Random Cardboard:1996 Pinnacle Team Spirit Barry Bonds

Random Cardboard:1995 Fleer Ultra Power Plus Barry Bonds

Breakin' Wax:1997 Zenith Baseball 8X10 1 Pack Break

It's time for another trip back in time. A nostalgic packed trip back when card times were simpler. A time when collecting was mainly for fun and not for profit. A time when the market wasn't flooded....well with player worn materials.

When I was scouring the webs I found a good deal on a box of 1997 Zenith baseball 8x10 and just couldn't let it sit there. Even though I am not a huge fan of oversized cards I still had to go for it. I remembered how beautiful those cards were.

 

Every box came with 12 packs. Each pack comes with two 8x10 cards and a pack of 5 baseball cards. So seven cards in all. There was chances at V2 motion cards and the ultimate chase in Z-Team.

 

Here is what the pack looks like

Back of the pack and checklist. It was so much easier in those days to find checklists as they came in packs and on back of cards. Simpler times.

So let's take a rip to see how I did.

First, the two 8x10's

Barry Bonds. Full blown photography!

Roger Clemens Dufex!! Siiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiccck. It's like Roger is in Star Wars.

Now the five card pack. Interesting start topper to it.

Irabu. George Steinbrenner's favorite player ;)

Jose Cruz Jr

Edgar Martinez

Vladimir Guerrero

and the final card Javier Lopez. Great photo.

Fun nostalgic rip as I expected. I bet you are probably wondering what I will do with the rest now, well, as with other packs I have picked up recently, I am going to keep them sealed and packed away.

Have any of you guys ripped these before?

Wes Is At It Again!

 

Raise your hand if you are guilty of sending pure heat to mail boxes.....I thought so.

Once again the great Wes formally from the JBF blog, has made his presence again as I have seen him hit up a few mail boxes with some amazing mail days. Amazing isn't really the word to use here. Fire, heat, throwing pizzas, over the top, mind blowing, etc, etc, etc.

What I am showcasing today, is only the literal top of the ice berg. Just the small tip of it. The Titanic would survive through this part, but as I go on when the whole iceberg is revealed, good luck. I haven't quite figured out how I will showcase the rest or when, but it will be shown. I just wanted to give the introduction tour first.

Let's look at some Griffey's to start this off,

 Upper Deck KG

 Jr is swinging away here back with the Mariners after a long hiatous

I always liked this photo. Gotta be the bubble or the color photo on top of the sepia.

 Shiny spectrum. Upper Deck baseball is severely missed in the hobby

 I always like oddball adds to my PC for Junior

 I haven't ever see this card before. Brand new add for my Junior PC

King Felix dominant first year card

 A-Rod. My only A-Rod card now. I traded all of mine away a couple of months ago.

 Another addition for my Gleyber PC

 90's PC love!! Totally digging this addition

 Willie Money Mays!

 Burrell TTM auto

1986-1987 Fleer Bill Walto. This design to me is one of those iconic ones.

 Great looking Harry Carson TTM or IP auto. He has a well defined signaure.

Ernest Borgnine was the infamous gap toothed smile and voice as the Cheshire Cat in Alice and Wonderland but also was a voice actor and actor in many of TV and film as well. He also lived til he was 95 years old. I must have watched Alice in Wonderland a hundred times when I was younger.

Shiny Bonds.

Back in the 90's when the WNBA first started to exist, I collected the cards and seeing these in Wes' package just brought me back to then. I still have what I collected then and now will add these to it.

Thanks goes out to Wes for only the begging of what I have to show off from this mail day. I have a few new ideas I may implement to show them off but it will be a little while before I can do so as I am backed up with other things I must show off first. So keep this as a note of what is to come!

UPDATE: I am showing the rest of the mail day off on my Snagging Cardboard blog. I have decided to revive it after a year off. Add it to your blogroll and check it out HERE so you won't miss the rest of this mail day!! Card Number 1 already up!

Museum Musings:A Piece Of Barry Bonds History!

Back in March, I held a contest taking suggestions on what kind of stuff you guys would like to read more about on the blog. Many of the suggestions were toys to non sports to non card items. Well, to please the crowd I will do my best to post those kind of items in this new segment.

Over the years, I have accumulated so much junk. A good portion of it including most of my Starting Lineups and any figures were traded off. I also had a bunch of autographed items I was just looking to downsize with and traded half of those off as well. I still have some to go in that area.

Most of the items I acquired over the years were from purchases in online catalogs, local outlets, department stores, gifts from family, and from a few contests I won. I originally really wanted these items, but as time has gone on and I have gotten older and what feels as my house getting smaller, I decided it was time just to collect cards now. No more adding those markdown McFarlane figures just for the fun of it.

There are some pieces however, I plan on keeping forever. These pieces I will showcase on here.


Back when I first joined the era of internet collecting in 2011, I joined the Upper Deck Volunteer Alliance and earned myself a mail day with my work on my very first mission. As a reward, Upper Deck sends it's members who earned a mail day a prize or prizes. One of my first prizes was the Upper Deck memorabilia piece of Barry Bonds.


This is a Piece Of The Action gameball swatch from when Bonds hit his 500th home run. It is also numbered to guess what, 500.

 

The piece comes with the authenticity Upper Deck hologram on the back.

 

I like the piece but wished it had been Ken Griffey Jr instead. Never really been a Bonds fan especially after he was in the steroid accusations group. I had considered trading this off but never have had success doing so. For now, I plan on keeping this piece of MLB history* instead.There has to be a reason I have it still. I do like the design, ball swatch with stitches and the fact it's limited to 500 but once again, it's Barry Bonds.

How many of you own a piece like this? Own an Upper Deck Authenticated piece? What do you own or dream to own? Let me hear it in comments!!

Mail Day Saturday:Reader Mail Day Part V

The second part of my mail day, Part V, features some Panini baseball. The shiny goods.

Up first, two big name Prizm parallels in Bonds and Machado.

A groovy looking shiny Chen

And a low numbered Pedroia /65

Next up, some Optic parallels. Let is shine!

 

Diamond Kings shine!

Pretty solid findings in this round. Another coming up soon!

1997 Upper Deck UD3 Baseball Pack #2

Here are the results from Pack 2 I just busted. Another good pack with three name players included. 

Another thing I like about the cards are the  nice offset of the photos they used. Good balance.

Pack 3 will be busted tomorrow so stay tuned!