Hobby_Legends 2018 Panini Rookie & Stars Group Break

After having good success with eBay seller Hobby_Legends in a group break where I grabbed my Charlotte Hornets, I decided to see what else they were offering up. I found a whole case break of 2018 Panini Rookie & Stars football (I still want to call it Leaf instead of Panini!) and I grabbed the Carolina Panthers.

I missed watching the live break so I just decided to wait for the package to arrive and be surprised than to search out the video on his YouTube channel. I didn't know much about this years Rookie & Stars product, but it's one I've liked in the past so why not? In the end, I think I did alright for myself.

It appears the base set for the Panthers is small at only 3 cards...but when those 3 cards are of Christian McCaffrey, Cam Newton and Luke Kuechly is that really a bad thing?

Remember the old Action Packed brand? Too bad these cards aren't embossed like their former namesake. There is some red foil that did photograph too well. Nice looking card and subset.

On the RC side of things I ended up with 3 players. Ian Thomas started to get some playing time at the TE position after Greg Olsen went down for the year. DJ Moore also started to get more reps once WR Devin Funchess' play started to decline. If I'm being honest, I've never heard of Marquis Haynes!

What modern set isn't complete without various levels of parallels? Ended w/ with two parallels for rookie TE Ian Thomas. True Blue is numbered to /49 and the Red parallel is numbered to /25.

One shiny chrome Airborne insert card was pulled for my team, that being of Cam Newton. Beautiful card in hand. I also bought a similar McCaffrey card too. Call me a sucker for shiny cards.

I'm not sure how I ended up with three Year 1 jersey cards of DJ Moore, but I'll take 'em! The blue piece of jersey if you look close enough appear to be different. The one on the right has more noticeable lines if you will in the fabric. These aren't game worn either, which is a bummer, but still nice additions to the collection none the less.

The seller also tossed into my package a pack of Ultra Pro penny sleeves and two older sealed football packs - 2015 Panini Prizm and 2017 Panini Donruss Optic. Just another reason I gave him my business again and will probably do it again in the future. Overall I'm very happy w/ my pulls. I haven't bought a lot of 2018 football product so this was a fun and easy way to bolster my 2018 Panthers stack of cards.

By the way, I used a new app on my phone to take these pictures...how do you think they turned out? Another card collector told me about the app, CamScanner, which has turned out to be a life saver for work...but I really haven't tried it too much w/ cards. It was a lot easier and quicker than taking a picture with my phone, then having to edit the photo. I may have to make this app the new default way of sharing card photos moving forward.

Pack Break: 2018 Panini Rookie & Stars

I'm still waiting to find a football set in 2018 that really captures my attention. Panini's Donruss brand has filled that desire for the past two years, but I didn't care for the design (although I'm building 2018 Donruss baseball) so I decided to save my money. Will the old Leaf product, Rookie & Stars get me excited for a non-super premium football set? I grabbed a 10 card retail pack from Target to give it a try.

First card out of the pack was Detroit Lions' WR, Golden Tate III. While the borders do eat up a lot of the card's real estate, I actually don't mind the design. At least the cards appear to use the team color on parts of the border. Thankfully Panini went light with the use of foil stamping, opting to only use silver foil on the Rookie & Stars logo. I like this because when the players name is foil stamped it can be hard to read at times.

I will ding Panini for taking the lazy route and using the same picture, just cropped for the back. Lack of any stats is also puzzling. Could we not even get 2017's stats?

After this past weekend's game, I'm NOT a fan of Myles Garrett and the Cleveland Browns for continuing the Carolina Panthers' losing streak!

These Action Packed cards sadly aren't embossed like the Action Packed of old. However at least we get a horizontal action shot, a nice change from the basic card design.

Standing Ovation is another insert set. Those "scanlines" in the background makes the card look like an old CRT television!

Rookies seem to come two per pack and feature a similar design to the base cards. This Packers RC is being set aside for one of my few regular football traders. The rest of the cards are available if anyone wants them.

Overall I like the small sampling from this pack. Not enough to build the set, but enough for me to get in on a group break of Rookie & Stars where I grabbed my hometown Panthers. Be on the lookout for a post with my haul.