Autographs, Relics & "Just had to have thems" from COMC

I still have three posts in the Queue from the COMC Black Friday event, that have been done and ready to go since before Christmas, I just kept coming up with other stuff to post, but I am not ready for the next round of hockey posts so I will see about getting these posted. 

Yeah, I know I consider myself a base card guy first. But sometimes you have to just splurge and have fun.
For me fun is buying a large quantity of cards for the smallest quantity of price possible. That usually leads to me sorting COMC by lowest price first, and picking off the "low-hanging fruit". Several cards you shall see here were purchased for the sole reason that they were cheap (and I didn't have them already). None of these cards cost me more than 3 or 4 dollars, most were much less.

First, some autographs.

 I think this was the cheapest NBA autograph on COMC during the Black Friday event.

 I didn't buy this one on Black Friday but I left it in my cart until I had the Black Friday free shipping deal. This set is usually very high priced, higher priced than the players depicted would normally be, but I pick them up whenever I find them fairly low. I bought this one to celebrate making my first $5 in COMC sales. (Guess where I got the money for this one? 😄) The All-Time Fan Favorites Autographs come from 2005-06 Topps 1952 Style.

 I am a fan of manufactured patches...this one came with a very real autograph as well. And it's real fine, it's serially numbered 409 of 499.

Slowly picking off these autographs from 2013 Topps 75th Anniversary...this is my 4th now. Only a couple more I really want to get, but I might go for the set anyway...or I might not. Depends on how cheap the other ones are, LOL. I think this is one of only two in the autograph set where I have the original card, the other being American Gladiator Jim "Laser" Starr, who I got the card of previously.

Now, relics. I got more of them this time around. No real plan or pattern to that, it's just what I came across and liked.

I chose this one solely because it was the cheapest relic on COMC. That's all I needed. When I was typing it into my collection chart, I accidentally typed "George Lunch"

 This Ndudi Ebi relic is an insert from 2003-04 Topps Jersey Edition. I either didn't know or totally forgot that set even HAD an insert! His name is pronounced "Enjai" but "Nadoodie" is so much more fun to say.

 My first relic of either of the Lopez twins.

 I kind of/sort of consider Jimmer a local guy. Although Glens Falls in 3 hours north of me, I have spent so much time there that I consider that whole area a second home...my September post "Reclaiming my Life" details this more.

 Just a cool relic piece. No, I have not forgotten NASCAR, although NBA is by far at the forefront of my collection right now.

Big patch! SN to 25. Had to get it! My second patch of McCullough. Being a fan of a team with a poor record keeps prices down. Yes, this giant patch with pieces of two letters cost me under $5.

Now, here are some cards I just had to have. Most are serially numbered, but not all are.

 One of the things I really set out to do with this round of COMC purchasing was to get a veteran Refractor from 1998-99 Bowman's Best. All these years, I didn't have any. I pulled Vince Carter when it was new, so that's a good thing...but I wanted a veteran too. The Veterans had gold borders on top and bottom, while the rookies had chrome/silver. I bought this card near the start of my small binge of shopping, and then, by the time I was getting done (IE, running out of money) I couldn't remember if I had purchased a refractor from the set, so I went and bought another. I then thought to look in my purchase history and saw that I had purchased one already. Oops! At least I didn't purchase two copies of the same card.

 There was a 10 card throwback to 1996-97 Topps Chrome in 2006-07 Topps Chrome, all 10 of them being rookies. I did several searches and this one kept popping up, so I took it as a sign, and bought it. Now that I know it's only a 10 card set, and I only need 9 of them, I will have to see if I can pick up the other 9 on the cheap.

 I'm a sucker for Refractors. This is the only Finest set where I have only refractors, no base cards, in my collection. I nabbed the Carl Landry refractor when I was hunting down each set back in June.

 This didn't scan very well, but this is Chris Richard of the T-Wolves.

 I did a search for Nets refractors and when I saw this photo, I had to have it. I believe this was the first year that Refractors were not numbered in Topps Chrome since 2004-05, but I could be wrong. A card that is a refrator and has a great through the glass shot is always a winner in my book.

 I have no memories of Larry Hughes playing for the Knicks! Although I was mostly away from the NBA when this set was issued, I did watch the occasional Knicks or Nets game, so how did I miss that fact? I wish I had never left- I now consider it one of the biggest mistakes of my life- and what's worse, due to 2009-10 being Steph Curry's rookie year, finding packs or boxes from this season (my absolute favorite way to build a set) is nearly impossible.

 One of my favorite insert sets from Legends, it's only 9 cards- 3 of them are Richard Petty, at that- and these two are the only ones with 50s cars, so I had to get them. It brings me to 4 of the 9 cards in my collection, 3 of which were sourced from COMC. The text on the back of the Chrysler references Tim Flock's 1955 Chrylser, and talks only about his 1955 season which at the time set NASCAR records for most wins and most consecutive wins, however... the car shown is from the 1956 Daytona Beach race, a 1956 Chrysler, which would be near the end of his time with that team. (He left Kiekhaefer 4 races later. He did win the Beach race from the pole as well.) Lee Petty's 1959 Olds from the first Daytona 500 is the second car.

I love team cards, and they are so rare- 2010-11 Donruss was the only set Panini has ever issued them in, and these team photos harken back to the 1970s. Add to that the photo being taken at one of the NBA's special events, in Mexico? Yes! I had to buy this card. This is the red parallel, SN 21 of 25. It was actually the most expensive one in this entire post.

The Simpsons is my all-time favorite TV show. You've probably caught references on the blog before. I've seen every episode, most more than once. Some...probably well past 500 times. If The Simpsons are on, I am usually watching. I even gave up NBA for most of the time they were on the Marathon on FXX beginning on Thanksgiving. I purchased this card while watching the Simpsons in fact. It's a promo from the 1993 Skybox set, one of my all-time favorite sets. You may have noticed that the cards I need to complete the set have been on my Top 10 Most Wanted list on the right side of the blog for some time. While checking to see if any were for sale on COMC (1 out of 3 were) I saw this promo listed and into my order it went.

Top 12 Cards of 2016

2016 was a great year for me cardwise. The rest of the year? Well, it wasn't as bad as 2013 or 2014, there's that.

But cardwise? One of the best, even though I spent less money on the hobby this year, the cards kept rolling in anyway thanks to the kindness of fellow collectors. Two of my top 5 most new cards in a day both came in 2016, and both were gifts from fellow collectors. A non-blogger hit me with 1192 new cards, 1127 of them NASCAR, on July 16th, and then just in November Gavin at Baseball Card Breakdown dumped a bunch of his unwanted cards on me, and I ended up getting 2827 new cards that day, the second most I've ever gotten in one day! (Thanks to the box being mostly baseball, football and naked ladies, none of which I had much of, so not a lot of duplicates). I'm writing this before Christmas, and I've already gotten 9,777 new cards in 2016. More than half of them came to me as gifts, with more than a third just from those two gift packages alone!

I decided I would go through my Excel charts, and pick out my favorite card from each month, and showcase them here in one end-of-year post.

Some months were easy, but some of them were tough. Not for lack of choice, but because I got so many great cards! Two months actually had cards that I truly feel bad to leave off, but I went both times with cards I had been chasing for 15 or more years, and that carried a lot of weight with my selections.

Here now is a look at my favorite new card from each month...some of which I've never shown on the blog before!

 January...this was the first card I got from this set, and it's Elton...with all three of the Clippers colors including a patch, plus it's SN25/25. Has a lot going for it. This won't be the last time you will see Elton in this countdown.

 February. 1997-98 Ultra is a favorite set of mine (remember it was in my Top 20 countdown of my favorite sets, which I did in January and February). I had never gotten a Platinum Medallion from the set, so I went looking for one and found Kevin Willis. Each of the Platinums are SN to 100. Later in the year I would add the Serge Zwikker from the same set. I also added the 1999-00 and 2000-01 Platinum Medallions to my collection in 2016.

 March. This is my first patch from the Brooklyn era of the Nets, and when I bought it, I didn't know it was SN1 of 25, so not only is it a bonus in that I love SN1 cards, 1 is also his jersey number!

 April is the one month I really didn't have a strong standout, usually there were one or two that stood out, a couple of months I didn't even have to really think about. This one completes the Foil set of 1996 Pinnacle. Back in the 1990s I bought a set of these at a card show, but the seller didn't know what they were doing and had included a Winston Cup Collection parallel in place of the actual #13. The Winston Cup Collection cards were one per box or less, I believe, so it worked out OK, but the set was one card short for several years.

 May. I pulled this one! It's the first time I've pulled a One of One since Christmas 2006. I never showed it on the blog because I was trying to complete the Rainbow first, but I came up short on that so it makes it's blog debut today.

 June's is a simple base card, but it's been one I've been chasing for years. I did a box of 1994-95 Topps Embossed around the year 2000, but I came up one card short...#57, this one. I've been chasing it ever since. I even had someone on the Beckett message board years ago tell me they had the card but wouldn't send to me because "it wasn't worth the effort"...even though I offered to pay for it. I finally got it on COMC this year.

 July is when I got the huge box of mostly NASCAR cards, and this was my favorite in it, that hat relic for Martin Truex Jr. is the kicker. Part of the NASCAR logo!

 August is when Panini debuted their NASCAR sets, and for the most part I'm really happy with them. I got a box of Prizm (the first set) and I knew one of the cards from that box would be the card for August. Even though I got an autograph SN10, I couldn't remember which one without looking it up...(I have several autographs from the set now) I remembered this card without any trouble and so it got the nod.

 September and November were the two toughest months for me to choose. September came down to three cards- this one, my first card from 1938 Horrors of War, my first card from any version of the 1966 Batman sets, and the Bill Walton autograph that Angus sent me for winning his contest. I ended up choosing this one because Horrors of War is such an iconic set- considered to be the most historically important non-sports set ever- and I'd been hunting for an example for so long. I thought that I had found it one other time in the past but it turned out to be a different military set from the same producer (Gum, Inc, which I believe became Bowman).

 This one stands out for the month of October. I got some great cards during the month and even a bunch from this rare set, the sticker insert in 1971-72 Topps (the first standard card sized insert in NBA history) but I had to choose the ABA logos over the NBA logos. This is, I believe, the only card ever to show the majority of these logos in color. For the Condors, Pros, Rockets and Squires, I believe this is the only time these logos appear on a card...ever.

 November was by far the hardest month to choose. I had been chasing this card for 15 years, and Racing Champions holds a very special place in my collection. I also got a great sketch card, made apparently just for me, by Gavin of Baseball Card Breakdown, of Elton Brand. It came up between those two and basically the fact that I had been chasing this one for 15 years- a card I never thought I would ever get-got it the nod.
I'm basically going to say it was a tie for the month of November.

December, however, was the easiest month. Yes, I wrote up this post before Christmas, which is always a big day for my collection as my family knows what I like and treats me very well- but my very first Elton Brand Printing Plate is going to be pretty much impossible to top! I saw this card on COMC, and I had to buy it, even though it's actually the most I've spend on a single card in about 12 years- it cost me $28. Luckily, I had the money available...sometimes during the year I wouldn't have, but I did, and all was well. Ironically the card it's a plate of is ALSO a 1/1 so finding it will probably not be possible.

And that's my top card from each month. I really enjoyed doing this and I have the record of each card from each month beginning in 2014...so expect to see rundowns of 2014 and 2015 coming shortly into the new year.

I didn't want to end the year on a sad note with my In Memorium post so this goes out as the final post of 2016- my second full year of blogging, most successful by far as well, as I topped 150 pots for the first time ever...and with this being my 25th post in the month of December, it's also my most successful month of posting as well. I consider finishing a post to my liking enough to actually post it a success, by the way.

Hot off the Scanner Tray "Week" 15

HOST is back and this time should last as I have no series or other projects to displace it. Of course I don't have the greatest track record with follow-through so only time will tell I suppose!

I start with some new additions from SportLots...I finally figured out how the site works, for the most part, and I'm having fun with it for sure.

This is my first patch from the Nets in the Brooklyn era! Bonus, it's SN1 of 25, extra bonus, it's also his jersey number!

This was labeled as a patch, but it's not really. I don't dislike manufactured patches, but it shouldn't be marketed as a patch I don't think. Who cares about semantics though, this is a great card no matter what you call it.

This one didn't even have a picture on Sportlots but I didn't care about that. It's my first from 2013-14 Timeless Treasures.

I think my favorite additions from SportLots, though, had to be something from the Non-Sports side. I won two lots of some old tobacco cards, and while I am only sharing one card from each, I got more than one card from each set. Yes, it's true that they are not all in good shape, but for the price I paid...you can't argue. (50 cents combined!) Eventually I will need to do a Sets in My Collection post for three of them, one of them already has a post, I think. I can't even remember!

1912 Wills Arms of Foreign Cities, with metallic silver print!

1913 Wills Arms of Companies

1923 Wills Wild Flowers

1929 Player Hidden Beauties- one of the few Tobacco era sets I previously had in my collection,

I bought a full 550 count box for $15 on the Hot Spot Facebook group, and it was a mystery of what was going to be in it. I prefer it that way. I completed 2013-14 Prestige, which is only my second completed set of the Panini era- (2009-10 to current) and interestingly enough both are 2013-14 season issues.
In the box was one new set to my collection, 2015-16 Absolute Basketball. This wasn't my first card, but I had to scan this one...I don't enjoy scanning mirror foils so I set most of them aside for later.

As I was working on my non-sports card duplicates to post to my tradelist on the Database, I realized that I still had some car cards that I had no posted yet, so I got them out and did them.

The Famous Hot Rods set may be the worst designed ever.

ALL the cards have black backgrounds, including the cars that are painted black. They also appear to have been photographed mostly at night.

Even those photographed during the day, like this one below, are photographed with the sun behind the car- terrible for photography. I've taken more than 10,000 car photos and I always try to make sure the sun is not behind the car- it should be over the photographer's shoulder or, ideally, directly above.

This is an example of my automotive photography, for what it's worth-

Note that the car, which is also red, has the sun above and behind it and you can still see all the important details....I don't know what the card company was thinking or doing...but it may be why the cards are labeled as Series 1 and no series 2 ever happened.

Since the last post I made on Cardboard History, I joined the SportsCardForum message board. It's the spiritual successor to Trader Retreat, where I was very active in the early 2000s, even winning Member of the Month on at least two locations. (Sure wish I knew how to use the Print Screen feature back then, so I could have saved an image of my awards). In just about a week's time I have made two trades already, with one of them going all the way to Slovenia! We got talking and are now making the trade into a larger one but it's pretty cool to be trading again. It really makes me wish I could find the majority of my trade stash, though. A lot of it went missing when I was away from the NBA from 2006-12.

I also got Cardboard History to be an affiliate...hopefully that will get me some new readers. It's not easy to attract new readers when you aren't mostly about baseball, that's for sure. (There will be a baseball post later this week, would have been today but I wanted to get HOST going again) You will now find a link to my profile on SportsCardForum on the right side, above the blogroll.

During the month of March I prepped and posted- or at the very least saw that somebody else posted- exactly 3700 cards to the Trading Card Database. That is my new personal record since I started keeping track of what I do in a month, the previous record being 2958 in June 2014. I only began doing it this way in January 2014, where I keep everything I process to the Database in a big file and then upload it to my own website on the 1st of every month, then putting each card image in it's proper album. It's fun for me to do that and somehow I managed to get all 3700 uploaded on the 1st of April. In 2013 I put everything I processed during the entire year into one big album and then uploaded it all on January 1st...it took me several days to do and I decided to do something differently in 2014, and have kept at it. Sometimes I do a lot, sometimes I do a little, my record low is only 158 cards, in February 2015.
April is going to be big as well, as I'm processing all of the cards I had scanned and not yet posted. My "To be posted" folder had gotten to around 10,000 scans...I decided it was enough that I should start posting. I have it down to 4840 right now....they upload a lot faster than they scan. I'll never be able to get it down to 0 because there are too many cards I just can't find checklists for- some I can't even ID the set on.