2018 trade package #1: Scribbled Ink

Fellow Michigan resident (if not necessarily college fan) Paul from Scribbled Ink was nice enough to toss a few Wolverines into the first trade package he's sent my way:

The basketball portion begins and ends with Sauce Castillo, a.k.a. Nik Stauskas.  The Mississauga, Canada native was recently joined by fellow basketball alum Caris Levert in Brooklyn.  This is Nik's RC from Panini's 2014-15 Prestige set, made when he had been drafted in the first round by Sacramento.

And the football goods are impressively 100% college uni certified!  PC guy Mike Hart and should-be future HOF CB Ty Law join in the fun from Topps' outstanding debut of Magic from 2009.  The product peaked early and was never the same as this beautiful original.

John Navarre is a guy whose cards I would pick up more often if his prices weren't so confusingly astronomical.  I have traded with someone in the past who claims to be a cousin of his, so maybe his family is driving up prices.  Anyway, that means I was plenty glad to see this 2004 SAGE HIT base of the former QB.

And lastly, the Marquise Walker RC from 2002 Pacific Heads Update was my favorite of the bunch.  Why?  The fact that I didn't have it would be the obvious reason, but more importantly, when I went to check it off of my checklist I found I hadn't included it for some reason.  That made me go back through his 2002 RCs and led to my adding two cards I was lacking on the checklist for some reason.  Crisis averted, thanks to a fun college uni RC, my 28th of the ex-WR's 50 (the correct total!) first-years.

Paul, thanks again for these great additions as well as the Tigers/PCs I showed off on TMV this evening.  I've already got a nice pile I'm working on for your return and I'm hoping to be able to give them to you in-person at a show soon!

2016 COMC purchases: many (and Mini) inserts

Today I'm featuring a bunch of inserts I picked up on COMC last year, especially around Black Friday.  They're many in number and some are also mini in stature.  Let's have a look!

Let's start with the minis--2009 Topps Magic Minis, to be precise.  I absolutely love this set and its amazing base cards, parallels, inserts, and autographs, and the reason is staring you right in the face:  college unis!  I also enjoy the hand-drawn look and backgrounds used, but the biggest draw for me is seeing all these guys in their college duds, especially Hutchinson, who was almost a decade out of school.

I previously showed off my complete base team set of these guys a couple Decembers ago, plus I think you all know I'm chasing the autographs as well.  As for these Minis, I already had a few handy--Drew Henson, and then this Avant/Breaston/Law trio I found at a show last July.  Today's group of eight, which puts me at 12/15 of these, includes three of my PCs in Hart, Henne, and Manningham, plus other Michigan legends I love to collect like Arrington, Askew, Hall, Hutch, and Woodley.

Who's left for me to get?  Tom Brady, Braylon Edwards, and an apparently short-printed Marlin Jackson.  This will undoubtedly be another fun team set to show off when it's done.

As for the other inserts, let's start alphabetically with this pair of 2012 Topps Golds.  Both happen to be relatively recent Michigan WRs:  Jason Avant (#0819/2012) and Steve Breaston (#0659/2012).  Avant is pictured with the Eagles, the team that drafted him, and he'd play through the 2015 season with the Chiefs.  Meanwhile, speaking of KC, Breaston is shown with his second and final squad and would finish up his career in 2012 after a four-year run with Arizona.

Former #1 jersey-wearer Devin Funchess joins in the WR fun with this shiny 2015 Panini Prizm Draft Picks Team Trademarks insert.  The Refractor-like card features a couple Michigan trademarks:  the big block "M" and iconic winged helmet.  I'd be thrilled to add more Michigan uni inserts of Devin in the future.

My other serial-numbered card today marks DB Leon Hall's second appearance, this time with his original pro team, the Bengals.  Panini's Certified product has featured some beautiful colored parallels in its history such as this Platinum Red (#137/999), though that color would probably be more appropriate for Leon's current employer, the Giants.

Considering his place in Wolverine football history it's definitely a shame that I'm lacking in cards of former Heisman-winner Tom Harmon, a do-it-all kind of guy starred for the varsity squad from 1938-40.  I'll just look at this as a first step in righting that injustice, then.  What you're looking at is actually an insert from a baseball product:  a Fan Craze chase card from 2014 Panini Golden Age.  It's a classy looking card of a classic player (and College Football Hall-of-Famer), and hopefully one of many I'll be showing off this year.

I've already shown a couple Topps Gold inserts so why not finish up with examples of another favorite parallel:  Refractors!  On the left, RB Chris Perry appears on a Red Refractor out of 2005 Bowman Chrome, making it a second-year card for him.  To his right is longtime Giants WR Amani Toomer's 2007 Bowman Chrome Refractor.  Both of these are designs I like very much and made even better with the rainbowification (patent pending) that Refractors provide.

So far my posts have covered football rookies and inserts, but I still have plenty left from COMC, so stay tuned!

7/2/16 card show report: getting Rich-er by the day

Now that those of you who follow Too Many Verlanders read my show recap over there, it's time to show off the rest of my haul for the few of you that continued over here this evening!  As I said, my haul consisted of ten dime cards, 16 quarters, and four at $2 apiece, with a few of those being trade bait.

Here's the Wolverines from the bunch:

Rich Hill 2016 Topps

The set-filler guy I mentioned, with a table full of dime cards sorted by set, had the Rich Hill base I needed from 2016 Topps Series II, so I happily grabbed that for my first 2016 release of the A's' sort-of ace.  The photo's not the greatest--what do you call something like this, "resting pitch face"?  Anyway, it's my 246th of his 357 issues and 257th overall.

Rounding out the buck I spent with that seller, here's a nine-spot of Wolverines from recent base sets.  I grabbed my first two cards of Wolverine RB transfer Thomas Rawls, a kid who was simply poorly coached by the Hoke regime, headed to Central Michigan, and did well enough to join the Seahawks as an UDFA.  He had a pretty nice 2015 campaign before suffering a season-ending ankle injury, and with Marshawn Lynch gone in Seattle he could have a chance to put up some nice numbers.

Rawls joins Devin Funchess by being represented in both 2016 Prestige and Score, David Harris shows up in the latter, and Denard Robinson the former.  Meanwhile, I added to my Charles Woodson PC with a card each from those same sets to go with a beautiful base issue from 2015 Gridiron Kings, which is another excellent football product that baseball fans just have to be jealous of.

Devin Funchess 2015 Topps Museum Collection RC and Copper parallel

From the quarter box here's a pair of Funchess cards from Topps' 2015 Museum Collection product.  One is a rookie I needed for my first-year collection, and by my count that gives me half of his 24.  Next to his base is a Copper parallel, which is about as meh as it gets for parallels.

TK Legacy Michigan Checklists (#SK1)

Joining the Funchess parallel in the insert collection is this checklist previewing Sketch Cards from TK Legacy.  I've never managed to purchase one of those elusive items because they're relatively rare and very expensive.  Still, even the previews are nice to look at, and I'll pretty much grab any TK Legacy card I don't have in a slow, maybe-I-will-maybe-I-won't effort towards a master set.  Star WRs Braylon Edwards and Desmond Howard are pictured here, by the way.

Jason Avant, Steve Breaston, and Ty Law 2009 Topps Magic Minis

The last of my inserts were this trio of Minis from one of Topps' most well done sets, 2009 Topps Magic.  I showed off the complete Wolverines team set of 15 cards way back in December of 2014 and now I have some minis to go with them, meaning I may just have to chase those as well.  Not that I need any excuses to grab more Wolverine uni cards....

And last but not least we have the $2 hits:

Adrian Arrington 2008 Donruss Gridiron Gear Autographs Platinum Holofoil auto (#09/25)

I probably say this every time I add a new Arrington, which unfortunately isn't too often these days, but it's hard for me to find something of his that's new to me.  I was surprised to find that I didn't have any version of his 'graph from this product, so to land a parallel numbered to 25 for just a couple bucks was exciting for me.  This is my 47th hit of A-Squared, and each and every one carries his signature.

Thom Darden 2006 TK Legacy auto

And now we move on to a guy making his debut in my football hits collection!  If I have trouble finding new Arringtons, it's often even more difficult to track down TK Legacy autos I don't yet own, so $2 for Mr. Darden here was more than fair to me.  I introduced the productive Browns safety with an Afro back in April in a Rookie Blue-Out post, so he's not entirely new to my collection, just to the hits.  His extremely legible signature makes him subject #197 in that collection, and I hope I can push that number above 200 before the end of the year.

Devin Funchess 2015 Panini Prizm Prizm Premier Jerseys jersey

Lastly, I wouldn't have paid $2 for this Refractor-y (sorry, "Prizm") jersey relic of Devin Funchess by itself, but factored into the total I was fine with it.  It's got a nice photo of a concentrating Funchess making a catch along with a black Panthers jersey swatch, though the design isn't anything to write home about.  While I still need to dig up an autograph of Bunches of Funchess one of these days, I'm now up to three hits of the TE-turned WR.

And all that is clearly an improvement on last month's one-card Taylortown show so I hope I can continue that momentum into August.  Until then, how about some show-off posts from my latest COMC haul?

2014 COMC purchases: some Michigan Magic

After having lots of fun with COMC's Black Friday/Cyber Monday--including $25 worth of free credit!--I finally got around to getting things scanned and labelled, so today is the first of a bunch of posts where you'll see stuff I bought in late November/early December.

First up is a whole team set of Wolverines from Topps' outstanding 2009 Magic product:

Here's the backs for those:

And the other six:

Plus their backs:

This set is a blast to collect because of multiple factors including
-The college uniforms
-The design and artwork
-The player selection, I mean, where else will you find all of these guys in the same set?  Younger guys like Henne, Hart, and Manningham meet those in whose footsteps they followed, including Tom Brady, Ty Law, and Steve Hutchinson.  How cool is that?!

This is the full set of 15 Wolverines, and of course I'm working on collecting each of the autographs too, many of which you've already seen over here.  Each player has an autograph as well, and of course Brady's would have to be short-printed to 25 copies, but that's a problem for another day.  At least I have seven of them at this point.

Next up is a pair of pretty significant RCs headed to my football rookies collection:

Jim Harbaugh 1989 Topps Traded RC

What's that you're saying?  This guy has been in the news lately?  I'm not going to jinx anything, so I'll just that that it was fun to add a RC of a guy that remains such a large part of Michigan Football, no matter where he's coaching in 2015.

Charles Woodson 1998 Skybox Thunder auto

And naturally I found another Woodson RC to add to the other nine in the collection.  I'm not a huge fan of Skybox Thunder's barftastic design, but I'm able to overlook it for another Michigan uni card of Woodson's.  Old Charles continues to be a force in the NFL, forcing turnovers and doing his alma mater proud.

I've got lots more to show off soon so stay tuned!

I still think Henne is Magic

Well, the bowl games have been announced, and while we're not headed back to the BCS, all I care is that Michigan will be playing on New Year's Day, which is when the bowl season should end, in my opinion, but that's a whole other post.  The Wolverines will be facing off against South Carolina (they of the SEC) in the Shitty Chain Restaurant Bowl.  I'm happy with the scheduling and I'm pretty happy with the opponent, too--that's a couple years in a row now that we'll have played an interesting team.  As usual, I'll be pulling for the Big Ten in all matchups with the SEC.  And speaking of the Big Ten, God DAMN did we suck this year!  Way to allow the third best team in the other division absolutely pants you in the title game, Nebraska.  Anyway...

I picked this card up on eBay the other day and was excited to have it show up this weekend:

Chad Henne 2009 Topps Magic auto

My 48th Henne (and 592nd football PC card overall--I'm comin' for ya, 600!) is this beautiful Henne autograph.  I love the 2009 Topps Magic set, period.  It's so great I'm pretty sure Topps isn't responsible for it, but I can't prove it yet.  You hear me, Topps?  MOAR COLLEGE SETS.

I love these so much I currently have three other Wolverines from the set:  Arrington, Askew, and Breaston.  By my count, that should mean I'm missing Jason Avant, Tom Brady, Braylon Edwards, Leon Hall, Mike Hart, Drew Henson, Steve Hutchinson, Marlin Jackson, Ty Law, Mario Manningham and LaMarr Woodley.  Some of those are tougher than others, so this could be difficult to put together, but it's something I do want to work on.

Henne's had a bit of an up-and-down season with the Jags, who finally figured out that their mediocre QB is mediocre and are giving Chad a shot.  He's had a couple good games and some bad ones, including this afternoon's defeat.  I'd still like to see him given a shot with a decent team (read:  NOT Miami or Jacksonville), although I realize at this point that he's probably looking at a career as a backup.

As I usually do with these cool cards, I'll leave you with the back as well, since it's one of the better ones as far as card designs go:

Yo Adrian!

Here's a recent eBay pickup that I'm excited about mainly because I passed up a good opportunity to grab it on COMC and then went a long time without finding a good price for it anywhere...until last week:

Adrian Arrington 2009 Topps Magic auto

Yep, it's from one of my all-time favorite sets:  Topps Magic.  It's one of those sets I believe Topps got 100% right.  Really, shouldn't there be one all-college uni set every year?  Combine that with the excellent artistry of the design and you've really got a winner.  You might also remember that I already have B.J. Askew and Steve Breaston, and I'm always on the lookout for the other featured Wolverines. 

I also like to show off the backs of these because they're fun as well:

I'll give you one guess as to the answer for the trivia question...

Anyway, this was an exciting pickup for me, and it marks yet another milestone:  30 hits of Adrian--every single one of them being an autograph.  That's 29 "regular" autos plus one letter manupatch.  Arrington joins Braylon Edwards, Mike Hart, Chad Henne, Jake Long, and Mario Manningham in the football 30-plus hit club.  Interestingly enough (but definitely not coincidentally), all but Edwards are from my favorite draft class of all time:  2008.

I've got a couple more fun things due to arrive soon which I'll get scanned up while I await being able to ship a simply massive COMC haul that's getting larger by the day!