Clearing Out the Draft Folder with Some UFC Cards

I am not particularly enthusiastic about this post, but I hate to waste a scanning session by deleting old drafts from my queue. I pick up a handful of UFC cards from my usual eBay source back in February. He lists auctions that end on the night UFC events, featuring the fighters on that particular card. In this case, the event was UFC 208.

This is a copy of Jim Miller's autograph from 2014 Topps UFC Bloodlines. I don't keep very good track of my collection, so I probably have at least two or three copies of this card. The seller I buy these from starts most things at $0.01, so I'll just roll through and put $0.75 or $1.00 bids on anything that looks interesting. I wind up winning a handful of cards each time, and get a little stack of hits for the price of a pack or two.

This one is a Green parallel of Miller's 2012 Topps UFC Knockout card. It's numbered # 06 / 88. Miller hasn't had much good luck lately, losing a couple of decisions to Dustin Poirier and Anthony Pettis after tough battles. He at least got a Fight of the Night bonus for his fight against Poirier in UFC 208.

I snapped up this Roan Carneiro Gold parallel from 2015 Topps UFC Champions because it was a Gold parallel. It is a low-numbered card, marked as # 08 / 25. He lost his fight at UFC 208, falling by unanimous decision to Ryan LaFlare. A couple of months later, the UFC cut him from the roster.

Ronaldo 'Jacare' Souza got a Performance of the Night bonus at UFC 108 for his Submission of Tim Boetsch. This low-numbered Black parallel comes from 2014 Topps UFC Bloodlines. The Black parallels from this set look pretty much like base cards, only darker. It's a good thing they have serial numbers on the back, with this one being # 17 / 25 in the print run.

The last card for the post is another Souza card, a Gold parallel from 2015 Topps UFC Knockout. It's numbered # 63 / 99. There's not much else to say about it, as the only fighter in this post that I specifically collect is Jim Miller. The other cards were purchased because they were low-numbered and/or Gold parallels.

It does feel nice to get this post written and out of the queue, though, as it's one of my oldest drafts. I'll probably be clearing out some more old posts in the next couple of weeks, as I'll be away from my scanner for a while.

A Relic Card Tied to an Actual Event

My go-to breaker for UFC stuff has (temporarily, maybe?) closed up shop, so I haven't been as focused on that collection lately. I was never one of his biggest customers, but I did enjoy sitting down for an evening each week to watch and participate in the breaks. I've still been picking up the occasional card or two on eBay, though, usually trying to find a few cards from one seller so I can save on shipping. That's what happened with today's two cards. There were a few more cards that I had bids in on, but one goal for this collection is to get cards for my PCs that are cheap, so I tend to get outbid a lot. It doesn't bother me as much as it used to, because there will always be something else I want. I've always got an eBay watch list that is 4 pages long, and I've got wish lists on several other sites, too, so I'm never spoiled for options when I feel like buying something.

This Jim Miller auto / relic comes from 2013 Topps UFC Knockout and is numbered # 326 / 399. Miller has lost more than he's won lately, and is going to be on the upcoming UFC 200 fight card mostly because he also fought in UFC 100 rather than because he's an up-and-coming fighter or big superstar. Good enough, I guess, and maybe a decent win on the big stage will help to prolong his career for a while longer.

I also picked up this 2012 Topps UFC Knockout Fight Mat Relic Card of Urijah Faber, numbered # 88 / 88. The edges and corners on this card were kind of roughed up, but it's probably going to be in my collection until I die anyway, so that doesn't matter too much. Maybe one of my kids will inherit my card collection, and maybe my wife will trash it or sell it for pennies on the dollar. It won't really matter to me at that point. The cool thing about this card is that it actually is tied to a specific event. Down at the bottom of the card is the sentence, "The relic contained on this card came specifically from UFC 132." I wrote this post before I wrote yesterday's post, so this is actually the second post in a row that has featured a relic from a specific event.

Looking at pictures from the event, it looks like my relic came from one of the two Harley-Davidson logos on the mat. It's pretty cool that I can match the mat piece in my card to some specific part of the mat at the event. Cruz vs. Faber was the headliner on that card, and Faber lost by decision, brining their record against each other to 1 - 1. Just a couple of weeks ago they fought again for the 3rd time, with Faber unfortunately coming out on the wrong end of a one-sided 5-round beatdown. He even hinted at retirement in the post-fight interviews. I guess that's what happens when you choose to PC the older fighters instead of the upcoming young superstars.

I've started to really enjoy watching UFC events, and I'll probably keep picking up MMA cards for as long as the fights hold my interest. It is too bad that TeamBreaks.com is taking a break, but I can understand getting burnt out or stopping because it's hard to fill breaks.