Several topics I want to cover, so I will create a roundup post to cover them all.
#1. When I first joined the world of card-blogging, I saw a post that referred to Mark Hoyle as "Legendary friend to card bloggers", or something along those lines. NOW I get it. After my flood issues earlier this month, Mark said he could help me replace one of the 1974-75 Topps cars that I lost. He also took a look through my wantlist and found some others I needed.
I was shocked when I got the box!
Look at all those 1974-75s! And yes, that is the key to the entire set, Bill Walton's rookie card! This marks the first time in over a decade I've been able to add any of the 50 Greatest Players' rookie cards to my collection.
It will go nicely with this one, that I pulled in 1996...
This was the rookie reprint issued for the NBA's 50th Anniversary celebration in 1996-97. The 50 greatest players got their rookie cards reprinted, and 10 of them had autograph variations.
This was my 1974-75 Topps stats before I entered all these in... (screencapped from the Trading Card Database)
and after!
But wait, there's more!
And that's not even all of them, some I forgot to grab for the photo, and didn't feel like taking another.
Thanks so much Mark, I really appreciate it!
#2. I can't remember if I shared these or not. I got them from
Sports Card Mask-A-Rade a few weeks back. Great image on the Dorell Wright card.
#3. How about that NBA trade deadline? It was 3 PM this afternoon, and it's the most active one I can recall. According to Fox Sports 1, 38 players moved to a new home, and that does not count the draft picks. The biggest winner is the Milwaukee Bucks, who get Michael Carter-Williams, 2013-14 NBA Rookie of the Year. He'll be experiencing the NBA playoffs for the first time in his career this year, and the Bucks are one to watch for the future. They just keep getting better. Kevin Garnett also goes "home" to the Minnesota Timberwolves, where he played the first 12 years of his career and now surely will end his career there as well. Garnett is closing in on the record for longest NBA career, having joined the league in 1995-96. He is the only player left who began his career before I discovered the sport, by a matter of months. (I discovered the sport in February 1996, 3 months into his rookie year)
This is by far the best Kevin Garnett card I ever pulled.
#4. Rest In Peace to Jerome Kersey, who passed away today at age 52. A real tragedy, he lost his life due to a complication of a knee surgery this past Friday. A blood clot that formed there traveled to his lung, and he was unable to survive. I remember seeing him play when I first started watching, and he's far too young to have passed away.
#5. NASCAR's back! I am watching the first Duel race as I type this post. 2015 marks the first year of NASCAR where I have nothing new to collect. I discovered the sport through 1/64 die cast replicas at Christmas 1992, but I retired from collecting them at the conclusion of 2014. And then Press Pass went out of business in January of this year, meaning no new cards for the foreseeable future. The racing has been better in 2015 at Daytona than it was in 2014, so that's a good start. Hopefully the season can stay that way, I did not enjoy 2014 all that much to be honest.
Hopefully by the end of the season a different card company will jump in. (Upper Deck, I'm looking at you!)
#6. I am debating the idea of doing my own take on a "Card of the Day". It's not a wholly original thought- the Trading Card Database does it every day, as do some other websites. I was thinking about doing it a little differently, though. For one, every card would come from my collection. I would also write up a little piece about the card- either how I got it, or a bit on whatever is featured on the card, or possibly/probably both. I was thinking one day a week would be an autograph or relic, and one day of the week would be a serially numbered card. I actually have enough autographs and relics that I could do one day a week for them, as well, if I chose to. Some days would be random, while some would be reflective of whatever's going on in the world of sports.
I would like some input though; Would anyone actually want to see this or would I just be wasting my time? Should I do a day each week for autographs and relics, or combine and alternate them? Should I pre-empt them when I have something else to say, or make two posts those days? Would it drive my OCD nuts if I miss a day? Could I sustain it? Follow through is not always my strong suit, but I also never tire of talking about cards. I really think it would be fun to do, but it would take away time from scanning and posting too.
I truly love writing about my cards, and with more than 120,000 in my collection, writing about one a day would keep me busy for more than 328 years (!) so it's not like I have to worry about having nothing to say. Even if I broke out relics, autographs and serially numbered into their own days it would take me several years before I had to worry about running out.
If I do do this, it would cover everything in my collection. It would include the NBA, NASCAR, non-sports, as well as the occasional baseball, football and hockey cards. I have to admit I would probably favor the obscure more than the big names.
#7. I have mentioned in the past that I keep a paper listing of my card collection. I am trying something new with my hockey cards. I was given over 2000 of them on January 31st, and I will post my Epic Mailday Part 2 soon, I am still working on documenting them. I want to make sure I have all the numbers correct before I post. Instead of writing them out- that would kill my hand!- I have decided to document them on Excel. What I do is create a listing of each number on Excel, and then I type in the ones I have and the date I got them. I tried to create something like this for my NBA cards back in 2003, when I got my first laptop, but I bailed on it in a matter of less than a week. Unlike the failed attempt at the NBA listing I don't have a paper listing for hockey, so I MUST finish it to make sure my collection is correct.
Here is a screencap of the 1989-90 listing. I got a lot of the 1989-90 O-Pee-Chee set so there is actually something to look at in this screencap.
You can see all the tabs for various season on the bottom. I am also able to still color code things like I do in my paper listings. Each insert set gets it's own color on paper, and I can still do that on Excel. I even have a little more leeway because I can fill the panels with color and even patterns, which I can't do on paper. (My paper listing has actually made me a default pen collector- I have more than 40 different colors I use)
The black columns separate sets.
I might create a paper listing for my hockey, football and baseball cards some day, but for now I will try and document them on Excel only. I only started last night before bed so I still have a lot of documenting ahead of me. Luckily, I enjoy it- I AM OCD, afterall! Someday, after I finish scanning my entire collection, and I have nothing else to do, I may go back in and insert the teams each person played for, or I may create listings like this for my sets I also have on paper. Or I may not, it'll be years before I have to decide.
As always, thanks for reading, and hopefully for your input!