$5 Box Break

Over the weekend my family did our usual shopping trip to the local Walmart.  Do I like going?  No, but it is about the only place in town to get certain things.  They move things around too much and half the time there is a problem with self checkout.  This time the scanner would not read our gift card. 

I always try to use the lane by the card section.  Lately it has been fully stocked with everything you could want.  This weekend was the first time I spotted 2022 Topps.  As tempting as it was to grab a pack or two, I knew there was no need.  Last week I bought into a jumbo box break over on The Bench.  I received both the Cardinals and Pirates for $7 delivered.  3 days later the cards arrived from California.  

It was nice to knock out the Cardinals team set in 1 break.  If you search EBAY for the team set, quite a few listings leave out the Wainwright league leader card.  I do like the simple design this year.  I agree with quite a few other collectors that it has a Bowman feel to it.  One big strike against Topps is that the card backs are not all the same direction.  You would think they would have listened to all the complaints about last year's set and fixed this.  

My lone Cardinals insert was this silver pack Goldschmidt.  These look very nice with the 1987 design.  I did not have the time to scan all the Pirates before I shipped them off, but I did get the entire team set along with 3 inserts.  Nothing high dollar, but to get 2 team sets and 4 inserts from 1 box for $7 I was pretty pleased with this break.  
  

Icy Delivery

I was rather shocked to see my mailman yesterday.  I rarely see her anyway because I am at work, but yesterday marked the 4th Thursday in a row that my area received some type of winter weather.  The last two have involved ice and sleet.  I can honestly say yesterday was the slickest roads I have ever driven on.  It took me almost 20 minutes to go 2 miles.  I decided it was not worth going the next 10 to work, so I called in and headed back home.  

A lot of us have bashed the post office for one thing or another.  I have done it plenty of times myself.  I will not say a bad thing about my regular delivery person.  She may arrive late sometimes, but she almost always makes it.  The roads improved somewhat as the day progressed yesterday, but they were still very slick when she arrived about an hour later than usual.  I hope she finish her route without any problems.

It was great to see she delivered a trade envelope that occupied some of my spare time yesterday.  I managed to slide out to my box to retrieve a package from TCDB member Jquirp001.

Yesterday I was reading an article about DeJong adjusting his swing in hopes of having a better season (if they do get to play a 2022 season).  I have always liked him, so I hope he does figure something out.  This 2018 Opening Day insert is actually a sticker.  

There is really no good reason why I have not completed the 2021 Optic team set yet.  Most likely I have overlooked it because the cards just do not stand out to me.  After I find a couple more, I should not have to look at this bland design again.

These Goldschmidt and Arenado cards look a lot better.  Most refractors look better than base cards of any brand.  

Both of these are 2021 Chronicles base cards, but 1 definitely looks better than the other.  The Revolution cards blend the team uniforms and background together very well.  I am pretty sure both photos were taken during the same play, if not the same game.  

Even the non catcher cards look great.  Panini was smart enough to use the Astros spring training uniform to match the background on this Atluve card.  

      

Thursday Threesome

After a busy January on the trading front, my focus in February has been more to buying.  This morning I was logging my card related expenses into my spreadsheet and noticed my postage totals reflected this big time.  I spent close to $35 in postage in January, only around $8 so far this month.  I think I became so consumed with getting caught up with recaps and filing away cards that I forgot how fun it is to receive a package in the mail.  I will have to make a better trading effort in March.  

I have did manage to swing a handful of trades last week on TCDB.  The first arrived yesterday from member lpb331.  

According to the database, this is a Cardinals card from 1997 Donruss Limited.  I tend to agree, but even not it still goes in my collection.  If it has a Cardinals logo, or shows the player in a Cardinals uniform I consider it a Cardinals card.  

This was the best scan I could get of this 1996 Ultra Gold Medallion card after several attempts.  The card is not really that dark.  I guess it just has a little too much gold going for it.

I explained yesterday that I try to have 2 copies of every Lankford card.  One for the player collection and one for the team collection.  If this was my first copy, you can bet it would have appeared at the beginning of the post.  Even if it is my second copy, it is still a great looking card.  

First in Almost 3 Years

It has been almost 3 years since I have been able to show off a new Ray Lankford card.  It is great that I can search my blog and find out that March 2019 was the last time I could cross a card off my Lankford want list.  I have shown a few on my blog since then, but they are duplicates that go in my team collection.  I check a minimum of 7 sites almost daily in search of his cards.  Most of the time it is a quick check with no luck and I am done in 10 minutes.  

Last week I almost fell out of my chair when I found a needed Lankford on EBAY.  It was listed for a little more than I wanted to pay, so I contacted the seller to see if he had any wiggle room.  He did give in some, and also sent me a list of a few other Lankfords he was going to list.  I needed 1 of them.  In the end I worked out a deal for the 2 I needed for a price that was not too bad considering I have not seen either of these cards in over 20 years.

Both cards arrived yesterday in a standard envelope.  Lately I have been singing the praises of this delivery method for lower end cards.  I was not thrilled to see these arrive this way considering I paid well over the price of a blaster boxes for them.  They were in a top sleeve and loader that was taped at the top and wrapped in the invoice.  Thankfully they were both in great condition.  Enough of my rambling, let's see what I got.

1999 Pacific Crown Collection red parallel cards were inserted into retail packs.  I have read that there were distribution issues with retail boxes that led to a big chuck of these not being released.  That makes some sense considering the Platinum Blue parallel numbered to 67 is easier to find.

It is not very easy to tell what version of 1998 Stadium Club Triumvirate card you have.  Luminous has a chrome finish, Luminescent has a refractor finish, and Illuminator is a acetate card with a refractor finish.  This is the Illuminator card.  Awesome looking card in hand.  Bernie Williams and Ken Griffey Jr.  are the other 2 players to make up the Triumvirate.  

2 great cards that I can finally tuck away in my binders.  Really hope it is not another 3 years before I find another.

 
  

2021 Bowman Mega Box Break

My second box break of February went a little better than my first.  One of my Facebook groups was running a break for 6 2021 Bowman Mega Boxes.  The Cardinals spot cost me $15 delivered.  The big draw of course is the Mojo refractors.  

I already had the 4 base Chrome cards, but managed to work out a trade involving them with another collector.  

I did not have any of the Mojo refractors before the break.  A little downer to receive a duplicate, but at least it was a good one.  It should not be a problem trading the Walker to another Cardinals fan.  

I knew the odds were not great going into the break of pulling a colored refractor or autograph of a Cardinals.  There are 4 Cardinals in the set and a Walker autograph.  There was only 1 auto pulled from the 6 boxes and 3 colored refractors.  If I had to rate the break, I would give it a 6 out of 10.  

  

Care Package from Ron B

If I had to rank my favorite trading partners, Trading Bases member Ron B would be one of the top ones.  We are constantly sending each other cards for ourselves and our sons.  Since Ron lives on the east coast it is easy for him to find Cardinals and Altuves.  Here in the Midwest I have pretty good luck finding Pirates and Yankees for him.  His latest package arrived on Tuesday and did not disappoint.

These are my first 2021 A&G Chrome cards.  They are actually the first I have seen in person.  Very sharp looking cards.  I am sure the colored refractors look pretty amazing.

Carlson does not have a base card in 2022 Series 1, only some inserts.  That is ok though, as I can track down the hundreds of 2021 cards I do not have.  This may be one of the few times I prefer a Panini card over a Topps card.  The Chronicles Phoenix really stands out with the red and silver background.  The Topps Fire Gold Minted insert has a little too much gold going on for me.  A little contrast never hurt any card.

The Holo Red parallel really works well with the Cardinals uniform.  The Holo Blue DK is alright, but I am guessing the base card looks better considering Goldschmidt is wear the Cardinals alternate baby blue uniform.

My son added to nice Altuves for his chase to 500.  Just like the Cardinals the A&G Chrome is very nice.  It is not hard to tell the Donruss card is the 100 Emoji parallel.  If you could not see the silver numbering in the picture, you cannot miss the red 100s all over the border.  

  

 

  
  

Love the Standard Envelope

Last Friday I showed off an autographed card that I won on EBAY which was delivered by standard envelope.  As I mentioned in that post, I am guessing the low ending price had something to do with the shipping method.  I know plenty of collectors who refuse to accept mail in anything other than a bubble mailer or box.  I am not one of those.  If the card is not very valuable, there is no reason to spend over $3 to ship it.  

Last week I won another auction for a Cardinals autograph that came in a standard envelope.  This one cost me less than $2.50 delivered.

Austin Love was the Cardinals third round pick in the 2021 draft.  He did not appear in too many games last year because he also pitched for North Carolina.  My guess is he starts the year in low A Palm Beach, but should come through high A Peoria at some point.  My son and I will have to see if his in person autograph is as bad as this on card auto from 2021 Bowman Draft.