(Not at All) Recent Comic Art Acquisitions

One thing I love almost as much as trading cards is comic books. Recently I've been feeling bad that I stopped reading my comics, and I've made an effort to remedy that. I'd accumulated a several-year backlog that felt insurmountable, as I subscribe to around 30 titles a month and had fallen off the reading wagon several years ago. I was never going to get around to reading all those books, so I picked a monthly shipment a few months ago and started reading from there. Reading a few books a night gets me through my pile in about a week, and I don't have to feel guilty anymore about buying books and not reading them. Will I go back someday and organize and read all the stuff I missed? Maybe. Probably around the time I go back and sort all the trading cards in my collection shed. It might be easier when/if some of my kids move out in a few years and I can claim a room of my own for sorting.

One thing I really enjoy is collecting artwork of favorite characters of mine. Sometimes I seek out commissions, and sometimes I buy artwork that's already been done. Reaching into the wayback machine (this post was originally created in September of 2018), I'll try to recall some of the particulars of the artwork shown here.

This first one was definitely a commission, a Power Girl sketch cover from artist Alessandro Micelli. I forget most of the details, but he was offering commissions at some point and I was able to get on his list. When commissioning Power Girl artwork I generally ask artists to focus on her strength rather than cheesecake poses. I think he delivered on this one, done in his signature style. You can check out his work on Instagram.

I believe this She-Hulk illustration was also a commissioned piece, from artist Kate Carleton, who now apparently is Kate Dykstra. I like her art style and have purchased several pieces from her over the years, although not recently. My purchasing of artwork has slowed down over the years, and it's pretty rare for me to add something to my collection these days. She can also be found on Instagram, and is also taking commissions in her webstore at the moment.

These next two are sketch covers I picked from a group of pre-done artwork. The artist is Doug Riggsby, who appears to have dropped off the face of the earth at some point in 2019. If I recall correctly, I purchased the covers through his daughter, Emily Riggsby, who is/was also an artist. Her Facebook page has been taken down, so I'm not sure where you might locate either of them to get artwork. Some stuff is still available on eBay from various sellers.

The cover on the left features Vampirella of comic book fame and Count Chocula, the cereal mascot, with a joke alluding to the Count's sugary origin. The cover on the right shows She-Hulk mistaking Tigra for Tony the Tiger, and Tigra retorting with a Jolly Green Giant barb.

The final piece of artwork in this post is a dynamic illustration of barbarian Red Sonja, who has a long history in comic books. The artist is Scott Dalrymple, and I believe I purchased it directly from the artist's eBay store. I don't have a link to the eBay store, as the purchase was made several years ago and I lack the ambition to research it tonight. He can be found on Instagram, though. I particularly like the word perspective on this one.

Not a lot of commentary to go along with the artwork in this post, as I can't recall most of the details anyway and it's getting a bit late in the day as I write this. The kids are hoping for a snow day tomorrow, but it seems unlikely given the weather report. We'll probably get just enough snow to make the commute miserable. I do enjoy getting my art portfolios out from time to time to look at the artwork I've accumulated. It's not a huge collection, but it's good enough for me.

She-Hulk by Rodrigo Martins

Another day, another She-Hulk sketch card. The last She-Hulk card I showed off came from the Rittenhouse Marvel Dangerous Divas Series 2. This one comes from the first Dangerous Divas set, released in 2011.

The artist is Rodrigo Martins, who also goes by lengthened (Rodrigo Martins dos Santos) and shortened (Rod San) versions of his name. I haven't found an online store for him, but he does have active Instagram, Facebook, and DeviantArt profiles. I like his version of She-Hulk on this card. She looks sufficiently strong for a Hulk, and I enjoy the way he made her interact with the card border. I'd like to track down more of his artwork in the future.

Blog Bat-Around: What I Collect

I don't think I've ever participated in a Blog Bat-Around before. I tend to do things on my own schedule, and by the time I am ready to participate in something like this, everyone else has moved on. I think most people have already moved on from this one, too, but I'm posting about it anyway. I think credit goes to Night Owl for starting/inspiring this one, entitled 'What I Collect.' It's basically an excuse to list your various projects and collecting interests. Some people listed theirs in order of preference, but my collecting habits are too random for me to do that.

I'll start off with baseball. I mainly focus on player collections, although there are some other things I chase. I would say the primary player I collect is R.A. Dickey, but Jon Singleton is up there and I also have tried to put together a decent Josh Reddick collection. Evan Gattis is a guy I've tried to start an accumulation for, but I get distracted from that one too easily. He's probably one of my favorite players to watch, though, outside of Jose Altuve. Singleton's available cardboard seems to be drying up, as it doesn't look like he's going to pan out anytime soon. Maybe I'll change my focus to Gattis or someone else once I feel like I'm done getting Singleton cards. I also pick up Munenori Kawasaki cards when I can, but I think he announced his retirement in the last few days, and he doesn't really have a lot of cardboard out there anyhow.

Because I can't reasonably expect to get all of the cards of any given player, I just try to get the ones I like best, and the ones that are available at a reasonable price. I will grab random hits and cards featuring other players I like, such as Max Scherzer, but when it comes to single cards I am usually pretty focused on a handful of guys. I did pick up a whole lot of Topps Now cards from last season, mostly the ones featuring Astros. I also like to get some of the oddball cards that Topps prints for the Now program, like the card that talked about the Royals' Rally Mantis. I will generally grab any that include a donation to charity. A couple that come to mind are one Topps did for Hurricane Harvey relief and another donating to veteran's charities for Memorial Day.

I usually buy a factory set of Topps and a set of Update from eBay. In most years I collect the blue foil parallel set out of Opening Day. Sometimes I buy a set of Heritage after busting enough of it to realize that I can't possibly build a set without spending a whole lot of money on packs full of doubles. I typically buy a box of Allen & Ginter for Gint-a-Cuffs. Usually I find one other product that I buy a bunch of. Last year it was Bowman Platinum. There are other collections that I sometimes add to, like Wally Moon, Rollie Fingers, Nolan Ryan, Randy Johnson, vintage sets, Fan Favorites autographs from Topps Archives, and oddball releases.

One big focus of mine has been sketch cards and full-size artwork. I have a few main character collections. The primary ones are DC Comics' Power Girl and Leia from Star Wars. I also have small collections of Marvel characters She-Hulk, Squirrel Girl, and Scarlet Witch. I've accumulated quite a few Captain America sketches, as well as a small number of M.O.D.O.K. sketch cards. I will pick up sketches of other subjects, too, if they catch my eye.

I also collect Star Wars cards, but not all that obsessively. I just get what interests me. Topps puts out a lot of Star Wars products, and keeping up with them all would be a full-time collection. I don't have that kind of focus. I gather cards featuring Leia, interesting relics, and autographs from other characters that I like.

I like wrestling cards. They are a lot of fun. Again, I collect just about anything that catches my eye. I don't try to get all of the Topps Now WWE cards, but I get one or two every few months if a wrestler I like is featured. I like autographs of classic guys like Sergeant Slaughter. I also have collections for Nia Jax and Bayley. I started a Charlotte Flair collection after I met her last year at a book signing, but I don't have an autographed card from her yet. John Cena is too popular for me to collect, but I should really track down an autograph of his.

I've gathered a couple of Iron Sheik hits over time, and I went out and got that Trish Stratus autograph recently. Most of my collections are grab bags of single cards that I pick up on eBay, with the occasional box break or group break thrown in.

I also collect trading cards of Japanese women wrestlers. BBM puts out an annual set that covers a wide range of promotions, and the Stardom promotion puts out their own card set every so often. The Stardom packs are really hard to get, so usually I am limited to whatever singles pop up on eBay. I have a pretty good source for unopened BBM True Heart cards, though, and between eBay and Yahoo! Auctions in Japan I am able to get most of the cards I want. I have a full run of Command Bolshoi (the masked wrestler up top) autographs dating back to 2003. That's my best Japanese wrestler collection, but there are several other wrestlers that I collect. I am currently waiting on a large shipment out of Japan, which includes the complete 2004 set, which almost never comes up for sale. A couple of high-level Japanese wrestlers have transferred to the WWE recently, and that has driven up interest a little bit in these cards. 

I collect UFC cards, too. I have a couple of fighter collections. Neil Magny is one of the primary ones, and Randa Markos is one of the others. I really just like to collect a little of everything, though. I will usually grab just about any relic or autograph if it is cheap enough, and especially if I don't already have something featuring that fighter. I gather up low-numbered parallels if I can, from just about any product. It seems like every year I go pretty hard on at least one product. Last year it was Museum Collection and Chrome. This year I might go after those same products.

I chase NASCAR cards, mostly focusing on a handful of drivers. Most of my favorite drivers have retired, so I am looking for new people to collect. I haven't settled on anyone yet. In reality most of my racing card money goes to Danica Patrick cards and the occasional box break. I am thinking about starting a Darrell 'Bubba' Wallace collection, or maybe collecting one of the Busch brothers. Other racers I collect are Tony Stewart, Jeff Gordon, Dale Earnhardt Jr., and Josh Wise. I also have a small collection of drag racing stuff, with the main focus of that collection being the Force family (John, Courtney, and Brittany). 

I guess this scan represents pop culture celebrities and other sports. I gather autographs, relics, and other cards featuring people that I've heard of from outside of mainstream sports. Goodwin Champions is a good source for those, as are Panini's various celebrity offerings. I've got a fair number of cards featuring Olympic gymnasts, a decent Felicia Day collection, some singers, some authors, and some people who are mostly famous for being famous or being related to someone famous.

Basketball cards were the main thing I collected during my teen years in the 90's. It is mostly a fringe collection now, but I still gather cards for my main player collections (Hakeem Olajuwon, Gheorghe Muresan, Manute Bol). I will also pick up any Houston Rockets cards I can find, but I don't often go out of my way to track them down. 

Football cards are pretty far down my list, but I still have a couple of NFL collections. Most of the cards I add picture former Broncos' tight end Shannon Sharpe. I like getting Terrell Davis and John Elway cards. I will collect just about anything with Tim Tebow on it. I also recently started a Jake Butt collection, because how often does someone named Butt play for your favorite team? I've picked up one or two Von Miller cards over the last couple of years, too, but I have a hard time focusing on football. The careers are so short, and the sport just hasn't been as exciting for me as it was previously.

That's a quick rundown of my collecting world. I am not a very focused guy, so I bounce around from thing to thing as new products release and my interests change.

Three Fred Hembeck Marvel Sketches

I snagged a few more sketch cards from Fred Hembeck's eBay store, since he listed some characters I like. Right now I think he's got a bunch of combo cards listed, picturing comic book characters standing with Santa. The Punisher one he's got listed is pretty funny, as Punisher is holding a couple of gifts with gun barrels poking out of them.

First up is She-Hulk, a character I apparently already had a Hembeck sketch of. This one is a little bit different, so no harm done. The back features Hembeck's usual self-portrait and certificate of authenticity. I think the purple and white costume works pretty well for She-Hulk and is a bit of a nod to Hulk's famous purple pants, but my favorite She-Hulk costume is her blue and white one from her time as Thing's replacement on the Fantastic Four. There is also a red, yellow, and blue variant from a different stint on the Fantastic Four that is pretty neat.

The second sketch I got was the Fantastic Four's Invisible Woman in her traditional uniform. Hembeck added a little extra to the sketch by showing her leg phasing into invisibility. I thought it was a pretty cool sketch of a character that doesn't get much time in the sketch card spotlight, especially with Marvel's legal battles surrounding the movie rights to the Fantastic Four. It's been several years since the team had a comic in print, although Human Torch and Thing are coming back in a Marvel Two-In-One series soon.

The next sketch features Invisible Woman in a costume that debuted in late 1992, when Marvel was trying to be X-Treme and X-Citing! Susan Storm announced that the old jumpsuit uniforms made her feel frumpy, so she was unveiling this new look. The keyhole swimsuit costume only lasted a few issues before artists started filling in more fabric over time, and eventually her uniform pretty much went back to where it started. I still remember seeing this costume on a comic book cover at the store and being like, "Whaaaat?" so I guess it had the eye-catching effect that Marvel needed to get attention from juvenile male comic buyers. Hembeck added the invisibility effect to this sketch as well, on her left arm.

Those are three of my latest Hembeck acquisitions. I like following his auctions to see which characters he will offer next, and sometimes I bid on and even win a few.

She-Hulk by Fred Hembeck

Fred Hembeck is an artist with a distinctive cartoon art style. He's got a website, but I am most familiar with his eBay sketch auctions. He's usually got a handful of auctions going for artwork as well as a book of his art. I like his work because it's distinctive and because it is pretty comprehensive. He draws all kinds of characters from movies, comics, books, and television. He draws a lot of characters that you don't see very often, and he also draws versions of characters that don't get a lot of love, like alternate uniforms on superheroes.

I was able to get this She-Hulk sketch from his auctions a while back. I've bid on quite a few of his sketches, but I think this is the first time I actually won. It's done in his signature style, and the back features his certification of authenticity, as well as a self-portrait doodle. I'd like to get more of his work someday for my Princess Leia and Power Girl collections, but for now I am very happy that I was able to add this She-Hulk piece to my art collection.

A Fantastic She-Hulk Sketch by Anthony Hochrein

My favorite comic book team of all time is the Fantastic Four from Marvel, with their usual cast consisting of Mr. Fantastic, Invisible Woman, Human Torch, and Thing. Marvel hasn't published a Fantastic Four comic book in a while due to legal disputes about Fantastic Four films, but I maintain hope that they will be back someday. Over the long publishing history of the Fantastic Four, the roster has seen occasional shakeups. During the mid-1980's, Thing left the Fantastic Four for a while, and She-Hulk replaced him as the team's muscle for a while. She-Hulk is one of my favorite individual characters in the Marvel Universe, so the combination of my favorite team with a favorite character is awesome for me. A statue of She-Hulk as a member of the Fantastic Four is the largest statue in my relatively small figure collection. I've also got a couple of action figures and other assorted stuff featuring her as a member of the team.

When artist Anthony Hochrein listed this She-Hulk sketch for sale, featuring her in her blue Fantastic Four uniform, I had to snap it up. I've purchased Hochrein's work before in the form of a Power Girl sketch, but it's been a little while. With my focus on my Power Girl and Princess Leia sketch collections, I don't get a lot of opportunities to add to other sketch collections. I'm always happy when I can get something for one of my other favorite characters. This one is a pretty cool sketch card, and She-Hulk looks appropriately powerful here.

Hochrein has a Facebook page and an Etsy store. He also has an eBay page, but doesn't currently have anything listed for sale. He's pretty active on Facebook, though, so if you are interested in his work it isn't to hard to get in touch.

Sketch Card Week Bonus Round: Sketches from Emerald City Comic Con 2012

These aren't sketch cards, but I haven't ever posted the sketches I got at the 2012 Emerald City Comic Con (ECCC). My other blog has a post about the sketches we got at the 2006 ECCC, if you want to check those out. My wife and I went to one previous ECCC while we were dating (maybe 2004? I don't think we knew each other in early 2003 and I was in Iraq on the 2005 dates), but we didn't get any sketches at that one. I don't remember a lot about the interactions we had with each artist for this post, but oddly enough I have a map in my head for approximately where in the convention hall each artist's table was located. I'll try to remember as much as I can.

One thing I definitely remember is that the show got a lot bigger between 2006 and 2012. The hall was super-crowded, and we had our twins who were just over a year old in a huge double stroller that we were trying to push around, as well as a second stroller for our three year-old boy. I have grown in patience over the years, but about halfway through the first day I was ready to leave and go straight home because the crowd was getting me frustrated. My wife talked me down from acting rashly, and we made a better plan for getting around and seeing all the stuff.

I don't know if artists like this or hate it, but I take a list of characters I like and ask them to sketch any character on my list that they feel would be cool. Sometimes I have a list of artists I am looking for, but I will also stop at any booth where I like the art on display and there isn't much of a line. If I recall correctly, Randy Emberlin was set up near to some huge megastar-type guy like Adam Hughes or something, and his booth was kind of overshadowed by the line for the other booth. I wasn't familiar with Emberlin's previous work on Spider-Man, but I liked what he had on display and he did this awesome old-school Punisher for me. 

I am having some difficulty remembering if Jon Morris drew this for us on request or if he had it already on display. I have a vague memory of having to figure out how to transport the piece while the paint used for Mr. Freeze's gun dried, though. That could be a false memory, though. Either way, he's got a pretty cool art style and I like his stuff. The more I think about it, the more I am convinced that he chose Mr. Freeze from my list and drew him right there in front of us.

I am having a similarly difficult time remembering how we got this Cookie Monster sketch from Adam Watson. I think he was set up near Jon Morris, though, and they might even have been sharing a booth. I noticed that Adam Watson recently reblogged something that Jon Morris posted, so they know each other well enough for that. I don't know. He also appears to be interested in entomology, which makes him all right in my book. I was an Entomology minor for a while during my first attempt at a college education.

I don't remember a lot about Dean Trippe. He had some cool prints and I think I knew his name from seeing some of them online. At that time I was looking at a lot of comic book fan art, probably in preparation for this convention. He did this nice Spider-Man sketch for us, complete with tingling Spider-Sense.

Chris Burnham did this She-Hulk sketch for us. He drew it on a really big piece of paper, which is cool, but it was hard to carry around. Most of the other artists used paper from the sketch pad I was carrying around in my backpack or smaller paper of their own. So I had to figure out a way to carry this large paper without it getting destroyed. It's a pretty cool sketch, though.

Colleen Coover was really cool, and we chatted with her and her husband, Paul Tobin, for a little while. I think we chose this Wonder Woman sketch from her portfolio, and then she personalized it for us.

We barely caught Laurie B! as the convention was closing down. I think she was pretty burnt out after a long weekend and she apologized that she couldn't do a free sketch. We weren't expecting a free sketch anyway, and she did this Power Girl sketch for a very reasonable price. Getting a sketch from her was probably one of the highlights of the convention for me. I love her work, and I was glad that she made time for us even though she was ready to get out of there. You might be wondering why I would wait until the very end of the convention to get a sketch of a favorite character from a favorite artist. I don't know. Things just worked out that way.

I think I was drawn to Michael Cho's booth because I liked the prints he had on display, but I may have gone looking for him specifically. He's got some cool stuff out there. I'd probably seen some of it online prior to the convention. He did this Captain America sketch for us. 

The only sketches I commissioned before the convention were a group of three sketches featuring the characters my kids are named after by artist Jeremy Dale. Because they were pre-commissioned, they are a lot more detailed than most convention sketches and they cost me a little more. But it was totally worth it. This is some good art. First up is Hulk.

Jeremy and his wife, Kelly, were very friendly and we talked to them for a while when we went to pick up the sketches at his table. They were nice people, and they seemed like the kind of people we might have hung out with in real life 1) if we lived near each other and 2) if we were the sort of people who hung out with other people. Anyway, they were cool and friendly. This one is Wolverine. My scanner and my phone camera both have a hard time with the colored paper that these are done on, so the colors are a bit off.

Sadly, in November of 2014 I saw that Jeremy had died very suddenly, and it later came out that he had an autoimmune disorder triggered by a case of the flu. Obviously I only knew him from a short conversation at a convention, but it's one of those events that sticks with me for some reason. This third sketch features Thing from The Fantastic Four.

I don't remember much about meeting Leigh Kellogg, but this Rogue that he did for us is super cool. In trying to search out more information on him, I discovered that he worked on several video games I enjoyed, like Close Combat: A Bridge Too Far and MechCommander 2 from a while back, and more recently the Facebook/Mobile game Marvel: Avengers Alliance. Unfortunately, Disney very recently decided to shut down Avengers Alliance, a game that I played quite a bit over the last couple of years.

We got a lot of good sketches at ECCC 2012 and we've been trying to get to another convention, but it seems like the dates and finances never quite match up. Maybe 2017 will be our year to go to one of the conventions in Portland, Seattle, or Salt Lake City.

Marvel Dangerous Divas: She-Hulk Sketch Card by Irma 'Aimo' Ahmed

She-Hulk is one comic book character who is under-represented in my sketch card collection. I am not 100% sure why that is the case, as she is one of my favorite comic book characters. I have nearly a full run of her books, a couple of She-Hulk statues, and maybe an action figure or two, but I just don't buy a lot of sketch cards with She-Hulk on them. I did add one more to my collection recently, though.

This sketch comes from the 2014 Rittenhouse Marvel Dangerous Divas Series 2 set, and was done by artist Irma 'Aimo' Ahmed. This is one of Ahmed's simpler sketches, but I think it does a good job of illustrating the character. Her homepage says that she did 100 sketches for this set. I always like to see how many sketches the artists do for each set. I don't think most companies will release the numbers, but some do and you can sometimes find artist discussion threads where they talk about how many they did for a particular product. I was happy to find another sketch card for my collection, especially one featuring a character that I don't have many cards of.

At the Trade Deadline 42: An Awesome Trade Package from Lonestarr

I recently got a massive trade package from blogger Lonestarr / Twitch. It touched on nearly every part of my collection. I scanned quite a bit of it for this post, but there was plenty more. I just couldn't scan any longer.

I don't have many Elway cards, and this SPx Gold card is a great addition to my collection. I remember that the Hakeem Olajuwon SPx Gold from this set's basketball equivalent was one of the prizes of my collection in my teen years. Hologram, die-cut, and foil on thick card stock? Yes, please!

This package may have nearly doubled my Peyton Manning collection. It certainly was a big boost to the number of Manning cards I have showing him in a Broncos uniform. I've heard rumors that Peyton will officially announce his retirement soon. I guess we'll see what happens. That whole business with the sexual harassment allegations from his college days is pretty disappointing. Without any context outside of working in male-exclusive jobs for a large portion of my life I imagine he tried to pull some sort of prank that went over the line, and instead of owning his actions he denied them and went on the attack. Probably a sincere apology and an admission of wrongdoing 20 years ago would have cleared the whole business up.

There were plenty of other Broncos in the package. That Terrell Davis is probably my favorite of this bunch, although it is hard to deny the power of Tim Tebow. I wore my Tebow jersey just the other day. Apparently there was a poll recently in which respondents were asked who their favorite and least favorite NFL quarterbacks were. Tim Tebow appeared in the top handful of both lists (5th-most popular, 2nd-least popular), despite the fact that he hasn't played in a regular season NFL game for a few years.

Switching sports to basketball, several Houston Rockets cards were included in the package, highlighted by a couple of appearances by my favorite player of all time, Hakeem Olajuwon. I also liked that Panini Black Friday Dwight Howard card, although Dwight Howard himself has been pretty underwhelming as a Rocket. I have to wonder how long it will be before he and James Harden get run out of town and the Rockets enter another rebuilding phase without really living up to their potential? It's almost like a repeat of the Yao Ming / Tracy McGrady days, although their problems had more to do with injuries than with attitude. I don't know why that Earl Boykins cards has rounded corners. It must be a parallel that I am not aware of.

There were two other cards in this Astros scan, but I cropped them out when I discovered a big hair on the scan in front of one of them. It was a sweet card, but I was so done with the scanner by that time. I like that Bill Virdon card. I pulled an autograph of his out of a box of Heritage in 2014. For whatever reason that makes him stick in my head. I'm not about to run out and start a Bill Virdon PC, but I'm at least two cards into one now. I love those rainbow-colored uniforms. Sometimes I think I might be part unicorn or part leprechaun or something.

There were plenty of Astros from all eras in this package. I think I've mentioned at least six times that I didn't scan them all. I DIDN'T SCAN ALL THE CARDS IN THIS PACKAGE! There were a lot of cards. If I were a rapper I would be bragging about all of my phat stacks (of cards). But I'm not a rapper. When I try to sing or rap my wife tells me, "No!" and mists me with a spray bottle.

That Nolan Ryan / J.R. Richard card is one of the cooler cards in the package. It's an Astros card, but it's also a Nolan Ryan card, but from a time when he wasn't an Astro. And now the Astros are in the A.L. so this card wouldn't even be possible anymore unless they started making AL West Leaders cards. At that point Topps would have jumped the shark. Can you imagine Division Leader cards for all of the different divisions? That would be ridiculous.

The Astros probably got the least freaky of the 1995 Fleer card designs. Things don't get all that trippy until you're below the waistline and the colors go weird, which I guess is kind of a metaphor for life.

I like those framed Gypsy Queen parallels. That's one of the few things I like about the Gypsy Queen brand. I guess I'm a Ginter man if it comes down to faux-old-timey vintage brands. I like that Lance Berkman Soaring Stars card. It's like he's defending the Earth from Randy Johnson-thrown meteors with a cosmic bat or something.

Now we're getting to the hits portion of this trade package. Those two cards on the top are serially-numbered. Nolan Ryan is # / 250 and Tony Scheffler is # / 200. Olajuwon is die-cut, Prizmed, and # / 199. Also he is wearing those cool goggles that he sported for a while. He tried, but he couldn't rock the goggles as well as Horace Grant did. If there were a Mt. Rushmore of eyewear it would definitely have Horace Grant and Kent Tekulve on it. Who else would be on it? That Aaron West autograph is pretty cool, too. When I see the name Aaron it makes me think of that Key & Peele Substitute Teacher skit.

These relics are all pretty cool. I believe that Lancaster JetHawks Mascot Patch is my first manu-patch relic. Some of my readers might be impressed that I have remained untainted this long, while others wonder why I didn't get on the manu-patch train a long time ago. My one stalker might comb feverishly through my posts to find out if this really is my first manu-patch card. I know for sure that the J.R. Towles card in the upper right contains my first game-used base relic. The other relics are your more standard swatches of fabric, but the Rod Smith is # / 750 and the other card contains the previously-mentioned Tracy McGrady's pants or something. It's not a breathable enough material to be a jersey.

Closing things out are some non-sports items in the form of sketch cards featuring some of my favorite comic book characters. I believe the She-Hulk sketch was done by Lonestarr / Twitch himself, while the Wonder Woman sketch was done by Colby Zigler. I haven't been able to add as many She-Hulk and Wonder Woman sketches to my collection as I'd like, so these were a welcome addition to my sketch card binder. (I wish I had a sketch card binder. I actually don't. I have a vague idea of which sketches I have and sometimes I can find them in among the other cards in boxes and the piles of cards on my desk.

Closing things out is a sketch of Power Girl reminding all the fanboys out there that Cosplay does not equal Consent. That's a big deal with cosplayers and models, both online and at convention or promotional appearances. Sketch artist Cesar Feliciano has illustrated what might happen if one of these rude folks mistook Power Girl for a cosplay model.

This was an awesome package from top to bottom, and I was super-stoked to flip through all of it. I wasn't super-stoked to scan all of it, but I scanned many of the best parts. The rest of the stuff you'll just have to wonder about. It was all pretty cool, with plenty of touches personally-tailored to my collecting habits. Thank you!