An Olympic Edition Single Card Post Sunday

A quick one time return of the Single Card Post Sunday in honor of the Olympic Closing Ceremonies tonight. I've had a blast watching as many events as possible over the past two weeks. I found a blaster of the Topps Olympic set and was fortunate to pull this out of it:

That is a Team USA patch of four-time gold medalist(5 overall), Simone Biles numbered #/99. I figured it would be a great time to show this one off since she will be the US flag bearer during said Closing Ceremonies. The only downer is that it came out of the pack with a crease that is kinda visible down the edge of the relic closest to the pic of Simone. Probably won't try to get it replaced, just cool to have a card like this of one of our most dominant athletes. Anyone have any favorite Olympic moments to share or are you happy they are over for another four years? Thanks for reading.

Celebrating the Games of the XXXI Olympiad

This evening the Opening Ceremonies will officially kick off the Rio Olympic Games. I remember watching the summer games every four years going back as far as the 1984 LA Games. At the time I was too young to understand how the political climate impacted those games. I was captivated by the grand scale of the event which was supplemented by the excitement of having family that lived in LA. Ever since, I have actively followed as many events as possible during the fortnight. So, as I anxiously await the Opening Ceremonies and the swimming events that will follow tonight, I want to share some Olympic themed cardboard.

On my many trips to the local Target, I've seen these sitting on the shelf. In previous incarnations, the blasters had promised an auto or relic. This year there is no mention of a guaranteed 'hit' so I opted to drop a few dollars on two loose packs from a freshly opened box.

Here are some highlights. There are silver, bronze, and gold(not shown) medal parallels for each base card. I think he design is pretty clean and I like the Team USA across the top. The inclusion of Paralympic athletes is one of the best things about the set for me. In recent years, I've done my best to follow along with those games as well. While I didn't pull any of the big names like Phelps or any of the basketball squad, I did pull this:

Franklin won 4 gold medals and a bronze in London four years ago and is one of the favorites for gold again. I mean, she's the cover girl of the product! Definitely a decent pull from a loose pack. Moving from the mainstream to the oddball, we have a set that could be found on the backs of cereal boxes in 2012 featuring 'Team Kellogg's'.

Here are six of the eight cards in the set.

Here are the final two that round out the set. Each box of this:

...contained a complete set on the back. At the time, I had no idea that there were cards of any kind on these boxes, but I was lucky enough to find a set in pretty good shape on Listia for next to nothing. I've got other Olympic themed cardboard that I may share as the games proceed, but for now I hope you enjoyed these. I'm going to go get ready to watch the Opening Ceremonies. Go Team USA! Thanks for reading.

Maybe This Guy Will Be Good Someday - #1 Draft Pick Edition

Occasionally I indulge in ripping some Bowman(or Bowman Chrome or Bowman Draft, etc) or select other prospect heavy products. I am especially prone to doing this if I can find said product on clearance at my local retail outlet. A few years back I stumbled upon a discounted hanger box of 2013 Elite Extra Edition(didn't know hey did hangers in addition to blasters) which promised some set number of cards that I can't recall with one guaranteed autograph. I picked it up quickly and ended up pulling a die-cut Aaron Judge and an auto of Jake Bauers who at the time the card was printed was a San Diego prospect but had recently been dealt to the Rays as a part of the Wil Myers deal. Therefore, I was pretty excited to pull an auto of a guy I might get to watch with the Bulls. Tucked towards the back of the stack of cards was this U15 Team USA relic card:

I had never heard of this kid and I tucked it away in a box. I came across this card over the weekend while I was searching for some other cards. When I saw it I thought, 'Hey, I've heard/seen that name recently'... Where did I hear that name?

Oh yeah...that kid was just taken number one overall in the 2016 MLB Draft! Not that being the top draft pick guarantees big league success, but at least he's not just some random guy that played for Team USA as a teen, never to be heard from again. Kinda cool to get a bit of reinforcement that maybe some of those unknown guys pulled from products like these may actually amount to something someday. Guess I should probably follow his career a little bit. Thanks for reading.