2014 COMC purchases: year-end Yankees

We're still smack in the middle of bowl season, one of the true highlights of what can otherwise be a rough time of the year in the northern midwest, but I still have lots of baseball stuff to post, so let's get back to those instead!  Today I have 11 cards with a theme:  every single one of them is a Yankee.  I'm no fan of that team, but plenty of Michigan baseballers have played for them, so I happily collect them anyway.

First up is former two-sport star Drew Henson, who appeared in three straight Michigan bowl victories over SEC teams during his college career:

Drew Henson 2001 Fleer Triple Crown RC (#2486/2999)

Beckett's online checklist lists "just" 12 RCs for Drew, all out of 2001 Fleer products.  I already had his Platinum RC and now I own one of his 10 numbered rookies.  I remember trying Triple Crown that year and thought it was decent, but I'm just not one for trying to pull short-printed cards out of boxes, so I'm glad to be able to add this on the cheap.

Drew Henson 2002 Topps Traded Gold (#0912/2002)

And now we get a bit rarer with the serial-numbering.  It's funny, the 2002 Gold parallels don't look extremely different compared to the base cards when it comes to color.  Still, I've always been a fan of some of the Topps designs from earlier in the decade, including 2002's.

Drew Henson 2003 Bazooka Blasts Relics bat

Bazooka brings back some bad collecting memories for me since for some reason I decided to chase the 1996 set despite the product having abysmal collation (and absolutely no redeeming value).  But for under a buck I found my 8th Henson relic and 13th hit overall.  This kind of card was just about right as a hit out of the 2003 product, one that wasn't awesome for collectors older than 10 but still much better than the '96 version!

Drew Henson 2003 Topps Chrome Refractor (with Brandon Claussen) (#191/699)

Refractor!  I really like the fact that the 2003 version of the "regular" Refractor was blue, which is obviously my favorite.  Claussen, by the way, is the player the Yanks sent to the Reds for Aaron "F%$king" Boone in 2003 before his fateful HR.

Drew Henson 2003 Topps Gallery

Not much to say here--Gallery was often a beautiful set and 2003's version combined the artistic design with some shininess.  Count me as a fan.

That gives me a new Henson count of 31--just baseball, of course!

Next up is pitcher Scott Kamieniecki, whom the Yanks drafted when Henson was just six years old:

Scott Kamieniecki 1995 Stadium Club Members Only Parallel

Just one of Kam today, but that's no surprise since I'm in the home stretch as far as his collection goes.  Today's card is his '95 Stadium Club Members Only issue, and that not only closes the door for me on that set, but also the year of 1995.  I own 85 of his 90 cards, and of the five remaining I'm really only worried about his tougher 1998 Pacific Online versions. 

And last but not least is the most recent Yankee draftee, OF Michael O'Neill:

Michael O'Neill 2013 Elite Extra Edition Signature Aspirations auto (#032/100)

I'm always aware of what I'm getting into when I collect Elite Extra Edition stuff--lots of different parallels, some of which can be pretty tough to find.  But I tend to like the designs, plus in some cases that might be the only product that carries hits of some of my guys.  Fortunately that's not the case with O'Neill, but regardless I'm having fun tracking down his EEE cards, like this die-cut auto.

Michael O'Neill 2013 Panini Prizm Perennial Draft Picks Draft Hits and Draft Hits Prizms

Here we have a "base" insert and a Prizm parallel of that insert--it's Prizmception!  I count 15 different O'Neill cards in the product and I own six of them, so hooray for hitting 40%!

Michael O'Neill 2014 Bowman Chrome Prospects and Prospects auto

I was doing pretty decently with my O'Neill collection until 2014 Bowman Chrome and its 30 (by my count, hope I'm not missing any) new cards came along.  Well, it'll probably be tough sledding, but now that I have his base card and "base" auto, I just need 14 more parallels of each!  With the above EEE auto I now have eight of Paul's nephew.

Five new cards at this point is a very helpful boost and I can now lay claim to 16 of O'Neill's 70-card run, good for about 23%.

Stay tuned for one more baseball post and two or three more covering football.  The new year may start tomorrow but I'm still not done covering 2014 pickups, and that includes a very special Boxing Day COMC haul still to come!