2023 trade package #32: Sports Cards From the Dollar Store

Hey, it's been a while, how about another trade recap?

Here's what a "Small Packet" envelope from Canada looks like:

Something this large and in charge and stuffed with goodness could only be from one person: Doug of Sports Cards From the Dollar Store!

Here's a (very) brief overview of what he sent my way back in December:

Baseball was highlighted by numbered cards of Mr. Tiger and Barry Larkin. All hail Upper Deck! The other Tigers are great as well, including the Deckle Freehan, which isn't a dupe because this one has a blank back.

Basketball and football get short shrift this time in numbers but not quality. My first card of Mazi (rhymes with "Ozzie") is a Michigan uni RC out of Prestige. Sounds like the Cowboys enjoyed some of that quality Texas education when deciding to completely misuse him this year!

A pair of numbered UD Henne autos are among the highlights of the package, and I can never have too many of these! (But I'm not renaming the blog.)

The bulk as usual is hockey, starting with the much-improved Wings. I'm a big fan of the Lidstrom and Howard cards especially, with the former being a nice color match.

I don't know if these are from shows, repacks. elsewhere, or all of the above, but I was excited to have a bunch of ex-UM icers to flip through. This one already stars two hockey Mikes, not to mention a rare for me Beniers.

Hughes and Hyman have had nice years for their teams, and of course I love seeing Copp join the ranks of the WolverWings.

Another hockey Mike here, the John Madden I prefer, and I feel like I don't add Montoyas to my collection often enough. Plus there's WolverWing supreme Dylan Larkin, who's been fantastic this year for the home team.

I loved the plethora of Brendan Morrison cards and he remains one of my top hockey PCs, second only to a guy you'll see later in this post. Nystrom is a 2/14 baby meaning Doug and I both collect him.

MaxPatch is a Buckstorecards trade package stalwart, and Palushaj often comes along for the ride as well, but recent star Power is nice to see when it comes to some of the newer guys I haven't collected much of yet.

There's the #1 dude, goalie Marty Turco. He was featured on a lot of Pacific cards including an insert set of his own (card #3 above), not to mention the usual enjoyable stuff like the die-cut Crown Royale product. Goalies often simply get the best photos on cards, and Marty deserves it!

There were a few horizontal and odd-sized cards, covered here, plus a couple more hits. The two Topps minis of Madden have the same front image but different backs. Naturally Pacific brings the heat with more die-cut action including a numbered card (#d /290) of another hockey Mike: Comrie. A numbered swatch of Jack MF Johnson plus a Cup-shaped jersey of Blue Jacket Zach Werenski (wait, do I need a "hockey Zachs" tag too?) close out the cards portion.

But we're not done just yet because we go big AND go home with this signed 8x10 of four-year Wolverine and former Leaf/current Oiler winger Zach Hyman! (#HockeyZachs) This is a beautiful, high-quality photo signed with a very legible autograph plus Hyman's jersey number. He's been very effective for Edmonton since signing with them back in '21, establishing career highs in all three big offensive numbers. Based on those stats it's no surprise that he's pottted an absurd three hat tricks this season!

Thanks again to Doug for all of these goodies that arrived in plenty of time for Christmas. As always I appreciate the huge variety among sports, players, and designs, and of course the quality of the goods. I don't have a lot to send your way just yet but will be working on it as usual.

Next time, another trade recap!

2022 trade package #26: the Collector

Now that I've made lots of progress getting Christmas packages out in the mail, it's time to get back to what I was fortunate to receive this month! Chris (the Collector) went the Xzibit route, sending Christmas cards with a Christmas card:

Chris is a nice dude, confirmed (as if I didn't already know that.

Here's the cardboard contents:

Scan number one includes cards of a couple local teams: the Tigers and Wings. I love that Chris hit both my former and current blog namesakes in Granderson and Verlander. Curtis is seen on a Mets-appropriate Orange parallel (/250) from 2014, though of course that color also works for his original team. JV appears with both the Tigers (Topps' Chasing History insert) and his new old team, the Astros. Dig the back of the latter, which is just a blast to look at:

Since that injury-abbreviated 2020 campaign he tacked on an 18-4 record/1.75 ERA/185 K NL Cy Young season and his first World Series winning decision while earning ring number two. To say his career has been special is an understatement!

Current (though injured) Tigers pitcher Skubal joins the orange party with that parallel from last year's Topps Big League to sew up the baseball group.

Over on the ice we have a fun group of Wings. Datsyuk and Zetterberg are two Detroit players I associate with each other because they were longtime European teammates (02-03 through 15-16) that were late round draft pick gems (sixth and seventh rounds, respectively) back when the Wings were great at that. They also won the 2007-08 Cup together while spending their entire careers with the franchise, and tallying more than 300 goals.

Chris Osgood is another name that's known well around Hockeytown, even if he wasn't initially given the respect he deserved. After backing up veteran Mike Vernon in 96-97 he led the team to a cup repeat. A few years later he'd be off to the Isles and Blues, but he'd return to Motown in time to run it back with the 07-08 squad mentioned above.

I have less to say about Hirose because he's a Michigan State guy, but as with those in other sports (see: Kirk Gibson) I'm willing to give him a shot.

As for Michigan State's big brother, here's some cards of guys that played football and hockey for my old school. Brady, Manningham, and Woodson are all legends of the Ann Arbor gridiron, and all won Super Bowls in the NFL too. Tom's 2022 Father's Day card looks great with the old college action photo, which appears way better than his NFL season, which proves he should have hung 'em up and put time into his marriage. The Manningham (hey, another former blog namesake, that's all three!) 2011 Rookies & Stars parallel is absolutely sick, a beautiful blue that works for his alma mater and pictured team. That one's also numbered /75 and is definitely my favorite of the bunch. That's not to knock the die-cut UM card of GOAT CB Charles Woodson out of '98 Press Pass, though, because the design, including a textured football, kicks all kinds of ass!

Heading back to the ice one more time we have a really nice pair of cards of former sniper Mike Cammalleri. The 15-year center scored almost 300 goals while suiting up for five different teams, including two stints each with the Kings and Flames depicted in his two above cards. On the left is a base from 2007-08 UD Mini Jersey, a fun product with the thing in the name as something to chase, plus what I believe to be a red(?) Prizm parallel from 2013-14. Whatever the actual color, Chris continued to kill it with the team-appropriate parallels in this package.

Chris, thanks so much for the warm Christmas wishes and cards of both types! I'm happy to report that a present of your own is on its way back to New Jersey as we speak, possibly in time for Sunday, and I hope you enjoy it as much as I loved these early gifts!

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 trade package #1: Sports Cards From the Dollar Store

It's February 14 and that means one thing around here: celebrating the birthday of buddy of the blog Doug over at Sports Cards From the Dollar Store!  I think it's awesome that he collects cards of athletes, celebrities, and more, with whom he shares a birthday, and today's post is a good example of that fun, listing his top 10 2/14 cards from the last year.  I'm happy to announce that he has a few more things from me that he'll be able to show off whenever he feels like it.

Speaking of "whenever he feels like it," unforeseen circumstances delayed me from getting his latest package to me (delivered weeks ago!) scanned and ready so eventually I figured, why not show it off on his big day?  And "big" is appropriate when discussing this latest mailing, one that arrived in what I believe was a 600-ct box, meaning he shelled out good money to get it to me.  Such is the generosity of my Canadian neighbour.  And as I flipped through the cards, I felt that generosity even more!

That Miggy is from a 2014 set that was available (probably in packs?) at that year's National, and it's cool because I hadn't seen it before.  The other three hail from one of Doug's favorites: Panini's Chronicles.  I love the mix of brands/designs it offers, and those are on full display here with a pair of Christin Stewarts and my first auto of young IF Dawel Lugo.  Nice!

The baseball continues here with even more Panini goodness.  Griffey hails from 2012 Prizm, and that sweet shot of his sweet swing is new to me.  The not-so-outspoken-anymore Verlander also cameos with another example of a 2019 Chronicles design, this one from the super thick Spectra.  And then there's two of my favorites in the whole box:  2019 Elite Extras of former Michigan pitchers Tommy Henry and Karl Kauffmann, two guys that were key to the Wolverines' College World Series run last year.  I love that they're both college uni cards plus I was thrilled to get my first of Henry, hopefully card #1 of many.

When it comes to packages from Doug, hockey is always well represented, and this time I was treated not just to cards of my alma mater, but the local pro club as well.  The Wings may be terrible this year but they were fun to watch in the 90s and 2000s when they were like the Braves except they won more than one title.  You'll see O-Pee-Chee's 2019-20 base set quite a bit today, one I think looks quite nice, as is typical for the brand.

Wings content #2 of 3.  The star of the show here is PC guy Dylan Larkin, whom I scanned with both teams just because.  I was happy to need all three because I love growing his collection, and all the cards look nice, too, including the Artifacts red insert called Aurum, which is a bit short on gold, but that's fine for this Red Wings fan!

The last of the Wings stuff comes with a couple more 19-20 OPCs, but of course I'm more interested in cards starring The Captain--and now The GM--Steve Yzerman.  The mix of old and new photos, designs, and uniforms, makes those a fun trio!

On the Michigan side of things, the basketball team has had its highs and lows this year but have been pretty interesting under new coach Juwan Howard.  Representing that team, Doug hit me up with a new base of Rumeal Robinson, a jersey of weed entrepreneur (go figure!) Mitch McGary, and a ridiculously beautiful slide/auto of Robinson's '89 NCAA title teammate Glen Rice.  I believe the Rice is my second such auto from that set and, yes, it looks even better in person!

A very nicely balanced package continues with some excellent football content.  '99 Collector's Edge Masters makes four appearances throughout this scan with base cards (/5000) of PC guy Tim Biakabutuka and former QB Elvis Grbac, plus HoloSilver (with red stamps?) parallels (/3500) of '98 champs Griese and Woodson.  Touchdown Tim is also represented on a super cool '99 UD Retro base, also new to me.  I also loved the nostalgia for 90s inserts with '94 Score Gold Zone parallels of AC and OT John "Jumbo" Elliott.  And then we have my first card of another newbie to my collection, former LB/DL hybrid Craig "Death" Roh, a pretty good recruit who played in Ann Arbor during one of the team's worst eras, 2009-12.  While NFL success eluded him he's since done well for himself in the CFL, and made his way onto this Red parallel from UD's product for that league last year.

These two guys have been associated a bit more with winning, though, in college and/or the pros.  (Future former?) Patriot great Tom Brady features on a very cool horizontal Panini Gridiron base while blog favorite PC guy Chad Henne gets in on the fun with a card I surprisingly didn't have: his 2011 Plates & Patches base (/299).  I recently hit the 300 mark for the latter and can't wait to boost his collection even more this year as I make him my top football PC.

And now we get into the bulk of the package:  Michigan Hockey content!  19-20 OPC makes a solid seven more appearances over the next three scans, proving the Ann Arbor-to-NHL pipeline is as strong as ever.  There's also a couple example of the prior season's factory set blue version of UD's MVP which were also new to me, as was practically everything you'll see in these scans.

There's WolverWing Dylan Larkin again, and I promise my scan of the Aurum insert looks much better than the one used here, getting much closer to the actual red color.  Joining him is a fun AHL card of winger Brad Jones, PC guy Brendan Morrison, and a new 90-91 OPC offering of D-man Jeff Norton.

Before we get to the real fireworks of the box here's the last of the "regular" hockey stuff.  That includes another Norton, two more OPCs, and a card each of D-men Jacob Trouba and Zach Werenski that allowed me to provide scans to TCDB.  I'm noting that because very few cards in the box were missing images there, often thanks to Doug, which was very cool.

And now the part you've probably been expecting considering the source!  Up first is another autograph of the pride of Flower Mound, Texas, Chris Brown, and as usual I'll mention that Doug is almost 100% responsible for my collection of that player.  Next is a couple jersey relics of hockey Mike #1, Cammalleri, from 02-03 Be-a-Player, plus a 2012-13 UD Game Jersey set that was given away at the NHL Hall of Fame back in 2013.  I hadn't seen those before so learning about them was cool, plus I got the set added to the TCDB.

The other hockey Mike is Comrie, and his card happens to be more than just a normal BAP relic (from 03-04) as it got a 1/1 stamp at the 2004 All-Star game.  These aren't your standard 1/1s but I still like to label them that way, and anyway they sometimes make plain cards more interesting.  That'll become my first 1/1 of Comrie.

Another guy with twice the hits today is D-man Jon Merrill, a guy who's been with Vegas for the last three years but was drafted by the Devils, the team pictured above.  The designs of those relic cards are different but the Dominion and Titanium cards came out of Panini's Rookie Anthology, kind of an ancestor of Chronicles.  Doug's also been a major factor in my Merrill collection.

Last up in this scan is yet another defenseman, Jacob Trouba, who finally saw his tenure with the Jets end thanks to a trade to the Rangers, with whom he could possibly tie or best his career-high of 10 goals.  This relic with a fun design should represent hit #10, making him one of a select group of guys in the collection to hit that mark.

Two of the guys on these horizontal cards are also in the 10+ club.  One is Cogliano, whose Upper Deck Ice card is twice as nice thanks to dual swatches!  The other is possibly my favorite card in the whole package is a new Shawn Hunwick--something I haven't been able to say in a while--that includes an autograph plus an enormous Blue Jackets patch, plus, you know, his Wolverines helmet.  Hunwick remains my lone hockey supercollection and it was a nice surprise from Doug that I could finally add to it again.  And last but not least is a cool multi-swatch card of former Michigan star Tyler Motte, a guy that went off for 32 goals and 24 assists in his final year in Ann Arbor, then bounced around from Chicago to Columbus to his current team, Vancouver.  I like when manufacturers make relics more interesting with ideas like swatch windows that spell out something relevant.

Doug, once again, happy birthday and also thanks for all the effort (and money!) you put into this amazing package that was an excellent start to the year.  While I work on getting all of these scans added to my collection and my stats updated I hope you enjoy the little envelope I sent your way to celebrate 2/14, and I'll work on another one as soon as I can.

Everyone please head over to SCFtDS to check out Doug's work and send him some cards of 2/14 babies yourselves.  Then stay tuned for all the other posts I've been promising while I've been slacking this year!

2019 trade package #30: Card Boarded

Once again I'm celebrating a Michigan Football win on a lovely (if chilly) Saturday, even if the team didn't play as well as expected.  And I'm doing so with another package from Paul who lives in Sterling Heights, Michigan.  

But wait!  It's not buddy of the blog Paul who runs Scribbled Ink, but instead Paul who runs Card Boarded!  This Paul contacted me letting me know he had some Michigan Hockey dupes to send my way, and I said sign me right up, because I love trading with new folks, especially fellow Michiganders, and especially especially anyone that has Michigan stuff I can use.

So on a day dominated by football but also marked by Michigan's second contest of the season on the ice, here's a look at all the great hockey stuff Paul sent my way:

It was a very Hockey Mikes kind of package, and I would have used that tag if it would have fit, but Paul sent me a nice variety of players so there wasn't room.  Cammalleri (1 new card, 71 total) and Comrie (14, 41) are two such players, and the latter definitely got a nice boost.  You'll see more of him in a minute, but this first bunch of five gives you a good idea of the range of years and sets spread throughout the mailer, especially Pacific and Upper Deck MVP.  Cogliano isn't a "Mike" but did get three new additions to his collection (46).

I mentioned Paul added 14 cards to my Comrie collection, and here's most of the rest.  Pacific makes a couple more quality appearances with designs I like--no surprise at this point in its run.  This scan includes the first of a number of Victory cameos you'll see in the next few, plus a shiny (a.k.a. difficult to scan but good looking) Parkhurst.  Jack Johnson (52) gets a newbie from UD, a brand also included in Comrie's count.

Here's our other Hockey Mike:  former Wolverwing Knuble (2, 24), pictured with his fourth (and sixth) team, the Flyers.  As you can see, 2007-08 MVP's base cards came with the silver signatures instead of making them an insert, which seemed pretty cool to me.  Then we get into another nice run for a single player:  John Madden (10, 29).  The three-time Cup winner (two with the pictured Devils, once with the Hawks) got a nice boost with this selection, including more Pacific goodness, Victory and MVP, and one of a couple appearances of a very cool UD Victory design, right down the middle.

After a couple more Maddens, from previously seen Victory and Ultra sets, we move on to a singular Al Montoya (17), the goalie for the first team I watched with student season tickets.  Then we go to one of my biggest hockey PCs in Brendan Morrison (11, 94), big enough that he has his own Google album in my collection.  Ranked #2 after a guy you'll see in a couple scans, he was also the beneficiary of many of the same sets we've seen already, which is a great thing since I like how they look.  2001-02 Topps makes its third and final appearance, plus there's the beautiful 2000-01 UD Vintage, once again, to its left.

Four more Morrisons lead to a singular cameo for Max Pacioretty (51) on a 2013-14 Score Gold parallel I'm surprised I didn't have (though I do have the base version).  It reminds me of the look Topps used to use on its own Gold inserts until recently.  Then it's back to the crease for yet another big player run:  Steve Shields (14, 31).  These were a huge boon to one of my smaller collections that I'm happy to be growing, and, as is often the case with goalies, there's some terrific shots.

Nothing against the rest of the cards you're seeing today, but this scan and the next are my two favorites, and I think you'll see why as you look them over.  The 2000-01 Pacific base that ends the last scan includes an outstanding photo, but that same year's Stadium Club design, leading off this one, can't be beat.  Then we're back for the Vintage design I keep mooning over, and the shiny Parkhurst look from 2003-04.

We'll get back to Shields in a minute, but first we have a couple other players to cover here.  The first is top PC guy Marty Turco (7, 126), who also gets some good crease shots.  He stars on one of the coolest cards in the whole envelope, a solid (acetate?) base card from a 2005-06 Upper Deck Trilogy subset numbered 092/599.  I don't think I'd see these before, but the Frozen in Time cards are quite thick, and the see-through aspect is always a plus.

Zach Werenski (9) then pops up on the newest card in his small collection.  We'll see if the Columbus D can score 11+ goals for the fourth straight season.

This penultimate scan is my other favorite because it includes some excellent looking stuff, plus everything's horizontal.  Comrie, Madden, and Morrison all return for their final appearances before we come to the conclusion of the Steve Shields show.  And what a show it is with some cool designs, including a sweet 2001-02 Atomic Premiere Date parallel of the already die-cut base set (#03/90) and my first Shields relic in nine hits:  a 2000-01 Black Diamond Game Gear goalie pad.  That's much cooler than the traditional jersey swatch and I think it's awesome.

Last up today is the remainder of the Turcos, and why shouldn't the #1 PC guy get to send us home?  His three horizontals are from 2002-03 MVP, 2003-04 Pacific's In the Crease, and the same year's SPx.  The Pacific insert somewhat reminds me of other inserts the brand did on the baseball end while the SPx design brings to memory the product's earlier emphasis on holograms.  Those are joined by a mini from 2001-02 Private Stock's PS-2002 insert.

Paul, thanks for reaching out and sending me some great looking, useful stuff for a bunch of my hockey collections!  I'll try to start piling up more Wings/Preds/goalies/etc. so we can do this again soon.