Retail Repack Adventures #16

As I was putting some cards away the other day, I took inventory of just exactly how many of these 100-card bricks I have sitting around. Not including this particular one, I've got two baseball oness and two hockey ones left. I guess this is a good a time as any to tear into this.

As usual, the cover card. This time is a 2017 Donruss Optic of Freddie Freeman. I bought a box of Optic back in 2016 and wasn't impressed with it. I don't mind getting Optic (or Chrome) singles here and there but I'm not going to be buying any packs of it.

The one thing I like about these repacks is that you find little random cards like this. How this card of factory set limited edition card of Albert Pujols would up in this re-pack at a Walgreens in the middle of the country, I'll never know.

Here's something I never really knew I was searching for until I found it, that being this 1986 Topps Tom Seaver. His official "sunset card" would come the following year in the 1987 Topps set but 1986 was his last active year of pitching. For a White Sox squad that was on their way to finishing 4th in the AL West that year, he appeared in 12 games, going 2-6 with a 4.38 ERA. In June of that year, he was swapped to Boston for Steve Lyons where he appeared in 16 more games. Overall, in his sunset season he went 7-13 with a 4.03 ERA in 28 games.

2000 Topps I always think is a bit of an under appreciated set for a few reasons. First, the design was pretty clean both front and back. Second, there was a plethora of nice action shots (see the Barry Larkin card) and finally, it's the first set of the new millennium for gosh sakes! Now, all that being said, the Craig Biggio card certainly didn't Chrome up very well since it's a basic posed shot. And yes, that's my reflection you see at the bottom of the card. 

Man, this repack is rife with Hall of Famers. Here's a few from the middle of the junk wax era. Yeah, the 1990 Donruss set may be bowling shoe ugly, but the Diamond Kings card, well at least this particular one, are pretty nice looking. It almost makes me want to get a box of it on the cheap and tear into it.

Random minor league cards are always fun to find in these repacks and boy are these random. On the left, we have Bob Davidson of the Albany-Colonie Yankees, someone who literally was one and done in the majors. Not one season and done, but one inning done. He pitched one whole inning in his major league career, presumably at the end of the Yankees season in 1989, at left with an 18.00 ERA. As for the 1989 Albany-Colonie Yankees? They finished 92-48 in the Eastern League that season.

The other card of this duo was a mystery until I started doing research for this article. It turns out that it's a 1980 team issue card from the Nashville Sounds, which oddly enough, was a Yankees affiliate in the 1980. Anyway, Ted Wilborn played in 121 games for the Sounds that year, hitting .270 with 6 HRS and 63 RBIs. He also had a very brief career in the majors, appearing in only 30 games with the Blue Jays and Yankees over parts of the 1979 and 1980 seasons.

Here's something I found rather curious on the back of the Ted Wilborn card, it looks more like business card instead of a baseball card. Sure, it's got the vital info of the player but look at the bottom right, there is the photographer's name, address, and phone number. Also, there is no date or stats or anything. I don't think I've ever really seen a card like this before. For curiosity sake, I plugged the address into Google Maps just to see what came up ...

And wouldn't you know it, looks like the photographer is still in business after all these years.

There was plenty of 2016 Topps included as well, these are the best from the mix of standard base cards and team issues. Ben Revere was briefly with the Reds during Spring Training this year but obviously didn't thrill anyone as he was cut towards the end of camp.

2016 Heritage ... still meh.

Some gems from 1990 Fleer that were included. Being a card blogger has afforded me the opportunity to gain a nice appreciation for cards from this time as previously I had just overlooked most of them and kept only the notable stars. Kevin Appier was a fresh faced rookie for the Royals during 1990 and finished third in the ROY voting that season. The photo on the card looks like it was taken during spring training that year as why else would there be a scoreboard in the background. Pedro Guerrero was still going strong in 1990, finishing in the top 25 of MVP voting. He'd hang around with the Cardinals for a few more years after this and finally hung up his spikes in 1992.

Speaking of 1992, I've always had a bit of a soft spot for 1992 Upper Deck. While I'm not trying to complete the set or anything, the design was a favorite of mine as a kid, mainly because of the "alternate logos" (for lack of a better term) and the photography that Upper Deck used on the cards.

I'll close out this repack by showing off a smattering of random cards to finish this up. 1994 was the first year I really liked Stadium Club during its original run as the design was very MTV-ish and Topps tried to be hip and cool. The designs of the previous years I always get mixed up because they all look nearly the same. Also, there's a Carlos Delgado rookie card from Triple Play (did anyone else forget he was a catcher?) and a 1983 Fleer Carney Lansford, which I though was the oldest card in the box until I discovered what year the Ted Wilborn card was from.

I'd say this was one of the better repacks I've torn into in recent memory. Was there some junk? Yes. But for five bucks and a few minutes of enjoyment thumbing through cards that are new to me, I'll take it.