I mailed out all the Anniversary Giveaway gifts. You should receive yours by August 6 - except Derek, who will hopefully receive his PWE around the 14th. [Fuji, the postal clerk made me leave out the second number of your home address so if you've got a box at your place check #70]
I also received a giveaway today. Tom offered some great cards on his blog and welcomed anyone to claim up to nine cards. I'm both greedy and lazy so I asked for ten cards, assuming that at least one of them was claimed in a previous comment. Rather than take the time to check, I just asked for any that were left.
They were all left, and Tom sent all ten:
I'm chipping away at the 1992-93 Upper Deck basketball set, and these three Hall of Famers help push me past 60% completion. I'm not planning to put together the 1983 Topps baseball set but I grabbed two HOFers just in case. Got a CMC for the PC and a color matching Matt Moore just because. No idea how I'm going to fit Tyrese Maxey or Byron Scott into my basketball box, but I can discard a Michael Porter or Terry Rozier if I have to.
Tom, thanks for the PWE! Sorry I bent the rules a bit 😁
I finally finished a set project decades in the making.
After a couple Sportlots purchases and a PWE trade that took more than a month to complete, I now have every base* card in every Upper Deck hockey set from 1990-91 to 2025-26.
*this does not include Young Guns or other short-printed cards.
There are about a dozen cards with corner dings that I might try to replace/upgrade through TCDB trades, and I have not decided if I want to add 2025-26 Upper Deck Extended Series to this project. I could buy blasters right now at Barnes & Noble but I'd prefer to just buy the full base set for the same price (or less)
That decision might come down to whether or not I can fit them in my rows of 800-ct boxes.
I don't consider having this 200-card extension neccessary at the moment. Perhaps I'll reconsider soon.
But for now, it's done. All 35 Upper Deck hockey sets are complete.
Oh, and I completed another set recently.
The last card arrived in the mail yesterday.
It had to go through eBay's authentication program (it didn't have to, but...) hence the sealed sleeve. I might break the seal on it. I've kept a couple other graded cards sealed with that crud - but this one's special.
Exactly nine years and eleven months after officially starting the set build... it's done.
I'll have more posts about this once I complete my stats spreadsheet and scan a few more singles from this 70 year old set.
Now I can focus on some much newer and cheaper projects...
Here's part two of the retro box break... and also part three of the Anniversary break?!?
Before opening any packs I perused the face cards to try and match the collecting preferences of my friends in the Anniversary break. So if you're collecting the base set or glossy All-Star set *cough* Fuji don't add any new singles to your set build until you receive these 😉
These are the packs I kept:
Yup, two Mel Hall cards in the same spot. I could not inflict that horror upon any of you, so I'm stuck with 'em.
I was too busy playing tic-tac-toe with Blue Jays to see there were two Enos Cabell cards facing front in the same spot as well. Not a single Hall of Famer base card facing front, but the Cecil Fielder RC might be the best card in the set anyhow.
Got two Tim Wallach All-Star cards facing front, too. Wonder why they seem to choose the same cards to top off each rack pack? And why they wouldn't put bigger names to entice kids to buy them? This was a BBCE sealed box so I know it wasn't searched. I checked the backs and found three Hall of Famers: Jim Rice, Rod Carew, and Steve Carlton. So the stars are in these packs -- at least some of 'em.
There's no way I would have completed a Glossy set even if I'd kept every pack.
x Sparky Anderson 2 Eddie Murray x Lou Whitaker 2 George Brett 1 Cal Ripken x Jim Rice 1 Rickey Henderson x Dave Winfield 1 Carlton Fisk 1 Jack Morris 1 American League team 1 Dick Williams x Steve Garvey x Tom Herr x Graig Nettles 1 Ozzie Smith 1 Tony Gwynn x Dale Murphy 1 Darryl Strawberry 1 Terry Kennedy 2 LaMarr Hoyt x National League team
Six Padres seemed excessive until I remembered that 1) the 1986 set has 1985 All-Stars, and 2) the 1985 All-Stars were largely chosen based on their 1984 performance. San Diego won the NL pennant in '84 - but the Tigers won the World Series and they only had half as many cards in this insert set? Was the NL just totally bereft of name-brand players in '84-85?
As for the main set, I opened them pack-by-pack and sorted them on my kitchen table, just as I did with my first-ever set build which was actually 1987 Topps, but ..close enough.
I cracked these open during a rain storm, which reminded me of a similar day sometime in '86. My mom agreed to drive me to the corner store to pick up packs of Garbage Pail Kids and we got back home just as the sky darkened ominously. I remember spreading out my packs on the dining room table while thunder boomed and rain poured outside. Maybe I should rip a box of GPK for this Anniversary break?
Don't worry, I'm not going to send you all GPK stickers lol. But while I'm on the topic, Series 4 was the set I was most familiar with, as it was the most common and current release in the summer of '86 -- just like 1986 Topps baseball.
Series 3 packs were released in January 1986, but they may have well been released before I was born. A couple older kids on my block had Series 3 singles and I was in awe of each and every one. Similar to how I viewed my older brother's baseball card ablum and his random singles from 1982-1985.
6 year-old me when I saw a 1 year-old card/sticker
I knew someone who had Garbage Pail Kids stickers from Series 2. And boyyy did he let us know it. He even claimed that he had an Ashcan Andy from Series 1 (the '52 Topps of GPK lol) but he never took it out because it was "too valuable" and our goober hands would wreck it or whatever. Psssh. He sooo did not have an Ashcan Andy.
Oh! Speaking of round metal things.. I saw the Stanley Cup! It was so random and unexpected. Yesterday I decided to take my bike out for a ride in downtown Cranford(town next to me) because Saturday was a washout, and I was on my way to get a burger when I turned the corner and saw three guys getting out of a car. They all looked to be about my age (i.e. not pro athletes) and one of them was carrying The Stanley Cup!!!?
In New Jersey.
Like..huh?
I had actually not watched much of the playoffs and it took me a second to figure out who had won when I got semi-close to the guys and shouted "You got the Cup?!?! That's awesome!" across a side street.
They did not reply to me because of course they didn't. They're friggin Carolina Hurricanes 😡
If I were a few years younger, if my wife were still around, or if it were a member of a team I haven't hated for three decades.. I might have followed them and asked for a picture with it or something.
Instead I went on my way, grabbed my burger, and immediately started searching "Day With the Cup" online. All the internet would tell me was that little-used spare forward Nic Deslauriers had it in another part of the state on Friday. It's Day with the Cup, not weekend.
This wasn't Nic though. Even though he's at the end of his career he's still noticeably younger than the guy I saw.
I had never heard of this guy (I'm not exactly current on Carolina's front office staff) but apparently he's the third member of the organization to bring the Cup to New Jersey. I'm still not happy they won it though.
New Jersey hockey fans got a chance to see the Stanley Cup up close this week, more than 20 years after the Devils last won the championship.
Carolina Hurricanes forward Nick Deslauriers brought the trophy to North Wildwood, where fans posed for photos on the pier. Deslauriers, a former Philadelphia Flyer, said he grew to love the Jersey Shore during his time in the area.
The day before, Hurricanes assistant coach and Wood-Ridge native Bill Burniston brought the Stanley Cup to his hometown firehouse, Ridgewood High School, W’s Village Grill in Oakland and Parkwood Deli in Ridgewood, giving fans another chance to celebrate hockey’s biggest prize.
Before I left for that surprise Stanley Cup viewing... I recorded the third and final installment of the Chrome Anniversary Box Break trilogy. Ugh I am never filiming myself ever again ever...
We're still a month out from my actual blogging anniversary but I want to get the rest of the prize haul posted this week and mail out the gifts next week. You'll see why soon enough.
One thing I wanted to chase down for my anniversary/birthday this summer was old wax packs from my youth. I knew that JB's Sportscards had some early 1990s packs but had no idea that their wax pack stash went even further back.
Additionally, the card show I stopped at last weekend had much more retro packs including rack packs of 1983 Topps. I initially picked up a pair - along with a pack of 1986 Fleer - but balked at the price. $135 total. I put back one of the '83 Topps rack packs and my new total was $75.
$60 for one of these sounds high to me, but I had to get at least one. These predate my card collecting years (I was 3) and I probably won't see an entire box of unopened 1980s rack packs again at least until the end of this post... I resisted the urge to rifle through all the packs for a favorable face card and picked this one after a short sifting mainly for the Tigers team card. (If a Red Sox player or HOFer was facing up I would have grabbed one.)
Here's how I know the retro wax guy at the show overcharged me. The 1986 Fleer pack, with no HOF rookie cards possible, was $15. The 1983 Fleer pack on the left was purchased from JB's store. Potential PSA 10 rookie cards of Ryne Sandberg, Tony Gwynn, Wade Boggs... $10 a pack.
I will not be opening the 1986 Fleer pack, for two reasons. The first reason is that I already have the completed set and at $15 a pack, with little chance of seeing another one in the wild, it makes no sense to unseal it. The second reason? 1986 Fleer is the first pack of cards I can remember buying as a 5-6 year old. I know I saw packs on the shelf at my local WaWa, next to Bazooka Joe and Charms blow pops. If Topps or Donruss packs were also on the shelves, I don't remember them. In my mind, Fleer was first. Maybe I was drawn to the stickers?
Since I don't have any personal attachment to the 1983 packs I'll go ahead and crack those open.Fun fact: these 1983 packs will be the oldest I've ever opened. My father in law opened a 1977 Topps pack from the 2011 Topps diamond giveaway(a 34 year-old pack at the time.)
Besides the Ryno/Gwynn/Boggs rookies, we're looking for any of the 43* Hall of Famers who were active at the time (hat tip to Night Owl for the research) Mike Schmidt, Rickey Henderson, Cal Ripken, Nolan Ryan, Yaz, and Robin Yount in particular.
*an appropriate number since these packs are 43 years old **N.O.'s count lists 52 Hall of Famers. However that counts 9 HOFers who were managing in '83
Here we go...
Wow, the cards are so crisp! The Lonnie Smith made me smile. Jon Bois fans know why.
Jim Palmer is a nice Hall of Famer to have, since the Orioles were World Champs in '83.
I somehow pulled both side of the Black & Blue franken-card - but out of order (I was momentarily stunned by how off-center Vida was lol)
Kent Tekulve makes an appearance. I had to explain to my friend Brandon at Baseball Brittie why this old reliever he'd never heard of was so popular.
And... that's it. No Red Sox but some nice cards. I definitely would buy more if I see them again at JB's.
Now for the $60 rack pack of 1983 Topps. Less value per card here, but more chances to hit a HOFer.
Let's start with the top window.
Soo many leader cards. The Dodgers and Cubs cards are nice. There was no Bob Emergency in the early '80s, that's for sure.
Window #2 felt thicker... because it had an extra card.
A few of these were off-center including the Rose. But the Eckersley is sharp.
Last window. Let's get the right Boggs this time...
Nope. Another Gaylord Perry, a couple minor stars, and a Red Sox common. Also, another extra card. Did that happen often with Topps, or were these resealed somehow?
Dennis, do you need this Gibby? If anyone needs 1983 set fillers let me know.
Quick story about that Gary Gaeti RC - it's not the first time I've owned this card. When I was about 8 or 9 , I was browsing at my local shop, a hole-in-the-wall called Bobby's Umpire. A customer had just ripped open a bunch of packs and put all the singles he didn't want into a brown paper bag. When he got up to leave he saw me and offered the bag of cards. I excitedly accepted and rifled through the bag as quick as can be. Before he was out the door I shouted "You gave me a Gary Gaeti rookie card!" I'll never forget his response: "So?" It meant a lot to me at the time, but I get why he didn't care.
So the 1983 Topps rack pack was subpar. Let's move on to 1986, shall we?
I bought this for just under $200 at Dave & Adam's, which works out to roughly $8 per pack. A much, much better value than the 1983 - even with the lack of star power potential.
Per Night Owl's math there are 37 Hall of Fame players in the 1986 Topps set (and 7 managers) no Rookie cards of Hall of Famers; the best RCs possible are Cecil Fielder, Darren Daulton, and Ozzie Guillen I guess? This is pure nostalgia for me. Not the first cards I ever purchased -- the first cards I ever collected.
Guess what I'll be doing this weekend? Hopefully there's a complete set in here. I already see Cecil :)
Results of the break will be posted next week.
What's the oldest pack of cards you have ever opened - either by year or by age (how long it stayed sealed)?
I had planned on shopping at a baseball card shop while I was in Connecticut, but it just so happened there was a card show in town as well. This one was in an American Legion building, and it exceeded my modest expectations. I brought home lots of goodies I'll share over the next few weeks.
For now, here's a look at some singles I picked up. The first table I stopped at had four boxes labeled 25 cards for $20. Basically a dollar box with 5 freebies thrown in. I ended up with 61 cards, the seller asked for $40, and then said I could take five more. But I'd already spent a half hour at his table so I passed.
Lots of shiny refractors and singles from high-end products. Yu Chang is numbered /149.
A few basketball prizms. I couldn't resist the color matches, especially UConn alums Stewie and Ray-Ray.
Like the last show I attended in NJ, there were tons and tons of football cards for sale. The Jaheim Bell is serial numbered to 75. I didn't know if he was still in the league or not, but apparently he's in Steelers camp this summer.
Colorful legends. The non-Prizm Bo is serial numbered to 299.
I'm actually stunned at how much football stuff I've seen at shows, particularly in the off-season. It's nearly equal to baseball in total volume.
My Packers collection is at capacity but I always manage to make room.
A Sonny Jurgensen relic for a buck? Sure, why not? I'll even take Tyreek at that price.
This show even had some hockey! The Brendan Othman RPA did not come from the dollar box, but the Bobby Holik auto did. I wanted to pick up at least one soccer card to commemorate this year's World Cup, and a lot of sellers had a lot of soccer cards (probably the third-most plentiful sport at the show.) I probably wouldn't have picked this particular Haaland card but I didn't want to use up any more time/money searching for a better soccer single.
The Warren Moon RC was in the dollar box, I'm lucky I got to it when I did because there was a guy searching through the other end of the box (mainly looking for baseball) and when I added the Moon to my stack he said "You found that in here? Nice one!" The vintage-ish hockey cards were not from the dollar box. These and other vintage cards came from a seller at the other end of the room. He noticed my Whalers hat and mentioned that he was an assistant to GM Paul Holmgren for a while. His job was to work on arbitration cases for the team; he said the last case he worked on was (against) Manny Legace.
The odd thing is, Legace never made it to Hartford. He was drafted by the Whalers but didn't debut in the NHL until after they'd moved (and he was shipped to the L.A. Kings by then.) 🤷
On my way out there was a doorway with tables on all sides belonging to one dealer. To the left there were higher-end ($5-50) cards in top loaders and snap-cases. One row was filled with hockey relics from the same early 2000s SP Game Used set. Some were gold versions but they were all the same. Behind me was a dollar box that didn't seem nearly as good as the one I'd hit earlier.
In front of me was a table with sealed wax packs, rack packs, and boxes from yesteryear. 1993 Leaf and 1994 Topps wax boxes for $40 caught my eye. And then I saw the 1980s packs. Stuff I haven't seen since my earliest days as a collector. I had to bring some of those home for the anniversary break. I just.. I'm not sure I can open them. Maybe next week.
For now, here's a box I'm happy to open: more Topps Chrome Platinum.
I've got more sealed packs in my house than I've ever had at one time, so I might start posting these breaks weekly. Can't wait to ship out the care packages!
Like a lot of American sports fans this summer, I am suddenly and thoroughly invested in soccer.
Last night's match between Argentina and Cape Verde was one of those rare sporting events where the losing team won more than the winners, if that makes sense. Against Lionel Messi and the defending World Cup champions, a tiny island nation with a population roughly the same as Sacramento nearly pulled off the impossible. I kept thinking it's gonna suck when Cape Verde lose this game on penalty kicks ... and we were almost there.
I mean... look at this goal. Did Beckham ever bend it like that in a knockout match?? (he did.. kinda)
Anyway... you're probably not interested in those types of goals. And I'll have plenty of time to talk about soccer at this afternoon's 4th of July picnic, every time the in-laws mention politics.
We are officially in the second half of 2026 and I wanted to take a quick look back at my New Year's collecting goals. The initial post wasn't as clear about my objectives as I remembered, but the main three are:
set building, team PCs, and vintage
My set building projects are a little more daunting than I'd expected. I added 2026 Topps to the list, and Series 1 is almost complete. I'm not quite ready to publish an updated wantlist, as I do expect to find some needs at the card shop in CT. However, thanks to my Sportlots order finally arriving, I am nearly done with my flagship Upper Deck hockey base set project. Not counting upgrades, I'm less than 20 cards away from completing every set so far:
Upper Deck Hockey
year
card #
player
status
2016-17
323
Kris Russell
incoming (SL)
2017-18
320
Connor McDavid
incoming (eBay)
2017-18
422
Daniel Sedin
incoming (SL)
2019-20
354
Brian Dumoulin
incoming (TCDB)
2019-20
392
Craig Smith
incoming (TCDB)
2020-21
52
Oliver Bjorkstrand
upgrade
2020-21
528
Carl Soderberg
incoming (TCDB)
upgrade
2020-21
549
Marc Staal
incoming (TCDB)
2020-21
560
Alexander Wennberg
upgrade
2020-21
564
Olli Maatta
upgrade
2020-21
626
Ryan McDonagh
upgrade
2020-21
649
Trevor van Riemsdyk
incoming (TCDB)
2020-21
658
Patrick Kane AS
incoming (TCDB)
2020-21
669
Braden Holtby AS
upgrade
2020-21
677
Leon Draisaitl AS
incoming (TCDB)
2021-22
58
Miro Heiskanen
upgrade
2021-22
63
Tyler Seguin
upgrade
2021-22
128
Evgenii Dadonov
upgrade
2021-22
188
John Carlson
upgrade
2022-23
511
Patrik Nemeth
2022-23
515
Nick Foligno
2022-23
528
Antti Raanta
2022-23
552
Dominik Kubalik
2022-23
569
Filip Gustavsson
incoming (SL)
2022-23
571
Jacob Middleton
2022-23
572
Alex Goligoski
2022-23
592
Jaroslav Halak
incoming (TCDB)
2022-23
593
Ryan Carpenter
incoming (TCDB)
2022-23
596
Ryan Lindgren
incoming (TCDB)
2022-23
600
Tyler Motte
2022-23
609
Chad Ruhwedel
2022-23
628
Ilya Samsonov
2022-23
652
Axel Jonsson-Fjallby
2022-23
699
Tkachuk/Niederreiter CL
incoming (SL)
2023-24
511
James van Riemsdyk
2023-24
563
Steven Lorentz
2023-24
586
Scott Mayfield
2023-24
659
David Pastrnak AS
2023-24
666
Kirill Kaprizov AS
2023-24
688
Leon Draisaitl AS
2024-25
651
Rasmus Kupari
upgrade
2024-25
699
E Bouchard / Fox CL
upgrade
2025-26
149
Justin Faulk
upgrade
2025-26
267
Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen
upgrade
And I'm about as close to finishing the 1956 Topps set as Cape Verde was to beating Argentina.
I still need to find a ... Bob
As for team PCs, I continue to chip away at the base card binders - while often finding room for one more page. I'm very close to having every Hartford Whalers base card from 1992 to 1998; my spreadsheet says I’ve got 29 cards left to track down but I probably have half of those in completed sets and need another copy for the Whalers collection.
Sidebar - you know how Topps made those SSP photo variations of Washington Nationals players on Expos day a few years back?
Upper Deck has produced some Carolina Hurricanes base cards from Whalers night, but they haven't done one in a couple years. Which is a shame, because superstar winger Mikko Rantanen played all of 13 games in Raleigh before declining to sign an extension(whoops!*) and ending up in Dallas via trade.
**if Mikko chose Dallas over Carolina to avoid paying taxes, well... he also avoided winning another Cup lololol
Anyway .. one of those baker's dozen appearances for the Canes happened to be on Whalers night. I would pay $25 or more for an SP photo variation of Whaler-rantanen. Alas, UD didn't think to make one.
I was working on a deal with a TCDB user who had several Whalers I needed. But he was so slow in responding that I had to put an Out of Office sign on my profile stating I'm pausing trades on the 3rd (This was the 29th btw) Though I made it clear that if we could come to an agreement by the end of the week (on a PWE swap) I'd be able to mail the cards. He declined the trade and said maybe we could revisit later in the summer. He needed more than ten days to decide, I guess?
The last goal of mine was to complete a 144-card collection of (mostly) vintage slabs. That has gone very well, though I'm still about 20 cards short of my goal. I've been saving for the Connecticut trip so I haven't added to this collection lately.
Some of my newest additions
What are you working on this year? If you set collecting goals for 2026, how close are you to achieving them?
Thanks for reading!
~
p.s. ... did you hear the tight end for the Kansas City Chiefs got married? ;P
