Trying to Tie Up Some Loose Ends

Anyone who has followed this blog for a while probably has recognized I have quite a wide range of collecting interest and goals.  I have found that sometimes my focus drifts away from some goals I set and I lose focus on some areas of my collection I would like to fill.  One goal I have set for myself since I started going after Giants cards with gusto (start of the 2011 card releases) is to gather most, if not all, of the Giants base cards that are released.  I will also target certain parallel sets and insert sets.

What I found was that once the new year of card releases start, my focus on the prior year diminishes.  I couple weeks ago I went on a Sportlots spending spree with some credits I accumulated to try to fill some 2011-2013 gaps.  Here is what I was able to pick up:

These first two scans are from the same seller and is Panini dominated.  While my non-SP base set of 2012 Panini Cooperstown has been complete for a while, I was lacking quite a few Giants, not any more.  I also secured one from the 2013 Cooperstown set and the Bill Terry Golden Age is the only Giant base card in that set.  In the second scan I am showing off 4 2012 Panini Prizm, this set was actually released early in 2013 as I recall and I saw little of this broken in the blogosphere.  The Elite Extra Edition cards are from 2011 while the Machi Pinnacle card is a 2013.  I also realized I never picked up the McCovey mini insert.  I don't believe any of these cards were over a quarter and filled some gaps nicely.

These next 3 scans are from a different seller:

 These two 2012 Cooperstown cards, coupled with the ones from the prior seller, finished off the team set.  The Extra Edition card is from 2011 while the others are from 2010.  While 2010 isn't a huge focus, I wasn't going to pass up knocking 3 cards off that want list at 18 cents apiece.  The Lincecum finished off the Bowman Platinum team set, the Molina made it just SPs for the National Chicle set and I still need a couple Attax cards to put that team set to rest.

 These cards are all from 2013 Panini Prizm, also released in 2013. I get these two sets confused, they look too much a like to me.  Fortunately the 2012 base set is complete and I am a Buster Posey away from finishing this one.  There are tons of nice looking color parallels but the scarcity of them on the secondary market will prevent me from going after any team sets.  The Cain in the bottom right is an insert from the Superstar set and it is nice seeing my favorite player being rightfully tagged as a superstar.

The final quad of cards are from a late 2013 release by Panini, it is a resurrection of the Select brand that was produced from 1993 to 1998.  I was able to pick up 4 of the 9 Giants from the base set.  These are very nice looking cards but I have no idea how they were released.  I will keep my eye out for the other Giants and possibly some of the inserts to check them out.

Still work to do on the loose ends but it was nice to make some progress.  If you have some of the Giants I need from my want list, drop me a note and let's make a deal.