2009 Upper Deck X

This is one of those products I keep going back to if I find a Target cheapie. I'm working on the die-cut set, so hopefully I'll get one I need.


Let's tear in.

Top to Bottom:
65 Alex Rodriguez

34 Garlos Guillen
44 Bobby Abreu Die-Cut (Got it already, dang.)

X3-PF Prince Fielder X3 Xponential (Didn't have this one yet. Even though he's no longer on my team, I still like getting his cards.)

68 Jack Cust
19 Aramis Ramirez

Well, I only needed one of those, but it was a good one. Most likely not my last pack of X.

2005 Upper Deck Pros & Prospects

It's gone past the point of becoming cliche to point out that no one posts here anymore. In fact, it's now cliche to point out the cliche regarding the lack of posts. So here we go. I'll just tell a lie about each player.

Let's tear in.

Top to Bottom:
35 Jason Schmidt
Mike Schmidt was a well-known practitioner of Onanism. If you've got a test tube and a quick, nimble hand, and you're in the general area when the seed is spilt, you can make a name for yourself in the AI game. Jason, I hate to tell you this way, but this is your origin story in a nutshell.

49 Alfonso Soriano
No fewer than 43 Major League Baseball teams have been disappointed when a post-Yankees Soriano failed to capture lightning in a bottle for them.

32 Ben Sheets
Sheets owns the world record for creating and cooking the world's longest knackwurst on the world's smallest grill.

88 Kerry Wood
Currently hanging above table 14 in a Wilmette, Illinois, Applebee's.

69 Livan Hernandez
Provides the voice for the Car Fox on those Carfax commercials.

29 Jason Kendall
Removes the toilet in each home he inhabits, just squats above the hole.

All of these guys were seasoned pros then, where are the prospects?

Repack Box Remorse - Volume 3

Aargh, not again!

A collector friend who buys so much retail he should own stock in the store recommended the $20 Championship repack boxes to me.  So the last time I was in my local Wal-Mart, there wasn't much of anything else interesting, so I caved and got one. 

The Box

When I got it home, I expected the concealed innards to contain packs of ubiquitous junk wax to contrast the newer stuff that was mounted in the windows. 

The visible packs

What I found was an even worse abomination than just junk wax.  Inside were several "bundles" of junk wax cards that had apparently been created by a previous buyer* who must have returned the box to the store.  They were five card groups of 1987 Topps, 1989 Donruss, 1990 Donruss, 1990 Fleer, 1991 Topps, 1991 Upper Deck, and 1995 Fleer sealed in what looks like penny sleeves closed with a shrink wrap heat sealer.

The inside "wrappers"

I thought it was just a cheesy way to repack old cards.  My friend says that these boxes are usually all more recent packs, so I knew I got screwed.   To make matters worse, I got DUPES in the bundles and a couple of the packs.  The OPC Premier pack only had five cards in it.

Dupes from bundles (top row) and real packs (bottom row)

Needless to say, this tarnishes my desire to ever buy any more repacks, especially from that store.  I'll have to check if their shrink wrap has logos on it normally.  This box was one of only two left along with one football box.  No use trying to return it now, since I opened everything.  More trade fodder at best....



* [Sensitive readers go back to the text now] Previous buyer = fucking douchebag.

1990-91 Topps Hockey

I can't believe nothing's been posted here so far in 2012. Since I was picking up some supplies at the hobby shop yesterday I decided to grab a pack of 1990-91 Topps hockey to rip. As the final couple of weeks of the NHL season unravel it seemed like the perfect time for a pack of hockey cards. For 50 cents I got 14 base cards and a glossy Team Scoring Leaders insert. I've already got a factory set of this stuff kicking around somewhere, but I still need some of the glossy inserts so maybe I'll get lucky there. Here's what I got:

#360 - Kevin Stevens

I think this is a rookie card. Kevin looked like he was poised for stardom early on in his career, but in retrospect his early numbers were somewhat inflated due to playing on a line with Mario Lemieux. Stevens was a member of both Pittsburgh Cup-winning teams in the early '90s, and went on to play for Boston, Los Angeles, New York and Philadelphia before returning to the Pens to finish his career.

I think the design on the fronts is half-way decent, but the backs are lacking as far as I'm concerned.

#157 - Tony Tanti

Unfortunately for Tony, he was traded during the '90-91 season to the Buffalo Sabres so he was not on Pittsburgh's roster when they captured the Cup in 1991.

#24 - Brent Ashton

Brent played for the Vancouver Canucks, Colorado Rockies, New Jersey Devils, Minnesota North Stars, Quebec Nordiques, Detroit Red Wings, Winnipeg Jets, Boston Bruins, and the Calgary Flames in his NHL career. How's that for a resume?

#336 - Ray Ferraro

I was hoping to pull at least one Hartford Whaler. Not long after these cards came out Ferraro was dealt to the Islanders, where he would go on to have some pretty memorable playoff games. These days Ferraro works as a broadcaster for TSN...

#68 - Michal Pivonka

Pivonka defected to the United States from Eastern Europe to begin his NHL career, and was a lifelong Washington Capital. If Wikipedia can be trusted he's still the Capitals' career assist leader.

#32 - Allan Bester

#267 - Daniel Marois

Team Scoring Leaders #17 - Mario Lemieux

Great, this is one of the glossy Team Scoring Leaders inserts that I needed. Guess this pack was worth the price of admission after all. Without looking, can you guess who was second in team scoring for Pittsburgh in '89-90 behind Super Mario?

If you guessed defenseman Paul Coffey give yourself a pat on the back.

#376 - Dean Evason

Two Whalers, this pack was officially a win. Evason is now a coach in the Capitals organization.

#363 - Chicago Blackhawks Team Card

I always liked the horizontal team cards in this set. One of the last helmet-less players, Doug Wilson, is lurking in the background of this photo.

#190 - Randy Burridge

#193 - Mark Messier All-Star

Aside from the Lemieux insert, this is easily the best card in the pack. 25 years in the NHL and 6 Stanley Cup championships. The All-Star cards were a separate subset, so each player from the All-Star team has both a standard base card as well as an All-Star card.

#215 - Benoit Hogue

Most notable for being involved in the Pierre Turgeon/Pat LaFontaine swap between the Sabres and Islanders.

#251 - Edmonton Oilers Team Card

Headless Ray Bourque makes an appearance on this card.

#140 - Sean Burke

We finish the pack with Sean Burke, who would go on to be a longtime netminder for the Hartford Whalers.

For 50 cents I wasn't expecting much, but I have to say I was pleasantly surprised with this pack. A couple of Whalers and a Lemieux insert that I needed made it worthwhile. I opened so much of this stuff as a kid that it was fun to take a trip down memory lane as well.

2008 Upper Deck Baseball Hobby

I picked up this pack at the card show from two weekends ago. It came from the table of "Overpriced Wax Guy." I always feel a little bad, since he's at every show and all I do is look and run. As it turned out, he had a bunch of 2011 Topps singles I needed, so I added this old hobby pack to round out the lot.

Let's tear in.

Top to Bottom:
121 Fausto Carmona

82 Andy Sonnanstine
43 Buddy Carlyle
4 Justin Speier
281 Mark Buehrle
86 B.J. Upton
(Did you ever get a look at the back of this card? Everyone else's name on the back of their cards is written with colored print on top of a white drop shadow. On Upton's, the color starts to crap out at the period. I'll have to run a check to see if anyone else's is like that.)

203 Shane Youman
89 Josh Wilson (Future Brewer.)
11 Roy Oswalt
162 Mike Bacsik
84 Al Reyes
42 Chuck James

81 James Shields
159 Damion Easley
369 Jake Peavy (I've probably pulled this card eight times. and I've opened maybe seven packs.)
306 Jerry Blevins
387 Fred Lewis Season Highlights
324 Joe Koshansky
360 Eric Byrnes

OPC-ER Edgar Renteria O-Pee-Chee

Not an amazing pack, by any means, but still the best photography of any set since I've gotten back into the hobby.

1996 Upper Deck Johnny Quest

The date of my birth puts me in just about the perfect wheelhouse NOT to be a fan of Johnny Quest. The original series aired in 1964-65, and probably lived on through the 1970s through reruns. This was followed decades later by The New Adventures of Johnny Quest, which theoretically should have been on my radar, but wasn't, probably because the series lasted only 13 episodes. The the time the series on which this pack of cards was based, The Real Adventures of Johnny Quest, was on television, I was nearly finished with high school, and the only cartoons I watched were The Simpsons and Space Ghost Coast to Coast. This pack of cards is as problematic as the final TV series. I'm familiar with the broad outline of the show, but none of its intricacies. Adult Swim meta-cartoons have provided much of my knowledge of Hanna-Barbera staples, namely the simmering undercurrent of homosexual tension between Benton Quest and Race Bannon.

Let's tear in.

Top to Bottom:
26 Dr. Jeremiah Surd
Good God, these cards are a mess! I cannot tell you how difficult it was for me to identify the subject of each card. With no fewer than seven separate places for text on the front of the card, the design seemed to combine early Geocities elements with a seventh grader's myspace page circa 2005. I don't know where to look, and I feel defeated.

35 Dr. Jeremiah Surd (???) Again?
I'm not sure if this card is part of the base set or not. It doesn't seem to be one of the listed inserts, but the card numbering is of a different style than the first one. Surd's profile is on the back, but we have this URL group shot on the front. I want to track down a laserdisc of this show so I can unscramble my brain.

22 Hadji
Back to the base design, I see. Hadji is a familiar main character, albeit with a rebooted wardrobe. The post-1993 WTC bombing environment most likely dictated a turban-free cartoon. Also clearly a Power Rangers derived look.

HC2 Hadji's Clues - Courage Overcomes Fear
If I rub off a portion of the back of this card, I'll get a clue that will help me while I play the Johnny Quest CD-ROM Adventure. I'm not falling for that one. (Turns out I was wrong on the turban thing, too.) Odds on this insert were 1:5.

47 Villain ^2 -- Ezekiel Rage / Dr. Jeremiah Surd
All Surd, all the time baby!

44 Tools of the Trade - Surd's High-Tech Wheelchair
Seriously, I cannot get away from this guy. And another design shift. Can anyone tell me what the base design even is? I give up. Just watch Harvey Birdman: Attorney at Law. At least that has more Race Bannon than this pack.

Repack Resurrection: 2007 Upper Deck Series 2

The long, arduous journey comes to a close today with the only pack worthy of the closing ceremonies: 2007 Upper Deck Series 2.
After all, for a blog whose purpose is to open and showcase packs of trading cards, it is certainly fitting that the final pack would be one that serves no other purpose other than to be opened for others to see. Which brings up the philosophical question: Does this blog exist because of this pack, or does this pack exist because of this blog?

Let's tear in.

Top to Bottom:
747 Emil Brown

571 Danys Baez
921 Barry Zito

799 Kevin Mench

654 Joe Borowski

Isn't it great to see the Toxic Avenger signing autographs for the kids?

Repack Resurrection: 2007 Topps Series 2

This is a product I have opened very little of since I bought a complete set of Series 2 at a card show shortly after it came out. I don't know what prompted me to do so. Perhaps it was a side effect of being in the middle of building the '07 Heritage set, my first experience with chasing down a buttload of short prints, and didn't need any other set-building distractions. Or maybe the price was just right. In any case, I probably already have every card in this pack, but let's tear in anyway.

Top to Bottom:
567 Chris Stweart (RC)
520 Adam Dunn

546 Orlando Cabrera
MMS29 Mickey Mantle Story

412 Gerald Laird
384 Alex Gonzalez

Yep, got 'em all, including the Mickey Mantle Story card. I finished that insert a long time ago. Not sure why. It's not like I snuggle up near the fireplace on a cold January evening reading the backs of those cards like a novel.

One pack to go and Repack Resurrection is over!