National Baseball Card Day 2016

Yesterday was National Baseball Card Day and I thought it would be a good day to take my boys to the only LCS in my new area.  It is a pretty nice shop aptly named The Baseball Card Shop and has a pretty solid inventory of baseball, football and basketball cards and some oddball stuff as well.  As part of NBBCD, they were giving out a free back of cards and an extra special card if you spent $10 or more on Topps products.  The guys in the shop were nice enough to give each of us a pack and a copy of the special card so I figured I would start by sharing those cards.  Each pack has 6 cards and I was hoping to pull the Buster Posey and Madison Bumgarner.  The card guy let me look through the packs as the top card was visible but unluckily no Giants on the top.

The first pack I picked had Bryce Harper on top.  While Bryce isn't having a very good season, he is pretty hot in card circles still.

Some decent star power in pack #1.  Altuve is hitting around 0.360 this year and Trout is having his typical monster year despite his team stinking up the joint.

For my second pack, I picked up one topped by Kyle Schwarber.  I am not really sure why but he is a fairly big name rookie despite being hurt for most of this season.

I was super happy to hit the Posey in this pack, it has a great picture as well in his full catchers gear and mask in hand.

My final pack I picked the super rookie from the hated Dodgers Corey Seager.  While I can't stand the guy based on his team affiliation, I do know he is a really good player.

No luck in pulling a MadBum but getting 1 of my 2 most wanted players in 3 packs of a 50 card set is pretty solid hobby luck.

Oh yeah, the free give away was a Kris Bryant card so we got 3:

I picked up some other stuff at the shop. I got each of my boys 2 packs of the 2016 Topps Series 2 flagship set.  Nothing notable in those packs.

I got myself 2 packs of Chrome...

 I was happy to pull the Samardzija but really nothing else for my collection.  I do have to say that the perspectives set looks amazing in Chrome.  My 9 year old screamed out a "Wow!" when I opened the pack.

I also picked up 2 packs of Ginter...

A couple of Giants in the 2 packs but I had already picked up the team set.

I also got 1 SP in Gomes, an insert of The Numbers Game (an insert set I really like), an insert of the Natural Wonders (an insert set I already bought), a couple minis and a hit!  A Missy Franklin relic.  At first I thought the relic was missing, upon touching it, it looks like it is a piece of her swim cap, pretty cool!

I dug through a couple boxes of 1972 Topps cards and picked up some cards for my set:

 I thought $10 for 25 cards was a solid deal and it inches me closer to the set.  For those of you that have completed this set or are close, any tips on the high numbers?  They are fairly scarce and super costly everywhere I have looked.

Finally I bought a box of 2016 Donruss Optic.  For some reason I was drawn to the product.  Here are the highlights of my box:

I believe there a couple hot boxes in each case where each pack has a numbered parallel in each of the 20 packs and I was lucky enough to get one of those boxes:

The Cueto was my Giants highlight in this group of inserts that are all numbered /299.  It was also cool to score an Ichiro card in this group.

These cards are a little more rare with the top row being /199 and the 6 with the dark blue border being numbered /149.

My two lowest numbered cards were this Jankowski /99 and the Burns /50.  No huge scores on the serial numbered parallels but it was cool to open each pack with some shine and color.

In addition to the numbered parallels, each box promised 2 autos and I was extremely happy with my pulls:

It isn't every day you pull an auto of a Hall of Famer, at least not in the ARPSmith household. This Kaline auto is a great addition to my HOF collection and while a already have one auto of Mr. Tiger in my collection, there is always room for another.  My other auto is a nice blue bordered Rated Rookie auto of Giants outfielder Mac Williamson.  The card is numbered 62/75.  Over all I have to rate this box extremely high and it made my National Baseball Card Day a success.

I Am Officially a Kansan and Back in the Blogging Game

With the exception of 1 post in April to ask for a temporary cease and desist in shipping me packages, this is my first post since March 1st - wow 5 1/2 months.  I doubt I have been missed but I have missed sharing my new acquisitions, sharing some Giants love in the blogosphere and staying fully connected with what has been going on in the hobby.

I have had a chance to periodically read some blogs, enter a couple contests and of course I have been spending my monthly card stipend.  We are finally settled in Kansas and I have all my cards unpacked (although far from organized) and I have been itching to get back in the game, so I figured this weekend would be a good time to start up the blog again.

I am hoping to contribute something every so often that gets you to click and read.  I owe some of the awesomely generous #supertraders members some return packages and hope to free up some space in my smaller than before card room by sending out some flat rate mailers over the next few months. I hear Kansas winters are a little more harsh than those in Southern California so I suspect the bulk of the sorting and mailing my happen in the winter.

In addition to the handful of packages since we got settled in Kansas, I have acquisitions from before my move to share as well.  I am so behind that I most likely will never empty out by Blog Stuff scanned card folder but I will probably try.

I haven't been completely absent from the hobby over the last 5 months but I am behind in picking up Giants from some of the newer releases so hopefully a few trades my be in order.  With my limited time due to the new job and relocation some of my purchases have shifted from larger quantity purchases to some higher dollar cards that have gotten me excited and hopefully make for a few good posts.

In the spirit of some of the those higher dollar purchases I thought I would share a pretty awesome card I picked up a couple months back:

I was able to secure this 1954 Topps Willie Mays, instantly one of my favorite cards in my collection.  While it isn't in mint condition, it looks pretty darn nice.  It has some staining on the front but this is in far better condition than I ever thought I could manage, assuming I could even get one of these into my collection.

Here is the back of the card with a cool Inside Baseball comic highlighting "one of the greatest plays in Giant history".  If you look it is talking about a catch back in 1951 that sounds pretty familiar to the one he would make in the 1954 World Series that is considered his most famous catch - we have all see it dozens of times.

This Mays completed my 1954 Topps team set so in my typical fashion, I will show the entire team set off:

 I am excited to be back, happy collecting!

An Update - #Supertraders Please Take a Look

Hello to all my collecting friends, this is ARPSmith here.  Still alive and well.  Read a couple blogs recently that referenced me as the primary Giants collector and also as MIA. I also noticed it has been 2 months since I posted on my blog so I thought I would give an update on where I am at with my relocation/move and also a quick collecting update.

As a reminder, I am moving from Southern California to the Kansas City, Kansas area for a new job opportunity.  I started my new job on 2/22 but my family is staying in CA to finish up the school year.  We found a great house in Overland Park, KS and we close on 5/25.  School ends here on 6/9 so we will start the 1600 mile trek on 6/11 or 6/12.  We plan to see some sites on the way so I expect we will end up in Kansas somewhere around 6/18-6/20.  I have been going back and forth to work in my new office spending about 2 of every 3 weeks in KS so my time in CA is limited. 

I packed up all my cards to help streamline the move so I don't have access to my cards.  I kept one box open for any new acquisitions.  I haven't had too much time to seek out Giants singles on the new products so I will play some catch up when I get to Kansas.  I have kept doing some shopping on eBay and have been able to pick up some nice cards that I will eventually share.

Special Note to #Supertrader friends
I have been impressed and excited by some of the great cards (and volume of cards) that have headed my way since we started the Supertrader list.  I am keeping these cards separate until after the move so I can adequately thank all of you.  I also have plans to return the favor over the summer, thinking of doing something like 5 packages a week once I get my cards unloaded and sorted.  I wanted to ask those of you that are sending out packages to hold off on sending any my way until I announce my new address.  My packing date for the movers is about a month away and with the slowness of the USPS these days I don't want to be in a situation where I miss your cards and I am not sure how forwarding of packages works.

Followers of this blog may recall that I set a goal to get 1 T206 card per month and I am trying to maintain that during my transition.  Prior to boxing everything up, I did take a scan of my March pick up.  Can't have a post without a card, right?

This is obviously another graded card and it is actually my second of three Mike Donlin T206 cards - the seated version.  Donlin was also the subject in my January T206 post, that card was the fielding pose.  I will eventually finish up the trifecta with the Bat version.  As you can see this is a PSA 2 and looks really nice (sorry for the blurry scan, the card is quite crisp in person).  Like the other card I picked up with this one it is listed as a miss cut. Again it has to be top to bottom centering as the size of the card is appropriate.

With this card I am up to 7 T206 cards in my collection.  If I keep with my goal I will be in double digits by mid year!

Looking forward to be back engaged in our blogging community this summer.

Complete Set Review - 1996 Bazooka

Back before Christmas I was able to pick up a few smaller sets and partial sets of cards from a seller on Sportlots.  The sets were all listed as auctions starting at a quarter.  I bid on probably two dozen sets and brought home 7 or 8 of them.  This 1996 Bazooka set is probably the set that fits least into my collection and collecting interests, I think I got caught up on the chase a little bit.

Regardless, I thought I would share some highlights of this unique set.  1996 Bazooka is a fairly small set, 132 cards.  Research shows it was released in both a factory set format and in 5-card packs costing 50 cents each with a stick of Bazooka gum.  The factory sets contained a reprint of Mickey Mantle's 1959 Bazooka card, I did not get that in the set I purchased.

The card fronts feature nice bright and colorful photos of the player with the Bazooka logo in the upper left corner and the players name and team overlaying a baseball bat near the bottom border.  Thumbing through the set I picked out 25 cards that caught my eye one way or another to share.

The back of each card contains one of five different Bazooka Joe characters (Ursula, Mort, Joe, Zena and Metal Dude), along with the Bazooka Ball flipping game, the player's biographical data and 1995 career statistics. Every card contains a Funny Fortune, which predicts the fate of each player on a particular date.  If I wasn't so lazy, I would consider researching the Fortunes and seeing if anything came close to being true.  Here are 5 sample card backs with each of the characters and examples of each of the 3 types of card types (Great Play, Bonus and Effect). 

 In addition to the 132-card set I received a header card that contains the rules on the back (the rules seem a little confusing to me).  Just in case you are interested in hearing how to play the game, here you go:

As I stated above, this doesn't really fit into my collecting lanes but there are some nice cards in the set.  I may not have been the only person to feel this way as Topps stopped producing Bazooka set until 2003.

My February T206 Addition

I set a goal late last year to start picking up one T206 Giants card per month through at least the end of 2016.  Right at the first of the month I missed out on a few cards in last second eBay sniper bids.  I was disappointed but kept looking then one day I got an email from an eBay seller I had bought from before advertising a set break of T206 cards.  I quickly went to their site and bid on a bunch of the cards that hadn't already exceeding my desired purchase price.

In the end I brought home 2 of the cards and will share one for the February pick up and save one until next month.  For your viewing pleasure, here is my newest T206 addition:

I typically don't seek out PSA graded cards but for this collecting I am going to make an exception.  They present pretty well and should keep these 100+ year old cards safe.  This is a great looking card of Jake Weimer.  Weimer was a starting pitcher for the Cubs, Reds and Giants, spending only his final year of 1909 with the Giants which resulted in this card.  Looks like he won over 20 games in 3 of his first 4 seasons then faded.  His nickname was Tornado Jake which is a cool nickname and seems even more appropriate with my pending relocation to Tornado country.

This card is listed as a miscut in the PSA lable which I am assuming is due to the top/bottom imbalance but I felt fine picking it up as his name and team are still fully visible.  While my move will most likely impact my ability to add to my collection until I get settled, I think this is one area of my collection that I will make sure to stay current on.

Kansas City Here We Come

Big changes coming for the ARPSmith household.  About 2 weeks ago I accepted a new position with my employer in the Kansas City, Kansas area.  It is a great job with some advancement potential and the company will pay full relocation.  My family and I are excited but it will be the first time living outside of CA for all of us - a pretty big change I expect.  My wife agreed to the move sight unseen, she has never been there.  Fortunately I have been out quite a few times for work and have some good friends who are either there now or have lived there in the past.

I spent last week out there meeting my new team and trying to get a lay of the land as the house hunting will need to begin soon.  Didn't get a chance to seek out any card stores, if you have been there and know of any LCS, drop me a line.  My only collecting interest that touches on KC sports would probably be collecting Matt Cassel cards for my USC football collection.  He was at his peak as a Chief which resulted in some nice patch cards.

2010 Certified Mirror Prime Patch 10/50

2011 Totally Certified Prime Patch 46/49

2012 Totally Certified Platinum Gold Patch 18/49

We wont be moving until early June to let the kids finish out the school year so any trade or supertrader packages coming my way should be fine for a couple months.  I will try to get a post up a few weeks before and also let Brian/Wes know so the spreadsheet can be updated.

In the meantime, expect sporadic posting at best.  I need to get my collection packed up and labeled in a way that the movers can box up and hopefully limit any damage and I will be spending about 50% of me time in KC until we move permanently.  Wish me luck, it is going to be a crazy few months!

Catching Up With Ben Petrick

I am working hard to get all my cards filed away but there are quite a few I want to share prior to filing so you can expect a few Catching Up posts over the next couple weeks. 

I have shared quite a few of my Ben Petrick cards that I have acquired and I am pretty happy with my player collection progress.  My Petrick collection is in honor of my Grandma who battled the same disease, Parkinson's, that Petrick is currently fighting.  I am going to share a pretty cool group of cards I have tracked down via COMC and eBay over the last few weeks.

Here is a trio of different parallels of his 3-player Topps rookie card.  I have the Topps base and Chrome in my Giants collection due to the presence of Mirabelli but the refractor is currently only in my Petrick binder.  Sometimes I find myself having to decide where to place cards that fit in different parts of my collection and the order is usually Set, Player Collection then Team Collection.

This is a somewhat eclectic group of cards with only Petrick tying them together.  The SPx card on the top right is the Radiance parallel and is numbered 040/100.  The card looks pretty cool in hand but scans even better.  The Middle card is minor league release from 2004 and is the last card on my checklist besides a buyback card released in 2005.  I was happy to track it down.

These are all Bowman/Topps parallels.  The upper left card is a gold parallel numbered 30/99.  The upper right is the Topps Gold parallel numbered 1964/2002. The lower left card is a refractor the bottom right is the mini with a Carolina Brights back.  The mini completes the "rainbow" of 4 different backs that were made of Petrick back in 2002.

Here are some Fleer/Skybox releases.  It is impossible to tell in the scan but the Fleer Tradition card is the glossy parallel and is numbered 121/200.  The Fleer Focus is the green parallel and is numbered 143/300.  I already had the Ultra Gold Medallion but now added the base, I am still on the lookout for the Platinum /50.  The Skybox card is the Ruby parallel. there is a Ruby Extreme parallel /50 that I would still like to add.

Here are a trio of Pacific parallels.  The top left card is the Copper parallel numbered 90/99.  I still need quite a few parallels from that set including Emerald Green /99, Gold /199, Platinum Blue /75 and Premier Date /37.  I really like many of the Pacific designs and parallels but they are not easy to track down.  The Private Stock card is the Silver parallel and is numbered 132/199.  Finally a nice looking Prism Holographic Purple parallel numbered 54/99.  I am getting close to finishing off this rainbow of 15 cards needing just the Holographic Blue /80, the Premiere Date /61 and the Tinsel Silver /331.

I will finish off the post with a couple hits.  The Bowman's Best Locker Room Collection has a nice jersey swatch and pairs nicely with a Bat card of the same design I added a few months back.

I am pretty happy with these additions, most were somewhat rare and serial numbered.  My Petrick collection now stands at 201 different cards with a total of 307 appearing on my checklist for a nice 65.5% completion percentage.