Afro Diesel

Posted by cardboard hogs on January 19, 2015

Since i’ve been getting back in to the whole blogging lifestyle, i thought it would be cool to show off some of the purchases i’ve picked up over the past few months…mostly summer pick ups.

This week i wanted to focus on the graded Redskins rookie cards. Obviously, i didn’t want to blow my budget on all of these cards but wanted something really nice to add to my collection. Initially i wanted to shoot for 9+ cards but realized very quickly that most of those cards were a little ridiculous in price, so as i’ve done with most things in my life, i lowered my expectations.

The first card is of one of my most favorite football players, John Riggins aka Riggo aka Diesel. My very first jersey was of John Riggins and his #44 when i was 7. Now, you have to understand that i grew up in San Antonio and this was the early 80’s. A time when the Cowboys rivalry with the Redskins was serious and fierce. Both teams seemed to meet in the playoffs each year and there was a lot of hatred for the Redskins where i grew up. But i didn’t care. I loved the Hogs and the Diesel.

This little gem is in pretty nice shape although the centering is off just a tad. The 8.5 seems to be a little high maybe? I’m not card grader and i was happy with the price on this one, so I couldn’t pass it up.

John Riggins was one of those players that was kind of a bad ass that would plow through the defensive line and sway defensive back away like annoying gnats. Kinda like what Marshawn Lynch has been doing in recent years. Riggo has managed to take great care of himself after retirement and stays busy. Still a little crazy and an off beat personality but he’s doing well for himself.

Rickey’s Week

Posted by cardboard hogs on January 18, 2015

Rickey had a great week, not an epic week or amazing, but it was pretty eventful for the wallet card. Rickey as wallet card is a little shy and doesn’t like to come out too often, but when he does, he makes quite an impression. We are working on that though…there were a couple of moments when Rickey didn’t want to be seen with nice old fashioned that was ordered for his photographic purposes…but hey, everyone has their own thing.

After a wonderful weekend, Rickey had to make his way to work on Monday…a little weary and lacking energy to do much of anything. But Rickey is a fighter and did some great things at work. You may notice some other paraphernalia on the desk, the two RGIII’s are from Collector’s Crack from a trade a few months ago. The Ganesh was a gift from an old friend that was brought back from India and i think may not be working too well being that close to Robert’s ligaments…maybe next year I will shift it up a bit. There is also a tiny and outdated photo of our little family along with my vitamin jars. I’m big on those raw, whole food vitamins. Gotta stay healthy and alert! 😉

Rickey got to go on a field trip to my latest completed middle school project. He really liked it! We were doing the photo shoot with a fantastic local architectural photographer and i had to set up some of the staging. Rickey had some thoughts on staging, but they fell on deaf ears. Rickey don’t like deaf ears…but he does like the media center…and those roses, pretty dope eh?

Rickey ended the week with a wonderful date night and dinner with some wonderful friends. We hit up a couple bars on NW 23rd and had a great time catching up with the group. It was a bittersweet meeting though as we found out one of our great friends that both work at Nike are being relocated to Amsterdam. They will be leaving soon and will be greatly missed. We hope to make a visit in the next two years to see them, but who knows. Either way it was great to see the crew again.

We should really clean our mirrors…

What will we have in store for Rickey this week?

Pre-Christmas LCS visit

Posted by cardboard hogs on January 13, 2015

I had a great holiday break and was able to get a couple of weeks off from work. That also meant that I had the kid with me most of those two weeks and had to plan fun adventures for him. The first and most funnest adventure I could possibly think of was taking him to the LCS down the street. Seriously, what kid wouldn’t want to visit a card shop with expensive pieces of cardboard, wooden bats and autographed baseballs…seriously…The adventure was a bit of a mis step on my part, but Rick was fantastic with him running around the store, plus we got there so early that nobody was in the shop. That was a great way to keep my level of embarrassment down to a minimum. The kid did manage to get in to some trouble, but overall was fantastic and most important, he did not break anything. Well, nothing that I noticed. Haven’t been back since.

Rick has always been generous with me and offers up a few free items each time I go in. Nothing major, but free is always cool. This time though, the free card went to the little kid and it was a very nice Derek Jeter card from 2008. Our kid actually looked at the card in sort of confused/excited sort of way. He tends to keep away from my cards since i’m very protective of them. Not to mention he’s managed to wreak havoc on a couple of them already.

During the slightly chaotic visit i was able to pick up a couple Redskin rookie cards…which, are unfortunately no longer Redskins. Lache is a practice squad Panther last i checked, which is cool. I like the Panthers and hope he gets a chance to shine next season. He is crazy fast and quick but couldn’t seem to make the team this year. If the Redskins have one area of decent depth, it’s at running back.

I also picked up the Cody Hoffman rookie card from Prizm. I thought this kid would make the practice squad this year but was off and on and I believe he was cut just after a few weeks in to the season for good. Not sure if he will pick up somewhere else, but I could use this card for the team set!

During the visit we also managed to finagle a few junk wax packs of 1991 Pacific and 1990 Donruss baseball. Cards which Rick was more than happy to just let us have. I’m sure he would not have minded us taking a few more for the road…maybe next time.

Podoley Mail Day!

Posted by cardboard hogs on January 8, 2015

Mr. Hog got some mail today from the electronic bay. A very nice copy of Jim Podoley’s 1959 Topps card graded PSA 8. Quite a nice card with no real visible marks or scuffs on the surfaces. I’m guessing it was graded an 8 due to the off centering as the corners are pretty sharp.

Jim played for the Redskins for four seasons (1957-1960) making the Pro Bowl in 1957. He crossed the end zone 13 times which isn’t too bad considering how poorly the team played during that stretch going 13-31-4…wretched! Although you would never know it with a smile like that!

Looking at Jim’s stat’s he looks to have been the old timey version of a deep threat or had ridiculous YAC totals racking up an average gain of 23.8 yards for his 16 receptions.

Unfortunately, Jim passed away in 2010 from melanoma…please remember to get your moles checked, wear sunblock and stay out of the sun as much as possible…for real. That cancer is no joke.

A New Year, A New Post

Posted by cardboard hogs on January 4, 2015

Man, oh man…it has been a very, very long time since i’ve had the time to post anything here. Not sure if anyone has checked in periodically or just assumed i’ve dropped off the face of the blogosphere earth. I still collect, i still read other blogs and i still am trying to get organized. That has been the main reason for my absence, well, that and a very active and passionate 2 year old exhausting all of my free energy. I love him dearly, but i have cards to write about…

As i mentioned, i am still doing all the things that we do as collectors and i’ve managed to make some great progress in getting organized and up to date on my checklists…thanks to a few late nights on the home computer and an extended vacation from work. My main focus has been on getting everything logged from the 1950’s-1990’s. Everything was sweet until i hit the abyss of the mid 90’s when subsets and serial numbers and various parallels became all the unreasonable rage. This was also the period of time when i put the hobby aside to be a 20 year old male. I’ve regained my focus and will have some checklists updated in the next few weeks to months as they get incorporated in to google docs.

Enough with the words. Here are some photos of a few cards from the 1950 and 1952 Bowman sets i’ve picked up the past 6 months.

Normally, bloggers like to save their best for last. Not me. This one cost a few nickels but was very much worth it to me. It’s a beautiful card and centered fairly well…the corner are in pretty nice condition too. I looked at a few 8’s that were available on eBay and were well outside what i could spend and feel ok with myself. This one wasn’t too bad and it’s in great shape.

One of the things that i wanted to do with my set was get each of the Redskins cards from 1959 and earlier graded, so i searched around and picked up what i could from eBay and from the local card shop just around the corner from me, Hoopla Sports. The guys there are great and have nice deals on what i’m looking for…this isn’t one of them though. This one was scooped from eBay. Love how i drop the curve on you huh? completely unrelated story and then this image.

I love the smaller format cards from the 50’s. The card designers and artists did an amazing job with them and holding these pieced in your had you can really appreciate the amount of work that had to go in to each layout.

Collecting redundancy happens quite a bit in our hobby. You pick up multiple variations of cards…red cards, yellow cards, blue cards…rarely, but sometimes, you pick up the same card that comes in two different sizes like this large Dick Alban…large Dick…

OK, here’s my shot at ending on a high note. Another Slinging’ Sammy Baugh card…1952 Bowman Small. I waited and waited on this card in hopes of finding one at a great price from eBay and finally stumbled across a guy that had it listed as BIN. I made him an offer that he quickly refused and came back with something a little better. After another number from him, i finally got it shipped. A little more than i hoped to get for it, but much less than others had their versions priced at.

We have two shows coming up this month and i’m hoping to make one of them. The Cedar Hills show is much closer to me but tends to be less occupied by dealers and i end up walking away feeling like i wasted my time…but it is closer…if not, i will hit up the show at Mall 205 to see what they have going on…hopefully my friend from COMC, Tom will be there?

One last item, i am going to attempt to do the wallet card “challenge” and see what 365 days in my side pocket will do to a 1986 Topps Rickey Henderson. I chose this card because it has my favorite player on it in my favorite baseball teams jersey…and it was the first set i ever completed. Here is day one, which started yesterday…so 363 days in my side pocket.

…side note, i’m rockin’ a money clip this year as i do not like wallets, so let’s call it the money clip challenge here.

Vintage ‘skins

Posted by cardboard hogs on September 29, 2014

hey, you got any vintage Redskins cards from the 1950’s you lookin’ to unload? i need some help!

1950’s Washington Redskins checklist

where in the hell have i been? doing this and that, getting organized…that’s where. seriously though, let me know if you have any buried treasures with redskins logos on them…help a brother out.

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. 🙂

Leather Helmets and Art, Pt. VI

Posted by cardboard hogs on February 5, 2014

One more 1950 Bowman card!

I completely forgot about this guy…or maybe I ain’t no good at countin’ higher then five. Howie Livingston, number 24. My favorite number! This handsome young fella got his NFL start with the New York Football Giants. I can forgive him for that…you have to let these things go you know. These guys play football for a living and don’t have the same passion for their teams like we do. So you have to get over it and appreciate them when they are rocking the Burgundy and Gold or whatever color combinations your favorite team wears.

Like a lot of these mid century guys, there’s not much information out there without doing some serious research which I’m not too keen on doing at this point of the evening. A quick peek at his NFL stats lead you to believe he was quite a beast on the field. He had 9 picks in his first year in the NFL and 29 for his career. But, as you can see from the back of his card his position was halfback and hd also had 313 yards rushing in the same season. He was a dual threat before dual threats were dual threats.

This kid also punted!

Howie has a strong chin. I wish this card has some clouds or blue sky in the background. The bland green (is it really beige?) background needs a little life.

Leather Helmets and Art, Pt. V

Posted by cardboard hogs on February 3, 2014

The last card. Mr. Frank Spaniel from the University of Notre Dame.

And it’s my favorite card of the bunch.

Awesome imagery with Mr. Spaniel rushing towards the end of his short one year career. This card has all the makings of a wonderful piece of cardboard. Great color. Great facial reaction. Great hair…look at that freakin hair…it’s perfect. And the clouds, JEEBUS! The CLOUDS on a beige sky no less. I think a perfect blue sky may have blown my mind and I wouldn’t be able to write about this card. My only issue with this one is the kids thumb. It’s like a mutant thumb or maybe a regressive thumb stump. I wonder if it was chopped off in a table saw accident. Not sure why that would come to mind…there’s a kid that rides my bus. He’s a high school kid, super chatty and likes to sit next to me sometimes. One thing I am not is super chatty. Especially with strangers. Extra especially with strangers that could be my kid. Anyways, he was telling me a story about how he chopped off his finger with a kitchen knife one day on accident. Really! Is that the kind of thing you tell some random guy on a bus? I don’t think so. This is a perfect example of too much information from him and a case of the i don’t give a f***s from me.

Getting back to this 64 year old piece of cardboard. It’s pretty cool huh? I’m really loving these 1950 Bowman’s and think i have a couple more to pick up and one I may never be able to pick up. But that’s part of the chase right? Cards that are out of our financial reach and that you will never get to own? Maybe i can get one that’s severely damaged and has Giants scribbled on it or something? It’s all about the chase…

Leather Helmets and Art, Pt. IV

Posted by cardboard hogs on February 2, 2014

What a dud of a Super Bowl…I didn’t have a dog in the fight so I wasn’t too concerned with which team won. Although i’ve made my feelings known in the past about the football franchise from Seattle, they were hands down the best team in the NFL all season. So i guess it’s good that the BEST team won. I really like that Russell Wilson kid too, he seems like a genuinely nice and grateful kid. I’m really happy that he is now a Super Bowl champion…if only the game could have been a little more exciting.

Next up for the 1950 Bowman Redskins I picked up from e-bay is Harry Ulinski. My second Harry…speaking of which, have you read Fuji’s post on Bush?

Harry is one of those guys that doesn’t have much information on the internet about him, unless you dig relentlessly and go like 12 pages deep on a google search of him…which is always kind of a creepy thing to do anyways.

Harry was another one of those mid-century american kids that defended our freedom in Asia. Doing so for four years of his life with the United States Air Force.

He was also lucky or maybe unlucky to play under the great Bear Bryant. So, this kid was a Center in the no face mask era, but his nose looks great. I would image that a guy playing in the middle of the field like that would wind up with one of those great boxer noses in no time. You know, those flat bent ones that seem way too long for the faces they are on.