes II, one of the hottest names in the NFL right now, I snatched them all up. Looks like most of these are going for over 4 bucks a pop on COMC, so good score on my part.

Kershaw.

Bellinger.

I got a bunch of Rhys Hoskins cards.

Votto. That card in the middle looks creepy, but hey, it's #'d on the back.

2018 AL ROY hopefuls.

2010 Cards Your Mom Threw Out original back variations.

Big Yanks.

Sox.

Bryce.

More Sox.

Shiny. The Ozzie dupe was on purpose.. just love that card.

I grabbed a bunch of numbered parallels, including these guys.

My lone basketball card pickup of the day, TJ Leaf

Cheap autos and high end Astros.

More refractors.

And a smattering of vintage. I'll have wantlists up for 1974 and 1975 Topps soon, by the way.

Not a bad haul. Among other cards not shown is some trade fodder and more numbered stuff.
Thanks for reading!