I bought a very random lot of oddball 90's food issues from an ebay seller and he mailed the cards in 9-pocket pages. With a few changes for aesthetics, this page of 1993 Jimmy Dean cards is one of the rare ready-made pages in my collection. We'll get into the rest of the cards in this lot in a moment.
I had to reorganize the pile of mail into something I could handle. It went from this to this:
I am going to need a second cup of coffee...I mean, there are 35 PWEs alone here:
Included amongst the Jiffy packs were some trades and contest entry winners and they will get their own write ups soon. In fact, Night Owl already got his.
Okay, that is enough Postal Porn, let's get back to the cards.
Also included in that madcap food issue lot were some 1992 Jimmy Dean cards, and...
...a 1992 Score P&G All Star Set. I already have this set broken up into a page and players, so if anyone wants this one, just shout. It has a wonderful early 90's look and checklist.
The reason I bought this lot was it had some of the 1992 Mr. Turkey cards and I couldn't tell you why, but I find this to be one of the great all time oddball sets: the name, the design, the airbrushing, this set has it all. I still need three more to make a page but I am working on that.
The other set in here was a 1992 French's set, something I had never seen before. Even though this is an 18 card set, I am going to go against my best instincts and break this badboy up into a 9-pocket page and for player collections. A few of the leftovers might even find their way to you in trades.
I was on a real Mr. Turkey binge and also bought the 5-card 1993 Baseball Greats set.
I nabbed this particular one, over all the others on eBay, because it came with an official Mr. Turkey Baseball Greats notepad. All of my correspondence will be done on its pages from now on.
I got a little carried away with my 527 eBay purchases:
The top three all came from the same seller, you know, to save on shipping. The others all came in a combination of low price or short impulse. I have four binders full of low price and short impulse buys on that front. Where else can nameless/faceless rookies hang out with the likes of Mario Lemieux and Brett Favre?
Going back to early 90's oddballs, here is another set I only recently found out existed, the 1992 Upper Deck Heroes Highlights. It is ten cards of early retro vintage goodness:
I immediately put nine of the cards into its own page courtesy of the other oddball seller. This set is wonderful in its Upper Deck-ness: the player selection, the terrible computer color adjustment on otherwise awesome photos. Given my love of the Upper Deck Heroes series and faux-vintage, it had to be mine. What happened to the other card in the set, you wonder?
It is none other than Reggie Jackson and that card will go into my player collection. It was a hard choice between his and Ted Williams but the Splinter's card just looked better on the page.
The other cards on this scan all come from those PWEs and Listia. I have decided to jump on the Yasiel Puig bandwagon. I figure anyone who makes traditional sportswriters that uptight must be doing something right. I will need six more; please check the player page want lists for further information. Also there are two Mike Piazzas I needed and one that I didn't. Also some nifty Goudy reprints and a 1963 Topps Dal Maxvill. I am not 100% sure why I bought these, but hey, the price was right.
Here are some more puzzling cards from Listia:
The top three cards were all bid upon at the very last minute for 200 credits or less. My motivations were nothing more than "oh, look, card!" I figure, any OPC card with a trade line is fun and the blue parallel of a Kansas City Royal is quite good looking. I also got lots of 2010 Topps and 2014 Opening Day with the similar thoughts and theories. I love that photo of Big Papi and not only is that EY card have a fine photo, it is his "rookie card." Sold and sold. While looking for a few Roberto Clemente cards, I found one Listian with a bunch of small faux-vintage lots of different players. I won the Clemente, Al Simmons, Tony Gwynn, and Buck Leonard lots. I am willing to bet that is the first time those four players have ever been in the same sentence together, much less the same envelope. A simple search of Google proves my suspicions on that front to be correct, at least in the online world.
Sorry folks, we aren't even close to being done. Did you see that pile? I mean, this scan is just the "bonus" cards I got in all those envelopes:
I find that a lot of Listia sellers throw in random bonus cards or use non-baseball cards in as toppers. None of these cards remotely goes with anything I bought but they are appreciated nonetheless. The Rickey and Buster Keaton cards are especially appreciated.
I didn't get a lot of other sports cards, but there was just enough to make up a single scan:
Those hockey cards were all nabbed last minute while I was browsing. I bet you'll never guess why I got that first one? That 1992 Dave Krieg finishes my Topps page for that year. Would you believe I finished my 1960's pages before I finished the 90's? I really didn't buy any football cards back then. Those bottom two Prizm cards are very very shiny and those scans do them not justice.
Speaking of shiny blue Prizm cards:
I picked up a lot of seven baseball cards and now I have to decide whether to get two more of that year or make a Frankenstein page of those shiny wonders. I lean towards the hate side of Prizm, but shiny is shiny and those blue cards are good looking. Of course, they don't hold a candle to the Topps Blue Refractors. Maybe I should just send them all to Chris at View From the Skybox and be done with them. I also picked up a huge lot of 2013 Allen and Ginter dirt cheap. The big cards are not shown here, the minis are. While I don't want all cards to be mini, there is something just so enjoyable about those little devils.
Wait, where are all the Mets cards? Don't worry, they're coming...
All these 2014 cards come from Listia, including that camo parallel Jon Niese. I might have to do his rainbow now that I have one of his low numbered parallels. While I usually like Mets parallels to be in blue or orange, there is something organic and baseball-appropriate about the green parallels. Topps has used a lot of white for the base the last decade or so, but I think a light green color like this might also do nicely. I was always a fan of the 2001 Topps set for this reason, though the color on that border leans a little too teal for what I am talking about.
This Matt Harvey comes from that Opening Day lot from earlier, but he migrated down here.
The other cards on this page are random and diverse. The second card is a rare shown-as-a-Met Richard Hildago card. The Orosco, Kingman, and the bottom three were all in a couple of random Mets lots I got on Listia for nothing more than I like to tear open envelopes and pull out Mets cards. The two Tom Seaver cards are the oddest of oddballs. The middle one is a Sportsflics-esque card from Kellogg's back in the early 90's. I remember actually pulling this card out of a cereal box. I couldn't remember if I still had it or not, so I picked it up for nothing on Listia. The other card comes from eBay. It is from 1995 and not only have I never seen it before, I can barely find any information about it. It's a cool looking card, so my $2 was well spent.
Last but certainly not least, let's look at the non-card items:
I got a couple of 1987 Mets schedules on Listia, which actually document the fact that the Mets once won a World Series. Stop laughing, it's true! I also got a free Saints car air freshener on Listia because hey, free air freshener. The other thing here that I picked up is a Mets 101 board book for my niece's 1st birthday. Even though I am aware that indoctrinating your children as a Mets fan could be considered child abuse, please do not report me to the authorities.
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