5/2/25 card show report: it's gonna be May

With another monthly show coming up in less than a week, tonight I'm recapping my Taylor Town trip from May.

Coming off a show where I'd spent a yearly low of just $55 I almost doubled my spending at a $100 even. Oddly enough I may have come home with fewer cards than April, but that was the result of an increase in quality at the expense of quantity. Hey, whatever works!

First up, I did snag a bit of trade bait to make available here, all of which is a bit higher end than normal:

The Lo Duca auto is numbered /227 while the patch is limited to 100 copies. I know I trade with a bunch of Dodgers collectors but decided I might prefer specific offers of items in trade for these as they're on the nicer side. Meanwhile, the jersey/auto of Stewart is /75, and the Sano manurelic isn't numbered.

Please claim any if you'd like to trade for them here or over on TCDb.

As for my keepers, I can also sum them up in a single scan:

#1 PC guy Cal gets yet another addition in the form of a '21 Topps 70 Years of Topps insert that imagines what he'd look like on the 1978 design. His fellow 2007 Hall of Fame inductee (I was there!) Tony Gwynn is the other baseball representative tonight in the form of a pair of early 2000s relics. The vertical card is from 2002 Topps 206 while its horizontal sibling hails from 2001 Upper Deck. The latter came out just four years after Gwynn was on the small checklist of the ballyhooed debut of UD's Game Jersey cards. It was certainly a different time back then! I now count 12 relics in my collection of Mr. Padre, and I'll happily spend in the $5-$10 range to continue growing that count.

As for football, the lone non-relic I picked up was a 2021 Absolute Blue Diamonds parallel of former UM RB Chris Evans. It's numbered /99 and the color was along the right lines so why not? Next to him we have my first two hits of 2023 National Champ QB J.J. McCarthy, both of which are Vikings jersey relics. On the left is a jersey from '24 Absolute's Rookie Force insert, and that's joined by the same year's Donruss Rookie Phenom Jerseys set. I hope he hits the ground running as Minnesota's QB this season after barely playing during last year's preseason due to injury. For now he becomes subject #265 in my football collection.

Last up is relic #5 (and 6th overall hit) of the electrifying Desmond Howard. He's pictured on the card above with the Lions but this one was actually made by Stadium Club in 2001 to celebrate his appearance earlier that year in the Pro Bowl as a KR for the NFC. That was his lone appearance in the NFL all-star game over his 11 seasons, and he was named to the team on the back of numbers like 457 punt return yards (including a career-high 95-yarder) and TD, plus 1401 kick return yards on 57 tries, including a season-high 70.

That's all for this time but I'll figure out what I'd like to show off next and try to get another post up soon. Until then, if anyone has any solutions for the reeling Tigers, please feel free to share them with the front office in Detroit!

2024 COMC purchases: Nine from November

With the finish line now in sight I'm even more motivated to get this post done and call 2024 a wrap! Here's a look at the cards I bought for myself during COMC's Black Friday sale:

First up is hit #1 of another UM WR to wear #8 (besides another guy in this post), Ronnie Bell. The receiver/returner outplayed his practically anonymous recruiting rankings and was a key contributor as the Wolverines marched back to respectability under Jim Harbaugh. The Bowman's Best University card pictures him with the Wolverines (instead of the 49ers who'd eventually draft and then release him) and that's a great start for his hits collection! Sure, it's a sticker auto and he signed with his initials, but at least he added an inscription with his jersey number.

The day's other "first" is my second hit but first signature of LB Devin Bush II, a three-year Wolverine who did some nice work in 2017 and 2018 in Ann Arbor. The Steelers took him in the first round in 2019 and he's since bounced to Seattle and Cleveland, but was good enough to appear in an autograph insert (#d /299) in 2020 Panini Legacy.

In spot #3 is the other WR #8, the sure-handed Jason Avant, who was able to rescue the planted Michigan flag in Columbus this past season after Buckeye Jack Sawyer threw his hissy fit once his OSU team lost to Michigan again. Avant never won a Super Bowl with the Eagles but did have a solid 10-year career mostly spent with them, and I was thrilled to add another Triple Threads jersey/auto of his from his 2006 rookie year. The one you see above is the Sepia version /75 and is hit #66 of #8.

Next, RB Chris Evans appears to be out of the league at this point, but that wasn't going to stop me from picking up a third Michigan uni autograph of his. I may have passed on other brands but usually tend to like the simplicity of Score's rookie autos, so I had no problem ponying up a couple bucks for this one.

Sure, we've already had Devin, but what about second Devin? I paid less than $6.50 total for the cool pair starring former Panthers WR Funchess and I think that was a steal. The card on the left is a 2015 Panini Black Gold Sizeable Signatures Rookie Jerseys prime version, and I'm thinking you'll agree that it lives up to its "sizeable" and "prime" descriptors with ease. The other is a 2015 Panini National Convention VIP manupatch auto, which isn't the kind of thing I'd pay a premium for, but I do like seeing athletes sign things other than stickers. Funch moves up to 34 hits thanks to the pair.

I'll move down one spot horizontally to discuss the next card, a Jake Long 2008 Topps Triple Threads Sepia parallel. This one came with three really nice multi-color Dolphins swatches to go along with his signature (and numbering /75, like the Avant above). It's a great looking card to add to a collection that now stands at a very nice 98 hits, though he remains in third place behind our next two players.

Forever #1 guy Chad Henne continues to outpace the rest by a mile with his 146th hit, which happens to be one of the higher-end items in his collection. The 12th 1/1 I've landed for him, the card you see above is his 2008 Finest Yellow Plate (the non-auto version). It set me back a reasonable $14 which I don't mind paying for a top PC guy like Henne, whose hit collection isn't too far off of that from all-sports leader Rich Hill. As always, I'm a fan of when manufacturers do the border thing with their plates to make it obvious which color you have, especially in this case where the back is otherwise normal.

And last but not least is former blog namesake guy Mario Manningham. The 2008 Leaf Certified Materials auto you see above (#d /100) is everything I love about 2000s-era cards of some of my favorites, but it may be the most significant from this post for an entirely different reason: it puts Super Mario at exactly 100 hits, making him just the second player behind Henne in the football collection (and third overall including Rich Hill) to reach that mark! It actually wasn't 100% intentional as I would have been happy for Jake Long (again, 98) or Braylon Edwards (95) to make it first, but I only found one of the former I liked and none of the latter this time. So it looks like I get to celebrate Too Many Manninghams as my 2024 year of collecting comes to a close! (The football hits collection also surpassed the 1700-mark before the calendar turned, basketball went over 150, and hockey moved up to 350, with baseball very close to 450.)

Once again, thanks to everyone for making 2024 a great year of trading, blogging, reading, comments, shows, and more! I'm looking forward to treating you to recaps of the cards I've picked up since 2025 started including (at this point) seven blogger-related trade packages, two shows, and four TCDb deals. Look for a post covering the first blogger trade of January soon!

2023 trade package #33: My Sports Obsession

It's the last day of January so I'm making the effort to cover one more card package I received this past December. Tonight's comes from buddy of the blog Jeff of My Sports Obsession.

I actually got to see Jeff in-person again earlier this month at a show (which you might have seen on Twitter and/or other blogs), and I promise I'll cover that once I wrap up 2023 stuff. Included in that is a fat stack of cards he sent me before Christmas.

Here come 15 scans worth of goodies!

We'll lead off with lots of el Mago, all as a Tiger which is great. I'm still skeptical he'll hit reasonably well again but his defense should retain its value with Detroit possibly looking to put the newly-extended Colt Keith at second.

One more Baez gives way to a bunch of cool recent Miggy stuff. It'll be bittersweet when opening day comes and goes without Cabrera in the lineup. He offered minimal production over the past few seasons but was still a big reason to come out to the ballpark. Hopefully Spencer Torkelson is on his way to bringing some of that offense back to the lineup.

More Miggy? Why not! I'm fairly quickly approaching his career HR total with an excellent 472 to my name right now.

Going back to the early 20th century, how about a couple cards (and a couple more in the next scan) of "Wahoo" Sam Crawford, a 15-year Tiger who's the only MLBer to top 300 career triples; His former teammate Ty Cobb is #2! The HOFer spent his first four years with the Reds before an outstanding career in Detroit.

Yep, Panini can recycle images with the best of 'em. I'm always happy to get even a single Cronenworth from Jeff because we both collect him. I'm telling you, having friends that collect some of the same players you do is great: it's not competitive and you actually tend to help each other out. This is a great example.

Big Daddy and Hammerin' Hank are a couple of Miggy's predecessors in the middle of the order and at first, and boy could they put the ball in the seats!

Jeff's done a great job lately of bulking up my Griffey PC, in this case with cards from as far back as 2001 and as recent as last year (next scan). It's no wonder he's my second player collection to reach 1000 (and 1100) cards after Ripken.

One of the guys who could join those two in the 1000-card club in the near future is Mr. Padre, who's now a bit over 900 thanks in part to this cool bunch. Hell yeah, Post and Mootown Snackers! Shininess from Gold Label and Fleer Brilliants is great too, plus there's a couple more recent issues with throwback looks.

I don't really have to compete with anyone when it comes to Dick Mountain, and he may have enough fairly common recent base/inserts for me to hit the 400-mark this year. I'm working on it!

The last scan had hill with the Red Sox and this one opens with one of his '23 teams, the Pirates. Will he add a new team to his list this year? It sure seems like he wants to continue to compete, judging by the way he pushed back on Anthony Rendon's comments whining about the length of the season.

Next, are you also a Tigers (or HOFer) collector? Do you love seeing Mr. Tiger in newer products as much as I do? If you do, you're awesome.

You'll see one more card of him later but Barry Larkin (another PC Jeff and I share) is my closest player to 1000 as I need fewer than 50 to hit that mark. I'll likely make that milestone and Hill's among my top priorities this year.

And Mad Dog is pretty much a lock to be my next 900-club member as he's 30 short and nobody else is even above 650. I'm happy to see Maddux continue to appear in recent products as well and will continue to take whatever I can get of him.

Morris and Maggs are two other guys that are happily still found in recent sets. Panini tends to like including HOFers and some other starts in lots of their products while Topps Chrome Platinum has included some fan favorites as well. TCP has popped up in a number of my recent trade packages and I'm pleased with how many I've knocked off of my wants because of that.

And then, hey, it's another shared PC! Cal remains #1 in my entire collection and I have him nearly halfway to 2500, though I can't see hitting that mark for quite a while. Those '23 Donruss cards like his above look quite sharp to me and I'll be glad to continue adding others as I can find them.

Here's another nice grouping of Tigers stars. Jeff pushed my Torkelson count above 20 and I'm happy to see his collection growing as his star rises. I love the two Tram oddballs, and there's another example of a HOFer like him popping up in a newer Panini product. I kind of enjoy older action photos on newer designs but I know that's not everybody's thing. And how about two or...

...Too many Verlanders! Jeff sent 14 of them, and two even commemorate his brief stay with the Mets, one of those in Refractor form. There's a great mix of brands here (and a couple more in the next scan), and hauls like this have made him my top Tigers-related PC at over 600 cards!

We'll finish out the baseball stuff here with some cool horizontal items. It's always fun seeing Abbott with Team USA and remembering their success in the late 80s. A return to health could portend big things for Greene this year. The other Larkin in the pile was from one of my favorite parallels: '98 Score Showcase. And the Heritage Then & Now insert returns once again, with the (I believe) previously mentioned pairing with Catfish Hunter.

The basketball group opens with two nice college uni cards of former star and transfer (to Kansas) Hunter Dickinson and Orlando's (they get all the Wolverines!) Jett Howard, my first of both, plus Jett's dad (and current UM coach, for better or for worse) Juwan.

You can tell Jeff was hard at work sorting through cards for the shop given the number of different ex-Wolverines represented here, again, most of which we have in common. My favorite is the Rice Refractor right down the middle, but it's always great adding new cards for guys like Pool, Rose, and both Wagners (Franz here and Mo in the next scan) because I just don't put much effort into getting their cards myself.

Wagner bro #2 and fellow Magic hooper Mo gets a new pair, and then it's over to probably the most notable Wolverines basketball player of the past 40 years, Chris Webber.

Then we hit the gridiron, starring the 2023 NCAA champion Wolverines! Anthony transferred before UM reached the title game, and Brady had to wait until the NFL to reach those heights, though it sure worked out for him.

Some new additions for guys earlier in the alphabet (Breaston, Bush, Clark) include WR Nico Collins and RB/KR Chris Evans on some pretty swanky looking cards! Nico had quite the breakout season once he had a competent QB throwing his way, even if that QB is a former Buckeye.

Even more swanky cards of the non-Captain America Chris Evans! I love the Score throwback insert of Gary because of my nostalgia for 90s sets plus, you know, the college uni thing. Talented DB Dax Hill gets a new RC for his collection. Hutch is one of the biggest reasons the Lions' defense hasn't been an embarrassment the past couple seasons and I could see him leading the team back to the playoffs next year. Taylor Lewan is a jackass, 'nuff said.

We made it to the last scan! I really want to see what Ojabo does in a full season for Baltimore after playing in a defense like theirs for multiple years in Ann Arbor. Those colorful Payes look awesome! Rawls is a guy who transferred away but still tends to be remembered for his play at Michigan. And we end things tonight with GOAT DB Charles Woodson, who's #4 in a close race for the top spot in my football collection, all of whom could be the first to crack #400.

Jeff, thanks again for a great Christmas present to end 2023. It was great seeing you in Kalamazoo (which, again, I'll recap eventually) and I hope I get to see you at another show soon, but until then I'll work on a new return package to send your way.

I believe I have four more '23 blogger trades to cover, then the other stuff (TCDb, eBay, shows), and THEN I'll finally be caught up and get to some '24 pickups including, oddly enough, another stack from Jeff!

2023 trade package #25: the Lost Collector

Let's keep on keepin' on with trade packages! Tonight's comes from AJ, the Lost Collector. Though he stopped blogging almost two years ago now he's still plenty active on Twitter and in the collecting game, so I thought of him a few weeks ago as I was going through some unwanted stuff in my collection and came up with a Wheaties box that included his dude Tino Martinez on the front; I later added a Donruss promo card I found at a show and somehow he didn't have that either!

AJ was nice enough to send me a pretty sizeable envelope in return filled with Tigers and Wolverines:

Bojarski was born in South Africa and has appeared in games for American minor league teams plus one in Australia, so yeah, dude's well-traveled! Fick's rooftop grand slam was the last homer hit at Tiger Stadium so he'll always have that going for him. Greene, Jobe, and Manning, all of whom appear down a diagonal here, could all be part of the team's future "Mojo." Tommy Henry, the pride of Portage Northern High School, is the lone Michigan baseballer here today, appearing on his Heritage RC from this year. Pudge was indeed a star wherever he went, a total of six teams as it turns out. And as I said the other night, Tork's power potential could make things very interesting for a lineup that's been starving for runs.

Another Tork insert--because why not--gives way to probably my favorite card in the whole package. Gibby and Tram were certainly cornerstones of the '84 champs, not to mention a number of teams that surprisingly couldn't repeat that year's success. The insert you see is from 2005 Leaf, so it's old enough that it was made when inserts still meant something other than TacoMojoPrizmFractor. Too cool!

Over to basketball, a sport in which Michigan's success this year has been fleeting. At least the team has been an NBA factory, producing guys like LeVert and Wagner. I just made fun of Prizms but that first Caris looks great, even if blue is a much better color than green. And if I had to pick between the Wagner bros who play for Orlando, Franz would be my choice as he's been the better of the pair, though I'd be happy to get cards of either.

Oh, hey, football, that sport that Michigan's been great at the past three seasons! Not only are the player selection and overall design variety in the group outstanding, but there's a ton of college uni action going on too! Star WR Nico Collins is finally benefitting from having a QB who isn't a serial sexual assaulter and/or dead-armed retread. Though he may now be dealing with an injury, he's already eclipsed the 1000-yard mark for receiving yards and has also amassed a career high six scores. Hell, you name a stat and it's a new personal mark for him this year.

Meanwhile, Chris Evans hasn't become a star like his Hollywood namesake, but that won't stop me from collecting him. I'm always glad to land new stuff like the above plus a couple more seen in the next scan, putting me at a solid 18 with plenty more to come.

Like I said, green isn't my top choice for a Wolverine alum's parallel, but the color does look solid in Prizm form.

Next we get a look at some rare cards of players on the D side of the ball. Kwity Paye's been pretty good for the Colts since they took him in the first round in '21. This season he already has career highs in fumbles forced and recovered (two each), and his 7.5 sacks are also a personal best with a few games left. He's also got a good shot to surpass last season's tackle (combined, solo, and for loss) numbers, so he's definitely trending in the right direction. Naturally he gets a Green Prizm too!

Ambry Thomas is a DB that flashed a lot of potential in limited play in Ann Arbor and he's made a bit of noise for a Niners team that includes fellow alumni Ronnie Bell and Jake Moody. He doesn't have a lot of non-college product appearances yet but I'm plenty happy seeing him in the winged helmet thanks to SAGE.

LB Josh Uche was a bright spot for the Pats last season after going off for 11.5 sacks, 9 TFL, and 2 forced fumbles, but his 2023 has been about as middling as the rest of the team. Hopefully he can move on to a squad that'll appreciate him more and put him in position to succeed.

Speaking of success, few Michigan RBs enjoyed more in college than Tyrone Wheatley, seen high-stepping to another TD at the Big House on a card made by Classic. Blake Corum's historic career brings to mind the affinity Wheatley had for piling up yards and finding the end zone. What a great photo that encapsulates the experience of watching him play.

AJ, I really appreciate this great package you put together for me that featured some great additions to my collections. Though it's rare to find new Tino items for you I'll keep working on it just in case because I owe you a lot of thanks for this stuff!

So who was the next generous soul to gift me some cards? Check back soon to find out!

2023 trade package #1: Scribbled Ink

I've been slacking long enough in 2023, so let's start looking at cards that are new to me this year! Tonight I have this year's first trade package courtesy of buddy of the blog Paul, of the defunct Scribbled Ink, who can still be found tweeting at @Scribble4me.

A bit earlier this month he let me know to expect something, and not long after I had the following on my porch:

Quick backstory there: among the things I sent Paul for Christmas was a signed Marcel Dionne jersey. It was a crazy good deal and I couldn't pass it up, and I'm glad he appreciated it. I'll show off what was in the box at the end but first we'll dive into the "CARDS" envelope.

(Please note that Paul sent much more than what you see here but I was too lazy to scan most of the dupes.)

The biggest former Wolverine currently playing not nicknamed "Dick Mountain," Cronenworth is one of my favorite recent PCs. That collection got a very nice bump thanks to Paul. Highlights include Stadium Club, some Topps and Chrome color, a sweet Donruss Season Stat Line parallel numbered /94 (for the total of runs he scored in 2021), and a Retro '88 jersey from the same '22 Donruss product. Very nice! I now have a pair each of relics and autos of Mr. CroneZone, and TCDB tells me I have 75 total cards, which is excellent (and also tops on the site for now)!

Paul hit a few of my other big PCs while he was at it. The Stadium Club Griffey (Red parallel) is a stunner, and of course I recognize the play it captures (check out a video and more here) as it happened in Tiger Stadium back in '98. What. A. Catch! The Topps Pro Debut insert of a young Junior is very cool too. I'm glad Paul also included a Stadium Club base of Kenny's former teammate Larkin as it captures Barry's Hall of Fame induction in 2012. I still need to grab his HOF plaque postcard, now that I think about it!

The one Maddux card in the package was a literal work of art, produced by talented artist Lauren Taylor. Three other players I collect can be found in the product and I might have to track their cards down as well because this beauty is a huge step up from the MSPaint-quality, drug-induced nightmares that came out of the Project sets.

And what would a baseball recap be without my biggest PC, well on its way to 1200 cards? Cal gets four new items: a couple Topps inserts, a chase card from Prizm, and one of Score's old trivia holograms. Is anyone else sick of 1987 Topps all over again?

Paul also added a trio of Verlanders, and I'd say the Mosaic insert with its "Aces" motif is just too cool to beat, but the "Mojo" Refractor of the '87 Topps card is a worthy contender.

On the basketball side of things we have Mo's little bro and teammate Franz Wagner, who's having a pretty nice season for the Magic. The Chronicles card with the old Hoops design really takes me back while the Prizm parallel is all kinds of patriotic. Bonus points for both being including college action shots!

Closing out the cardboard portion, Paul repeated that feat with the football items he included. Nico's Prestige card from '21 hails from the previously mentioned Chronicles, and it's a good reminder of why I tend to enjoy the brand's college draft cards. Paye's insert from the wildly confusing Wild Card Matte product appears to be called "Weekend Warriors Gold/Green Shield" if TCDB's checklist is to be trusted (and that's the one I'd trust the most, so...) and that comes with a cool Wolverines shot and numbering on the front /40. And then there's the second cool hit of the package: a '21 Contenders Draft auto/RC of Bengals RB Chris Evans. It's just my second of the versatile speedster after I added one from COMC, and his signature looks nice on the typically pleasing Contenders design. Nice find!

(Here I'll insert a quick note that I'm unofficially over 2500 Michigan sports hits, so depending on when I can verify those, I may have a celebration post forthcoming. In the meantime you can always see my collection stats on the bar on the right.)

So as Mr. Pitt would say,

Well I'll be happy to show you:

It's another box! I can't remember if I'd seen these figures before but I have to say they look really good. The bottom of the box has a 2017 date on it and also mentions Loot Crate so I wonder if these were exclusive to those subscription boxes. The figures are sculpted quite nicely and the box boasts the number of articulation points. My search shows that batters come with a plate while pitchers get a mound.

Here's a look at JV out of the box. The little pegs are places where you can attach the figure with holes in its feet if you want to pose it that way. I think the creator did a pretty good job capturing Verlander, with the only real goofiness being the oversized heads, which is actually kind of fun.

I'm going to leave this one out of the box and put it out on display with some of my other stuff like bobbleheads. Big thanks to Paul for including such a cool item of my blog's (current) namesake and a guy we both love to collect.

Paul, thanks for always keeping things interesting whenever you send me a package! I'm glad you liked your Christmas cards and I'm already hard at work on a new mailer for you which will hopefully be ready after another show or two.

Up next is trade package #2 from another one of my Christmas card targets (who should be receiving their envelope in the next day or so, actually).

2022 COMC purchases: check out who's back!

It's 2023 but I still have some 2022 content to cover before getting to some great adds already this year.

Tonight you'll get to see the entirety of my first COMC order since late 2020. A number of factors, some pandemic-related, made the site a lot less attractive for a while as their processing speed for adding and shipping cards dipped below acceptable standards. After seeing that things were closer to normal late last year, I once again dove in during their big Black Friday/Cyber Monday deals.

About $160 later, I had a nice stack of cards for myself and some Christmas card packages to boot (some of which still need to go out once my oft-mentioned Sportlots box ships!). Here are the items I scored for my own collections:

Baseball part 1. God do I love me some 90s inserts, and few could compare to Upper Deck's Amazing Greats in 1997 and '98. Both versions look stunning, and the Maddux you see above is from the former. Its wood grain design and clear inset player image look great, plus I love the punny name of the insert. From the same year you also get a look at another GOAT insert technology: Pinnacle's Dufex. I nabbed PC guy Dean Palmer's Museum Collection parallel for under a buck, and boy does it look nice in its own right.

To those I added a five-pack of ex-UM pitcher autos, all of which I believe were less than $2.50. Bourque's is a Refractor of the only other hit I owned of him, and that's numbered /499. New Rockie Jeff Criswell gets a nice trio added to his total out of Bowman Chrome, Elite, and Topps Pro Debut, and of course the middle card is my favorite since it features a college uniform photo. He now has four such cards to his name in my collection. And I ended up with a single card, but a spiffy one, of Criswell's potential Colorado teammate, Karl Kauffmann, also from Elite. It's a Status die-cut parallel numbered /99 and gives him four autos also out of six total hits.

The other two baseball items deserved their own scans. I thought the 2013 Panini America's Pastime booklet of former Tigers (and Yankees) A-Jax and Granderson was just too cool to pass up, especially for just $6.45. I don't have many booklet cards in my collection and getting one with large relic swatches from two of my favorite Tigers OF was a coup in my book. The one you see above is the Gold version numbered /49. The Granderson pinstripe is a nice bonus!

Card number two here was I believe the most expensive one I landed for myself, but well within my price range for a card of its type. My purchase history says I dropped $8.34 for Clayton Richard's 2018 Topps Cyan plate, one of five 1/1s I bought this time (but the only one for myself). That gives the former QB/P 13 total 1/1s to his name, 10 of which are plates.

Switching over to football, it was easy to split these into vertical and horizontal scans. A couple players got the most love this time but I also added a pair of new names and lots of college action cards so I spent my money well.

My first autograph of stud WR Nico Collins was one of my biggest steals at just $3, and I couldn't complete the purchase of it fast enough at that price given they usually go for more (plus the whole Michigan uni thing). Darboh got four new additions to his count (two more below) including a sweet triple jersey/auto and a green parallel of his 2017 Prestige autograph (/150) seen here. I love the latter's use of an action shot from a home game in the Big House.

Chris Evans made his debut in my hits collection thanks to the crazy cool 1/1 Matt sent me, and now I have a college uni autograph to go with that, also courtesy of Prestige. Talented DB Lavert Hill is making his first appearance with a 2020 Prizm autograph, and so is the guy on the last card of this scan, outstanding C (and current New Orleans Saint) Cesar Ruiz out of the same year's Playbook product. I'm making a more concerted effort to add hits of players missing in my collection and that work paid off here with some great looking cards of two recent Wolverines, both in their alma mater's duds.

And who could forget the namesake of my former other blog, Mario Manningham? I scored three verticals and one horizontal card (in the next scan) of the Super Bowl hero. One's from '08 Absolute and it comes with a football chunk plus jersey swatches in the shape of his number. The second is one of his two appearances in 2008 SP Rookie Edition and is done in the style of SP's '93 product. And the last one seen here is 2010 Prestige auto limited to a somewhat strange 113 copies.

Over on the X-axis we start with the other two Darboh cards. The current iteration of Leaf is pretty sketchy but you still get some extremely cool cards from them sometimes, like Amara's inscription-laden Trinity auto seen above. The jersey/auto/RC next to it from Panini's Illusions was also pretty cheap and further enhances one of my quieter quality collections, which now stands at 47 cards!

I occasionally chase cards of some of the guys that transferred out such as QB Ryan Mallett and found a good price on the slightly flawed (bit of a crease between his first and last names) auto/jersey from 2011 Timeless Treasures. That kind of thing doesn't pop up much in the other places I tend to look, so why not drop $2 for a solid hit?

The final Manningham card--though four is NOT "too many"--is from the hit-laded 2008 SPx product, and this one's a dual jersey with the swatch windows also in the shape of his jersey number. Mario's just one hit away from joining the 100-club in this collection, which currently includes Chad Henne and nobody else! (Jake Long remains at 97 and Braylon Edwards is chilling nearby with 93.)

One of my most interesting pieces I scored this time is the Denard Robinson 2013 Panini Black Rookie Shadowbox auto you see above. I thought the card enclosed a small mini jersey but it turns out it's just a flat image in a shadowbox-type design. That's still extremely cool, plus it's a new autograph of Shoelace for my collection, and it was just $2.25, so I'm very happy with it. That appears to be hit #54 of the dual-threat QB.

And this evening's final addition is my fifth hit and third autograph of DT Chris Wormley, a Ravens draftee who now suits up for the Steelers. He's the final recipient of a college uni auto for his collection, in this case out of 2017 Elite Draft, a product that was made for collectors like me. He's got a very good signature, especially with how low standards have gotten, and this one wasn't even $2, so it happily found a home in my football collection.

I was glad to be able to take another ride on the COMC train in 2022 and score some nice cards at great prices, plus they even arrived in time for me to send some out before Christmas! I hope those of you who follow the folks I sent them to (and will be doing so soon) enjoy seeing even more spoils on other blogs and social media.

As for me, while I wait for Sportlots to send me my now-ready-to-ship box cards, I get to show off some fun early 2023 items thanks to two fantastic trade partners plus some spoils from last weekend's show. It was a great start to the year in collecting and I'm looking forward to another enjoyable one with all of you. Happy new year!

12/3/22 card show report: Show This is Christmas

Christmas has come and gone and the year that was 2022 is quickly approaching its end, so let's have a look at what I brought home from my last card show of the year.

With the Michigan/Purdue Big Ten Championship game not until later in the evening I was able to head east to Taylor on Saturday, and I didn't have to contend with an especially large crowd as I pored over the boxes. After I think not quite two hours of listening to Christmas music (not the worst!) my purchase breakdown looked like this:

• 70 @ $0.20 (5/$1 box) = $14
• 2 @ $0.50 (2/$1 box) = $1
• 32 @ $1 = $32
• 9 @ $1.67 (3/$5 box) = $15
• 1 @ $5 = $5

That's a total of $67 and the seller made it $65 for me.

I did quite well picking up some quality items that have made their way into Christmas Card packages (and more that will go out in some of the remaining five that are waiting on Sportlots cards to go out), random trade bait, and cards for me.

Speaking of random trade bait, here's what I came up with out of the $1 and $2 boxes:

Here's the baseball stuff. Despaigne is #122/299, Vargas is #389/399, and Tejeda is #44/50.

And football, which as usual outnumbered the baseball. Fales is #14/25, Quick is #28/99, Prosise is #138/199, Richardson is #42/49, and ASJ is #24/25.

As always these are up on TCDB but also available here so please feel free to make me a trade offer!

And as for the stuff for myself, most came from the 5/$1 boxes with a couple $1 cards snuck in there:

On the baseball side of things I scored fun stuff of my big four PC guys: Griffey, Gwynn, Maddux, and Ripken (plus a Mize thrown in for variety). The Gwynn Stadium Club Chrome Refractor looks fantastic and brings back good memories of the product's inception. Meanwhile, the Maddux brings to mind a '98 Bowman's Best insert but is actually from 20 years later. And the Pacific Gwynn and the Bonds/Ripken Pinnacle chase cards mean tonight's post gets my coveted "90s inserts rule" tag.

Switching to football, I found a pair of new Donruss Optic RCs for Bush and Evans and they were just $0.20 each, which I'd pay any day to further that project. Graham's Press Proof is super shiny and looks great in-person. I'd skipped over Toomer's Topps Black (#d /53) parallel for a number of shows until it made its way into the $1 box, which was cheap enough for me. And Wino's Prizm parallel is a sight to behold for better or worse!

Finally, WR Nico Collins gets his own scan with this five-pack. The first is a '21 Clearly Donruss RC that's acetate and looks amazing. The Gridiron Kings card is a Pink parallel, and that's followed by a Chronicles card and Rookies & Stars Prizm parallel. Last up is an Optic jersey card that was just a buck or two, and it's just my third hit (also relics) of the receiver who's starved for even mediocre QB play in Houston.

It's fun going back and looking over my loot from a few weeks ago, but even more so I'm looking forward to seeing the reactions from folks who received their Christmas cards from me (as well as those who will in the near future). Some already have either on their blogs or Twitter, and maybe when they're all accounted for and I'm board I'll do a recap post that links to all of them.

Anyway, I hope everyone had a fantastic Christmas whether or not cards were involved. Though Christmas '23 is a long ways off I'll be back at the monthly show in a couple weeks to start piling up cards for gifts once again!

2022 trade package #25: Sport Card Collectors

Christmas cards are coming! Both incoming and outgoing, as it turns out. I'll have more details on the outgoing items when I have a bit more clarity on my COMC and Sportlots shipping situations, but the good news is that there will be a Too Many Verlanders Christmas Cards 2022, which means lots of you will be getting presents from me!

As for items going the other direction, I have lots to show off thanks to multiple blogger trades, eBay purchases, TCDB deals, last weekend's show, plus the aforementioned Sportlots and COMC buys.

Today's trade package is a terrific combo of "stuff I set aside for you", Christmas cards, and a giveaway, all from Matt of Sport Card Collectors. My not-so-secret Santa let me know to expect a rare bubble mailer from him and that's exactly what I got just before the calendar flipped over to December. This thing was absolutely stuffed with goodies, so here's a quick rundown on what he included:

A big stack of current and past Tigers dominated most of the envelope. Baez (a very quality Museum base) and the returning Boyd (shout out to John!) are the current guys here. The team very recently cut bait with Candy, who had a good amount of potential but was trending in the wrong direction for what he'd cost. Washington signed him and I'm interested in seeing how he does. I can't say no to a Prizm Refractor and numbered Donruss parallel! Cobb looks great on his Gallery card as well.

Check out the killer G's to start this scan! I love the Grandy '07 Chrome Refractor which was new to me, as was Hammerin' Hank's Diamond Kings Artist Proof (and Kuenn's too!). Infante was a quality middle infielder for some of the Tigers' more successful teams in the 2000s and 2010s. Kaline is always, and I mean always welcome in envelopes heading my way! As is young pitcher Matt Manning, for whom you see two items here before another one that somehow got lumped into the next scan. V-Mart had some big moments before his bat waned late in his career.

Mazara has discoed off to other teams that aren't Detroit and that's fine by me. I wonder if Meadows will be healthy enough to appear in 100 games this year? Looks like one of Manning's cards got grouped in with fellow injured and talented Detroit P Casey Mize on some nice looking cardboard. Morris makes as much sense as anyone on an insert throwing it back to the '87 set. Nathan was a Tiger for all of 63 games over two seasons--almost entirely a nice 2014 campaign--but that was long enough to get on a team-appropriate Chrome Orange Refractor.

A few of these guys are active but only the guy in the middle--Tork--is currently with the team as they're hopefully cutting out the dead weight to bring in some quality players to pair with the youngsters. I appreciate the card of Spencer since I don't have many yet, and I still have high hopes that he'll adjust to the bigs after a rough 2022. Norris and new White Sox OF Victor Reyes look good in Topps' Royal Blue parallel here too.

Here's the rest of the baseball stuff, starting with a six-pack of A&G Minis. Bunning and Morris are HOF pitchers that began their careers with Detroit so it's fun to see them here together. Each appears on two different versions as you can tell by these backs:

The Topps Heritage Minors auto of former OF prospect (who retired due to injury) Brock Deatherage was a fun surprise! It's numbered /100 and the guy had one of the most metal names in the minors. Just don't look at his social media if you don't want to further lower your opinion of the education level of pro athletes. I love the autograph, though!

And to finish off the sport, why not include a wax pack of '88 Donruss? I haven't decided what to do with this yet but at least for now I'm keeping it sealed.

And now we get to the football content, much of which is made up of my giveaway winnings. The RC/rookie-related cards of Collins and disruptive Detroit Lion Aidan Hutchinson are much appreciated, especially the latter as I work on building a collection of this year's #2 overall pick who's been a "bust" to Spartan and Buckeye fans only.

But I'm most excited about the autographs of Hutchinson and his fellow 2021 partner in crime off the edge, David Ojabo. Hutch's auto came from 2022 Prestige and features a nice shot of him on draft night when his home state team took him #2 overall. He's been worthy of the pick ever since overall, even with a few quiet games. While his signature leaves something to be desired, that's nothing new for athletes these days!

Ojabo's card is terrific as well. He thrived on the other side of the defense that Hutch played, coming up with huge moments himself. The Nigerian-born defensive stud moved with his family to Scotland when he was young, and rewarded Michigan's interest in him with 11 sacks in his one season as a starter, the last of which led to the iconic "O-ja-BO!" call by Gus Johnson in the Wolverines' romp over Ohio State. An ill-timed injury after the season hurt his draft stock but he was still selected in the second round by coach Jim Harbaugh's brother's team, the Ravens. I love having my first autograph of the future defensive star be a Michigan uni card from a Panini Origins autograph set available in this year's Chronicles product.

One last card in this image was a total surprise for me: a Chris Evans 1/1 proof card from 2021 Leaf Metal Draft. It's a Crystal Blue version of the State Pride insert, which ends up being the perfect color for a Michigan guy like the current Bengals RB/WR/KR. Part of the design obscures Michigan's state motto, "Si quaeris peninsulam amoenam circumspice" ("If you seek a pleasant peninsula, look about you") because that's where the autograph would go. The current incarnation of Leaf has been pretty shady, but these state flag cards still look amazing. I'll happily add this as my first hit of Evans, an out-of-the-blue (pun intended!) Michigan uni 1/1 in a very generous trade package!

Here's the back of the proof card for completeness, and because it's fun to stare at.

The three new players here bump the unique subject total count of my UM football collection to 236, and the overall count is a minor milestone of 1600!

We're not quite done just yet because the giveaway included a few other cards courtesy of Panini. Three are from Panini Chronicles like the Ojabo above. The Chubb, numbered /49, is a Purple parallel from the Donruss Retro insert. Goodson's auto is a Contenders College Ticket Autographs Red version. Hall's signature is from the Donruss Rated Rookie Autographs insert. And finally, the parallel of Fant was inserted into 2022 Prestige packs and is an Xtra Points Premium Gold version numbered /99. Many thanks again to Panini and to Matt for giving these away. I've since put them up for trade on TCDB but will happily offer them here as well to those interested in working out a trade.

Matt, thanks so much again for this ridiculously stacked envelope. I'm grateful to be one of the folks you trade with and I appreciate your holiday season generosity here. I can also promise you'll be quite happy with your return envelope once everything I ordered gets shipped my way, so you should look forward to a merry Christmas yourself!

Stay tuned for more great Christmas cards coming soon.