2019 trade package #1: Sports Cards From the Dollar Store

When Doug (of Sports Cards From the Dollar Store) sends me trade packages there are times when he undersells them, promising more in the way of quantity than quality.  While I don't think I can say that's ever been true, I guess it's a matter of perspective.  The one I just received from him the other day was another two-parter, and maybe you've headed over here from the TMV portion starring a bevy of Tigers and Wings.  Lots of quantity there, to be sure, but plenty I liked.

And it's possible that I'm just as pleased with this envelope as usual since the quality was mostly concentrated on the Michigan PCs, which is my preference anyway!  Here's all the great stuff I get to show off this time:

Up first:  basketball, and some recent guys at that.  It sounds a bit funny to refer to Crawford as "recent" but, hey, dude's still playing!  THJ, LeVert, and Sauce Castillo all at least played in Ann Arbor within the past decade.  By the way, all four guys you see above were first round picks.

As was this guy, German star Moe Wagner.  I'm happy to get my first hit of the big man in the form of a jersey from last year's Hoops product in a set called Rise N Shine Memorabilia, a name I know they've used before.  Hopefully he'll be starring for the Lakers before I know it!

The football bunch ended up being a group of nine, perfect for scanning purposes.  Super Bowl-bound QB Tom Brady starts us off on a beautiful 2018 Classics base, one of Panini's best offerings.  2018 champ Brandon Graham is next on a rare base appearance that isn't from his rookie year, and I'm curious to see what his next move is.  Severely underdrafted DL Maurice Hurst follows on a great four-spot:  his 2018 Leaf Draft base and All American insert plus RCs from Panini's Luminance and Rookies and Stars.  I'm loving the focus on college action here.

Then there's a great 2017-18 one-two punch starring Jabrill Peppers:  a rookie year Score Gold Zone parallel (#29/50) plus last year's Donruss Optic.  Doug is now responsible for three excellent Peppers cards from the former, including another parallel plus an autograph!

And then a very cool vintage surprise sews up the gridiron portion:  a 1963 Topps CFL base (in very nice condition!) of QB/RB Bob Ptacek.  After his three-year Michigan career in the late 50s he was drafted by the Browns, spent a year with them, then headed off to six seasons with the pictured Saskatchewan Roughriders.  Doug's gifted me with a few cool CFL issues and this is definitely one of the best!

As usual the hockey portion was the largest, and like the TMV version you'll see a ton of 2009-10 and 18-19 O-Pee-Chee, which I'm definitely down with, especially since I really like the design of the former.  I decided to have fun this time and separate these out in a scan I like to call "Hockey Mikes", the name of one of my favorite tags to use on this blog; I count at least six in my collection and you see four of them here.

And now I may have to create a new tag for "Hockey Andrews" because there's three alone right here (plus one or two "Andy"s not seen here).  Glendening got a double-dip as a Wing and appeared in this evening's other post.  And I'll take hockey John Madden over the Ace/Tinactin guy any day!

The Miller card leading off here was of interest to me because he played for four years in Ann Arbor starting in 2005, so it's possible I saw him play in a few games but can't remember him.  PC favorite Morrison makes another appearance, as does one of many hockey players from my hometown of Livonia, David Moss.  And the UD Nystrom (and its excellent photo) was a nice surprise since he's one of Doug's fellow 2/14 babies.

And here's an excellent pair of hits--the cream of the quality crop--to end things for today.  First up is a sick-nasty patch of Swedish chef Carl Hagelin courtesy of 2012-13 Limited and numbered to just 10.  It's a beautiful patch from a Rangers jersey and a nice upgrade on another Hagelin I believe Doug sent me--a jersey version of the same card.  No surprise there, though, since my Canadian trading buddy has sent me some of my best Hagelins (and hockey hits in general).

#2 is another collection newbie:  C David Wohlberg.  The South Lyon native (a bit north of me here in Ann Arbor) played four seasons for Michigan starting in 2008-09, and while he never made it to the NHL, unlike Miller above I do remember Wohlberg a bit, likely because he put up a nice number of points over his four years.  As always, kudos to Doug for turning up another new Wolverine for my PC, this time in the form of a 2014-15 Upper Deck AHL Box Set auto.

Doug, many thanks for this great start to trading between us in 2019!  I have a few things set aside for you already and will aim for sending something back your way in time for your birthday, especially since I know you have some COMC goodies for me.

2018 COMC purchases: 32 of Rookie Blue, and a 70-year-old card too!

I decided that part two of this latest COMC series would cover all of the new football RCs I picked up this time.  As usual it's a nice eclectic bunch, one that mostly spans 2000-2018, but I also managed to add what's now the oldest card in my entire collection!

And this would be the big winner, a 1948 Bowman rookie of Robert Nussbaumer, a guy who as far as I can tell is making his debut in my collection today.  A "left halfback" (things sure were different back then), Nussbaumer played for Michigan from 1943-45, appearing in 29 games and averaging a solid 5.8 YPC.  After Green Bay took him in the '46 draft, "Bomber" spent two seasons each with the Packers, Redskins, and Chicago Cardinals, closing his career where he started it.

Needless to say I'm very excited to add this 70-year-old card to my collection of Michigan football rookies and vintage stuff!  1948 is as far back as my checklist goes, and I'm chasing cards from Al Wistert, Gene Derricotte, and Merv Pregulman from that year as well.  Nussbaumer joins Wistert in appearing in both '48 Bowman and Leaf while Derricotte can be found in the latter and Pregulman the former.  Whenever I can add any of those it'll be another cause for celebration!

And now we move ahead to modern day, starting with 2000.  I decided to present these in chronological and then alphabetical order (mostly).

The 2000 group comprises Pacific's Omega cards of WR Marcus Knight and TE Aaron Shea.  As is often the case in this series their cards are numbered, #053/500 for Knight and #246/500 for Shea.  That and/or short-printing tends to inflate prices but I ended up doing reasonably well this time.

2001 brings one of my favorite one-two punches in David Terrell and Anthony Thomas (reversed in the scan because I'm stupid).  The WR appears on the Retail version of that year's Pacific Dynagon while the A-Train shows up on Fleer Focus (#0154/1850), Pacific's Private Stock (#061/200), and Upper Deck's confusing Rookie F/X RC (#127/750), which includes multiple versions.

FB B.J. Askew represents 2003 with one of my favorite brands, Prestige, on one of its best designs, again bringing the college uni love.  Possession WR Jason Avant brings the scan and his RC collection to a close with 2006's Flair Showcase (#358/499) and Select (#506/599).  That Showcase card is one of the coolest in my bunch of rookies!

TE Tim Massaquoi leads off this bunch with his 2006 Bowman Sterling first year, leaving me short just his Ultimate Collection card from the same year.  Then we go on a little 2007 run beginning with Alan Branch

...destroyer of QBs, on his Wolverines-approved Ultra RC.  Transferred QB Matt Gutierrez makes his second appearance in this series with his Leaf Limited rookie (#186/399), another numbered affair.  CB Leon Hall brings us back to one of the school's better defenses with Donruss Elite (#078/599) and Ultra Retail cards, two more examples of college shots.  I love that '07 Elite design!  Closing out the year, beastly DE/LB LaMarr Woodley pops up on Leaf Rookies and Stars Longevity (#229/999).

Now we take a quick look into my favorite draft class, 2008.  Mike Hart starts things off on his Icons RC (#508/750), one product that's been my nemesis for a while.  Jake Long's UD Masterpieces card was a short print from that beautiful set, but I finally found a price I could handle.  And Mr. Namesake himself, Super Mario Manningham is back on another good example of a nice Donruss Classics (#371/999) design.  But that's not the last we'll see of #82...

...because he leads off this scan with the final of the 23 RCs I needed, Ultimate Collection (#032/275).  That means he joins Avant as players whose rookie collections I completed today, along with the next guy, QB/WR Devin Gardner on his 2015 Topps Field Access base, a.k.a. his only RC appearance on my checklist.  A 2016 Certified card of another QB, Jake Rudock (#794/999), puts me three away from completing another player's run.

And now we can close out a fun look at Michigan rookies with 10 cards from the outstanding 2017 class.  TE Jake Butt and WR Amara Darboh star on Donruss Optic cards that bookend a pair of pairs.  Cowboys DT Taco Charlton is the #1 attraction here on cards from Classics and Prestige, with both brands clearly in top form.  Chiefs WR Jehu Chesson gives us a look at a couple other brands in Certified (#513/999) and Panini Phoenix, which brings the shiny in droves!

Here's one last defensive pair, starting with all-everything guy Jabrill Peppers from Prestige again plus Select.  I sure do wish Panini didn't have a football monopoly because I'd like to see other brands and their designs, but since I have to put up with that I'm thankful for how great Prestige is year in and year out.  Lastly I dug up a pair of Ravens DE Chris Wormley:  another example of Panini's Phoenix plus my first of Unparalleled, which is a bit busy but plenty shiny.

I had a blast buying and posting this big group, especially the '48 Bowman card, of course, and I'm happy to announce that more rookies are on their way to me from Sportlots.  Before then I still have lots of COMC football content to get to!

2017 trade package #8: Sports Cards From the Dollar Store

You wouldn't know it by the score, but today's victory over Cincinnati was a close one for a large part of the game thanks to a pile of mistakes by the Wolverines.  Still, a win's a win, plus Michigan seems to have escaped the game with everyone healthy as far as I can tell, so I'm more than satisfied.  2-0!

Let's celebrate with a third straight 2017 trade package from buddy of the blog Canadoug, a.k.a. Doug from Sports Cards From the Dollar Store.  A couple months ago he teased me with a partial image of a huge pull from his 2017 Score Football break, then sent that very card plus lots more football content (with a side of hockey) my way, and now I'm finally getting around to showing it all off.

Let's start with the sport of the moment, football:

From another of Doug's breaks, a box of 1989 Panini football stickers, here's career Packer LB John Anderson, whose RC I showed off in this post last April.  My brother and I were big into the baseball versions but not football, and frankly I can't even remember if they were available around here or what.  Anyway, it's nice to see a defensive guy here.

Next is a pair representing QB Tom Brady.  On the left is some pattern or another from 2015 Topps High Tek (which should just be "Tek" in my opinion since it sounds better), while on the right, Twelve is joined on a 2017 Score insert by since-departed RB Blount (off to be ineffective away from New England again) and out-for-the-year receiver Edelman.

Now let's take things back a bit to 1970 and a vintage OPC CFL issue of RB Dave Raimey.  This is my second Raimey as I have his card from the following year, also thanks to Doug, and it features a fantastic photo on a colorful design!

Now we'll get back to the present and this year's Prestige product.  This Panini offering almost always features college unis and excellent designs, and I'm happy to say that this year is par for the course.  Better yet, this Xtra Points parallel of shutdown corner Jourdan Lewis is Blue!  I'm looking forward to grabbing the base versions of all the first-year Wolverines from this one.

Speaking of football rookies, here's a four spot of those courtesy of Doug's 2017 Score break.  Once again I'm a big fan of this low-end Panini product and its simple design plus college action photos.  He was able to pull four extras, giving me my first RCs of TE extraordinaire Butt, DL beast Charlton, all-everything Peppers, and the also effective Wormley.  I'm excited about the Peppers the most because his college career means he'll get plenty of NFL hype, upping the prices of his cards...

...cards like this one, a Red parallel from the same product.  That looks nice, but I'm not the biggest fan of the color.  Maybe Doug could find something a bit different...

Yep, that'll do!  I was very happy for him to have pulled this because I'm sure it would have covered the price of the box, and now I'm even happier that he was generous enough to send it my way.  Of course I've wanted a Peppers auto since they were made and now I'm thrilled to own one with a college photo, low numbering, and a blue border to boot!  The first Cleveland Brown I'll be rooting for in quite a while is the 205th member of my football hits collection and I couldn't be happier to have him.

So why not throw in another to make it twice as nice?  Completing the tri-Pep-ta, here's an excellent maize & blue-theme Panini Father's Day College Memorabilia relic of the Cracked Ice variety.  Some of the Father's Day manurelics are fine, but I'm happier here with this blue college jersey.  Going from zero to two hits of Jabrill sure is exciting!

And now we'll finish up with a handful of hockey:

No doubt from one of Doug's favorite dollar repacks, this Knuble/Turco pairing hails from 2008-09 Upper Deck Victory, something like UD's answer to Score.

And finally, from last year we have an Upper Deck Trilogy Rainbow Green jersey (numbered 238/629) of Columbus D Jack Johnson, a former fan favorite in Ann Arbor.  It features a larger-than-usual jersey swatch, and a bold red one from the Blue Jackets' 'Murica-esque sweaters to boot.  That makes 13 hits of Johnson in my Michigan Hockey collection.

What an awesome wealth of Wolverines, Doug, and thanks again especially for the amazing Peppers stuff!  Once again I hope to return the favor soon.

2017 trade package #4: the (Pedestrian) Collector

I recently received my second trade package courtesy of Chris who runs the (Pedestrian) Collector, and this time I was happy to find some Wolverines to go with the rest of the contents.  If you read my TMV post from this evening you saw that I showed off a pair of cards relevant to that blog, but those make up a tiny fraction of the contents.  In fact, I like to think Chris was doing his best impression of Doug with this package based on the attention to detail he put into finding some Michigan stuff for me (and that's high praise!).

Here's a look at what Chris sent:

The five-card football portion starts with a QB club of three cards.  First is a '98 Topps Chrome of Elvis Grbac, a former Niner/Chief/Raven who had a nice Michigan career from '89-'92.  Next is a nice pair of cards featuring current Wolverines coach Jim Harbaugh.  These hail from '95 Playoff Contenders and '97 Finest.  Shiny and higher-end seems to be the theme of the day!

The fourth card represents two of my football collections:  rookies and vintage.  It's an '81 Topps first-year of 17-year Atlanta Falcon T Mike Kenn, one of the school's most successful NFL products.  This one doesn't fit in with the shiny theme but is high quality for sure!

The fifth and final card gets us back on track with the others, and it's also from about the same time period:  a 2001 Topps Chrome base of Tai Streets, a WR who played for the '97 national champs and went on to a brief NFL career with San Fran and Detroit.

Now that's some good football content!  On to hockey:

It's a Mike Comrie hot page!  The first five cards represent the former Michigan C who's pictured with his original team, Edmonton, for whom he skated from 2001-2003.  The former Mr. Hilary Duff appears on cards from

• 2002-03 Pacific Heads Up
• 2002-03 Private Stock Titanium
• 2003-04 Upper Deck High Gloss Parallel (#24/25)
• 2001-02 and 2002-03 Atomic

This is a really nice bunch, especially thanks to the pair of die-cut atomic cards, not to mention the low-numbered UD parallel, which may be my best Comrie that isn't a hit to-date!

Two other players came long for the ride, and one is this '94-'95 Electric Ice parallel of LW (and Kitchener, Ontario native) Cam Stewart's Upper Deck second-year card.  It goes to show that Upper Deck's penchant for quality design goes way back.

Finally, Chris included a pair of cards of blog favorite goalie Marty Turco, both showing him with the Stars, the team that originally drafted him.  These come from 2002-03 Private Stock Titanium and 2007-08 O-Pee-Chee (which was being handled by Upper Deck at the time).  They give me a nice pair of action shots with Turco in both away and home unis.

Once again, thanks a lot for a great package of Wolverines, Chris!  I'll work on sending you a nice response as soon as I can acquire stuff I know you'll like.

2017 trade package #1: Sports Cards From the Dollar Store

Having shown off some goods over on TMV this evening, let's have a look at even more stuff from Doug at Sports Cards From the Dollar Store in the 42nd(!) package I've posted from him on this here blog:

The basketball contingent starts with this pair of 2013-14 Panini Crusade RCs of recent stars Trey Burke and Tim Hardaway Jr.  THJ went on an absolute tear for Atlanta last Friday, then posted this yesterday:

From one Michigan Alum to another, all I can say is that boy Tom Brady is untouchable!!! #GOBLUE @UMichFootball #RespectGreatness

— Tim Hardaway Jr (@T_HardJR) February 6, 2017

#RespectGreatness indeed.

Joining that pair was this beauty:

This here is a :takes deep breath: Glenn Robinson III 2014-15 Panini National Treasures Air Apparent Jersey Autographs Prime patch auto (#05/25).  This card of the third Glenn Robinson is a triple threat of a very cool signature, ridiculous patch, and low numbering.  GRIII will be in the All-Star slam dunk contest and tweeted the following this morning:

I want to let all my followers know, if you have any ideas💡 for me to do in the Dunk Contest I wanna hear it!! 😳🤔

— Glenn Robinson III (@GRIII) February 7, 2017

Good luck to him!  This amazing patch auto is my fourth Robinson hit ant 69th overall in my basketball collection.

Football was represented too, and it even had a Super Bowl connection:

Repping my vintage football collection is this 1962 Post Cereal CFL of former QB Bob Ptacek.  If you see a CFL-related card in my collection you can put good money on it having come from Doug, who digs up gems like this all the time.  Very cool!  It's been almost four years but I previously posted about Ptacek after picking up his TK Legacy auto.

Moving on to a more recent product, this Devin Funchess 2015 Prestige Draft Picks card will go right into my football inserts PC.  Funch's base card from this set looks pretty nice, but this extra shiny/foil-y insert of the 2015 2nd-rounder is cool too.

Joining those guys is--what's this?  A redemption?  Interesting.  It's from 2007 Playoff Contenders and autographed Rookie Ticket #106 is Alan Br--

ALAN BRANCH KILLS QBs

Uh, I believe that's "Super Bowl champion Alan Branch Kills QBs", friend.  Your friendly (except to QBs) neighborhood NT had a half-sack and recovered a big fumble for the Pats on Sunday while earning his place in NFL history.

This redemption is an interesting one for two reasons; first, Branch never signed his cards so these got returned with a "NO AUTOGRAPH" stamp, like so:

and a replacement.  And second, I'm aware of that because way, way back, like almost 10 years ago, I bought a redemption card just like this one and tried to redeem it.  So I'm really curious to see what happens when I send this card in; will Panini honor it?  And if so, what will I get?  Stay tuned to find out!

Finally, it's hockey time!

More like Hockey Mikes time with more than half of the cards representing Cammalleri and Comrie, including that sweet Invincible card.  Also in the shot are a pair of Jack Johnsons, fellow D-man Jon Merrill, and sharer of Doug's 2/14 birthday Eric Nystrom, a guy I saw a ton of during my season ticket days.  His ability to pull Wolverines from Dollar Store packs and case breaks is unparalleled.

Case in point:  this stunning 2012-13 Dominion Patches Autographs patch auto (#52/60) of Bork himself, 2015-16 Stanley Cup-winner Carl Hagelin.  One Michigan alum patch/auto is great but a pair is just crazy.  I do believe this card, my eighth of the Swede, is my new favorite!

Doug, thanks again for a crazy (or would you be more comfortable with loonie?) good package, not to mention the second one I need to post while I try to figure out what to send back your way.  In the meantime, happy one week until your birthday!

2016 COMC/Sportlots purchases: Rookie New-out and Through-out

I'm back today with more COMC pickups, and this time I'm mixing in some Sportlots purchases as well since I made even more progress on my football RC collection thanks to both sites.  I'm going to split them up into a couple posts since they combine for more than 100 cards, but this post will show off a smaller number as I'll be going into them in a bit more depth.  While an upcoming post will feature a bunch of cards of players whose first-year collections I've already started, this one includes three other groups:

1.  Rookie new-out:  my first RCs of a player in the collection

 

Jeff Backus 2001 NFL Showdown First and Goal

Larry Foote 2002 Bowman

Backus, the long-time Lions LT, is reasonably well-known around these parts since I've picked up a couple signatures of his, including one from SCAMB.  This is my first of his five 2001 RCs and the oddball-iest as it comes from MLB Showdown's football version.

Foote is a LB whose career I followed closely as he was with the Wolverines in the early part of last decade and then in the NFL at a time I was getting more into it.  The Detroit native went to the Steelers in the fourth round of 2002 and won a pair of Super Bowls with them in addition to spending a season each with Detroit and Arizona.  Now that his 13-year career has ended he's a linebackers coach for the Cardinals.  I just need one more RC of his (Titanium Postseason) to finish up his collection.

2.  Rookie Through-out, part 1:  the below cards finish off the rookie card collections of their respective players

Ronald Bellamy 2003 Upper Deck Pros and Prospects (with Amani Toomer) (#0857/1800):  Bellamy's eighth and final card pairs him with one of Michigan's great WRs
Prescott Burgess 2007 Topps Chrome:  It's kind of hard to believe the last Burgess I needed, his eighth, was this simple Chrome card!
Ty Law 1995 Bowman and Bowman's Best:  It took me a bit to find reasonable prices on both of Ty's Bowman entries from '95 but Sportlots, as it often does, did the trick, to get me to 10/10.
Jonas Mouton 2011 Absolute Memorabilia Retail (#390/399):  Numbered retail-specific versions of somewhat obscure guys sure are fun to track down so it's nice to have all nine Moutons.
Shantee Orr 2006 Select:  Here's the Select version of Shantee's '06 Score RC to put me at 100%.
Ernest Shazor 2005 Upper Deck Rookie Debut:  Rookie Debut was a pretty nice looking set that yet, though I'm surprised the undrafted Shazor was included for one of his three RC appearances.
Terrance Taylor 2009 SP Threads:  Taylor was a big enough dude to fit on three 2009 RCs, including this lovely college uni issue.
Jerame Tuman 1999 Revolution and Skybox Dominion (with Amos Zereoue):  Two many Tumans!  I love the variety here:  a very typical eye-melting Pacific card plus a much simpler (and kind of boring, actually) dual RC with former Mountaineer Amos Zereoue, to give me all eight of the TEs first-years.
Tyrone Wheatley 1995 Crown Royale:  I can "Ty" a bow on Wheatley's collection!  (Sorry, I'll see myself out).  This excellent Pacific die-cut was the 25th card I needed of the Wolverines' RB coach.

Rookie Through-out part 2:  these guys' rookie collections are done as well since they each appeared on only one RC!

Mike Bass 1973 Topps:  Bass, from nearby Ypsilanti, is completely new to my PC.  A DB for Michigan in the mid-60s, he was selected by Green Bay in the 12th round back in '67, was sold to the Lions before the season started, then signed with the Skins, with whom he spent the remaining seven seasons of his career.  Bass piled up 31 INTs and four TDs (including a fumble recovery in Super Bowl VII.  As you can see here, Bass had to wait until halfway through his career to appear on a RC.
Hayden Epstein 2002 Fleer Platinum:  Epstein's not completely unfamiliar around here as I have a pair of his signatures from TK Legacy, including this one from the M Go Blue set.  Jacksonville drafted the kicker in the seventh round in '02, and he split his season between the Jags and Vikings, with whom he's pictured, going 5/9 on FGs and making all 13 PATs.  That would be his only pro season, but at least he got the honor of appearing on a rookie card as a kicker, which is rare!
Jay Feely 2001 Leaf Rookies and Stars:  Wow, two kickers?  Feely, who's about to turn 40 on Monday, was a Wolverine from 1995-98, so he got a bit of run with the '97 champs before a full campaign the following year to show off for NFL scouts.  His path to the pros went through the Arena Football League, and in 2001 Atlanta signed him.  Over 14 seasons he also kicked for the Giants, Dolphins, Jets, Cardinals, and Bears, and finished up with 332/402 FGM (with a long of 61) and 449/452 extra points.  Jay parlayed that career into a new one covering college football on CBS.
Len Ford 1955 Bowman:  Ford, who was primarily a DE, is quite possibly the best player in today's post.  A D.C. native, he transferred to Michigan in time to play for the 1945-47 teams including the legendary 1947 champs.  He somehow went undrafted and played his first two pro seasons in the All-America Football Conference before joining the Browns for most of his career.  He enjoyed a great run with that team, going to seven title games and winning three of them while also earning Pro Bowl honors four times.  His outstanding career, which finished in Green Bay in 1958, earned him enshrinement into the NFL Hall of Fame in 1976.  I love the image on his '55 Bowman RC, a classic design that includes a hilariously cut out Browns logo pasted on.
Chris Howard 1998 Leaf Rookies and Stars:  Howard was a '97 champ but went in the fifth round in '98 and never garnered enough interest for companies to have him appear on RCs besides this Leaf Rookies and Stars issue.  Though his rookie card run was one and done, I do have a TK Legacy auto of him.
Jon Jansen 2007 Topps Total (with Chris Samuels and Randy Thomas):  Jansen was another OT that came out of Michigan's offensive lineman factory, and a very good one at that over his nine seasons with Washington (and a bit role with Detroit), but despite being a rookie in 1999 he didn't appear on non-Press Pass/SAGE cardboard until his inclusion in 2007 Topps Total.  This was a judgment call on my part but I felt that Jansen deserved a rookie card so here he is.  You'll see I made a similar call with another player in a second.
Alain Kashama 2004 Sweet Spot (#0694/1299):  Kashama is definitely one of the more unlikely guys you'll see appear on a football card at all, let alone a rookie.  The DE was born in the Congo before his family moved to Canada, ultimately ending up in Montreal.  Michigan took a flier on him--hey, Tim Biakabutuka is his cousin!--and Kashama had a pretty reasonable career over 40 games.  The NFL wasn't interested enough to draft him, though he did go in the first round (to Montreal) in the CFL version.  The Bears gave him a shot as an UDFA, and he would appear in three games with them in 2004, then one with Seattle in 2005.  Apparently his fate rested with the CFL after all, and Alain would join Montreal, Hamilton, and Calgary.  Amazingly, Upper Deck included him in the high-end Sweet Spot set back in 2004.
Ron Kramer 1958 Topps:  Kramer didn't quite have the same pro success as Ford, but among Michigan greats he has few equals.  I know I've spoken about him before a few times, especially when I introduced his TK Legacy auto to my collection.  I absolutely love his '58 Topps RC featuring Kramer in his old-style winged helmet somewhere on campus (I'm not 100% sure which building that is).
Reggie McKenzie 1974 Topps:  Man, talk about a bunch of Wolverines legends today.  I've shown off a couple McKenzie signatures recently so I'm thinking at least a few of you should remember who he is.  Another College Hall-of-Famer, Reggie looks pretty imposing on his '74 Topps RC, a card that came out a couple years after the Bills grabbed him in the second round.
William Peterson 2003 Topps Total (with Will Allen):  Peterson, who apparently goes by "William James" now, was a DB for Michigan in the mid-to-late-90s, including the '97 team, before transferring.  The Giants took him in 2001's third round, and he went on to play for Philly, Jacksonville, Detroit, and San Fran between then and 2010.  Like Jansen above I threw him a bone on this multiplayer Topps Total card that came out a few years after he debuted.
Josh Williams 2001 NFL Showdown 1st Edition:  Williams was a DT at Michigan in the late 90s, so again, he was part of that '97 title team.  He joined the Colts in 2000 as a fourth-rounder and played all six of his NFL seasons with them.  That's actually a pretty successful career when you consider how many guys wash out so early.  Anyway, he was interesting enough to make it into the same NFL Showdown set as Backus above, which is pretty cool in my book.
Maurice Williams 2001 Pacific (#0861/2500):  Our final player today is another Williams (and another '97 champ!), and in this case I already had something of his, a Press Pass autograph from the same year.  The OT was good enough to make it into Pacific's '01 base set, which was anything but basic since rookies were serial-numbered.  Williams appears with a nice shot from what I'm guessing is the Senior Bowl, so I'll happily check this one off as a Michigan uni card!

If you were scoring at home you'll know I added 14 new names to the rookie collection and finished up 21 players.  Taking a gander at my checklist I can see that I've completed 117 of 173 different players, not including pending rookies from this year's draft.  I'm also nearing the 1,000 card mark, and as I mentioned you'll get to see a bunch more rookies of guys that have already appeared in this series in a future post.