Josh Wise Torque Auto Relic - Quaker State 400 Presented by Advance Auto Parts

It's been kind of a slow week for posting here on The Raz Card Blog. Most of the posts in my Draft queue are pretty old, and I guess I'm a little tired of looking at the titles and trying to pick one to finish out. I also don't really feel like scanning more cards or processing scans from the last couple of months. I am still collecting trading cards, and I enjoy that, but I am finding it difficult to sit down and do blog stuff. I am also focusing a little more on picking up original art in the form of sketch cards and larger sketches, either through eBay or commissions directly from artists.

For the 4th of July, MLB.tv had their service on sale for $17.76 for the rest of the season, and the military discount meant that I was able to get it for $13 and some change. I've watched a handful of Astros games since then, which has been pretty fun. I also watched most of the UFC fights last night, although a couple of good fights got pulled from the card, one of my favorite fighters (Jim Miller) lost, and a lot of the fights weren't all that exciting. That's how it is sometimes.

Yesterday there was also a NASCAR race, the Quaker State 400 Presented by Advance Auto Parts at Kentucky Speedway. Danica Patrick started in 20th place and moved up to finish in 15th, so it was a pretty good run for her.

The guy pictured on this card isn't Danica Patrick, though. This is Josh Wise, who I believe is retired from racing so he can focus on other stuff. This is the Red parallel of his Jumbo Firesuit Signatures card. It's got a sticker autograph, a big swatch of gray firesuit, and it is serially-numbered # 11 / 25.

Here is the back of the card. It's got a little write-up on Josh Wise's career. I think I got this card from COMC for a couple bucks, but it could have been an eBay purchase. I doubt Wise will have many cards in the future, so I am kind of running out of non-Danica Patrick drivers to collect. I'll need to go through the current NASCAR roster to see if there is anyone else whose personality or sponsors appeal to me. I like Kyle Busch's cars, but what I've seen of his personality rubs me a little wrong. I don't know.

2011 Press Pass FanFare Josh Wise - Coca-Cola 600

Although the vast majority of my NASCAR card purchases are for my Danica Patrick collection, I still pick up a few things here and there for other drivers, like the now-retired Josh Wise. I may have to start another driver collection at some point, as it seems like most of the racers I've focused on collecting are either retired already (Tony Stewart, Jeff Gordon, Josh Wise) or are on their way out (Dale Earnhardt Jr.). That really leaves Danica Patrick as my only active driver collection. Some of those other folks will continue to get cards due to their popularity and status in the sport, but it's not the same.

This particular card is a Magnificent Materials dual relic card of Josh Wise from 2011 Press Pass FanFare. I don't recall where I got this one, but it was probably an eBay purchase. It's been a few months since I added it to my post queue. Instead of the usual firesuit or sheet metal relics, this one contains a piece of glove and a piece of shoe.

Back to active drivers, Danica Patrick qualified in 15th place for the Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte Motor Speedway. That's a pretty good starting point for her (over 10 spots higher than her season average), so hopefully it will translate into a good finishing position as well.

Pack of the Day 137: Hobby Box of 2016 Panini Prizm NASCAR

Like I mentioned yesterday, I found a new (to me) card shop here in Dayton, Ohio, and while I was there I bought a box of 2016 Panini Prizm NASCAR. This is the first NASCAR product from Panini, and the first NASCAR product since Press Pass shut down. I think that was in January of 2015. So it's a pretty big deal if NASCAR trading cards are something you're into. Each box has 20 packs and 4 cards per pack, for a total of 80 cards in a box. 

I got 54 base cards in my box, with no doubles. The checklist is 100 cards deep, so you're going to need multiple boxes if you're trying to complete a set. The set starts out with your fairly standard driver cards. The first 22-ish cards run in numerical sequence based on the driver's door number, but then I guess they ran out of door numbers and things get a little random. Drivers like Josh Wise don't have a stable number all year, so they don't even get their numbers on the card. The card backs are pretty bare-bones, with very basic height/weight/birthdate information and a paragraph about the driver.

After the driver cards is a subset showing the cars themselves. The backs of these cards feature a paragraph about a particular achievement that driver has accomplished, usually a victory, a pole, or a run of good finishes at a particular track.

Following that, there are several more subsets. One features Champions, the next has Driver Introductions, then there are a few Hall of Fame cards, and finally there is a card for the 2015 Chase for the Cup with the final Chase standings on the back.

The most numerous parallel is the basic rainbow-hued Prizm. I got ten of these in the box, although there are also Prizm parallels for all of the inserts that I am not counting in that number.

It took me a couple of minutes to figure out what these are. Apparently there is a short-print base variation set featuring eight drivers. I pulled a Rusty Wallace base version and a Mark Martin Prizm variation from this group. They are numbered as if they came from the base set, but they have a checkered flag background to differentiate them from the base cards whose numbers they share.

I pulled 5 inserts from three different insert sets. The first is Competitors, next is Qualifying Times, and last is Winner's Circle. I think Competitors is an insert for drivers who are popular to get a few more cards in the set. Qualifying Times talks about drivers who qualify first for a race, and Winner's Circle is a set that honors each race winner from 2015. There are a couple of other insert sets that I didn't pull any cards from, like Champions and Machinery, as well as retail-exclusive inserts for Wal-Mart and Target.

I pulled three basic Prizm parallels for insert sets. They are just like the Prizm parallels for the base cards.

There were three colorful serially-numbered Prizm parallels in my box. All come from the base set, although I believe most of the inserts have parallels. That Rusty Wallace is a Green Flag parallel numbered # 031 / 149, Denny Hamlin is a Blue Flag parallel numbered # 37 / 99, and Jamie Mcmurray is a Rainbow parallel numbered # 19 / 24. I guess it is just because of good branding, but I can't see a rainbow parallel without thinking of Jeff Gordon.

Each box doesn't guarantee three hits, but it does tell you to look for three hits, on average, per box. I got three in my box. Here they are in the order they were pulled. The Kyle Busch Firesuit Fabrics card is the only numbered parallel in the box. It is a Green Flag Prizm parallel, numbered # 56 / 99. The autograph is a Driver Signatures Prizm of Ricky Stenhouse, Jr. and the Race Used Tire relic card features Kurt Busch. I can't say I am blown away by these hits, but they are nice enough. I've seen better breaks out there, but I would imagine mine is about the average you might expect to see from this product.

I was happy to find some of this in a hobby shop, and overall I think it's about what you would come up with if someone asked you to describe a Panini Prizm NASCAR product. I would like to see more cards per box. The price would probably feel a lot better with 100 cards in the box as opposed to 80, even if you don't increase the hits per box and just add another 14 base cards and 6 inserts/parallels.

Some Josh Wise Relics on NASCAR All-Star Weekend

Here are a couple more Josh Wise relic cards I picked up a while back. This weekend is the All-Star race in NASCAR, which is about as meaningless as any other All-Star event in pro sports. Josh Wise has a pretty interesting All-Star race story, though, so although he isn't in this weekend's race it is appropriate to post about him here.

In 2014 a Reddit user took note of Wise and started a push to get him voted into the All-Star race, as well as to get him a Dogecoin sponsorship. Most of the spots in the All-Star race are allocated to drivers who finish well or meet other performance-based criteria, but there is also a fan vote that allows for other drivers to get into the race. Over the last few years that vote has largely gone Danica Patrick's way, but in 2014 the support of the Reddit / Dogecoin community pushed Josh Wise past her in the voting and into the All-Star race, where he avoided a couple of wrecks and finished in 15th place. Lionel made a die-cast car of his Dogecoin car, which I was glad to add to my collection.

Today's relic cards come from 2014 Press Pass Total Memorabilia. Press Pass sadly went out of business right at the beginning of 2015, and eventually Panini picked up the NASCAR license. They haven't put out any NASCAR products yet, but they have announced a few products coming down the line, with Panini Prizm probably being the first one. This first card is a single-swatch tire relic, numbered # 076 / 275.

Next up is a dual relic with another piece of tire and a plain blue firesuit swatch. It is numbered # 149 / 150. I've slowed down a bit on my NASCAR collecting lately, but I will still pick up stuff here and there. I think getting a couple of Panini products out will really be good, because we 'need' some fresh material in the marketplace.

2013 Press Pass Ignite Hot Threads Josh Wise

I meant to post this sooner, but I didn't get around to making a NASCAR post on Sunday after the AAA 400 Drive for Autism at Dover International Speedway. It was a pretty significant race for one of the drivers I collect, as Danica Patrick finished in 13th place for her best finish of the season so far and her 4th Top 20 finish this year. People are saying that she benefited from the wreck that involved 18 cars from the field, but the same could be said of anyone else who finished among the leaders in the race. Dale Earnhardt Jr., another driver I follow, wrecked out of the race and finished the race in 32nd place.

Lastly, Josh Wise finished in 36th place, taking his usual spot among the racers at the back of the field. It would be interesting to see what he might do with better equipment, but there aren't usually a lot of open spots in the big-name cars. I picked up a handful of Josh Wise cards a few months ago, and this 2013 Press Pass Ignite Hot Threads relic is one of them. It's a nice enough card. I opened a fair amount of 2013 Ignite and it was also among the first products I opened when I returned to collecting in 2013, so I've got a bit of a soft spot for these cards.

2012 Press Pass FanFare Magnificent Materials Josh Wise

I am sharing another NASCAR card today featuring one of the drivers I follow, Josh Wise. He finished in 38th today at the STP 500 after dropping out early due to engine issues. Other drivers I follow, Dale Earnhardt Jr. and Danica Patrick, finished in similar places (14th and 16th, respectively) but those results are disappointing for Earnhardt and a step up for Patrick. Earnhardt dropped two spots in the standings and Danica's spot in the points went up by three.

This firesuit relic card is from the 2012 Press Pass FanFare Magnificent Materials set. It is numbered # 077 / 299 and came as part of a group of Josh Wise cards I ordered together so I could take advantage of combined shipping.

My post titles and written content have been a bit lacking lately. The shortfall probably arises from a mix of blogging fatigue and this lingering illness I've been battling. It's like the cold / flu that keeps on giving. Much of the time I would normally spend blogging is spent sleeping or trying to sleep. I will probably be skipping out on the blog for a month starting in about a week, as I will be away from my collection and my internet connection. I thought about queuing up some posts to keep the blog running in my absence, but I don't think I'll get around to it.

A Josh Wise Autograph Pickup

Most of my NASCAR content lately has been Danica Patrick-centric, but there are a couple of other drivers whose cards I collect. One of those drivers is Josh Wise, who currently drives the #30 car for The Motorsports Group.

2016 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series, California18-20 March, 2016, Fontana, California USAJosh Wise and Michael Annett© 2016, Nigel KinradeNKP
Posted by TMG - The Motorsports Group on Thursday, March 24, 2016

Wise seems to be a pretty good driver, but thus far has only been able to get into some under-equipped rides and generally spends most races either not finishing or running in the bottom 5-10 cars. It's got to be tough to be out there at the end of the pack week after week, but I guess at least he's still getting paid to be a race car driver and not out looking for a 9 to 5 job somewhere.

I did a search for his cards a couple of weeks ago and found quite a few deals on some things, especially once I factored in combined shipping with people selling multiple Wise items. One of the highlights from my searching was this autograph card from 2013 Press Pass Ignite. The autographs from this set are designed to scan as poorly as possible, turning the card background into a murky dark mess while highlighting the signed sticker and whatever bits of stuff are on the scanner glass. This card is actually quite attractive in-hand, as the dark mess in the center is a silver sunburst pattern surrounded by a nice blue color. The card is numbered # 10 / 25, which probably makes it some kind of parallel. Ever since Press Pass went under it is hard to look up their checklists for print runs and parallels.

The back of the card features the usual congratulatory text and a cropped version of the photo that was on the front. Pretty basic stuff. Just as I hope Danica Patrick can move into consistent top 15-20 finishes, I hope that Josh Wise can progress with his new team and move up into the 20's with his car. Getting faster requires money, though, and you need sponsorships to make money. It'll be a tough road for him, but hopefully he can grind it out and stay in a car.

Combined Shipping Leads to Buying Stuff 3: NASCAR Parallels

After adding the NASCAR quad relic, the R.A. Dickey auto/relic, and the George Springer Panini card I still needed two items to qualify for free shipping. I eventually settled on a couple of parallels from the 2014 Press Pass Total Memorabilia NASCAR set. One is a Gold parallel of Dale Earnhardt Jr. and it is numbered # 019 / 175. The other is a Black & White parallel of Josh Wise and it is # 91 / 99. I tend to focus mostly on my Danica Patrick player collection when it comes to NASCAR, but it is nice to pick up a card or two featuring the other drivers I follow. 

Earnhardt Jr. is 6th in the driver standings right now and has made the Chase for the Cup playoffs for this season. I don't know what his chances are, though. I haven't been paying a huge amount of attention to NASCAR for the last few months, but my impression is that he did better at the start of the season than he has in the last little while. Looking at the race by race results tells me that he's been pretty consistent all year.

Josh Wise changed teams in July and has a couple of races with his new team. It seems like his new car is pretty similar in quality to his old car, and he is qualifying and finishing in about the same spots as usual, spending a lot of time in the 30's. He does have a 10th-place finish this year, but is currently in 37th place in the points, far out of the Chase for the Cup.

That does it for my current batch of cards that I bought just for free/combined shipping. I usually try to limit my additional purchases to cards that I want anyway, but a good deal on shipping will often give me that extra little push I need to make a purchase. I have another big batch of cards on the way that I bought from one seller after noticing that anything after the first item shipped for free. I searched their inventory and came up with some good gems for my collection.

Josh Wise 2013 Press Pass Signings and Ignite Hot Threads

Here are a couple of Josh Wise items I've picked up. I got the 2013 Press Pass Ignite Hot Threads firesuit relic from eBay sometime during the last couple of months. I think multi-colored swatches are more common in NASCAR products than they are in the various stick-and-ball sports, but I couldn't pass on this three-color piece. I am not really sure where I got the autographed card, but I found it while sorting a bunch of stuff and figured I might as well scan it and put it up here on the blog. It's from some 2013 Press Pass product, and it is numbered # 15 / 25. You can tell by the relatively blank front of his suit that sponsors are hard to come by when you're a one-car operation without a superstar driver.

There isn't a race this weekend, so I can't fill space by talking about where my favorite drivers qualified and finished this week. I suppose I will just leave it at that.

MLB.tv offered a couple days' worth of free games to get people to sign up prior to the start of the baseball season. That was pretty nice of them. I still haven't decided if I will take them up on it or if I will just hold out for the price to drop a bit. It was fun to watch a couple of Astros - Royals preseason games, even if the Astros did lose both of the games I watched. I am trying to get excited about fantasy baseball this year, but I haven't been able to muster much excitement at all. I am in a few leagues still, but I usually prepare a lot more for my drafts and then go through my rosters all the time looking for updates and guys who are coming out of Spring Training with good numbers, but I have not done any of that. I even have a spreadsheet that projects what my league's numbers will look like that the end of the season so I can see what pace I'm on compared to everyone else, but I haven't even loaded the teams into it yet.

The Die is Cast 7: Josh Wise 2011 Nationwide #7 We Salute You Impala

I added another die-cast car to my NASCAR collection recently, after doing an eBay search to see what all Josh Wise had available on the market. The last car I picked up was also a Josh Wise car, the Dogecoin-sponsored #98 car from 2014. This one goes back a little further, being an America-themed ride that Wise piloted in the Nationwide 5-Hour Energy 200 on May 14, 2011. He split time in the #7 that season with Danica Patrick.

I didn't really set out targeting this specific car, although I do like patriotic paint schemes. I wound up with this one because the seller was blowing it out at about half the price of anything else listed, pushing for a quick sale. I'm more than willing to purchase discount die-cast and there were 5 watchers on the listing already, so I added it to my cart and checked out hastily. Two days! later the car arrived in a Priority Mail box.

Inside the back window you can see the DIN printed on the plastic, which you can use to register the car on the Lionel Racing website. I told my wife while I was registering the number that for me one of the most satisfying parts of getting a new die-cast is going to the die-cast DMV to register my new vehicle. Hey, what's that on the windshield...

Yes, this is my first autographed die-cast car. Most of the JR Motorsports drivers used those holographic stickers on their autographs for a couple of seasons, and they can be found on a lot of Press Pass trading cards from that era, as well as die-cast cars and other merchandise. This isn't a particularly limited piece, being serially-numbered # 0491 / 1284, but it's a pretty cool piece and I couldn't argue with the price.

Just to be on the safe side the box also included this Certificate of Authenticity. More recent certificates actually have the serial number of the car written on them, and collector's get pretty anal about the quality of the handwriting and complain when the certificates are creased or dinged in packing/transit. Collectors are an odd lot.

Contested Shots 5: A Little Win and a Huge Loss

This past year I participated in the official Press Pass Yahoo! Fantasy NASCAR league, and I did pretty well. I wound up finishing 6th out of around 100 participants. Sixth place wasn't good enough to win, but the 4th and 5th place folks never responded to requests for their shipping information and after a while I got an e-mail telling me I was next in line if I responded with my address. I didn't know what the prize would be, but I was sure happy to provide my information. It turned out to be a Hobby box of 2014 Press Pass Total Memorabilia cards. Five packs, with a hit in each pack. That's a pretty good prize, and this post was all set to be a happy and victorious post about my big win.

But now I have to address the loss part of the post title. Various outlets are now reporting that Press Pass is going out of business. It looks like the news started with a tweet ESPN Sports Business Reporter Darren Rovell, and then spread quickly to other collecting media outlets like Beckett. I guess maybe I should have realized something was up, since the last post on the Press Pass Facebook page was back around Thanksgiving, but a lot of smaller companies come and go on social media without going out of business. Press Pass put out a lot of really neat and innovative racing cards and with many years working with NASCAR probably developed a pretty good relationship with the drivers and teams.

If the news is true, the collector in me can't help wondering where I will get my NASCAR fix from now on. There are plenty of past releases out there for me to acquire for my favorite drivers, but I like new stuff just as much as the next guy. I hope that some company is able to pick up the license in time to put out 2015 sets, and I really hope that whatever company winds up with the NASCAR rights doesn't completely blow it. I like shiny new things, but I hate change.

Press Pass put out a lot of good products. Their flagship set each year was really nice for the couple years that I've been collecting them, and their memorabilia and autograph products usually were innovative and well-designed. Whoever picks up the license has a lot to learn. Maybe they will be able to pull in some of the Press Pass staff and glean their institutional knowledge to facilitate a smooth transition.

Enough about that mess. Let's see what I pulled from my prize box:

As far as base cards go, I just got one card that fits into my Driver Collections. Josh Wise is a driver for a lower-tier team, and got a bit of publicity in 2014 when the users of Reddit raised funds to buy a sponsorship for his car and then voted him into the All-Star Race over Danica Patrick. They also sold some t-shirts to fund the Dogecoin sponsorship for another race. I was able to add the Dogecoin die-cast model to my NASCAR die-cast collection when it was released near the end of the year. It's one of my favorite additions of the last few months. I am not sure if Wise will be back in 2015, but I guess we'll see how it goes. The last few spots in the NASCAR running order are kind of like your Quad-A guys in baseball, with a mix of older guys barely hanging on and your young prospects getting a chance to try their hand in the big leagues.

I got a couple of these shiny Black & White Holofoil parallels in the box, both numbered out of # / 99. Neither driver is anyone I have a lot of interest in, which was a theme throughout most of this break. The Elliott Sadler card is # 10 / 99 and the Ty Dillon card is # 46 / 99.

The Gold parallels worked out all right for me, with the big highlight being the Danica Patrick card there in the center. She is the main driver I collect, and this Gold parallel is numbered # 165 / 175. Kyle Busch isn't a bad pull either, as he drives the popular M&Ms (and sometimes Skittles or Snickers) car. The Busch is numbered # 087 / 175. David Ragan I don't really have an opinion on at all. His card is # 066 / 175.

Acceleration is one of the inserts in the product, showing off a couple pictures of the cars to go along with a driver photo. I got another Kyle Busch card here, along with another guy I like to collect in Jeff Gordon. There are a few other drivers here, but no one I really pay attention to. I guess I pay a little attention to Clint Bowyer because of his absolutely wooden acting in the 5-hour Energy commercials.

I guess if I am thinking about 5-hour Energy while I sit here and type this post, then Clint Bowyer did his job effectively as a shill for the company.

The other insert set in 2014 Total Memorabilia is this NASCAR Hall of Fame set. It's a shiny foil set with little medallion-looking illustrations for each driver. The Rusty Wallace appears to be some kind of holofoil variant, but I couldn't find much information about them online.

And now we get to the hits. All of these cards are pretty thick, and the excessive foiling around the edges means that most of them come out of the pack looking pretty rough, with soft corners and chipping appearing pretty much universally. This Joey Logano card is numbered # 048 / 150 and features bits of tire and sheet metal from his car.

These two cards feature three swatches each, and are numbered out of # / 99. Brian Vickers' card has a pretty nice bit of firesuit, a piece of shoe, and a glove swatch. It is numbered # 57 / 99. Clint Bowyer makes another appearance, with his card featuring a firesuit / shirt / sheet metal combination. It is numbered # 32 / 99. I wonder if he is actually wearing a blank cap, or if the logos on his cap had to be airbrushed out for some reason?

I guess this would be the hit of the break, if we were trying to determine that sort of thing. It's an Austin Dillion Champion's Collection relic card, featuring a large bit of firesuit and numbered # 01 / 25. It commemorates him winning the 2013 NASCAR Nationwide Series Championship. One thing that would add immensely to this card would be to have some sort of color in the firesuit swatch.

And the final card to show from the box is this Rising Stars relic / autograph of Ryan Gifford. It's numbered # 60 / 99 and features a piece of glove. The autograph isn't really that fuzzy. It's just set back in a little shadowbox and my scanner has a hard time dealing with the change in depth. He races down in the lower circuits right now, but he ran a couple of Nationwide races last year and may eventually move up into the higher levels.

That's about it for this box. There wasn't much outside of the Danica Patrick Gold parallel as far as additions to my personal collection, and there weren't any mind-blowing hits. I'd say that the two boxes of 2013 Ignite I got from Blowout Cards' Black Friday sale offered much more in the way of excitement, but I can't complain too much because the box was free. If you kept the mix of cards the same and changed a few driver names around this could have been a really exciting box for me.

It's a shame that Press Pass looks to be done printing cards. I never really liked their sports cards during my first stint in the collecting hobby during the 90's, but their racing cards over the last few years have been really nice. I hope that someone else will pick up the NASCAR license soon and I really hope that whoever it is manages not to screw things up.

Black Friday Blowout Part 2: More 2014 Press Pass Ignite

This is the second box of 2014 Press Pass Ignite that I got in the Blowout Cards Black Friday Doorbusters sale. It would be hard to live up to the first box in the break, which produced 3 relic cards, two numbered parallels, a 1/2-case special card, and a low-numbered autograph from one of NASCAR's bigger names. This box didn't quite match the fireworks, but I still pulled some good cards, including a very nice PC hit.

This is what the normal base cards look like. They are quite colorful, and feature the drivers in their best 'standing there' poses. I included Josh Wise in the scan because I became a fan of his this season after the big push from internet users to sponsor his Dogecoin car, which I was able to acquire in die-cast form a little while ago. Danica Patrick and Tony Stewart are mainstays on my top driver list, and Travis Pastrana is a crossover star from the world of the X Games, motocross, and rally cars who ran some colorful cars in the Nationwide series before leaving at the end of the 2013 season. He's got a couple of die-cast out there that I'd like to pick up some day.

I again got two each of the Turning Point and Convoy inserts, For Turning Point I got Tony Stewart and Kevin Harvick, who won this year's Sprint Cup Championship. For Convoy inserts I got another of my favorite racers in Dale Earnhardt Jr. and also Kasey Kahne, a driver I really have no opinion on whatsoever. I will be sad to see the National Guard sponsorship of Dale Jr.'s car lapse, but I can see how taxpayers might not want their money funding a racing team.

I got the usual two Profile inserts, with this box yielding Matt Kenseth and Denny Hamlin. I used to like the FedEx car, but I don't anymore. Neither of these cards does a whole lot for me, but once I find the Ignite cards from previous purchases I can pool them and see how close I am to completing these insert sets. I got one Hall of Fame insert, featuring a guy named Buck Baker. I don't know a single thing about him.

Another insert in this box was a part of the Davey Allison tribute set, honoring the 20th Anniversary of his death in a helicopter accident. It was issued across 5 different Press Pass products in 2013, with two cards from the set found in each release.

Since this was a special Hobby box, it contained a Power Pack, which contained a Kyle Busch Power Picks card numbered # 29 / 99, and a Jeff Gordon Hot Threads relic card similar to the one that I got in the Power Pack from the last box, although this one has a plain black swatch as opposed to the two-color red/black relic on the other card.

My autograph for this box was a Scott Speed Ignite Ink Black card numbered # 62 / 99. It's not quite as exciting as the Kyle Busch autograph I pulled from the first box of this break. Speed was a transfer from Formula One racing, and didn't find a whole lot of success in the world of NASCAR. His last race was in 2013, and I don't know if he'll be coming back for another try.

My numbered parallel was a Clint Bowyer Yellow Color Proof, which is Hobby-Only and numbered # 5 / 5. Bowyer has had a pretty good career, with a whole pile of Top 10 finishes, a few wins, and a 2nd-place finish in the 2012 Sprint Cup Championship standings.

For me the big his of the box was the relic card, a Hot Threads Red parallel of Dale Earnhardt Jr., numbered # 08 / 10. It's a nice low-numbered card of one of my favorite drivers and it features a three-color relic swatch. It's pretty good stuff. This box probably still rates below the other one in terms of quality, but I only paid $20 each for them, and I think I definitely got my money's worth out of them.