Hey Moe! Knuck Knuck Knuck

This is my attempt at a 5 minute post so I decided to keep it as minimal as possible. Now the 5 minutes does not include research, which was another 6 minutes getting everything ready.

 

The cards are from the 2005 Breygent Three Stooges release and are film cells from Three Stooges clips. The smaller strip is from their silent movie’s days and the other is from their 1939 film "Yes, We Have No Bonanza"

I am pretty bummed that Breygent has since shut down, they made some of the neatest entertainment cards.

Lets Face It

If there is a unique memorabilia card, I want it. The stranger it is, the more I have to have it and it doesn’t matter what sport. Most sports I will try to find one of a player or team that I like but in cases like NASCAR I will take anyone if the relic is cool.

Last year I picked up two face mask cards, both from 2003. The Koren Robinson is from the 2003 Donruss Elite Masks of Steel insert and the Marcus Trufant is from the 2003 Leaf Rookies & Stars Masks release. 

These pieces are from the Rookie Premier, so they aren’t game used, but I don’t have a problem with that. There are several Leaf face mask sets between 2001-2007 and most are rookies with the pieces coming from the premier and those that are game used, like John Elway, are significantly higher in price.

A Double Stinger

 While I have been a fan of wrestling going back in to the 1980s I was never a fan of Sting. I didn’t have anything against him I just didn’t know much about him until I started watching WCW Wrestling in the late 1990s but after that point I'm a fan. 

When the WWF (WWE) bought out WCW in 2001 several of WCW’s top wrestlers moved over to TNA including Hulk Hogan, Ric Flair, Kurt Angle and Sting. During the TNA Impact years TriStar had the exclusive license of the brand and I think they did an amazing job, I had talked about their products a number of times during the early years of my blog. 

One night a few weeks ago I was doing a search of some wrestling cards and eventually ended up looking at Sting’s cards and was immediately drawn to this 2009 TNA Impact Sting Face Paint card. Tristar used Sting’s face paint to spell out his name on the card front. It isn’t actually wrestling used paint but I am guessing from a can of the face paint his uses. 

I had tweeted about it after I won it because the price was extremely low and after I bought the card the seller put it back up for auction. I was worried because the price was well under the going price and the seller was new, so I feared he changed his mind and was going to cancel my purchase. I emailed him and he assured me it was relisted by accident and that he would be sending the card.  

About a day or two later, while still stuck on Sting cards, I found this baseball bat relic card from the 2008 TNA Cross The Line release. If you are not familiar with Sting’s character, he would often carry a black baseball bat during his later WCW and TNA career which he would occasionally use as a weapon. You wouldn’t expect a bat in a wrestling release, but here you go. 

Donruss was well known for their detailed information about the relics that they used in cards, including images of the specific item too. Tristar’s guarantee takes it one step further not only saying when the bat was used, but how. Sting struck Samoa Joe with the bat at the Victory Road pay-per-view during Samoa Joe’s bout against Booker T. 

Happy Landings!

I ended last week on a political note so today I am going in a different direction and taking aim at a White Whale.

In the 1970s every little boy knew the name Evel Knievel, a daredevil that influenced us greatly. He started in 1966 and made his final appearance in 1981 but in between broke every bone in his body while he made jumps over Caesar’s Palace famed fountains, Snake River Canyon, buses and even sharks.

One of the most popular toys of the day was the Evel Knievel Stunt Cycle set and you were a real boss if you got the BMX bike for Christmas. Even grown up kids still have fond memories of their favorite Evel Knievel toy, even making it on to an episode of My Name Is Earl. Merchandising for his products took on an entity on themselves appearing in comic books, movies, television shows, commercials, advertisements, video games, trading cards and plenty of books. He is still popular enough to be included in recent checklists for both Topps and Panini. The Simpsons spoofed him with their character Lance Murdock

Which brings me to today’s post. One of my White Whales is the 2007 Sportkings Autograph Evel Knievel #A-EK card but I don’t have hundreds of dollars to spend on one of his autograph cards so I went in a bit of a different direction and instead picked up a 5x7 autograph picture he signed in red ink, now it isn’t same as having an on-card signature but I am calling it a fair exchange. To add to my EK collection I picked up a 2015 SportKings memorabilia card with a nice swatch of leather from one of his jackets.

 

I love when something as simple as an autograph and leather swatch can bring me back to those days in the 1970s when I was a kid living in New York and me and my brothers used to shoot our Evel Knievel bikes at each other down the hallway over the red shag carpet.

Some Relics Would Be Worth Chasing

Last football season Topps worked with the St Louis Rams to create a set of special Rams Kids Club cards with 10 Defend Our Turf cards and a Rampage fur card. The cards were given away at two games in December at a Rams Kids Club table. There were also some autographed versions that were given away through Topps Twitter and Rampage’s Twitter & Facebook pages.

There are already mascot cards as well as autographed mascot cards and collectors love them with some of the autographs topping $50, I think that mascot relics would be a natural transition. I can just imagine what a San Diego Chicken or Phillie Phanatic relic auction would look like, triple digits would probably be a realistic selling point. I would definitely chase down a Mariner Moose and Blitz relic.

Topps needs to get on this.

Vintage Card Of The Month: 2001 Donruss Classics Steve Largent Hash Marks

This month’s Vintage Card of the Month comes from 2001 Donruss Classic. Not really a vintage card by any means, at only 11 years old, but instead is going old-school with Steve Largent and Three Rivers Stadium.

 

In 2000 Pittsburgh Three Rivers Stadium was closed and demolished and the Steelers moved on to Heinz Field. Donruss was able to obtain pieces of the turf from the field and created the Hash Marks relic to honor the stadium’s history. The 25-card set created contained Hall of Famer players and current stars and the front showed the player along with their best game stats at the stadium. A list of some of the players who were includes in the set: Bart Starr, Steve Young, Jim Plunkett, Dan Marino, Cris Carter, Emmitt Smith, Walter Payton, Eric Dickerson, Barry Sanders, Reggie White and Steve Largent.

 

Steve Largent is one of my favorite Seahawks of all time, he was around from the beginning (originally drafted by the Oilers in 1976 but traded to the Seahawks during the preseason) and set the standard for years to come up in Seattle. He spent his entire career in Seattle, 14 years total, and when he retired he had 819 receptions for 13,089 yards and 100 touchdowns. He went to the Pro Bowl 7 times, was inducted in to the Hall of Fame in 1995 and his jersey #80 was retired by the Seahawks.

 

I dislike the Steelers but when it comes to Steve Largent I am able to overlook that and when I was finally able to find of these cards a couple of years ago I jumped on it to add it to my collection. Many of the cards can be found for under $10 but there a handful above that price for some of the bigger named players. I have seen a couple of autographed versions but I do not know if there were actually part of the original release or if a collector had the player sign after they owned the card.

 

The card is pretty thick, about double the thickness of a standard jersey card, and the turf piece is embedded on the front. Beneath the turf is the stat and date, in Largent’s case it is 30-Yard TD 12/4/77. The game was a 30-20 Steelers win and Steve Largent had 4 receptions for 71 yards and 1 touchdown. The back of the card has information about the turf and the stadium along with a picture that was taken at the stadium (not from the game day).

 

Early Preview: 2012 Panini Golden Age Baseball

One of Panini’s upcoming products is the 2012 Golden Age Baseball release, set for a late November release date. Each 24 pack box (6 cards/pack) should run in the $70-75 range and will include an interesting collection of baseball related cards along with historical related cards.

 

The set consists of 150 base cards (there are 25 SP variation cards), 150 mini parallel versions (two different colored backs), 50 Historical Signatures, 50 Museum Age memorabilia cards and a Triple Crown Winners signature card. The Historical Signature autograph cards will have cut signatures from deceased personalities and sticker autographs for living personalities. The preview images show the cards as hard signed but with the white mist at the bottom where the auto goes leads me to believe it will contain a sticker.

 

Box Break:

1 Historic Signature
1 Museum Age relic card
24 Mini Parallels
2 Headlines
2 Batter-Up
1 Newark Evening World Supplement
1 Box Topper (Either a Ferguson Bakery Pennant or a 5x7 Movie Poster)

Mini Parallel

This set was created with the intent of offering up a historical view at baseball and Popular Culture and with a low price-point Panini will probably sell through pretty easily. I know that there are collectors who do not care for this type of mixed product but personally I get a kick out of stuff like this because of the history connection.

 

On the down side I am not a fan of the design and I do not like the use of gold/tan coloring. I know it plays on a sepia type coloring, which is often used to generate feelings of vintage and historical, but the color and design elements do not appeal to me. The base card is depicted above with the Loch Ness Monster.

 

Some of the highlights of the product:

Autographs and memorabilia from the past 100 years from both sports and non-sports personalities

 

 

 

Headlines: These cards cover various headlines from major historical events

 

Batter Up: Pop-up cards based on the 1934-36 Batter Up cards

Original 1934-36 Batters-Up Charles Gehringer card for example

 

Newark Evening World Supplement: Cards based on the original 1907 Newark Evening World Supplements set, though significantly smaller than the original 7.5x11 sized cards. The originals were included in the Newark Evening World newspaper, any of the original 15 card in the set are nearly impossible to find

Original 1907 Newark Evening World Supplement cards for example

 

Box Topper: The box topper will be either a

Ferguson Bakery Pennant (miniature version)

Or

5x7 Movie Posters

 

 

The 1916 Ferguson Bakery Pennants were a 2.5x5.75 felt pennant that contained a picture of either a baseball player or a war hero. The Allied Hero versions contained a black and white photo of the hero along with “Allied Heroes” across the pennant while the baseball player versions had the player picture along with their name and team name across the pennant.

Original 1916 Ferguson Bakery Pennants for example

 

 

The movie posters are based on reprints of original Golden Age cinema. Some of the posters will even contain a relic from an actor/actress in the movie depicted.

 

Buybacks: Each case will include 1 Buyback card from the 1930s or 1940s and according to Panini’s sales materials this includes Goudey Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig cards

 

Black Sox Bats: A Joe Jackson bat relic card, I am not certain how many of his bat cards will be printed. Additionally, while some of their sales materials only show a Joe Jackson card they have posted on their web site “…and memorabilia cards featuring the infamous 1919 Black Sox” so I am wondering if there are other players from the team.

 

 Triple Card Winners Autograph: A hard signed triple-autograph card from three living Triple Crown jockeys

 

Even though I do not care for the elements of the card design I still expect to pick up some packs to get a hands on review, who knows, maybe once the cards are in my hand I may feel differently. It is also hard to argue with what you will pull from a box when you are only paying $75 a box. The Batter Up, Newark Evening World Supplement and Ferguson Bakery Pennant reprints alone peak my interest, toss in an autograph and museum relic along with the possibility of pulling a buyback and I am almost ready to buy in right now.

Leave It To Upper Deck To Have Some Fun

There have been some interesting relics included in cards over the past decade like shoes, hats, gloves and even a corked bat (Thank you Pacific, you may be gone but we will always love you) but now we can include a flpppy disc in that checklist. Upper Deck inserted a Steve Wozniak relic and dual-relic cards in the Goodwin Champions release that includes pieces from floppy discs. There are both red and black discs with some of the dual-relic cards containing one of each color. The dual-relic cards do not appeal to me, I prefer the vertical style that is used on the base card and single relic cards.

Surprisingly most of the single relic cards can be picked up for a couple of bucks with the dual-relic cards hitting the $15-20 range. If Upper Deck were to have included Steve Jobs version I would bet the price would be sky high right now instead of a few dollars. I know this is kind of a gimmick but no worse than Topps and the Gypsy Queen's jewel relics and Gypsy King's bat relics.

Leaf Gives Us Another Interesting Hit

One of the most original cut signature/relic cards in recent times comes to us from the 2011 Leaf Pop Century release. Amid all the chatter about Charlie Sheen’s autograph cards is this 1/1 booklet card containing cut signatures of John F Kennedy and Lee Harvey Oswald plus a leather swatch from the seat of Kennedy’s limousine from that fateful day.

 I have to say love him or hate him, Brian Gray, has taken some interesting strides to bring something new and different to the collectors. Since Razor has become Leaf we have seen a rebirth of sorts, in just a short time we have seen Leaf MMA, Metal Draft Football, Muhammad Ali, Joe Jackson’s cut signature card and now Pop Century all of which have been received quite well by collectors.

Dexter Relic Cards

I am a fan of relics, but not just normal jersey swatches, I like the obscure relic. I like those cards that contain a piece of material that not everyone is pulling from a pack. Sure I have a variety of jersey and bat cards but I pride my collection on cards like shoe cards, Diamondback Authentic cards and hat cards. What really gets my attention are cards that the average collector do not hunt for like actor’s costume relics, historical pieces and movie prop cards. I have been trying to get my hands on some of the 2009 Goodwin Landmark cards and always on the watch for the Upper Deck Champs Museum pieces.

My most recent addition is from one of my favorite television shows, Dexter. The card is from the 2010 San Diego Comic Con and was created by Breygent. This glossy metal card contains a decent sized swatch from Dexter’s tool bag. The card is pretty heavy and made entirely from metal. The front and back are a thin glossy metal and the edging is a heavy duty solid metal piece. The card is pretty thick too, about 1/8th of an inch (about the depth of two quarters).

From what I can find Breygent produced these cards for the 2010 San Diego Comic Con and they were only available in the Breygent mystery packs. You could pull cards (there were relic cards, autograph, promo and sketch cards in the mystery packs) from sets like Dexter, the Ghost Whisperer, Paranormal Activity or any number of comic book related sketch cards. You can find most of the relics running between $10-20, the autographs under $10 and the sketch cards really vary in price. A couple of sealed mystery packs are up for auction around $25-30 range.

Is This Card On The Horizon?

In the last year we have seen Topps release some very questionable relic cards. In January this year they admitted that some of the more prominent cards in the 2009 Topps Tribute Baseball set actually contained wood from stadium seats and not bats as originally believed. This included the Babe Ruth Dual and Triple relics, Ty Cobb Dual relic and both the Jackie Robinson and Mickey Mantle Triple relic cards. Most recently there have been questions regarding Topps 206 Mickey Mantle “Warm-up Jacket” relic cards. I am not positive but I am pretty sure that Mickey never wore a warm-up jacket with pink or teal on it.

I suggest that Topps takes a look at relics that will not be in short supply any time soon. How about a relic insert based on jail garb? Every month it seems like another athlete shows up in another mug shot, so lets take these lemons and make lemonade.

Please note that I am making this post in jest, I really hope that none of the card companies become so desperate as to actually consider this avenue. But, with that being said I introduce my newest custom card set, the Jailbirds relic set. Each custom card will include actual jail-worn garb (Just so everyone knows these cards are just digital mock-ups and will not actually be printed plus I wouldn't even know where to go to get the jail gear.).

Watch for your favorite parolee to make their appearance in this promising new insert set. First up is one of my favorite jail birds, and University of Arizona product, Gilbert Arenas in his Washington DC Department of Corrections gear.

2010 Topps Allen & Ginter's Unusual Relics

Where can you find beans, torch wicks, dominos, Tony Hawk’s skateboard, a dog’s Frisbee and a juggling pin? You would find them in the same place that you would also find Topps employee’s autograph, a David Blaine card and Regis Philbin’s tie, in the 2010 Allen & Ginters release. Topps has once again topped themselves with the inclusion of some very peculiar relics on the checklist.

The list includes:
Topps’ Employees Autographs
Rory the Flying Dog’s Frisbee
Anthony Gatto’s Juggling Pin
David Blaine’s Trick Card
Hubertus Wawra’s Fire-Eating Torch Wick
Preston Pittman’s Turkey Caller
Shawn Johnson’s Gymnast Leotard
Max Poser’s Stacking Dominos
Jack and the Beanstalk Beans
Tony Hawk’s Skateboard
Regis Philbin’s Tie