Random Scan Post V: The Scans Strike Back

I kept the 10 posts per month streak going another month. Yay for me. Enjoy the random cards? Yay for you!

 With my new scanner I can mix the Stadium Club cards in with the other cards, something I have not been able to do since...hmm...2012? I can't remember. RIP to Jerome Kersey, who was killed by a blog clot following knee surgery.

 The sky blue Kings jerseys were cool.

 You don't see people wear #52 too often. 1990-91 Fleer is another set I set aside to do later, and that later is now.

 I bought this set complete in 2013, and I'm pretty sure this is the first card of it to get scanned. It's from Panini Canada, and is bi-lingual.

 1994-95 Hoops is one of my all-time favorite sets, driven mostly, but not fully, on nostalgia. It's a quality design, and is one of the very few sets to include the player's jersey number on the back. They also have full career statistics including playoffs, it's probably the best card back in NBA history.

 This one comes from a yet-to-be-blogged trade with Kenny/Zippy Zappy. It's an insert from an Ebisu Muscats set, which may or may not have been published by BBM. It has the same texture as the BBM cards I have...

This is an insert, as I said, but the base cards are all in bikinis. Not something you would expect from an American music group, but I am not going to complain!

 Funny story about this one. Motorsports Modelcards was a company in business from 1991-92, or perhaps 1994, depending on how you want to look at it. The company also made Blue Ridge decals for scale models. and some of the decal sets came with cards. I got both the decals and the card sets in either 2004 or 2005, but I didn't notice until last week that the cards are different! I always thought, since the pictures were the same, that they were just the regular cards put into the decals. Earlier in May, I looked through my decal stash for the first time in about 10 years, and I looked at the cards again. As it turns out, the cards ARE different! The card number is different and they have a line of text about looking for the full sets.

As far as I know they are undocumented anywhere on the internet, except by me.

 This card was actually scanned on the last day of scanning with scanner #4. But it came out awful so I set it aside. I finally got around to scanning it with scanner #5 and pulled off the good scan on May 28th...original, bad and long deleted scan made mid-February.

Around 2015 I bought a mixed lot of cards in a Facebook group, which is pretty unusual, and the seller padded out the box with a big stack of 2014 Prestige football. The foil name is easy to read in hand, but not in scans, it's Shane Vereen.

You had to know there would be a Star Wars card in here at some point, right? From my favorite Star Wars set, Galactic Files.

Random Scan Post

Busy with models, but too windy to paint today (err, yesterday, as I'm scheduling this for Friday, but typing it Thursday), didn't have all the paint I needed, so might as well write up a post.

I'm taking the easiest route possible because I have a lot of model related stuff to do that I've been putting off for...eh, almost a decade now. (properly labeling my pictures, updating my decal collection scans, etc).

So, I'm going to just show ten semi-random cards. The randomness comes from the fact that I'm only pulling from scans that are sitting on my hard drive, not yet processed into my folders. That's not too many cards but enough that I can get some posts out of it.

1996-97 Bowman's Best Refractor, from a trade I made in January with AirPete of the Trading Card Database and Pete's Card Habit.

 I have always been a DC fan but I remember being a big fan of this X-Men cartoon when I was a kid. I don't remember much of it unfortunately.

 1995-96 Ultra. Ultra is my favorite NBA brand, I don't know yet what my favorite NHL brand will be.

 2005-06 MVP, with their very hard to read name fond. It's easier in scans than in person, because it's bigger.

 1995-96 Upper Deck Zan Tabak. I took this card in via trade or gift earlier this year (I don't remember exactly where, and since I'm trying to type up a bunch of posts quickly, not inclined to look it up. I thought it was a duplicate at first because I've been familiar with the photo for years- I pulled the Electric Court parallel when it was new.

 I told you it would be random!

 Unfortunately my copy's bottom right corner took a big hit.

 A parallel of a subset from my all-time favorite set.

 Nabbed this one on COMC.

This one came to me from one of Gavin's duplicate/unwanted dumps.

Kevin Garnett's retirement is the end of an era for me.

Kevin Garnett announced his retirement from the NBA after 21 incredible seasons today, and I'm not happy about it. I've been a big fan his entire career, true, but there's more to it than that....KG is was the last player in the NBA who was active when I discovered the sport in February 1996.

He was only a rookie then, and truly, so was I. He was the first player in 20 years to skip college and go directly to the NBA, and he faced backlash because of it. He persevered, becoming the greatest player in Minnesota Timberwolves franchise history, an NBA Champion and a sure first ballot Hall of Famer when he becomes eligible in 2021. (What a stacked class that will be, with Kobe Bryant and Tim Duncan both becoming eligible in the same year!)

I remember when the T-Wolves debuted their new jerseys in 1996-97, only the second design in franchise history, how badly I wanted to get his road blue to wear around. I was never able to find it, back then in those pre-internet days you were at the mercy of what you could find in local stores, and me being a fatso, I was never able to find one big enough...I never got it.

I also remember, when I came back to the NBA after my break from 2006-12, how badly I wanted to get a card of him with the Celtics. I now regret my break immensely, considering it one of the biggest mistakes I ever made, but during that time he was traded from the T-Wolves to the Celtics, where he would win his only NBA Championship. When I took the break in 2006, the first game I watched (or at least remember watching) was when the Celtics won the NBA title. I have since added several cards of him with the Celtics, but getting that first one (2008-09 MVP) was a memory that I treasure. 

This card, his 1995-96 Finest rookie, was in my Top 5 most wanted from the time it was new until I finally got it, in mid 2015. Amazingly, I don't think I ever shared it to the blog.

This was my best pull of any of his cards (I have over 500 different of him, he ranks in my Top 5 of most cards) It also depicts the black variant of the blue jersey that I mentioned above.

While not the first Celtics card I got of him, this one has my favorite photograph. I just scanned it yesterday, so that was timed nicely. I haven't even labeled the scans yet.

In 2013-14, he came, with Paul Pierce, to the Nets, my favorite team. I was pretty happy with that, although it also coincided with health issues taking it's toll on him, and he never again reached the superstar calibre of play that he was known for. I still enjoyed watching him play, and the Nets still made the playoffs while he was with the team. Even though the trade that brought him here has pretty much killed any chances the Nets have of being good for quite a while, I don't really regret it because the time he was with the Nets were great. (The Celtics control the Nets' draft picks until something like 2019)
While with the Nets, he wore the #2 in honor of his friend Malik Sealy, who was killed when a drunk driver hit him while he was on the way home after a birthday party for Garnett.

In mid-2014-15, he was traded back to the Timberwolves, and finished his career with the franchise that started it all.
I've shown this card before- I was watching this game and he got the ball and had a fast break dunk, it was shades of the KG of old...but it turned out to be the last highlight of his career, as injuries just took too much of a toll and he ended the season unable to play...he attempted to come back for one final season but just couldn't do it, retiring now, just 4 days before training camp opens.

He ends his career tied for longest in NBA history at 21 seasons played.
He also earned more money than any other player in NBA history...including Michael Jordan, Kobe Bryant or LeBron James.  There had been some talk that after retirement he would become a partial owner of the T-Wolves, but that was before a portion of the team was sold to Chinese investors recently, so I don't know if that is still in the cards. I hope so. NBA rules prevent players from owning or coaching a team while they are playing for some reason. Personally I would think a person who has more interest in a team than just employee would be more of a motivator, but nobody asked me!

For me, now going forward, it's a weird feeling, as every player in the league has now come in after I started watching. Although, due to the break I mentioned above, I didn't get to experience the full rookie impacts of the 2007-11 drafts, but none of them- not a single one- has always been there. Every single player in the league now is somebody I got to learn about as it happened, where with KG, he was already part of the league's history before I discovered the sport existed. I'm sure I'm not explaining it well because I am not even happy with this paragraph, but hopefully you get the drift of what I'm trying to impart. I knew this would happen eventually- I have no plans of ever leaving the sport again- but to have it actually happen is a weird and not particularly pleasant feeling.

Still, it's been fun to watch him play all these years, and I have many memories of watching him play that I will treasure.

My favorite, I think, was with a game against the Nuggets. I believe it was a playoff game, probably 2003 or 2004. During a timeout, he just casually went over to the Nuggets' huddle, and they didn't even notice! Not only that, they included him! The T-Wolves won that game, of course. In fact, it's one of my favorite memories of the NBA at all. My mom and I still laugh about it (we watched the game together).

NBA 2015-16 Season in Review

The NBA season ended tonight, and I'm really not happy. I have had a lousy day to begin with and then saw the team with 3 of my 5 favorite players in the NBA get beaten at home after the best season in NBA history. While I generally like the city of Cleveland and the state of Ohio, and were they not facing the Warriors I would have been rooting for them, (I've been a Cavs fan since they wore the black and blue jerseys in the 1990s) but this leaves me with a bad feeling towards the NBA- game 7 the Cavs won fairly, (Game 3 as well) but game 5 and 6 were rigged- no question. Considering how much revenue a Finals game 7 brings in, I'm truly surprised we don't see that more often. Fouls were called on the Warriors when they breathed on the Cavs in those two games, yet the Cavs were allowed to travel at will. At least in the first half that is true- by the second half, the Cavs had such a huge lead that they generally stopped getting everything handed to them on a silver platter, but it was too late to make a difference. Let's put it this way- I remember seeing the Tim Donahy games. Remember the Ref who threw games for gambling? That's the guy, I may have spelled his name wrong. But the games HE refereed were more honest than the first halves of game 5 and 6. Granted, the Warriors couldn't hit a shot for most of the finals. One of the best shooting teams EVER suddenly stopped being able to nail a basket, even open ones. I don't get it. The worst part is they didn't even need the help, they simply played better down the stretch. Instead of winning by 15 points they probably would have won by 8 to 10 in those two games.

It really stinks that the season ended on such a farcial bad note, because overall 2015-16 was one of the most fun seasons I can recall in a good long while. I'm one of the few people who prefer the regular season over the playoffs- and I am very much looking forward to 2016-17. (I've known for years that the playoffs are manipulated to boost revenues, but this year was the worst.). Usually it doesn't bother me- my Nets are almost never in contention this late in the season so I usually don't care who wins, as long as I get to watch more basketball.

Not only that, but card wise it is the best of the Panini era, or at the very least tied with 2012-13. While Panini still doesn't truly get it- ignoring at least 150 players each season- the designs were better than they had been since 2012-13, and perhaps even better. The only set this year I didn't care too much for was Threads. I loved this year's Hoops set, the joke that they called Complete- 330 out of 450 people is NOT complete in any way, shape or form- the cards themselves, though, I loved. The Donruss design is one of my favorites from the Panini era, and I have not even posted about my best pull from the set yet. I managed to pull a patch from a blaster, only the second patch I've pulled from the Panini era. I pulled an autograph out of the very first set of the year, and it was one I would not have been able to afford as a single, (Andrew Wiggins) so that was a pleasant surprise.

One other thing worth noting, one of my favorite commercial series for the NBA took place this season, State Farm's "The Hoopers". I hope they bring it back next year. 

I did something I have never done before, and that was keep track of the games I watched. I had to watch at least a full quarter for it to count (usually), and here are my grand totals, provided I didn't make any mistakes, which is very much possible as I sometimes got a little behind and had to scroll through the box scores on basketball-reference to see which ones I remembered.

• 356 total games watched
• 252 regular season
• 71 playoffs
• 23 Pre-Season
• 7 D-League
• 3 All-Star (Plus the non-game stuff like the Slam Dunk competition, which is not counted)

I watched more than I thought I would to be honest, and if my TV didn't act up sometimes I would have watched some more. Probably would have increased 10 or so games.

I plan to keep the chart for the 2016-17 season as well, and this year I will attempt to include Summer League games, which I didn't have the idea of making the Excel chart until the 2015-16 Summer Leagues were already over, so that information was lost.

I've already gotten a few cards that mention games I watched. In the past I usually was left wondering if it was a game I saw or not, when a specific one was mentioned. Now, I will know. I just got one this week, in fact my very first card out of my very first pack of Excalibur, #147 Anthony Davis, references a game I saw. I would probably not have remembered that otherwise. That sort of thing tends to all blur together in my head- I tend to remember if I ever saw a player play, not specific games.

As I will watch any team, at any time, (something I can do because my mom gets me League Pass as a birthday present every year) all 30 NBA teams appear multiple times on my chart. I don't know of a way to figure out exactly which teams I watched how many times, but I know the Warriors are the team I watched the most. Second would be probably the New York Knicks or Philadelphia 76ers, once they signed Elton in January. After that would probably be the Nets, and beyond that, I have no clue. I watch them all.

I think my favorite game that I watched this year was Kobe's final game where he scored 60. The Lakers have never been my favorite team, nor Kobe my favorite player, but that was just incredible to watch. It's the end of an era that is a little hard to fathom- the 1996-97 rookie class is the first one I truly got to experience so it has a special place in my memories. Kobe was the best player in the League for most of the past 20 years, until the injuries set in, and to see him get 60 in his final game was something truly special. It's not diminished in my eyes that the Jazz, who knew they would not make the playoffs, didn't really play defense and that most of the other Lakers made sure to funnel the ball to Kobe. That to me is a sign of respect, actually, one final moment in a career filled with incredible moments.

I know this is a really negative post, not the kind I usually make, but I am really an unhappy person (I hide it well) but I can't hide it tonight. I can't be the NBA-does-no-wrong guy that I usually am tonight. I even set aside the NBA cards and worked on hockey cards tonight.

With that said, the 2016-17 season truly gets under way this coming Thursday, when the NBA Draft takes place. I always enjoy the Draft, seeing all the new names entering the league and, hopefully, my card collection. The Summer League kicks off July 2nd so that's really not all that far away- it'll be here before too long, and then there's the Olympics. I LOVE the Olympics and will watch as much of them as I possibly can. (There will be several Olympic-themed posts in the not too distant future)

I can't wait.

Now, here's a look at all of the 2015-16 sets in my collection. I don't have Clear Vision yet and don't know when it will make it's way to my collection- I'm mostly done buying cards for a while, but that's a whole other topic.

Absolute Basketball

Complete- first set to show photos taken during 2015-16

Donruss- first set to show action photos of the rookies

Gold Standard

Hoops - a set I actually completed!

Limited- this is the third time I've posted this card. Only one I've got.

Panini Excalibur- the newest set, just came out this month.

Panini Prizm

Panini Threads

Prestige

Revolution

Select. This is a Prizm, I don't have a base card in my collection.

Totally Certified

Hot off the Scanner Tray Week 17

This week's HOST is a short one- several days were spent away from home at the NNL East, the world's largest scale model car show, in Wayne, New Jersey, and two days were spent working on the new 2015-16 Panini Threads set. Then, for the entire week after the NNL, I didn't scan a single card.

But I did manage to get some scanning done the week before the NNL which I will post now...

Here is Kevin Garnett's base card from 2015-16 Donruss. (#159). I saw this image happen! I was watching the game on League Pass, and I said to my mom, also watching, that this would make a great card image. KG may be in his 21st season but he can still run a fast break, leading to a dunk and a free throw. Opened up a pack of Donruss and there it was!

This season I did something different also...I kept an Excel chart of each NBA game I watched during the season. I listed each game, keeping it in columns as to which team was at home and on the road. I watched all 4 T-Wolves/Nuggets games, but since this was in Denver, this photo had to be taken either October 30th or December 2nd, 2015. I don't remember which game it was, but this is now the first time I have ever been able to match up a card image to a game listed on my Excel chart. OCD can be really helpful sometimes :) I mainly created the chart for two reasons- one, so that I could look up and see if games referenced on cards were ones I watched, and 2- I have never had any idea how many games I've watched in a season. I wanted to know that (it serves no practical purpose, but..OCD!)

As I type this, on Wednesday afternoon (the final day of the regular season) I've watched exactly 250 regular season games, and 283 overall, the overall total counting pre-season, D-League and the All-Star game. By the time this gets posted on Sunday, I'll have watched at least two more regular season games and at least one Playoff game. For me to include a game on the list, I had to have either seen 1 whole quarter, or if I only saw the end, at least 5 minutes worth of playing time. If I only saw that I marked it with a P, for partial. If I saw the entire second half and some of the first half, I didn't mark it with a P, but if I saw the entire first half and only some of the second, I DID mark it with a P. Weird, but, it works for me. I prefer to watch whole games but sometimes it just didn't work out, schedule wise or TV working wise (my TV doesn't always work). (Update: I didn't post this on the 17th as I expected, so I did in fact watch two more regular season games, and I've since watched a bunch of Playoff games, too)

Also of note....Joffrey Lauvergne (possibly spelled wrong), #77 on the Nuggets...Panini has not bothered to give him a card, so this background shot is his only appearance to date. 

I mentioned in my Threads review that I hadn't gotten the Team Threads insert scanned yet when I made the post. Now I have, and here it is.

Yes, I decided to post a back scan. Not something I do too often in a HOST. These are die cut in the shape of the jersey. There are 100 of them in the set, 60 veterans and 40 rookies (numbered separately). I wish they were more common. I really like them. Last year the rookie ones were part of the base set.

Just a cool Corey Maggette card. He follows me on Twitter! This set is one i always liked. They always smelled like Vick's Vapo-Rub to me. Not sure if that is a regional product or not but if you know what it is, you will know the smell.

The lines through the picture and across his skin were added by my scanner, by the way. It has some issues with some sets. This is one of them. You need to be careful with the set as well, because the silver can come off if you handle it too much.

As I mentioned above, I didn't scan any cards during the week of getting home on the 17th through today, the 24th, I did scan all the comics that have arrived to me in 2016, which is not all that many as I don't read too many titles anymore...and I have only read one of the months that arrived this year so I'm behind in reading them as well as scanning them. (I've been off on a kick reading books from the local library, mostly about WWII and Ancient Rome).
Here's just one which has a cool wraparound cover, which I combined into one image with PhotoScape.

 Hopefully I will get back into scanning and will have more to show in the next HOST.

Uniform History: Boston Celtics

Perhaps the most steady franchise in sports history, the Boston Celtics have worn essentially the same design for more than 80 years!

Current Logo:

History: The current Celtics franchise was founded in 1946, and is one of three remaining teams that were part of the first season of what would become the NBA, along with the New York Knicks and Golden State Warriors, then located in Philadelphia. The uniforms the Celtics wear, however, are much older. The early days of basketball saw many professional leagues come and go, and also a profusion of barnstorming teams, that would travel the country playing whoever they could find to play them. (The spirit of barnstorming lives on with the Harlem Globetrotters). The first Boston Celtics, also known as the Original Celtics, were one of those barnstorming teams, first founded in 1918. Their history is quite convoluted, and I can't determine when the team folded, but it was before World War II. They wore the exact same uniforms the current Celtics did when they began. The first professional basketball card is of one of the Original Celtics, Joe Lapchik, in a multi-sport release called Sport Kings in 1933. I don't have it, so I can't show it.

The Celtics home whites have remained virtually unchanged in their entire NBA history. The construction of the jersey has changed over time, notably the width of the bands that go over the shoulder. The NBA logo has been added, then moved several times. There are far more ventilation holes than there were "back in the day", etc...but design wise...practically unchanged. The largest change, which doesn't even show on cards, is that from 2005-06 through 2013-14 there was a small shamrock over the player's name.

Actually, the largest change the home whites have ever had was having the player's last name added over the number, which occurred for both home and road jerseys for the 1972-73 season. But that's not a design change so much as a concept change.

So with all that said, you can see that the home whites are basically the same in 1957-58..

1957-58 Topps #5

as they are in 2015-16!

2015-16 Prestige #22

The only real change is that the Celtics word has been slightly compressed, so it does not go from armhole to armhole. 

The road greens have changed only slightly in the Celtics' long history.
Originally, they read Boston across the front in a wide arc.

2007-08 Topps Bill Russell Missing Years #BR61

The last year they said Boston was 1971-72, it was also the last year they did not carry the player's name on the back.  I'm not sure if this is an actual image or a composite- I have a suspicion they may have digitally created the background of this image. I don't have any cards issued in that time period to show the road green so I had to use this later one.

The wide Boston jerseys have been work as throwbacks several times, beginning with the 1996-97 50th Anniversary celebration.

The road greens then were modified in 1972-73 to say Celtics, and would be basically unchanged until 2013-14. Minor adjustments only- a shamrock was added to the "belt buckle" in 1999-00, and a shamrock was added over the player's name in 2005-06.

2003-04 Topps 1st Edition #14

The road green was changed back to Boston for the 2014-15 season. It also saw the shamrock over the name removed as the NBA mandated that area as the location of the NBA logoman. This card shows the shamrock "belt buckle" well.

2015-16 Complete Silver #297

The Celtics have several alternate uniforms. The first and most used has black lettering and black stripes down the side. These were used so much when I was getting back into the NBA I actually though they were the new normal for a brief time. These debuted in 2005-06 and are still in use.

2012-13 Panini #92

Another alternate has gold lettering. I really like these. They debuted in 2006-07.

2012-13 Absolute Basketball #99

They also have had sleeved alternates. The first, which I don't believe they wear anymore, were a combination of the first two alternates. This is the only card I know of to show these alternates.

2014-15 Prestige #139

Debuting in 2014-15, the sleeved jerseys are gray with white lettering. This marks the first time in the Celtics' long history that they wore any colors other than green and white.

2015-16 Complete #50

 The Celtics also have several jerseys that have not appeared on cards. The Celtics were the Nets' opponent in the 2012 Christmas Day game, which saw the Celtics wearing solid green jerseys with green lettering.  They also wore a special jersey for the opening game of the 2008-09 season, which was like the normal home whites, but had gold borders on the letters and numbers. Neither of those jerseys appear on cards to my knowledge.