Well, hello there…

Posted by cardboard hogs on March 7, 2017

Yeah, it’s been a while.

I’ve been on a bit of a blog hiatus.

Various reasons really. Work overload, tired, old, rainy cold days…and really feeling like my hobby was getting in the way of my amazing family. I was putting cards before my awesome little boy and my amazingly beautiful wife. It’s all about balance, which i’ve mentioned multiple times here. I think it’s really important…you know? The blog is fun and the hobby and collecting are also fun…but family first. The past few weeks, we’ve been able to see the snow at Mt. Hood and the ocean along the Oregon coast. It’s pretty amazing living in the Pacific Northwest…and i don’t want my hobby to get in the way of that.

That said, i do love doing this collecting things and writing about cards. It’s a great way to share my hobby with others…and really, connect with others…just like you!. With the multiple ways of connecting with other collectors, it’s not hard to find trade partners. Now, to be honest, i’ve made a few trades in the past that i’ve felt were not equal in return, so i’ve tried to steer clear of making trades with people i’m not too familiar with. Until one day…Shane from Off the Wall reached out to me regarding a couple Silver Pack cards i pulled…they were Red Sox, so i knew i wouldn’t be too upset to part with them…:) i kid Shane!!! He was nice enough to post a recap of the trade from his end HERE. So, after a very long delay…here is my post!

Shane and i went back and forth on twitter to work through some items i was looking for…i’m a difficult trade partner, because i don’t keep up with my checklist that well. Luckily though, Shane had quite a few cards to help out with my 1960’s set needs. The biggest chunk of cards was the 1969 set needs. Here are a few of the really nice lot of cards.

Next up, was a few cards to fill my 1963, 1966 and 1967 set needs. The way Billy looks at Hal, you would think they hate each other…but they don’t. There baseball cards…i think the whiskey is kicking in now…

The third lot of vintage Topps card needs is the currently popular 1968 Topps burlap set. Go get your Heritage needs filled kids!

Shane also helped out with my 2009 and 2010 Heritage needs…he made a huge dent in my lists, check it out.

It was so great to cross off most of these guys from my list…not to mention a bunch of these guys are SPs or small insert sets. Very cool

In case you don’t know, i collect Redskins. That’s the bulk of what i collect…of course you know that. Most of my card money goes to Redskins cards. Here’s a group of cards that Shane passed along to me in our trade.

I love the Joe Lavender cards. The shades are top notch…plus a Fleer action photo which aren’t the easiest to find!

Last card of the bunch is a card that i have…but love nonetheless. It’s a lovely Don Mattingly card. With Shane being a Red Sox fan, i’m sure he wasn’t too upset to part with the card…:)

Hey, that was a great trade…honestly, might be the best trade i’ve ever made. I was able to cross of a ton of stuff off my lists which these days is a very great thing.

Hope you guys are doing well and getting excited about the 2017 MLB season. I have quite a few things to post in the next few days or weeks, so lets go! Thanks for reading.

Blogging by Hand.

Posted by cardboard hogs on April 4, 2016

Crazy Card Show success!

Posted by cardboard hogs on March 9, 2014

This past Saturday, Mall 205 had their monthly show (although there wasn’t one in February). I hadn’t been to a show since the end of last year (although I stopped at the Cedar Hills show for about 20 minutes) and was really excited to see some new product and pick up a few cards for my various personal collections (way too many of those things for me right now). As usual, I stopped by Tom’s table.

Tom is always my first stop. He’s extremely personable, easy to talk to and is more than happy to pull cards for the regulars…like me. He also works at Check Out my Cards (COMC.com for the cool kids)…which is cool…really cool. They seem to be one of the few companies that are working to strengthen the hobby rather than dictate it’s direction. Their new plan for databasing cards seems like a wonderful idea and one that the hobby is in desperate need of. I’m not really sure how the details work for the database creation, but that’s not my job to figure out…only to contribute in some way.

Now that i’ve completely lost track of what I was talking about…I should get back to the card show.

Tom’s table.

So a few weeks ago, I sent Tom a list of cards to fill my Redskins Topps team sets and didn’t think much of it. Apparently Tom took the list very seriously and hit me off with a huge stack of cards from the 70’s and 80’s nearly obliterating my checklist.

So freakin’ wonderful. Plus! He put them all in penny sleeves and top loaders. Double Plus! He told me he pulled most of them off the COMC.com inventory, which saved me a few dollars in shipping and more than likely a few dollars in the asking price.

Needless to say, I was blown away. The only bad thing was the stack of cards was going to cost me my card show budget for the day. I sifted through what Tom had and saw he had a few other cards I didn’t need. Pulled the ones I wanted and needed and we made a deal that allowed me to troll around the show for a few other bargains. I was more than happy to part with a chunk of my cash for this chunk of cards.

I need to get my checklists updated for the 90’s and 2000’s now. Gotta keep Tom busy, you know. Once again, Tom, if you are reading this…thank you very much. You saved me some money and no telling how much time.

Here is a peek of some of the other Redskins cards I got from Tom. New stuff and some rando’s that will soon be crossed off a list thas has yet to be generated. Yes, those are mini cards, not some weird proportion bending photo.

There were also these kids. Some new rookies, some Cooleys and some 2000’s thingys.

I did pick up a few other Harper’s, Hanley’s and Strasburg’s at the show which I hope to scan and post in the coming days (months depending on the lil boys needs…)

Box Break: 2013 Topps Magic Football

Posted by cardboard hogs on February 7, 2014

It’s been a while since i’ve picked up a box of cards. I have been doing my best to stay away from boxes of cards unless I plan to put the set together since I have terrible luck with the ‘hits’. I’m not a hit chaser and don’t plan to be one either…but I do love opening packs of cards. It takes me back to being a happy go lucky kid with $5 in my pocket riding my bike to the Stop’n Go for a few packs of 1986 Topps or Garbage Pail Kids and tall bottle of coke…man, those were the days. Back when $5 could get you way more than 8 cards to a pack.

As you can see from the title, the box is Magic Football from this year. Unlike the last couple of years, the rookie class isn’t too exciting…but I love this brand and here we go!

Card Design: 3.5 of 5

Just like the past couple of years, the base card design is pretty simple.

Topps does it’s best to give these cards a sort of retro look with the banner and stars. Nobody really does that anymore, do they? seems like a throwback to the 50’s. I’ve always felt like Magic is Topps version of Heritage for football, minus the copying of vintage designs. Instead of copying them verbatim, they take bits and pieces of the cards to create a ‘new throwback’ look, which i love.

I also like that they used a good solid card stock with no glossy finish. I’m kind of old school like that. The glossy cards are great and have a time and place, but i really enjoy a card that isn’t slippery or covered with texture. Just some nice smooth cardboard with a little friction. Such a weird comment…

Photography: 4 of 5

Photography, yes, photography. The photos are highly over processed and in most cases i despise this. Technology is a great thing, but a heavy hand can ruin a great photo.

I was quite impressed that Topps was able to get a photo (almost looks photoshopped, eh?) of Josh Freeman’s short lived stint with the Vikings (is he coming back to the Vikings next year?) As i’ve mentioned in previous posts, I enjoy photography and my wife is a professional photographer, so we have our fair share of HDR imagery discussion in our home. Fun huh?

This fairly new form of photo processing is everywhere now and definitely has its place…and I think sports card photography is that place.

The photos on these cards always look really sharp and you can see a lot of texture and depth on each card…i guess for some, this may make up for the lack of glossy-ness.

Look at that smile! And those Tattoos!

Look at those crazy eyes! And that old school mesh jersey top!

Hits: 3 of 5

As i’ve mentioned, I do not by boxes for the hits. I am not that type of collector. Magic does offer three autographs in their boxes along with the occasional relic or memorabilia card. The autographs are stickers though…ugh stickers…better than redemptions, but man an on card autograph is so great! Since the rookie class wasn’t too stellar this year, the autographs weren’t that stellar either.

Brandon Myers – New York Giants

Kayvon Webster – Denver Broncos

Khaseem Greene – Chicago Bears

Magic is owned by Topps, so they fill your box up with little hits and parallels and a whole bunch of other shit that makes collectors want to collect things they don’t really want to collect. Like some micro cards with Drew Brees and Arian Foster on them.

or how about some receiver action with Cal bookends of Keenan Allen and DeSean Jackson sandwiching Anquan Boldin from the base white mini.

How about some green border minis with these three dudes.

Or what about these black border minis!

and a Hall of Famer Blue Border mini!

I could have done without these groovy Aerial Attack inserts…but my wife loves Cam, so here honey.

The colors on this thing…holy crap…ho-lee-crap.

The Rookie Enchantments are back, but aren’t that enchanting.

Markus Wheaton for all of you Steeler fans out there.

and a Cordarelle Patterson card.

Desmond Trufant, a man that Steve Smith respects.

Review

All in all, i love the cards. I was really hoping to put together a set, but after seeing the 330 card set checklist and heavy dose of SP cards i’m not sure that’s gonna happen. I need to think about it. My collection is a bit chaotic right now and this won’t help with the chaos. I really wish Topps went a little lighter on the SP’s. A box of these guys won’t set you back too much, but if you plan on putting the set together you could be dropping well over $100 on this set and i’m not sure that’s worth it for this group of cards.

and a MINI!

Bacarri Rambo…the best name ever.

Hope you enjoyed the review…my pack breakdown for 2014 Topps will be up soon. I’m waiting for everyone else to release theirs before I put my thoughts out there. 🙂

Trade Post: Nachos Grande

Posted by cardboard hogs on January 23, 2014

As i was going through some of my random hit cards, I noticed I had a Barry Larkin card that didn’t have a great place in my collection. I knew someone who would appreciate it though, Chris over at Nachos Grande! I sent him the card and he was able to put together a trifecta of cardboard that I can definitely use for my team and player sets.

Hanley Ramirez – 2008 Allen and Ginter

LaRon Landry – 2008 Absolute Memorabilia Gridiron Force 19/250

Joe Theismann – 1989 Pro Set

At this point in my blogging days, I am a very difficult trade partner as my lists are incomplete…and I have a good amount of cards for the teams and players I collect. Chris was able to find three cards that I do not have…I used to have the Theismann, but it’s gone awol, as has the single bar face mask.

Thanks for the cards Nachos Grande! They will find a home in their respective binder soon.

Look at the Harper kid

Posted by cardboard hogs on January 14, 2014

Here are a couple more pickups from the Mall 205 card show for one of the new kids on my PC block. A few inexpensive Harper cards that set me back a grand total of $2. Can’t beat that for this kids baseball card.

look at the kids well manicured eye brows here. Very precise, just like his nearly flawless swing. Seems to be some very minor controversy about him ‘ballooning’ in weight over the off season as if he’s lost control of everything and just letting himself go…DC media…build you up and knock you down.

look at the clean shaven Harper. There has been some crazy beard action going on in this country and it is very heavy in Portland…i’m putting full blame on the hipsters and all those folksy/campy 12 piece banjo bands that keep popping up on my spottily streams. One thing I will not miss is the beard phase. You know what’s worse? A dude with a full grown beard, a vest and a handlebar mustache. Absolutely no excuse for that, at all!

I will post a couple Strasburg cards I picked up from the dollar bin as well soon! Good night kids.

alls they wanna do is win.

Posted by cardboard hogs on January 9, 2014

Big day for all you Redskins out there. The organization has a new head coach and I am really excited about it…until it bombs and I cycle back through my football depression. I think Jay Gruden will be a lot of fun. He has a pretty good sense of humor and a wonderful accent…sounds just like his brother minus the television schtick. Hail to the Redskins!

Ok, enough about football teams. The real reason I want you to read this blog of mine is to let you kids know, I am putting my sorting and collating skills to work over here at the Hog household. I’ve started work with the Redskins Topps cards of the 1970’s. There are some unbelievably wonderful cards and some very exceptional hair stylings like Mr. Hanburger. This guy.

What about the good ol’ days when the Cowboys and Redskins played in NFC Championship games…and the Redskins won!

If you have some extra cards you are dying to get rid of or care to make a trade, take a look at my checklists for the 1970’s Redskins. I’ve managed to pick up a few little gems like this shiny and bright Sonny card!

I also have some gems like this…

…and this…

But I still have quite a few holes left to fill, so if you can help a brother out. You just let me know and send me an electronic mail my way to see if we can work something out.

no more Mickey Mouse Horseshit football please.

Shiny Baseball Cards

Posted by cardboard hogs on January 6, 2014

My football card blog is lagging in baseball card posts…not really, I just have a few Harpers and a Hanley I wanted to show you kids.

These bad boys have been sitting in my man cave aka, my closet! Just sitting there, precariously perched on a box of top loaders stacked on a box of books, next to a pair of jeans that no longer fits my ever growing winter ass.

Bryce Harper everyone!

I managed to pick up 3 Harper cards that do not have him with a Curly W Nats hat.

This one is very patriotic and shiny and Prizm-y.

Here is the Hanley Ramirez card I noted in the very first sentence of this post. I love Hanley and hope that he can stay healthy next year.

I have paid more attention to the Dodgers in the 1 1/2 years since they picked him up…this also gave me a great opportunity to listen to Vin Scully. Man, I miss baseball already…

Black Friday Reeds

Posted by cardboard hogs on January 2, 2014

Going back to Black Friday. As I mentioned earlier, I jumped all over the COMC.com Black Friday sale and picked up some very nice Jordan Reed cards. These are the kind of cards that you want to put in nice card holders and present on some prominent shelf in your sports card room. I don’t have a sports card room, so they will be shown here on the blog.

Here are the player worn patch/player worn relic/player worn memorabilia cards in landscape format. The first one is from Topps Inception. I love these cards with the very cool over processed images and intense photography. Plus it’s number 1 of 93. What’s up with the random number 93?

Next up is Bowman Sterling with Mr. Reed staring very intensely into the cameraman’s lens.

And here is a quad patch numbered to 75.

Here is the autograph portion of the post. The Bowman card along with the three above are super thick cards that barely fit into a penny sleeve. It’s kind of a shame that a card this thick and nice is a sticker auto.

The next card is from this years Prizm set. I love Prizm.

For the last two cards, you will notice they are crazy die cut cards with reflective shiny-ness all over them. I love the die cut cards, but they can be a pain to put back in the penny sleeves.

This one was more difficult to put back in the sleeves. Not putting the toothpaste back in the tube difficult, but difficult no less. I happened to scan these along with the thicker cards, so pardon the shadows…although they create a nice depth to the card and the angles. So nice!

If you are in your late 30’s like me and love some good ole Hip Hop, then you should listen to this as I am doing right now. This takes me back…life moves way too quick.

PS – I’ve updated my 1970’s Redskins checklist…check it out if you think you have something to help me complete my team sets.

Hobby and Collecting Goals for 2014

Posted by cardboard hogs on January 1, 2014

My first year of blogging is in the digital books. I have had a great time and was able to connect with quite a few bloggers that i’ve been reading for a couple years now. There are a lot of friendly collectors out there and it gives me hope for our community. My objective for starting the blog was to be able to connect with other guys like me and I think that i’ve started to do that this year. I’m hoping that 2014 will be an even better blogging year and that I can connect with more bloggers. Before I look forward though, i’d like to take a look back at what I wanted to do and what i accomplished.

First and foremost, i really need to get organized and finish getting my checklists in order. This is something I have been working on for years and always start great, but never finish. I have managed to get the Redskins team checklist set for Topps cards, but the player collections are really lagging behind. Guess i should get some excel time in soon. -Ummm, no. Like many of you guys out there I am lagging in my organization skills. That seems to be the trend with our hobby. The very basic and generic foundation of this hobby is collecting, consumption and to some extent…hoarding. I’ve done a fantastic job of picking up cards that I do not already have, but I don’t have any of them documented. Without any kind of documentation, i’m not really sure what I need…or really have.
As a follow up to the item above, i would like to complete the Redskin Topps team sets for the 70’s and 80’s. This is mostly complete except for the 1970-1973 sets and some random cards for most other years. Once the season is over i can start posting completed pages of Redskins joy! There is a great shop in NE Portland where i could probably knock out the missing cards on one Saturday. -I have visited the NE Portland shop a couple of times and picked up plenty of cards that I don’t already have. Unfortunately, this goes back to the lack of organization. I believe I have most of the 70’s Topps Redskins team sets complete and have a great deal of the 80’s cards done as well.
For the past 3 years, i have been scooping up Chris Cooley, Clinton Portis and Santana Moss cards with no real recollection of what i have and what i want. This is the year i get these guys organized and stored properly. Why these three players you may ask? Well, these three guys reflect some great and miserable times as a Redskins fan. All three players were vital to the playoff runs in 2005 and 2007…especially Clinton Portis. I know there are a lot of fans that don’t look too highly on Portis, but for me, the way he carried the team down the playoff stretch will always be remembered. Not to mention the way he rose to the occasion after Sean Taylor was taken away from us…These guys are always going to be Redskins in my mind and am so happy that Cooley and Moss are a part of the 2012 NFC East Division Champions! -Organization, collating and documenting is lacking…again.
Speaking of Sean Taylor…He was a phenomenal player, someone that created so many problems on the field for offenses and made some nasty hits on receivers…and punters. When he was murdered, i was completely shocked and felt like I had lost one of the potentially greatest players of our generation. Some idiots like Colin Cowherd and Michael Wilbon made light of his murder with callous comments suggesting he had it coming. Regardless of what you think of Sean Taylor, he would have been a great player for many years to come. I have been working for years to collect all of his base cards along with some jersey cards, probably staying away from the 1/1 cards though…too much for me. -I actually have not picked up too many Sean Taylor cards this year. His cards are hard to find at shows and card shops and the stuff I see on ebay and COMC are more than what I want to spend. This one is something that I’d really like to focus on again this year.
Last and definitely not the least of my goals. I would really like to get one, just one, on card autograph rookie card of Robert Griffin III. I’m only shooting for one right now due to the cost of the cards…crazy expensive right now and i can’t rationalize spending $500+ on any piece of cardboard right now. At the last card show i noticed the Leaf Signatures card…such a beauty…but going for $250. Kind of steep…but if it’s still around for the next show and i can convince myself that it’s an investment, i will pull the trigger! -Ok, this goal was accomplished…twice this year. I was able to find a great deal on two cards from ebay just after the injury. There were a lot of people dumping his cards and I was able to jump on them for a great price. I had been saving my paypal money and ended up with two on card autographs that I am more than happy with.

Now as I look ahead to 2014 and what I want to do. Organization has to be at the top of the list along with the purging of stuff I don’t want or need. I am also hoping to generate a few more trades.

Organize my Redskins! Get my Redskin Topps team sets organized, in sleeves and in binders with labels on the spines. Maybe if i just focus on the Topps stuff the other brands and sets will quickly follow.
Purge, purge and purge again! I’m hoping to post more items on ebay or COMC this year…or make trades to get rid of cards that don’t fit into my selected PC items.
Trades! I’ve made some nice trades with The Daily Dimwit, Fantastic Catch, My Cardboard Mistress, Collector’s Crack, Cardboard Collections and one in the works with Nachos Grande. I’d like to expand my export/import operation with a few of you bloggers out there in hopes of completing some our checklists.
Read! I know this isn’t really something that’s sports card related but i’ve really been trying my best to find some time to read more. As you may have noticed, I posted two images of books that I am reading on the right column. My hope is to read 24 books this year. I’ve finished the two that you see now and am looking to add two more. I have plenty of books available to me (it’s fantastic and terrible working across the street from the largest independent bookstore in the world, Powell’s) I’m not doing book reports because I’m 38 and have done that already. Although, if any of you folks out there are reading/have read the books, i’d love to discuss them with you.
Add and Purge! Since I decided to start collecting Tim Duncan, Bryce Harper and Stephen Strasburg, I think it’s time to cut the chord on a couple other players that were once in my collection. I will be getting rid of my duplicates for Justin Upton, Evan Longoria and Carl Crawford. If you are interested in any of these guys, let me know what you need and I can see if they are available from my collection.
Posts! I was hoping to keep my list to 5 items but am going to add a 6th for good measure. I am pushing to have at least 200 posts. I got 127 out in 2013, which is ok for the first year. I do have a personal rule of making one post a day and plan on keeping that. I may end up writing multiple posts about one visit to stretch this out…but maybe that’s cheating?

There it is. My list of things to reach for 2014. I hope all of you had a safe and fun first day of the new year and wish you all good luck in your collecting adventures. I love reading the posts and plan on keeping/getting in touch with most of you guys this year.

Thanks for reading and as always Hail to the Redskins!