Cardboard Keepers - My Favorite Card Acquired During Quarantine

Today's post is in response to a prompt by Tim B., who blogs at Cardpocalypse (I Love the Smell of Cardboard in the Morning).  Recently Tim laid out the 7-post Trading Card Challenge depicted above, and invited and encouraged other bloggers to partake.  I'm a little late to the party, but today I'm answering the first challenge, which is my favorite card acquired during quarantine.

Since my wife and I have been fortunate enough not to have our household income impacted by the pandemic to date, something we are incredibly grateful for, I have actually picked up a few different cards during quarantine.  I wanted to select a card that I hadn't already blogged about only recently though, and just yesterday the perfect candidate arrived in my mailbox.

This is a card that in some sense I never even knew existed until I stumbled upon it while browsing eBay, but that I absolutely had to have once I located it.  It was listed for less than $80, but features multiple HOFers, and may be the only copy like it in existence (or one of just a few, at most).  Intrigued?

Well, before we get to the card, the way that I acquired it was actually via an "eBay flip".  I've really been digging this process lately.  As I have been using my increased free time the past few months to fast-track the ongoing purging and thinning down of my collection, I've begun selling cards on eBay and bundling up the proceeds from those sales to acquire fewer but much more significant cards.  The best example yet was when I flipped nearly three dozen graded cards for a Michael Jordan RC.  Today's flip may not exactly be on that level, but I love the end result equally as much.

For this particular acquisition I parted with my 1977, 1978 and 1979 PSA 8-slabbed Yaz cards.  Many years ago I thought I'd try to chase every base card that Yastrzemski had in the Topps, Donruss and Fleer lines from his 1960 RC through his final cards in 1984.  It didn't turn out to be as fun a quest as I'd envisioned, and I'd already sold off some of the '80s graded versions a while ago.  Since I already have all three of these cards in raw form as part of complete sets, it made perfect sense to part with these three.

On their own, each is no more than probably a $15-$20 card in a PSA 8 holder, so for efficiency I batched them up and listed all three together.  Got close to $60 within a few days, which I was more than happy with!

I was still just a few bucks short on covering the cost of today's card after the Yaz sale, so I went ahead and listed one of my two doubles of Mookie Betts' Stadium Club RC.  Mookie's cards haven't been quite as red hot as they were say a year ago, but they still do alright and I hauled in $15 for this base card from just a few years back.  About what I'd expected based on checking the prices of other recently completed auctions prior to listing.

The good news is that was enough that, when paired with the proceeds from the Yaz trio, I was able to click "Buy-It-Now" on today's gem without it truly costing me a dime!

Alright, thanks for sticking with me through that lead-in.  Here's my favorite card acquired during quarantine at last!

Whoa!  I don't even recall what led to me stumbling across this one to be honest with you.  All I know is that, as I mentioned above, the moment I saw it I knew I wanted it in my collection.  For those who aren't hockey card collectors, this is the NHL Goalies Wins Leaders card from the 1971-72 Topps hockey release.  It depicts the top three (or in this case four, since two goalies tied for third place) netminders from the previous year in terms of games won.

Someone took the time to have all four subjects autograph this card, then submit it to PSA for authenticity/slabbing.  The above image is a scan from my flat-bed scanner, but here's a better look courtesy of my iPhone...

There are so many things going for this card.  First of all, I think it's fascinating to consider the amount of effort someone must have gone through to get this signed by all four subject, three of which are enshrined in the Hockey Hall of Fame no less!  I suppose maybe at some point these gentlemen were all at the same event, but it's much more likely that the collector who got this signed had to work it as a long-term project, bringing it to multiple events over an undetermined period of time.  It's fascinating to think about the stories this card could tell.

Secondly, this autograph hunter was apparently a pro because you could not ask for more clear, legible, bold signatures than this.  Even in such limited space, all four signers did great work.  The signatures themselves are fantastic, and they're placed just perfectly to avoid covering their faces even.

Talk about four solid subjects right there.  Of the four, only Ed Johnston is not in the HOF, and he was no slouch with a decades-long career in playing and coaching, two Stanley Cup championships, and is also the last goaltender to play every single minute of every single game for his team for an entire season (in the early '60s).  Cheevers, and of course Esposito, were cardboard heroes of mine and legends in my mind based on sports cards alone when I was a kid collector.

Lastly, this set itself is just fantastic.  If it weren't for the 1979-80 set that many collectors (myself included) feel is the best hockey set ever created, this would be many hockey collectors' favorite set of the '70s.  I know it's my personal favorite from that decade after '79-80.  Plus, during the season this card came out the Bruins won the Stanley Cup behind the play of two of the guys who signed this card.  Simply awesome.

Obviously the back isn't really the star of the show here, but there it is in case you want to see the other guys who racked up some wins in '70-71.

So, there you have it, my favorite card acquired during quarantine.  This is an absolute gem, and goes straight from my mailbox to my "Cardboard Keepers" collection in record time!

I'll try to get to the remaining posts in Tim's challenge in the coming days.  In the meantime, the non-baseball Cardboard Keepers collection is up to 21 cards in size now, and can be viewed here.  I've still got a long way to go, with 979 cards remaining to be selected.  I'll be back soon with the next card or group of cards for that project as well, but until then thanks as always for stopping by!

A Unique New Super Mario!

The very first hockey cards that my brothers and I ever opened packs of were 1989-90 Topps and O-Pee-Chee.  Though I still have my childhood binder of those cards, and have also picked up complete sets of each release from that year in mint condition, I'm always on the lookout for more ways to add unique 1989-90 hockey cards to my collection.

Recently, I stumbled upon one that I was completely unaware of, but was an absolute perfect fit for my collection.  Check it out...

Alright, a nice enough early-career highlights card of the great Mario Lemieux.  At first glance you're probably wondering what makes this one so special?  Well, if you look closely at Mario's right shoulder there, above the word "Highlights", you'll see a faint trace of something on the card.  It's actually been embossed with some type of press, because this is a "Fan Favorites" buyback from 2003-04 Topps!

Topps did this buyback promotion across their baseball, football and hockey brands in 2003.  Given that this card exists at the intersection of two of my hobby passions, 1989-90 hockey cards and buybacks, I can't believe I had the good fortune to stumble upon it.

Here's a better look at the embossing, I tilted the card a bit and snapped a pic with my iPhone to give you a better idea of what it looks like in hand.  Gimmicky?  Sure!  But for a hair over $10 this was a really, really cool way to add another unique element to my never-ending pursuit of '89-90 hockey cards.  Truth be told I'd grab just about any buyback from this set if the price was right, but to have my first and only be the great Mario Lemieux was just awesome.

One of the more unique, cheap pick-ups to join my collection so far this year.  Making the deal even sweeter was the fact that the eBay seller I picked this up from included a little stack of other Super Mario cards as a free throw-in when he shipped me my buyback!

I'm pretty sure this 2003-04 Topps Lemieux is from the set that these buybacks came randomly inserted in, so it's pretty cool to receive the base card as an unexpected freebie!

Loved these Members Only boxed sets from 1991.  I think Topps printed tons and tons of them, but they're fun cards nonetheless.

Even got a nice, shiny mid-'90s Donruss Elite Lemieux!

More from those Stadium Club boxed sets, with Mario's card from the Charter Member release...

...and another Members Only as well.  Great look at the Conn Smythe Trophy here.  Keep scrolling for more NHL hardware...

A nice horizontal Season Highlights from 2005-06 Parkhurst, the Crosby/Ovechkin rookie year.

From the same year, here's a Power Play base card.  Not really sure what Lemieux is doing in this photo, looks like he just released a pass and is admiring his work?

More hardware, this time courtesy of 1993-94 Stadium Club.  The Hart Memorial Trophy, given to the league MVP...

...and the Art Ross, given annually to the player who paces the league in points scored.

Again from 2005-06, this is the Upper Deck Rookie Update set.  I'm guessing this set was a ploy by Upper Deck to produce a few more Crosby and Ovechkin cards, but it's not a bad looking set all in all.

Even got Mario's base card from that 2005-06 Parkhurst set.

Here's one that looks like it could have come straight out of the '90s, but it's actually a 2006-07 SPx card believe it or not.  As a lover of shiny cards I'll happily accept this one.

Even Metal made an appearance in the stack, with this new-to-me '95-96.  Awesome stuff.  Every one of the bonus Lemieux cards I just showed were new to my collection.  Those unexpected throw-ins pushed me to over 100 cards and counting of the Penguins great as well, pretty cool!

There were a couple of others that I didn't bother showing because they're duplicates for me, like this 2005-06 SP Authentic base card.  Still appreciate them though, and have tossed them into my "halfway decent trade bait" box for now.

What a fantastic eBay auction this turned out to be.  I was happy with the one-of-a-kind addition to my '89-90 hockey collection as it was, but the seller really stepped up and knocked it out of the park with the extras.  That little surprise turned this action from a great one to an amazing one.

Thanks as always for stopping by!

An Awesome Soccer Re-Pack to Ease the Boredom

Even though I've largely (and successfully) sworn off ripping wax these past few years, there are times when I just can't resist the siren's song of the baseball card aisle at Target and will grab a cheap pack or two just to scratch that itch.  Even though my primary philosophy these days is to target exactly what I want and to bring a limited amount of cards into the house, the allure of not knowing what awaits you in a pack is still there from time to time.

I haven't walked into a Target in probably three months though thanks to this pandemic, so instead I decided to hit eBay to satisfy my "something with a surprise element" craving.  What I settled on was the package you see above, which is a random soccer re-pack.

For $11.99 this was an intriguing offer by a seller with excellent feedback.  Each lot contains over 20 cards and is guaranteed to have:

• One card of each Messi, Ronaldo, and Neymar (three of the biggest names in the sport globally)
• Twelve inserts
• Two serial-numbered cards
• One relic
• One autograph

For significantly less than the cost of a blaster even with shipping and tax included, I decided to try my hand at one of these.  Figured it would scratch my itch, and get me a blog post (even though I'm aware that soccer cards aren't a big hit with most readers).

I have to say that I was presently surprised!  Right out of the gate, this Connections insert is one I needed towards my 2018 Panini Prizm World Cup master set build.  I opened literally hundreds of packs of this stuff in the summer and fall of 2018, but had yet to pull this particular card.  A perfect way to lead off.

No complaints about this Leo Messi, even if it is the lone card in the re-pack that I already had a copy of.  Arguably the world's greatest player over the last 10-15 years, Messi has quite a following among collectors.  While there aren't any copies of this even available on COMC at present, this is likely a $5-$10 card on that site anyway.  I'll toss this into my "halfway decent trade bait" box for now.  If any of my regular trading partners would like it, just let me know in the comments...

Here's a cool blue parallel, my first card from the 2016 Panini EUFA Euro Prizm set.  This one is serial-numbered on the back, I believe to /199.  Don't know anything about the card's subject, Peter Pekarik, but looks like he's been playing in the Bundesliga in Germany for many years.  That's actually one of the few professional sports leagues to hold games these past few weeks (albeit to empty stadiums).

Here's a cool Purple parallel from Donruss.  The scan is a little deceptive, but this one sure is shiny and cool in hand.  These last two cards were exactly the type I was hoping for and expecting with this lot; teams, leagues, players and even sets that I was wholly unaware of.

There were a handful of cards from the 2018 Donruss release in the package.  Baseball fans will surely recognize elements of this design from Panini's Donruss baseball product a couple of years ago.

I like this Harry Kane in particular.  Aside from being one of the top offensive threats in the Premier League for years running now, this is just a great shot of a jubilant Kane taken presumably just moments after he found the back of the net for his country in international play.

I'll confess that I'm not all that familiar with Gabi, but I appreciate this insert from 2015 Donruss since I did not pull one of them when I busted a wax box of this product a few years ago.

Next up we have a couple of players that I absolutely do recognize and have watched play many times.  From Topps UEFA Champions League Gold we have Olivier Giroud of Arsenal...

...and Antoine Griezmann of Club Atletico.  I've shown cards of Antoine on this blog quite a few times, as I really enjoyed watching him and his French teammates capture the World Cup in 2018.  Really happy with the pair of stars that I pulled from this particular set.

I'm not really big on Topps "Match Attax" soccer cards.  These are game cards similar to the Attax baseball line from a few years back.  This particular card though is a 100 Club parallel, and is so damn shiny it's almost jarring!  So, I'll keep this one in my soccer box for now.

As far as parallels go, this was the star of this re-pack.  This one is also from the 2015 Donruss set, and I did not pull anything near this cool or scarce from my box.  This Gold Panini Logo parallel has a foil effect on the borders, and is numbered to just /10.  True, it's not exactly Cristiano Ronaldo or anything but I feel like a card serial-numbered that low is cool in its own rite.  Besides...

...I got my promised Ronaldo anyway!  As with Leo Messi and Kylian Mbappe, this guy is such a titan in his sport that any new card of his feels significant.  Much like Jordan or Wayne Gretzky.  I've got about a thousand soccer cards and counting in my official collection now, but this is just my eighth card of the superstar from Portugal.

Completing the trifecta of the hottest soccer players on the planet as far as sports card collecting goes, here's my newest Kylian Mbappe card!  At this point I'm pretty astounded at what a great deal this repack was.  Even though this is just a base card, good luck finding a copy for less than $5.  This one card probably covers half of what I paid for this re-pack, not that I plan on selling it.

I've eyed these "Fireworks" inserts on COMC a few times, they're pretty much dollar box fare.  Really cool idea for a card.  It looks a lot more vibrant in person than it came across in the scan, as is typically the case with Prizm cards.  There are "Prizm" versions of these that are even shinier, I'd love to pick one of those up of a player I enjoy at some point.

Back to the 2015 Donruss well again, and this one is actually a parallel of an insert.  The Press Proof parallels come in different flavors of rarity, with this Silver Press Proof being numbered to /199.  In the 2015 set the Press Proof parallels were available for all base and nearly all insert cards, which is interesting.

This extremely bright and shiny card is a "Multi-color Prizm" from 2016 Panini Select.  As crazy and vibrant a card as this is, it turns out this is only the second best card of Austria's Christian Fuchs (he he) in this particular re-pack!

I'm showing these in the order that they came out of the team set bag, and I have to say that at this stage I was already more than satisfied that I'd gotten my value out of this $11.99 spent.  This Harry Kane is from the Golazo insert in Topps' Stadium Club Premier League release from 2016.  I busted a box of this as well, and commented at the time that these colorful beauties were among my favorite cards in the product.  I was not fortunate enough to pull Harry Kane in that box, but now I've got one years later.  Awesome stuff.  One of my top three favorite cards from this re-pack I'd say.

This Rafa Silva Superstar Sensations insert is my first card of any sort from the 2018 Topps UEFA Champions League Chrome set.

Ditto for this Simon Francis, which I had to do some research on but discovered is a subset card from the 2017 Topps Premier League Gold set.

Here's another nice star card, featuring American phenom Christian Pulisic.  Being one of the best prospects in soccer years back I was already familiar with Christian by name, but I've gotten to see him play a few times now since he transitioned to the Premier League with Chelsea.  He's still just 21 years old with a long, bright future ahead.

Each repack promised a relic card, and this one contained a piece of Ivan Perisic's kit.  I really like the look of these as far as relic cards go, and have even considered spending over $50 on a Ronaldo (shinier than this card, some type of Prizm) but haven't pulled the trigger.  I'm actually familiar with Ivan due to his involvement in the 2018 World Cup, and inclusion in the corresponding Prizm set.  I'm not a big relic guy in general, but I was satisfied with this one.

Last but certainly not least, my autograph was this really cool Christian Fuchs card from Panini Black Gold.  I think this was a higher end release, it's certainly the first card I've ever seen from the set in person.  It's hard to tell in the scan, but quite a bit went into constructing this card.  Holding it on its side you can see that there are actually three layers that give the card a kind of "shadow box" effect.

The back layer has that brown striped backing that you see behind Christian, then there's a middle "spacer" layer that elevates the top portion of the card which contains the border and the image of Christian.  The box behind Christian is a clear acetate on that top layer, allowing you to see down to the bottom layer and creating a cool 3-D sort of effect.  I did not expect anything this nice as my hit in a re-pack for $11.99, that's for sure!

Well, that was a whole lot of fun.  I killed an hour or two stuck at home just enjoying these cards, researching the subjects and typing up this post.  I'd certainly consider going back to this seller for another re-pack or two if this pandemic lasts as long as it's supposed to!

Thanks for stopping by as always, and especially for sticking with me through a soccer post, and have a great Memorial Day weekend!  I've got more content planned for the holiday weekend so stop on by again if you're looking for some cardboard happenings to read about...

Platinum Traxx Pastrnak

A fun card to say the name of, a fun card to hold in person.  Check out this shiny beauty!

This 2014-15 O-Pee-Chee Platinum "Traxx" parallel of David Pastrnak's RC was one of my favorite hockey pick-ups from this past winter.  Got a real bargain on this card in the weeks before the pandemic.  I've always preferred David's O-Pee-Chee Platinum RC from 2014-15 to his Upper Deck Young Guns rookie, just because of all of the fantastic parallels of the former that are available.

I'd previously picked up the Blue Cubes (#'d /65) and Seismic Gold (#'d /50) versions of this card, and was pumped to form a nice trifecta here with the Traxx card.  This pattern is also sometimes referred to as a "Mojo" refractor or prizm in other releases from Panini.  I hadn't really been on the lookout for one of these, figuring I'd just been priced out of new Pastrnak cards at this point given how hot he has been the past couple of years.  I was pleasantly surprised to stumble into this card available at less than $40, and pounced immediately.

Here's a look at the back, standard fare here as this is the only parallel of the three I have now that is not serial-numbered.

With 48 goals tallied before the 2019-20 NHL season went on lockdown due to the coronavirus, Pastrnak seemed like a lock to be the first 50-goal scorer for the Bruins since Cam Neely reached the milestone more than 25 years ago now.  Unfortunately, I don't think we'll ever know if David could have notched two more now.  Getting to watch him and Alex Ovechkin compete for the Rocket Richard Trophy is one of the thrills that sports fans were robbed of this spring.

Great card though, and one I'm psyched about adding to my collection!

What sports moments are you most bummed about missing due to the pandemic?