I got this card on his birthday

 Since I finished typing in all my collection data to Excel a couple years ago, I realized that there would be instances where I got cards the same day players were born. I started keeping records on when I got cards regularly in 1999, but was spotty in 2000 until early 2001, but then I kept it up pretty well until 2006, then did it correctly again in 2009-current. So it's not foolproof but there should be instances. 

As I was editing some scans on the night of April 13th, I decided to look up some of the players that I thought might be matched to a card addition date. 

On the third player I tried, I got a match. Nothing for Cam Reddish or Luka Doncic, but 2nd generation NBA player Cole Anthony was born on May 15th, 2000. 

On that day I show one card being added to my collection, Elton Brand's Topps Chrome rookie card. 

Cole Anthony card I was editing scan of, 2024-25 Haunted Hoops

This is the card I added to my collection the day Cole was born.  Unfortunately being a Chrome card it scans terribly.

Pretty cool that it randomly happened to be a card of my all time favorite NBA player. While I do keep track of when I get each card it doesn't really stick in my memory, for the most part. Certain cards I've gotten for my birthday or some Christmases do, and others I remember that I got them for Christmas but not WHICH Christmas. Most of the time if I want to know when I got a card I have to either pull out my paper listing or now, much easier, look on my Excel chart. 

Because Elton was already a favorite by that point, it's entirely possible that I got other cards that day but I only bothered to write the date down for his card. At this point in time I have no idea, but it's early enough of a date that I may not have done fully accurate record keeping at that time. 

I have dates recorded for 490 cards of Elton, and this is the 7th earliest. I am closing in on 600 cards of him so even my favorite's records are nowhere near complete.  I accidently typed in an acquisition date of 1991 for a card issued during the 2009-10 season so I can't say everything is 100% accurate but I find all this stuff endlessly fascinating and will probably post about it again in the future. Now I need to figure out when I got that one. Probably 2019 and I just reversed the digits and Excel auto filled it to 1991 instead of 2019 but who knows, lol.

it wouldn't be a COMC box without a healthy batch of my favorite players

 this box was heavy on the NHL favorites, not as much on Elton Brand or Dale Earnhardt Jr. but they were represented. 

This is a promo only available at the 2002 NBA All-Star Game in Philadelphia. I never knew it existed until I found it for sale. It's holofoil.

This oversize card is lenticular, so you can see his car or him depending on how you turn it.

This one completed a set for me, more on that in a coming post.

The only NBA Patch I added in this order.

 Not a great photo, but still an Elton I needed.

Clear plastic card!

This is the Silver Spotlight parallel of this insert, SN to 49.

Spectra is ridiculously overpriced so I've never opened even a single pack of it, and never will. 

He would eventually hold the record by himself, I believe.

This is from the National promo set.

Great shot!

I added a lot of cards of Mats in this order, I had been neglecting to chase his cards and he's less popular so cheaper than Henrik, so I was able to get more. This is an e-pack exclusive card. It would be the only card with the right team I added in this order.

I got his 2019-20 O-Pee-Chee Update card...

the blue parallel...

gold parallel...

and finally Retro parallel. I only need the Red and Black Retro now to complete the rainbow. I might actually be able to do that at some point. There is also a Retro blank back which is supposedly 1/1 which I don't really count, to me that's more like an unfinished card. but I would certainly add it if I came across it. It looks just like one of the others on the front so I don't feel it's needed for the rainbow.

Another e-pack thing. These cards are huge. Larger than a Tallboy.

Right before I shipped I had a couple dollars left, sorted by SN-cheapest, and this popped up. So it was a no-brainer, I bought it.

And the Retro parallel to the 2020-21 O-Pee-Chee set.

Hitting the Favorites- NBA and NASCAR

Although I'm more into hockey now, that doesn't mean my other two main sports are going to be neglected. Not by a long shot! I picked up several Elton Brand cards in this COMC order, and a couple Dale Earnhardt Jr.- NASCAR cards tend to be higher priced on COMC than my other sports for some reason, so I get less of them.

 Topps Gold Label Class 3 from 1999-00, meaning I now have all three versions of his card...not counting the parallels of course. Funny thing about this card...I had accidentally marked it as being in my collection on the Trading Card Database back in 2012. I never bothered to take it off, even though I should have. (in actuality, I needed to check my paper listing, which I kept forgetting to do). As it turns out, I had accidentally entered the Class 2 date into the paper listing, but when I entered my whole collection onto the Database in 2012, I missed the fact that I had crossed it out, so I marked it as being part of my collection. Now, finally, it is.

 New Standard insert from the same set.

 Ultra Gold Medallions are my second favorite parallel after only Refractors.

 Essential Credentials are always cool, too.

 I thought I had the 2000-01 Topps Chrome Refractor all these years, but I didn't. Now I do.

 This Special Force parallel from 2001-02 Fleer Force isn't actually all that special, but I had to have it anyway.

In addition to being a Refractor, it's also SN to only 99 copies.

I really loved the 2004-05 Luxury Box set, as each card is a hologram...and then I pulled a 1/1 out of it, too. Someday I hope to complete the base set, and get as many of the serially numbered parallels as possible. This is the Tier Reserved, which is SN300. It feature a blue hologram...I now have three of the six different versions for Elton, and while that seems like halfway, one of them is a 1/1 so not likely ever to be completed.

This is the only late-career Elton I got, from 2009-10 Court Kings. It's a base card but also SN. I consider anything post-Clippers to be late career.

This one I found totally by accident. On a whim I sorted Multi-Sport by SN, cheapest first and there about a third of the way down the page was this Elton! I had never seen it before and had no idea it existed, but it was an instant buy. As it turns out, it was only available at the National Sports Collectors Convention in Anaheim, California, in 2006. When I got my cards scanned and began to post to the Trading Card Database, I found out it was a six card set. That was just pure luck that I found it.

My Dale Jr. additions were slim. A 2004 Kraft promo and a 2017 Select Prizm. That's all I was able to add. Not even a serially numbered card! The Select Prizm also counts towards the PPPP post, which is written but not likely to be posted for a while yet.

Christmas Eve means it's Secret Santa time!

It's Christmas Eve, and one of the traditions I've come to look forward to, is the opening of my Secret Santa package on that day...or this day, I should say. (Yes, you're actually getting a post written today, not written weeks or months ago and then scheduled!) I've done it on Christmas Eve all four times it's been held, with the first time in 2016, then 2017 and 2018 as well. (Funny weird thing I saw composing this post- I just finished scanning the cards I got last year within the last week! I had somehow missed scanning the Kyle Larson Elite Dominators card from last year!)

This year the Secret Santa was opened up to both bloggers and Database members, and I got Kmack, who, coincidentally, had just sent me a PIF within a couple of weeks of getting my name in the draw. Being a Database member, he knew exactly what I liked and wanted, and targeted the cards specifically to me- three of the non-sports cards from various Allen & Ginter sets, a new to me Elton, and a fatpack of this year's Hoops!

 This was the first card out of the package...

 The second. The PIF he sent me back at the end of October was 2 other cards from this same insert!

Next was this mini of Napoleon. I never think to look for the non-sports cards in Allen & Ginter, so these are very pleasing to me to add.

The last single card was my favorite though, as it just literally glows! Topps Gold Label only appeared in the NBA in 2 seasons, 1999-00 and 2000-01, this card is an insert from the second year. It shows the black alternate jersey, always a plus to get an alternate card, even if these jerseys aren't as nice as the black with red pinstripes worn just a few years before. By the Database's reckoning this is the 590th Elton in my collection, although in actuality it's less as they count league leaders, team cards, multi-subject cards etc. in those totals.

Now, moving onto the pack of Hoops...it's a 30 card pack, and I needed 27 of them (which is kind of crazy because I have only three 8 card packs worth of the set) but I did very, very well with this pack...

 It always is a good start when the first card out is your first card of a person...

And the second card out is one of the brightest young stars of the game, already playing his way into MVP conversation in only his second year in the league.

 The Miami Vice jerseys are always cool. They have worn them for three years now, originally neon pink, then black, this year's are neon blue.

 Drummond pulling down a rebound, his specialty.

Always thrilled to get a new Nets card! Allen is going to lead the league in blocks one of these years...soon! Mark my words.

 Both the Rockets and Thunder wearing alternate jerseys here.

 Don't see many players wear 99.

 Of all the cards in the set, this is the one I wanted the most! Craig is the first player who turned a two-way contract into not only a regular NBA role, but also a starting role, integral to his team! He started 2017-18 on a two-way contract, played so well he got converted to regular, and by the end of the year he was starting. He's not a big time scorer, but he's one of those heart-and-soul guys who make a team work; the Nuggets had the second best record in the West last year and he played a key role in that. It's his first card, I don't believe Panini included him in anything in his first two years...although I have not stayed up on that sort of thing like  I once did.

 Another heart-and-soul guy, Smart plays with a lot of passion.

 Ferguson is in his third year, but I don't know all that much about him, to be honest.

 He missed the entire 2018-19 season due to injury.

 Every year I tend to pull a lot of cards of one or two rookies, and last year Hamidou Diallo was that rookie...going so far to even pull two different cards of him out of the same pack at least once.

 What better than to pull a card of a man sometimes called Jingles as part of a Christmas exchange? He sports a throwback jersey here.

Jimmy Butler wearing one of the worst jerseys ever. It doesn't say it anywhere, but that's the 76ers' alternate from last year.

 Brogdon's career has been forever tainted in my eyes because he was awarded Rookie of the Year for political reasons. I shouldn't hold that against him, because he certainly did nothing wrong, but I'm just having a hard time accepting it.

 Nurkic broke both bones in his leg last year, and will likely end up missing more than an entire calendar year because of it. The injury occurred March 25th in a game against the Nets, which I was watching, and he's not expected back anytime soon.

I wasn't lucky enough to pull either of the Fatpack exclusive parallel colors but at least I got this cool Purple, my second Purple parallel from the set. It also shows their alternate jersey, which I really like. Of the 27 cards I needed in the pack, this is the only one that needed a scan on the Database.

 This insert shows the Kings' stupidly lettered but awesomely colored alternate. Sactown, really? That's the best you could do?

 My first card of the Class of 2019 insert is also my first card of the Knicks' RJ Barrett. This is my 2nd favorite card in the pack, after the Craig. Barrett, from Canada, actually grew up as a Knicks fan and was thrilled to come here...something most players wouldn't say. I like this card as well due to the group photo from the rookie photo shoot on each card.

 I've now opened 5 packs of the set and pulled three Arriving Now. inserts, and all three were my first card of each person. I just wish they hadn't made the player's skin color graytone. In case you are keeping track, that's 4 new players...

 Make that 5 new people for my collection...

 and six! I don't know anything about either of these guys yet, but that's changed now, or will, once I read the backs of the cards.

 Monk with the alternate jersey.

 7th new person

 I really dislike the Tribute subset. There are 525 players in the NBA, but Panini can't be bothered to make any sets larger than 300 cards. And now they are taking away 20 of those slots to make another card of somebody in the set, or of somebody who retired long ago. I wish we could either get rid of these subsets (in it's second year), or just make the sets larger and do it right. I don't know why they refuse to make a proper set.

8th new person added to my collection! This pack did a great job in helping my project of getting at least one card of everyone who's ever gotten one!

Kyle Anderson rounds out the pack. I don't even know which jersey is the alternate or the base for Memphis anymore, because they seem to rotate them every game. This might be the alternate or this might be the base...based on the floor color this photo was taken in Houston. You can't tell based on jersey color anymore, which is fine with me other than the fact it makes it a little harder to "place" a photo now. A truly minor concern.

Well, that's my Secret Santa haul! I think I did very, very well, adding 8 new people, a new Elton, and some cards I would never have gotten otherwise! I will have another post up sometime tomorrow, where I will show, if nothing else, my Christmas tree. Merry Christmas!