Too Many Plates! Part 3: football

Previously:  baseball, basketball

Between May and June I won eBay auctions for a total of 17 different printing plates at a cost of a bit more than $100 (not bad!).  14 of those came from one awesome seller (markaguirre22), whom I can't recommend highly enough due to his great prices, excellent communication, and super fast free shipping.  A fellow Michigan collector, he was unloading some of his better stuff, and I was able to take advantage of quite a few great deals.  Better yet, over the course of my purchases he threw in three extra plates for free, giving me a nice round 20 to show off.  Several separate purchases rounded out the run on rarity.

All of the players are Michigan alumni that I collect, so you'll see most of them in three separate posts on here, one per sport, including this evening's post covering the football pickups:

Alan Branch 2007 Leaf Limited Printing Plates Cyan (1/1)

#AlanBranchKillsQBs!  The "under center undertaker", the "tackle of terror", or the "ex-sack-utive Branch"--whatever you want to call him (and I could keep this up all day!), Branch is always welcome here, and he kicks things off today with this rookie-year plate from one of the higher-end offerings produced by Donruss/Panini.  Of my 16 Branch hits, this is the first that isn't a straight-up autograph; I'd say a plate is a fine way to break that streak.  At $5.50, this and another plate you'll see in a bit made up an order (from the seller I mentioned above) back in April close to when I started piling up these rarities.

Jumbo Elliott 1996 Pro Line Printing Plates Cyan (1/1)

In my baseball post from this series (as seen on TMV), I showed off one of the three freebie plates I scored from awesome eBayer markaguirre22.  This is the second such card, and it happens to be my first hit of former OT John "Jumbo" Elliott, a longtime Giants/Jets tackle I mentioned briefly when showing off his RC a while back.  I didn't bid on this Pro Line plate when it was up for grabs because the provenance of such cards in the days before they were officially inserted into packs (especially pre-2000s) is a bit tricky, as tricky as determining what color this is without the usual identifying info on the back (which, in this case, is blank).  I could rule out magenta and yellow, and it seems to be more blue than black, so cyan it is.  Welcome, Jumbo!

Devin Funchess 2017 Score Printing Plates Cyan (1/1)

May 1 saw the purchase of plate #1 of a guy who was no stranger to wearing #1 in Ann Arbor.  Better yet, at $2.79, the winning bid set me back less than the $3.50 shipping cost.  At that rate I could afford bunches of Funchess plates!  In this case the bluish cyan looks nice as it somewhat fits in with the Carolina jersey colors.  That'll be easier to verify once I own the actual base card, which I'll oddly be getting after nabbing a 1/1 version!

Brian Griese 2001 Pacific Prism Atomic Printing Plates Cyan (1/1)

This Griese from another typically untypical Pacific product is the other plate I mentioned that I grabbed along with the Branch above in late April, and it also set me back $5.50.  Although I don't believe these were inserted into packs (like the Elliott above), it's at least helpful to see the bold stamp on the back, which includes the now-familiar "1/1" designation and plate color.  Hit #16 of Griese in my collection is actually my second plate as I already had this 2007 Topps Total three-player card handy.

Chad Henne 2008 Finest Moments Printing Plates Yellow (1/1)

Chad Henne 2014 Score Printing Plates Cyan (1/1)

Don't be too surprised that I spent more on these two plates than those of any other player you'll see in this series--I mean, Henne's is my favorite football PC!  Each ended up costing about $11, though I probably would have even gone a bit higher if necessary.  I didn't mind paying a bit of a premium for the Finest since it's a rookie-year card, plus it comes from a pretty cool insert, and it's yellow maize!  Pair that up with the plate equivalent of blue, a.k.a. cyan, on a 2014 Score base card (which I also don't have) and you get a very Michigan-hued couple of cards.  They double my count of 1/1s of Chad to four and raise his football collection-leading total to 104.

Chris Perry 2005 Topps Total Printing Plates Cyan Front (1/1)

It's easy to forget thanks to their dearth of creativity lately that Topps made some pretty cool printing plate labels in the past, like this one of former star RB Chris Perry.  You should also note that the "front" is specified in the name since this is one of those cases where you could also chase the plates used for the backs, which I could see being of interest to the folks that give the underappreciated side of cards some love.

Perry's card is the last one I purchased for this series, giving me an even 20, and it cost me a reasonable $6.50, split right down the middle for the winning bid and shipping.  I probably would have gone a bit higher too considering it allows me to celebrate another new member of my 50 hits club!  Chris is player #6 to hit that mark and joins Braylon Edwards plus four 2008 draftees:  Henne, Long, Hart, and Manningham.  I even have a few other players knocking on the door, but for today, that's just one milestone to announce.

Charles Woodson 2016 Prestige Plates and Patches Printing Plates Yellow (1/1)

Ok, here's the card that kicked off this whole platefest to begin with, and it's a big one (at least for me).  Back in mid-April I was surprised to land a 1/1 of one of the greatest Wolverines (and maybe the best NFL CB) ever, Charles Woodson, for under $14.  This initial plate would allow me to put together a pentafecta of the '97 champ, and I might just have to get on that at some point soon!  That yellow sure would look nice paired up with something blue.  I'm sure I can find something appropriate among my 18 Woodson hits, and I have plenty of rookies from which to select as well.

Today's eight-spot puts my 1/1s count at 79 (and I still have the hockey stuff to show off!), plus it allows me to hit one more pretty nice milestone today:  1200 football hits!  1202 to be exact, and that's before taking into account some things I've grabbed from various sources recently.  Who knows?  If I keep at it I may just get to cross the 2000-mark for my overall Michigan Sports hits collection before the year's up, which would merit quite the celebration indeed!

Stay tuned for the final part in this series, centering on hockey (see what I did there?), soon!