The largest team upload ever!

 Being that it's the first of the month, that means it's upload day, and I knew as of May 1st that the June upload would be the largest team update ever. On May 1st, we celebrate "Glad I'm Not Dead Day", to celebrate the second chance I got at life back in 2013. And of course, when it comes time for gift giving, that means cards! And this year it was the Factory set and a tin of the New York Rangers Centennial set. 

Of course, I prioritized scanning them and I got them all scanned successfully. Those, combined with the other cards I scanned this month, saw me have 243 Rangers cards to upload this month, the largest update ever since I began my Cardboard History Gallery nearly 8 years ago. 

Here's a behind the scenes look at how I do my uploading. The computer automatically puts them in order by title of card, and I go through and upload them in order based on whatever is oldest. I tried doing it alphabetically by team but I found that wasn't much fun so switched away quickly. Then I just slide them over from one window into the team listing, and done. It's actually really quite simple, but time consuming. Doing the team update is usually my favorite part of each month, although sometimes I enjoy updating each person's album more. I have not done the people part yet, that's always the most work and I always do it last, but I am curious to see how many people from the Rangers Centennial set will be new to my collection. I'll find out soon, and share it in the New People post, whenever I finish. 

It also put my Rangers collection over 2000 cards scanned! To put that into perspective, the Boston Bruins are in second place, with 860 cards scanned. 

New record for longest time between getting a pack and opening it

I set a new record shortly before Christmas, that I didn't set out to set but did anyway.

All the way back in 2004, Upper Deck did a 90 card set documenting LeBron James' first NBA season. Each of the 82 games got a card, plus the awards he won got a card, and at least one "filler" card that was used to make the set 90 cards.

They didn't come all at once. As I recall, they would send some in waves. I got the first 55 cards as they came out, and while I don't remember the exact details, I never got the rest. I do remember we had to call them and complain to get them to send the rest of the cards to me. They did...eventually. I don't remember exactly when, but they came in a big clear heat-sealed pack. This was in 2005. Possibly even 2006, but I'm going to go with 2005.  But...in that time period, 2005-06, I was starting to lose interest in the NBA. I realize now that it was ME that had the problem. But, whatever, I stopped collecting the NBA in late 2006, but I had been unhappy with the sport and cards for a while beforehand. I didn't open the package that contained cards #56-90 and inexplicably a copy of card #54 but not 55. Until December 23rd, 2017. At least 11 years after I got it in the mail!

When I finished scanning my collection for the Database, I went looking for some peripheral stuff that I could post, and the box from UD- still in the mailing box they used to send it to me- was among the items I found. I finally opened the box and added them to my collection late on the 23rd.

I don't know the previous holder of the record. I used to blow through cards as soon as I got them, but when I was not really in the hobby- 2007 and 2008 - it changed. (I never truly left, but scaled way back, where I only got 14 cards in all of 2008 combined...less then I got new in this box, in fact) When I came back in full force in 2009, I did things differently. I took it slower. Instead of the average box taking me 5 minutes or less to open, I now spread it out over hours or even days. It's not uncommon for me to save packs now to spread out the enjoyment. I still have packs I purchased in 2013 at retail that I have not opened yet. Back then, I would just look to see what I got, but now I actually take the time to appreciate what I've got, and sometimes even read the backs.  The record from 1988-06 was probably about 2 or 3 days, as I would sometimes buy a box and save it to open in Lake George.

As I write this, on Christmas Eve, I know I also  still have some packs saved from a box I bought on Ebay in either 2010 or 2011.  I have two left and will open them in 2018, in theory.  But, that was planned. This LeBron set...totally unplanned. In fact, to be honest, I had completely forgotten I even had them until I opened the box and saw an extremely young LeBron looking back at me.

Here's a couple of examples of the cards that waited more than a decade for me.

There's a lot of gold foil that scans black on these cards.

The funny thing is...I'm not sure I included the first 55 in my official collection count. I had a tendency at that time to not count single player tribute sets. And I have absolutely no way of knowing short of doing a full recount. It's why when I say something about my collection totals, I say it's probably not accurate but I treat it as if it is. I don't think I counted the various oversize sets (except 1976-77 Topps) or the undersize sets either, back in the day. (Like the 1996-97 Collector's Choice Mini-Cards, which I separated) Eventually, when everything is typed into Excel, I will know. I'm going to let the computer count for me because I keep the number in three places and none of them match. I don't really trust my ability to get an accurate count, but the computer doing the real work should solve that problem. Cards #56-90 ARE counted, at least.

A historic night

I've been watching the NBA for a little over 21 years. I've seen many great players, many great plays, many historical events. Last night set a new record. Second year player Devin Booker of the Phoenix Suns put up 70 points on the Boston Celtics. It is the most I've seen scored by a single player in a single game in my entire time watching the sport. It wasn't enough...the Celtics held on to win 130-120, but this is a pretty big deal. He becomes only the 6th player all-time to hit 70 in a game. Only the second to do so in the time I've been watching, but...I didn't get to see Kobe Bryant's 81 point night against the Raptors in 2006. I was keeping up with the scoring online, but I didn't get to see it. This one, I saw. I watched it on the repeats. I have both NBA's League Pass and the NHL's Center Ice (Thanks Ma!) and I usually watch hockey live as it doesn't repeat, and then I watch the NBA games as they repeat over night. This game happened to be the 6th game I watched all or a portion of on the 24th-25th of March. (And since the repeat went off I found a 7th game to watch- I'm writing this at 4:49 AM but I will publish it later) The great thing too, is that even though the game had been done for hours, I had no idea what was going to happen in the game. I had seen the final score, but I didn't know the details. I love the sport itself so much that I will watch games where I know the final score already. I'm sure glad I did this time!

I'm not a huge fan of the Suns or Booker to be honest, but I'm still really thrilled I got to watch that game. I love to see history.

This was the most ever scored against the Celtics. One of the NBA's original teams, the previous record for points scored against them was 64 by Elgin Baylor, who did it in the 1960s, long before I was born. This was the first 70 point game this decade. The NBA averages only one per decade, so it's pretty special. There have been games where the entire team scored less, I think the Mavs put up 67 earlier this season, for example, when most of their best players were out injured.

Any time a player can score into the 40s is special (Many never do in their whole career) so to put up 70 in a single game is nothing short of incredible.

I don't have a whole lot of cards from the last two seasons, but this is, by far, my best Booker card.

The autographs in the Complete set are significantly rare, but I managed to pull his; I don't think I've ever shown it on the blog before. I believe the autographs are one per case in last year's Complete, but maybe not. The math involved is more than I want to do for fun :) They fell one in every 720 packs, and there are 36 packs per box. Luckily, I still have the box I opened last year still at arm's reach away.

Booker held one record that he's held since opening day of 2015-16, also. He's the first player to be born after I discovered the sport. He was born in late 1996, after the start of the 1996-97 season. I discovered the NBA late in the 1995-96 season. 

It's not too often I am compelled to make a post about current events, but this...seeing the most points I've ever scored in a game in my favorite sport- this was enough to do it! I already had a post planned for today, but it can wait.

It's not every day you see 70.

In case you are wondering, the 5 players to hit 70 before last night are: Wilt Chamberlain, Elgin Baylor, David Thompson, David Robinson, Kobe Bryant. That's in chronological order. Even Michael Jordan never did it, his career high was 63 (69 in the playoffs).

A new personal record!

I didn't expect this to happen today, but I set a new personal record that will be hard to beat. When I woke up this morning, I was not feeling well. My health issues have been acting up as late (I don't wish to go into them more) but I decided early on I was going to spend most of the day scanning. I don't know why but it went easier today, even though I mixed in some mirror foils and Finest pages, which take about double the time to edit than a regular scan.

In the end, I scanned 81 pages of cards! Since I began doing the fronts and backs of each card in 2012, my record was somewhere in the 40s. I don't remember if it was 42 or 46 but I do remember it was somewhere in the 40s. I doubled that number today!
The number is uneven because I had one page where I only had to do one side.

That is a grand total of 746 scans made, edited and labeled...all since 6:30 this morning.

It is going to take me days to post these scans to the Database, but I enjoy it.

Quite a few of the cards that came out of the boxes were some of my favorite sets, which made it more fun. My collection is sorted somewhat by player, somewhat random so I have no idea what is going to be in each box as I open it.

The Trading Card Database hits 1,000,000 cards scanned!

Yes, you read that right...1 million cards!

As most of you have probably gathered from my numerous references to it, I spent a lot of time on the Trading Card Database. I discovered the site in August of 2011 and used it as a checklist until October 2012, when I decided to enter my collection in and start contributing some of the card fronts I had previously scanned for my own personal website. (within a short time I decided to scan the backs of my cards as well, and I have been working ever since on catching up the backs to the fronts- I've got it down to 300 or so, it had been over 1000 at one point)

It has become my favorite website on the internet, (moreso even than my own website that I have maintained since 2004) and I always have at least one window open to the Database- usually more than one. (One for working, one for researching). There are all kinds of great features on the Database, some I am still discovering, even after spending so much time on there.

Some time late yesterday, the Database hit the 1 million scan mark. That is a MASSIVE accomplishment! The million scans cover everything- every sport and non-sport set is either posted or in the process of being posted to the Database. Literally, everything, dating back to the birth of trading cards in the 1870s. Baseball of course has the most cards posted, but that only makes sense because it has had the most cards issued over the years.

I don't know yet which card was #1000000, Admin will post that later. I do know that I was not the million-card poster. I only posted one scan yesterday (2006-07 Topps Turkey Red #226 Larry Bird- a card at one point I believed would be the last new NBA card I ever got, but that's another topic for another day).

The Database does tell you how much you've contributed though, and this is my contribution, from August 31st, 2011 through February 8th, 2015:

They even supply a color coded pie chart! (mmmmm, pie) I screencap it periodically, and that's what you are seeing now.

The errors number is off. They now allow me (and anyone else who qualifies) to correct the errors ourselves instead of having to send them a correction, and they don't update to our contributions chart. Everything else is accurate.

I've posted 33,759 different card fronts. I am #6 in all-time combined contributions to the Database. I had been #5 for a while but as life has gotten in the way I dropped out of the top 5. Since mid-November I've also been working more on my Tradelist, which, while still a feature the Database offers, does not add to my total of items contributed. (it has, though, brought me more than 600 new cards, so it's well worth the effort and the general lack of contributions for the past 3+ months)

I expect to finish typing in my NBA duplicates today, finally- I've been working on them since the second weekend of January- and will get back to what I enjoy the most, scanning and posting to the Database shortly. I was not able to post #1,000,000 - but I will try for #2 million :)

The Database averages over 1,000 new scans posted every day, so it will be here before we know it, I'm sure. This is their logo, which I lifted off their Facebook page.

 

 

 

 

As always, thanks for reading! Ok, back to work on the tradelist...

 

 

Recapturing a long-lost sense of wonder

This isn't quite part 2 of the Epic Mailday post, but it's part of the series of entries spawned by that epic mailday.

I finally started typing my new cards into my chart where I track the order I get my cards. I am so OCD I started doing that on January 1st, 2014, and I've kept at it, already filling an entire college-rule notebook and well into book #2. It serves no purpose other than satisfying a bit of my OCD nature.

With all the cards I got on the 31st, however, I know that I can't write all of them. For one, it would probably fill my second book totally, and perhaps more importantly, it would pretty much kill my writing hand. I CAN write with my left hand if I need to, but it takes a long time and is pretty ugly- not to mention the fact that my handwriting isn't always the best in the first place.

So what I am doing is going to put a line in the book to check the Excel file to see where the hockey, football and baseball cards go in relation to the NBA, NASCAR and Star Wars cards.

I only started typing them a few hours before I went to bed, and I got done roughly half of one of the big boxes shown in my post of that day. It's a 900 count box, although they never quite hold 900 cards.

I will pick up where the arrow points to in the box...I still have the rest of the box, above the arrow, all the other boxes, and one box I forgot to include in the photo. (ooops. I knew it felt off when I was taking the picture!) I guess I got a little past halfway on box #1. I have numbered all the boxes using PhotoScape. 4 is the one that missed the photo.

 

Remember I said that I was at 699 cards for the month of January before then? I stopped at 1100. Considering that I have another full 900 count, half the first, and 5 other boxes, I think it's safe to say I will be setting a new record for most new cards in a day!

I've also gotten 46 new sets already, blowing the old record of 22 out of the water by a WIDE margin. Considering how early I am into the typing project, I now think that it's likely that I got more than 100 new sets on the day, which is surely a record that will never fall. I'm not even to the big box of cards from my friend Ricky yet, which has lots of sets in it. Actually, I would not even be really shocked if I hit 200 new sets. Even an entire major brand is among them. Before 1/31/2015 I did not have a single O-Pee-Chee card in my collection. I've got more than 100 now, and quite possibly that many from the 1989-90 hockey set alone!

But all that is not the topic for today's blog.

I have discovered, that typing these in, and cataloging all these cards...I have a feeling that I have not had in a long time. 1996 to be exact.

I have the feeling of the sense of wonder, and newness, and excitement, that I had when I first started collecting the NBA. There was so much to learn then, and so much I didn't know, and had to research...it's a feeling that I lost a long time ago. I don't know if it means I have become jaded (I hope not) or if I just know too much to have that sense of wonder, but by time the 1996-97 season was over, it was gone. I never really had that feeling with NASCAR, because when I started collecting them, they only had 5 year's worth of sets issued, less than 20 different sets, and several of those I didn't experience in hand until the early 2000s. I was NEVER able to get large mixes of assorted NASCAR cards, so they were all in groups by set, or in rare cases, as single cards, so that sense of wonder and excitement never truly happened as I generally knew what I was getting as I got it.

But all these cards- mostly hockey, some baseball and football-that sense of wonder and excitement is back.

It's a little easier now to determine what sets the cards go to, and which are parallels and which aren't. When I started collecting the NBA, and getting them in mixes, in 1996, there was no internet. Back in the day, you had the Beckett annual price guide and you have to manually look through each set you thought it might be, and try and determine if it was from that set or not. Now, you simply pull up which set you think it might be on the Database, and there's usually a scan there to help you determine...and if that card is not scanned, others in the set usually are, so you can tell. It's a much better system than paging through the tiny, not always accurate Beckett, that's for sure. Let's put it this way- of the cards I've entered yet, including from those 46 new sets, there was not 1 that I was not able to figure out what year and set it goes to via the Database.

I know this feeling probably won't last. I don't have the finances to take on a new sport, I can't even do all the NBA and NASCAR sets. (I do know that if I did take on another sport, it would have been hockey, even before this stash of cards made their way to me). Not to mention the fact that the other sports all conflict with the sports I already follow. I only have one set of eyes and ears to watch and listen to events with. (To be honest, I actually listen to the sports more than watch them, as it is, looking up only when I hear something interesting is happening). Once I process these cards, I'm going to put them in boxes and it will be some time before I deal with them again. I will- once I finish my NBA collection, I'm sure I'll make charts of my other sports, but that is going to be a couple of years from now.

Processing them will take some time, though. After I finish typing them in, a process that will take me several more days, most likely, I will need to enter them into my collection chart on the Database, which, at the same time, I will determine and separate them by which need to be scanned and posted, and which are already done. The ones that are done, will go into a box labeled to be scanned after I finish scanning everything else (I have boxes of NBA, NASCAR and Star Wars cards that other people posted before I got them scanned, as well, to do after I finish everything else) and the ones that need posting will be mixed in with my NBA and NASCAR to-be-scanned stacks, where I will mix them in until I run out. I've discovered that I enjoy doing a mixture of everything more than just groupings by set or player. Unfortunately for me my entire NBA collection is mostly sorted by player, many of them over 100 cards per player. But I digress.  Eventually I will get them all scanned, for posting on my own personal website, but I'll spend time doing the ones I can post to the Database before I do the ones somebody else already posted for now.

So, I'll be working with these cards for quite a while still, then not for a while, and then again. So maybe then when I get back to them, I will get that feeling of newness and excitement again? Only time will tell (but I'm sure I will document it on this blog- I've only been at it for 2 months but I have no plans to stop any time soon!

As always, thanks for reading.

22 New Sets added to my collection in one day- a new record!

While I am a set builder primarily, I know that there are many sets that are too rare or too expensive for me to ever have any hope of completing without winning the lottery, but getting at least one example from as many different sets as possible is much more within reach. Usually I can only get one or two at a time, sometimes 5 or so. But this past weekend, I got 22 new sets in one day, by far my personal record! It could only come in non-sports. There aren't that many NASCAR sets not yet in my collection, and the NBA sets I'm missing, while larger in scope than 22, tend to be the high-end, expensive sets, so it is highly unlikely that I could get 22 of them in one day.

But non-sports...the world of non-sports cards is various and expansive. There are literally thousands of sets, covering just about as many topics, and a rich history that goes back to 1879 in the USA, possibly earlier in Europe. (My oldest is, I believe, 1910, but I one of the 22 I got this day may be older...read on). Unlike the NBA and NASCAR, I don't know much about non-sports cards, comparatively. There are some areas I'm fairly knowledgeable on, like Star Wars and DC Comics. But other areas I know very little about, even subjects like history and automotive, there are so many sets that I've simply never seen or even heard of, and then there's the estoric stuff, that I love but know even less about. And that doesn't even take into account the vintage issues, the cigarette card era, etc. The more I learn, the more I enjoy, and there is more I don't know than what I do. But I love learning about them, and the best way is to add those cards to my collection!

I will show each of the 22 sets, and start with the ones I need help with.
This one is the one that intrigues me the most. It's clearly very old, but I don't know how old. The texture of the card tells me that it's 1920s or older. I don't know what exactly is going on on the card front, or what it says. I see a small 1883 at the very bottom, but I don't think that is the copyright, I think that it is actually part of the coat of arms of the company that issued the card. But I could be wrong...I really have no clue. Also, the front and back of the card are 180°, which is highly unusual...although perhaps not in Belgium?

I got 8 of the cards from this next set, which is quite clearly from Germany. The subject is military history, and while all the cards I got are WWI topics, the dealer had others as well. None cover WWII or later. I know cards were quite popular in Germany before WWII, and I wonder if these date to that time? I have no clue, but I'd love to find out. I got cards numbered as high as 264. They are small, and very flimsy. The writing style looks old but I don't know if it really is. Some are yellowed, some are not.

I don't know what country it was issued in, when it was issued, or the while checklist.

This set is from 1976, and I have it tentatively labeled "Car Fax" but I don't know more than that. The dealer had others from the set but this is the only one that was even marginally interesting.

Now, we get into the sets I can ID.
Pre-War, Arm & Hammer issued cards, including 10 series of Useful Birds of America, between 1915 and 1938. This is my first from any of the series. Series Six was issued in 1933. Considering how few early cards I have, quite surprisingly this is not my first set from 1933!

Next up comes Wings Series C. Wings Cigarettes issued several sets of plane cards, two in 1940, one in 1941 and this series, from 1942. They all use the same design. I have cards now from 3 of the four sets, missing only 1940 Series A.

Bowman issued several very important sets, including the first NBA set. Until this weekend I had only their NBA set in my collection. Three of the 22 new sets came from Bowman. (The basketball set was actually pre-NBA, but it's just easier to call it NBA as the league shown would merge with another to create the NBA)
This is a large set, 180 cards.

There were several sets issued of automotive license plates, mostly in the 1930s. This set was issued by Topps in 1950, and I got two of them.

The presidents of the US are popular card subjects, although more in the past than today. Bowman issued this set of 36 cards in 1952, and I got 19 of them! They are mostly all in poor shape, but they are mine, and that's all that matters!

The third and final Bowman set, from 1954, is US Navy Victories. This was a 48 card set, but I only got this one.

For a long time I've wanted the Topps Flags set from 1957...and this isn't that one. But it's close! Actually, I didn't know this one existed until I added them to my collection. I got 6 of them. From what I've gathered, it's from 1963 and called Flags Midgees. I have not been able to find a full checklist yet.

Brooke Bond is still issuing cards in the vintage style, or at least they were until recently. I had never heard of them until I saw some getting posted to the Database, but they do a wide range of mostly historical subjects. I hadn't had any, but I got two sets this weekend- and as it turned out, both were issued in 1969.
This one is a 50 card set of various famous people, although to be honest, I hadn't heard of this person before I got the card.

This one was issued by Brooke Bond Canada, and has round corners. I'm not generally a fan of cards with round corners, but it does prevent damaged corners most times. I love space/astronomy, I wish the dealer had more from this set...

In 1969, Man reached the Moon for the first time, and Topps created a set to memorialize that. I got two of them.

In 1974, Wonder Bread issued a set that was half DC Comics, half Warner Brothers cartoons. I got two of the DC half of the set...both are in poor shape.

John Player and Sons is a tobacco company from Great Britain. They sponsored F1 teams and issued cards. I don't know if they still do, this set is from 1975.

A Marvel set, from 1975. Art by Jack Kirby, or a copy of his. I'm not really a Marvel fan, I grew up a DC fan, but I still have several hundred of their cards....and will pick up random cards from their sets if they are cheap enough...all of them in this rundown cost me under $1.

Oddly I missed the 1991 Marvel Universe set when it was new....I have a complete 1990 set, I have some from 1992 and 1993, and I'm 6 cards away from the complete 1994 set...but no 1991. Now I have two!

An automotive set from 1991. I don't know the checklist, meaning how many or what they are. I'd like to.

Another Marvel set, from 1992. The card is actually is printed on a form of foil stock.

Had to censor this one before I could post it based on the Terms of Service, lol.

And last but not least, a set for Popeye...My favorite classic cartoon. I didn't know Popeye had cards issued, even though I was very much active in the hobby in 1994, until 2012. I am not sure if this is an insert or promo. I need to do more research!

The blue border on both front and back is the same color, but I didn't edit it properly.

And that ends my rundown of my new additions. I hope you enjoyed seeing them as much as I enjoyed adding them to my collection!
Thanks for reading!