Oh My! How the local card shows have changed!

The other weekend I noticed a card show was being held a small church, hosted by the closest LCS to me. For once I didn't really have any plans so my oldest daughter (14) went with me. We had a 30-40 minute drive to get to the venue. On the drive there I asked what my daughter was going to be looking for, since I was a little surprised that she wanted to go with me in the first place. She told me she would like to find some wrestling cards, particularly of a few of the female wrestlers she likes. For me, I wasn't looking for anything in particular.

Growing up I used to attend card shows all the time. I have vivid memories of all the boxes, packs and singles on the table from various vendors. I would place the "dice game" for that change at a lucrative card (and usually lose). I'd search for cards of some of my early PC guys like Tim Salmon and David Justice. This was before I was a Braves collector, so it was fun hunting cards of a few guys.

Fast forward and the card shows began to get bundled in with general "collectible" shows. Cards, comics, toys, die-cast vehicles, that sort of thing. There the dealers would always have nickel and dime boxes. I loved browsing through those boxes as at that time I was still into quantity over quality. I could walk away from a table with a huge stack of cards and that was always a great feeling.

When I wanted to the gymnasium of this small church for this card show I guess I was expecting more of the same. Boy was I wrong. Just about ever table had slabs, slabs and more slabs. All the cards were modern, flashy, shiny stuff. If the dealers had boxes of cards to sort through, they were a minimum of $1 each. Are those the new nickel and dime boxes? I barely saw any sealed boxes for sale, instead everyone was trying to sling overpriced retail boxes...except the one guy that had $10 NASCAR blasters. I was tempted for a moment, then I came to my senses and kept walking!

I like modern cards as much as the next guy, but I've never got much into the grading game. Now I have to say it was nice looking at so many different grading companies' slabs laying all side by side. Some of these companies have some very sharp looking labels, HGA for instance stood out to me, but I'm a binder kind of guy so if I have a card of one of my PC guys I want to either put it in a One Touch to display on my card shelves or put it in a binder with the other cards. I guess I was surprised that I didn't see older stuff being offered. I go to a lot of comic book shows and you always have a good mixture of 80s/90s books available with all of the modern/slabbed books. Not so much at this show. Perhaps I just picked a bad show to go to? Since then I am seeing more card show ads for the Columbia, SC area so I may have to give it another shot and this time lower my expectations.

I didn't walk away empty handed. I managed to find a 2008 Upper Deck A Piece of History Lance Berkman Stadium Scenes jersey card numbered 89/99 in a dollar box I just happened to thumb through. I also grabbed a 2000 Fleer Tradition Ken Griffey Jr. Halls Well insert card from the only dealer I could find that was offering "older" cards. I'm a sucker for cards from that era, especially acetate stuff. However once I got home and was ready to log these two cards in my collection using TCDB.com, I noticed I had the entire Halls Well set. I had no clue!

My daughter did end up finding some wrestling cards in a small box, next to the guy I got the Griffey from. She loves Charlotte Flair and not-Sasha Banks and these cards were priced at 3 for $5. Probably overpaid, but all 3 are Refractors/Prizm parallels. She likes the shiny stuff. I'm just happy we share a common interest in wresting and trading cards!

All in all we had fun, though I think we were in and out in maybe 30-45 minutes? It was a small show, but it just wasn't what I was expecting. I know finding junk wax singles and boxes at shows now days may be a little tougher to find as the Hobby has changed quite a bit since I first entered it. I'll give it another try at some point, but as I said before I guess I'll just have to adjust my expectations next time.

TwinsJake / Topps Project 2020

A good majority of the card collecting community may be familiar with the handle TwinsJake. Many of you may have purchased a Topps Now card from him when he had a presence on eBay. Some of you may have purchased Topps Project 2020 cards from him earlier in the year? 

If you are familiar with TwinsJake, then you'll know of the associated "issues" with him. I don't want to put words in his mouth, but he basically admitted he bit off more than he could chew and fell massively behind. Toss in the destruction of his neighborhood post office in Minnesota due to riots months earlier and it appears some health issues and he fell further behind. 

People on Twitter were ready to grab their torches and pitchforks and storm the gates. Yes, the lnch mob was ready. I tried to remain neutral, even though I had several Project 2020 orders that just didn't seem to be moving. I understand that while someone's social media appearance may be just fine, you never know what is going on once you start to peel back that layer. I tried to keep my cool and at times would even defend TwinsJake online in places such as Twitter. 

In July I tried placing an order for some Braves Topps Now cards and after 4 unsuccessful orders I gave up. Later I noticed my PayPal account was hit for all 4 charges. I reached out both through TwinsJake's website as well as through Twitter and nothing. The radio silence went on for a few months. Shortly there after, out of the blue it seems, I was emailed some tracking numbers in early September. Yes! My orders were finally going to ship.

Then nothing. The tracking numbers showed zero movement. I messaged again through the website and Twitter and at first nothing. Then I got a reply. He offered to toss in some free stuff and I told him I just wanted those PayPal transactions refunded and wanted the cards I paid for. A few days later I got a new tracking number along with a picture of my outgoing package. Then I got a message from PayPal that refunds had been processed. Last week my order finally arrived.

While I still think these cards are beautiful, I'm done with Project 2020. I was excited earlier in the year for this project...as you can tell from my purchases, but through nobody's particular fault, I've moved on. I'm glad to finally have these in my hands, especially the Jackie Robinson cards (in retrospect, I just should have stuck with his cards and ignored everyone else).

Thank you TwinsJake for making at least my situation right. I still don't know what happened behind the scenes and I don't really care to know. As frustrating as things can be when communication slows down or drops between two parties, just remember that none of us have he shoe on the other foot...meaning we don't know what is going on in the life of the other party. More communication on the behalf of TwinsJake would have been nice, but I'm not going to criticize or judge. I'm thankful he finally responded to my messages and made things right. If you happen to be waiting on orders from him, continue to keep pushing with emails, Tweets and DMs and eventually he'll get back to you. I don't think for one second that he ever set out to swindle anyone. When he eluded to getting in over his head, I believe him. The early stages of Project 2020 were crazy. I'm glad I got off that rollercoaster.

Be good everyone...

Group Break Results - 2005 Fleer Platinum & 2006 Fleer

Another week and another Affordable Group Break is in the books!! This one started off on the wrong foot as I overslept, causing the break to start about 30 minutes late. Earlier in the evening I had mowed the lawn and between that and staying up late and getting up early (now that my wife & girls are back to school) I feel it took a toll on me and I crashed Friday evening after dinner. Ironically enough once I did get live I had the most viewers I think I've had since I took to breaking on YouTube. Toss in some nice hits and it made for yet another successful break.

This time around we broke a hobby box (or tin) of 2005 Fleer Platinum. This was the last year of the Platinum set and it was handled pretty nicely in my opinion. It's not cheap these days, but I kept scouring the 'net until I found a good deal as this was a product that I really wanted to feature.

Rookies in this set were short printed and each were serially numbered to /1000. One of the parallel sets, Platinum Finish were each serially numbered to /199. This Edwin Encarnacion is a mish mash of the two.

We also landed a super nice Griffey Jr. Platinum Finish parallel. Think of these as the equivalent to the Platinum Medallion parallels found in Fleer Ultra of the time.

The Diamond Dominators inserts in retail were printed on your standard cardstock, however the hobby versions were printed on metal! When I first pulled this card I was bummed as I have a rather hefty Tim Hudson PC and didn't have this card and the A's were claimed by another individual in the break. I was still groggy from oversleeping and as a result I didn't even notice that the card did in fact go to my Braves! Others in the live chat had to point that out to me. *facepalm* 

I normally don't prefer as the host to get some of the better cards, but I'd be lying if I said I wasn't excited about pulling this card.

One of the other inserts found in the box were Lumberjacks. While the base design is decent, one of the promised two hits in this box turned out to be a game used bat Lumberjacks of the Twins' Jacque Jones. It seems the Twins don't always get a lot of love in this department so I was happy for Base Card Hero that grabbed Minnesota.

We weren't done yet as we were looking for one more hit in the tin and oh boy was it a hit! This is the Lumberjacks patch/bat Platinum version and numbered 12/20! What?! Cards on Cards got in on this break and grabbed his Cardinals and I'm sure he's grinning ear to ear now. Beautiful card.

Next up we moved onto a hobby box of 2006 Fleer. This was one of the first Fleer sets after Upper Deck acquired the Fleer/Skybox company. I chose this box because I thought the design was good, I knew it would yield a lot of base cards, each pack had an insert and as a bonus if you will there was one game used card guaranteed.

Initially I didn't even know there was a parallel set until I reviewed TCDB's listing for the set. These are Glossy Silver parallels and fell 1:12 packs. Neither of these 4 cards had images in the TCDB database so I was happy to scan and upload these.

The guaranteed Fleer Fabrics jersey card we were promised turned out to be Mark Teixeira. Nice clean design, nice blue jersey swatch (at least it was white)...not too bad. This card was actually in one of the first few packs we opened and one of the participants in the chat mentioned that with an early hit there was the possibility for another hit. I really wasn't expecting much since this release was targeted for the mass public and not a high(er) end set, but I was wrong...

Upper Deck didn't list the print runs for the Autographics inserts until after the set had been released. This Casey Kotchman was actually a short print with just 25 copies! Yeah, I know the name isn't a big hobby heavy weight, but still it's a nice card.

Overall I thought this was a great, fun break and I'm so thankful that my wife checked in on me and woke me up! I've been looking forward to breaking these boxes ever since they came in and I would have hated missing out. 

My next order didn't arrive in time for me to show off on camera, so keep an eye out here on the blog and in my Facebook group as I should have the next round posted on Monday, 09/14/20. If you liked these Fleer boxes, I have more in the same vein coming up soon. I've also got some football coming too, after all it's finally NFL season once again! Thanks to everyone that participated in this break and past breaks...I can't do this without you guys (and gals!).

1996 Topps Laser Group Break Results

We have yet another Affordable Group Break in the books! We went back several years from the previous break to bust both series 1 & 2 of 1996 Topps Laser...and let's just say my streak of good luck continued. If you missed the video you can catch it below, otherwise keep reading for a break down of the two boxes.

It had been almost 10 years since I've opened a box of Topps Laser and this week's break was just as much fun as it was all those years ago. We'll start with series 1. If you aren't familiar with this set, that's OK. Surprisingly it was a one and done set...perhaps it didn't sell well because of the initial high price tag? Perhaps it turned out that it was to expensive to of a product to produce for what it yielded? Each card is features one of four laser cut designs.

The base runner design

The pitcher design

The batter design

The fielder design

It should go without saying that these cards are more condition sensitive than your standard baseball card, especially the pitcher and fielder designs. With each pack only yielding 4 cards and a rather small set of 64 cards per series, duplicates are going to show up. Collation wasn't too bad, but there were a few packs that we opened where two or three of the same players show up in back to back packs. Some of the star players like Griffey however only showed up once.

While the base cards are fun, the inserts are pretty cool. The odds aren't necessarily in your favor with just 24 packs per box. I thought we'd pull a Bright Spots card (1:20), but instead we got a Stadium Stars (1:60 packs). I've not seen one of these in person before and they are beautiful. I guess you could call these a precursor to booklet cards as the card opens up to review a photo of the player. The top right portion of the card didn't want to open easily and I didn't want to damage the card, so I didn't chance it...after all Ben who claimed the Mariners in the break was watching!!

Series 2 I had previously opened and I remember getting some good cards, but this box yielded more surprises than I expected. The same four designs from the previous series are carried over, however the batting design now has a strip of gold etched foil along the right side of the card. This makes for a much better looking card in my opinion and allows the laser cut ball and flames to show better.

With the series 1 box yielding just one insert (1:60 at that!) I wasn't sure what to expect out of the series 2 box, but as it turns out the box was very good to us!

Not only did we pull a Bright Spots insert, but two! Before the live video I had asked a few of the viewers I had in the stream their opinion on which card from several I had that were "One Touch worthy". Well as you can see after this Chipper was pulled it got the One Touch treatment instead! While the other card of Jimmer Haynes may not have the same name recognition as Chipper, I knew the card was going to a great Orioles home.

The fun didn't stop there as we pulled another Stadium Stars insert...and of another Mariners player in Randy Johnson! I was shocked when we pulled the Griffey from series 1 and I didn't not expect to see another. These are beautiful cards in hand, but like the previous the card didn't want to open all the way and I didn't want to chance it either. Hopefully the new owner of these Stadium Stars can carefully open them and share some pictures of the cards in my Facebook group!

Overall I thought this was another fun and successful break. It seemed that activity was down a little from previous breaks, but I'm sure with the 4th of July holiday a lot of people were taking a break. That said, I'm taking a short break myself as there will be no break on Friday, 07/10/20, but I'll return with another Affordable Group break the following Friday night, 07/17/20. I hope to have a sign up post this Sunday (07/12/20) so keep your eyes open for that! Thanks again for everyone's participation and support!

30 Day Baseball Card Challenge - Day 17

30 DAY BASEBALL CARD CHALLENGE

DAY 17

A card from the first set you put together hand collated

While I've attempted (and still am) to build certain sets, the first set (I'm counting this awesome insert set from 2001 Topps Stadium Club) that I was able to build was this unique dirt relic set. I'm glad I started to build this set when I did because the prices of these cards have done up a bit since I acquired mine. I've never seen a set quite like this before and haven't since. Because of the dirt, the cards are thicker than most relic cards and as a result the corners are prone to damage. If you're buying these, try to buy them in hand if you can. If not, ask the seller for multiple pictures so you can check out the condition of the corners, front and back.

A "new" kind of relic to collect...

In this day and age of relic and game-used cards it's always refreshing to run across something that falls outside of the average jersey and bat cards.  This was the case a few weeks ago when I some how I stumbled across a 2001 Topps Stadium Club Play at the Plate game-used dirt card.  Yup, you read that right.  Game-used dirt...embedded in a card!  Awesome!  After doing a little research I discovered that the set wasn't too large and offered up some good names so I decided I wouldn't mind chasing this set.  I think I got started off on the right foot with the purchase of this card for my first in the set:

I know that Chipper is in the set, but I've yet to find the card for sale.  I also saw that McGwire's card was commanding more on eBay than I want to pay so I'm hoping this is where you, the reader will come into play.  If you have any of these game-used dirt cards let me know as I'm excited about completing this set!