A Pretty Great Repack Box

After I returned my bike, I planned to just get something cheap to break the fiddy dollar bill I got in return so I could re-deposit half of it.  My first four packs of 2015 Topps weren’t very good though, and the dupes were already starting to pile up.  So I bit the bullet and grabbed pretty much the only other thing of interest to me that Target had: a $20, 20-pack (plus bonus) repack box that was almost completely devoid of junkwax.

Here’s the breakdown:

One 1991 Score

Three 2012 Panini Triple Play

One 2013 Bowman Platinum

Three 2014 Topps Series One 8-card blaster packs

Two 2014 Topps Series One 12-card retail packs

Four 2014 Topps Heritage

One 2014 Topps Heritage Jumbo rack pack (20 cards)

One 2014 Gypsy Queen

Three 2014 Topps Series Two 12-card retail packs

One 2014 Allen & Ginter

Bonus Item- Three loose 2014 Topps MLB Chipz

It sounds like a pretty lame bonus, but it turned out to be significantly better than expected.  Take a looksie, won’t you?

Poker chips are a somehow apt metaphor for pack-bustin’..

Turns out that gold-bordered glow-in-the-dark Tulo is actually pretty rare and reasonably valuable.  A run through the very few sold listings had them going for $5-20 a pop (with Jeters in $50 range), depending on the player.  The only two gold borders up for the bidding at the time were a Travis d’Arnaud Gold/Glow-in-the-Dark and Jose Reyes Gold/Blue, which sold for $13.01 and the opening bid of $9.99, respectively.  So this seemingly silly, innocuous bonus item was probably the hit of the box.  But this little repack had more going for it than just the bonus.  Much more, as you will see below.

Every once in a while, the gamble pays off..

Hit #1!  Yeah, there’s more on the way.

Flagship inserts..

Seein’ red..

Great name, one of only three Cubs, Bonifacio is #’ed 1282/2014, and Keppinger is 228/2014..

Topps Series One proved much more interesting than Series Two even without the sweet Zack Wheeler relic.  Better inserts, and the Target Red parallels aren’t something I see much of, even if there weren’t any huge stars.  Cosart, JD, and the series dos Hoz aren’t too bad though, and everyone is at least pictured (Cosart became a Marlin at the trade deadline) on teams that should trade easy enough.

Princert, Altuve base mini, Cuddyer SP, Choice RC..

GQ was meh, as it usually is.  But I never buy it anymore, so it was nice to find a pack in there.  It’s a meh that tastes a whole lot better when it costs $1 than when it costs $3.

Alen Hanson Top Prospects, Gary Brown base, Richie Shaffer chrome..

Bowman Platinum is the shiny version flipside to GQ’s old-timey style pointlessness, but it has been fairly forthcoming with the marginal prospect autographs & such for me, especially in 2012.  I don’t buy at full price anymore either, but it also makes for decent repack filler.

Mercifully, the only junkwax..

 

1991 Score wasn’t terrible, as junkwax goes.  A RC of a solid player who had nice, lengthy career that included a couple monster seasons and a stint with the Cubs & a couple late career Hall-of-Famers is the best you can really hope for in a pack like this.

Heritage base..

My resemblance to Holmberg is kinda uncanny..

The repack was heavily weighted towards Heritage, which is another product I’d never normally buy on its own, but am quite happy to get in numbers in a repack.  Despite my snarking to liven up the uneventful rack pack in my first post in ages over at APtbNL, that’s probably what ultimately made me decide to keep the repack while I was wandering around Target desperately trying to find something cheaper.  The McCutchen is fantastic.

Heritage inserts/SPs/parallels..

Outside of the red Yadi (my only complaint about this box is all the damn Cardinals inserts!), there wasn’t really anything all that special in there.  Just low level inserts & a trio of highly trade-able SPs.  I’d already pulled my hits before I got to them though, so it’s cool.

From the rack pack..

Quite possibly my only keeper from the entire box came out of the rack pack, so that helped too.

Captain Marvel Jr. insert and Giancarlo base mini..

Finally, main event time.  Allen & Ginter is consistently the best, most fun product Topps puts out every year (though 2014 had some legit competition for once, in the form of Finest and Stadium Club).  I’ve pulled a few hits & some rarer minis & other such nonsense (sea monkey card, flower card, World’s Biggest Mini SP) over the years, but the following, while not all that extraordinary, might still be my best pull to date.  Easily top-3.  Feast your eyes…

Kipnis Everdeen..

This Jason Kipnis is the first auto I’ve pulled out of retail in seven years of buying Allen & Ginter packs & blasters, and it is a beaut.  The funny thing about this outstanding repack box is that I had just started carrying that Prosperity Bean TJ sent in my Nerd Week prize pack that very morning.  Maybe it’s legit, maybe I’m just a superstitious and cowardly lot, I dunno.  I’m mostly just happy to have pulled some nice stuff out of a repack after the disaster that was January’s Greatest Chase repack/turd.

Anyway, that pretty much wraps up this post.  Let me know if anything strikes your fancy, and thanks for stopping by.

Latest COMC Order Highlights

Which was more than a month ago, but hey, I gotta get back in the habit of posting (and just writing in general) again.  Nothing I post is even gonna be as timely as this anytime soon, and I’m buried in tons of stuff needing to be scanned again.  So just enjoy the pretty pictures of cards & politely tolerate my struggles to saying something of note about them, eh?

Starting off big with a Boog Powell RC!

I couldn’t pass it up at the price.  Condition is surprisingly decent too.  Ol’ Boog was intended for Project ’62, but he already has three apparently.  Thus, it remains with me.  I will entertain offers, but I’m in no hurry at all to let it go.

Jamaal Charles Number Patch..

I put Jamaal Charles back in my full-on collection category after his amazing return to form last season.  Due to being by far the best player on a historically sucky team, his return from serious injury got overshadowed, but it’s no less impressive than Adrian Peterson to me.  To put up the same kind of yardage & yards-per-carry Charles did before the injury, with the total QB incompetence he was working with in 2012 (at least Ponder bothered to show up for AD & didn’t actively hurt the Vikings chances of winning most weeks), damn impressive.  I think, due to his penchant for breaking off more big runs than maybe anybody else going right now, Jamaal Charles could easily break 2000 yards with a more competent team around him.  And he might be able to do it with fewer carries than anyone that’s come before.

It would be safe to say I’m a huge Jamaal Charles fanboy at this point.  Also, I hope whoever the dipstick that let Orton go and replaced him with Brady f*cking Quinn got fired so hard he’s never allowed to make any even the most marginal of what could be considered important decisions for the rest of his days.  Because HOLY CRAP dude!

1974 Topps Bob Gibson..

Just about the only Cardinal I’ll allow in my random baseball binder (only Lee Smith as a Card, Ozzie Smith as a Padre, & maybe crazy-hot prospect Oscar Tavares have exceptions made for them).

In the meantime, my asshole neighbor just threatened to call the police on me for noise right after she just slammed the hell out of her door.  Have I mentioned lately how much I absolutely HATE this godforsaken hellhole in which I live?  Moving on.

Andre Dawson Leather Nameplate ManuPatch..

Monte Irvin Leather Nameplate ManuPatch..

I never really cared for these nameplate things until I finally got the above two in my hands.  Much nicer in person.  Got them for what totaled out to just over $2 apiece, if I recall collectly.  I’ll gladly do that anytime.  These cards are also pretty much the upper limit of thickness that will fit in my current favored binder pages.

Matt Murton UD auto..

Japan’s single-season hit king (last I checked), and quite probably my favorite “failed” Cubs prospect.  He might’ve been the name I gave my ginormous 3 foot tall stuffed bear from my toddlerhood if I were a wii youngling in the mid-2000s rather than the late-1980s/early-1990s (it was named after Jerome Walton, for the record).  Anyway, thanks to this and an ’06 Chrome Black refractor, I think I’ll be up to 4 or 5 keepers of Murton, once the I get ship one I picked up after this, and once my Just Minors auto turns up.  That auto being from the infamous 4-Just Minors auto lot I picked up for $6-something years ago just for Murton, that also included some guy named JOEY VOTTO.  No, I never get tired of mentioning that Votto auto falling into my lap before he became a thing.  Thanks for asking. 😛

Harold Baines auto!

I picked up freakin’ sweet (though the photo is kinda depressing) Harold Baines auto for my dad, because I finally brought the Gordon Beckham Heritage auto back to my place, because he’s one of dad’s all-time favorite White Sox.

Vintage George Brett..

Not exactly minty fresh, but it was cheap as can be.  Looks nice on a page across from the above Bob Gibson.  Can be had for something I’d like more.

Bonds rookieness..

What a pleasant looking fellow.  I’m sure he’ll never turn into a giant raging ego case that will topple records through questionable means and bring (preposterously overblown) scandal to the game.  Nope, never gonna happen.  Straight class, this guy.

A trio of Fergie-Ferg-Ferg..

I now have Fergie Jenkins RC & 2nd year cards.  I’m trying to get all the regular issue cards from his playing career.  It is going to take awhile, but progress is being made. 🙂

1955 Bowman Bill Wightkin..

Random Bears vintage!  This feller immediately became my oldest football card by far upon landing (and 4th oldest overall), by about a decade.  I believe my prior oldest football cards were two Bears defensive backs from the same year, from sometime in the mid-1960s.

More Fergie!

We’ll finish out this post with THE card of the order.  Leaf Legends of Sport Fergie Jenkins auto #’ed /20.  I’ve been wanting an inexpensive Fergie auto ever since I gave mine to Mario back in the day.  This only set me back a little over $6, I believe.  I didn’t realize it at the time, but it turns out these cards (or at least this one) are super thick, so I had to pick up an extra 130pt magnetic holder for it.  Weirdly, despite the sorry state our local K-Mart is in (corporate raider suck ‘er dry tactics, from what I understand), they still have these things with two extra thick Ultra Pro magnetic holders + a stand for $4.99 that I’ve seen nowhere else.

Update: The cretin next door actually did call the police on me.  So I politely informed the officers that those two started things in the first place with their constant door slamming & how utterly useless the office has been, then sent them upstairs to deal with the stompy jerkass up there.  It was all very pleasant and easy, and it feels like a weight has been (at least temporarily, cuz THIS F*CKING PLACE) lifted off my shoulders.

So I guess that be that.  Apologies for the weird tangents and asides, and that unintended dramatic subplot, and thanks for stopping by!

My soul is gentle, but don’t doubt my fire…

Flea Market Finds #2: First Binder Page

Heya, card blog homies!  Here is the first binder page from my glorious afternoon at the flea market:

1987 Clemens All-Star, 1987 Bo Jackson, ???? Daryle Lamonica, 1983 topps George Brett, 1983 topps Joe Montana (Record Breaker), 1970 topps Bob Brown, Jackie Smith, 1968 topps John Hadl, 1970 topps Ben Davidson

Why purchased: Very early career Montana (close as I’ll likely get to his rookie anytime soon); Hall of Famer (Jackie Smith); Daryle Lamonica card I have no idea about; Vintage!

Keepers: Just Montana for the time being.  The rest are available.

Notes: I actually already own the Bo and George Brett, both pulled from packs myself, but they are cool cards either way.

It appears Bob Brown is also a Hall of Famer as well.  Very cool. 🙂

All the non-Hall of Fame football players on the page (Davidson, Hadl, Lamonica) made First Team All-Pro at least once (Lamonica twice), and have 14 Pro Bowl selections between them.  Oddly, Hadl and his loonytunes stats has the most Pro Bowls with six.

Seriously, I have no idea what the Lamonica card is supposed to be.  The back is very similar looking to the Deckle Edge baseball cards, so I assume it is from the late-’60s as well, but I dunno.  Also, it is beat to hell.  None of the vintage I picked up was in perfect condition, but very few were that bad.

All the binder pics were taken by my ridiculously expensive webcam.  They didn’t come out perfectly, but pretty nice for any webcam at 800×600, methinks.  Also, I haven’t tinkered with any settings, so it may yet be able to be further improved.

Mind-Blowing Statistics: John Hadl had 33503 career passing yards, but only completed 50.4% of his passes and had more interceptions (268) than touchdowns (244).  Looking at his stats year-by-year is even crazier.  It’s hard to fathom how he was allowed to start long enough to put up such impressive yards and touchdown numbers, while being so… so bad, to put it bluntly.  I’d just chalk it up to different eras and less emphasis on statistics in the past, but it’s pretty hard to ignore those numbers.

Jackie Smith’s best year was in 1967, when he caught 56 passes for 1205 yards, good for 21.5(!) yards-per-catch.  He also had receiving 9 touchdowns, more than doubling any other season of his career.  But forget about that.  He went for 21.5 yards-per-catch.  With over 1200 receiving yards.  As a tight end.  The guys that are specifically paid to be deep threats these days are rarely able to put up numbers like that.  He also put up an impressive by any standard 16.5 YPC for his career on nearly 8000 receiving yards.

That’s it for page one.  Thanks for stopping by!  There’s much more vintage to come, but next time we’ll be making a stop in junk wax country.  But it will be a fun (and rookie-laden) trip, I promise.

Until our next…