More Cards From the Barrel

I want to tip my hat to Card Barrel.

I managed to finish off a bunch of the 2020 cards I wanted along with a bunch of other stuff I found on there while I did some digging through the site.

I'll start with some Series 2 and Update. I got these for mere loose change. These aren't necessarily players I collect but I thought they were just neat cards. 

Obligatory Reds cards. The Reds were major players in the 2019-20 offseason signing people like Castellanos and Miley but so far this year have barely made a whisper this offseason. I got the Galvis and Mahle cards because I'm a sucker for throwback uniforms as well.

More Reds cards and a Ken Griffey Jr. Home Run Derby card. Pedro Strop qualifies as a "short term stop" card as he was a bust as a free agent signing and only pitched a grand total of four ... yes four ... innings for the Reds in 2020.

There wasn't a lot in A&G this year that really attracted me but I did find these four cards. I also need to look through the inserts sections on Card Barrel as I primarily went for base cards. Also, I couldn't pass up a Fred McGriff Blue Jays card.

Another thing that I really don't get with A&G is the celebrities. I don't know hardly any of the celebrities that A&G features in their sets but ... these are two I just absolutely had to have. 

I got back into hockey because of watching Doc Emrick and listening to him call hockey on NBC and NBC Sports. He's absolutely one of the best announcers of any sport I've ever heard. Call him the Vin Scully of hockey if you will. He retired from broadcasting after last season but still does voiceover work for NBC hockey. I got his autobiography for Christmas as well and I'm really looking forward to diving into that as soon as I can.

Speaking of books, I started to get into fiction writing because of R.L. Stine. I read the Goosebumps books as a kid but they never really made an impression on me. Then a few years ago, I watched the Goosebumps movie with Jack Black as R.L. Stine and wow ... that was a really fun and really good movie. The thing that inspired me in the movie to starting doing my own writing was the scene where he has to write the book as the movie continues to figure out the end. It's really a good movie and I highly recommend it ... and if I ever complete any fiction stuff I'll be sure to update everyone as well.

Here's a bunch of singles from Archives. I was honestly hoping to find a lot of cards from the 1974 design so was a little disappointed that I only liked the Willie McCovey card. However, I found several from the 2002 design that I liked so I guess that evens out. On the plus side as well, there's a Dennis Eckersley Red Sox card and a Joe Morgan Astros card so I was pretty happy about that. 

Some cards from Diamond Kings and Heritage Minors. Diamond Kings works really well with old time players who don't have logos on the uniforms like Shoeless Joe and Christy Mathewson. I don't collect a lot of minor league teams except for mainly the Dayton Dragons. However, it's kind of hit and miss when Topps includes the Dragons in their sets but when they do, I like to try to nab as many as possible. Plus these aren't your typical posed shots, their in-game photos which I prefer.

I picked out a bunch of random cards too ... well, because ... why not? The Negro Leagues don't have a lot of representation in my collection so I made sure to grab these from the 1983 Donruss Hall of Fame Heroes set. Satchel Paige gets a lot of representation in Topps sets but other players like Josh Gibson and James "Cool Papa" Bell unfortunately don't. I'm hoping that will change now that the Negro Leagues are considered part of the official MLB canon.

Some early 2000s Donruss Original goodies. These are cards I really need more of in my life. The 2000s are pretty much a collecting black hole for me and for some reason cards of that decade are super hard to come by in dime boxes or anything like that. I'll probably go back for more of these on my next order.

Here's the lone 2020 card I didn't cover earlier, this being a short-term stop card of Yasiel Puig who, as of this writing, has yet to resurface in the majors after splitting 2019 between the Reds and Indians.

Some oldies but definitely some goodies. I couldn't pass up an Andres Galarraga rookie card for mere pocket change. Nor could I pass up a 1971 Manny Mota card that's in very good shape for only a dollar. I've mentioned this in the past but I like the 1971 set so much that my goal is to get as many cards as I can afford from the set. I know I'll never have the money to complete it but I can definitely do the best I can.

I'm always one for a good deal on cheap relic cards and I just couldn't pass on these from 2020 Diamond Kings. Sure the Suarez is a little dinged up on the edge but that's fine with me.

I did a number on their $3 relic cards as well. Scrolling through there is like sifting through a virtual bargain bin, occasionally you'll come across something interesting. And that's exactly what happened when I stumbled across this Chuck Todd card from 2014 A&G. I thought, why not. Let's just grab a card of a TV news guy I like as we pretty much flipped between him and Steve Kornacki on Election Night last year. Topps totally needs to include Steve Kornacki in A&G by the way.

A large part of the $3 relic bin are these manu-relics, which I honestly don't mind all that much. I think they're honestly pretty neat and I'll probably go back and grab some more. It's hard to pick a favorite of these three but if I had to pick, I'd do with Paul Konerko since it shows him with the Dodgers.

So that closes out another order from Card Barrel and this was a super great birthday haul. I highly, highly recommend ordering from Card Barrel if you haven't already. The prices are great, the shipping is free with orders over $25, and there's new stuff added all the time.

 

System Update Required

I finally found some cards out in the wild! 

While I was at the local Walmart a week or so ago, I decided to take a look at the card section. I'd set myself up for disappointment as every single time I've looked at a card aisle be it at Walmart, Target, or even Meijer, the shelves are completely bare (or there's loads of hockey cards which no one can be bothered with). This time though, I was surprised! There was exactly one blaster of Topps Update and one blaster of Topps WWE Finest. I was tempted to get the WWE cards but settled on the blaster of Update.

I didn't care if the box was awesome or if was a bust, I was just so excited to finally find cards in the wild again and open some packs!

I won't go pack by pack but I'll show some of my favorites and just some general neat cards. Starting off, here's the obligatory Reds lot. The Eric Davis card you'll see in an upcoming post about my most recent Card Barrel order from the holidays. The most curious card in the here is Matt Davidson, who became a footnote in Reds history on Opening Day to be the first-ever Reds DH on Opening Day.

Rangers cards that have the "Inaugural Season" logo. I heard about a a whole kerfuffle about there only being one Rangers card or something like that in Series 1 last year. Not sure if it had anything to do with the "Inaugural Season" logo or uniform change or something

One of my absolute favorite things about both Flagship/Update are the stats on the back. I especially love it when I get cards from players like these two who have been around forever. I mean, look how small the stat lines are on Rich Hill's card. You'd need a magnifying glass to see it.

Nothing special about these cards. I just thought they were neat, especially Bartolo Colon. It's not often that you see a player noted as a "free agent" on a card.

These guys look weird in these uniforms. 

With there being no All-Star Game and no Home Run Derby this year, Topps included images from ASGs and Derbys past. I actually kind of like these. The Mike Trout is from the 2015 game in Cincinnati and I wonder if there are others. I'm still also working on putting together all the All-Star Game and Derby cards from 2015 Update.

Here are some parallels. I think the blue ones are Wal-Mart exclusives.

Each pack had a Turkey Red card. The action ones are nice but I just find the posed shot ones boring.

Inserts were prevalent. I've been meaning to get some of those "Decades Best" cards.

I was really excited that this Turkey Red Chrome Derek Jeter card came out of the box. Getting cool inserts like this is honestly pretty rare for me when I get blaster boxes.

The same pack that held the Turkey Red Chrome card also held this nice foil parallel as well. If you're keeping track, that's two nice Derek Jeter cards in the same pack. Those were definitely worth the price of admission here.

Lastly, as is the usual case with blasters there's some sort of manu-relic. This time is a collectible coin card of some sort. The honestly looks better in person that it does here. The problem is that these things are about the size of a brick in thickness (ok, maybe not but they are super thick) so finding something to put this in will be a bit of an issue.

Overall though, I enjoyed this blaster a lot. I got a lot of fun cards, had a blast opening a few packs, and was pretty happy overall. I'm looking forward to the 2021 cards coming out soon and if I find a blaster or some retail packs in the wild, I'll grab those.

What I Collect

I'll be honest ... I haven't spent money on baseball cards since Thanksgiving last year.

Since I put my old blog, Cardboard Clubhouse, on ice last fall due to family reasons (aka new baby), baseball cards were the last thing on my mind. I did, however, purchase quite a few cards during the annual COMC Black Friday sale last fall.

Over the past few months while my collection grew dust, I could count on one hand the number of times I thought about these cards I'd ordered. Now, since I'm getting re-acquainted with everything and getting this organized again, I thought I'd start with these since that's about where I left off last year.

Along with the super shiny Hank Aaron card above, I purchased a number of other baseball cards, along with miscellaneous cards for my other collections. Seeing as I'm trying to keep this blog (and my collection) limited to just baseball, that's all that I'm planning on covering.

My collecting interests are really varied. I don't really focus on one thing in general when it comes to baseball cards as I'd get pretty bored of that pretty quick. I'm not really a team collector either. I mean, if I had to pick one team to collect, it'd be the Reds. I had a lot of fun watching Nick Senzel play center field last year and that's why I nabbed this Donruss Rated Rookie card. I can't really say that the Donruss designs this year and last year are all that enticing but I felt this was worth picking up.

Another thing that I like collecting are "unfamiliar uniform" cards as I call them. These typically fall into one of two categories ... "short-term stops" or "zero year" (trademark to Dime Box Nick) but on this blog they'll be referred to as "unfamiliar uniforms" because that's what they are. Take Steve Carlton here for example. Most everyone will think of him as a Cardinal or a Phillie but I'll bet you didn't know he pitched for the White Sox as well. The South-Siders were one of three stops of a whirlwind tour Lefty had in 1986. 

I know I mentioned that the non-baseball content will be next to nothing. I intend on sticking to that but it's cards like this from Allen & Ginter that fall into that grey area. Technically, this is a baseball card as it came from a baseball product but obviously Tiger Mask is not a baseball player. Along with baseball, pro wrestling is another big interest of mine and to see the legendary Tiger Mask featured on a card is pretty cool. On this card, it says "1st Tiger Mask" and that would be Satoru Sayama who portrayed the character until 1983 when he left New Japan Pro Wresting. Since then, several other wrestlers have portrayed the character, the most notable being the legendary Mitsuharu Misawa.

This card certainly checks off several things I like to collect ... oddball? Yes. Defunct retail? Yes. Defunct team? Yes. Hall of Famer? Yes. There's just something about these types of cards which is just fun. Maybe in the future I'll do a blog post on cards from defunct retail chains. Not sure yet but it's an idea I'm kicking around. 

Here's another card that would qualify as an "unfamiliar uniform" card. When I first got into collecting as a kid, I always thought it was weird to see former Reds players in a different uniform. That's exactly what's happening here as Hal Morris is shown in a Royals uniform. Despite being the first baseman for the Reds from 1990-1997, Morris left as a free agent and signed with the Royals for the 1998 season. He would return to the Reds the next season (1999) and stayed with the team until midway through the 2000 season when he was purchased by Detroit. I'd always found that one year in Kansas City a curiosity and now I finally have a card to document it.

Another big thing I like to collect is vintage cards. Typically if I'm at a show or browsing online, if I can find cool vintage cards for a reasonable price, I'll jump on it. This 1961 Topps card shows the Reds outfield trio of Vada Pinson, Gus Bell (grandfather of current Reds manager David Bell), and Frank Robinson. That trio, along with fellow outfielder Wally Post (shown in the 1962 Topps card), would help the "Ragamuffin Reds" get to the World Series in 1961 where they lost to the Yankees in five games.

One of the last big things I enjoy are cheap relic cards. I'll be honest, I'm not a the kind of person who would buy packs of cards and get disappointed there was no relic or anything. If I get one, great! If not, fine too. Products like Topps Tribute, Museum Collection, and all that are way out of my price range and I'm fine with that. It's not like I'm exactly their target audience anyway. That being said, if I come across cheap relic cards from those sets or just cool looking ones in general, I tend to jump on them. Take this Bruce Sutter card for example, it's a dual-jersey card of him with both the Cubs and Cardinals and it was a steal at under five bucks. 

I'm in the process of updating my want list to be posted on the blog soon after I update my lists for Pilots cards and 1984 Topps along with several other random things. 

2019 Allen & Ginter Blaster Box

I'll come right out and say it, Allen and Ginter isn't exactly my favorite product of the year. However, after seeing the cards around the blogs, I thought it looked like a pretty good set this year. So, I bit. While at Walmart the other day, I grabbed one of the random boxes of Ginter as I figured a blaster would be enough to satisfy my interest.

I'm sure by now everyone has seen the base cards. The one thing I like about this year as opposed to previous years is that there's actually a background. It doesn't feel like the player is just floating in space. And the backgrounds are pretty colorful and unique. That's a win for me.

Toukki Toussaint looks like he's standing in front of the warehouse at Camden Yards. I like the background of the Jose Altuve card as well, looks like he's mingling with some old school players as well.

Four short prints per blaster box and I got these. Not a bad batch.

Some old school players. I really like the fact that Reggie Jackson is shown with the Angels, which is a team he's not really known for. He played for the Angels from 1982-1986, was an All-Star for three of those five seasons and finished 6th in MVP voting in the 1982 season.

More old school, this time with some Expos (Vlad and Gary Carter), then Bob Feller and one of my favorite cards in the whole blaster, a card of the original 1869 Cincinnati Red Stockings. I can see why they were included in the set because of the whole 150th Anniversary of MLB thing and all.

Each pack had a mini. I'll be completely honest and say that mini's aren't my thing. These will probably be going to Night Owl at some point for his A&G mini frankenset.

On to the inserts now. Each pack had some sort of insert. I really like these "Ginter Greats" inserts. 

Another cool insert, Baseball Star Signs featuring the zodiac signs of top players. I've never really delved much into astrology or sign of the zodiac but I really dig the designs of these cards. For the record, my zodiac sign is Sagittarius.

Of course, with Ginter, there are non-baseball subjects. I got two of the "Mares and Stallions" inserts. These are pretty neat.

Other inserts in the blaster. One of the "Incredible Equipment" of the Pied Piper's Pipe (kind of made me think of Roddy Piper) and one piece of the history of flight series. I would really like to put together the whole "history of flight" series.

And then there's this ... a framed mini-relic of Vladimir Guerrero. I'll be honest, I'm really thrilled to have found this!

For grabbing a random blaster from the display in Walmart and going into this just for some fun, this is probably the best blaster I could've gotten for the money. It was light on the non-baseball content but still had some, some fun inserts, and a Vlad relic. I may splurge on some more A&G this year just because I really enjoyed this. For now, this will definitely suffice on my A&G curiosity.