2018 Sportlots purchases: Rookie Blue for day 2

Today's post covers the new football RCs I nabbed for my ongoing Rookie Blue collection.  A quick note:  since buying these I've added a few more players to that checklist, with all of them having transferred away from Michigan at some point.  I made the judgment call to include them, though I'm not counting anything that depicts them with any other college, because then they're not Michigan rookies, are they? 

With some of my attention now being held by the idea of filling out the eight new football PCs I recently added I'll likely do another Sportlots run chasing those guys as well as some of the new rookies as well.  Is there such a thing as productive distraction?

Anyway, on to the first-years:

The cards in this post span 2000-2017, and naturally we'll start at the beginning of that run with a pair starring TE Aaron Shea:  Absolute (#1177/3000) and Metal.  Just these two alone illustrate the mountain of variety we enjoyed back then!  I now need five of Shea's 15 rookies.

With a move to 2002 we get a very airbrushed shot of WR Marquise Walker From Fleer's short-lived Maximum brand (#2246/3500).  As usual you'll see a good amount of numbered cards today, such as my 30th of Walker's 50(!) rookies.

A numbered card that includes a non-airbrushed Michigan helmet in a shot from the Senior Bowl is QB John Navarre's 2004 Donruss Classics RC (#0004/1850).  Executed with a typically strong design this marks my 11th rookie of his I've tracked down out of 25.

Former college ballhawk DB Marlin Jackson makes an appearance on a card I never landed on COMC--his 2005 Topps Heritage RC--because for the longest time the only copy belonged to one of the site's worst offenders.  Yeah, you all know which one: that guy and his shit show.  Anyway, I picked it up for super cheap on Sportlots and now just need six more of Jackson's 30 first-years.

Let's finish off this scan with a pair of Rookies and Stars RCs numbered to 999:  Big Gabe Watson from 2006 (#340) and transfer QB Matt Gutierrez (#895) from the '07 version.  You may recall the latter as the guy who got Wally Pipped by a true freshman Chad Henne before heading to Idaho State.  I'm at 20/22 for Watson's checklist and also need just two more to sew up Gutierrez's five.

With a lot of the '08 portion of the checklist already done and not much quantity in between we'll move all the way up to 2015 and a solid design on WR Devin Funchess' Donruss flagship RC (my 19th of his 24).  May he make that kind of leap forward himself this year!

The rest of the group hails from the amazing 2017 draft class.  Big DL Taco Charlton was my lone example from Crown Royale this time while WR Jehu Chesson repeats the feat from Elite Draft Picks.  Chesson is joined by fellow WR Amara Darboh and RB De'Veon Smith from Score's excellent annual effort, and I believe I'm now done with that product.

Meanwhile jack-of-all-trades Jabrill Peppers gives us today's first look at Donruss' Optic and the only example of Playoff (on a less interesting design than usual).  DE Chris Wormley finishes out this group by joining Peppers in Optic.  This nice little bunch gives me varying degrees of success with that class, from my first of Smith up to six each of Charlton and Peppers; I still lack cards of Delano Hill and Ryan Glasgow but will definitely track those down before much longer.

As I said before I still have lots left to show off and no idea what I'll post next so stay tuned and prepare to be as surprised as I am!