Panini Black Friday Packs - Part 2

Continuing from post 1, below is another base series from the Panini Black Friday Packs.

These are from the Kings series (Diamond Kings, Ice Kings, and Gridiron Kings).  the scans don't do these justice - they are foil board and very shiny.  I'm not a fan of the no logo look on baseball, but the cards look great.

More Gridiron Kings.  Love the Richardson.

Some old school Kings...

Another card where the scan is not great.  Gold foilboard of RGIII and a great looking card. 

Kobe cracked ice - these look really good - not numbered but reportedly limited to 25.  

That's all for now.  I will have one more post to follow.  

Panini Black Friday Packs - Part 1

I am a huge fan of the Panini promotional packs.  My first experience was the Father's day promotion, my second was at the National this summer and I decided to grab some this Black Friday as well.  These packs always have some interesting "base sets" and are always loaded.  Below is a sampling.

The Thanksgiving series features football players who played on turkey day.  These are cool looking cards.

Rookies of Luck and RGIII - cards are numbered to 599 and look great.

More rookies...

These are proofs - similar to printing plates but not made of metal.  They are blank backs and I have been told there are 5 for each color - these are clearly the yellow variety.  The Namath looks pretty cool.

Another proof card (Doug Martin - yellow).  The Woodson is numbered out of 5.

I will post more later.

Jaybarker's Draft

I recently received my loot from the recent Jaybarker's Junk draft.  These drafts are always good cheap fun...for the cost of a bowman chrome rack pack, I scored the following eclectic mix of cardboard goodness:

A 1959 Robin Roberts and an 1969 Billy Williams.

A 1969 Ruben Amaro and the ERA leaders (featuring Tiant) which is in really nice shape.

Reuss and Messersmith with teams I don't associate them with.  

 

Some well loved 78's of two great pitchers (love the stache that Eck is sporting - not to mention his cool Cleveland windbreaker under the jersey).

And finally two future hall of famers.

I love these drafts because of the eclectic mix - things you probably would not seek out, but your glad you found once you see them...

Thanks Jayabarker's Junk for a great draft.   

One Man's Trash...Is Another Man's Treasure

I recently attended a card show in Chantilly, Virginia (just outside of DC).  Collector's Showcase of America hosts a pretty big show every 4 months or so, and there are usually some pretty big name autograph guests and a pretty large number of dealers. 

October's show was disappointing from a collector traffic standpoint (there was nobody there) but for a browser and a bargain box digger, it was just fine. 

I spent a good amount of time digging through one dealer's box of jersey cards - marked $3/card.  As I was merrily flipping through the boxes the dealer was showing off some of his higher-end modern jersey/auto cards to another dealer and negotiating over prices.  Most of the prices they were discussing were in the hundreds of dollars (which, quite frankly, I just don't understand when it comes to a modern card with a sticker autograph).

In any event, when I finished digging and presented my haul to the dealer, he asked to see the cards so he could see "what was moving out the junk box".  I responded with the title to this post "one man's trash is another man's treasure..." which caused him to stammer and apologize...but I assured him I was only joking.

Anyway, these were the $3 "treasures" I scored....

First - two phan phavorite Phillies (I don't see a lot of Lefty relics and for $3 I thought this was pretty cool)

And a couple of Rollins (I really like the way the Gypsy Queen relics look - particularly the framed minis)

An some Iggles.... (great action shot of Jackson, and the multi material Kolb looks pretty cool).

More iggles....I like the jumbo swatches.

...and more Iggles (the cards with football pieces are an interested change to the typical memorabilia card)

While I was digging, I couldn't resist picking up a few NFL stars that either are (or once were) on my fantasy football team - the Harrison did not scan well (it is foil board and numbered out of 99).

I had Curtis on my team back when he was with the Pats....

....and Jamaal the year he broke out....

Hope you enjoy the "garbage".

Pimpage - Jaybarker's Junk

Head on over to Jaybarker's Junk for a weekly recurring Free Card Friday contest  Free Card Friday.  It's really easy to enter (and I even won a few weeks back)!!

Better Late Than Never....Community Gum Group Break

Community gum is offering an all Upper Deck group break.  Teams still available and a special discount if you act tonight.  Break is located here community gum group break.

Kermit Washington - American University's Favorite Son

While many college sports programs regularly send numerous athletes to the professional ranks in multiple sports year after year, such is not the case for my alma mater - American University.  American is a small school in Washington DC with no football program and no baseball program.

A member of the Patriot League, American University competes in Division 1 NCAA basketball and has since 1966, but it wasn't until 2008 that AU finally earned a trip to the "Big Dance" (losing to Tennessee in the first round).  AU would return to the tourney in 2009 ultimately losing to Villanova (despite having a double digit lead into the second half).

While AU has had its share of big name coaches (Gary Williams who would go on to win a national championship with Maryland and Jim Lynam who would coach the Philadelphia 76ers) only one AU player would make it to the NBA - Kermit Washington.  Unfortunately Kermit Washington is best know for "the punch" - an unfortunate brawl where he punched  Rudy Tomjonovich - which largely defined and derailed both men's careers.

Before that incident Kermit looked to have a bright future in the NBA - earning All American honors while at American and a first round selection by the Lakers in the 1973 draft.  As you can see from the back of Kermit's rookie card, he became the 7th player in NCAA history to average 20 points and 20 rebounds for his collegiate career, joining Dr. J, Bill Russell, Artis Gilmore and Elgin Baylor.  In fact, he needed 39 points in his last college game to accomplish the 20/20 average - and he scored 40.

As an AU grad, one of my main goals at this year's national sports card convention was to obtain Kermit's rookie card (and a few other samples from his playing days).  They are not expensive and I managed to land all of these for less than the price of a can of soda.