It’s been a long December, but we finally got back to Florida a few days ago. Thanks to everyone who has sent me well wishes and for everyone who has kept me in their thoughts. The doctors were happy with how the surgery went, and Karen has seen some improvements with breathing, but the site where she had the chest tube got an infection, so we are trying our best to take care of that so it heals. She should start seeing the full effects in 6-9 months, so for now, it’s just taking it easy, making sure she doesn’t lift more than 5 pounds, and hopefully getting better every day.
I had an unexpected bonus check from work, so before we left, I ordered some sets, and had a ton of boxes waiting for me when we got back. The sets included 1996 Bowman, 1997 Bowman, 1998 Bowman, 1998 Topps Gallery, 2010 Topps, and a 1998 Topps Finest no-protector series 1 set. With the 1997 Bowman’s Best, 1998 Bowman’s Best, 1996 Collector’s Choice, 1998 Collector’s Choice, and 1998 Upper Deck sets I purchased a few months ago, I had a nice representation of favorite players, Tigers, and Rays in my boxes of cards that need to go into binders.
I almost got a 95% complete 2014 Topps set, but that started going south pretty quick. It was priced under 100 bucks, which is what I think it should be, as really the only rookies are Marcus Semien and Jose Ramirez. Most ones online are priced at 200-300 bucks, and I have no clue why. Any thoughts? After seeing the price, I asked the seller on eBay if it included the Jose Ramirez rookie. He responded that it had a bunch of cards and sounded like he really didn’t want to dig through them. That was fine. I asked once more if he could look through them, and got no response. I saw a few decent priced Ramirez rookies if it didn’t have them, so I went ahead and purchased the set. A few days went by, and it still hadn’t shipped. I messaged him, and he claimed he was moving and they would be out soon. A week went by and he said he was almost done and it would be shipped soon. Another week, and I asked how it was going, and he said it would be soon again. Then last week, I get an email that I’m getting a refund. I just really wanted the set as it was a great price. Makes me wonder if he really had the set at all or if he is going to relist it for a higher price. I guess it doesn’t matter. I’ve never been one to list negative feedback, but I felt like I had no other choice just because of the bad communication and radio silence when I asked about the Ramirez and at first when I asked about shipping. Again, thoughts? One day I’ll complete the 2014 Topps set, even if I have to purchase every missing one from SportLots.
In addition to the sets, I had a huge box of rookies that Kevin from The Diamond King sent me. I forgot about it, and let me tell you, that box was huge!!!
I don’t really follow milb too much, although I know most of the Tigers and Rays top minor leaguers, but many of these guys are guys I’ve heard of from Top 100 prospect lists and from their picture being on packs of Bowman. While I would love to get cards of these guys, I just don’t have the money to buy tons of Bowman, and if I have to spend 5 bucks on a single, I would rather it being a Topps card I need or a Ray or Tiger. Now I have rookies of many of these uber prospect guys. Not just any card, but 1st Bowman or 1st Bowman Chrome cards, as you can see with the Travis Bazzana, Charlie Condon, and Dylan Crews.
The Donruss blaster got me a green & red Sparky parallel. The Archives ones hit great with the Tigers, as I am just a Ty Cobb away from finishing the team set. I also pulled a few Tork parallels. Not very many Rays, but I pulled a Donruss star parallel of Junior numbered to 250, and a blue parallel of McClanahan from Holiday. The base McClanahan is actually one of about 10 cards I need to finish the Holiday set.
Kevin included a ton of Elly De La Cruz, there was a photo variation of Jarren Duran’s 2022 Heritage rookie, and rookies of Walker Jenkins and Jesus Made. The River Ryan was a red rookie logo variation, and it took forever for me to find it on TCDB. I got rookies of the Dodger duo of Sasaki and Yamamoto, a ton of new Paul Skenes cards, Cam Smith rookies, Spencer Strider rookies, and rookies of JJ Wetherholt and James Woods. Just some incredible rookies of some guys who could be big names in the future. Thanks so much, Kevin for the giveaway! I will have hours of fun putting these into albums.
I didn’t get shut out of cards while in NJ either. I may have picked up a few blasters of things like Holiday, Allen & Ginter, Archives, Donruss, and Chrome Update.
The rookies and parallels were some great finds. I pulled a Black parallel of Nick Kurtz from Archives, a Santa Hat SP of Jacob Wilson from Holiday, but the best was probably a Pink refractor of Spencer Schellenbeck from Chrome Update numbered to 299. I got a Chrome Refractor of Ozzie from A/G. There was a nice Optic parallel I pulled of Roger Clemens, I just don’t know what it is called. Archives gave me me a green parallel of George Brett numbered to 99. I pulled an Ohtani parallel from Holiday, as well as one of Bryce Harper.
I go back to work tomorrow. I really hope muscle memory does me well, as I haven’t thought about work since I hit ‘end shift’ almost a month ago. I’ll probably do a post with collecting goals in the next week or so, and I’ll definitely be on the lookout for 2026 Topps sneak peeks.
Everyone have a happy new year. I hope it goes better than 2025 and that lots of cards you can use are in your future. Thanks for checking out my latest post.
-Jeremy
Happy New Year. That's a lot of cards.
ReplyDeleteSounds like things are looking up, continued good thoughts for the family.