Here We Go

I missed out on all but the first few minutes of the KC/Pats game yesterday since Kate had her roller derby banquet last night.  I'm bummed the Chiefs lost and happy the Cardinals won, so it's a bit of a wash.

After the most improbable of endings to the Steelers Wild Card game last week, this is a game that they realistically shouldn't have even made it to.

 Not that I'm complaining.

 I'll gladly take another game, even if the odds of winning aren't leaning our way.

 Still, I'll gladly take either "one last" scenario today.  If the Steelers lose, it was still a solid showing in a year where injuries (Bengal induced injuries, I might add) took a huge toll on all of the team's stars.

 And if they do improbably pull out a win, it will be a little bittersweet, since it would presumably be the last game for Peyton Manning.  While Manning annoyed the hell out of me for most of his career (I was a Ryan Leaf fan, which took me about a decade to get over), in his final years I've come to respect the hell out of his ability and intellect on the field.

 I honestly don't know that we will ever see another player who has been able to control and dictate a game quite the way he has.  And even if his body can't do the things his brain calls for anymore, I'm always a sucker for a good sunset story.

 So either way, I'm looking forward to watching the rest of this postseason.  Just please, please, please...somebody, anybody, knock off the damn Patriots.

Lesson Learned

It ain't over til it's over.  Yesterday was a roller coaster ride.  I spent the better part of the afternoon with my father in law learning how to do some basic car maintenance.  No, I didn't know how to change my own oil.  Or do much beyond put gas in the car and drive.  My dad has always been staunchly in the camp of "pay an expert to do it, cause you might get yourself killed."  But considering the hour plus drive I have each way to work every day, the miles and oil changes have added up pretty quick.

Luckily my f-i-l is well versed in car...things.  And it was some nice bonding time with a guy who is a man of very, very few words.  I was feeling pretty darn proud of myself, as we pulled out of my inlaws driveway and headed home to catch the Steeler game.  That is until about 5 miles down the road the electrical in the car suddenly shorted out.  While driving.  Luckily I was able to safely get off the road, restart the car, and nervously get back to the inlaws to diagnose the problem.

We cleaned some gunk (technical term) off of the battery terminals, and it looks like one of the connections wasn't tightened all the way.  Oops.

We had missed our window, so decided to stick around there to watch the game.  My nerves settled down just enough over the car scare to get ramped back up over the playoff game about to start.

But boy did that exceed my expectations.

As someone who enjoys the occasional bloodbath, I really enjoyed watching the whole game.  Kate and I made the drive home at halftime, successfully this time.  But as the lead was slipping away in the 4th quarter, I angrily turned the tv off after AJ Green's touchdown.  With a backup qb and time ticking away, I wasn't feeling too confident.  I checked ESPN, and saw that the last play had been a Landry Jones interception, sealing the loss under quite literally any logical scenario.

But who needs logic.  While the Steelers were improbably winning the game through the craziest of circumstances, I sulked off to bed.

Lesson learned.  Always check.

I was pretty shocked to open up facebook on the iPad in bed this morning, seeing gleeful statuses from my friends last night.  I was perplexed to say the least.  And then I opened up ESPN, screamed loud enough to get elbowed in the side by Kate, and learned the good news.

So the Steelers survive another week, and I have another good reason to wear my Kordell Stewart jersey.  And this time, I'll watch the whole game.

Ending the Year in Style

I'll be settled in watching some college football all day today.  I've never been a big New Year's guy, but there probably aren't many who are happier to see 2015 turn into 2016 than this guy.  And while this year has been a roller coaster for my blogging, including a disappearing act for most of the year, let's send 2015 out in style.

In my COMC package from their Black Friday sales, I nabbed a couple big additions to my collection.  I was able to spear a couple cards that at one point topped my want list.  And there's no sweeter feeling than that.  But first up, I may have a addition to my favorite cards.

Vlad Guerrero has long been one of my favorite players.  I still vividly remember a game against the Expos where a friend and I were sitting in the seats directly behind home plate and being amazed by how big and athletic Vlad was up close.  At his prime, I don't know that there was any player more interesting to watch in my lifetime.  He could do it all.

I've been looking for a Vlad auto for a while, but haven't pulled the trigger.  But as I was browsing through a seller's sales, I saw this card for $8.  It was an impulse buy, but one I'm glad I made.  The sticker auto doesn't look so bad on the awesome foil stock, and I'm glad I was able to get a card that pictured Vlad in his Expos road uniform.

 But the real gem?  This guy.  This Sean Casey auto is his only picturing him as a Pirate, and is insanely hard to find.  Before my Pirate collection went full scale, I was working on just getting an auto of every player who had a Pirates certified auto.  And aside from a couple high priced Heritage Real One autos, I had them all.  Except this one.

And after years and years of looking, I had only seen one copy that was already in another Pirates collector's hands.  I nearly lost my mind when I saw a copy had been recently added to COMC during one of my routine mid-week searches.  Better yet, it was listed for a whopping $1.25.

I couldn't click buy fast enough.  It may not be a huge value card, but man does it feel good to spear a card that has been near the top of my want list for a full decade now.

 While the back story isn't nearly as compelling, I added a couple of these Japan Fractors.  They just look awesome.  End of story.

 And my first Santonio Holmes auto.  Now I just need another one to turn into an awesome custom idea I have.

 And for the third year in a row, Starling Marte autos continue to be very affordable on COMC.  I was able to snag this one for about $3.  On card and Prizm?  Yes, please.

 And despite the top side damage, this is just an awesome pickup for my collection.  My first tobacco card, and an awesome WVU card to add to my collection.  Amazingly I was able to add a card that is over 100 years old for a whopping $2.  The scan doesn't do the card justice - the gold on the card really pops in person, and has a slight fleck like quality to it.

 There is no such thing as a bad PMG.

 And more Marte!  This is, to date, my only card from the 2015 Tek release.  But I can only hope there will be many more to follow.

And last but not least, another former Most Wanted card.  At one point in 2008-9, this Pedro was at the top of my want list.  He was, after all, the future of the franchise and his Razor cards were his only autograph releases.  I think they actually still are.

These cards have seen some major swings (and misses) along Pedro's career.  I think this officially counts as buying low, though.  The card cost me about $3.  At various points, they were selling for well above that.  But so the hobby pendulum swings.

So here's to 2015.  It was a year I can't say I'll miss, but I did add some great new cards to my collection.  Hope everyone has a happy and safe New Year, and happy collecting in 2016!

Sunday Funday

While it's far from a sure thing that the Steelers will make the playoffs this year, I can say as a fan this may be the most exciting team I can remember watching in quite a few years.  It's not your typical Steelers style, but I'm a-ok with that.  For a couple years the Steelers had looked like lame ducks, still trying to ground and pound the ball while the rest of the league was having a feast on their horrid secondary.

The team still has plenty of holes (and injuries), but watching throw after throw after throw yesterday sure was fun.

My COMC order from Black Friday is finally safely in my hands, after a two week long ordeal where the package had delivery attempted, but the wonderful mailman never left the delivery slip.  With COMC's terrible shipping times over the past year, I thought nothing of it.  Fortunately I managed to rescue it from USPS hell one day before it would have been shipped back to Washington, when I checked the online tracking to see it had been a mere mile from me for the past two weeks.

 The order was heavy on Pirates and assorted other mini collections.  But after the great game the team played yesterday, why not lead off with the few Steelers highlights?  I'm always a sucker for black refractors of the Pittsburgh teams.

 It seems like football, even moreso than baseball, is all about boom or bust when it comes to cardboard.  When Rashard Mendenhall was the Steelers starting back, he sold pretty well and was a decent, though far from spectacular, player.  Fast forward to a couple years after he is out of the league, and I have snagged a handful of his autos for under $2 each.  I think this one /65 ran me about $1.50.  Yes, please!

 And of course I'll always gladly add a new pickup to my Slash collection.

 And the bumblebees?  Yes please.

 Speaking of wonky football card values, I added yet another dud RB auto to my collection, again for about $1.  I think Dri Archer is still with the team, but I can't remember seeing him on the field this season.

 Alright, you're seeing the theme here?

 One thing I always enjoy about the big sales on COMC is scooping up all the cheap autos of my teams that I can.  This is pretty tough for the Bucs, since I have just about every run of the mill auto at this point, and just hope that there's a big price cut on some parallels or less common autos that I need.  But for the Steelers and Pens?  There are still plenty of holes to fill.

 And how can you pass up a dual relic/auto of a huge bust for a buck?  Well, apparently some can.  But not this guy.

 I've been trying to be more selective with my COMC spending, focusing on mid tier cards rather than just adding boatloads of parallels and high serial numbered cards.

But try as I might (and I do find the occasional solid price on mid-end cards), COMC is pretty much geared towards having good prices on lower end parallel types.  And while I'd like to stop my collection from continuing to grow at the scale it has for the past couple years simply out of space concerns, I never mind flipping open a binder and looking at cards like these.

Thanks for taking a look - I'll probably be finishing out the year with COMC posts, since my order was north of 300 cards, before jumping into a project that has me pretty excited for next year.

Autographs at Work? Yes, Please

Along with a new job came the discovery that work can, apparently, be a lot of fun too.  My new position includes overseeing programming for our part of the United Way's middle school mentoring campaign.  It's really a great concept - middle school kids are paired with adult mentors from the community and local businesses.  The sessions are once a week, usually during lunch time for the kids, and only last about 45 mins.  But you'd be amazed at how much of a difference having a good, professional role model and presence can make in the development of these kids.
So I spent yesterday morning at a recruiting event for the middle school mentoring program.  The United Way did the leg work - I just had to show up at one of the big banks downtown, smile, and try to recruit new volunteers for the program.

 Added perk?  The United Way had arranged for Steelers safety Will Allen, who is very active in trying to give back to the community, to appear, sign some autographs, and hopefully convince people to show up so I could swoop in and tell them about mentoring.

It was a great event, and I'd strongly suggest looking into any similar mentoring programs in your area.  For a very small commitment of nothing but your time, you really can make a huge difference in the life of a child.

And now that the PSA is out of the way, I did print out a couple customs the night before.  You know, just in case.  Considering the Steelers had a Monday night game all the way in San Diego and Allen banged up his ankle in the game, I was amazed he still made it there right on time at 11:00.  Talk about committed.

Ok, maybe it isn't the prettiest signature in the world.  And I was a little bummed when he said he doesn't sign anything from his time in Tampa Bay.  But still not bad for a morning's work.

Bigger is Better

I was going through the piles of stuff that cover what I used to call a desk, and realized I had missed sharing one of my favorite new additions.  During one of my recent flea market hunts, I came across a vendor who had a ton of signed photos and cards.  She had owned a memorabilia store in a mall years back, but at this point was just slowly trying to clear out inventory.  I picked up a few cards that have disappeared into one of my many boxes.  But the real finds were the signed photos.

 I'm typically not a big fan of signed photos.  Cards are easier to store and I can slide them into my binder pages for easy access.  And while I could eventually see myself getting some of my nicer photos framed, the likes of Paul Maholm or Brad Eldred aren't really wall-worthy.  Still...nostalgia!

At 3 for $10, I ended up bringing home six signed photos.  Most were backup Steelers from the mid 00's.  But there were a few gems.  The top photo is former Steelers wideout Yancey Thigpen.  Thigpen had a couple of excellent seasons for the Steelers, but his career quickly fizzled out after leaving Pittsburgh.

 And how can you not love Kordell?  He was the player every kid in my area idolized, and I proudly wore my Kordell jersey while playing backyard football with my friends.  The signature looks like it is probably from earlier in his career, which would make sense with a photo from his Slash days.

 Jim Tracy doesn't exactly give me the warm and fuzzies, doing an atrocious job with some pretty bad teams.  But...2006 All-Star jersey!  Yep, I spent $3 cuse I like pretty jerseys.  Are you surprised?

And finally, one that might actually find its way to a wall.  I have a nice pile of Jumpin Jack Flash photos, but I really like the look of this one.  And you can never go wrong with an autograph of your favorite player.

The Value of a Dollar

There's no question about it.  I'm a bargain shopper.  And that applies in spades when it comes to vintage cards.  The great thing about large shows is that they tend to draw dealers from across the country, which will knock prices down to about their bottom basement price.  The Robert Morris show has done wonders for my vintage team sets over the past few years.  The sheer selection has allowed me to knock out just about every common, with only superstars like Clemente and Stargell remaining from their early sets and those pesky short printed high numbers.

I actually didn't do as well on vintage this year as in the past.  That certainly had a lot to do with the influx of modern dealers.  Last year, I spent a lot of time digging through vintage boxes simply because there...wasn't anything else to look through.  But with more modern this year, most of my box digging was centered around the more recent stuff.  And the vintage bins I did look through mostly just had the same common cards I already had priced at $1 or $2.

But I was going through one dealer's $.25 box.  A lot was more or less junk - late 80's star commons.  A few serial numbered cards.  Lots of 70's commons.  And...half a dozen Pirate cards I needed.  Wait, huh?

The four cards above are definitely of the well-loved variety.  But at just a quarter a piece, they are welcomed placeholders that cross a card off my needs list, and can always be upgraded if a better copy ever presents itself at a great price.  And that's just what I did with the Rice RC.  I had picked up a really, really, really beat up copy off COMC for $.65 as a set filler.  While this copy isn't close to mint, it's a major upgrade in eye appeal at less than half the price.  Just ignore the crop job at the bottom, which is just a result of my scanner being a jerk

I'm always a little amazed how many great looking cards can be found in discount bins.  I had no idea this card even existed, but was thrilled to find a Quasar card of former Steeler and Mountaineer Amos Zereoue.  The design was actually reused in UD's Fleer Retro product, and there is a Geno Smith version I still need to track down.  Now the big question becomes which binder this goes into.

And at a buck each, I was thrilled to find two cards that had been sitting in my COMC watchlist forever, but priced around $5.

This Lemieux/Bradshaw just became one of my favorite cards in my collection, featuring two of Pittsburgh's greatest set in front of a beautiful painted skyline.  How much better can it get?

There just aren't any avenues that provide the kind of bang for your buck that card shows do.  I love COMC.  I love still buy on ebay.  And sites like Sportlots and Justcommons are great.  But there is a degree of maximizing profits that can be avoided at a show.  Most of the dime and quarter boxes I dig through are the leftovers from large deals that were long ago into the black for the dealer.  Anything else they sell out of their inventory is just icing on the cake.  And that always seems to equal great finds for my collections, and is far less irritating than the COMC seller willing to sit for years and years on a card priced well above what anyone is willing to pay, hoping just to find that one person willing to overpay someday.

I don't care how overdone Bowman is, or how watered down the checklist is.  A gold refractor of a Pirate is just too nice looking not to own for $1, even if the player will probably never hit AA.

Or to find oddball sets, like these Cooperstown Orange parallels that were only available in retail.

Or these Pinnacle Artist Proof cards.  This is apparently the blue version, which I didn't even know existed.  And I think I paid 20 times more attention to the set than the rest of the hobby did.  Again, I'd guess it was a retail exclusive.  But I honestly have no clue, and didn't find any info online.  Anyone have the inside scoop?

There's nothing that beats finding a big stack of cards from a dealer, and when all the dollar and quarter cards are counted up discovering that you just nabbed a great stack of cardboard you'd be hardpressed to even find elsewhere for less than the cost of a fast food lunch.  Long live the card show!