2024 trade package #15: Sports Cards From the Dollar Store part 1: everything but hockey

Tonight let's take a look at part of the latest big-ass shipment from Doug over at Sports Cards From the Dollar Store, received by me in August.

That's right--I said "part of" because he literally sent me this:

I split it into hockey and non-hockey, and you'll be getting the latter tonight. In true SCFtDS form, you'll get to see a large package broken up into multiple posts!

Baseball's up first and my Tigers PCs, some old and many new, were well represented. I don't know if Baez is long for a roster spot but that Bowman's Best is pretty cool. The '72 Gator would be cool enough on its own but this one is a Canadian special: O-Pee-Chee! Miggy makes a few recent-ish appearances here plus one more in the horizontals section. Campos is only 21 and a potential OF prospect to watch. Traded Tiger Canha joins a bunch of others in this post from this year's Heritage.

Cronenworth is of course a favorite. Flaherty is surely happy to be with the NL champion Dodgers while the Tigers got two solid prospects in the deal. Gold is 24 and still in high A while Graham will be that age early next year and seems to be hovering around A+ himself. The Riley Greene playing card is a cool one of a fun player I'm definitely growing to like on the team. And Griffey was pretty good in his day as well.

Jobe is pretty much the franchise's top prospect after going 3rd overall in 2021 and he was though of highly enough to make a late-season MLB debut followed by a couple appearances in the playoffs, which had to be thrilling for a young dude. Jung is another top-100 prospect for the team and while his '24 MLB debut wasn't amazing, it was cool to see the '22 first-rounder get some ABs with the big team. Keith is locked up for a few seasons and could be a key part of a rebuilt offense. Kemp is another OPC Tiger from my Canadian buddy, this one from 1979.

Kinsler's was a bit of a favorite of mine during his Motown tenure so I love the Refractor above. Larkin is of course a longtime personal favorite and PC guy. McGonigle is an intriguing middle IF prospect that the Tigers took 37th overall in '23. Austin didn't work out but his Tigers draftee bro Parker has shown a bit of hitting ability and a flair for web gems in the outfield so we'll probably see plenty more of him next year. Melton's a '22 4th-rounder out of San Diego State, Morris is a team legend and HOFer, and Olson is looking to be an excellent acquisition whose numbers were hampered by a sorry lack of run support (and bad health luck) this season.

I have to say, it's super cool to see a guy like Magglio in products like Panini's '23 Chronicles, including the card numbered /199 above! As with other players you saw today I'm always glad to see cards of Cal in trade packages. Skubal is largely responsible for taking what looked to be another below-average Tigers squad and making it a big story, with a Cy Young-worthy campaign that led his team to a very unlikely playoff berth! Tork recovered a bit after a dismal start and we'll likely get a better idea next year if he'll be part of the club's future. Tram is another team legend appearing courtesy of '23 Panini Select. And Papa Grande and JV had fans plenty excited back when they were starring on perennial playoff teams.

The versatile Vierling is our last standard vertical issue in the baseball group. Miggy gets another Heritage MLB pair card that looks quite cool as a throwback to past Topps designs. The two guys who led the '82 Tigers on the '83 Topps card had an especially good time in '84! A stray '85 OPC half sticker of Lou Whitaker was a very fun surprise. Jung makes a couple more appearances, including one with the also previously-seen Melton. And then we have a card of a former Tiger the likes of which I wouldn't tend to keep, but there's no way I could turn down the Leather & Lumber black gold signature you see here even if it features failed prospect Christin Stewart. Come on, how cool does that look?!

Switching over to basketball, I believe that every player seen here is currently active in the NBA. Injured Hawks G Kobe Bufkin leads all comers with three new cards. THJ had a solid 14 points in Detroit's season-opening loss last night, and the card you see above is numbered /165, which is cool. LeVert's Cavs are actually scheduled to face the Pistons tomorrow. I couldn't find any stats for Washington's Poole yet this season. And then we have the Wagner bros, Franz and Mo who combined for 30 points (23 and 7, respectively) in yesterday's season opener win against the Bulls.

Basketball got a couple new hits too! Brooks is a newcomer to both my basketball hits collection and UM basketball PC in general. He played as a G for five seasons in Ann Arbor, spanning 2017-18 to 2021-22, then went undrafted, so he's prime fodder for a product like Wild Card Alumination that gets signatures of players who probably wouldn't sniff a cardboard appearance otherwise. While he becomes the 36th subject in my basketball hits PC, Wilson gets his second: a Crown Royale jersey/auto (numbered /199). The 2017 Bucks first-rounder is pictured with the team that drafted him though he's since suited up for Houston, Doug's Raptors, and the 76ers.

As we switch over to the gridiron, transfer RB Thomas Rawls is the lone base card out of 10 items (hence splitting the remaining basketball and football into two scans). WR Amara Darboh gets a nice spotlight down the right side of the scan with three beautiful looking auto/relics. #1 is a dual jersey (you might call them "prime" as they aren't far off from patches) and football combo paired up with Darboh's signature, and the Absolute beauty is the Spectrum parallel of that product's RC, limited to "just" 99 copies. Next is Panini Phoenix's Orange parallel of his jersey/auto, clocking in at 150 copies. And finally we have a Rookies & Stars Dress for Success signature and memorabilia pairing that's also numbered /99. Fun news: these additions allowed Darboh to join the 50-hit club in the football PC! He's just the 11th player to reach that milestone.

The above three hits go quite well with this super sextet. Arrington is one of the 10 other 50-hit guys in my collection and the '09 Topps Magic autographs will always be a favorite of mine. Talented defender Devin Bush II joins the collection with his first hit, a Panini Luminance jersey that makes him football collection dude #254 and the fourth with that first name. I now have 11 Butts including the shiny one numbered /99 above, and I'll leave that there for all of you to get your best comments in. Chesson was a college teammate and position mate of Darboh's and he hit the double-digit mark with his 9th card including a signature (the other's a plate) thanks to 2017 Panini Spectra (#d /199). I would assume most of you who've followed me for long enough remember the namesake of my now-retired secondary blog, Mario Manningham, on a sweet Press Pass college uni signature. By the way, he's one hit away from joining Chad Henne in the 100-hit club while Jake Long needs three and Braylon Edwards needs six. Goals!

And last up is one of the biggest surprises in this mailing. Doug's certainly been generous enough to send me plates and other 1/1s before, but I didn't expect this Yellow 2020 Leaf Draft plate of former transfer QB Shea Patterson! The two-year Wolverine went 10-3 and 9-4 in 2018 and 2019, a few seasons before things really turned around for Jim Harbaugh's program. This appears to be my 56th 1/1 in my football PC with Shea being the 34th member to appear on at least one. I really enjoyed finding this among the rest of the loot which was already very high quality.

So as you can see I was quite pleased with the baseball, basketball, and football content. As for the hockey stuff, you'll have to wait until next time, but I promise it's worth a look as that stack was bigger than that of these three sports combined! I look forward to sharing that with you so y'all can get a feeling for just how much Doug stuffed into this box.

Until then, thanks so much for another fantastic package, Doug!

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.

2019 Sportlots purchases: Rookie Blue on a Bye

The boys in Maize & Blue may be on a bye week but that doesn't mean I can't have my own Michigan Football Saturday.  Today I'm covering 62 new cards for my Rookie Blue project where I'm chasing every RC of each guy to suit up for Michigan (excluding autograph and relic cards).  Since this is a chase I started when I was still posting on Too Many Manninghams, the checklist I'm working from is currently here while the album containing what I've picked up so far can be found here.

And now on to the new stuff for today.  In the past I've generally shied away from buying these RCs on Sportlots because most of my spending leans toward the $0.18 site minimum price.  This time, though, I finally bit on some that were in the $0.45-$0.75 range, especially from one seller who had a bunch I needed, many of them numbered.  My overall spending has been down this year and this purchase was very productive so it was pretty easy for me to justify it, especially after surveying the damage to that checklist I mentioned above.

So here's the main event:  62 new RCs of 35 former Wolverines!:

2008 draftee and PC guy Arrington's numbered '08 Stadium Club RC is my 17th of his 19.  Former OL Baas only has five to chase but they've been tough sledding, and the UD pair above gives me three.  Touchdown Tim gets his 30th of 32 thanks to '96 Score Board Lasers, a card I hadn't caught for my checklist until recently.  Michigan-to-W. Illinois LB transfer Bowens had just one card for me to chase:  that 2005 Topps Total.  Alan Branch (who kills QBs) gets numbered '07 Gridiron Gear Retail (ugh) and Select first-years to put me one short of his 26 RCs.  Finally, you can see two Butts (hehe) out of three in this post, in this case '17 Playoff and Rookies & Stars.

Campbell's '99 Fleer Focus was a huge add for me here because that numbered RC was impossible for me to find for under $1 until recently on Sportlots, and now I've tracked down all three of his cards.  Former Cowboy Charlton, who's doing pretty well when he, you know, actually gets playing time, gets within one card of halfway to his 20 after the '17 Select you see.  You'll also see Chesson again below, and for now Rookies & Stars and Prizm from 2017 are above, followed by fellow '17 guy Darboh's own R&S.  Darden's '74 Topps fixes an earlier misstep when I thought his '75 was the RC for some reason, and I'm glad to have that fixed, not to mention a new vintage add!  And then we have three out of a five-card run of transfer RB Fargas:  2003 Bowman Chrome plus Fleer Authentix and Focus (the latter of which are numbered).  Some of you might recall that that "Rookie Authentix" piece in the middle can be removed, another goofy Fleer innovation of the time.

This scan begins with the other two Fargas RCs, Mystique and UD's Honor Roll, which are also numbered, and I'm now half way to his 22.  Gold is a guy from 2000 so his stuff can get a bit of a Brady bump, but the Playoff Momentum above, my 7th of his 9, wasn't bad.  Fellow '07 draftees and PC guys Hall and Harris appear on numbered cards from Select and SP Authentic, and while I need three more of Hall's 23, the Harris is the 24th and final RC of the former tackling machine, sewing up another player.  Here-and-gone dual-sport guy Henson gets a nice trio highlighted by '04 Fleer Greats along with Playoff Honors and the college-themed Prestige for 18 of his 37.  And lesser known 2017 DB Delano Hill marks the first of three appearances of Panini Phoenix with one of his two rookie issues.

PC guy Marlin Jackson's 25th of 30 first-years is from '05 Ultimate Collection like Baas's above, and we'll see that product (different year) in a couple more scans.  '97 Ultra (and its great design!) was the last of three I needed for transfer TE Damon Jones.  Speaking of that position, I landed a couple more for Bennie Joppru:  the gorgeous '04 Donruss Classics plus Fleer's Avant, both numbered, which get me to 25/32.  I'm short just one of WR Marcus Knight's 15 rookies thanks to this 2000 trio of Fleer Showcase and Leaf Certified (both numbered) plus Playoff's Absolute (surprisingly not numbered!).  And I was thrilled to knock off a beautiful pair of numbered college uni RCs starring '04 DB Jeremy LeSueur--Classics and Elite, which leave me three short of his nine.

CB Jourdan Lewis is 2017 Panini Phoenix guy #2, which is also RC #2 in his collection.  Former #1 overall pick Long joins Arrington from '08 Stadium Club for his 19th of 22 rookies.  Transfer QB Mallett gets a big boost with six cards, all from 2011 Topps brands, to get him up to 8/10.  And we get the first of a pair starring another QB, John Navarre.  This one's from 2004 Fleer Platinum, and I was surprised that it was a numbered card given the brand's history.

Navarre's other issue is from the previously mentioned Ultimate Collection, and his pair puts him at 13/25, as his stuff continues to be a thorn in my side.  Do-everything dude Jabrill Peppers is '17 Phoenix player #3, and the 8th of his 21 RCs is from a product that's grown on me a bit.  Next you can see two of the three Jon Ritchies I found, representing another backfield guy that transferred from Michigan and ended up with the Raiders.  These are from '98 Bowman Chrome and Skybox Premium.  Aaron Shea is yet another 2000 draftee and here you see him on a shiny and numbered Pacific Prism Prospects card (his 11th of 15) which is a good reminder that the Brady from this set and others will be super expensive.  I happily checked off another player by adding RC #9 of 1999 WR Tai Streets from Leaf Certified.  Toomer joined Biakabutuka above from the '96 Score Board Lasers set and I now need just two of his 23.  And finally this scan includes a numbered pair of LB standout LaMarr Woodley--2007 Donruss Classics and Leaf Certified Materials--that go nicely with a third card below.

This mostly horizontal scan starts with a trio from the love-it-or-hate-it 2017 Panini Unparalleled set, including the previously seen Butt (7/14) and Chesson (8/13) plus the lone RC of DT Ryan Glasgow, part of the amazing walk-on family at the school.  The well-traveled Dhani Jones has two RCs and you can see one above, which he shares with a couple other Giants in 2003 Topps Total.  Another Giant follows as transfer CB Will Peterson (#2 of 4) appears on his numbered 2001 Titanium Post Season that uses a kick-ass die-cut design.  Ritchie's third card is also a die-cut from '98 Crown Royale, and gets me to 7 of his 12.  WR David Terrell looks a bit lonely without fellow Bears draftee Anthony Thomas on a 2001 Fleer Legacy RC that puts him at 27/53 rookies and 149 cards overall, one short of his RB counterpart.  And lastly, we have one more vertical card that didn't fit in a group of nine:  Woodley's numbered 2007 Topps Performance base, which puts him at 20/26.

This post plus some fun results on the field today definitely made this a fun college football Saturday for me.  And for those of you who prefer the diamond, I'm now done posting football pickups and should have something like five baseball posts to close out this series.  Thanks for reading and GO BLUE!

10/4/19 card show report: trade bait, not clickbait

What a difference a couple weeks can make!  Just two Fridays ago I took the day off from work again to head to Taylor for my monthly show, and though it had started cooling off, we managed to hit 60 that day, which we'll be lucky to get at this point going forward.  Chilly weather aside, I'm happy to be back today posting the spoils of that show.

This time I think I ended up staying a bit longer, leading to my spending a yearly high of $60.  That may also have something to do with my favorite seller making everything half off its usual price.  That meant that the stuff that was usually $2 or $1 was an even better value, and cards I'd otherwise ignored came home with me this time.  I believe the breakdown was 39 cards for a buck apiece, 38 that were $0.50, and 40 from the 20/$1 box.  Whatever the precise numbers were, I was elated to get out of there with a few things for myself and a lot of good value in terms of trade bait.

Speaking of stuff not for myself, let's kick things off as usual with cards that are available for trade that weren't ticketed for trade packages:

The abundance of college cards in this post mostly came from the $0.50 box, and I figured if nobody who reads this wants them, they can head to TCDB, but regardless, the price was right!  That trio up top--a pair of nice Rox relics and a manu-letter auto--seem the most likely to be claimed, in my opinion.

Again, most everything here was in the $1 box, so I didn't mind that most of the names weren't big, besides that Matt Ryan jersey.  I went for stuff that I figured could have broad interest--autographs on different surfaces, auto/relics, and just cool stuff in general.

As always, if you see something you're interested in, please let me know in the comments and we'll work out a trade!  Eventually I'll get what doesn't get traded up on TCDB since I've got a pretty nice pile of interesting trade bait that I hope turns into Michigan and baseball PC stuff.

And now we'll head to my pickups from those various collections:

It was another small but productive day for a few of my collections.  First up is a 2007 Chrome White Refractor of former blog namesake Curtis Granderson, #d 468/660.  I think the White Refractors were underappreciated so I happily grabbed this one that includes what I think of as a fun photo, a rarity for a Topps card.  Although I thought I'd picked up more toward this rainbow I actually only have the flagship base to go with it, so hopefully I'll track down more in the future.

Next is Hank Greenberg from the very familiar 1987 Hygrade set.  You'll get to see much more of him and other Tiger greats in future posts when I get around to my latest Sportlots effort.

One of my biggest surprises of the day was that Maddux you see above--his 1998 Donruss Diamond King (#03063/10000).  That was on my singles wantlist, and the key word there is "was" because I happily crossed it off when I got home, leaving me short just Ripken's card in terms of my PC guys in the set.  Man, do I love these!

Speaking of Cal, I found his Superstar Spotlight subset issue from the base set of Upper Deck's 2000 Ovation product.  I'm pretty sure I remember these textured cards being overpriced when they came out, but when you can get 'em cheap these days they're fun to pick up.

Last up on this side of the collection is a surprising first for me:  hit #1 of former Tigers 2B Ian Kinsler.  I'm sure I've said multiple times that I was already thrilled when Detroit shed the bloating contract (and carcass) of Prince Fielder, but to get Kinsler and his production was nothing short of a coup.  He's one of my favorite recent Tigers, and I was happy to see him get a ring last year, even if it was with the Red Sox.  So welcome to the Tigers hits collection, Ian!

On the Michigan side of the field the story of the day was inserts and hits.  Chesson (card #14) is a Purple parallel from 2017 Elite Draft Picks (#06/99), transfer QB Mallett (12) is from 2011 Topps Prime Rookie Gold (#33/50), and former #1 recruit Rashan Gary (3) makes his way back to Ann Arbor by way of a 2019 Prestige Blue Chip Recruits chase card.  I also hit two PC players:  card #297(!) of Henne, a 2010 Classics Timeless Tributes Silver (#015/100), and a 2012 Topps Magic Mini of C-Wood, his 309th.

We'll end with a couple more results from the dollar box.  I think I recall seeing both of these cards in what was originally the $2 box at the last show or two, but they didn't make sense at that price; cut it in half and I'm all over them, though.  First is a 2017 Donruss Rookie Threads Red jersey of WR Amara Darboh.  As far as I can tell, the non-numbered parallels of these relics are determined by the color of the foil used for the player's name, set title, and logo.  I'm just happy to take whatever I can get of one of the more interesting receivers from recent teams, plus this gives me 30 hits out of 40 cards, one of the craziest ratios in my collection!

He's joined by the more well known Jake Long, the former #1 overall pick whose position is clear on his 2008 Leaf Certified Materials Rookie Fabric of the Game Position dual jersey (#074/100) seen here.  I'd call a buck the sweet spot for a card like this that comes with an "event worn" jersey swatch from the Rookie Premiere, so in his collection it goes as hit #83 out of 128 cards, which is getting into Darboh territory.  Thanks to recent-ish (COMC) acquisitions Jake is fourth in the hits collection, a couple behind Braylon, but with a distant lead over #5 guy Mike Hart's 68.  Who knows what those standings might look like by the end of the year!

I hope you all enjoyed this show recap, and you may be able to look forward to a few trade packages around the blogosphere featuring even more stuff not seen here.  Speaking of envelopes, I'll have a new one to show off in my next post.  Until then I'll be watching the Astros and rooting for JV's team to do the world a favor and eliminate the Yankees!

2019 COMC purchases: non-PC football and hockey hits

A quite satisfying Michigan thumping of Rutgers (52-0) has me in the mood to post some cards from my most recent COMC shipment comprising purchases from earlier this year.  It looks like this will be a four-part series, and today's kickoff will cover hits I scored of guys who don't have their own PC albums and play(ed) football or hockey:

Two players dominate today's post, and that's cool since I often pair them up mentally the way I do with David Terrell and Anthony Thomas.  The first is WR Jehu Chesson (click his name to go to my TCDB gallery for him, plus the other players in today's post).  Considering his playing time in the NFL has been minimal it's been easy finding nice stuff of his at low prices, such as the four autographs you see above.  Jehu's got an interesting signature, with his name somewhat reasonable to make out, and he includes the "II" in his name, which is pretty cool.

In terms of what you see above, Leaf Metal Draft includes a Michigan uniform-ish picture (hey, what are you gonna do?) and Panini's Unparalleled is a super shiny design, plus it's #39/49.  The middle two are from Panini's Preferred (using the Crown Royale design) and Prizm.

Numbers-wise, Chesson's hit count nearly doubles from three to seven after these additions, and I'd surely be happy to land more when I can.

Chesson always brings to mind position pal Amara Darboh, and vice versa, so naturally I have a bunch of his cards to show off today as well.  As a matter of fact, this scan of four vertical designs is just the tip of the iceberg!

The relic in this group is a nice Mirror Orange jersey card from 2017 Certified and is numbered 122/399.  To its right is a jersey/auto/RC (#095/299) from 2017 Limited, and that interesting swatch has the slightest hint of green stitching, so it looks like it probably came from the jersey numbers on his chest.  Then there's autographs from Origins' Rookie Signatures and Playoff's Rookie Autographs (#107/199), also 2017 Panini products.  Like Chesson he has a pretty decent signature.

Yep, five more cards of the nomadic WR, all horizontal this time.  Relics from Panini Contenders Rookie Ticket Swatches, Origins Rookie Jumbo Jerseys (#026/199), and Vertex Startup Jerseys (#89/99) comprise a nice jersey trio, with the latter two being my favorites, especially the Vertex card and its enormous swatch.

Those are joined by the base (#04/99) and Orange (#15/25) versions of Amara's 2017 Panini XR Luminous Endorsements autos.  The super cool design here is kind of a thinner shadowbox idea, with the image framed by the border underneath a clear acetate cover that the player signs.  That makes it great to look at, plus it gives players a very large surface to cover with their signatures.  Too cool!

Darboh has been one of my more productive recent collections and this big haul jumps him all the way up to 29 hits (and 39 cards total), a number I'll look to increase soon.

This last football scan includes three miscellaneous players.  Funchess is well known around these parts, and here the former TE/WR stars on a 2015 Panini Contenders Rookie Ticket Swatches jersey.  As usual I find the Contenders design simple and appealing.  That's hit #11 and card #54 of the injured Colt.

Next is one of two new players debuting in the Michigan Football hits collection today.  Mike McCray was a two-year starter at LB in Ann Arbor who put up fairly similar numbers in 2016 and '17, though that's where his career ultimately ended as he retired last year.  That makes me grateful for a product like Contenders--in this case 2018 Draft Picks--that allows me to chase an autograph of a guy that wouldn't otherwise have one, even if that autograph is a bit on the "???" side.

Last up is QB Jake Rudock, the Iowa transfer that came to Ann Arbor in 2015 and led Jim Harbaugh's first team to a 10-3 record, including a thumping of Florida in the Citrus Bowl.  Harbaugh was able to elevate his play enough to get Rudock drafted by the Lions in the sixth round the following year, which I guess isn't exactly an ideal fate.  Fortunately he's escaped that vortex of suck, only to be encompassed by a worse one down in Miami!  Anyway, my first hit of his is this beautiful (if poorly scanned) 2016 Panini Black Gold Golden Prospects Signatures White Gold auto (#92/99).  Like the Darbohs above this one has a bit of a shadowbox effect, though the image of the player you see is on the top layer, and the autograph was on a sticker placed on the other acetate piece.

I'm happy to welcome McCray and Rudock as the 220th and 221st players in the football collection, and even happier that they contributed to today's big milestone:  1400 football hits and counting!  1402 to be exact, with more to be posted soon.  Right now I doubt I'll hit 1500 before the end of the year, but you never know.

With hockey season (both college and pro) starting up soon, today seemed as good of a day as any to post my lone pickup in that sport:

I love it when I can get 1/1s for cheap prices, and this plate of Steve Shields from 2017-18 Leaf Masked Men certainly qualifies:  I grabbed it for just $4.85 way back in April.  As you can see, it's the cyan plate from the goalie-centric product's Jumbo Goalie Patch insert, and I'd sure love to add one of those actual cards to my Shields collection as well!  For now this plate goes with the seven autographs I have of the former Michigan netminder, and it becomes 1/1 #122.  I don't have any more such cards from COMC to show off, but an upcoming eBay post may just blow your mind.

Here's hoping I'm in the mood for posting next weekend after another one, this time against Iowa.  In the meantime stay tuned for a few more COMC posts, plus another Sportlots run.

5/4/19 show report: blogger meet-up edition

(L-R):  yours truly, John, and Paul.  Apparently I didn't get the facial hair and Tigers hat memo, GUYS

Moving on to more recent shows, today I'll be taking advantage of the holiday to cover the one I hit up a few weeks ago when the stars aligned and I got to meet up with John (John's Big League Baseball Blog) and Paul (Scribbled Ink) in Taylor.  John was able to hang out for a bit before heading a bit further east to watch the Tigers on Star Wars day (May the Fourth), and I got to do more in-person trading with Paul (trade post upcoming!).

My favorite seller had his prices back to normal after last month's dime-mania, but that didn't deter me from finding a bunch of great stuff from the usual dime/quarter/$1/$2 boxes.  Actually, most of what you'll see today came from the latter two options in the form of another hit parade!

Here's what I came home with for myself this time:

First, trade bait from the $1/$2 boxes.  Who doesn't like manu-letter autos?  Knox is from 2009 Finest and is #035/102, while Turner is from the same year's Donruss Threads (#131/300).  Ricardo Louis hails from 2016 Panini Certified, and the patch/auto is #331/499.  Claim any or all in the comments!

On the baseball PC front I didn't have as much luck as last time, but I did come up with a few gems plus, hey, fewer cards means less work!  Most of these were either from the dime or quarter boxes, starting with a pair of 90s Griffeys:  '93 Mariners Stadium Club and '98 UD Special F/X #1.  1996-98 is probably my favorite three-year run of Upper Deck, and the Special F/X version looked great as well that year.

Then I was feeling like a Gwynner when I found a dime box '89 Scoremasters and, more importantly, a '99 Revolution Foul Pole insert of Mr. Padre in the dollar box.  Pacific came up with some extremely cool inserts like these (and Fielder's Choice, to name another) while helping make the 90s the unquestionably most creative decade for cards as far as I'm concerned.

Last up from baseball is a pair of a pirate's favorite letter, "R".  Clayton Richard's 2019 Heritage base is now off of his checklist thanks to the dime boxes, and I also enjoyed a more recent return to Topps' Gallery product with a 2018 Ripken base.

For whatever reason the $1 and $2 boxes were very kind to my Michigan Football hits collection this month.  I couldn't tell you the last time I came home with twelve such cards from one show, let alone a few combined!

That started with this six pack of 2017 WR draftees Jehu Chesson and Amara Darboh.  While the 2017 Prizm Pink auto of Chesson is just my second signature (and third hit) of him, I followed up on a productive 2018 COMC purchase with another jackpot of Darboh cards.  One of those is from the same set as the Chesson while I also came away with another autograph, an oversized jersey swatch, patch, and jersey/auto, all for either $1 or $2!  As Jeff noted in the comments last time, Darboh seems like a guy with more hits than base/inserts, and I sure get that feeling too with days like this.  I've got 19 and counting!

The other six comprise an even split of vertical and horizontal cards.  I haven't added many Devin Funchess hits to my collection since I haven't come across anything that interested me, especially Michigan uni stuff, but I couldn't pass up the 2015 Crown Royale jersey you see above during my shopping spree.  

Speaking of going on a bit of a run, I dug out four new Ryan Mallett hits, following up on the lone relic I bought last time.  I'm pretty sure the three jerseys and auto were only a buck each--a far cry from what they would have cost back in 2011.

And last up is another new addition (#219) to the collection.  After three guys joined last month I added DB Channing Stribling on his 2017 Contenders Draft Picks auto/RC.  A four-year contributor, he helped solidify the position for a 2016 squad that did pretty well, leading the team in picks (4) and defended passes (12).  Since going undrafted it seems likely he doesn't have a real NFL future, but he's exactly the type of guy I love to see in these sets as a college fan.

These past two show recaps have me excited about hitting up the next one this coming Saturday.  In the meantime I'm glad to be caught up on just about everything else, so next I'll be looking to cover a bunch of trades plus a one-card eBay purchase.  Hooray for productivity!