Breaking my group break fast with 2021 Archives

I think my last group break was 2018 when I got in on a couple 2018 Bowman player-specific breaks for Gavin LaValley on eBay. I ended up with a brick of his base paper and base Chrome from the product, but nary a parallel out of several cases ripped on my behalf. Not even a single base refractor in 12+ cases. It was a major bummer for me and basically swore off group breaks after that.

But I caved to take the Padres in a recent break Nachos Grande did for a pair of 2021 Archives hobby boxes. I was feeling like a bad Padres fan for not having many 2021 cards of the team, plus I credit Archives as the product line that helped get me back into collecting, so it's a sentimental set for me even if I no longer buy a hobby box or two like did in years past.. and I've gotten in on breaks with Chris before and he's a good dude.

I lucked into a Slam Diego poster box-topper and the standard card version of it. Very cool. The poster slides nicely into the front cover of a new Padres-centric binder I'm starting.

Jake Cronenworth was in the running for ROY in 2020 and made the All-Star team in 2021, yet this Padres fan didn't have any of his cards until just recently. So embarrassing! I like the Bazooka card a lot, and the "draft pick" inserts are seeded one per box (though only one of Chris' boxes actually had one, so I got doubly lucky here).

Happy to finally add cards of Darvish and Snell in San Diego threads. I didn't end up with any cards in the 1991 design (besides the Bazooka thing), 1957 Topps, nor the weird "futuristic" design in there this year. Oh yeah, none of the 2011 design either, unfortunately.. one of my modern favorites.

A few more highlights to close out on. Love the Gwynn and Winfield cards. Neat Tatis insert. And my first card of Ha-Seong Kim, another new Padre with a lot of potential, though his first season in the majors was bumpy.

Glad to see Topps didn't skimp on the backs this year. Full career stats! Archives usually has a lot for us OCD collectors to nitpick about, and they'll never quite be perfect, but they seem to have done a solid job this year as far as being faithful to the old designs for the most part.

So I forgot to watch the break live, but checked out the recording later that evening while playing a game of Bases Loaded 2. Maybe it's a sign I should stay away from group breaks, because the computer team kicked my ass. The game was called by the mercy rule in the 6th with my Boston Blue Guys getting their butts handed to them by Philly. I don't lose to the computer very often, especially not in a blow out like that. Perhaps the break video distracted me, as shakey defense did me in. This was around the time in the break that another Cubs auto was pulled and I had seen enough.

But no, I did just fine in the break. Some nice inserts and several PC additions. No regrets. Chris did a great job running the break as always. I wouldn't rule out getting in on another break in the future, but don't plan to make it a frequent thing.

-o-

Speaking of 2021 Archives, I perked up when saw (via Dimebox Nick) that Dick Allen was included in the checklist this year-- his first time in the modern Archives (he was in '01 and '02 Archives, back when it was a "reprint" line). I think I'm going to work on a rainbow of his card, though probably won't pony up for anything too low-numbered (expensive).

So far I've just got the red (/75) and red foil (/50). The pair looks great, borders matching the red White Sox unis of the time. I still need plenty more including the base, so if you've got any to trade, let me know. 

Hoping for good news regarding Dick Allen's HOF candacy with an announcement due later today. Really hope his legacy gets honored with induction. But if not, well I guess the consolation for me is his card prices won't see the "HOF bump" and I'll be able to keep adding to the PC without an influx of HOF-centric collectors also after his cards!

Rainbow in the Dark

I'm still living in a giant smoke cloud, stuck inside with record-breaking bad air quality. It's supposed to ease up around Thursday or Friday. At least the wildfires haven't been moving closer to me, but they're still uncontained.

While I wait for the sky to clear and that metaphorical rainbow to stretch over the city, I've acquired a baseball card rainbow. 🌈

Base, Purple (/150), Silver (/99), and Blue (/25). All that's left is the Gold 1/1, but I haven't seen that surface yet. No printing plates are included in the auto set this year, which on one hand is kind of a bummer, but at least there's less for me to worry about. I think my favorite of these is the grey one, with the border matching the Yankees uniform.

According to the back, he still lives in El Cajon, so that's cool. I just did a Shane Spencer PC post last month when I first learned about this 2020 Topps Archives autograph, so I won't rehash too much, but he's a guy who graduated from Granite Hills High School a couple years before I started going there. Neat to think I walked down the same halls and pissed in the same locker room urinals as a future World Series champ. lol. Probably had some of the same teachers, too.

Shane Spencer is the second Topps Archives autograph rainbow I've gone after. The first was back in 2014 when Bip Roberts unexpectedly got a card. What the heck, let's revisit that one real quick.....

Base, Gold (/50), Silver (/25), Purple (/10), Blue (/5), and a couple printing plates. Apparently there's also a 1/1 Red parallel out there, plus the remaining two plates, of course. I still have a saved search for them, so maybe someday I'll add to this group. These parallels are pretty underwhelming thanks to Topps' baffling refusal to modify the 1990 Topps border at all, instead just putting a tint on the background of the photo. The silver looks the same as the base, and the purple looks pretty similar to the "sapphire" (blue). So that's lame. But still a lot of fun piecing together a Bip rainbow.

Rock on.

Once again dipping into the Archives Reserve

Splurged on a few more cards for my Topps Archives Reserve master setbuild over the past few weeks.

Love this Harmon Killebrew!

2002 Archives threw a wrinkle into the backs by including the stats from the year the original card came out (e.g., stats from the 1969 season on the back of a reprint of his '69 Topps card.. kinda hurts your brain to think about, but I suppose it's kinda cool. It's not like Topps to give themselves more work to do on reprints. The stats here get blocked somewhat by the authenticity hologram that Topps was using at the time.

From one Twins legend to another, here's the first Kirby Puckett relic added to my collection. Looks good with the pinstriped swatch. Magnifique!

We round out the trio of 2002 Archives Reserve hits with this lovely Big Dave Winfield bat card. As a Padres fan, I always appreciate seeing a young Winfield in the brown and gold. I kinda dig these relics that are essentially mini refractor reprints with some extra stuff included around it. 

Unlike those above relics, this little fella really is a mini card (though framed). It's regular Archives (not Reserve), but I'm squeezing it in as a bonus into this post for the heck of it.

2013 Archives was among the first new sets I got into after returning to the hobby as an adult. Ripped a fair amount of it hoping for something cool like one of these 1973-style minis, but to no avail. But now here a few years later I ponied up for this Will Middlebrooks. Not a big name today, but well, the big names are very expensive. The fact it's a Christmas Card helped me justify biting at the cost-of-a-blaster asking price. 

Middlebrooks had a sharp decline after his promising '12 debut, and his days as an active player are already behind him. He was able to taste the thrill of victory with the 2013 Red Sox, so he's got that going for him. I suppose the fact that he was a Padre (for 83 forgettable games in 2015) is a plus for me. And Will seems to have kept "on the scene" thanks to a good social media presence (@middlebrooks), plus the fact that he's married to a sports reporter who's also good at social media (@JennyDell_).

Back to the card, yeah, it's right up my alley. I'd probably say 1973 Topps is my all-time favorite design, and I think the mini interpretation is cute. I also really like the frame design.. I'm pretty sure that's paying tribute to a vintage card thing, though I couldn't tell you which off the top of my head.

Nice that they made a full back for it, too. 

So yeah, fun pickup for my 12/25 collection.

Oh, and the seller of the Kirby relic threw in a couple random Nolan Ryan cards. Cool.. pretty sure I needed them for the PC.

Thanks for reading. This is my first post written with Blogger's annoying new site design, so hopefully it looks ok. Took a few more clicks than the old site, so that's a bummer. But hey, as long as it keeps working and is free..!

2019 Archives blaster

Picked up a discounted blaster of '19 Topps Archives back at the October monthly card show.. eventually got around to opening it. Let's take a quick look to see how I did.

A few PC dudes of mine in the '58 design. Always nice to pull a Trout.

Some keepers in the '75 design.

The '93 design takes the crown as far as having the most cards from the box that I could use in my collection.

I did pretty well with the inserts, including a nice Vlad Jr. and a few guys I collect.

Anybody working on '19 Archives? The cards in the above photo are all available for trade. If I wasn't so lazy, I'd add these to my TCDB inventory, as I think recent cards are more likely to spark trade interest.

After buying a pair of hobby boxes of Archives the past few years, this year I think I'll call it good with just this one blaster as I seem to be less interested in modern cards these days, but we'll see. I wouldn't say this blaster was a dud (despite lack of any hits, numbered cards, or SPs), but it also didn't inspire me to pick up any more. I considered picking up another blaster at the November card show, but ultimately passed.

Thanks for stopping by.

Striking Black Gold

Those 1993 Topps Black Gold inserts might be my favorite inserts from the junk overproduction era. I remember I pulled a Frank Thomas back then and it was like winning the freakin' lottery (the card is now worth less than a buck, but it was sooo awesome at the time). Foil/shiny cards were fresh and exciting. While '93 was when my interest in collecting was waning-- and I would soon step away from the hobby for a couple decades-- if anything put up a valiant effort to keep me around, it was the luster that Black Gold.

(Coincidentally, "Black Gold" was a 1993 single by the band Soul Asylum, which along with the hits "Runaway Train" and "Somebody To Shove", helped their album Grave Dancers Union go multi-platinum.)

Fast forward to modern times, like I say, they're all worth pocket change, and while I hope to finish the set someday, it's not a big priority. But what if they were actually rare and special today, like how they felt to me as a kid? Then you'd have my attention and I might have to go out of my way for them. Well, buybacks to the rescue, and Topps Archives Signature featured some signed '93 Black Gold cards. After keeping an eye out for several months, I finally landed one...

HOFer Dennis Eckersley! That's a nice card. Yes, it's silly that the black background eats up the majority of the autograph (would have made more sense for Topps to have provided metallic pens instead of the old standby blue Sharpies), but I'm still very much into it.

Here's an angle where you can see the full signature a bit better.

I almost thought a little about trying to build a full signed set of these. But, well, I'm sure any Kirby and Gwynn representatives that might be out there would have been especially tough to find. Then a Mark McGwire Archives Signature of these just recently sold for over $100 and I'm like, yeah nah, maybe I'll just be content with Eck here and call it good.

But wait, while I respect him and his accomplishments, Eckersley is not a guy I collect. How can I shoehorn this card into my collection.

Oh yeah, that's right, I do have a shadowbox display featuring a card of his. So I cracked open the display and swapped out the Eck cards.

That looks pretty good! I'm happy I've been able to work a '93 Black Gold card into a display on my wall. I've now swapped out both cards from the original display I bought years ago. I believe the original Kirk Gibson card (2004 Retired auto, featuring Gibson on the Tigers) ended up with Dennis at Too Many Verlanders (it was made expendable to me when I eventually scored the refractor parallel).

Replaced by the Black Gold card was this 2004 Retired Eck auto which is now available (I've got the refractor, so by my self-imposed collecting rules, I don't need to keep the base auto), so if anyone wants to make me an offer for it, let me know. It's a great card, but no regrets for me choosing the Black Gold card over it.

While it'd be a stretch calling myself a Dodgers fan, as a baseball fan, you've gotta love that Gibson World Series home run (unless you're an A's fan, I suppose).. such an incredible baseball moment. I really love how this display has turned out.. with the alterations making it more special to me.

2018 Topps Archives hobby boxes

In the past, I've gone all-out with my posts of Topps Archives hobby boxes, putting on little plays with my old childhood toys (2014 part 1, 2, 3, 4). But these days, I just can't get as excited about it. Topps Archives is the product that I give the credit for getting me back into the hobby. The past few years, I've pre-ordered a hobby box or two each year. Aside from hitting the jackpot with a 1/1 Griffey auto a couple years back, I haven't pulled much of note from the product, but it's still a fun rip.

So let's get to it: A pair of 2018 Archives hobby boxes.

The autos I pulled were fine, but sadly nothing "big" or even any PC hits for me. Ouch. The Mike Timlin is one of the few hobby-only autos, though, so that's something. (Felix Millan was supposedly retail-only per Beckett, but that's obviously not the case, as I pulled him from a hobby box.) And the Merced is a grey parallel numbered /99. All four of these are up for trade, so give me a shout if you're interested in working out a deal for any of them.

Three base card parallels here. Goose is a nice PC hit for me. Newcomb is a handy trade chip for my bud Bubba who collects him. As for the Salvador, I can't even remember the last time I traded with a Royals collector, so sadly this nice-looking /25 blue parallel-- the lowest numbered card I pulled from either box-- doesn't do me much good. But it's available if anyone wants to trade for it.

Numbering.

Some Rookie History reprints. I pulled a Kaline from each box and figured they were dupes at first. Then I realized one had blue foil.. turned it over and saw it's #'d /50.. so that's kinda cool. Any of my Tigers-collecting trader buddies want to call dibs on it? No offence to Mr. Tiger, but I wish it had been the Trout reprint that was numbered instead. Oh well.

Looks like the Sandlot inserts are 3 per box. Seeing as I've previously completed this set thanks to trades and blasters, these six are all available. Feels like that Bertram Weeks card was double printed or something.. I think this is my 3rd or 4th friggin' copy of it.

Seems these Turn Back The Clock cards are 3 per hobby box, too. Nice selection here.. all dudes I've got PCs going for.

I was pleasantly surprised to find all these Coming Attraction inserts in my hobby boxes. They apparently aren't in blasters, so I was thinking maybe they were exclusive to value packs. But nope, I pulled a bunch of them.

Some horizontal highlights.

I pulled an Ernie Banks card from each box, then eventually realized they had different photos. Turns out the in-game shot is a photo variation. From looking at eBay sales, it's not all that scare/valuable, but still a neat pull.

To make sure I didn't miss any other variations, I strained my eyes reading all the tiny code numbers on the backs of all the base cards. But nope, came up empty. About 15 minutes of my life wasted. #ThanksTopps

Here are a few highlights from my tall stack of "keeper" base cards. Last year and/or the year before, my two hobby boxes basically had the same base cards in each box, with only the inserts being different. Thankfully there were much less dupes between my two boxes this year. But if you gotta pull dupes, hard to be upset with Trout, Soto, and Ohtani.

New additions to my Willie McCovey PC! How great is it that Topps included tribute cards with him on the A's! Haha-- no, I'm only joking-- those cards on the sides are customs I recently whipped up.

As my "free bonus item" with the order of the boxes, I went with this 2017 Leaf National Sports Collectors Convention VIP 2 Card Set. Happy to add another card to my Vin Scully collection. I don't have much interest in the Mayweather/McGregor card, so that's available for trade.

Also got tons of other 2018 Archives cards not pictured that're available for trade. Anybody working on the set, or a team set, or what-have-you.. please get in touch and help me thin out my stack.

In summary, I'm not thrilled with how Archives went down this year. I pre-ordered my boxes way back in April when they were scheduled for August. Then the release date got bumped to September, then way back to late October, even though the retail version of the product came out earlier. Topps gave no explanation for the delay, per their usual poor customer relations. There were no cool surprises in the hobby version to make it up to collectors or anything (besides maybe the Karen Allen Sandlot auto, which is a pretty tough card to pull [the shitty-looking grey #/99 parallels are more plentiful than the base!]). After all that wait, the estimated value of cards I pulled came nowhere near the price I paid. Not that that's a surprise, but a solid hit would have taken the sting out of the delay. The whole experience left a sour taste in my mouth and at this point I'm leaning toward not buying any Archives hobby boxes in 2019, just calling it good with a blaster or two. But we'll see how I'm feeling in a few months. Really though, I think I'm losing interest with modern cards, and have been enjoying vintage set building more these days.

Thanks for reading.

Another blaster of 2018 Archives (with a hit!)

After scoring a blaster of 2018 Topps Archives on its release day Wednesday, I grabbed a Target giftcard from home and went back the next day for another one. Glad I did, as the second one turned out to be better than the first.

An auto! Not exactly Ohtani, but when I saw Bill James listed on the autograph checklist, I made a mental note to track down a copy someday. So I was very happy to have pulled this one. I'm not much of a sabermetrics guy, honestly, as I can barely get my head around the OPS stat much less all the more intricate "cyber stats" or whatever you call 'em, but I can still appreciate his considerable contribution to modern baseball.

Some keepers from the '59 design base cards. Happy to see Hoyt crack the checklist.

And some more keepers. I was happy to not pull any dupes from my two blasters. If my 2 hobby boxes have good collation (not due out till next month.. ugh), I'm thinking I might try to complete the base set. But maybe not. I might decide on just going for the guys I collect plus all the Sandlot stuff.

Pulled some cool kids here. Squints is a good one to get from the Sandlot cards. Plus I was able to call dibs on the available Sandlot stuff Julie pulled (Yes!!), so I should be sitting pretty on my goal there (though it's the autograph set that'll really put a Herculean bite in my wallet, but at least there are no big names like Charlie Sheen and Kevin Costner of past Archives movie auto sets).

The Yount rookie reprint is nice. And the Yankees Future Stars is probably one of the best you can pull, with Torres and Andujar having big rookie seasons. I'm guessing these 3 inserts are 1-per-blaster, as I also pulled one of each in the earlier box I ripped.

To wrap it up... I always look forward to Archives every year. I've accepted that the current design team at Topps isn't gonna nail the classic designs perfectly. Stuff like putting the position as "Outfielder" isn't of just "Outfield" is annoying, but I can get over it. And fonts being a little off and text positioned strangely. But for the most part, they did a fine job this year. Sucks about the hobby version being delayed.. I guess maybe one or two of the Sandlot folks took too long to submit their autographed cards? (I have yet to see any Wendy autos pop up).. but that's just my guess. I probably won't buy anymore Archives this year since I've got those two pre-ordered hobby boxes coming eventually. But yeah, it's a fun product.

Have a great weekend, everybody.

A blaster of 2018 Topps Archives that just couldn't wait

I was expecting my 2 pre-ordered hobby boxes of  2018 Topps Archives to be delivered within the next few days, but then I learned that it's only the retail version that's out today. Hobby isn't out till sometime in September.. WTF? Lame.

Even though my first day back to work has kept me busy-- if you missed it, you can read about my fun little New England vacation here in a post I just published like an hour before this one-- I still found a moment to run to Target. They had a few Archives blasters, so I grabbed one. I couldn't even wait till I got home, so I ripped it at work and typed up this quick post.

Pack 1...

Off to a good start with a few guys I collect. Happy to see Satchel included in the checklist. The George Brett is a grey parallel (Topps probably calls it "silver".. eh, I shouldn't be too hard on them, as this one is more silvery that past silver parallels they've put out) and is numbered /99.. so that's a decent pull.

Pack 2:

The star of this pack is the Kershaw rookie reprint.

Pack 3:

Cepeda on the Cardinals is a nice change of pace (most of his post-career cards seem to have him in a Giants uniform). And the Canseco '77 Turn Back The Clock is kinda neat.

Pack 4:

Love the 3-player '81 rookie card.

Pack 5:

Looks like just base cards here. I should mention the card stock feels good this year; I think collectors are going to be happy with it.

Pack 6:

The '59 combo with Posey and Cutch is a nice touch. Glad they included some subsets from the sets they're paying tribute to this year.

Last pack... Pack 7:

I had been getting worried that I might get shutout on a Sandlot insert-- I assumed they were one-per blaster, but hope was fading. But thankfully in the last pack, I pulled one. Bertram Grover Weeks isn't going to be among the most sought-after of these inserts, I'm pretty sure of that, but happy to check it off regardless, as I plan to go after the full Sandlot set eventually.

The blaster also included a 2-pack of coins. I don't care much for collecting coins, honestly. I didn't open it, but I could tell by looking through the wrapper that Donaldson and Albies are inside.

Man, I rarely go to Target, but the one downtown definitely has a legit card section. I know I've got an extra gift card or two at home, so maybe I'll remember to grab one and go back for another blaster tomorrow.