2019 COMC purchases: superb basketball and football

It's been a superb Sunday here in Ann Arbor weather-wise considering it's just the second day of February.  Temperatures got up in the 50s a day after we were dealing with the usual cold and snow, and I definitely took advantage.

Now I'm sitting here putting together a post while glancing at the game every now and then, between two teams I don't really care about.  But the fact that it's Super Bowl Sunday is a good reminder that I still haven't covered all of my 2019 pickups.  This COMC recap and one more should do it.

Today I'll be showing off my basketball scores and, yes, some of the football as well!  (A quick note:  I don't have all of the former cataloged in my own albums or on TCDB yet as I've had to create their checklists myself, which sometimes takes a bit.)

I believe I mentioned the crazy number of plates I purchased in the last post, and a large chunk of the ones staying with me are surprisingly from basketball, my least favorite of the four major sports.  I'm not the type to pass up a good deal when it comes to my Michigan collections, though, and four of these were under $4, with the other less than $5.

Here's the backs so you can tell who actually appears on each card.  I landed my first plates of Burke and THJ (times two!), second of Rice, and fifth(!) of Sauce Castillo himself, Nik Stauskas.  All of them are from higher-end products meaning Panini did their thing where they affixed the plates to super thick pieces of cardboard.  Those are totally fine but I really like what they've done with colorful backs on the actual metal the last couple years.  Three of these were inserted into the following year's National Treasures products so checklisting them can take a bit of work.  But who cares, because five new basketball plates!

The football section is quite good as well, though you're in for a pretty good show in the final post of this series.  WR Amara Darboh's up first with a cool pair from 2017:  a Playoff autograph and Absolute dual jersey/football auto RC (#282/299).  As long as Panini keeps producing Playoff cards with college photos like that, I'll keep buying them!  Those two bookend my first 1/1 of former QB (and one-year WR) Devin Gardner.  It's a magenta plate from his only NFL card out of 2015 Topps Field Access, a product known more for its plethora of sticker autos.  He's looking quite acrobatic there for sure.

The middle contains three new players to the collection.  First is DL Rashan Gary, a former top college recruit who went to the Packers in the first round last year.  I came up with a 2019 Panini Legacy auto of him in a Michigan uni, which is awesome, though his signature is anything but.  Hey, they can't all look like Griffey's and Rivera's!

Next is his fellow New Jersey native Ron Johnson, not to be confused with the former Michigan RB.  This one played on the D-Line and was part of that same recruiting class, but he transferred out last year.  He's one of a few future college players I can name from the autograph portion of that 2016 Upper Deck USA set.

The last of the newbies is another former QB that changed positions like Gardner, but in Zach Gentry's case, the move to TE stuck, and it worked out ok for him since he got drafted by the Steelers.  His 2019 Contenders Draft auto looks pretty cool, which doesn't surprise me a bit, and he has a somewhat interesting signature too.

Moving on we have another QB, transfer guy Ryan Mallett.  As I think I've said a few times, I occasionally collect his stuff as long as he's not shown in an Arkansas uniform.  Here you can see a 2011 Plates & Patches jersey/auto RC (#080/299) followed by a Topps Magic signature from the same year.  Both are cool in their own right but Magic is a somewhat recent Topps product I actually like, so that's notable.

Ok, we're on to the last QB of the day, I promise.  John Navarre, the gumpy signal-caller from Cudahy, Wisconsin, gets another of his very occasional appearances; this is just my 13th hit of him.  Luckily I found a cheap new addition in the form of a 2004 Bowman's Best Green auto (#189/499).  I already had the base version, which I prefer mainly because the green ink doesn't look great here--the parallel version of the card is fine otherwise--so it's nice to have them as a pair.

Last up is former Michigan DL Chris Wormley, who's often a fun follow on Twitter:

I hit the trifecta today! I got pooped on, peed on, and puked on by my lovely daughter. 👍🏽

— Chris Wormley (@Chris_Wormley43) January 29, 2020

My second auto and third hit of his is a rookie year 2017 Donruss Optic Rookie Autographs Blue auto (#23/75).  What better color of a parallel could you ask for in terms of a former Wolverine?  He's seen a decent amount of playing time with the Ravens and hopefully that increases enough for him to earn a rare non-rookie appearance in some Panini products.

That's it for today but stay tuned for another blowout post where I cover the rest of my football purchases.