Leaf offers Jose Abreu cards on eBay

Jose Abreu is the hot player right now – on the field and on cards.

With his autographs just hitting the market, his card prices have blown up. Expect his cards to be everywhere now just like they were last year with Yasiel Puig. The good thing for Abreu collectors is that cards have hit earlier in the card cycle than it did with Puig.

Everyone wants to cash on this young star – including Leaf.

Leaf created a “Welcome to Chicago” card that it’s selling exclusively through eBay.

Of course, since it’s not Topps, it’s mean no logos or team names – and lots of airbrushing.

What do you think of this card?

Ichiro! Ichiro! Ichiro!

Now is your time to finally get an autographed Ichiro card. Leaf Metal Draft released this week, which is essentially a prospect product.

Collectors can expect these kinds of cards in there with players such as Manny Banuelos and Bubba Starling. 

However, international star Ichiro has his first autograph in years in the set - as a redemption. The first of these redemptions have popped up on eBay.

While many of the Buy it Now options (here and here) have the card going for an insane price, here the first auction that is set to end.

(Although one already sold for $750)

 I’d like to see where this one goes.

How to keep a rumor going on the Internet - Leaf baseball edition

This is how a rumor starts.

As I continue my love fest with the fellas over at Freedom Cardboard, I came upon a thread where Leaf’s Brian Gray left a cryptic message. The OP mentioned how he wished Panini had baseball license.

Essentially, the OP wanted there to be more than just Topps. NO MONOPOLIES!

Gray's first response on the thread was this:

It says: "You may well get your wish for competition imminently ...
BG"

Does that mean there will be competition in the baseball world again?

Perhaps, but certainly not of the likes of the Topps and Upper Deck competition. Topps still has an exclusive license for at least the next four years – I believe – with the MLB. The only way there would be a new license is with the MLBPA, which means faces but no uniforms and logos.

Gray also posted there should news in about 2-3 weeks regarding this matter. So, I will sit here and twiddle my thumbs in the process.

This blog post is how you keep adding fuel to the fire.

Lack of competition equates to lack of interest

I have been thinking about this a lot lately, and just recently had a conversation with Flash about it. While I love my PC dearly and wouldn't part with it under almost any circumstance in the world, there is nothing driving me to continue it either.

The fact that I don't collect football, basketball, or hockey cards basically means it's baseball or bust. I don't have any interest at all in starting to collect another sport. Baseball is my passion, and for me to invest money into something just to kill the boredom doesn't make sense.

While I do go out and pick up a new release as soon as it hits the stores, the excitement or enthusiasm often wears off within 5 minutes of writing the post of my newly acquired loot. I was terribly mad and disappointed when Donruss lost their licensing for making MLB cards, and then when it happened to Upper Deck it mad me upset but not as much as Donruss. The second blow was just like the icing on the cake for me.

I really thought early in the year that it wouldn't be that big of a deal when Upper Deck stopped making baseball cards. For a whille, it wasn't that bad and was tolerable. But now approaching the end of the season and the year, there are so many products I miss having to open, like Goudey and Sweet Spot especially. The monopoly on baseball cards really makes no sense to me anymore.

If you think about it, there are 17 spots for baseball product releases and 12 months to a year. Two or three of those spots are wasted on crap products that are boring and usually suck every year. I get that Opening Day is for kids, but there has to be a way to do something goofy that can move that product to another line of production like animating it or something. I really don't care but no one wants Opening Day hobby boxes. I know it sounds goofy but I am so bored with the options of new cards. Approximately 1 release per month.... then we sit around and wait for the next boring set design with silver sticker autos, crinkled corners, damaged cards, and missing hits.

I bought hobby boxes at the National. Does anyone recall what boxes I purchased? I'll tell you this, not one of them was a Topps product nor was it a recent product. Since the National I think I have purchased maybe 8-10 cards, if that. I'm at the point of just buying what I like for my PC and basically nothing more. Wax is fun to me while I am opening it, and that's about it. But.... it doesn't mean I won't buy some new stuff later in the year. I like opening, just wish there was some Donruss 2010 or Leaf 2010 baseball around to entertain me.

I've been to Target 3 times this week and left with nothing. I went to the card shop last week and I left with a couple of 15 pocket sheets.... Ripping a case of 2010 Topps 206 was awesome for me because I got the thrill of opening a ton of packs, only took the few cards I wanted and didn't have to spend money on a whole box for nothing. I am looking forward to the Chrome break to add stuff to my PC and I like wrappers.

Has anyone else been feeling like this lately?

P.S. If anyone has any Cano, Pujols, or Lind mini's from 206 I'd like to trade for them.

P.P.S. I will also say that Bowman Platinum looks like it will be the best set of the year. I am hoping that product is awesome to get things going again.

Why so many secrets?

The first product to come out under the Leaf brand will be Leaf MMA,, which is set to release next month.

But what is in this set?

That’s a good question. There are eight packs per box and each pack will have eight cards with one autograph and seven base cards, according to the company’s website. Some autos included in the set are Fedor Emelianenko, Brock Lesnar, Randy Couture, Chuck Liddell, Forest Griffin and Gina Carano. Here is the sell sheet for the set.

The picture is from the company's website, which also has two other shots of base cards if you want to see them.

According to the site, over 100 fighters will be featured in the release, 40 of which will be making their trading card debut.

But who are those people?

Another good question. But this time I have no answer. The checklist for this product has not been released. Perhaps it was Leaf finalizing cards or maybe the set isn’t ready yet.

But it looks as though it‘s neither. Leaf is apparently protecting its assets.

Brian Gray wrote on my favorite message board Freedom Cardboard:

“Honestly, one of our competitors as (sic) been calling around to distributors trying to get our checklist for MMA in an effort to make last minute additions to have the first ever autographs of some fighters which we have. We have purposely (sic) withheld that checklist to date, in an effort to perserve (sic) our status as first autographed cards of many athletes.

“I do feel comfortable letting that list roll in the next 10 days... I can assure you that the checklist of over 100 fighters autographed is very strong. Ill make sure you guys know when we post it to the website, leaftradingcards.com”

The checklist is coming soon, but it seems Leaf just wants to keep that to themselves right now keeping it a secret for as long as possible while other companies who create MMA cards are left guessing.

Razor Rookie Retro checklist coming together

The last Razor branded product should be coming out at the end of August, if not sooner, Brian Gray said on Twitter. Razor Rookie Retro is a set of some of the most popular graded rookie cards of the top players over all sports.

Gray bought the 2010 Bowman Stephen Strasburg superfractor when it was re-listed and bought it for $21,403 exclusively for this set.

Razor had success with a similar product, Legends of the Diamond, where every card is slabbed by PSA. The boxes go in the $200-plus range and include one pre-1970 vintage card.

There is no checklist yet for Razor Rookie Retro, probably because cards are still being bought. However, if you look at this eBay account (hint, hint), you will get an idea of what cards will be included. Some of the rookies include Alex Rodriguez, Michael Jordan, Lebron James and 2007 Jason Heyward superfractor.

Like every hobby box, these boxes are a gamble. While at the National, I saw two Legends of the Diamond breaks. One had a card that was immediately sold for $60 (after paying $200) and another had a 1969 (I think) Nolan Ryan.

Gray has said the average return on the Rookie Retro boxes will be around 80 percent of factory cost across the print run. As of Monday night, pre-order boxes are going for $219 on Atlanta Sports Cards.

Gray has purchased money cards from collectors to fill this as well. At the National, many sold graded cards of well-known players and some of today’s hottest prospects. Imagine if they opened this product and got their own card back. Ha!

In other good news, Gray also said the boxes will have security stickers in hopes of preventing tampering.

While this set is out of my price range, I am looking forward to seeing some of the breaks of this product.

Update: View the checklist here.

Day 1 National Report

The National is one biiiiiig card show. Here are the highlights from the first day of the show.

1. Brian Gray has launched a new endeavor. He is bringing back the Leaf brand and acquired all the non-baseball brands from Razor.

2. The Strasburg Heritage will be very difficult to get. We got to the show around 5 p.m. and the line was already more than 100 people long. Only 100 were given out on the first day. However, a bit disappointing is the centering was not good on many of these cards. We saw one and the centering was off and after speaking to some folks, they all said the same thing.

Dave and Adam’s has a sign saying they will pay $80 for any Strasburg redemption.

3. There is so much vintage here. I don’t like it. There are many people who collect vintage and there should be vintage at the show, but the number of vintage is way more than the number of modern cards. This is not a good thing for someone like me. I’m looking for Derek Jeter and Kevin Kouzmanoff cards.

4. Here’s a crazy story: A person many of us are friends with on Twitter had a large shipment of 2010 Bowman cards off the get graded and got lost in the mail. This person had somewhere between 40-50 cards in that order and some very low-numbered cards including a superfractor.

Two members who are volunteering for FCB walked passed a booth with lots of 2010 Bowman and, amazingly, sitting in the case were two of these cards, including said superfractor.

The guys called out the dealer and told them exactly what happened and how this person lost their cards in the mail. He said he bought it off eBay, but eventually gave in and handed two cards over, a superfractor and red refractor.

Craziness.