Digging Into Archives

Before I start, I want to thank everyone for their support on the Cal Ripken raffle/good deed post from over the weekend. You're all really great for helping in any way you can! If you haven't gotten your ticket and you'd like to take the shot at the Cal auto, you have until this Friday night/Saturday morning at midnight. If you have no idea what I'm talking about, you can get caught up right here.

Believe it or not, until I walked in today, it had been an entire week since I had set foot in my local Target. I really wasn't looking for anything card related but as I always do, I had to check out that aisle. Much to my delight, I found this:

Honestly, it hadn't even occurred to me to look for it. I knew that it was being released this week(tomorrow to be exact), but I've got a Hobby box with my name on it that I'll be picking up Jimmy(my enabler) who formerly owned/operated Big D's Sports Cards brick and mortar store in Raleigh. Now he just runs Big D's(on a much smaller scale) online. Despite having a box to open later this week, I couldn't leave this blaster on the shelf. Here is a quick rundown of the contents.

Before I start with my impressions, I am not a stickler for original design details. I would much rather crack these packs and focus on the cards that look good regardless of the fact that they are not exactly the same as their historic counterparts. That being said, I love the Satchel Paige in the '53 design and the Bryant and Betts in the '79 design are pretty nice too. 

I noticed as I flipped through the contents of these packs that most of the cards I really liked hailed from the portion of the set that is paying tribute to the 1991 set. That is one of the first sets that I have fond memories of building with my older brother. No matter what has gone on between us since then, I can always think back on putting that set together and smile. I was lucky to pull the blue parallel of Roger Maris which is #/199. It's not often I pull a nice parallel like that AND it's a Yankee.

Here are the inserts I unwrapped. The Topps Super set up top is going to be the next insert set I put on my set building list. They are nicely done.i guess I'm a sucker for those vintage oddball tribute sets from the past few Archives releases. I dig the Father-Son and the Draft Picks because I remember flipping through the originals in my collection when I was younger. I'm not thrilled with the players I pulled though. Last but not least, the big draw for me...

This year, there is a small insert set that immortalizes characters from one of my favorite baseball movies on cardboard. I am going to actively hunt down as many of the Bull Durham cards as I can. Base inserts, colored parallels, autos, etc...I want them all.i am quite disappointed that neither Crash Davis nor Annie have base insert cards. Their likenesses will only be seen on cards sporting their signatures. Maybe I'll get lucky enough to pull the Crash auto from my box later this week. Hey, a guy can dream, right? Thanks for reading.

A Brief and Early Peek at Some Archives

Imagine my surprise. While I was perusing the card aisle at the local Target, what did I see? Blasters of the soon-to-be officially released 2015 Topps Archives! I hadn't planned on making a card purchase, but of course I had to grab one of these!

The packs looked like this, albeit very briefly(before I quickly ripped them). The blaster contained a total of 80 cards and I got a mixed bag, nothing terribly exciting but certainly solid.

Stars of today(and maybe tomorrow). I don't collect either Trout or Stanton, but they were a few of the bigger names that were in my first 8 packs. Taylor is probably my favorite rookie that was pulled. He may well be the next Nats player that I start to collect.

Stars of yesterday! Again, no PC(though Rickey is close), but these are some of my favorite retired player cards of the lot.

Yankee stars! These are just three of the six Yankees, but they're definitely the three best photos to share.

Last but not least, insert stars! Mission kinda accomplished. I would have been terribly disappointed if the blaster didn't yield at least one of the ten Will Ferrell cards. As it was, I had to suppress disappointment anyway because the Ferrell was smack-dab in the middle of the first pack I opened. I had high hopes that at least a second would make an appearance. Oh well, there's always tomorrow to go back and grab another blaster. For now, it's one down and nine to go! I was pleased to pull the Gomez. I wasn't sure what it was exactly, but a bit of research says it is a gold parallel. It's serial #'d out of 50 on the back. I might know someone out there that would enjoy this one... I wrap the insert portion of the program with one of the most well known US Presidents, a very cool card of Abe Lincoln.

Not too shabby. Sadly, no SP's(which meant no Bryant or Soler RC), Topps Game inserts, or Will Ferrell auto's but I guess I can't have it all in the first blaster. I'm just thrilled to be able to open something early for a change! Opening this makes me wish I could justify the cost for one of those last spots in the Nachos Grande group break of this stuff!

This IS Happening!!!

A while back, during Spring Training, I wrote a post about Will Ferrell playing for 10 different teams(all 9 positions) in one day. I had high hopes back then that Topps would document the feat with some cardboard at some point this season. It looks like my hopes will be realized next month when Topps Archives is released! For more details, click here. Here are some images that I've swiped from the internet.

  

Apparently, there will be 100 total autographed cards broken down between the 10 teams. So, each team's auto card will be serial numbered /10. Fortunately for those of us who aren't lucky or rich enough to own an autographed copy, there will also be a 10 card unsigned insert set to chase. I don't know about anyone else, but I can't wait to complete this set!