Christmas Cards! Golden Treasures Part I

For Christmas this year, I actually received a decent amount of card-related gifts, which was awesome.  I'll be spreading the new additions to my collection out over a few posts, and today we'll start with a gift from my parents...

A "Golden Treasures" re-pack box!  This contains 20 total packs of baseball cards, plus a handful of "vintage" cards, which I assume would be the 1955-1979 range.  I really appreciated this gift, because I rarely treat myself to unopened packs these days, so this will be a fun way to scratch the itch.

I'm obviously not going to scan and review hundreds of cards across 20 packs in a single post, so for today let's tackle the first three packs to spill out of the box...

First up...1990 Donruss.  No shocker here, as this junk wax set was printed in such abundance that you still regularly encounter unopened product to this day.  The bright red design of the base cards didn't go over so well this year.  I'm not sure what Donruss was thinking quite honestly.

Anyway, 16 cards and a puzzle insert, let's see what we get...

Here's the puzzle piece, featuring some of Yaz's arm and his bat knob.

And here are the extremely loud base cards.  I'm not going to provide commentary on every card in this post, but will selectively throw some in throughout.

The photography wasn't anything special for the most part either.  Certainly wasn't varied.  As we proceed through this pack notice how many of the photos fall into the same three categories; guy at the plate about to swing, guy on the mound delivering a pitch, guy posing on sidelines...

For me, this one may have been the highlight of this first pack.  Yeah, that tells you what to expect over the final few cards here.  Not much.

Even the photograph cropping by the folks at Donruss this year seems questionable at best.

For some reason I got just a single card that was extremely off-center top to bottom.

At least I pulled an Expo!

Best facial expression in the pack.

Here's a slightly different photograph, with speedster Lance Johnson about to lay down a bunt.

Well, that wasn't a very exciting pack by any standards.  No Red Sox, unless you count that Yaz puzzle piece, and not a HOFer to be found.  Let's just assume we're getting the worst stuff out of the way first here, shall we?

Next up, 1989 Fleer...going from red borders to grey here.  One less card than '90 Donruss, with 15 base cards per pack, and a sticker insert rather than a puzzle.

My sticker features the Chicago White Sox.  I have to be honest and say that I never liked their logo from this era.

Alright, we're off to a much better start here.  HOFer Goose Gossage's killer handlebar mustache is the first keeper card of the box for me!

Back-to-back Padres cards.

Kirk Gibson was a huge name in the game at the time when this one was printed up.

As far as these first two packs go, I'll give the nod for design to 1989 Fleer.  The color pallet isn't quite so obnoxious, and I like that the photographs overlap and spill over the upper border.

Two packs, two Expos.

Apparently the most flattering picture of Eric Show that Fleer had access to.

One of the more interesting photographs in this pack, Bob Boone sporting the tools of ignorance.

Here's another keeper for me.  Don Baylor was no slouch, and I like a good bat rack photograph to boot.  This is also card #1 on the checklist, which is kind of cool.

Steve Jeltz wraps it up.

That pack was an improvement over the first, with a couple of cards I'll hang onto at least.  Let's do one more for today...

...1991 Upper Deck baseball.  I think I may have a '91 Upper Deck factory set in storage in my basement, but since I'm not entirely sure these will all be "new" cards to me, per se...

I've always liked the clean design of 1991 Upper Deck.

A Mike Gallego double-play card.  Not much else going on so far though...

I like this shot of Mark Grace, classic photograph and perfectly framed.

That is an awfully low-to-the-ground delivery right there.

Rock on, Lloyd Moseby.

This one's a keeper for me.  Vizquel was one of the last players from my childhood to retire, so I've always enjoyed his cards for that reason.  There's something to be said for longevity if you ask me.

Mark Grace hot pack!

My rookie subset card wasn't exactly a stud.  Also, this card was creased in half for some reason.  Only card in the pack like that.

Sweet, three packs in and we finally get our first Red Sox card proper!

Pensive Pete Smith.

In the Upper Deck pack it's not a puzzle, or a sticker (well, it is a sticker I guess), but a hologram!

Final card, a checklist.

Well, I wouldn't say that I found any "golden treasures" just yet, but ripping these sure was a fun trip down memory lane.  Plus, looking ahead I'd say I got three of the more boring packs the box has to offer out of the way first here.  I'll get another good five or six blog posts worth of enjoyment out of this before all is said and done.

It was so cool of my parents to think of my odd little hobby this holiday season.  As I mentioned, I received a couple of other hobby-related gifts as well.  Will have those posted soon, until then...