The Weekly Roundup…Aoki and WFT

Posted by cardboard hogs on December 27, 2020

Hope everyone had a great Christmas, Hannukah, Kwanzaa or whatever you celebrate at your home. The Cardboard Hogs family had a great time…of course it was mellow over here. Not too many family members in the house, but we did manage to have a good amount of family conversation via phone and facetime.

What a year, what a year, man.

During the last few months, I’ve been thinking a lot about the hobby.

The good and the bad.

The collectors and the flippers.

The blah blah blah…

I love the hobby and am all in for whomever wants to join. One of the things about the hobby that I enjoy is the multitude of ways you can collect or be a part of our community. Now with the greater reach of social media and added interest in cards, the gap between old man collector and young kid collector has been filled with so many new characters…celebrities, I mean. That term celebrity is a difficult one to tackle. Who is a celebrity and how did they become celebrated? More importantly…why are they celebrated? The one well-known name, read celebrity, I’d like to talk about today is Steve Aoki. That’s right, this guy

Not sure how many of you have heard of this fella. He’s pretty big in the dance or electronic music scene, I guess… My only real knowledge of him is, as a close friend has described…

“…a knob twisting celebrity-J, like Paris Hilton.”

The worst part about that quote is that I’ll feel compelled to tag Paris Hilton to this post, simply because I typed her name.

A quick snippet of Aoki’s Wiki page notes that he’s a musical renaissance man of sorts, something of each of the following titles.

”…an American entertainer, DJ, record producer and music executive. In 2012, Pollstar designated Aoki as the highest grossing dance artist in North America from tours.”

You can add online card breaker to that list, as well as card designer…and apparently future card shop owner as well. Man, everyone has a shop these days.

When Topps started pimping him out on their site along with his upcoming cards, I said to myself.

“DON’T BUY THAT SHIT…DON’T DO IT!!!, DON’T BE A PART OF THIS COLLABORATION OR REMIX OR WHATEVER THE HELL IT IS. IT’S JUST A CELBRITY GRAB FROM TOPPS!!!” – yes, I was internally shouting at myself…sortofa Shia LaBeouf Just Do It sorta thing.

but then I saw the cards and thought, eh…they’re not horrible…kinda cool even. The photos I saw on eBay looked quite nice to me. A bit trendy with the light blue color and some laser show lights bouncing around and whatnot. I dove into the checklist and decided I would only pick up my PC guys. Here’s a couple for your viewing pleasure. Trea Turner and Bryce Harper. Former teammates and now division rivals brought back together by a knob twisting celebrity DJ, Steve Aoki.

***

Now that the cards are in hand, I must admit…a little underwhelmed. I had imagined they would be a tad thicker, something of a nicer card stock. They’re pretty basic. About as basic as a card can be. The backs are something to behold though, self-serving even. Each player has a “REASON TO CELEBRATE” breakdown on the back, which is somewhat self-explanatory albeit brief. Basically, Bryce likes to hit homers on opening day and Trea Turner runs fast. The Aoki bio though, that’s where it’s at…apparently, he likes to “CAKE” people. Topps does a good job of describing the act so I don’t have to google it and potentially come across something inappropriate on my computer. For that, I say thank you, Topps!

I have a few more of these cards coming in; Rickey Henderson, Don Mattingly, Derek Jeter and Juan Soto. They come in waves, their term, not mine. I’ll share them once they come in.

Topic change…

As I type this, The Washington Football Team can clinch the NFC East this afternoon. If they beat the Carolina Panthers and go to 7-8 along with a New York Giants loss to the Baltimore Ravens, the WFT will have a division crown in their first year as The Washington Football Team…with no better than a .500 record…maybe worse. To that, I say who cares! Gimme that NFC EAST DIVISION CHAMP T-SHIRT and a home playoff game!

The great season by the young and exciting Chase Young has me passing on most cards from ebay, but here a few that came home to me this week.

A PATRIOTIC ROCKET POP FROM PRIZM

A DISCOTEQUE BLINGY BLINGY FROM PRIZM…also apropos of today’s main character subject.

A MOODY BLACK AND WHITE VARIATION FROM PRIZM

A BIT OF CRACKED ICE FROM PRIZM

A PREMIER, YET NON-SPECIFIC EVENT OR GAME OR SOMETHING ELSE 1” SQUARE FABRIC FROM PRIZM

A PANINI INSTANT FRANCHISE CARD…I really wanted this one to be a recessed image

Also picked up a Terry McLaurin relic, which appears to be a glove…possibly a shoe relic numbered to /99. I was hoping to get the jersey number 17 for this one, but 12 is close and looks a tiny bit like a One-Seven.

The final card from the week is a JT Riddle Father’s Day card numbered to 50. I had bid on a version of this card when Topps Update came out and lost when it reached $15…I thought, damn…that’s a ton of money for a JT Riddle card. So I waited and waited, then this one showed up and got it for about five bucks shipped. Still looking for the Mother’s Day version, superfractor and printing plates…just in case you come across them.

That’s all I got this week, hope everyone enjoys their Sunday! I’ve been on a bit of Bob Segar tear lately…no explanation for that. Enjoy and please feel free to turn the page on 2020 as soon as you like, doesn’t even have to be over…you know.

Box Break: 2013 Bowman

Posted by cardboard hogs on June 1, 2013

Bowman is one of those in between sets for me. Do I buy packs? A box and build the set? Pull my favorites out and part ways with the rest of them?

I’m not a prospector, but I love to pull some of the great rookies that I read about.

I don’t put together too many sets, but I love to buy packs and sometimes a box of cards that I enjoy openings packs of.

I like inserts, but too many of them become overwhelming.

Bowman has a way of providing a response to each of these contradictions in my collecting habits. When Topps brought back the Bowman cards in 1989, my friend Alex and I were all in. The cards were weird and big and didn’t fit well anywhere, but they were cool and had a Ken Griffey Jr. rookie card. Griff was the man in 1989 and his rookie cards were something every kid in America that collected cards wanted. I had them all, and loved the oversized Bowman version (after the Upper Deck version of course…) Although the cards weren’t that great. The photography was a little grainy at times and the overall design was weak…plus the stat on the back were quite confusing and took some getting used to. Either way I was going to collect this set…and all other versions that would come out in the future. That was, until 1992 rolled around. The card quality became significantly better and the rookie class was pretty stellar at the time (I still have my Raul Mondesi in a screw down holder, iknowright!). 1992 was also the time I began to realize I can’t collect everything…because I couldn’t afford it. So I never completed the set and ended up getting rid of my other sets from the previous years.

Fast forward to the future that is today. The card quality has improved exponentially and in relation to the other stuff that’s being issued, Bowman is quite affordable. I’ve purchased a box of these the past three years and took a bigger step this year and bought the jumbo pack box from Dave and Adam’s card world. Here is my review.

Card Design – 3 of 5

The overall design of the cards is quite simple, which I love.

No extra weird things going on here, just some simple graphics and all the basic information you need on a baseball card. I do like the subtle variation on the front of the card that differentiates the Bowman Prospects from the Major Leaguers. Bowman also carried this through as they do on the back of the card with the numbering and color of the card stock.

Photography – 3 of 5

The photographs are your typical action photos mixed in with awkwardly posed for photos of young men in uniforms. There are a lot of beards and facial hair in general around the world these days and the major league baseball franchise is no different. I’m thinking Panini needs to do a facial hair card set. Maybe Josh Reddick get the coveted #1 card?

Hits – 4 of 5

Like I said before, I’m no prospector. I simply don’t have the patience or wherewithal to invest in people I don’t know and Bowman counts on people doing this. That’s what makes this set so wonderful though. If you do pull a great auto of a young talented player or a refractor you have a nice piece of cardboard. If you don’t, well, you have something shiny to look at i guess. Another thing with the hits is that you have to wait a couple of years for these guys to pan out and get a year or two under their belts. Just because you are a top 100 prospect doesn’t mean you are going to be a star in the bigs. All that said, It’s nice to get the ‘First Bowman card’ of a potential star.

Another thing that i really enjoy about the Bowman cards and the young stars is the names of these kids. Damn.

Review

Bowman is always fun to open and the cards are always a very solid quality. I’m not sure if I will buy a jumbo box next year unless i plan to start building the sets again…but getting 32 cards in a pack is pretty cool.