Barnes & Noble >>> Target

Christmas is just over a month away and my daughter's 16th birthday is even sooner, so I've been doing a lot of shopping for girly things I know nothing about. We're visiting my family in Connecticut for Thanksgiving, so I had to order what I could last week to ensure it would arrive before this coming Wednesday.

A Barnes & Noble opened nearby just as the school year was starting, and both my girls wanted books, so I stopped in on my lunch break. There was a woman practically harassing the cashiers and manager, over something that was going to be released the next day. The lady claimed that Wal-Mart and Target had already released them, so she couldn't understand why B&N wouldn't sell to her. She tried all the excuses -- you're losing out on sales, flippers are going to buy them all up. Can you hide one for me? Can you limit them to one per customer?

The staff stood firm - we're going to follow store guidelines, ma'am. Good on them. But now I was curious... what the heck was coming out the next day that this woman was going psycho for?!?!

Just in time for the holiday season, the highly anticipated Pokémon TCG: Mega Evolution—Phantasmal Flames drops Nov. 14 

Part of me wanted to come back that morning and buy up all the Pokemon I could, but the collector in me sympathized with the kid who asked for them. My mom used to go to toy stores at the crack of dawn and ask the stock workers if they were unloading a fresh supply of Starting Lineup figures so she could get first look at the selection. 

And so, as a way to support the store for standing firm while also appeasing the collecting gods, I bought some cards.

Apparently this has been a thing for a while; we used to have a much bigger B&N that closed about three years ago. Never saw any cards in there. 

I was pleasantly surprised by the selection -- four or five different brands of football, a small amount of baseball, and Topps Holiday Basketball. 

Yes, Topps is back in the basketball business. I've seen some interesting breaks of Flagship, but didn't know there was a Holiday release until I saw two mega boxes sitting on the shelf.

I don't care if there's a towel relic of some first-round bust in here, I'm just happy to have my purchase in hand..

The closest big box retailer to me is Target, and they almost always have a good selection of sports cards. I stopped in to shop for my girls and naturally checked the card aisle for Topps Update baseball and Upper Deck hockey. They had neither. I'm used to Target not having any hockey (they had a couple blasters of last year's Skybox Metal. Ugh) But ... no baseball?!?! Very little football, too.

Target had gone all in on Topps basketball; 80% of the card aisle was NBA product. I had to order the cards I wanted on Target's website because they are not available in stores. 

And so, I went home and ordered everything I was going to buy. Delivery was scheduled for Thursday. 

My soon-to-be 16 yr old had her first detention that afternoon (three tardies) and would have been home at 2:45 p.m. on any other day. My 13 year old comes home around 3:10 p.m. I texted her this:

NOT GOOD!!!! We didn't get the f**cking box!!!

Someone must have swiped it off our porch in the 15-20 minute gap between delivery and my daughter's arrival. Son. Of. A. Bitch. $150 in merch - more than half of which was cards - gone. 

There were more deliveries on the way, Friday and Saturday. I ran home as soon as I saw the delivery photo on Friday, then ran back when I saw a FedEx truck on my lunch break. Picked those up without incident. Saturday though... that was the big one. 

First year without my wife/their mom + sweet 16 b-day + Christmas = $800 laptop. This was me all day Saturday:

Needless to say the laptop arrived safely. One more delivery tomorrow and gift giving is just about done.

But I needed to fill that megabox-sized hole from losing my merch. I've been pulling double parent duty for 2+ months, working and cleaning and shopping for the girls. I deserve a little retail therapy, no? 

I wasn't going be too greedy and buy hobby boxes from my LCS for triple digits. And I wasn't going to order online again, especially since the delivery date would be the day we leave for CT. That meant more retail hoops:

It's not what I wanted, but I can treat myself to baseball and hockey after my next commission check from 4 Sharp Corners comes in (or my Christmas bonus from work 😉)

Not that anyone reading this is a big basketball collector (where have you gone, Jon and Billy?) but here's the highlights of the basketball haul from Target, starting with Prizm:

The Topps hanger was pretty standard. But it was interesting to see a (licensed) Topps set in a sport other than baseball:

Team cards and a Grizzlies throwback. I don't mind these, I just wish Topps would 86 the captions. The words "stars", "shine(s)", "young", "duo", and "lead the way" appear multiple times in these six cards. The editor in me is fuming at the lack of creativity. 

Legends are definitely not short-print variations in NBA sets. I pulled four, including a Schrempf Sonics card:

What is that wordmark though? I do not remember that at all. 

Here's a side-by-side comparison with the Holiday set:

Sochan paying tribute to Dennis Rodman here

One thing I was curious about was the cutoff date for off-season acquisitions. 

These weirdos both changed teams over the summer, but KD is pictured with his new squad on the Holiday card, while MPJ - now with the Nets - is still a Nugget in Flagship. Durant's latest trade demand was granted on July 6th while the Nuggets offloaded Porter on July 8th.

Holiday was released one week after flagship. Durant is a Rocket in both; MPJ is a Nugget in both. 

The hits had some more Nuggets, including the Jokic ornament and blue glitter parallel. The Dylan Harper relic is a nice pull as well. 8-Bit Ballers and 1980-81 Chrome are Flagship inserts. 

More Dylan Harper here. Collation was a bit odd - not that I was expecting a Cooper Flagg. Of the 85 base cards in the box, 18 were duplicates. Cam Thomas - who is still pictured in his Nets jersey despite being traded to Denver in the Porter deal - appears three times. Guess I'll have to return to TCDB soon..

One more thing... after I put my books and basketball card box on the counter, the girl at Barnes & Noble asked me if I would like to buy an Advent Calendar -- from Topps:

Yes. Yes I would.

Looks like I'll be doing daily posts in December :)



Thanks for reading!



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Opening Day

This is how I celebrate receiving a job offer at a sports apparel company:

My local Target hasn't been this stacked in years. Prizm packs? Penny sleeves? Repack boxes? Hell yes!

The reason baseball is missing is because the only product available is 2023 Topps, and if I buy a pack of that I'll be tempted to build the set. I've got enough set projects left to complete as you can see here.

Don't worry, there will be baseball on this blog tomorrow. And the next day, and the next, and the next...

As for the job, it's right down the street. It pays more than any job my wife or I have ever had, and it's right down the street. At a sports apparel company! Did I mention it's right down the street?!??! 

The only obstacles left are my background check (no worries there) and my professional references. Hmmm. I sure hope they don't talk to the office manager at my last job. And I realllly hope they don't talk to my previous office manager, who was showing us back office boys the OnlyFans page of our administrative assistant and being very personally critical of her. Without an HR person to report it to, I was torn between defending my mentor/Best Manager Ever or the Witch Goddess I was swooning over. I'd like to think I would have done the right thing regardless, but I'll never know. 

Anyway, that's ancient history now. It blows my mind that I worked at that place as recently as 2022. You're not here for office stories, you're here for cards. So let's start cracking open some packs!

 The hockey repack promised seven packs, one sealed fat pack, and one "bonus item"...

A loose common with a corner ding. Grr. And I didn't get one sealed fat pack in this box. I got two.

To save time/space, here's the rundown of packs and pulls:

2017-18 Upper Deck Series One 5-card pack: Henrik Sedin, Ryan Kesler UD Canvas
2020-21 O-Pee-Chee 8-card pack: P.K.! Connecticut Cam! McAvoy! Ethan Bear retro
2020-21 Upper Deck MVP 5-card pack: some old Russian "rookie" on Winnipeg
2021-22 O-Pee-Chee 8-card pack: some Finnish backup goalie rookie for Trannah
2021-22 Upper Deck Series One 8-card pack: a Young Guns RC I could get for 45 cents on COMC
2021-22 Upper Deck MVP 6-card pack: Hedman, Bread Man, CT Cam again, Carey Price
2021-22 O-Pee-cheek 28-card fat pack: Pastrnak, Makar, Tanner Jeannot RC, two Winnipeg retros
2021-22 Upper Deck Extended 26-card fat pack: a Devils card, four Kraken, and an actual decent Young Guns RC that I can't get for two quarters on COMC.

the whole hundred-dollar haul

The hand-picked 2022-23 packs were not even worth mentioning. Nice cards though.

My football boxes are full, so I only picked up one pack of 2022 Donruss. I didn't pull a Packer or a notable rookie. 

Thud. Should I have picked a Panini Prestige pack instead? This is beginning to feel like a bad idea.

That only leaves the big prize - basketball. I sure hope that Optic or Prizm can save the day...

I sure hope that Prizm can save the day...

I pull one current superstar out of these packs and it's Ja Morant. Figures.

The patriotic 'bonus pack' parallels were underwhelming:

At least Tim Duncan pops up again. 

 

Good news! I pulled two different Prizm parallels of an active player with an MVP award on his resume.

Bad news? It's Derrick Rose:

Did you know that Cam Thomas was born in Yokosuka, Japan? Has he repped the rising sun in international competition? (googling....) Nope. He does not appear to have Japanese citizenship.

Welp, that was $100 spent. I guess my good luck went as far as getting a good job within walking distance. At least I've got some new stuff for trades and giveaways.

Could I have done better at the card shop two blocks away? Perhaps, but his hobby pack prices are higher than Target's fat pack prices. I would probably have ended up with significantly fewer cards and few (if any) significant 'hits'. 

Oh and the shopkeep just went on vacation anyhow. Store's closed for the next five days.

Tomorrow.... baseball!


Thanks for reading!




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2018 Topps Chrome "Monster" Blaster Box Break

Before I get to my box break I want to thank all of you for the belated birthday wishes, and I hope you enjoy your prizes. Reading your reactions to each gift will be more exciting than cracking open a dozen packs of cards. 'Tis better to give than receive, after all.

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I was in Connecticut this past weekend, visiting my family for what amounted to a second birthday. On Sunday - after having lunch with my mom - I popped into Wal-Mart to check their card aisle, since I don't have a Wal-Mart near me here in Jersey. I've read that some bloggers have had better luck there anyhow. 

The sports card selection at the West Haven Wal-Mart wasn't great, but they did have fat packs of 2018 Topps series 2. I bought one of those, and with my last $40 I grabbed this:

This "monster" box of 2018 Topps Chrome was dented (hence the lousy scan) and it was the last one on the shelf. But that's one more than my Target has had, so I gave it a shot. 

I assume that these are called "monster" boxes because they are the physical size of two standard blasters. But the contents aren't that different: 10 packs plus two X-Fractor packs. The four-card packs allow me to scan the complete contents of each pack two at a time. 

Packs 1 and 2:

A pair of Dodgers, a pair of Phillies, and a pair of star third basemen. Are the purple refractors a Wal-Mart exclusive? 


Packs 3 and 4:

Gleyber Torres RC! I'm obviously not a Yankees fan, and Miguel Andujar has sort of stolen the hype from him, but I'm not complaining about this pull. Chris Taylor starts a trend of pulling the same card in base and refractor form. 


Packs 5 and 6:

A little bit of everything here - the first insert of the box, a Conforto prism refractor (I think?) and a Victor Robles RC. Also another Rendon, and another Yankee. 


Packs 7 and 8:

Manny Machado in back-to-back packs. I really like the '83 insert in Chrome refractor form. This Rafael Devers Freshman Flash insert is the only Red Sox card in the box. 


Packs 9 and 10:

Not a great finish here, the Buehler RC is nice and the Eugenio Suarez completes the base + refractor trend, joining Taylor and Rendon. Good thing I've got the X-Fractor packs to fall back on...

There are five cards per pack here. I've scanned them all together:

Wait...that's only nine cards. Where's the tenth card?

There's your 2018 American League Rookie of the Year right there. It seems like he's had a clutch home run in just about every Yankee win this month. I'll probably hold onto this until the season ends but it will eventually end up in the hands of a Yankees fan. Most of the other cards in this post are available for trades (except the Devers of course). If you're interested in anything, let me know.


Thanks for reading!


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Season Ending Retail Break - 2017 Topps Heritage High Numbers (and some hockey)

Y'all remember my five-box break of 2017 Topps Heritage? I spent about $300 on those five boxes but considering what I pulled (and how much fun I had) I'd say it was worth it. I still haven't finished the entire set - I need 25 of the 100 SP's - but I knew I'd have to set some money aside for High Numbers.

However, when I searched pre-sale prices at my favorite online retailers I found that many of them didn't have any in stock, and those that did were charging $90 for a single hobby box. I wasn't willing to pay more than the $65 that a "low number" box cost, so I had to go the retail route. 

As soon as I got word through the blogosphere that High Numbers hit stores, I made a trip to my LCS (Target) and grabbed a little bit of everything:

I also bought a fat pack of 2017-18 O-Pee-Chee hockey because I like to sample the season's first issues, and I usually prefer it to MVP.

But this year... blecch! I liked last year’s design a lot better. When I opened the pack I saw a shiny sticking out...

...figures it was a checklist. At least I got one Devil. Domi is a guy I kind of collect, and Mitch Marner is better than I thought (I guess he was overshadowed by Auston Matthews.)

My favorite card in the pack is definitely the Jagr playing card insert. As Shoebox Shane said, someone sign him! The fact that the scoring-starved Devils signed Drew Stafford (21 points last season) instead of Jagr (46 points) boggles my mind. Even if he can only manage half that total, the experience he'd bring would be invaluable for Jersey's young forwards like Pavel Zacha and Nico Hischier.

I was hoping to pull a RC of Charlie McAvoy – who I will be collecting because McAvoy is my wife’s maiden name – but instead I got White and Keller. Can't complain with those two.

Now back to baseball, and the Heritage High numbers. My first thought when opening these is that the black wrappers are much cooler than the yellow packs from the main series:

The second thing I noticed is that there were no "Rediscover Topps" buybacks included. Bummer.

I have to admit I didn't study the checklist before opening the packs, and so I assumed there were only 25 SPs in the high numbered portion of the set, numbered 726-750. I was half-right. There are 25 SP's, but the set "only" goes up to 725. I pulled four: 712, 715, 722, and 723. 

Here are the inserts, including the Target exclusive Topps Game rookies:

I got the "wrong" Dodger. Oh well, at least I pulled a Kris Bryant. The Thames and Schwarber cards are cool, too.

As for the base cards, I’m disappointed my guy Trevor Williams isn’t in this set. (Maybe 2018?) But I'm even more disappointed in the repeat packs I picked.

Of the 114 base cards in these packs, 42 of them were duplicates:

 And some were triplicates (is that even a word?)

Aanyone waant to taake these extraa A's off my haands?

Even though I'm planning to build a second (base only) set - as I did with the low numbers - I still have plenty of trade bait because... 

I bought the whole High Number base set from Just Commons. It cost me $25 and arrived the day after my retail break, but I still think it was money well spent, for one reason:

A couple hours after this set arrived I watched Bellinger tie an NL rookie record with his 38th home run. It's a good bet that he'll break that record and end the season with at least 40 bombs. It's an absolute lock that he'll win NL Rookie of the Year.

         And we all know who the AL's ROY will be.


This concludes my card buying for the 2017 baseball card season. I spent over $400 on Topps Heritage products, including the boxes/packs, base set, and SPs I purchased on COMC. It was a lot of money but it was also a lot of fun. I haven't bought this many cards in a single season since before my daughters were born. 

But now I've got to gear up for Black Friday. It's only two months away!


How much have you spent on baseball boxes/packs this season?


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