2020 purchases: affordable group breaks with Colbey

I'm in another one of those funks where I don't really feel like writing but have lots of cards to show off, so I'm going to try to let the images do most of the talking and see if that helps.

Today's post is a recap of all the fun I had over the last couple months participating in group breaks run by Colbey of Cardboard Collections. He calls them Affordable Group Breaks and that's a very apt title--nobody's gonna be accusing him of false advertising anytime soon! Colbey offers a nice variety of modern and older boxes with team slots going for reasonable prices, especially as you get closer to the breaks and some remain available, at which point he'll discount them. The fact that he lets you pile up your stacks until you want them shipped is also a nice touch. I paid about $7.50 for everything, most of which you'll see here.

Here's a quick rundown of what I ended up with:

2020 Diamond Kings--Orioles: Cal Ripken Jr. base (a great looking card!)
1996 Topps Laser--Reds: Reggie Sanders and Hal Morris base, plus Colbey was nice enough to toss in a Tony Phillips I needed for my PC, and a Frank Thomas too
1997 Pinnacle XPress--Blue Jays, Expos, A's, and Mets (see below)

Here's a look at each of the base cards (not including dupes) from the XPress break.

And here's the inserts: two Swing for the Fences cards plus a pair of parallels: Men of Summer, with a great gold look to them.

I also jumped into a number of football breaks at low prices partially for trade bait, a bit in the hopes of landing a few cards I'd like, and also to encourage Colbey to continue including the sport in his breaks.

Seen here are team stacks from those breaks: 2006 Bowman, 1999 Collector's Edge First Place, and 1996 Pacific Litho-Cel (see what I mean about the variety?). I won't go into too much detail about these but I'll show off the more notable stuff below. For my fellow Wolverines fans, I'll mention that I ended up with Collector's Edge base cards of Woodson and Harbaugh (who's seen above).

2006 Bowman: Bengals, Ravens, Giants, Raiders, Eagles, Bucs
1999 Collector's Edge 1st Place: Cardinals, Saints, Giants, Raiders, Eagles, Chargers
1996 Pacific Litho-Cel: Bills, Giants, Raiders

Here you see the non-base from '06 Bowman. Those packs included some Chrome prospect cards and these are the ones I landed. I also ended up with a pair of Orange parallels of the regular base set (I hate when people say "paper"): Randy Moss and Reggie Brown.

And now the best stuff from Collector's Edge: a Donovan McNabb RC, Ricky Williams Future Legends insert, plus a bunch of parallels. Gold Ingots include James Jett, Rich Gannon, Junior Seau, Jim Harbaugh(!), and Freddie Jones. I also got two of the numbered /500 Galvanized cards: Natrone Means and Bryan Still. Obviously the Chargers were a good investment!

Finally, I jumped into the '96 Litho-Cel break hoping for an Amani Toomer RC (one of just two I still need), and Colbey delivered, along with a Game Time insert to boot! Hopefully I can add a Cel card of his to complete the full image. Speaking of those, I landed Jim Kelly, Rodney Hampton, and Dave Brown.

All in all I had a good time without spending that much, and it's cool to have the option of watching the breaks live or on your own time on Youtube. Oh, and I have one more card to show off that came from a break in which I didn't participate.

Buddy of the blog Paul claimed the Pats for all of $2 in Colbey's 2003 Fleer Avant break and promised me any Brady cards he got, which would likely just be a base card (New England's only one in the small set). Colbey had a hot hand, though, pulling three very nice hits: a Jeremy Shockey patch, a Joey Harrington relic for Paul's Lions, and this guy:

Well damn, now that's nice--a beautiful blue jersey swatch of the GOAT, and numbered /250 too! I don't think any of us had any idea that many hits were coming out of this box, so I think all of us were fairly pleased by the result. Many thanks to Paul for being generous enough to think of me and keep his word when such a nice hit got pulled.

I also want to thank Colbey for putting in the time and effort to run such affordable and entertaining breaks. Everyone should consider this my endorsement of them, though anybody that's dealt with him at all already knows he's one of the good guys of the blogosphere. If you've got some extra card money from the lack of shows and retail stuff (the latter being a huge blessing in disguise, in my opinion), keep an eye on his blog where he announces his breaks most weekends and get in on the fun!