Friday Was A Big Deal

The Giants are in "must win now" mode and it shows after Friday's dealings. The big deal of the day was re-signing Franchise Tagged Jason Pierre-Paul to a new 4 year deal which also helps their tight cap space. Maybe giving them a chance to run at DT Jonathan Hankins and keeping last years dominating D-Line intact.

I think JPP earned his worth last season with decent numbers of 7 sacks, 3 Forced Fumbles and a TD despite his hand issues. At times he seemed to make a bigger impact on a game then most noticed. I even thought he played well enough to earn Comeback Player Of The Year honors.

To celebrate the big re-signing, here are some recent additions of JPP to my PC I just put in the Giants binder today,

JPP wasn't the only Friday moves....

Two other moves was a re-signing of backup QB Josh Johnson and another later in the day when they agreed to terms with QB Geno Smith if he passes the physical by Monday. I think Smith still has NFL talent, but was just put in the wrong locker room situation. The Giants have been known to take flyers on guys with some troubled pasts before like Kerry Collins and David Carr and did well with them. Collins actually took them to the Super Bowl. Maybe by the time Geno sits behind Eli for a few years, he matures into a better QB. I can only hope.

I also hope Geno makes a comeback because of this card I pulled from a Fleer Retro autograph pack back in 2013.

 

These moves on Friday go along with other key offseason moves with the signing of WR Brandon Marshall, OL D.J.Fluker, and TE Rhett Ellison. I expect more to come and especially in the running back department. That should be an interesting one to watch.

Wrappers Of Collecting Past:2013 Upper Deck Football

2013 became the first time I started to appreciate NCAA football cards from Upper Deck. Not being a big college football card fan, I mainly strayed from collecting it even though I have always loved what Upper Deck brought to cards.

But, something with 2013 caught my attention and I started to collect and appreciate Upper Deck's college football efforts more even though NFL still took more of my money. It must have been that highly touted football rookie class that turned out to be a flop. But at the time for me, it was all about finding Geno Smith in packs as I thought he was the next big thing.

 

Four years later, I am still wrong about that. At least I got some enjoyment of opening this product and pulled my first ever high-number Sp from a few hobby packs I picked up.

So how bout you guys? You bust lots of 2013 UD looking for those top notch rookies? Do you bust it now? Thoughts in comments are welcomed as always!

Breaking Wax: 2013 Fleer Retro Autograph Packs Break Of 13

As most of you know by now, I was a lucky recipient of a #UDRAK that had some amazing items in it including today's Breakin Wax product . If you don't know what that is, it's a program that Upper Deck is running to give back to fans who have supported them over the years or have given back to the hobby.

Now that I have given the back-story on how I got these, you also could get one if you had ordered a box of 2013 Fleer Retro from one of the bigger companies such as dacardworld.

Each pack of 2013 Fleer Retro Autograph pack has three cards. All three cards are autographed and are either a Fleer Retro Rookie Sensations or Fleer Ultra design.

Overall, I pulled a whopping 39 autographs. Many were unknown so I wasn't going to post em. I just wanted to get right down to the good stuff and here we go!

Two Justin Pugh autos for my Giants PC!

Not bad here either. Bengals heavy.

I posted these not because of the player, but how he signed the cards. Two different....

There were also tougher autographs to land in these packs, believe me, as most packs had repeat players. The next two cards are tougher autograph pulls of players I believe still have potential in the NFL but have to be put in the right situation.

First up is Mike Glennon. I think this guy has more potential but for some reason the Buc's decided to bench him. He played really well subbing for the starters the last two seasons when they went down and he has led the Buc's to victory a few times too. Maybe a change of scenery will help.

And finally, Geno Smith. This guy I had big expectations for out of the 2013 class. I picked him as the top QB of the class. Guess I was WAY wrong though he has had his good games. New York is probably not the best set up for him either. Who knows what happens next year to Geno with a new coach coming in.

Overall, it wasn't a bad break. All of the cards above are going to my PC and I have set some aside to giveaway too. Hopefully the players all will have a bright future ahead.

Panini Card Of The Week: 2013 Absolute Memorabilia Rookie Roundup Jersey Geno Smith

Player Of The Day # 12

Here is you way to start earning points in our DAILY CONTEST in our Player Of The Day Promo!

If you have ANY PANINI CARDS of the featured player of the day, take a picture of the card (doesn't matter if it's a base card, insert, autograph, or memorabilia card as long as it's Panini) of the featured Player Of The Day and email it to us at sportcardcollectors@hotmail.com and you will earn 1 POINT for doing so. If you have pulled our featured Player Of The Day from your pack or packs of Panini Player Of The Day cards (card should look the same as the Luck above), send us a picture of YOU and the card to sportcardcollectors@hotmail.com and you will earn 2 POINTS for doing so.

Entries Due By The End Of The Today

Contest Open To US Residents ONLY!! Sorry! 

Fan Gallery Of Geno Smiths!

 

 

Burt Gummer

mrblu1976

 

 Jammin JDcards sweet auto card

 Jason B sent us one as well!

Review: Topps Football Blaster 2013

With a lack of funds for a jumbo box and the fact a hobby box only has 1 hit in it, I always give retail Topps a go. As with every year, I am mainly searching for rookie cards in a product like this. The exclusive commemorative patches are just bonuses.

We did pretty well in this break and for $20 felt like it was the worth the buy. Read on to see why.

Box Break Down:

• 10 Packs Per Box
• $20 a Box 
• 1 Commemorative Ribbon Per Box

   

BASE CARDS: Topps most of the time struggles with action photography. But this years flagship set is some of the best photography we have seen from Topps and may also have reminded us of what Upper Deck used to bring to NFL cards. All of the rookie photo's are from the Rookie Premier so a lot of them have the players on the field. Rookies fall about one to two per pack.

The base cards also have the trademark white border which isn't quite as wide as we have seen it some years. The bottom of the card design with team logo and player name looks great. One of the better designed Topps base cards in awhile.

And as with all Topps flagship products there is the Sp base and rookie card factor as well with the different photography.

Nice blaster box find at 1:63 packs

 

 

 

INSERTS:  In recent years Topps loaded up their base flagship products with inserts. This year it was nice not to find 3 inserts per pack. Most of our packs in the blaster only had 1. A few had two. So overall this blaster only had about 15 inserts. Not bad. The designs were nicely done as well and we were glad to see 1,000 Yard club make its return. Mini's also make another return in this years product.

And there are a good amount of parallels to find as well. We only landed one in this blaster in the Military one above.

Here are a list of the inserts:

- Gridiron Legends
- Legends in the Making
- Future Legends
- 1,000-Yard Club
- 4,000-Yard Club
- 1959 Topps Minis

And here is a list of parallels to find:

- Gold-Bordered Parallel Seq #'d to 2013.
- BCA-Bordered Parallel Seq #'d to 399.
- Military-Bordered Parallel Seq #'d to 399.
- Black-Bordered Parallel Seq #'d to 58. HOBBY ONLY
- Platinum Foil Parallel Seq #'d 1/1.
- Base Card Printing Plates #'d 1/1 HOBBY ONLY

AUTOGRAPHS: N/A unless you are very lucky.

 

JERSEY/PATCH CARDS:With every Topps NFL blaster release comes with a commemorative patch. Our patch was actually a bonus surprise as it was the military parallel. Most of the patches you find will be pink Breast Cancer awareness ones. We lucked out and pulled this paralleled one. We don't have much in terms of info on these. We tried to contact Topps football to find odds but never got an answer (are we at all surprised by this, no). If you have some info on these, please feel free to comment with it :)

OVERALL THOUGHTS: With 80 cards total, 1 commemorative patch per blaster, one rookie and about one to two inserts per pack its a reasonable price at $20. But the better retail buy to us for Topps football 2013, not that this one is bad, is the Blister pack. It has one rookie oversized jersey card per blister at $15. It's also loaded with inserts and rookies as well. And the Sp parallels fall 1:35 packs. W also believe there is 72 cards in there as well. The only un-fun part of those is it's only one big thick pack.

Review: Rookies And Stars Football 2013

First off, I would like to say thanks to the WONDERFUL people at Panini America for providing us with this box to review. Here are many places you can find Panini America: official site, blog, Twitter, and Facebook. If you don't follow them at all..you should! They talk to you on Twitter, have contests on their blog and Facebook and the site is also fun to visit!

Box Break Down:

• 24 Packs Per Box, 8 Cards Per Pack
• Four Autographs/Memorabilia Cards Per Box
• At least Two Autos Per Box
• 24 Rookie Cards Per Box
• NEW! Crusade Inserts - 2 Per Box
• Under $90 a box

   

     

 

BASE CARDS: Finally glad that Panini has moved away from the dreaded white background design of Rookies and Stars past to a more bold colorful approach that includes somewhat action shots. This is probably the best looking base set of Rookies and Stars to date. 

Another positive to this years base set is the inclusion of top rookie cards. In years past, all of the top rookies you could only find in autograph form. Now they are apart of the base set. I think this drastically improves the wanting to put a base set together.

Another thing I have personally always enjoyed about Rookies and Stars is they normally include rookies you don't find in every product. And those rookies are sometimes diamonds in the rough such as the 2004 Wes Welker I posses.

 

Favorite insert of the product and one of the best looking football inserts in years:

Here is a closer look at Geno Smith Gold parallel.

Gold Parallel in Crusade

INSERTS: The inserts stick with the typical Rookies and Stars appeal and they are well done. Such as Longevity, "rainbow" Longevity (there are much other rarer Longevity inserts as well), and basic looking inserts which the Statistical Standouts one rises above the others with its blend of colors and design scheme.

But the best insert in this years product was the one they resurrected and probably THE BEST LOOKING INSERT in years for a product. Crusade!!!! This insert made an immediate splash with me when I saw pics posted from Panini, but the pics don't do this insert justice. You have to hold one to really enjoy it and to treasure it. This design and appeal makes Topps Chrome refractors hide in the closet from fear of it. You get two of these per box. We got lucky and landed a third of Geno Smith that is a gold parallel version numbered to 25.

Here is a breakdown of the Crusade inserts with it showcasing several colored variations:

- Blue - randomly inserted
- Red - numbered to 99
- Purple - numbered to 49
- Gold - numbered to 25
- Green - numbered to 5
- Black - numbered 1 of 1

Going back to the other inserts, you should find the following in a box:
- 6 Parallels (includes all 100 rookies)
- 2 Statistical Standouts
- 2 Touchdown Club
- 2 Game Plan
- 2 Crusade
- 2 other inserts/parallels
 

AUTOGRAPHS:  The rookie autos are the base card design with an auto. But you can also find stunning Film Rookie Premiere Slideshow Signatures and Team Chemistry dual-signed cards and Rookie Materials Signatures that is much improved over years pasts that included manufactured patch cards signed.

I don't think we did too bad with our pulls. The two running backs are rising stars and if Bell can stay healthy he could be a starter in Pitt. I do wished we could have gotten more variety here other than base autographs however. I would have liked to seen one of those Rookie Materials Signatures being included in a per box basis.

JERSEY/PATCH CARDS: I like jersey cards on silver board and ones with a little bit bigger of a swatch. Panini did a great job here with eye catching silver board. I also like that they are all numbered so you know there is only a certain amount of each and not an overabundance. That should help with market sales.

Some of the swatches that Panini used for the Prime parallels are sickening especially against the silver foil. We have seen others post patches from the product that are stunning.

OVERALL THOUGHTS: Another solid Rookies and Stars release (and one that we would probably try again with the low numbered parallels and hit potential) that some are calling the best in years. Solid base card design, sweet looking auto/jersey cards and Crusade inserts to me are an extra auto or jersey hit in a box and are pretty popular on eBay right now. So basically you are getting at least 6 hits in a box guaranteed without knowing if a bonus one is hiding. I would much rather pull a nice looking insert over a plain swatched jersey card any day. Tell me if you feel the same and I assume you do.

The autographed cards we didn't pull in our box look outstanding and if you don't know what we are talking about, here is the link to Panini's blog, The Knights Lance where they are displayed.

http://paniniamerica.wordpress.com/2013/08/16/the-panini-america-quality-control-gallery-2013-rookies-stars-football-110-pics/ 

Let us know your thoughts on our break and Rookies and Stars football in general.

Panini Breaks Out Their Playbook for 2013

Panini broke out their Playbooks to design this years Playbook Football 2013. The product promises to have taken the best of the first two releases in 2011 and 2012 and also add some new fun collectibles as well.

New and exciting to this year is Flywire Booklets, Playbook Coaches Signature Booklets and Down and Dirty Booklets.

Also, this product will include four autograph or memorabilia cards in every four-card pack that breaks down to two booklet cards, at least one autographed version, one additional autograph and one other hit. And I would imagine the price would be similar to past years at $200 a box.

We have broken down three of our favorites so far in this years product:

  

Down & Dirty Booklets: These look SICK!! Finally, unwashed jerseys! Lets see all of the blood, dirt, grass stains and bring us closer to the game. To me this may be one of the greatest innovations in awhile. I have always wanted to see the hard work players put onto the field and now we can.

  

Flywire Booklets: These are collars from players taken from players and are GAME WORN! But tough pulls at 1/1's. Incredible idea and design however.

 

Rookie-Drawn Play Booklets: The 40 players who attended the 2013 NFLPA Rookie Premiere each sketched out and autographed their favorite plays that they hope to run in the NFL for them to make the biggest impact on the field.

I don't know if I can wait til October til this product hits the market. Just sick, sick stuff. So far, Panini is having an strong early start to their NFL card season.

Review: 2013 Score Football

First off, I would like to say thanks to the WONDERFUL people at Panini America for providing us with this box to review. Here are many places you can find Panini America: official site, blog, Twitter, and Facebook. If you don't follow them at all..you should! They talk to you on Twitter, have contests on their blog and Facebook and the site is also fun to visit!

Box Break Down:

• 10 Packs Per Box, 50 Cards Per Pack
• Three Autographs Per Box
• One extra Autograph or Memorabilia Card Per Box
• Fifty Rookies Per Box
• Ten Hot Rookies Per Box
• around $95 a box  

 

BASE CARDS:  I not only really like the design, but the photography is amazing. The cards give you that feel like you are at the game or remembering those moments on the field when you watched it on TV. Yes, I know it has a border and usually I am not a border type of guy, but once you get a glimpse of this photography the border appears as a TV screen as the cardboard brings the game to life.

There are also three subsets that wrap up this set.Airmail, Franchise and Road To The Super Bowl along with the 110 rookies in the classic 1989 Score design.Road To The Super Bowl wraps up the Ravens run through the playoffs and into the Super Bowl. The Airmail are top QB's in the game and Franchise are some of the most important players to teams. You know, Franchise players.

Overall there are 440-card base set that includes 220 veterans, 110 RCs, three 32-card subsets and  then the 14-card Road to the Super Bowl.

I like seeing subsets built back into products. It breaks them up. In terms of Base cards, Score gets a high five here.

 

 

INSERTS: Parallels galore!! We lucked out and pulled a End Zone black parallel numbered to 6. There are also Scorecard (we borrowed an image from Panini to show since we forgot to take a pic of one), Gold Zone, Red Zone and Artist Proof (low numbered pulls) and what we call "glitter" parallels. The Glitter parallel reminds me of Score Summitt parallels in 1995 that they called Ground Zero.Overall, well done design on the inserts.

The Hot Rookies jump off the cardboard at you with their bright colors. And for once it does bother me that players are in 00 numbered uni's, because seeing them in their NFL uniforms for the first time overtakes that part. I would rather see this then unmarked helmets that some companies use.There are also autograph and parallel versions to the Hot Rookies as well.

There are hard to find parallels of the base rookie cards as well as we landed a purple bordered version of first round QB EJ Manuel thats numbered to 99. There is also harder to find Black parallels. Not to mention Red and Blue retail parallels as well.

You get a decent amount of inserts per box.

 

AUTOGRAPHS: Two autographs per box is whats stated from Panini (will explain at the bottom in final notes why I said it that way)..but from what I hear there are actually 3 in every box. We found Tavon Austin hiding in our box early on. He should be a great weapon in this league and probably one of the better players in this draft.

I once again enjoy the original set design so an autograph looks great on it.

The Inscriptions design is that of the late 90's autograph insert that could be found in packs of Pinnacle. Back then the cards were printed on acetate. Here is an example of one:

I think its a great design and would have been awesome if Panini had followed the original suit of printing on acetate instead of cardboard.But still, very well designed.

JERSEY/PATCH CARDS:A nice prime swatch of the Future Franchise receiver of the Bears Alshon Jefferey.A well designed material card as well. I like the white against the color of the memorabilia.The player stands out as well.

OVERALL THOUGHTS: Did this product live up to its hype and celebrate 25 years of Score...YES!!! If I was Dennis Green and had to say something about this product, I would say "This product was what I thought it was!!" I was impressed just by Panini's images, but now that I have busted some of this product, not only will I highly recommend it to you, I really want more! And I will probably find a way to get it!

Honestly, there is a lot of fun in a box of Score Jumbo or even a pack. They are 50 card packs and rummaging through it is like buying a box of cards at a yard sale, you never know what you are about to find. The cards in the packs are also aligned like an Oreo cookie. You got to eat through the first chocolate cookie (base cards) to get to the awesome creamy center (inserts, autographs, memorabilia, other surprises) and you finish the rest of the cookie by finding the subset cards.

The one thing that I really need to point out is the box has a printing error on it, it states "one autograph or memorabilia per box" don't listen to it. There are at least 3 hits in a box and possibly more low numbered hits and printing plates and most likely a bonus autograph.

My final thoughts on this product is, not a bad price. 500 cards per box. A ton of parallels with great odds of hitting a low numbered one as I have seen at least every box with one under 50. 3-4 hits. 50 Rookie Cards of tomorrows stars. There is value in every box and fun waiting to happen.
 

RATINGS:  Bloggers Note: Our ratings are based specifically on the blaster, box or packs we opened and do not express what the overall product could bring. Ratings based on a 1-5. 1 Being the lowest and 5 being the highest.
                Packaging: 5
                Base Design: 5
                Insert Design: 5
                Memorablila/Autographs: 5
                Blaster, Hobby Box, or Pack Value: 5 if not easily 6.