$25 A Week Challenge Week 9:Collins Takeover

This weeks pickups are here fresh off the press, well, most are. The thing about this segment is, I am a few weeks behind on some adds.

So let's check this out!!

(oh and this will be the final week on the Kerry Collins adds in this segment, they will be featured in another way down the road)

I already had one of the Black Diamonds from 1998 for Kerry Collins, so why not add another especially for $.99 and shipping for $1.00.

Low numbered, rare 90's insert of my new PC for $1.49 and $1.55 shipping...yes!

Whether it was Collins or not, $2.49 plus $.50 for shipping on this beautiful International refractor was an easy grab.

A NY Giants relic for $3 plus free shipping. Yes!

Same goes for this one with $3 and free shipping.

Underclassmen refractor and a

 

a 1995 Stadium Club rookie add for $.99 and $.35,  YES YOU READ THAT RIGHT. THIRTY FIVE CENTS SHIPPING. I couldn't leave that there.

 

It's not very often you land a low numbered card of a top rookie QB for .99 with  $2.49 shipping. I had to grab it.

A new Saquon Barkley add for $.99 and free shipping. I love the photography on this one.

And a nice foil based Gridiron Force for just $1.49 and free shipping!

This weeks grand total is $21.88. Always fun to stay under budget when you can.

Some nice PC pickups all around and more to come next week including the 10th post in this series so I am gonna have to make it a special card.

So now I pass it onto you, what would you have picked up for $25 this week?

NYG PC Spotlight: Saquon Barkley

Today is a special edition of NYG PC Spotlight. I am thinking of turning this entire series this way where I just tackle of the best cards I have of one player and post them instead of posting a front and back of an individual card.

Today's focus is on NY Giants Running Back Saquon Barkley. He had an amazing record breaking rookie year but has yet to find himself in 2019. But, that's mainly due to an injury, bad play calling (I mean who calls a sweep on a third and one with Saquon in the backfield??!) and a poor offensive line in front of him. I am hoping a much bigger 2020 for him and this young team.

Let's check out the gallery of Saquon,

Most of these Saquons were picked up through trades, including the one and only Facebook trade I ever made, with one coming in a box break and some as gifts.

I haven't spent much time in 2019 picking up Saquon hits as I have been going for Jones and Slayton, but it doesn't mean I haven't picked up Barkleys. I have been grabbing cheap inserts and base of him I don't have for 2019 with most averaging $1

I have well over 100 Barkleys in all and am driving towards the 125 mark. He is quickly becoming one of my bigger NY Giants PC's but still has some climbing to do before he is up there with the elites.

I look forward to sharing the next player in this series.

I Play On Team Pinnacle

I bought a ton of 1995 Pinnacle football and never ONCE, NOT ONCE ever pulled a Team Pinnacle from a pack in 1995. And when I say bought a ton, you could probably fill a bathtub of wrappers. That's how hard it was to pull one.

However....

 

Flash forward to last year, and boom, the 1:90 pack pull sat right in my hands after breaking a 36 pack lot. It was definitely worth the wait and finding two of the top QB's in the 90's wasn't a bad thing either.

These were the toughest cards to pull in 1995 Pinnacle football and I think baseball as well.

Just like with many of the projects I start, I feel connected to them. Same went for 1995 Pinnacle Team Pinnacle and the word set gets thrown around quite often by me. So what did I do, I went set chasing.

Two of the rookie RB's from the 1995 draft

Two rookie QB's from the 1995 draft. Collins is a double PC card

 

Who can go wrong with these two on a card??

The fronts of these cards are full on dufex effect and the backs are foil. I have read somewhere recently that there is a double dufex parallel to these that I don't know about. Would be interesting to actually see one.

I haven't gotten too far with this 10 card set as you see above and as always any hobby friend help is appreciated. I know some of you can find things at card shows, sportlots, etc that I don't have access to.

Kicking Off The New Year Right!

My second to last trade of 2019, came from @Alindz99, that was our first trade ever.

What turned out to be a tweet by me looking for a specific card, which he had and I plan to show off soon in a separate post, turned out to be a whole lot more than that. We boomed out a pretty solid trade for both of us in the long run. It's really cool how that works out.

I tried to hit every part of his PC up and he returned the same for me.

Let's check out what I scored, if you want to see what he got he posted his on Twitter.

 I told him I like to collect 90's inserts and he delivered with this Mystery Finest of Tony Gwynn.

 A Mickey Mantle I hadn't seen before. From an Upper Deck soccer set

 I don't have to say anything about this card, it speaks for itself

 Really fun Robin Yount. This is when baseball cards were cool

Nolan Ryan sealed Coke set

Andjuar rookie card from Opening Day. His name continues to be tossed around in trade rumors

 Hideki Matsui black border parallel numbered

Greg Bird gold border paralell

Tanaka Game Used relic

A-Rod rookie card.

 Pele Allen And Ginter No Text Back. Haven't seen one of these in person before. Cool addition.

 And of course no trade with me isn't complete without lots of NY Giants.

 Some Odell and a nice Wayne Gallman Prizm Silver Prizm

Evan Engram bronze. I have quite a few of these Donruss parallels of Engram. I should probably gather them together again and see where I am at with a possible rainbow.

Engram Phoenix and silver parallel from Select

 Kyle Lauletta Optic silver

Totally digging the Rookie Introductions of Shepard. I think the base set should look like that for Prizm

 Some examples of why 90's cards are the best especially the mixed in Fleer Metals

 Phil Simms rookie card. I do have one, maybe two already but why not another. A Giants legend.

Some Rodney's,I do have them all but I always look to upgrade my not so mint ones. The Tiki I was hoping was Rodney. I really need that 1997 Black Diamond base card. Only one on eBay its $15 for a base

 Giants team draft card. Never seen or pulled one of these

Followed up by Bill Parcells. The Giants have had some great coaches over the years, well except the last few. They need to figure it out again. Coaching can really change a team around.

And a nice surprise to finish, a Xena Warrior Princess auto of Cleopatra. Any new addition to my non sports PC is a plus especially an autograph.

Hobby Resolutions 2020

It's that time of year again, time to make New Years resolutions. I try not to make them for my personal life as I have never once stuck to them with it mostly being weight based. You know the "I will be a better person this year." "I will try to avoid eating donuts" "I will at least lose 10 pounds this year" When honestly, most of these are things we should be doing already every day and not things we set for the beginning of the year only to fail a few weeks later. I know that personally many times.

Even though this year I have set a 15 pound loss goal because it was what I put on the last couple of years. I would like to at least get back to where I was, I could never lose the 50+ my Dr actually wants as I don't like a lot of vegetables and meats. I am a carb-a-tarian.

Last year I set some pretty lofty collecting goals for my collection and they were my biggest ones yet. Let's see how I did.

Before I move onto my 2020 goals, let's take a look back at my 2019 ones.

1. Add 1 set from my 1990's Spx needs (added 3 I need to show)
2. Finish up my three favorite football 90's insert sets (NOT EVEN CLOSE)
3. Finish up my 1996 Spx baseball set (noooooooooppppppe)
4. Finish up more 90's insert and base card sets. (I did finish up at least five sets, but many more to go!)
5. Add 100 more new Griffey Jr's (think I fell well short of this)
6. Add 50 more new Rodney Hamptons (well since it's getting harder to find newer ones, I could only pull in less than 30)
7. Add some new Non Sport Autographs from my list of wants. I will be posting those soon as I revamp my tabs.(added some of those!!)
8. Start my collection overhaul (re-organized my entire collection!)
9. Post updates on my collection overhaul project (think I did some but not all)
10. Put at least half of my Griffey want list onto the computer if not all then upload it to here (finished it all!!)
11. Improve the blog look, appeal, and content (this is always a goal and this year I am really striving to do so)
12. Fix all of my want lists, checklists, and update the face of the blog (on and off I did)
13. Make a list of more late 90's sets I want to finish adding the set number needs on here. (did this!!)
14. Improve the way I write. It's been a habit to type what I write before my pictures, but it seems I have been doing that wrong for the past 6 plus years and it needs to be fixed. I always thought words lead into a picture but it's not as the words must be posted after. I also want to add more words and information to each post. Or even a flashback memory. Something that won't make the articles so short and sweet. (I started to then fell off the wagon again. sigh. I think it's because I strive to do daily content that I just throw something up)
15. Post less mail days on here or find more creative ways of posting them instead of this is this and this is that type of posts. They bug me when I do those. I may move some/most mail days back to Twitter only (we will see) and post more articles on the things I am passionate about instead. (did some of this but gotta strive to do more in 2020) 
16. Work on a new blog name. Yes, I am still at that point of wanting a new one and would love to accomplish it by my blogs birthday in March. I want this title to say what I collect like Eli's Crew or anything you guys can come up with. Wes suggested "In The Cards". I do like that one. But something that covers Ken Griffey Jr, NY Giants, Rodney Hampton, Non Sports and the 90's. (I did and it was a good one but for some reason or another, it hurt this blog in the long run)
17. Use the background my wife picked up to take blog pictures on. I waste so much time taking pictures and cropping. WAY TOO MUCH. With this background it will be just snap and upload which will save me tons of time. (did this and boy does it save time)
18. Cutout/cutback on trading with newbies. I know this sounds odd, but I wasted too much precious time last year digging stuff out only to have a trade fail. This was many, many, many times of spending hours digging out trade bait and having the person preferring to sell or simply just backing out despite liking what I offered. So my trades will happen only with my usual group.(no, I fell for newbie trades again but I would say overall my trading was way down in 2019 due to funds to ship) 

There was a lot to do in that list but I was pretty successful.

Lets check out 2020. We will see some similar goals involved

1. KEEP MYSELF MOTIVATED TO BLOG. (I have been teetering on this for a couple of months and this one will not be easy)
2. Add 1 set from my 1990's Spx needs (really need to get a basketball one done)
3. Finish up my three favorite football 90's insert sets (GOT TO FO-CUS)
4. Finish up my 1996 Spx baseball set (Dennis gets me closer, but I am still not at the finish line)
5. Finish up more 90's insert and base card sets. (so many I want to do)
6. Add 100 more new Griffey Jr's (time to try this again)
7. Add 20 more new Rodney Hamptons (this number gets less and less as I close in on all)
8. Add some new Non Sport Autographs from my list of wants. I will be posting those soon as I revamp my tabs.(will be adding a new list)
9. Add 100 Kerry Collins for that new PC.

That's it for 2020. I set my goals shorter this year in hopes I can accomplish more of the things that have more meaning to me. Makes sense doesn't it?

Well, I hope this starts a train of 2020 goals across the blogosphere as I would like to see yours as well! If you don't have a blog, just tell me them in comments.

Happy New Year to all and have a great one!