Fairfield Guaranteed Memorabilia Pack

As being a part of this blog has already made me do on earlier occasions, I found myself buying something I normally wouldn't buy for the sake of ripping it open and posting it here. And as a sane, rational human being, I realize that what I would most likely pull from a Target Fairfield box like this won't be that great. Take the box cover for instance:

Looks to me like I've got a chance of pulling a game-used Mantle, a Jose Reyes autograph, a game-used David Wright, or a Jackie Robinson swatch.

Let's tear in.

Hmmm, looks like I get to open a little more stuff. The memorabilia card is in an envelope, and I got a pack each of 2004 and 2005 Topps baseball, both series 2.

Let's not eff around here...I'm going for the good stuff first.

But before we get any further, I need to point out my realization that, if cropped effectively, the skin of my hand can be made to look positively pornorific.

Oh. Great. Sammy Sosa.
I'll try to contain my excitement

Why? Why a stinking, dirty Cub? And a cheater at that? Why did I get a card with a built-in glue stain?
For those of you counting at home, this is a 2003 Fleer Platinum Scouting Report, #030/250.

How come it doesn't say, "Uses steroids" underneath attributes? This thing will be on eBay within a matter of hours, unless someone wants to offer something better in trade.

Oh, and here's the other packs.
2004
439 Darrell May
697 Bengie Molina Gold Glove Award
409 Paul Wilson
686 Ryan Wagner Draft Pick
394 Chris Woodward

2005
569 Willie Harris
663 Mariners Team
BB101 Barry Bonds Home Run History #101
552 Jeff Cirillo
652 Dodgers Team
692 Dodgers Prospects Chad Billingsley/Joel Guzman

Don't buy these things, people.

2001 Upper Deck Evolution Baseball

At long last, my computer can finally handle the task of creating a pack post. Trips to the Mac store on two consecutive nights made for some tense evenings but all is finally well.

Today's pack came in a trade from fellow member dayf. It's always fun to get a pack from the fallow period between around 1994 and this past season where I failed to collect any cards at all. Sure, the big names are the same, but it's the obscure faces that make it invigorating to open something from those dark ages.

Let's tear in. (Man, it feels like a long time since I've typed that!)

Top to bottom:
85 Ken Griffey, Jr. (Spokesperson on the first pull...sweet.)

14 Jim Thome (A future hall-of-famer whose rookie cards you can get for a nickel...also sweet. Outside of the Cleveland metro area (as well as select pockets of Philly and Chicago), Thome reportedly has to pay people to autograph their cards at shows.)
81 Scott Rolen
55 J.D. Drew
EC 2 Gary Sheffield E-Card UD Classics Scratch Off

The thing about this card is...well...where to begin? The back of this card suggests I scratch this off and "Go to upperdeckdigital.com to digitize your e-card." This is stupid, and very 2001 of Upper Deck. First of all, a digital baseball card is like a non-alcoholic beer. Or, more aptly, an imaginary handjob. No one wants it, but if you somehow got a hold of one, what would you do with it? The practicality of this card has also long since expired, as the above web address merely gets you to Upper Deck's website.

To top it all off, as a Milwaukee resident and die-hard Brewer fan, I consider Gary Sheffield to be the most reprehensible player the organization ever signed. And this includes Julio Machado, a guy who is currently finishing up a twelve-year prison sentence in Venezuela for fatally shooting a woman for basically cutting him off in traffic. Sheffield was worse. The guy was a complete jag-off for his entire stay, starting from the time he chose #1 as his uniform number. Had I acquired this card in 2001 and decided to redeem it, the most likely outcome would involve smoke billowing out from my DVD drive.

God, what an ass!

Thanks, dayf. Not to be too negative, any pack with a Griffey is a good pack. I look forward to future trades.

By the way, check out Thorzul Will Rule and its new design. In my triumphant return I have posted a few select treats.

2007 Bowman Heritage

So I check the message boards this morning and discover that Bowman Heritage is live, live, live, baby. About four hours later I'm at the shop plunking down my money for a box and a pack. Here's the pack, check my blog later this evening for info on the box.

33 Jeff Kent
1 Jeff "Gold Glover" Francoeur
164 rainbow Jeff Duncan
BHP19 Noe Rodriguez
BHP91 Ryan Norwood
245 Travis Buck RC
155 Jimmy Rollins
23 Carlos Delgado

I opened up this pack and was not thrilled about the first card I saw. Not a big fan of Jeff Kent. Then I realized that Jeff was just protecting another Jeff from being damaged, the true first card, Jeff Francoeur. Frank Wren needs to forget about signing an over the hill Met pitcher and lock Frenchy up for a long time. The base cards are all pretty good, 4 stars and a rookie. Jimmy Rollins looks cool in front of the Liberty Bell. I don't know who Travis Buck is, but I like him. He's no Torii Hunter, but he looks delightfully unhinged. He also has the same signature as Matt DeSalvo does on his Topps card. Methinks Topps is forging these odd faux logo autos.

Unlike last year's mess of a set, the rainbow foil cards are actually rainbowy this year. I got Chris Duncan for the pack searching deterrent card. Dave's kid is a lot nicer card to pull than the stupid Upper Deck thick advertising cards. There are no mini cards this year, which is disappointing. The '05 minis with the '51 design looked really good.

Topps ganked the 1954 Red Heart Dog Food set for the design of the prospect cards this year. They look pretty sweet and I think it's better that they are differentiated from the base design. The fronts are an exact copy of the '54 set while the backs shrink the logo and shift the stats a bit, but are more or less the same. I don't know who these two are though.

A pretty good effort from Topps, unlike last year. I don't know who the short prints are, but I don't mind at this point. It would be nice if they weren't skip numbered this time. Overall, I'm as happy as 'ol Travis here with this pack.

2001 Topps American Pie

I was cleaning out the basement and found this pack (among many others) among the detritus. Topps American Pie Baby Boomer Baseball edition. Anybody out there remember this crap? Back in the early days of the Retro wave there were a lot of odd throwback sets designed to separate the nostalgic collector from their moola. Some, like Heritage, stuck and thrived. Some, like this, did not. The basic idea behind this set is to combine baseball players from the 60's and 70's with pop culture icons and events from the same period. Donruss Americana is going to try the exact same thing, just without all those pesky baseball players.

Before we open up this puppy and find out what horrible things could lurk inside to cause this pack to be banished to the basement for 6 years, let's take a look at the wrapper, shall we? The logo of this stuff looks like a bad shroom trip. It's a bit frustrating for a blogger whose mission statement is to get kids to do cards and not drugs to have to deal with a set that is trying to BE drugs. The great Willie Mays shouldn't be associated with all this stuff. The crazy rainbow of colors in the background is more reminiscent of the woefully underrated Upper Deck 70's set than the design on this product. That's not the only misrepresentation on the wrapper, I think the font used on "baseball legends and pop culture icons" is supposed to be a retro 60's computer font, but it looks more to me like a 50's tiki font. They wouldn't be trying to sneak 50's icons in here, thus prematurely aging the target boomer audience, would they? The horrors! Ok, enough nitpicking the wrapper, let's look at the cards already.

117 Bay of Pigs
134 U.S. Gas Shortage
150 Malcom X
109 Johnny Podres
108 Lou Whitaker

It's a bit jarring to open a pack of cards and see a picture of a tank labeled "Cuba Invasion Debacle". This isn't actually the worst card from the set, I have one titled Nuclear Test Ban Treaty with a picture of a nuclear mushroom cloud on the front. I've filed that card away with my 2007 Atlanta Falcons team set. The Gas Shortage card is pretty funny in retrospect. Gas prices were cheap as hell in late 2001 and I'm sure I laughed at all those non-gas having suckers because I would surely never have to deal with that. After two horrifically lame cards I finally pull a cool Malcom X card. Fight the power! I really wanted to do my 6th grade Black History Month report on Malcom X, but I got stuck with WEB DuBois. I wish Wikipedia was around back then, my report sucked. Finally! Baseball cards! Johnny Podres, while he technically did play during the 60's, is a 50's baseball icon period. Topps also screwed up the bio, stating that the Brooklyn Dodgers bested the Yankees in the 1953 World Series. Sort of off topic, but does anyone know if Johnny Podres has a card where he's in a Padres uniform? Edit: Andrew with the assist! The pack ends up on a high note with a card of Sweet Lou. It might be a sweeter card if the border design weren't so weird. It does have Yogi on every card though so I guess it's not so bad. Not good enough to save this pack though. Back to the basement with you!

1990 Donruss

This is the pack I got in my trade with Thorzul. This pack is dying to be open, the cards are ready to burst out of it as I type. This can't possibly be the first pack of 1990 Donruss opened on this blog is it? If not, this pack will still be the best one opened, I can feel it.

Carl Yastrzemski .40 .41 .42
132 Mike Morgan
373 Mike Bielecki
613 Rick Leach
710 Ozzie Smith All Star
270 Gregg Jefferies
221 Chuck Crim
461 Jack Daugherty
50 Jeff Treadway
289 Ron Darling
647 Scott Sanderson
651 Steve Lyons
604 Don Carman
138 Jerry Browne
379 Randy Johnson
619 Shawn Hillegas
624 Mark Lemke
276 Paul Kilgus

See what did I tell you? Wizard of Oz All-Star card, Big Unit and best of all, Mark Lemke. Ya can't get much better than the Lemmer. The puzzle card is of Yaz's right shoulder. This is actually one of Donruss' more fascinating puzzles. All the Diamond Kings from that year have the usual stylized, whacked out backgrounds that they had since the subset was introduced in '82. The puzzle however has a more traditional portrait of Yaz with the subdued, neutral background style used in the 1991 Diamond Kings, yet it works well with the bright, blocky borders of the puzzle. Surely this puzzle will one day hang in the Louvre as the key transitional piece that shows Dick Perez abandoning his wilder Modernistic trademark style to embrace the Renaissance Baroque method of portraiture reminiscent of the Master Rembrandt van Rijn. You laugh now, but one day his portrait of Jim Edmonds from the 2007 Allen & Ginter set will be more well known and more critically acclaimed than the Mona Lisa. The rest of the pack isn't too bad. I got Mike Morgan in one of his many uniforms, a Gregg Jefferies card that was a much better pull in 1990 than it is now, and Psycho with his pants mercifully on. Plus two Braves and two Hall of Famers! Gotta love that 1990 Donruss.

Pack Playoff! Football Edition

I'm taking a break from vintage packs this week to honor the Colts-Patriots matchup with a football edition of Pack Playoff.Two packs of 2007 football cards face off to see who is the champ. The Indy-New England game isn't technically a playoff but it should feel like one. Our matchup isn't quite as good, as it features two bottom of the barrel products. This is more a Falcons-49ers showdown but it should be more fun than that game.

Upper Deck First Edition football will take on Topps Total in this battle of lightweights. You want good packs, you go buy 'em. The Colts will be represented by the old veteran Topps as they were an original NFL team, while upstart Upper Deck will proxy for the AFL Boston Patriots. We'll play four quarters with each card or design element representing one drive from the team. Here's the coin toss............. heads. Topps wins the toss and elects to receive.

First Quarter

Topps ball, wrapper design:
Topps has LT as their Total spokesman, shown here in a closeup with the Vader shield on his helmet. LT is nice and all, but the red is really dark and not very eye catching. Topps has the insert ratios on the back which is always nice. A good drive, but they stall in the red zone and settle for a field goal.

Topps 3, Upper Deck 0

Upper Deck ball, wrapper design:
Upper Deck features an action shot of Emmitt Smith on their wrapper. LT is nice, but he hasn't won a playoff game yet. Emmitt has championships coming out of his ears! He can't even lose a dance contest. Smith should run for president, he'd win in a landslide and couldn't do worse than the other clowns running. The wrapper has a classic looking design and stands out more than the Total wrapper. UD takes the ball to the 1 yard line, but are denied the endzone when I discover there are no insert ratios on the back.

Topps 3, Upper Deck 3

Topps ball, front design:
How to describe this mess... Green borders with curved neon lights and shockwaves in the corners. They don't even put the team name on the front. This looks like 1991 Fleer football got an extreme makeover. Ugly is still ugly however, no matter how you dress it up. Interception returned to the 10 yard line.

Topps 3, Upper Deck 3

Upper Deck ball, front design:
This is what Upper Decks base set should look line. The silver borders look good and there's no goddamn unreadable foil name. It's not a that great a design to begin with but thanks to the interception, they don't have far to go. Upper deck punches the ball in the endzone with their fullback.

Topps 3, Upper Deck 10

Topps ball, back design:
Topps is at least consistent, the back is as awful as the front. Too busy, the stats suck and you have to hunt for the card number. At least they remembered the team name this time. Topps muffs the kickoff, Upper Deck's ball on the Topps 18.

Topps 3, Upper Deck 10

Upper Deck ball, back design:
This is what a card back is supposed to look like. Big name, card number in the top left corner, concise bio, full career stats, plus it has the team logo as well as a small head shot that isn't swiped from the front. Very, very nice. Upper Deck lofts a beautiful pass to a wide open receiver in the corner of the end zone for the TD. The holder screws up the snap on the extra point, but the kicker picks it up and flattens a lineman on the way to paydirt for 2.

END OF QUARTER ONE: Upper Deck 18, Topps 3

Second Quarter

Topps ball, Card 1: Barry Cofield, Fred Robbins, William Joseph
Reeling from Upper Deck's onslaught, Topps counters with three Giants D-Tackles who have combined for 20 tackles and two sacks this year. Three and out.

Upper Deck 18, Topps 3

Upper Deck ball, Card 1: Alge Crumpler
He's not having a great year, but Alge's my favorite player on my favorite team. Upper Deck caps a long drive with a 7 yard touchdown pass to their big tight end.

Upper Deck 25, Topps 3

Topps ball, Card 2: Tye Hill, Fakhir Brown
Two defensive backs with zero interceptions this year. The Topps offense is being completely shut down by Upper Deck's front four. Punt.

Upper Deck 25, Topps 3

Upper Deck ball, Card 2: Steve Smith
A great receiver on a terrible team, and he's still putting up decent numbers. He's got David Carr and Vinnie Testeverde throwing to him and he's still on pace for a thousand yards and a dozen touchdowns. Upper Deck goes for the kill with a long bomb on first down and hits it with a long TD strike. They go for two to rub it in but fail on the conversion.

Upper Deck 31, Topps 3

Topps ball, Card 3: Jason Witten
Topps finally stops trying to be cute and comes up with a single player card. Witten's a good tight end, but TE's don't normally top Beckett's Hot List. Topps engineers a long drive that stalls at the 45. Punt.

Upper Deck 31, Topps 3

Upper Deck ball, Card 3: Braylon Edwards
Braylon is finally coming into his own and is averaging almost 100 years and over a touchdown a game. If he can keep this up, he'll finally live up to that #3 overall pick the Browns spent on him. Upper Deck runs the ball to kill the clock and takes a knee instead of attempting a 52 yard field goal.

END OF FIRST HALF: Upper Deck 31, Topps 3

Holy crap, what a slaughter. I don't think anyone saw this coming, except maybe someone who cracked open a box of Total. I won't be offended if you switch over to the Topps Chrome-Playoff Contenders matchup over on CBS. You never know though, Topps might have a Frank Reich up their sleeves. On to the second half!

Third Quarter

Upper Deck ball, Card 4: Jay Cutler
Upper Deck opens the half strong with a good young quarterback. No one's forgotten John Elway in Denver yet, but he's not doing too badly for having less than a full season of starts under his belt. Upper Deck runs the ball down Topps' throat and come out of the drive with a 32 yard field goal.

Upper Deck 34, Topps 3

Topps ball, Card 4: Tim Carter, Leigh Bodden, Kenny Wright
The coach gave a fire and brimstone speech in the locker room, the assistants have made their adjustments and the players are all geeked up. And Topps comes out with... another triple player card. Hey, Leigh Bodden's on my fantasy team! He better get an interception, Larry Fitzgerald's done crap for me today. Topps' drive stalls at midfield, they pooch a punt into the corner and stick UD deep in their own territory.

Upper Deck 34, Topps 3

Upper Deck ball, Card 5: Tony Gonzalez
Upper Deck is not letting up on the gas at all. Here's another star card, this time future Hall of Famer Tony Gonzalez. Another long grueling drive from UD results in points on the board as a 28 yarder goes through the uprights.

Upper Deck 37, Topps 3

Topps ball, Card 5: Mark Bulger
Finally, Topps delivers with a good card. He's hurt, has no offensive line and the team sucks, but Bulger is still a decent card of a QB. Topps finally puts together a decent drive and scores on a TD pass to the back of the end zone.

Upper Deck 37, Topps 10

Upper Deck ball, Card 6: Deuce McAllister
Out for the season and Reggie Bush is 4-1 in games Deuce hasn't started. Not good for Deuce. Topps' defense gets an emotional boost from the success of the offense and stuff Upper Deck's rushing attack. First punt of the day for UD.

Upper Deck 37, Topps 10

Topps ball, Card 6: Walter Jones, Chris Spencer, Chris Gray
Topps gets the ball back from Upper Deck after stopping them and they counter with... three offensive lineman. NFL success begins with the o-line, but football card success most assuredly does not. Topps' vaunted line lets through a jailbreak and their QB gets slaughered and coughs up the ball. A big fat defensive lineman rumbles it back for a 72 yard TD. Oh the humanity.

END OF QUARTER THREE: Upper Deck 44, Topps 10

It's the start of the final quarter, the stands are emptying and Michael Eisner is looking extremely sour in the owner's box. The coach for Topps better be getting his resumé together. Don't leave now though, maybe some rookies will take the field for garbage time.

Topps ball, Card 7: Champ Bailey 1st Edition parallel
Topps has run out of base cards and enters the Insert phase of the pack. Maybe a miraculous comeback is in order? Champ Bailey is a superstar defender, a Georgia Bulldog, and a 1st Edition insert to boot! Touchdown all the way! What are the odds for this card? One in... two?!? Topps has spent years trying to position first edition as a rarity and they turn it into an 18-per-box parallel for a crappy football product? You gotta be kidding me. The Topps QB lofts a beautiful 48 yard touchdown pass only to have it overturned on by a flag due to offensive pass interference. They cough up a fumble on the very next play. Upper Deck ball deep in Topps territory.

Upper Deck ball, Card 7: Willie Parker
Upper Deck don't need no stinking inserts. Willie Parker is rushing for over 100 yards a game for the 5-2 Steelers. The Upper Deck running back blows through a wide open hole and dives into the end zone.

Upper Deck 51, Topps 10

Topps ball, Card 8: Kerry Rhodes, Erik Coleman Gold parallel
A three per box parallel of two safeties. The exits are jammed, the mezzanine level is on fire and the Totals' head coach is being escorted from the stadium at gunpoint by security. Not for his own safety either. Three and out, negative yardage on the drive.

Upper Deck ball, Card 8: Mark Bulger
The only decent card in the pack for Topps is mirrored by Upper Deck. To add insult to injury the photo is much better on the UD card. Upper Deck keeps the ball on the ground to run out the clock, but the Topps defense is exhausted and provides no resistance. The tailback waltzes into the endzone through a huge hole.

Upper Deck 57, Topps 10

The game is pretty much over and the rookies are all in the game. Let's end this quickly for mercy's sake.

Topps ball, Card 9: Darius Walker RC
Rookie running backs are the best bet to have an immediate impact on the team that drafted them. Too bad this one was cut from the team in July. Topps is forced to punt on first down when their QB hides inside the instant replay monitor and refuses to come out, screaming "pay no attention to the man behind the curtain!" over and over.

Does the score really matter at this point

Upper Deck ball, Card 9. Calvin Johnson RC
Ok, this isn't fair now. The Topps defense late hits the UD quarterback on a kneel down play on first down with 36 seconds left. The irate QB audibles a hail mary on the next play and hits his rookie receiver for a 68 yard touchdown. They go for two and make it. They then on side kick.

Chicago Bears 73, Washington Redskins 0

Topps ball, Card 10: Jason Hill RC
One catch in 9 games. Upper Deck recovers the on side.

Georgia Tech 222, Cumberland 0

Upper Deck ball, Card 10: Chris Houston RC
It's a Falcons rookie card, but I just can't pile on Topps anymore. Upper Deck takes a knee and time expires.

FINAL SCORE: Upper Deck 65, Topps 10

What a horrific slaughter. Topps has a gripe in pointing out that I am comparing pulls from a single pack of a 200 card set with 100 veterans to a 550 card set that squeezes in 900 players. That doesn't make up for the hideous design and rainbow of useless parallels. Dollar packs are supposed to appeal to kids and casual collectors, right? Which of these packs do you think that demographic would be happy to open?

Wal-Mart Blister pack

So it's Saturday morning at 7:30 AM and I'm standing in the feminine products aisle of a Wal-Mart looking for something with wings. I capture my quarry and head to the card aisle because I actually deserve some cards for this. Still no Updates & Highlights blasters, but they got in a crapload of repack stuff. A stack of the $10 Cubes Chris Harris bought, a bunch of $5 blisters that guarantee $15 book value (at time of packing), some $2 blisters that make no such grand promises, and some $4 blisters that have two or three unopened packs. I found a repack with a pack of '06 Topps Heritage and snagged it. Here's what I got out of it. And yes, a blister counts as one pack for A Pack A Day even though I'm opening two packs. Don't blame me for being efficient.


I'll start with the appetizer pack before moving on the the main course. The Heritage pack was paired with a pack of 2007 Opening Day so they could justify charging 4 bucks for the blister. Time to rip.

one piece of chewable gum
165 Philip Humber RC
207 Prince Fielder Rookie cup
93 Scott Kazmir
75 Ryan Howard
46 Derek Jeter
Puzzle 19 - Vlad Guerrero's crotch

Since it was less than a calendar year old, I went for it and chewed the gum. It was a little tough at first, but it got better after a minute or so. This is a pretty kick ass pack for something that was a lame throw in. Prince Fielder with a Rookie Cup, Ryan Howard in his signature stance, Kazmir pitching well in a bad situation and a Philip Humber rookie. Humber's still only pitched in 5 games in his career, but he could end up a starter next year. The big pull is the Jeter sans goofy schmuck in the background. OK, that's not really fair, not even W with his silly grin is as dorky as the dude with the bright yellow shirt and flowing mullet in the background of this pic. The insert is the oh so attractive puzzle piece featuring Vlad's nethers. It's got a teensy picture of Andruw Jones on the back so that's pretty cool. Good start! Let's get to the main attraction.

one piece of stiff yet pliable gum
379 Craig Biggio
476 Brad Thompson
248 Tom Glavine
434 Adam Kennedy
319 Carl Crawford SP?
84 AJ Pierzynski
132 Mark Kotsay
161 Pittsburgh Pirates

The Carl Crawford short print is pretty damn sweet. He's in a posed photo where he's apparently looking to catch a meteor falling from the heavens. Every card in the pack is a posed shot, some more effective than others. Biggio looks great in a Billy Ripken pose, although he's too classy to have anything written on his knob. Adam Kennedy is fielding a grounder in the outfield with his back to the infield. On the flip side, Pierzinski's card is completely washed out and he looks like he's in someone's back yard. Brad Thomson looks like a bored 11 year old. Tom Glavine looks bored and irritated and is posing in what appears to be a wet parking lot. The whole scene looks so weird I'm having a hard time thinking it's not photoshopped.The only real dud card in the pack is the Pirates team. The team photo is black and white, pasted onto a color background and then an extremely fake wall with a pirates logo was stuck over the bottom third of the photo to obscure the bat boys. Uuuuug-leeee. It is interesting to note on the back of the card that Arky Vaughn is the Pirates all time leader in batting average at .385 though. They should have gone ahead and photoshopped Arky into the team photo.

Guest Blogger - 1995 Stadium Club Series 1

Here's a pack from reader Kevin, who recently picked up a box of 1995 Stadium Club. I'll link to the rest of the box break just as soon as I get it up on my site. I've taken the liberty to scan a few of my own '95 cards to decorate the post. :)

A few weeks ago, I scoured eBay for a relatively cheap
(under $20) box of cards. I found a box of Topps
Stadium Club '95 Series One that fit my criteria and
took the plunge. You see, way back in 1995 I was a
scrawny, awkward middle schooler and a rabid card
collector. If I recall correctly, I'd already lost
some of my innocence as a sports fan thanks to the
horrors of the baseball strike, but I came back around
gradually. Although none of the basic 1995 sets did
anything for me, I was immediately drawn to the
beautiful photography and classy design on the front
of the Stadium Club cards...and I guess I overlooked
the butt-ugly clusterf*ck on the back. I never came
close to completing the set, so as a scrawny, awkward
mid-twentysomething I decided to jump back into it.
Let's rip some packs, shall we?

11 Carlos Garcia
28 Virtual Reality Paul Molitor
35 Barry Larkin
219 Roberto Kelly Best Seat in the House
122 Deion Sanders
232 Jose Lind
52 Denny Hocking
195 Eduardo Perez
193 Jeff Conine
245 Mike Bordick
72 Dennis Eckersley
22 Ken Hill

For a first pack, this is a real dud. I knew what I
was in for when I saw a Pirate looking up at me from
the top of the stack. I already had Molitor, Hocking,
and Conine. Eduardo Perez really amuses me on
Baseball Tonight. He sounds like his tongue is too
big for his mouth, but still, he just looks like he's
trying so hard to be cool and insightful. The Eck
card is great, though. No one takes an action shot
quite like him...that classic windup, the wild
mustache and hair frozen in motion, and of course the
ass-kicking squint.

2007 Topps Updates and Highlights, errr..., Series Three

Just got back from the Granite Run Mall, and picked up a Hobby box of Topps Updates and Highlights Series Three. I was tempted to rip the box, and post the contents of each pack here. But then, I wouldn't have any material for my own blog.

Base:
Jason Phillips
Chad Gaudin
Freddie Bynum
Yunel Escobar (RC)
Placido Polanco All-Star
Wilson Betemit
Chris Schroder

Parallels:
"Red Letters:" Jason Marquis & Magglio Ordonez HR Derby (two-per-pack)

Mirrors:
Generation Now: Curtis Granderson #2 (1:4)

Remember that old rent-a-car commercial? "Did you ever get the feeling that they just stopped trying?" Well, did you ever get the feeling that Topps just stopped trying? The last Topps baseball release of the Shorin era can be summed up in a single word: disappointing.

I pulled two meaningless "Red Letter" parallels and a Curtis Granderson mirror insert. No contrived Joba Chamberlain "errors." No short-printed Jacoby Ellsbury's. And no cards of furry animals.

I'll go into further detail on my own site sometime either this weekend, or next week -- depending on whether or not I'm motivated to continue my graduate school application.

2007-2008 Upper Deck Artifacts Baketball

Ok Halloween frivolity is over. Time for serious business. Let's open up some packs!

I've never been real interested in the Artifacts sets before this year, but a few months ago I tried the baseball set and liked it. I then tried a pack of the football set and hated it so much I didn't bother with a review. For the record, here's my 2007 Upper Deck Artifacts Football review: Recycling card designs for a particular brand throughout a year is lazy but acceptable. Recycling classic card designs for a new product can be quite nice if done properly. Recycling a card design from two years ago is neither nice nor acceptable. A 2007 football set with a 2005 baseball design is so mind-numbingly stupid that it doesn't deserve the bandwidth to gripe about it. Even typing 502 characters about it is way too much.

So, when I found a pack of the basketball edition I was interested but apprehensive. Would this be like the good baseball set or the bad football set? The wrapper looked good at least showing MJ dribbling out of a gilded frame. Since I'm more geeked up about the NBA season then I have been in years and because there is really nothing else good out there right now I decided to go for it and try a pack. The store only had the blister pack version so I unfortunately had to buy 4 cards worth of trash to buy the one 5 card pack. it would be nice if whoever repacks these things would at least put a card to cut out on the back of these things so it's not a complete waste.


13 Luol Deng
29 Monta Ellis
Upperdeckstore.com code card
15 Andres Nocioni
31 Yao Ming
163 Dave Cowens Legendary Legacies 251/999

My fears were unfounded. They not only used the attractive baseball design, but they took the time to tweak it to reflect a basketball motif. Good job, Upper Deck art designers! They did bling it up with some foil stamping, which the wrapper foreshadowed with the gilded frame. I've resigned myself to the fact that using foil stamping on cards for the player's name is just an ugly trend right now and will pass eventually. At least it's somewhat readable (and scannable) in this design unlike the eye-straining Topps and Upper Deck base cards. There are only three changes from the baseball design. The foil stamping, a parquet floor border that gets very dirty at the bottom of the card, and a neat old fashioned map design in the background behind the player. The map shows the fictional kingdoms of Gulicher and Nider and it looks like it was really fun to draw. More kudos to the art department. The back is identical to the baseball 'spy dossier' design.

This pack netted a couple of Bulls, Yao Ming and a player from Golden State I've never heard of before. There is also a numbered insert of Celtics legend Dave Cowens. Uh oh, wait a minute... that's no insert that's part of the base set. The checklist on Upper Deck's website is damn near incomprehensable, but this is how the set breaks down: 100 base cards of veterans, 50 short printed 'Legacies' rookie cards, 50 short printed 'Legacies' legends cards and 30 'Artifacts Exclusives' cards that include a handful of rookies and stars and about 4 cards each of Michael Jordon, LeBron James, Kobe Bryant and Kevin Durant. The legends cards are all numbered to 999, the rookies are infuriatingly numbered to 699 for most of the lottery picks and 1299 for everyone else and the Exclusives appear to be box toppers. Box toppers as part of the set? Yipe. I must admit I covet the Al Horford box topper though. Apparently the numbered cards are inserted 1 per pack in the $9.99 a pack hobby edition, but only God knows the retail ratios. This is a nice looking set, but there's no value in retail packs unless you get really lucky like this pack. Too bad.