2010 Bowman retail binge - Part 1

Yep, this is in parts.

Since, I couldn't sleep because I'm sick, I decided to head to Target just as it was opening to get some medicine. As a bonus, I found a 2010 Bowman retail box. Packs are $2.99 for 10 cards. Two chrome in each pack. Odds have refractors at 1:32 and purple refractors at 1:8.
Here is the back of the pack to see the rest of the odds.

On my first trip, I bought seven packs.

Here's what I got.

Pack 1
Chris Coghlan
Michael Brantley RC
Jose Lopez
CHROME - Chase D'Arnaud
CHROME - Daniel Nava
Kevin Youklis/Lars Anderson - Bowman Expectations
AJ Pollock - Topps 100
Rashun Dixon
Adam Wilk
Kendry Morales - Gold

Pack 2
Kevin Millwood
Ruben Tejada RC
Clayton Kershaw
Magglio Ordonez
CHROME PURPLE REFRACTOR - Wilmer Font /999

CHROME - Jake Kahaulelio
Slade Heathcott  - Topps 100
Donavan Tate
Anthony Gose
Pablo Sandoval - Gold

Pack 3
James Shields
Freddy Sanchez
Billy Butler
Paul Maholm
CHROME - Gustavo Nunez
CHROME - Kevin Gausman USA baseball
Ryan Howard - throwbacks
Joseph Cruz
Tommy Mendonca
Justin Upton - Gold

Pack 4
Mike Leake RC

Miguel Montero
Kyle Blanks
CHROME - Jean Segura
CHROME - Carson Blair
Justin Morneau/Christopher Parmelee - Bowman Expectations

Prince Fielder - throwbacks
Yowill Espinal
David Lough
Alexei Ramirez - Gold

Pack 5
Dexter Fowler
John Lackey
Todd Helton
Elvis Andrus
CHROME- J.R. Murphy
CHROME - Felix Doubront
Vladimir Guerrero - throwbacks
CJ Retherford
Yen-Wen Kuo
Troy Tulowitzki - Gold

Pack 6
Tyler Flowers RC

Jose Reyes
Rajai Davis
Michael Bourn
CHROME - Sheng An Kuo
CHROME - Gerrit Cole USA baseball

Jimmy Rollins - throwbacks

Rex Brothers
Domingo Santana
Scott Rolen - Gold

Pack 7
Tommy Manzella RC
Torii Hunter
Josh Thole RC
Michael Cuddyer
CHROME - Byron Wiley
CHROME - Sebastian Valle
Max Stassi - Topps 100
Patrick Schuster
Jon Gaston
Joey Votto - Gold

Everyone likes pie

In Topps Series 1, there was a series of short-printed cardsshort-printed cards that featured the Yankees and their pie. After walk-off wins, A.J. Burnett led the pie onslaught and it happened a number of times last year.

Topps Series 2 didn't want to be left out of the pie fun.

Jason Heyward has his own pie-version SP and the card is bringing some series bucks (ebay links). Through Friday, Heyward has nine homers, 35 RBIs and a .295 average through 44 games.

This card is interesting because its something that has happened in 2010, which is a novel idea. So many times we see cards with guys who have been traded. Topps has to do some photoshopping or we have seen them just change the team name on the card while they are pictured in a different uniform.

Here, we have a card pictured with something relevant from the year that it came out. I like that idea.

Anyway, if you have this card, sell now!!!!

We're talking at least $100 for this.

Sunday Question

We mostly talk about baseball around here, but I know there are many other sports fans.

If you could attend one sporting event, what would it be?

Personally, I think I would like to attend a World Cup match. I could only imagine the vibe and atmosphere from that kind of game. If only I could get to South Africa.

Roy Halladay pitches a perfect game

This is season for perfect games and no hitters.

First Colorado's Ubaldo Jimenez threw a no-hitter, then Oakland's Dallas Braden threw a perfect game just 20 days ago.

Philadelphia's Roy Halladay is the next to join the club as one of the best pitchers in the game today threw a perfect game against the Florida Marlins tonight in a 1-0 win.

"I was just following Chooch (Carlos Ruiz)," Halladay said in his post-game interview on the local television station.

Having covered this team this season, Halladay was probably telling the truth. Halladay is one of the most prepared baseball players in the game. He doesn't take the other four days while he is resting lightly. Halladay studies his next opponent and is very vocal during pitchers' meetings.

Here are some of Halladay's chase cards:
1. 1997 Bowman Chrome RC

2. 1997 Bowman Certified autos (black, blue and gold)

3. 2007 Upper Deck Goudey Sport Royalty auto

4. 1995 Signature Rookies Tetrad set

What is the best Halladay card you have in your collection?

It has ended

The Stephen Strasburg superfractor auction has ended.

It didn't move in the last minute, which is popular with many auction. Not this one. I guess all the bidding prior to that was enough.

That auction ended at $16,403.

Sigh.

The things I could do with that money.

The Beckett Blog did an interview with the guy who pulled the card (link).

A Topps Redemption

About two weeks ago I was trying to clean off my desk and scanner of the piles of cards that have accumulated over the last semester, this is still going on and may go on forever. At any rate, I found a redemption card from the 2009 Topps Ticket to Stardom that I opened on Christmas. Yes, I forgot all about it until now.

Being that it isn't a player I collect it just got shoved into a pile of stuff that I was going ot figure out what to do with later. I thought about selling it on eBay, and then I figured I might as well see what kind of season he is having before bothering. I put the code in about 2 weeks ago and the card arrived today, which seemed awfully quick to me.

Want to know who it is? Click to satisfy your curiosity.

I'm willing to trade it for something fun. If no one cares.... off to the glue factory, I mean eBay.

My best poker pull

For those of you who do not know, I'm a big poker fan. I love the game, everything about it. The strategy, the psychology and even the luck involved.

Beckett is holding a contest to win a 2010 Razor Poker hobby box and I want to win it. I've been staring at these hobby boxes since they have come and haven't pulled the trigger (I got a birthday coming up if anyone wants to get me something!).

These contest is to simply state your best pull with a picture of yourself holding it. Here's my favorite pull:

It's a Phil Gordon auto from 2006 Razor Poker.

I like Phil Gordon a lot, though he can be a bit cranky at times. What I enjoy about him as a player is the way he thinks about the game. I've spent a lot of time listening to his audio book (The Little Blue Book after I bought The Little Green Book - or maybe it was the other way around).

I bought the audio book in Cleveland while I was working, so I had something to listen to on the drive back to NJ about 4-5 years ago.

Poker also holds a special place in my heart because it's how I met the boyfriend. We ended up on the same game at the Taj Mahal over four glorious years ago. The Taj Mahal is good for something.

I pulled some other autos such Men "The Master" Nguyen and Erik Seidel, but I like the Gordon best.

Oh, the symbolism

When Upper Deck announced its social media awards, we were not fans. I believe I wrote one post on the matter and then didn't want to talk about it after that.

Somehow, we were included in the top five, which meant we won.

We received a package of product - that we intend to give away at some point - and our trophy arrived in the mail a few days ago. I just got around to opening to the box that has been sitting here untouched for the last two days.

As I was opening it, I looked at the boyfriend and said, "This sounds broken."

This is what I found.

The award is broken into two pieces. It's actually a very nice award. Glass with the name of our blog etched into it. My intention with the award was to have a little fun with it. I planned on bringing it to different places and having different people take pictures with it. I was going to try and have a little fun with it.

It's first stop might be to the hospital now.

Update: I contact Chris over at UD and he said for us to send it back and they will replace it for us. Thanks, Chris. I was never expecting one in the first place and for you guys to replace it is pretty nice. 

First Look: 2010 Topps Series 2 Jumbo packs

I couldn't wait for the box to come in the mail so I went to the Baseball Card Store today to check out the goods. I was going originally to pick up a couple of cards Dave said he had for me, and I had planned on buying a pack of something for funsies.

I bought 2 2010 Topps Series 2 Jumbo packs from a fresh box that I opened myself, so odds were totally in my favor. I picked a special box and opened the pack second from the bottom instead of the last one like I usually do. Here is what was in pack one (Mickey Mantle wrapper):

(pack damaged A-Rod card not included in scan because it made me mad, also note missing silver in Topps logo on Yankees card. Also to be noted, the last pack on each side had Dustin Pedroia so I couldn't have bought them anyway.)


Miguel Cabrera gold






Pablo Sandoval 3D





So, my feeling about pack one was way off. I was happy with the Yankees World Series card, but whatever. Onto pack 2, which was picked second from the bottom, Babe Ruth wrapper.



Luke Hochevar gold
A card my mom would have NEVER thrown away.



Chris Coughlan 3D


Ubaldo Jimenez July 4th Commemorative hat logo card



I'm happy with the packs I got, and very happy with the hat card. I like the look and feel of the card and think it was a cool idea, however I hate manufactured patches so this is going on eBay to be flipped for a Cano/Lind of possibly the same variety.

The 3D cards are pretty awesome, they are like new age Sportflics and are a nice insert that we haven't seen 40 times already. While I like them alot, I hope that cards don't look like this in 2020.

There will be a more comprehensive review of the set once we break some boxes, from this small I am digging Series 2.