Michael Brantley Tier One Autograph

I mentioned a couple of months ago that I'd foregone buying the Astros spot in a Topps Tier One group break and instead devoted the money that would have been spent to purchasing singles from the set. Specifically I grabbed autograph and relic cards of slugger Yordan Alvarez. I still had some money left over, and I decided to see if I could add anything else from the set to my collection while staying under budget.

What I came up with was a Michael Brantley Prime Performers autograph. The first one I ordered never arrived, so eventually I opened a case on eBay and got my money back. Then I found another one for about the same price and ordered that one, and it arrived as scheduled. I don't believe I had a Brantley autograph in my collection yet, so this fills a nice hole in my collection, as Brantley was a key member of the team for a few years, although injuries robbed him of a lot of time on the field.

The Other Half of a Blaster Case of 2021 Panini Chronicles Racing

I'm back with the second half of a blaster case of 2021 Panini Chronicles Racing. I talked about the base cards in the last post, so I'll forego that discussion and get right to the hits and parallels.

This half of the case game me a ton of numbered Spectra inserts. The top row are numbered /99 and the bottom row are numbered /49. Brittney Zamora and Danica Patrick are two racers I collect specifically, so it was nice to pull so many of their cards in this bunch. The Brittney Zamora parallels are both nickname variations.

The William Byron Pinnacle parallel here is numbered /99 and the Austin Dillon Obsidian card is the lowest-numbered card in the whole break, at /25. The Obsidian parallels can be hard to spot, but the pink foil gives this one away.

Chase Elliott features on this Blue Pedal to the Metal insert parallel, the last numbered parallel in this half of the break.

Similar to the last post, most of the relics and autos don't really fit into my specific collecting interests. I guess my favorite card here is the John Hunter Nemechek relic. Chronicles Swatches are the basic relic you're going to find in most Chronicles blasters.

I've still got three pictures to go here and I've pretty much run out of things to say. All of the stuff that fits into my collection happened in the first photo. I guess maybe the several-year layoff has given me a bit of blogging rust.

I guess the Kevin Harvick card here is my favorite of the bunch of dual relics. It's kind of a boring card, though, as the black firesuit and tire swatches blend into the background of the card.

Just like in the last half of the case, this half produced 8 relics and 2 autographs. The autographs in this batch are Matt DiBenedetto and Sheldon Creed.

Overall this was a fun break, but probably not worth the price of admission. I'd argue that busting packs, especially retail packs, is a sucker's game on most days. You really are better off buying singles and sets on the secondary market, although that is much less fun than rolling the dice on ripping packs.

Half a Blaster Case of 2021 Panini Chronicles Racing

I mentioned a while ago that I ordered a couple of blaster box cases as part of a big card order from Blowout Cards. The first I already showed off, a case of 2018 Donruss Racing. The other case was 2021 Panini Chronicles Racing. A blaster case is 20 boxes, so this post will cover the first 10 blasters.

 

By my count, there are 17 different base designs in the Chronicles set. It makes for a lot of sorting. Technically I think the Chronicles are the base set and the rest are inserts, but either way there are 17 different designs. I got nearly complete sets of most of the 20-cards checklists, and partial sets of the bigger checklists. Scattered throughout are Green retail-exclusive parallels. This is a stars and rookies product, so the big chase is whoever your favorite driver is, as long as they are a star or rookie.

Blue parallels are /199 and cover most of the base designs. I pulled Ryan Blaney, Austin Cindric, and Kyle Weatherman. Not much else to say about these, as none of them really fit into my collection.

This Tyler Reddick Spectra parallel is numbered /99. Spectra is one of the bigger checklists in the product, so I didn't come close to completing it. There are parallels and nickname variations as well, which make it even harder to complete.

I was happy to pull a numbered Dale Earnhardt Jr. card, as he is one of the drivers I collect. Even better is that he is featured in his National Guard branding. I spent 20 years with the National Guard and retired last year, so I like this particular branding scheme.

The Jet Black Materials and Newly Minted relic sets feature multiple swatches per card. The Austin Dillon card has firesuit and tire, while the Paul Menard adds sheet metal to the mix.

Status Swatches are one of the basic relics you'll pull from this product. I wouldn't say I collect Ryan Newman, but I've gathered a handful of his cards over the years. With this being a 2021 product, many of the photos of current drivers feature masks prominently.

Chronicles Swatches are the basic hit you find in blasters. I pulled Ryan Preece, Erik Jones, and Aric Almirola. Two tires and one firesuit relic. Again, not much among the hits that fits into my collection specifically, although I cast a pretty wide net when it comes to collecting.

Each lot of 10 blasters gave up two autographs, with this half of the case yielding Michael Waltrip and Anthony Alfredo. Again, not anything that fits into my collection specifically, but nice to add a couple of names to my collection that I don't think I had autographs for yet.

That does it for the first 10 boxes of the case. As far as my collection goes, the best cards were probably the Dale Earnhardt Jr. parallel /99 and some of the Green retail parallels of various drivers I collect.

Some of My Favorite 2023 Topps Stadium Club Photos

I bought a set of Stadium Club cards on eBay a little while ago, and flipped through the cards a bit to look at the pictures. Stadium Club would be a fun set to build through packs, but I can't justify the cost of building sets that way when I can get a base set for so little compared to busting a handful of boxes. The hits you pull rarely make up the difference, especially as most breaks I've seen of Stadium Club this year feature a whole lot of no-name autographs. I thought I'd post a few pictures here of cards I liked when I looked through the set.

That Yogi Berra photo is pretty cool, with the lounge chair, the big TV, and the neat cart in the background. The Joc Pederson photo hit me with nostalgia, as I collected the Chevron cars pretty hard when they first came out. After I had kids I opened all the packages and let my kids play with them, so they were all pretty well destroyed after a few years. I don't regret doing it, though.

Next up are a couple of intimidating fireballers, in Nolan Ryan and Randy Johnson. I love that particular Astros uniform, and Johnson looks as intimidating as ever in this photo.

Not much to say here, just a nice shot of a play at the plate and a good wide photo showing the catcher and umpire at work.

This is about the most 90's pair of cards you could come up with. That Frank Thomas photo could have been a poster sold at the Scholastic book fair.

I had to get a picture of the home team in here with that Jeremy Peña card, and the Starling Marte photo features a beautiful sky as the afternoon turns to evening, a perfect time to be at the ballpark.

Closing things out is a silly photo of Joey Votto and a pic of Xander Bogaerts signing autographs. These may not be the 12 greatest photos in 2023 Topps Stadium Club, but they are 12 that stood out to me as I flipped through the set.

Haven't been feeling the blogging vibe lately, so it's been a few days since I posted anything. I'm trying to stick with it, but sometimes I don't feel like I have anything to say. I'd like for the blog to be more than just a showcase of what I've picked up lately, but sometimes it feels like those are the easiest posts to write.

C-3PO Golden Rod Error Sketch by John Soukup

Today's card is an art "card" paying homage to an infamous Star Wars card, the C-3PO Golden Rod error. Back when the original Star Wars sets were being produced, the C-3PO photo chosen had a bit of costume out of place, leading it to look like C-3PO was rather excited. This was scandalous, and Topps put out a corrected version of the card that removed the offending appendage. The uncorrected version is rather popular and probably one of the more expensive cards from the Star Wars sets now.

Recently, artist John Soukup, whose work I've featured on this blog before, has been posting Star Wars sketches done on wood to his eBay page. One of those sketches called back to the C-3PO Golden Rod error card, and I had to have it for my collection. I've got at least one copy of the error card in my collection, and in fact it makes up part of the background collage for my blog.

Here is the back of the artwork, for the sake of completeness. Not sure what SSW stands for, but it is appropriately labeled as a 1/1.

2023 Panini Select WWE Nikkita Lyons Autograph

Today's card is an autograph I've been waiting to get for a while. I'm a fan of wrestling in general, and of women's wrestling specifically, so I try to have as comprehensive a collection as possible. One wrestler who's only had a couple of autographs so far is Nikkita Lyons. I've been watching WWE card releases to see when she might get a couple of autographs on the market.

Well, she's finally got a couple of autograph cards on the market and I eventually sniped this one from 2023 Panini Select WWE for a lower price than they generally go for at the moment. It's even Valentine's Day-themed, as she included a little heart as part of her signature.

2023 Panini Prizm UFC Undercard Box

I'm returning to the recent order I made from Blowout Cards, with a box of 2023 Panini Prizm UFC Undercard. This is a watered-down Hobby product, bypassing most of the exciting stuff but also adding a few Undercard-exclusive parallels. The draw for me here is that you're guaranteed an autograph and a large portion of the base set at a pretty significant discount from the regular Hobby boxes. Although I am kind of a scattershot singles collector, I do value being able to complete base sets, and I'm trying to collect on a limited budget. I just can't afford most Hobby wax these days. The value isn't there for me.

The last card in the set is a famous UFC fan, Hasbulla Magomedov. He's a social media personality with dwarfism who hangs out with the Dagestani contingent of UFC fighters.

Most of the non-base cards in the box are these Undercard Prizms, which have a disco-style background that is exclusive to Undercard boxes. Similar to the 2022 set I showed a couple of days ago, there are 100 horizontal and 100 vertical cards in the set. The Valentina "Bullet" Shevchenko card shown here is a special nickname variation that is again exclusive to Undercard boxes. 

Here are a couple of the vertically-oriented Undercard Prizms. The set is pretty comprehensive, with 200 cards featuring current and retired fighters.

This Silver Prizm of Saidyokub Kakhramonov was the only regular Prizm in the box. They are more common in other packaging configurations, but here they apparently take a back seat to the Undercard Prizms.

I was moderately surprised to find 2 numbered parallels in my box. The Alatengheili Red Undercard Prizm is #/99 and the Francis Ngannou Blue Undercard Prizm card is #/25. Ngannou is the more recognizable name for me here. He famously left the UFC during his time as Heavyweight champion when the two sides couldn't agree on the terms of a new contract. He is currently signed with the PFL and participated in an exhibition boxing match with Tyson Fury.

All of the insert cards in the box featured Undercard Prizm backgrounds, so someone trying to complete the inserts would have to choose between regular packs and Undercard packs. I guess you could try to build mixed sets, but what kind of collector mixes sets?

The Dominance insert set appears to feature champions, with Stipe Miocic and Henry Cejudo being the pulls from my box. Cejudo is mildly irritating, but he embraces being a villain and is undoubtedly good at fighting. I've mentioned before that I collect Miocic cards, so I was happy to pull an insert of him here.

The Fearless insert is a nice-looking colorful insert that I'd consider collecting if I had the bandwidth to pursue such a thing. Holly Holm is another fighter I collect, so it's nice to get another PC pull from the inserts. Brock Lesnar is a fearsome person, but over in the WWE world he's been tied to some pretty disgusting allegations along with Vince McMahon, who has been ousted from the company (again). Of course everyone is innocent until proven guilty legally, but in the court of public opinion there is certainly enough smoke for me to suspect some of the fire is real.

Hall Monitors showcases Hall of Fame-level fighters, and I pulled one of the best in Khabib Nurmagomedov, Dagestani friend of the previously-featured Hasbulla.

Finally, the autograph in the box was Damon Jackson, who I am unfamiliar with. He had a stint in the UFC prior to the period when I was watching events heavily, and again after I stopped watching the UFC on a regular basis. He's fought a lot of fights, but they happen to coincide with times I wasn't paying attention.

This was a decent box break for the price. I could see myself buying a couple more boxes to chase the base set in this format. Although a lot of the big hits are off the table in this configuration, there is enough interesting and exclusive stuff to hold a little bit of value.