I Haven’t Done An Allen & Ginter Post Yet

I may be the last blogger to do an Allen & Ginter post.  This is the first year I have attempted to collect this set and for the most part I would say it has been a positive collecting experience.  I bought my original box for the Gint-a-cuffs competition but soon realized I was too lazy to mix algebra with card collecting.  From there I decided to try and complete the set.  Four blasters later I’m still left with what seems like a shit ton of missing cards.  In the hobby box I didn’t really hit it big, but my Colorado Rockie’s curse of hits has continued.

Helton, Rockies.  Holliday, former Rockies.  Teter, snowboards in the Rockies.  It seems every “hit” I get has some connection to the Rockies.  Other than a couple of black bordered mini’s this is what the hobby box yielded.

The blasters were a little interesting.  The local Wally World had three blasters.  I always let the kids pick out which one I buy.  So the first one I picked up had some messed up packaging.  The packs were all different sizes and sealed funny.  Some packs had two National Treasures, some had missing mini’s, one had three cards, and one had a non Rockie “hit” and a little surprise.

The Dye card is nice but he plays for the Sox, and I’m not a big fan of the Eastern Elk card either.  Honestly I never knew there was such a thing as an Eastern Elk.  From what I can tell these Extinct Creatures were seeded 1 per hobby case, so pulling one of these from a retail blaster should be next to impossible, let alone being placed next to a game used card in the same pack.  This will end up on eBay when the time is right so I can try to recoup some of the expense of this set.  This blaster left a nice taste in my mouth so I returned a couple of days later and picked up another.  Nothing jumped out at me at first.  It wasn’t until I started to sort through the cards that I noticed this.

And then there was this.

Nothing out of ordinary really, except for the Pence doubles.  Just a nice little selection of mini’s, right?

All eight of them are A&G backs, including three SP’s in which two of those are the same guy.  Not exactly pay dirt, but odd and interesting none the less.  After this blaster I felt compelled to go and pick up the last one they had.  I had thoughts of maybe a cut sig or a magical unicorn relic.  As you can see there are no scans of the third and fourth box because that is exactly what I got out of them, nothing.  I think my Allen & Ginter buying days are over for now.  I’m going to try and rely on you the reader and fellow bloggers to complete the set.  I have a ton of doubles, maybe more doubles than I have of the base set.  I even have doubles, triples, and even in Jeff Samardzija’s case, quadruples of many of the SP’s for trade.  I will be looking through many of the want lists out there to see what I have for some of you as well as posting my own needs.  If you have anything or want anything in this post drop me a line.  Here’s what I have left………..

2, 8, 14, 16, 24, 26, 33, 36, 52, 62, 67, 68, 71, 72, 73, 75, 77, 85, 86, 87, 90, 91, 99, 112, 114, 116, 123, 134, 137, 139, 146, 149, 151, 160, 161, 166, 174, 175, 176, 177, 184, 186, 192, 193, 194, 197, 199, 212, 214, 216,  232, 237,  246, 247, 252, 259, 260, 262, 264, 266, 267, 269, 273, 277, 278, 283, 291, 292, 300, 302, 303, 304, 305, 306, 308, 313, 314, 318, 321, 323, 326, 327, 328, 329, 333, 334, 336, 338, 339, 340, 341, 344, 346, 350.

Milton Sezzzzzz…….

Milton Bradley has decided as of late to be the new team spokesman of sorts.  It seems after having a miserable season on the field and keeping quiet to the media, he has felt the urge to start saying all kinds of stupid shit.  Like his latest and my favorite little gem so far……..

“Strange as it may seem, what people don’t understand is you play baseball your whole life, and you’re on teams that play mostly night games, you’re getting up at 2 in the afternoon to come in and do whatever you do. Here, you’ve got to get up at 8 o’clock in the morning and get ready. It’s an adjustment for your body. You may be ready for it and say, ‘I can do that, I can handle that.’ Your body’s going to tell you something different.”

Are you kidding me?  This prick has a $30,000,000 contract and is blaming his shit play on having to wake up in the MORNING?  He can’t hit because he is forced to get up before the crack of 2:00 pm?  Really?  I honestly tried hard to like the guy and even root for him on occasion, but after revealing why he was horrible, I’d be happy with a Sosa/Canseco platoon in right next season.  If my daughter can get up and get to school at 8:30 in the morning for free, I think this guy can get up and get ready for whatever it is he does for $30,000,000.  What a Schmuck!  He now has a new home on the sidebar.

Contest: Guess The Sketch

Here is the latest sketch card drawn by 5 yr. old Ms. Addison Gitz.  She wants to make a contest out of it.  She is willing to make a custom sketch card for who ever is the first person to guess which card this is.  All you have to do is leave your answer in the comments section.  All guesses are welcome, the more guesses the better.  I will put together a small prize package from a team of your choice and Addison will make a sketch card from a card of your choice.  If no one comes close, I will release a few clues to help out.  The only clue I will give out now is that it is from an ’09 release.  I also promised her I would post her rendition of the 1992 UD Rick Wilkins card, so here it is.  Thanks and good luck!

Winner:

Paul from Carl Crawford Cards is the winner.  That went a lot quicker than I had thought it would.   Paul, I need to know what card you would like a 1/1 sketch done of,  and as soon as it is finished it will be sent your way.  Thanks for playing along, she got a big kick out of it.

Junk Wax Group Break: List Of Junk

I have put together a shopping list for the group break.  Interest hasn’t been overwhelming, but with out details I didn’t expect it to be.  Here’s a list of what will be broken.  I’m also going to try and get this break sponsored if it happens, so more product may be added if it happens.  For the cost of an Upper Deck X blaster, you could receive your favorite team’s cards from the following junk boxes.

• ’81 Fleer Vending Box
• ’84 Topps Celo Box
• ’88 Score Wax Box
• ’94 Fleer Ultra Series 1
• ’96 Topps Lazer Series 2
• ’97 Pinnacle Totally Certified
• ’97 Topps Screenplays
• ’98 Topps Chrome Series 1
• ’98 Bowman Chrome Series 1
• ’98 Bowman Chrome Series 2
• ’98 Topps Finest Series 2 Jumbo
• ’99 UD Holografx
• ’00 UD Black Diamond
• ’01 UD Decade of the ’70s
• ’02 UD Vintage
• ’53 Topps Archives
• ’05 Topps All Time Fan Favorites

That’s a total of 17 wax boxes.  If you would like to sign up you can do so here or leave a comment on this post.

Punk Rock Saved My Life

A big thanks goes out to Travis of PunkRockPaint Enterprises, LLC for designing my new header.  He came through huge in very little time.  For his hard work, he shall be rewarded with a giant pile of Padre’s cards.  They will be in the mail early this week.

Junk Wax Group Break

I’ve been kicking around the idea of doing a junk wax group break.  I need to know how many, if any, would be interested.  The plan is for everyone to kick in $20 a team, first come first serve.  What I’m looking to buy is pure junk wax.  My plan is to pick up a couple of early ’80s wax boxes and vending boxes, maybe a couple packs from the ’70s, and round it out with some cheap wax from the ’90s and 2000’s.  All in all I plan on picking up between 15 and 20 wax boxes and as many junk packs as I can find.  What I need is a preliminary list of who’s interested.  After the list is full, or close to full, I will figure out just exactly what it is I’m going to buy.  I will publish this list and if you are still interested I will take payment through paypal, other forms will be accepted but paypal is the easiest.  I’m taking money for all 30 spots.  I don’t know exactly how many cards will be pulled from the expansion teams since some of the boxes will be from the early ’80’s.  For this reason I will only charge $15 for the Marlins, Rockies, Rays, and the D-Backs.  The Nats will be combined with the Expos at full price.  I’m going to try and pick out some boxes that I hope people don’t already have a shit ton of, like ’87 Topps or ’89 Donruss, I know I have too many of those laying around and really don’t want anymore.  All cards will be shipped shortly after the break.  I won’t be able to post every break but I will do my best to showoff some of the better cards pulled.  Who’s with me?  Leave a comment with your team if your interested.

Los Angeles Angels
Oakland Atletics
Texas Rangers
Seattle Mariners
Chicago White Sox
Cleveland Indians……………………….Baseball Dad
Kansas City Royals
Minnesota Twins
Detroit Tigers……………………………..Don S.
Boston Red Sox…………………………..packaddict
New York Yankees
Toronto Blue Jays
Baltimore Orioles
Tampa Bay Devil Rays
Chicago Cubs………………………………gritz76
St. Louis Cardinals
Milwaukee Brewers.
Pittsburgh Pirates
Houston Astros
Cincinnati Reds
San Diego Padres
Arizona Diamondbacks
Los Angeles Dodgers
San Francisco Giants
Colorado Rockies
Atlanta Braves……………………………Captain Canuck
Nationals\Expos
New York Mets
Philadelphia Phillies…………………….deal
Florida Marlins

What I Want To See From Topps In 2010

So we have all heard the news, Topps is king.  I don’t know if this is a good thing, a bad thing, or just a thing.  Honestly, I’m glad we are stuck with Topps instead of just UD.  In my opinion Upper Deck has done this to themselves and they only have themselves to blame.  Anyone who knows anything about the behind the scenes of the hobby knows UD hasn’t been the most honest company in the biz.  I walked away from the hobby in the early ’90’s partly due to UD.  They were the reason pack prices skyrocketed and the hobby turned strictly into a business.  I couldn’t afford to be a casual collector anymore nor did I want to.  If you wanted to pull anything worth pulling you had to buy the more expensive UD, Stadium Club, or Ultra.  Regular plain old cards were just not worth collecting and the more expensive brands were out of my reach.  From what I can tell from a lot of my bloggers, this happened to many of us.  Fast forward twenty years and now that I have the money to spend, I can’t find anything worth spending it on but vintage.  Even with the current competition the innovation of the hobby has become stale.  If Topps really wants us to continue to buy their cards, they better come strong with some new ideas in 2010.   Here is what I would like to see in 2010.

#1    Wax packs! If you want kids to flock to baseball cards like they once did, sell them like you once did. I remember mowing a lawn for $10 and being able to buy an ass load of packs at the nearest gas station and still had enough money left over for an Orange Faygo and some Corn Nuts.  Why not produce a throwback set that has a new design with current players.  I’m talking no gloss, no foil, and wrapped in actual wax.  Tuck in a few low priced autographs of solid players.  Just enough so it won’t jack up the price.  Include some chrome parallels to entice the kiddies.  That’s it.  Simple.  Make a good looking design with just enough bells and whistles that it won’t jack up the price of production.  They need to get the price of these packs at or around a dollar and sell them everywhere they can possibly sell them.

#2 Get old collectors back! From what I can tell, there are a mass of people returning to collecting that left in the early to mid ’90’s.  These people generally are in their late 20’s or early 30’s.  Many are fathers of young children.  If you want to hook the kids,  hook the parents too.  What I would like to see is a set aimed at us who collected heavy during the junk wax era.  What I would like to see instead of these sets based on 40 and 100 year old designs is something maybe 20 years old.  Maybe not a whole set but a subset of chrome versions of the big pulls of the ’80s.  I for one would love to buy a pack and have a chance of pulling a chrome autographed Boggs or Gwynn rookie card.  How great would that look next to the original card.  If enough collectors from yester year would catch a glimpse of those cards, I think many of them might take a chance on a pack or two and then turn into a full blown collector again.  It worked on me.

#3 Something new! I have been buying wax for the last couple of years now and I haven’t seen one single innovation introduced.  Yeah we have Topps Town with 3D cards and stuff like that but what are we supposed to do with that after the initial cool factor wears off.  Dazzle me, I dare ya.

#4    No lazy photography! I do not want to see the same photo twice in 2010.  There is no excuse for it.  I seen a 40 gb SD card in production, load that shit up.  In a time when you can take a picture, and seconds later, decide if you want to keep it or delete without costing a dime, there is no reason why a photo should be used more than once.  A professional photographer should be able to get more than one keeper per player per game.  If you are running low on photographers, set up a system where fans can submit a photo and have the chance of getting it  used on a card.  If I buy a pack of stadium club, I do not want to see a photo from Series 1 with a different border.  It is unacceptable.

#5    Chill with the gimmicks! I have to admit I like a few of the gimmicks, but for the most part they are dumb.  Turn the gimmicks into something that will hold value for more than two weeks.   Instead of upside down Fukudome’s, give me an alternate Chunichi Dragons card of Kosuke.  Instead of cards of fictitious 16 yr old pitchers, give me a card of a 16 yr old Lincecum.  If your going to force gimmicks upon us, and I know you will, step up your game a little.

Most importantly, I want to see something I want to buy.  It’s as simple as that.