2020 COMC purchases: look at these 'graphs (and more!)

Time to finish up a look at my late-year purchases from COMC so I can close the book on cards I bought in 2020, a year that often felt as bad as a Nickelback song.

I decided to throw all of the football content in one post and just try not to get too verbose about it. That way I can get this stuff put away and move on to other incoming items and stuff I want to post about. I'm showing off 35 cards tonight and the vast majority include signatures, hence today's title and the meme above. Let's get down to business:

The other 34 cards fit nicely into two scans each of nine (vertical cards) and eight (horizontal), so I'll give the only non-hit its own spot here to start. Old Ty joins Amani Toomer (back-to-back in the set, in fact) in my collection of the amazing 2000 Bowman's Best Acetate parallel, which is so cool I scanned both sides for this post!

Ok, on to the (mostly) 'graphs! Many of the cards you'll see were excellent deals that fortified some of my better football PCs. Avant's from the era of shiny stickergraphs and is numbered /125. Breaston did play a couple seasons for the Chiefs, who could repeat as champs tomorrow evening. J-Booty's auto comes on an Optic card, making it shiny in a different way than Avant's. Taco (Michigan uni!) was drafted by Dallas but is now potentially in line for a ring as a bit player for the Chiefs. I continued to bolster Darboh's collection with the three autos you see here (and more in a bit), and Jeff and I have lots of those in common which I noticed while adding them on TCDB. Braylon's huge Browns swatch (/150) was a nice value. And I scored another, uh, signature? of Gary, who had a solid sophomore campaign with the Pack.

Now this is a top three I can get down with: a trio of college uni cards! Gentry's tiny John Hancock graces a Prizm card, Big Mo is one of those acetate cards from Leaf Trinity's Clear line, and I tracked down auto number two of former lineman Trezelle Jenkins. Then it's on to just four out of an absolute bounty of Jake Longs, including a quad jersey/auto, autograph, and not one but two plates (2008 Topps Mayo and 2010 Topps), the first I've acquired of the former #1 overall pick. It's been a while since I've posted a new pickup of former college star DL Mike Martin so why not celebrate his return with a beautiful UD Black signature (/199)? And I enjoy seeing former stars like Toomer get recognized after their careers in Panini's various products, like this Certified jersey (/49) of Amani "It's Not A" Toomer.

Not everything was autographed in this bunch but most was. One of the exceptions was a cool rookie year Avant jersey (/499) where the shininess of the card is better than the swatch. Leaf's cards are fantastic values for college collectors like this sick giant patch/auto of WR Jehu Chesson that cost me less than $3. The three other Darboh cards I found were jersey/autos, two of which came with nice pieces of what's becoming a familiar Seahawks jersey for me as a collector of his cards. Braylon's Topps "patch" isn't terribly impressive but was a cool find for under a buck, and the large jersey number relic card (/25) is even better. Panini's Contenders/Draft products are also outstanding for those pursuing cards of their favorite schools, and here I was glad to find my third signature of former DB David Long.

And the last grouping allows me to end the post with a bang. I was very pleased with my Long haul (pun intended), nine cards for about $33 that also included four jersey/autos and an auto/manupatch. The Gridiron Gear card is one of those where the signed swatch can be pulled out, similar to the Denard that follows the group, though I think in Shoelace's case the signed piece isn't from a jersey. I was thrilled to add another of A-Train's beautiful signatures to my collection. And we'll end on a non-auto, a dual relic of WR Marquise Walker, representing Tom Brady's Bucs in this post.

Once again I had a great time landing some amazing pieces for my collection at pretty nice prices, even if my trade bait purchasing was less than ideal this time around. Just a few quick collection notes: Long zoomed past Braylon thanks to his big day, with the OT hitting 97 to the WR's 93 (Manningham's in between at 95), and threatening to become the second member of my 100-hit club (Henne). Despite his cards being relatively recent, Darboh's already over the 40-mark to 41. And Avant gets to 65 hits, good for sixth overall. Michigan's former WRs feature heavily at the top of my collection with #s 3, 4, 6, 7, 11, 12, 14, 16, and 17.

With these finally able to be put away in their boxes I'm not sure where I'll go next: possibly my first Baseballcardstore.ca order, or perhaps an interesting purchase from a new vendor, not to mention an incoming trade envelope. If I manage to get myself to put up a Super Bowl-related post tomorrow I know which one it'll be, and I'm curious to see reactions to it.

2020 COMC purchases: Dean-o and more new cards you haven't seen-o

Before I get to today's cards I just wanted to highlight a minor miracle that occurred since I last posted: last week my first COMC shipment containing the items I purchased for Christmas card packages finally rematerialized and appeared in Detroit, then Ann Arbor. I've since managed to put together all but one of those envelopes and send them out, so you may see some belated Christmas card posts soon!

Besides getting those done I've been hard at work ordering buttloads of cards from Sportlots (almost done!) and my first try with baseballcardstore.ca (ordered!), so I'll be showing those off in due time.

Ok, onward to tonight's content, which is 100% baseball:

Former slugging 3B Dean Palmer was one of two big winners today, and the guy who got the most new items added to his collection (now 160 cards strong). I'll get to the two most prominent items in a minute, but first, it's "90s inserts rule" time! The '94 Pinnacle Museum Collection design isn't nearly as good as '95's in my opinion, but it's still a great looking parallel. A year after the Preferred brand debuted as a Leaf name, it switched over to Donruss and was responsible for some very nice looking inserts, such as that Cut to the Chase die-cut parallel.

A Silver base card from '97 Finest gives me both of Dean's entries in the regular set, with the only two Rangers earning spots in the rare Gold versions the exact two you'd expect--Pudge Rodriguez and Juan Gonzalez. And '99 Black Diamond has some very fine parallels that are nicely differentiated both in coloring and numbering. Above you see the Double (/3000) and Triple (/1500) versions, meaning I still need the Quadruple (/150) to complete the mini rainbow.

As if 90s insert greatness wasn't enough, I managed to score my second relic (also a bat) and first autograph for my Palmer PC. The signature hails from the well known auto-per-pack 1996 Leaf Signature product and is the most common Bronze version, limited to 3500 copies. The writing is a bit squished but fairly legible otherwise. And speaking of hit-per-pack products, the bat was found in 2001 Private Stock packs I remember quite well, busting many back when relics were more novel. Both of these make for a nice boost to that growing collection.

This next group is a bit of a mix, comprising two former Tigers and another favorite PC. It may not have been too many© but I did find two new Granderson jerseys from 2008--SP Legendary Cuts and Topps Heritage--getting me to the 10 hit mark, for just $1.50 and $1.25, respectively. I also came up with a 2016 Donruss Stat Line insert for under $0.50 which was exciting since I've loved the parallel since it first appeared in 2001. This one's numbered to 263 for his career HR total through 2015, and he's put up 81 more in his final four seasons for a solid total of 344. And after all that we're not quite done yet with Curtis....

First let's have a look at the other cards here. Gwynn was one of the two subjects (Griffey's the other) I wanted to track down from Leaf's 1997 insert called Knothole Gang. Leaf took the motif seriously and came up with a super cool design. These are numbered /5000, which you should remember was pretty tough back then! 90s inserts rule and this was an easy purchase for me. Would you believe it was a "Freedom Isn't Free" special at just a buck-oh-five?

Former versatile Tiger (and player for five other teams) Tony Phillips, like Palmer, is another PC I've been starting to build up in the last year, and this '97 Refractor was the cherry on top of this order, the last card I snagged with my dwindling credit before seeing about shipping my two groups of purchases (trade bait and personal). 1997's design happens to be one of my favorites of the brand so I didn't mind paying $0.75 for this shiny 90s gem.

I said I'd get back to Grandy, didn't I? After naming this here blog after him more than 10 years ago I was finally able to add a plate to his collection. As you can see, this one's from 2017 Donruss and is of the yellow variety, and it was right in my $5-10 wheelhouse at around $8. I'm super excited to add another 1/1 of a favorite player, and I may have to put together a display for whatever "-fecta" I end up with. Right now I could do a RC, relic, auto, 1/1, and manurelic, which is a pretty nice group!

Switching over to the Michigan guys, here's today's last group. Leading off is the Mechanical Man and a 2012 Panini Cooperstown Crystal Collection parallel. This is the regular version, numbered /299, and it completes the trio for me as I already had the Red and Blue versions--a trifecta rainbow!

Next, I was ecstatic to score my first UM uniform autos of 2019 draft picks Tommy Henry (D-Backs, 2nd round) and Karl Kauffmann (Rockies, 2nd round). Elite Extra is perfect for collectors like me because of just such cards. In each case it's also my second auto but obviously my favorite for both given the college photos.

Staying relatively recent, I continued my slow progress towards P Clayton Richard's collection with a 2019 Topps Walgreens Yellow parallel. While the hues aren't quite right, combined with the blue of his team's uniform, it makes for a very appropriate card for a Wolverine!

I'm pretty sure buddy of the blog John, who's definitely already enthused by this group, will like this next card the most. My fellow Freehan collector would be all over this 2005 SP Legendary Cuts Glory Days jersey, one that was surprisingly new to me as I got down to my last few bucks of credit. I already owned the Gold (/75) version of this but not the unnumbered regular one you see above. $3 was a small price to pay for my 25th hit of one of the franchise's best all-time catchers.

And last but not least is the end of my baseball gets, namely a Getz. Hailing from 2008 Just Minors' Just Autographs set, this is a Gold autograph that's numbered on the back (digitally, on a foil stamp), which set me back $1.33. I ended up snagging it instead of the paradoxically more costly (on COMC, anyway) base version. This one getz (sorry, not sorry) his hit total up to 16, with all but two of those (a couple of plates) featuring his signature.

This is quite a nice haul to look at and I haven't even gotten to my football stuff yet! I haven't even scanned that yet, much less figured out if I'm going to break it up into multiple posts, but between the card stuff I mentioned above that's been keeping me busy and putting together this post, I've neglected a couple really nice trade packages I need to show off, so look for those to be my next two posts before I possibly get back to the rest of my COMC loot.

Until then, please enjoy looking at these pickups while we all wait for pitchers and catchers to report!

2020 COMC purchases: hockey new year!

I hope everyone had an excellent holiday season, I know I did. After taking a few days off, though, I decided I was ready to get started posting in 2021, and fortunately I happened to have some worthy content handy.

Although I'm still waiting on my original COMC order (which is pretty much all trade bait destined for Christmas packages), a package that's been in limbo since 12/14, the second one I had shipped days later made it to my mailbox before the year was up. All but one of the cards in this one were for me, so at least I've got that going for me!

I ended up doing quite well with the Black Friday/Cyber Monday sales so I have a nice fat stack of cards to show off. Because of that I'm going to break them down into (at least) three posts by sport. As you might have guessed by this post's title, hockey is first up:

While this is in now way a huge haul, I'll remind everyone that I don't tend to search out hockey very much, and I largely went after these due to their ridiculously low prices. Here's a bit more about each:

Chris Brown 2013-14 Upper Deck Overtime Autographs auto: once again, ladies and gentlemen, it's the pride of Flower Mound, Texas! $0.90 was all it took to grab this Coyote colored (:chuckles Phoenixly:) signature of Brown, my ninth including an auto of 12 total hits (and 15 cards overall). It's a rare addition to his collection by me since much of what I own is courtesy of The Buckstore Kid, naturally. Fellow Wolverine Jacob Trouba can also be found here so this may not be the last of the set you'll see!

Greg Pateryn 2013-14 Crown Royale auto RC (#450/499): Pateryn is something of an unheralded D-man but he's managed to hang in the league on and off for approaching a decade, which is nice to see. He was originally drafted by the Leafs but made his debut and played his first few seasons with the pictured Canadiens here. Crown Royale's die-cuts just about always look nice, and the fact that this is also a numbered RC is a plus. At just $1.25 I was glad to make it his third hit (two autos and a plate) out of just five total cards.

Jeff Tambellini 2005-06 Parkhurst Signatures auto: the last auto of the group belongs to the son of former Oilers GM Steve. Jeff was a dynamite college player during my school days in Ann Arbor, though his NHL career was nothing special. But, man, could he take over a game and carry the team on his back when they needed it! I had no second thoughts about paying a buck for his signature on such a nice design, not that I was surprised that the classic Parkhurst name offered up a good look like this. Five of my eight Tambellini hits feature his John Hancock (out of just 14 cards overall).

Mike Cammalleri 2008-09 Black Diamond Jerseys Quad quad jersey: only one hockey Mike today so I'm not gonna use the tag, but I am quite happy with the new addition. Everyone knows relics have kind of lost their luster over the years, but it's not because of cool ones like this. The four swatches on my copy resulted in three different colors, which is definitely a win, as was nabbing the card for $1.25. TCDB tells me Cammalleri is #3 in my hockey collection (76 cards) and it's no wonder when I can add cool hits like this, my 18th of the former sniper.

Dylan Larkin 2019-20 SP Game Used Showcase Standouts Jerseys jersey: no, it's not a Wings card, but when you only have to pay $1.05 ("Freedom isn't free!") for a relic of a star like Larkin you go for it. And it looks like instead of being the now infamous "event-worn" crap that involves throwing on a jersey for five seconds to meet the definition, it was at least used in action at that event. Larkin's prices make many of his hits cost-prohibitive so this was a fun, cheap way to grab relic #5 (of seven hits) and card #40 overall. I'm glad the Wolverwing will be back in Motown for at least two more seasons after this one.

Since this was just five cards, plus I needed some back scans for TCDB, here's the backs of everything.

I would expect my next post to cover all my baseball purchases next, but we'll just have to see!

2020 eBay purchase: As Many As I Can Getz

Coming hot on the heels off of my latest PWE from Paul, today's post covers another envelope that arrived the same day as his: another eBay purchase from my favorite eBay seller markaguirre22. He had a bunch of great Michigan Baseball items for sale including higher-end stuff like those sweet Topps Clear parallels limited to 10 copies, and other cards that were even more exclusive.

While I lost most of those at the last minute I still came away with a pair of wins at just a buck apiece, plus the dude threw in extras he knew I'd like, as he often does:

The two I won are on the ends of the top of the scan. Chris Getz's 2010 Topps 206 Mini Cycle was the last of his cards I needed from that "rainbow", and Getz's run from the set in its entirety. The Cycle minis were the toughest to find, numbered to 99 copies, and while they aren't particularly rare, I'd never seen one of Chris's cards at a reasonable price until now. More on that set in just a bit.

The other new addition was Getz's 2014 Topps Mini Pink parallel. This is of course the year where his photo has former Tiger Andy Dirks coming in hot and appearing to threaten the 2B's future hopes of having children. Compared to the flagship version which is number /50, the Mini set's card is twice as rare with just 25 copies made, and the one I got is #09/25. I now lack just the Black version /5, which I believe was one of the auctions I lost here. Oh well, I'll get one eventually!

The extras included a Getz Piedmont mini from the 206 set, which I already have--so Jeff will be the beneficiary if the seller's generosity, unless he doesn't want it for some reason--and Rich Hill's 2020 Topps Update base, which I did need. A super cheap common may not seem like much but it's certainly a nice way to keep me buying from you (as if the quick free shipping wasn't enough by itself).

Here's a quick look at the backs, which I've made an effort to show more often when I have a low number of cards to scan. Plus they're a bit more relevant today thanks to the minis.

And since I only had to scan four cards I went ahead and grabbed the rest of the Topps 206 Getz items I had to show off the rainbow (*not included is Mini Framed American Caramel auto, which is not a parallel version):

Pictured: top: base, Bronze parallel

bottom: American Caramel mini, Cycle mini, Old Mill mini, Piedmont mini, Polar Bear mini

I'm not generally one for mini cards, or parallels where the only difference is on the back, but these are kind of a fun way to look at the history of trading cards.

Now that I've posted these it may finally be time for me to show off the other massive trade I received from TCDB. I'll have some fun COMC items to show off at some point but haven't shipped the ones I purchased for myself yet (hmmm, interesting statement...) and haven't decided if I'll pay to get them rushed to arrive before the end of the year or wait until March. And who knows, other stuff may appear unexpectedly before then!

In the meantime, if you're perusing eBay, please consider Gary (markaguirre22), a trustworthy seller who offers free shipping on top of great prices! (#notsponsored)

2020 eBay purchases: 2020 sucks, Butt I love my Wolverines Henneway

I think a lot of people would like a do-over for 2020, if not a chance to just skip it entirely, for a multitude of reasons. Annoyingly, the garbage fire that has been this year has carried over to my college football team, which started nicely with a win over ranked Minnesota, only to completely undo any good feelings with losses to MSU (bleargh) and a seemingly good Indiana team. There's potential for even more suck as the Wolverines return home to face Wisconsin and however many players they have that aren't suspected of having COVID. Then again, it's also an opportunity to get things back on track for underperforming coach Jim Harbaugh and his program. Hell, at least we aren't Penn State!

While we continue to ride out 2020 and COVID's co-disease, Donald Trump (at least one of them will be gone in January!), I'm still picking up some PC items when I can. Over the last few weeks that includes a nice pair of Michigan plates I scored on eBay:

#1 is this 2013 Topps black plate of blog favorite QB Chad Henne, my first of the four in the 1/1 set (though he does appear on Jacksonville team card as well). I think you all know how much I like to chase his cards, and since he's one of my top PC guys I don't mind spending a bit more than I usually would on his nicer stuff. In this case that was a bit under $14 delivered the day before Halloween.

While this wasn't the reason I grabbed it, I did enjoy the fact that Henne had done the following a few days earlier, 

Chad Henne had to spike it after his rushing TD 😂 @Chiefs

📺 #KCvsDEN on CBS pic.twitter.com/Q06YjmuhOF

— The Checkdown (@thecheckdown) October 25, 2020

accounting for his first TD since 2014 and first rushing score since 2012, both with the Jags. Of course he now backs up Super Bowl champ Pat Mahomes, meaning he's got a pretty cushy gig mostly riding the pine and making some money with the defending champs. Good for him! And what's good for me is that this is my eighth 1/1 of the former Michigan QB.

And then just this past week I cut a best offer deal with a fellow Michigander for this 2017 Donruss black plate (inserted into 2017 Plates & Patches) of former UM TE Jake Butt. It came out to just a bit over $9 after shipping and tax, and the seller managed to PWE to me quickly enough that it arrived today. I was fine with the PWE because he packaged it well and only asked $0.70 for shipping.

This plate version of Jake's 2017 Donruss RC (which I do own) is already my second 1/1 of his as I also own one he shares with fellow 2017 draftee Taco Charlton. $9 might seem kind of high for some of you considering we're talking about a player like J-Booty, but he was a lot of fun to watch in college as a big TE target. Unfortunately his NFL career started off on the wrong foot after he tore his ACL in Michigan's 2017 Orange Bowl loss to Florida State, then dealt with further ailments in the league. He at least seems to be doing ok this year for now, and I hope his health continues to trend in that direction.

With card purchases few and far between for me this year given the circumstances making it more difficult to buy stuff, I've been in better position to grab nicer cards like this, so that's been a silver lining. And I'm looking to apply that kind of positive thinking to what's continued to be a strange college football season, the results of which I'm largely taking with a grain of salt anyway. I'll be glad if the Wolverines can stay healthy, and making it through the remainder of the season while winning a few more games would be a nice bonus at this point. Go Blue!

2020 eBay purchase: Many "M" Minis

Today's post is a quick recap of yet another purchase from my favorite eBay seller, markaguirre22. Among his auctions he tends to list stuff that must have been part of a pretty nice Michigan PC, and those usually start at $1. Also he offers free shipping on everything, which is super rare these days.

This time I kept an eye on four numbered cards that I secured for $1 each plus tax, though my total was less than $4 thanks to eBay bucks. Once again I was quite happy with my haul, which he even shipped in a bubble mailer despite shipping being gratis:

The first four cards you see here are the ones I bought, plus, as has happened before, the seller threw in a nice extra he knew I'd like. The third mini you see of tackling machine David Harris was a bit smaller than the rest so I set it aside, and it happens to be the oldest as it's from 2010 Topps Magic. That product included three small parallels: Mini, Mini Black, and the numbered Mini Pigskin 50, which is what you see above.

The rest of the cards hail from Topps' 2013 Mini product where all of the cards, including base, were printed with smaller dimensions. Harris joins blog favorite PC guy Chad Henne and former blog namesake Mario Manningham (the throw-in card!) out of the Gold parallel, where the cards were numbered /58.

Speaking of Henne and Super Mario, yesterday was the 15th anniversary of one of the best moments in the history of the Big House:

4th down ✅

:01 ✅

Trailing by 4 ✅#OTD 1⃣5⃣ years ago, Chad Henne found Mario Manningham as time expired to lift @UMichFootball past PSU. pic.twitter.com/a9YqPPROT6

— Michigan On BTN (@MichiganOnBTN) October 15, 2020

That clip still gets me every time I watch it. Anyway, all those at $1 apiece (plus the free Manningham) were already a nice deal, but then we get to the card I was surprised didn't get a second bid: Harris's Black parallel. While cards numbered /58 don't feel extremely rare these days, ones that had only five copies made certainly do! As the legendary clip says,

via GIPHY

That was easily less than $4 well spent. I now count 92 cards of Harris, 308 of Henne, and 221 of Manningham in their respective PCs.

And of course he's the backs for the sake of completeness.

This was another purchase post but coming up next I should have a brand new trade package to show off.

2019 COMC purchase: a 1/1 of #1 from before 1/1

For today's post we're going waaaaaay back to late last December. It was the 28th, smack dab between Christmas and New Year's Eve, days before the calendar would flip, and months before, well, :gestures vaguely to all of this bullshit:. It's been almost nine months so I don't remember exactly why I made this final COMC purchase for the year, a few weeks after having my most recent package shipped from the site. Maybe it was FOMO since this was a fairly nice deal.

Anyway, I'm only showing off that final pickup of 2019 now because I only recently had a few cards shipped from COMC: one for me, which you'll see shortly; one for Paul--the Dionne jersey seen here; and three more that'll probably get posted in the near future by my favorite Canadian trading partner.

Here's what all the fuss was about:

I love me some bunches of Funchess! This 2018 Score Black plate stars the erstwhile wearer of jersey #1 in Ann Arbor, a guy drafted by the Panthers who signed with the Colts, got hurt, signed with Green Bay, then opted out of this season. Before most of that stuff, though, he was enjoying a nice 2017 season, his third in the NFL, with career highs in pretty much every important stat, including targets, catches, yards, and TDs. He's pictured here looking well on his way to padding all of those numbers. The cost for all of this coolness? Less than $5. I'll take that over a questionably edible Subway sandwich any day!

I already had the base card this plate is 25% responsible for, from one of my perennial favorite products, and now count 61 cards of the star WR in my collection, including two plates (2017 Score Cyan) and 14 hits overall. This addition also puts me at an unofficial count of 147 plates & 1/1s, a number that'll change as soon as I can ID a few more and potentially excise one or more fakes/backdoored items.

Obviously COMC is in a state of flux right now as much as any similar seller, so I'm not sure when I'll next have cards from them to post. That makes it even nicer to be able to show one off from the before times!

Up next will be...I don't know. I think I may have one or two things heading my way soon, but in the meantime I may finally buckle down and find a way to show off the two huge TCDB deals I made earlier this year.

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!

2020 eBay purchases: Captain Comeback and the wait for plates

Things have improved a bit on the mail front over the last few days, and not just in the case of California rep Katie Porter grilling clueless and corrupt Trump toady and USPS Postmaster General Louis DeJoy. This morning I was glad to see that not only were two of my quite recent eBay purchases out for delivery, so was the one from three weeks ago, which was coming from Saginaw, MI, a city 90 miles away from me. That makes me wonder if the Detroit-area facilities are among some of the ones around the country publicly flouting DeJoy's attempts to derail the service, instead turning sorting machines back on and actually getting mail to folks.

So this afternoon seems like a great time to celebrate the two new additions for me that arrived today as well as one I snagged earlier last month.

Item #1 is that card from early July, a '97 Topps auto of former QB and current HC Jim Harbaugh. It's definitely a card of its time, with a design that doesn't set aside a specific area for the signature, and that's great. The frame around the photo is a nice touch too, and my only request would have been to zoom out a bit so the ball didn't get cut off.

I have to say that the back made me laugh a bit, referring to Harbaugh as "Captain Comeback." That's mainly because a comeback is a stat I'm not entirely enthused about, especially since in football there's a good chance poor QB play earlier in the game necessitated the comeback in the first place. (Can you tell I have to hear about Matthew Stafford for weeks at a time every year?)

Anyway, this is a fun card and it was great to add my third auto of Jim for about $5.50, a good chunk of which was shipping. While the Big Ten season looks like it'll (wisely) be at least delayed, if not cancelled, I'm looking forward to seeing what the team looks like again whenever he's back.

Up next is the first of two plates. I just won the auction for this one--a 2007 Bowman Sterling yellow of former Michigan LB Prescott Burgess--last Wednesday--so that has me feeling a bit better about shipping times again. Once again, shipping accounted for most of the price, which was around $6.50.

Burgess was a five-star LB recruit out of Ohio, and while I don't know that he lived up to that billing, he had a pretty good career in Ann Arbor. Baltimore took him in the 6th round in '07 and he'd see playing time in some 40 NFL games.

The plate you see above was used to make his 2007 Bowman Sterling RC,

and thanks to the very helpful frame on the front it's quite obvious that it's the yellow version. I'll admit that I wouldn't have figured that out myself without help. It's just my third hit of Burgess, who obviously doesn't have many--and it was fun to find something this nice of him out of the blue.

And last up today is a card that I bought so long ago it feels like I got it around the same time as the Harbaugh above, though it was actually a month later. I won this 2011 Topps Inception Magenta Plate of Braylon Edwards on 8/1, and the seller shipped it a couple days later. Please enjoy the following tracking information:

Damn you, DeJoy! Anyway, it made it to me and that's all that's important. I spent roughly the same $6.50 on it as the Burgess above, including similar shipping costs.

Again, I like the framing on the card, which gives it a nice look while also making its color obvious. It's my third plate of Braylon, and I'd say it pairs up nicely with this one:

the yellow version!

Combined with the Burgess, it gets me fairly close to 150 plates/1-of-1s. It's also my 90th hit of the former star WR, and along with the two above, helped me hit the 2,300 Michigan sports hit mark. "M" is for Michigan and milestone, baby!

I hope this continues a positive trend for mail delivery, but even if it doesn't, it makes for a nice treat on a hot Summer Monday.