Puck Ya!

 

In my finale post of my mail day from Grady M, I could have made this into a month long series from everything he sent, I wanted to show off my favorite cards from the box packed full of goodies.

First up, a hockey card set I actually like a lot. These Dazzlers inserts are from Upper Deck flagship Hockey for this year and they look amazing. This set brings me back to the 90's with the design and flair and tempts me to chase it. 

However, there are 4 different versions with Blue, Green, Orange and Pink and each set comes with 100 cards.

Below I got a taste of a few different ones,

But I at least got a few to kick off a "maybe later on side project chase".

Also, speaking of 90's...

How 90's are these?!! The facial expressions get me as well. I really like these but don't expect to chase them like I may the Dazzlers. I wouldn't complain though if a few fell into my hands though.

And the final piece of my Grady M mail day were these Mosaics. As everyone knows, I love this stuff and Grady had plenty of shiny to send my way:

My eyes are too distracted to continue this post.

But, I gotta finish it up.

Thanks again to Grady for the mail day. Those mail days you send always brighten me up and gives me plenty to do between sorting and taking pictures to share my treasure. I have got to continue to dig for you and hopefully before this posts I would have hit you back.

Dazed And Confused

My first thoughts when I saw an affordable complete set of 1997-1998 Spx hockey was Alright, Alright, Alright.

I was completely happy to knock down another one of my set needs for my 90's Spx project.

That's until I got it in hand.

It was a cold Tuesday afternoon when my mail arrived. I yelled "Shotgun" , despite going by myself, and made my way to my vehicle to drive down the road a little ways to my mail box to get the mail. I usually walk it, but not when its below zero with a wind chill on top of it.

I grabbed the mail and bolted home.

I thought about letting it sit and getting done some housework done first, but I couldn't. I had to check out the set. So I ripped open the box it was sent in and took out the plastic box that was holding the card set.

It opened pretty easy and as always I began enjoying the cards as they were. As everyone I think would agree, the 1997 Spx design is one of the greatest ever.

Here's a few cards from the set,

 Peter Bondra

Ray Bourque. This was the only one athlete I have ever met.

Curtis Joseph

Hmmm..something different about this card. Why does the card have silver foil?

Wayne Gretzky! The Great One. One day I will own his autograph!

 Brian...hold on a minute...

John LeClair

Jaromir Jagr and his wonderful mullet

 Hmmm another one...

And Joe Juneau

As I began looking at the rest of the 50 card set, I began to realize more and more that something wasn't right. That's when I had discovered that the seller had replaced some of the cards in the set with it's parallels but sold it as a complete set.

Why couldn't he have just sent what I paid for. It would be a lot cooler if he did.

Instead I found myself with 13 now missing from the set.

Eleven of those are Steel parallels

The other two, Silver parallels.

Even though I want to chase down all of the parallels-etc at some point, I need to complete my base sets first and this was a complete disappointment.

You Cool Man....

No, No I am not.

And stupid me, I always leave feedback on an item as long as I received it and can see it in hand. I wished I had opened this up all of the way first.

Oh well, you gotta keep on livin'...L...I..V..I..N..

I got to thinking more about this later today and feel I got more value than I paid for in this lot because of the parallels. So if there is a positive to take out of this, that's it.

Now the next journey is to find the rest of my needs to complete this set. This is not the first Spx set I still need to finish up with 13 or less cards, the other, 1996 Spx baseball.

Not sure if the seller was Dazed and Confused when he made this listing as a complete set or if he knew what he was doing. Either way, I will be much more cautious down the road when I make another purchase like this. Maybe even message the seller ahead of time to find out if it's a real complete set.

Let's Talk About Sets Volume 40:1996-1997 Spx Hockey Inserts Update

Can't believe all of the dirty sets talk I have had on here now as we have approached post #40 in this series. I hope you guys have enjoyed the ride with my set updates as well. By looking at the numbers, I would say no, but hopefully you actually have been.

Don't worry though, there is an end date to this series and the daily double posting. Just trying to help us all get through one of the hardest times our country has faced in some time and what better distraction than reading/discussing cardboard.

So let's get to doing that instead.

First up Holoview Heroes,

 

There are 10 cards in this insert set and I found a four card lot and made a really cheap offer. To my surprise, it was accepted. Did I mention this lot had the hardest card in Gretzky in it?! Now I only have 6 more to go. Here is what I am missing,

2,3,4,5,6,8

Hopefully can narrow those down soon.

Up next, an extra insert in Great Futures in which now I picked that up as well cheap.

It features Wayne and four prospects

And speaking of Wayne, well, here is the special Wayne Gretzky Tribute insert

This one looks so much better with the double hologram goodness in comparison to the other sports where it was just one featured.

All that stands in my way now is the few Holoview Inserts, the gold parallel set and the Gretzky autograph. I do have the Gretzky promo card on the way as well.

Still a mountain to climb with this set and any help is appreciated!

Let's Talk About Sets Volume 37:1996-1997 Spx Hockey Complete Set

Thanks to my big trade with @90sNicheFBcard, I was able to lock down some more sets from my Spx of the 90's project.

Three of them to be exact.

Today's knockdown is the 1996 hockey base card set. I gave up trying to knock it down card by card, so I jumped on the opportunity just to own it as a whole and here it is in all it's glory.

With this one in hand, it narrows my 1996 Spx hockey down to finding the Holoview Heroes, Wayne Gretzky promo, Wayne Gretzky autograph, Wayne Gretzky Comm, and the Wayne Gretzky draft card. Some of these I have since picked up. Not sure I will ever land the Gretzky auto with those high rates. Unless one of you have one for trade.

Stay tuned for more Spx adds coming up!

Blast From The Past:1996-1997 Pinnacle Mint Hockey 1 Booster Pack Break

In 1999, a flick with Brendan Fraser and Alicia Silverstone called Blast From The Past came out. It was about a scientist named Calvin Webber who was played by Christopher Walken, that took his pregnant wife in a deep underground fallout shelter in 1962 when he thought a nuclear war was imminent. During that time, their son Adam played by Fraser (who seemed to had been in every late 90's movie) was born and was exposed to only the culture of 1962 in the shelter such as the music and TV shows of the time. Life was accustomed to not being at the surface. 

Fast forward 35 years later, their supplies and food was running low so someone would have to come above ground and take a risk to get new products. That was supposed to be Calvin, up until he was ill from stress from his one visit to the surface. So his son Adam would have to venture out in a world he had never met.....

This segment takes a look at products that may have been hidden in a underground fallout shelter for over 20 years and now just coming back out to be rediscovered....by me. Guess you can call me Adam even though my name is Matt. These are products I opened when I was first collecting and is a Part Of My Past, but may not have a memory or a Origins story to attach to them. Most products I post on here will, but some won't and those will be covered in this new segment.These products will be between the years of 1995-1999 only.

Let's just hope my experience with these breaks is better than Adams first visit to the surface.

So let's take a Blast From The Past with a one pack break of 1996-1997 Pinnacle Mint Hockey!

In the 1990's, one of my favorite sports to collect was hockey believe it or not. Hockey cards is what got me into this great hobby. However, it's much different today. Football is my main sport by far with hockey being the least. Baseball is second with basketball a further third (mostly due to licensing)

But, when playing on eBay one day, I was looking for some packs of Pinnacle Mint to rip and I came across a seller who was selling five packs for $5 or so. I couldn't turn that down so I jumped on it and here we are today. I left four of the packs sealed for fun and ripped just this one.

 

Here is the pack itself. They used to go for $2.49 which I think is pretty cheap for cards and coins. Each one came with 2 cards, one base and one with a coin slot, and one coin.

Here is an overall at look at what you can find, Silver Team Cards 30 Cards 1:23 Packs - Gold Team Card 30 Cards 1:72 Packs - Nickel/Silver Coins 30 Coins 1:30 Packs - Gold Plated Coins 30 Coins 1:72 Packs - Fine Silver Coin 30 Coins 1:5,077 - 24KT Gold Coin 30 Coins 1:51,641 Packs

Here is the insert included in the pack.

That had the checklist on the back. Some big names to find and that's what I was hoping for!

Jocelyn was a goalie who played for 14 seasons in the NHL for 6 teams including the Canadians pictured here. Notice that the team symbol is bronze. There were three colors to find overall.

Back of the card

The holey card of Daniel Alfredsson who played 18 seasons in the NHL, that's a lot for the hits they take, with 17 of those for the Senators.

Back of holey card

And my coin was a base one of Brendan Shanahan.Was named one of the top 100 NHL players all time, won three Stanley Cups, scored a ton of goals, and is a Hall Of Famer. Can't go wrong with this find.

This was a really fun break. I need to find some baseball and football now to at least rip a pack of. I broke a box of football a few years ago. I think this product was a genius idea with crossing over two hobbies and it gave us more options to choose from. Not something we get today.

Hope you enjoyed this Blast From The Past!

While Posts Have Been Posting...

It may feel on here that I haven't missed a beat while the posts have been posting, but honestly, I haven't checked fully in on this blog in awhile.

All of the posts that have been posting are backlogged ones that have been desperately needing to see the light of day. So instead of posting my few small and far in-between mail days, I have been tweeting those out and letting these backlogged posts take up the blog.

Well, except for today. I decided to pop in with something fresh and update on what I have been doing in my spare time instead of putting up new posts.

I have been sorting. Every minute I have had a chance, I have been sorting, re-organizing and tearing it down and apart. This is by far the most work I have and will be putting forth into my collection since I started in the 90's.

First off, I have been stripping apart my once insert binders. Originally I was just tossing all the inserts into binders and that was it. But, I got so sick of looking for stuff I thought I had and since it wasn't by team it would take forever to look for. Well no more!

I finished baseball and football awhile go and now it's basketball and hockey time. I have to pull all of the cards out of the binder which is time consuming to say the least, then sort them by team using the handy BCW Sorting Tray. Which I suggest once again you go grab one for yourself HERE. Don't think I could have done this project without it.

Since I only have one tray free to work with, the other two have NY Yankees and rookie cards in them to be put away, so I have been transferring each sport by the tray onto my desk which I cleaned a spot for.

After that, I have been making sure to have BCW Penny Sleeves (which I found much more sturdy than it's rival counterpart), and BCW Trading Card dividers on hand so I can keep this project moving forward. I already had Shoe Boxes on hand.

 And Shoe Box Houses to keep it nice and neat. I have been labeling the outside of the boxes as I go.

Now a bunch of empty binders and pages remain. But, don't worry, those won't be empty long.

The next part to tangle once basketball and hockey inserts are done is my Rodney Hampton binder. I have decided after much back and forth that I want to put those in a box as well by year. That way if I am looking for something I can just go to the year and find it.

This is just some of the sorting I am tackling.

I still have the following to do,

• Sort hockey rookies by team. Last sport that needs it done
• Move star players by sport from boxes into binders for easier access
• Finally combine my football rookie inserts and my football rookies. Football rookie inserts must be pulled out of binder, sort by team to be put away
• Sort hits by team 
• Locate some non sport sets I have been wanting to binder

My point is to make it so I can locate cards easier. This should be a big help, but a lot of work and very time consuming.

I will try to keep you guys updated on my progress when I can. In the meantime, at least until November, enjoy the backlogged posts.

Another note before I close, I have been keeping my want lists and set needs updated on here. Just in case you are looking to trade :)