26 November 2015

Breaking it Down 23: Cards from the Nachos Grande Group Break


The last time I posted cards from a Nachos Grande group break, it took me a whole year to write the post. I didn't want that to happen again, so I made sure to get the scans cropped and ready to go (relatively) soon after receiving the cards. My notes tell me I got the cards on November 16th, so this really is a pretty quick turnaround from receipt to posting. This break ran for a while in October and November and featured several boxes of product from 2015, 2014, and 2012, along with some miscellaneous other bonus items. Per his usual, Nachos Grande added some extras to each package to go along with the group break stuff. I was a little slow on getting into the break, but I was still able to get one of my top teams, the Toronto Blue Jays.

I guess I could have saved it for last, but I am leading off with the hit that got pulled for my team, a Dalton Pompey autograph from 2015 Topps Heritage High Numbers. I don't know much about him, to be honest, but pre-2015 he was ranked by various organizations as being in the Top 50 or so prospects in baseball. He has spent some time with the Major League club during the last two seasons, although his numbers while there haven't been awesome. It looks like he's done some pretty good things in the minors, though, so maybe he just needs a little more seasoning.


These cards from 1982 Topps Baseball were some of the cooler bonus items in the package, especially the Danny Ainge card. He is most well-known for his basketball career, but he started out as a professional baseball player with special considerations made for him to play college basketball on the side. He wound up being drafted by the Boston Celtics and after some legal wrangling retired from baseball to go play basketball.


These are some of the Heritage High Number base cards I got. I had already purchased a full set of these, so I didn't really need them. Kevin Pillar had quite a season defensively, although he didn't get the Gold Glove award due to Kevin Kiermaier's even better year.


I've always liked the Collector's Choice brand, although that Joe Carter card kind of has some overkill going with three Blue Jays logos visible on the card front. I like that Jose Bautista game card, too, although it's not quite on the SEGA Card-Gen level.


That Roberto Osuna card comes from the 2015 Topps High Tek set, which has a staggering array of background patterns and parallels. This is the Pipes background, which is not particularly rare, but is also not the most common pattern. Again Collector's Choice pops up with a cool card. It's a shame that catchers are prevented from painting their masks now due to licensing agreements with the equipment manufacturers. I tend to like it when players like hockey goalies and baseball catchers can personalize their gear a little bit. The other cards in the scan are a cool look at some sets I wasn't familiar with.


I got a couple of Gold parallels from the 2015 Topps Stadium Club box. One is Daniel Norris, who got traded to the Tigers shortly after I made a half-hearted attempt to start a player collection of his cards. The other features the bat-flipping maestro, Jose Bautista, who is a favorite player of mine. I can't afford his cards, though. I wound up with a couple of cards from 2015 Topps Chrome. I can't remember for sure if any of them are Refractors, but I am pretty certain I didn't get anything bigger than a basic Refractor anyhow.


I think that Colby Rasmus came from the box of 2012 Panini Prizm. He is now with the Astros and just recently became the first player in history to accept a qualifying offer. My eyes still reject the idea of Frank Thomas as a member of any team other than the White Sox. That must be a different Frank Thomas.


I scanned the horizontal cards together, so this scan covers some ground I've already been over. I think I like 2014 Topps Stadium Club more than I like the 2015 version. Maybe it's just because I bought several boxes of 2014 and have been gathering Members Only parallels from that set. I don't think I've purchased more than a retail pack or two of the 2015 set. That Devon Travis card jogs my memory a little bit. I think the two previous 2015 Topps Chrome scans were base cards and this one is a Refractor.

I don't sign up for group breaks as often as I used to, but I still get drawn into one from time to time. I didn't scan all the cards that Nachos Grande sent me, but I hit most of the highlights. It was a fun break and I was lucky enough to choose a team that pulled a hit, so I am pretty happy overall. It probably worked out better for me than buying an equivalent dollar amount of unopened wax, which would really only be a blaster and a couple of loose retail packs or 3-5 Hobby packs of low-end product.

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