Christmas Cards! Golden Treasures Part V

It's Saturday, so you know what that means.  Time to tackle the next three packs from the Golden Treasures repack that I received from my parents this holiday season...

Today's appetizer is a pack of 1992 Donruss Triple Play.  A healthy 15 cards per pack, let's tear in...

Alright, this has to be a good sign.  HOFer Paul Molitor greeted me as I peeled back the wrapper.

The design here is bright, I'll say that.  Reminds me of those '70s "tequila sunrise" Astros jerseys.

I think these would have worked better had Donruss allowed some portion of the player to overlap the inner border for the photograph.  As constituted, they look a bit flat in my humble opinion.

There are one or two players who I seem to be pulling with some frequency in this repack, and Howard Johnson is one of 'em.

Nice, this one's a keeper for me.  Big Hurt was a big deal when I was a kid, and I still enjoy picking up new Frank Thomas cards to this day.

Amazingly, my very next card was Jeff Bagwell.  This one's a definite keeper as well.  Thomas and Bagwell were two of the biggest emerging stars in the game at this stage, this would have been maybe the best pack in the box back in '92!

It's not all about guys enshrined in Cooperstown though, as this pack had some good supporting, middle-tier stars like Orel Hershiser and Tino Martinez.

Here's an odd one.  Can you guess who this childhood photo is?  It's actually kind of obvious, or at least it was to me.  Yup, that's Cal Ripken, Jr., another player I seem to be pulling a lot of cards of in this box.  I love Ripken, but I'll probably send this one to Joe Shlabotnik in an upcoming trade package if he needs it.

The last card in the pack was my insert, a Gallery of Stars Jack Morris.  I set this aside to ship north of the border in my next package to Douglas.

The main course for today is a pack of 2003 Upper Deck Victory.  Certainly one of the more odd products in the repack.  This is from the absolute desolate wasteland of collecting for me personally, as sports cards were the farthest thing on my mind in 2003.  Just six cards per pack, and...

...they have rounded corners?  I have to say, that's something that doesn't appeal all that much to me.  I think it's because rounded corners are one of the qualities that separate playing cards from trading cards in my mind, and Upper Deck is blurring that line with this set.

Love the retro attire here, but man, those corners...

I think I got a decent pack of this stuff, as I received this blue Barry Bonds parallel, serial-numbered to /650.  It's impossible to tell, but I think Barry may be tipping his cap to the crowd here?

I think this is an insert?

Another great photograph here to close out the pack at least.  While I don't see myself hanging onto any of these, I think I did well with some interesting pulls out of just a 6-card pack.

For dessert, 1994 Fleer!  This is a set that I have seen before, and I think it's a solid, clean design.  Don't think I've ever opened a pack of the stuff though.  Let's check it out...

Yeah, I really like this set.  If it weren't for the fact that I'm trying to go the opposite direction and reduce my overall collection size, I'd consider putting this one together.  I'm generally a fan of sets that focus on large, crisp, quality photographs with minimally invasive design elements, and this one fits the bill.

I scanned a back for you, because I think these are as well done as the fronts.  Kudos, Fleer!

A good one-two punch to start my pack.  Sure, Strawberry and Beck each had their struggles, but they each shined at times too.  A couple of notable names anyway to lead things off, and check out that 'stache!

Bedrock

My one insert was a great one, Luis Ortiz of the Red Sox from the Major League Prospects set.  Not only did I pull a Sox insert here, but I already had the other Red Sox card from this insert set, so this one completes my Red Sox collection as far as this insert goes.  What are the odds of that?  This pack is an automatic winner regardless of what follows here.

Pairing quite nicely with the insert is this Mike Greenwell card, another new addition to my Red Sox collection.  This Sox fan couldn't have asked for a better pack of '94 Fleer than this!

The last card was, unbelievably, another Red Sox card.  Didn't have this one either.  With 3 Red Sox in a 15-card pack, this one single-handedly made up for the lack of Sox cards in some of the other packs in the box.

Well, that takes us 15 packs into the repack box now.  Next Saturday we'll look at packs 16-18.  Until then, thanks for stopping by!