Cyber Week Breaks: Day 3 - Chrome, High Impact, and Little Baseball Cards

Wow, today kind of got away from me. I guess that's mostly good, as I taught a lesson in church and spent some time with my wife and kids. All of that isn't great for blogging, though. Today's breaks are the last 8 packs in my first box of 2017 Topps UFC Chrome, 1 box of 2016 Topps UFC High Impact, and a pack of the On-Demand 2017 Topps Mini Baseball. In order for me to make it through all the scanning and posting, I'll just be hitting the highlights throughout this series of breaks.

I got one numbered parallel in these 8 packs of UFC Chrome, a Green Refractor of Cat Zingano numbered # 09 / 99. I collect Zingano's cards, so this was a good pull for me. To this point in the box I haven't pulled either of the two promised autographs, so they both came out of this batch.

First up is this base autograph of Henry Cejudo. I don't think I had a Cejudo autograph yet, so this was better than pulling a duplicate. I can't say much for his penmanship, but he made use of all the space available to him, and then some.

The other autograph was this Tier One autograph of Demetrious Johnson. The odds on these are 1:1,755 packs, or about one in 6 cases. This one is numbered # 4 / 5. It's a pretty cool card, but Johnson is one of the less popular names on the checklist.

From the box of UFC High Impact, this Rose Namajunas insert was one I needed for my set, so I count this as a win already. Some of the cards on this checklist have been hard to track down. Hopefully I'll be able to get the other ones I need.

I also got a Red parallel of Khabib Nurmagomedov. These Red parallels only fall 1:11 boxes, so I may only get one or two of these in the break. This one is numbered # 5 / 8.

The promised autograph features the signature of Luke Rockhold. I think he's another new addition for my collection, so that's a bonus for me. Overall, this was a pretty good box.

The pack of 2017 Topps Mini Baseball cards contained 35 cards, with 30 base, 1 insert, and 4 parallels. The base cards didn't have a lot of star power in them, but these are the highlights I picked out. It seemed like my pack was fairly heavy on the Update portion of the checklist.

My insert featured Joey Gallo on the 1987 Topps design. He hit the 3rd-most home runs in the AL for 2017 and had the 2nd-most strikeouts.

The parallels have print runs of 25 or less. Taijuan Walker was my first parallel, numbered # 07 / 25. You can see there is some color beneath the nameplate and on the spikes coming in from the edges to differentiate this as an Orange parallel.

I was happy to get some Astros content among my parallels, with the orange on this card going well with Yulieski Gurriel's jersey. You'll notice a pattern, as this card is also numbered # 07 / 25.

Staying with the AL West and the number # 07 / 25, I also got this Nomar Mazara Orange parallel.

I also got a Blue parallel of Dodgers pitcher Alex Wood, numbered # 01 / 10. Not a bad pull. I really should have ordered a couple more packs of this stuff. I would be interested to see how much of the print run they sold through, and I imagine it would be difficult if not impossible to put a set together. Player collectors and team collectors should be on the lookout for these.

Overall, this wasn't too bad of a break for the day. I got some PC cards, an insert I needed, a 1:6 case hit, and several low-numbered parallels.

Topps Now Players' Weekend Astros and Bonus Cards

Well, the Astros made it plenty interesting, but they managed to finally knock the Yankees off in a series where the home team won each of the 7 games. I didn't get to watch Game 7 since I am stuck in some barracks without internet for a month-long course. I'll probably miss the World Series, too, but I guess that's the price you pay for career advancement. I hope the Astros can pull it off, but the Dodgers are a formidable opponent. 

One major key to the Astros' success is their little second baseman, Jose Altuve. A huge portion of their offense runs through him and his bat. Although I mentioned his small statue above, I got pretty tired of the TV broadcasts mentioning the size difference between Altuve and Aaron Judge, along with shots of them standing next to each other. 

When MLB did their Player's Weekend promotion, Topps released team sets to commemorate the event. Part of the promotion was that players were allowed to wear nicknames on their jerseys, and the Topps' Player's Weekend sets show the nickname jerseys on the back of each card. 

Most nicknames are some variation of the player's real name, which makes sense. I go by a shortened version of my last name in most circles, because some people have a hard time pronouncing it.

I guess the Astros' uniforms for this special weekend were all right, but I'm glad this isn't their regular color scheme. I thought this was a reused photo of Reddick, but it's not. This is just the standard Josh Reddick photo pose. 

I was pretty happy with the player selection for this set, as Josh Reddick and Evan Gattis both got cards. They aren't exactly the stars or hot rookies on the team, so they don't always get included in these things. 

Part of the draw for these sets was that if the team had a 6-game win streak after the All-Star break, you got a bonus card. The Astros had two streaks, so I got two extra cards. The first card celebrates Cameron Maybin and Justin Verlander helping the team get to six in a row. 

The second card pictures Brad Peacock and Yulieski Gurriel. Pretty cool stuff. I don't know if I'll buy as many Topps Now cards in 2018 as I did this year. Keeping up with these extra sets and the Astros' playoff Now cards is hard to do. Topps released nine cards for the team's Game 7 ALCS win! If the World Series is this card crazy, I might have to give up. 

Pack of the Day 175: A Rack Pack of 2017 Topps Heritage High Number

I showed off a pack of 2016 Topps Heritage High Number with a pretty good pull in it a few days ago, and I decided later to try out a pack of the 2017 iteration.

Here's the front of the pack. It's got 16 cards promised inside, with possible inserts including Walmart exclusive Topps Discs. I didn't get any of those in this pack, but apparently if you want to try your hand at getting one you need to get to Walmart.

This is the back-of-pack stuff, with the odds listed for all the stuff you might find inside, as well as the No Purchase Necessary address and rules.

As is my custom, I didn't scan every card in the pack, but I did scan one card front and back. Joakim Soria was a mainstay on my fantasy baseball teams several years ago (longer ago than I thought), and he's managed to stay in the game and relevant for a few teams in the ensuing seasons, eventually returning to Kansas City.

These were my favorite cards from the rest of the base set. Clippard now plies his trade for the Astros, so I had to include his card in the scan. The Astros are actually his second team since leaving the Yankees earlier this season, as he was acquired by the White Sox in between. His outings for the Astros have been pretty rough so far.

Brandon Phillips is on the Angels now, so he's another guy in this scan who is no longer with the team he's pictured with on this Heritage Update release. Addison Reed is now with the Red Sox, so this scan is 3 for 6 with players in the wrong uniforms.

The pack wasn't done with the Astros, giving me this Rookie Performers insert of Yulieski Gurriel. These are a 1:4 pack insert, and this is the only non-base, non-SP card from the pack. I like the design on this insert, although I don't think I'll bother to chase the rest of the set down.

Pack of the Day 169: Blasters of 2017 Bowman Platinum

My wife and I got away on Friday and went to dinner at a Hawaiian place that opened up recently near our house. The food was pretty good, and it was fun to hang out with her for a while without our kids whining at us the whole time. After that I mentioned that I wanted to check out a Walmart nearby, as I hadn't checked it for Bowman Platinum yet and I'd seen a post somewhere about some stores seeing restocks on the product.

They had three blaster boxes on the shelf, and I grabbed them up. I found some more blasters at our 'home' Walmart on Saturday. I didn't take all of them, though, I just grabbed a couple and left a few on the shelf for the next guy. You can see the pack odds above for these.

Here are some of the notable base cards I pulled from the break. No Aaron Judge this time, but I did get two Cody Bellinger base cards, as well as some of the guys who have driven the hobby in recent years.

This Josh Hader Green parallel was the only colorful base card parallel I found in the break. This one is numbered # 09 / 99.

Each blaster contained a pack with four of these special foil parallels. I grabbed a handful of them to scan. I guess maybe Andrew Benintendi, Dansby Swanson, and Gleybar Torres are the hot pulls here.

These are the Bowman's Next Generation inserts I got from the break. The Nick Senzel is a Green parallel, numbered # / 99. They are seeded at 1:263 packs, so a fairly tough one to get.

I think I did all right with my Platinum Presence inserts, with plenty of big names like Trout, Seager, and Bryant. That Anderson Espinoza card in the lower right is an Orange pull, numbered # 21 / 25. Platinum Presence Orange parallels are seeded 1:1,040 packs, so this is again a pretty tough card to get. Hopefully Espinoza develops into a big-time player.

Aaron Judge didn't completely escape my grasp in this break, as I pulled his Rookie Radar insert, along with a couple of Astros and a couple copies of Christian Arroyo's card. I am probably done with Bowman Platinum for good now. I am disappointed that I didn't pull a single autograph out of any of my rack packs and blasters, but other than that I pulled some colorful parallels, some nice inserts, and rookie cards of some of the hottest players in baseball.