Three Freebies From The Wrapper

 One of the Trading Card Trade magazines I subscribe to is called "The Wrapper" a low-budget publication that comes out every six weeks or so (7 times a year) and is Non-Sport specific. Often they dive deep into vintage Non-Sport sets as well as the occasional newer set, some super popular and well known and others that are rare and very obscure. I forget how many years I have been subscribed. Anyway when it comes to renewing your subscription along with the notice that your subscription is about to expire they will often send a few freebies to sweeten the deal. Here are three cards I received in my subscription renewal envelope; 1 I am pretty sure I already have, 1 I know I already have and the 3rd is "new" to me:

2004 Inkworks Charmed Connections Promo CC-3

1978 Donruss Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band -

58 Preston, the weathervane, sings "Get Back".

1997 Fleer/Skybox Star Trek Original Series 1 - 47 EP16.2 The Menagerie

Washington Wednesday: By The Classic Numbers

Washington Wednesday: By The Classic Numbers

10 Oct 2018

When I first noticed this pair of cards on Ebay I was a little leery of their authenticity. What with the odds of one seller "pulling" these specific numbers from a pack and the sellers other auctions for cards with some of the more sought after serial numbers. D'oh OK so one of the special things about the cards I purchased were they are serial numbered. Another thing that chased the warm fuzzies away was the auction title calling them 1/1s. This seller has a bunch of listings using the 1/1 keyword. Even though the auction title also had the actual serial numbers shown it was titled as a "1/1 lot" indicating each card in the lot is a 1/1. OK semantics I guess. Even with the red flags and warnings going off I decided to grab this pair before anyone else did.

2018 Panini Classics Football: Timeless Tributes Gold: 188 Joe Theismann Redskins #d 07/99 and 99/99

The pair of cards I got are these 2018 Panini Classics Football: Timeless Tributes Gold 188 Joe Theismann Redskins #d 07/99 and 99/99 from Ebay for $14.99 Free Shipping. Like I said the seller titled the auction using their serial numbers and using the old "Ebay One of One" labeling trick. The serial number is on the front hard to see left hand side under the "Classics" logo near the top.

2018 Panini Classics Football: Timeless Tributes: Gold 188 Joe Theismann Redskins 07/99

2018 Panini Classics Football: Timeless Tributes: Gold 188 Joe Theismann Redskins 99/99

The dealer also sent these 5 Chiefs cards as a bonus. ?Redskins and Chiefs? Guess it is an Alex Smith connection, or the Indians Connection, or the seller just got confused and thought they were all the same team.

That one is vintage so it is a keeper by default.

1974 Topps Football: 34 Elmo Wright Chiefs

Then we have a card from the "Wave of the Future" insert set of 6 cards to the 1994 Fleer Flair Football set. I was going to toss this into the tradebait pile but in checking the player's team history saw he played for the St. Louis Rams in 1998 so it is a keeper.

1994 Fleer Flair Football: Wave of the Future: 3 of 6 Greg Hill Chiefs

Next up one of those annoying "two sided" cards that is a card with two players sharing the card one player on each side. Confusing the collector as to which face is the "front". Not really since this is a serial numbered insert and at the time the serial numbers were put on the back of the card, but that practice varies from company to company and from set to set it seems. I don't normally like this kind of card so again it is one of these was going to toss in the tradebait pile card but one of the players was a Redskin in 2001. The "front" player Donnell Bennett.

2000 Donruss Quantum Leaf Football: Double Team: DT-13

Donnell Bennet and Elvins Grbac Chiefs #d 0475/1500

The final two cards are tradebait and technically are the "same" card. You can't tell from the scans since they are separate scans but one is the mini variant of the other.

2014 Topps Chrome Football: Fantasy Focus: FF-JC Jamaal Charles Chiefs

2014 Topps Chrome Football: Fantasy Focus: Mini FF-J Jamaal Charles Chiefs

Out of five cards I originally didn't want to keep I am keeping 3 of them for now. The vintage one (wasn't ever really tradebait since it's "vintage") will be added to my 1974 set build (if I don't already have it). The other two "keepers" are just keepers for right now. 

UPDATE: 10 Mar 2021 - The 2 Jamall Charles cards have been traded away. One a few months ago and the other one just recently.

COTW: Classic Quads OPEY

2009 Donruss Classics Football: Classic Quads: 10

Merlin Olsen, Alan Page, Carl Eller, Jack Youngblood

I made a post on my Curly W blog discussing ideas for my Senators Singles feature on that blog. It is my Senators/Nationals version of this "Card of the Whenever" feature. Just simply a snazzy way to show off one card posts. For that blog I have often considered posting single card posts more often similar to card blogs that specialize in showing off just one card daily posts. Hmm I have a set or two that I have thought about making a separate blog for but that is just in the thinking pre-planning stages, not an actual green light project. The same question of frequency pops up here for the COTW feature. Do I make these things more frequent? I want to but I know I will never have the motivation or stamina to make it a daily thing, not even a weekly thing which is more achievable than daily. The last time I did a CotW it was tacked to the end of another post.

OK so here is a card I had all but forgotten I had. OK I probably did forget about it. I'm sure there are parallels to it I could pursue but I bet they wouldn't have the cool reciprocal serial numbering of this one. Oops I gave away an ancient Chinese secret code to this blog.

I have often liked the Donruss (Original Donruss not the current Panini using the Donruss brand) Classics and the insert sets. Oh man I miss the original Donruss products. Here is one of the base Classic Quads card, at least I think it is the base. It gets confusing when everything is serial numbered. This is a mighty impressive quartet. Merlin Olsen and Jack Youngblood from the Rams with Alan Page and Carl Eller of the Vikings. Check out that serial number. CORRECTION UPDATE: It is the Silver Parallel, the BASE version is not serial numbered.

2009 Donruss Classics Football: Classic Quads: Silver: 10

Merlin Olsen Rams Alan Page Vikings Carl Eller Vikings Jack Youngblood Rams

052/250

I don't recall when or where I got this card from. It might have been either from Ebay or Sportlots. I know it wasn't from CheckOutMyCards because I have the records for my purchases from there and this card is not in the few orders I have made there. If it was from a group box break then it was a very fortunate hit. I did a quick and dirty search of my TCC blog since I started recording my mail days there starting around mid 2007, but saw no indication of this card. It could have come in a huge Team Traders Rams package that had too many cards to count.

Oops it isn't the base version it is the "Silver" parallel. I have updated to identify it as the Silver Parallel.

Updated: 02 May 2018 2;10pm

Washington Wednesday: A Couple of Unseld Autos

 Washington Wednesday: A Couple of Unseld Autos

It seems like there is always a long time between my Washington Wednesday posts. I should fix that. Hmm when was that Last one? You can click that link to find out. Moving On!

In this episode I will actually mention and show the cards that I briefly blogged about on my Kirk's Knook blog to make my self appointed minimum monthly posting quota way back in April of last year 2017. What I mentioned cards over there? And in APRIL? LAST YEAR? Egads Man PROCRASTINATE MUCH?

On Friday 21 April 2017 as part of my mail day one of the two packages contained an Ebay BIN single card $4.90 + $3.25 Shipping. Bidding had started at only $1.99 but got dangerously close to my max bid of $5.00. Was it a shill? I don't think so, but sometimes when I win auctions very close to or at my max bid I do wonder.

So here it that beaut:

 2015-16 Panini Excalibur Basketball: Regal Endorsements Autograph:

RE-WUN Wes Unseld Bullets on sticker blue sharpie #d 135/200

Then that following Wednesday 26 April 2017 on a single package mail day coming from Ebay. A BIN auction for a single card $1.99 + $4.99 shipping. Short story with this one that I first posted on my regular blog (Kirk's Knook Blog as linked at the beginning of this post). It was mainly a rant about ordering from Ebay without checking out the seller and where they were located. Which was why I posted it on that blog. I knee-jerk bought the card without seeing where it was coming from. It was from a dealer in China. Sometimes that means you will get some kind of counterfeit product. Original tracking information said it would arrive sometime between early May to early June. Fortunately it arrived well before the estimated date.

It was this beaut: Looks like a Dave Bing Cameo. I played some with the post-scanning photo editing to help bring out some of the features. I am far from a pro at it.

2015-16 Panini Threads Basketball: Century Signatures:

CS-WUN Wes Unseld Bullets on sticker autograph blue sharpie #d 137/199

The seller included 3 bonus cards: Fortunately all basketball. I like surprise bonus cards when it makes sense like these from the same sport, but I don’t like it when you order non-sports and they send sports or vice verse, or they send different sports than what you ordered. I like all (well most) sports but some people are just one sport collectors, or Non-Sport only.

2016-17 Panini Donruss Basketball: At first I thought these were special “gold” versions turns out the regular base has the gold/bronze coloring.

142 Marcin Gortat Wizards - Hey they sent the “same” team.

Yes Gortat was the subject of  the previous WW episode.

197 Tyrone Wallace Jazz

2016-17 Panini Select Basketball: Yes I did have to play with the post-scanning settings for this "chrome" card. I didn't realize until after the initial scan that the right side edge and some of the left side had some kind of smudged schmutz on it as shiny chrome cards tend to have if not wiped as soon as gotten and put into a penny sleeve. I wiped the card of the smudge but haven't sleeved it yet.

9 Zaza Pachulia Warriors

The Wallace and the Pachulia cards are of course up for trade.

A Slightly Oversized B'More Orange and Black Bird

Back in September for my Sportlots Spending Splurge I got this nice card, with another card from the set Walter Johnson Senators which I am mentioning on my Curly W Cards blog. This one was 70¢ (Big Train was only 50¢) I also got a Hockey card for my name niche PC. Shipping was only 68¢ for the three cards. Buying from Sportlots stores is better on shipping than for the auctions. For some reason auctions there don't combine shipping.

I had forgotten that the cards from this set were slightly larger than standard size at 3.5" x 5" about postcard size. Still nice looking cards. Only 60 cards in the set and not too expensive. I don't think there are any super hard to get cards from this. That is good since it looks like I should get more of these oversized beasts.

1984 Donruss Champions 19 Eddie Murray Orioles

EDITED: To cross-link to Curly W Cards blog for Walter Johnson card from this set.

Washington Wednesday: The Magical Wizard of Lodz

The Magical Wizard of Lodz

This episode of Washington Wednesday I am featuring a card I hinted at in my Trading Thursday post that had the 2015-16 Panini Donruss Basketball cards I pulled from two packs I had gotten from my local Dollar Tree store. If I recall correctly the first pack wasn't too thrilling for me. The second pack though started off with a Bang er Zap?

I pulled a Homie Wizard card. The Starting Center for the Wiz Marcin Gortat. Gortat was born or rather grew up in Lodz (Łódź), Poland. He began his professional career in Europe and was drafted by the Phoenix Suns round 2 in 2005, but continued to play in Germany til 2007. His rights had been traded to the Orlando Magic in 2007 and he made his NBA debut with the Magic in 2008. He was traded to the Suns in 2010 and from there traded to DC in 2013.

2015-16 Panini Donruss Basketball: 69 Marcin Gortat Wizards

Here are three other Gortat cards I have for my PC. I pulled them last year (2015)  in my blog group box break. Probably the last time I'll do one of those too much work and responsibility. It wasn't until I pulled these cards out to scan them that I noticed that I had a nice run of recent years without skipping a season.

 2012-13 Panini Prestige Basketball - 59 Marcin Gortat Suns

 2013-14 Panini NBA Hoops Basketball - 76 Marcin Gortat Suns

 2014-15 Panini NBA Hoops Basketball - 152 Marin Gortat Wizards

Back in October on my Mascot Monday post I mentioned I needed to find the Washington Redskins card from the 1992 Pro Set Football Spirit of the Game sub-set I featured in the post. I have since acquired that card. It was going to be the next Washington Wednesday post, that is this post, before I had pulled the Gortat card at the beginning of this post. I haven't scanned it yet, but anyway I guess there is no real surprise what the next WW post will be about.

Trading Thursday: The Return?

 TRADING THURSDAY:
15 Dec 2016

Trade Info | Master Want List | What I Collect

The Return?

I'm going to try this again another blogging adventure that is just for my own personal fun and enjoyment I guess. The original intention of this series of posts was to get some of my trade fodder gotten rid of. Now I think it is sort of acting as a way to generate a trade list without really having a trade list.

This Week's Offerings:

Yeah that says what it means.

A few weeks back, I got some packs of cards from the Dollar Tree around the corner from me. Among the items I got were a couple of 2015-16 Panini Donruss Basketball for $1 each. I got two packs of 5 cards for a total of 10 cards. I pulled a Wizard  (I'll mention it in my next Washington Wednesday post possibly) so I got one PC card from the batch the other 9 cards I will trade or give away.

2015-16 Panini Donruss Basketball:
43 The Rookies: Nikola Jokic Nuggets - Traded
60 Luis Scola Raptors
64 Nikola Mirotic Bulls
75 Eric Gordon Pelicans
180 Blake Griffin Clippers
107 Dwyane Wade Heat
117 Gerald Green Heat
188 Nerlens Noel 76ers
197 Elfrid Payton Magic

Previous Offerings: 

Previous posts/offers are listed here.

This One Is On Eleven: Some traded away. Check to see what is left.
A Fifth Of February: All cards still available
Experiment Number One: All 3 cards still available

CFL Trading: All team lots available

Updated 15 May 2017

Something Is Gonna Break.

???

OK I will be a bit mysterious for now. In a day or so I will bust open a box of cards I got recently. I will then post some scans of the box break; the box, a pack, a sample of a base card, some or all of the inserts and of course all the hits. I plan on doing a review of what it is and give a little backstory of how it came to be. Actually how I got my grubby little hands on it. I might just end up giving away all the cards, or at least a good portion of them.

Why the mystery? Why not? Seriously though it is mostly just to insure I get a December post or two in on this blog. Also being a bit mysterious with a planned future post tends to get more people to read a blog, or get them excited about it a little.

In the meantime here is An Alex Ovechkin card I haven't shown. I got it from a group box break. I don't recall exactly when, but I think it was one of the last hockey ones I was in earlier this year. I cut back on all the breaks I was participating in. Now-Days I am only in one Baseball break that is taking December off. I may or may not continue with that one. I like group breaks but it just gets too expensive to stay in them month after month, especially if you are in more than just one or two. Plus the groups tend to repeat some of the products they bust, or they bust stuff you really don't want, or they only bust the high end stuff and your team is rarely in the expensive 5 cards or less 1 pack boxes. I digress.

Notice this card is one of those plastic acetate "see through" cards. Well it looks like it's white but that is the background of my flatbed scanner, actually the padding on the underside of the scanner cover. I tend not to like this type of card, but this one has grown some on me. At least it isn't a die-cut one with weird angles and shapes.

 2012-13 Panini Rookie Anthology Hockey: Intensity Elite Acetate:

I-16 Alex Ovechkin Capitals #258/500

(Front and Back in front of scanner's white background)

???

Four Cards For Less Than Four Bucks Fishing On Bay

This post is going to be one of those that I will duplicate on my Curly W Cards blog because it is has some Nationals. The post over there will be slightly different so it will not be a true cut and paste or just plain link up deal.

OK so from Ebay I had bought some cards from one seller each card at 99¢ with Free Shipping. Four cards total two of which are Nationals players in a Nats Uniform.

Lets just get on with the cards I will make some comments about them after showing them.

2000 Fleer Skybox 1 Cal Ripken Jr. Orioles

(Front and Back)

Hows that for planing the first card being shown is card number 1. OK so I didn't plan it that way, I planned it going in chronological order and of these four cards I'm showing This Ripken from 2000 lands first.

2005 Donruss Zenith 162 Nick Johnson Nationals

(Front and Back)

When I saw this card I just had to have it. I don't recall coming across the Zenith brand from Donruss before, maybe I did but this Nick Johnson card is the only Zenith card I have. I plan on getting at least all the Nationals and Orioles from the set, and eventually the entire set of 250 cards. I like the simple yet complex design. It seems that the Zenith brand was only produced in 2005.

These next two cards and the final half of the four are from the same set 2008 Topps Allen & Ginter's. Yes most people just say Allen and Ginter or simply abbreviate to A&G but as long as Topps includes the apostrophe es I will label it that way (or just A&G or A and G)
 

 

2008 Topps Allen & Ginter's 212 Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky 19th Century Composer

(Front and Back)

This is one of those cards from A&G that either makes you love the sets or hate them. The Non-Sport and more to the point Non-Baseball card. The A&G brand is primarily a baseball set but technically is an All-Sport all inclusive set since it has the Non-Sport as well. I personally like the Non-Baseball cards as well as the Baseball.

2008 Topps Allen & Ginter's 271 Paul Lo Duca Nationals

(Front and Back)

Paul Lo Duca is one of those players that only spent one season, actually only part of a season, with my beloved Nationals but he quickly became a favorite. 

I was going to post my CWC post simultaneously with this one but I will now wait till this one is published so I can link to it.