2008-09 Topps Basketball

Ah, the NBA Playoffs. Killer of dreams, crusher of... holy crap, that's embarrassing. I suddenly feel a lot better about the Blazers series.

Here's some basketball cards.

113 - Nate Robinson (Shamefully participated in obviously scripted 2009 Slam Dunk festivities.)
1 - Chris Paul (Couldn't they have found a better picture for the Topps coverboy? I wonder if Chris Paul is in hiding after last night.)

9 - Tony Parker (The lights are almost out on the Spurs era. Tony Parker is now basically their best player.)
82 - Corey Maggette (I'm absolutely shocked that this guy has spent 9 consecutive seasons with the Los Angeles Clippers.)

47 - Andrei Kirilenko (The Jazz were eliminated last night. I was hoping they'd at least make the Lakers sweat a little bit.)
154 - Eddy Curry

IGIO - Taurean Green / Sidney Green In The Genes (Taurean Green was drafted by the Blazers and then sent to Denver late in the season for Von Wafer when the Blazers were short on shooting guards. Wafer apparently had a lousy work ethic and didn't stick with the Blazers, but found a way to get back at them by playing for lousy rotten Houston in the playoffs this season. Meanwhile, Taurean spent the entire season playing in Spain and his father Sidney was just a solid pro.)
- Checklist 2 of 2
96 - Kirk Hinrich (Hinrich has been relegated to backup PG duty, but has been heavily involved in the Bulls bid to knock off the defending chumps Boston.)

192 - Alex English (I got to witness English score his 25,000th point in person. He was playing in his final season, with Dallas, and it happened to be my first NBA game. The Blazers won, of course!)
105 - Cuttino Mobley (I think he retired.)

195 - Hakeen Olajuwon


184 - Jo Jo White (Solid!)
- Students: Work Hard, Get Cards. Greg Oden: Work Hard, Get Fouls.

2008-09 Upper Deck Lineage

The NBA Playoffs are underway. In honor of this, I picked up an Upper Deck Lineage basketball pack at Target today. I have no idea what this set is all about, but I assume from the wrapper that it's some sort of NBA equivalent of Upper Deck Timeline. You can also apparently collect some Michael Jordan legacy cards. I think if you have a "legacy", it should include your washed-up Wizards years, Mike. The Blazers/Rockets series starts tonight - let's see if I get a Blazers or Rockets card. It could be a sign!

22 - Alonzo Mourning (Nice card using the design of the first set from 1991-92.)

13 - Dominique Wilkins (I love 'Nique. I wish they could have showed him dunking or something, though. The Hawks are pretty much my go-to Eastern Conference team now that Patrick Ewing is long gone.)

65 - Michael Redd (I guess all of these cards have the same design. That's kind of boring. Redd suffered a season-ending injury.)

116 - Andres Nocioni (Here's the back design. No text other than stats, really. The Bulls beat the Celtics in Boston this afternoon, which is great. Kevin Garnett is out for the playoffs, though, so they didn't have much of a chance anyway.)

190 - Al Horford (Another Hawk, Al Horford. I get Hawks like crazy, at least in the few packs that I've purchased this season. I always get Al Horford and Al Thornton mixed up.)

179 - Acie Law IV (I'm not sure how Acie Law made it into this set. Maybe it's a huge set. Maybe it's just very Atlantacentric.)

Now, back to your regularly scheduled baseball card postings, already in progress. (Go Blazers!)

2008-09 Topps T51 Murad Basketball

Topps Murad is basically the Allen & Ginter idea for basketball cards. I saw a fair amount of reviews of this stuff when it first came out, and although I try to avoid spending money on basketball cards so I don't get hooked, I knew I needed to try a pack of this stuff. This set has one of the craziest designs I've ever seen on trading cards. And they really have to be seen in person to get the full experience. Basketball cards seem to have a miniscule presence on blogs, so I like to throw one up here once in awhile.

31 - Gerald Wallace (Yes, the Charlotte Bobcats are an actual NBA team. Gerald Wallace was once the understudy to Chris Webber at Sacramento, but he's become a fairly well-rounded and unsung quality player. Unfortunately, Wallace had his season come to a grisly end around the time I purchased this pack, when a flagrant foul by Laker Andrew Bynum caused him to suffer a partially collapsed lung as well as a broken rib. Karma came back to get Bynum, as he's been out for quite sometime and his availability is a question mark for the playoffs. Incidentally, Bynum was taken out by his own teammate, some chump named Kobe Bryant. By the way, I hate the Lakers.)

16 - Josh Smith (Oddly enough, there is an entire chapter of this book dedicated to both Gerald Wallace and Josh Smith and their combined oddities and intrigue. Atlanta is a dangerous team this season and they could certainly make some noise in the playoffs this year.)

177 - Eric Gordon (Gordon is a rookie, as indicated in the upper right hand corner of the card, so he is required to carry two basketballs wherever he goes. Baron Davis will do something unmentionable to him if he doesn't.)

174 - Russell Westbrook Mini (Speaking of unmentionable, he's another rookie, Russell Westbrook, playing for a team that shall not be mentioned. They used to be the Sonics. Now they're a walking, balling disgrace in uniforms that look like some kid messed around with PhotoShop using Bobcats and New Orleans Hornets unis. The minis, I'm assuming, are one per pack like A&G.)

73 - Rasheed Wallace (Part of me really missed the days when Sheed would spot up around the perimeter at the Rose Garden to a chorus of "Sheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeed!" prior to nailing another 3-pointer. The other part of me laughs when hearing that he just got suspended for earning his 16th technical foul of the season, in his first game back from a two-week injury layoff. He's still in my Top 5 Blazers of all-time, but he could get pushed out soon as the entire current Blazers team is so likeable.)
1 - Elton Brand (Brand played 8 games last season and somehow signed a high dollar 5 year contract with a new team, the Sixers. He played in 29 games this year before being shut down with another season-ending injury. It has to be rough being a Sixers fan these days.)

2008-09 Upper Deck First Edition Basketball

Several years ago, when I succumbed to buying baseball cards again, I decided I would commit to buying cards from one sport and one sport only. Back in high school, when I worked for a hobby shop for a time, I collected three sports and had no idea what self-control was. However, I really do like basketball, and recently I've allowed myself to purchase one basketball card pack whenever I am making a decent sized baseball purchase. Upper Deck's First Edition is great for me, because it only costs 99 cents a pack and doesn't make me feel guilty. Not only that, since I don't really collect basketball cards anymore, I don't even notice how crappy the product is.

28 - Sasha Pavlovic (Pavlovic is a Bruce Bowen-wannabe who doesn't really do a whole lot of good things on the basketball court. Sorry, Cavs fans, I just don't see it.)
21 - Andres Nocioni (Nocioni is a decent player, but isn't quite the player that fellow Argentine Manu Ginobili is. Unlike Ginobili, however, Nocioni has stayed reasonably healthy.)

55 - Baron Davis (Highly talented, selfish scoring guard - the NBA has a lot of them.)
224 - Karl Malone UD Legends (I'm not sure how difficult it is to get these cards. Malone is one of my least favorite non-Lakers of all-time.)

237 - Kosta Koufos (Rookies are one-per-pack according to the wrapper. Koufos apparently played with Greg Oden at Ohio State and his name reminds me of doofus. That's all I really know.)

53 - Tayshaun Prince Gold (Here's a gold-ish parallel card. Once again, I have no idea how difficult these are to pull. Nice variety in this pack so far.)

SQ-1 Carmelo Anthony Starquest (The Blazers are one game behind Denver, who is in 1st place in the Northwest Division. That alone is enough for me to hate the Nuggets, but their players are reason enough. Starquest cards are one-per-pack, I think, and don't have parallel versions unlike the regular set.)
193 - Ronnie Brewer (This is an anti-Blazers pack. Two Jazz cards on top of the Nuggets card.)

103 - Michael Redd (Check out the look on Redd's face. Maybe he got a sign from the future that he was going to miss a huge chunk of the 2008-09 season and put his team at risk of missing the playoffs.)
165 - Mikki Moore

So... who wants to post a baseball card pack?

2008-09 Topps Tip-Off

I've tried to make a point to buy one basketball card pack every time I make a trip to a big box retailer or a card shop to buy a bunch of packs. For 99 cents, I felt like this Topps Tip-Off set was a low risk/high reward type of product for someone who is only marginally interested in basketball cards and only cares for one NBA team. I was expecting the NBA version of Opening Day, but was pleasantly surprised with a completely different card design and what I'm assuming are different photos from the base set.

17 - Mike Dunleavy (PLUS! The aforementioned card design. It's different. MINUS! It's um, different. And it kinda looks like a crappy Bowman design rehash. Plus, there's some kid's middle-aged adult's creepy fingernail scratch all over the top card, no doubt searching for that jackpot of an autographed Marreese Speights rookie card.)
82 - Raymond Felton (PLUS! These cards are cheap. MINUS! So cheap, in fact, that the first four cards in this pack are slightly miscut.)
87 - Chris Kaman (PLUS! At least Chris Kaman cut his hair. MINUS! He's hurt, and the Clippers are horrible.)

59 - Elton Brand (PLUS! This card reminds of of early Series 2 style NBA Hoops cards when there would be a big offseason trade or free agent signing. Almost all of the players that switched teams had cards with cheesy studio portrait photos. MINUS! Brand is also hurt, and now he's brought two franchises down to their knees with his injuries.)

33 - Dwyane Wade Some Sort of Red Parallel Card 0589/2008 (PLUS! It's, um, red. And it's Dwyane Wade, who is an MVP candidate this season. And there's those shiny gold serial numbers. MINUS! Dwyane spells his name like an idiot. And I bet these parallels are one-per-pack inserts since they aren't even mentioned on the back of the wrappers and there's currently one selling on eBay for $1.40.)

132 - Courtney Lee (PLUS! It's a Rookie Card, which actually sort of means something in the NBA. MINUS! Well, I can't really say anything bad about Courtney Lee. He's a rookie and he's doing alright, I suppose.)
- Checklist (And that wraps it up. Without this, I wouldn't have even known Marreese Speights was a real person.)

2008-2009 T51 Murad

Man, I haven't posted a pack in a month. Let's break the slump with a product I've been wanting for a long time - T51 Murad. This is Topps' foray into Tobacco-style Retro cards like A&G or Mayo. This set copies the T51 Murad set, which inserted cards featuring a college and a sport that college plays on the card. This set is the first one to have a basketball subject appear on a trading card although there were many other sports featured as well including baseball. I'm a big fan of retro ripoff sets and my lousy stinking Hawks are in FOURTH PLACE in the East right now which is good enough to host a playoff series. Hawks? In the playoffs? MADNESS! Oh so delicious madness... I'm looking forward to picking more of this up once I've finally gotten over my Heritage crazies. Let's check out a hobby pack:

119 Rashard Lewis

Ok, first of all these cards are busy. Really really busy. I'm guessing about 30% of people who see these cards will despise them off the bat. They're just following the design of the originals though, and they do a great job of it. It's hard to see on this frist card, but Murad is circling the border in gold ink (ink, not foil) and there are more gold ink highlights on the pennant and logo in the background. Something that will really frustrate some people is that the player's name is not on the front of the card. Hey, that's just how the originals looked.

Here's the back. Typical A&G minimalist design. I dig how the lineart logos contrast with the typeface. It is a little hard to read though.

137 Maurice Cheeks

Mo! the only thing I love more than retro cards is retro players on retro cards. I haven't actually taken the time to figure out the checklist or the short prints yet (Topps' recent crazyness has been too distracting) but these horizontal cards might be a variation of some sort. If I'm incorrect, someone please let me know. The original cards were all horizontal and I think the design works a lot better that way.

178 Joe Alexander mini RC

This is a mini card of some rookie named Joe. I have no clue who this guy is, so let's hope he's no good so I don't look like an idiot. The mini cards are bigger than A&G minis, but smaller than Goudey minis. The card it's closest to in size is a 1951 Topps red or blue back card, if you've ever seen one of them.

Checklist 10 of 30

The decoy card in the pack is an action photo that doubles as a checklist. This one here has Jason Kidd and Steve Nash facing off on the front, and the boxloader and autograph checklists on the back. Thirty cards isn't too bad a size for this set.

194 George Hill RC

The gold ink really pops out on this card. These look really good in person and they really are very similar to the original tobacco cards (Think T205 gold borders for the ink). Obviously there is a big difference between modern printing and old-school lithography but I still say they did a good job.

148 Walt Frazier

The best card was saved for last. I wouldn't mind a card of Clyde in every pack I rip, thank you very much.

I wish there was more than 6 cards in a pack, but I'll survive. The stuff looks really good and one of these days I'm going to break down and buy a box. They're going for about $70 right now which isn't too bad. Once I get a few more packs I'll do a full review on my blog.

2008-09 Topps Basketball

The Hawks won their 20th game tonight over Denver, the first time they've won 20 before January first since 1987. Since I unfortunately don't have a pack of '87-88 Fleer lying around, here's a new pack of Topps instead. Is it bad that I like the basketball set waaaaay better than the baseball set this year? The old-school players really make the set. I don't even mind that they short printed the rookies again.

55 Jason Kidd
48 Danny Granger
25 Al Jefferson
145 Jerry Stackhouse
34 Paul Pierce
162 Brendan Haywood
IG8 Damien Wilkins & Dominique Wilkins
32 Shaq-Fu
24 Kobe Bryant
16 Pau Gasol
8 Carlos Boozer
144 Luke Walton

The 'Nique & nephew card obviously made the pack for me. The rest of the pack was pretty awesome too, even if there was a distinct Lakers slant to it. The photography is amazing in this set, why can't baseball be like this? Why do we have Shaq stuffing some hapless blazer in the face, Kobe facing off against King James and Paul Pierce soaring to the heavens in basketball...

and then they give us stuff like this in baseball??

Even Bronski Beat wants to know why...

2008-2009 Topps Co-Signers Basketball

What the heck is Co-Signers doing at Target? Yes, these are retail packs. I didn't know Topps did such things, but since upper Deck is putting SP in retail outlets, I guess they are just going where the money is. The Hawks are kicking ass and chewing bubblegum right now so I shelled out for a couple of packs of the stuff. Both packs had craziness in them so I'm going to post 'em both in flagrant violation of this blog's credo. No one who reads this blog likes basketball anyway so I figure two hoops packs equals about two-thirds of a baseball pack. I'll owe you guys the third pack.

Pack 1:

100 Magic Johnson

LA LAKERS - FAST BREAK MAKERS - KINGS OF THE COURT SHAKE N BAKE ALL TAKERS - BACK TO BACK IS A BAD ASS FACT - A CLAIM THAT REMAINS - INTACT

Yes, I do have to sing that song every time I pull a Magic card out of a pack. I'm like Cartman and "Come Sail Away", I just can't help myself.

47 Andrei Kirilenko - A big goofy white guy in Utah, how shocking.

17 Josh Smith crazy ass Studio 54 shiny-refractor-except-not-on-chrome thingy #02/50

HOLY BLEEPING BLEEP. Are these things even allowed in retail packs?? I guess this is a hyper gold parallel? The thing looks like a time warp in hyperspace. It's a Hawk too, I guess the Topps spies are following me again and placing Hawks hits in my path. Seriously, this is like the third crazy Hawk hit I've gotten from that same Target. I also got a Joe Johnson jersey out of a '07-08 Topps pack, and a Dominique Wilkins numbered insert from a pack of Some other Topps product that I can't remember the name of now. All in the past year. Keep 'em coming, Topps spies!

Changing Faces Mix-and-Match Instructional Card - This is important later. FORESHADOWING...

79 Jeff Green - Seattle Uniform, Oklahoma City on the bottom of the card. Sad.

67 Shawn Marion- Nice, would be good for a Heat fan since he's in the new jersey after last year's Shaq trade.

Second Pack:

54 Joe Johnson

Two Hawks in two packs? I can't possibly do any better than that... CAN I???? (more foreshadowing)

58 Rashad McCants - Well at least the Wolves' new(ish) logo is more fierce than the old one that looked like a puppy dog.

CF-24 Shaquille O'Neal #321/399
CF-29 Amare Stoudemire

Ok this is that Changing Faces card that insert was warning us about. I wonder what is so special abo- OH NO!

A tragedy! It done broked! Oh wait, it's supposed to do that...

I should have read the info card. This is a 21st century Card-Supial gimmick card where you can mix and match the two players. WARNING - If you get one, don't pull it apart too many times. It's a real pain getting it back together. Here's the back:

The Shaq card is numbered to 399 but the Amare card isn't numbered which means it's not rare and there are MIIIIILLLIIIOOOONNS of them out there. I like Shaq-Fu better anyway. These drop at 1:12 packs according to the wrapper so you too can get one of these if you try hard enough.

56 Ricky Davis - Cheesy posed "just signed with a new team" stock photo.

Both packs had a Greg Oden "Stay In School" Irony card in them, both with security devices slapped on top of Greg. Dang, now I want more of this stuff, but I know if I rip 10,000 more packs of it, I'll never get anything as shiny and cool as the Josh Smith Hypno-Fractor. ALL GLORY TO THE HYPNO-FRACTOR.