1995 Fleer / Revco Update Cleveland Indians

#3 Albert "See my muscles" Belle


Fleer, Revco Drug Stores and the Cleveland Indians combined forces to present this update set in 1995. Produced by Fleer and sold through Revco and Indian outlets, this set updates the emerging Indian championship team.







The checklist is printed on the back of the wrapper.....




....along with this bit of wisdom. Too bad more of the players didn't follow this advice.

The cards are basically the same as the '95 Fleer base set, but have silver foil instead of gold and are numbered "x" of 20. Also, Dave Winfield, is now in a Cleveland uniform. Each pack has 10 cards and, if you pick the right two packs, you'll have a complete set.

#4 Mike Clark

#5 Alvaro Espinoza

#6 Wayne Kirby

#7 Kenny Lofton

#8 Dennis Martinez

#9 Jose " not on a steeek" Mesa

#10 Eddie Murray

#11 Charley Nagy

# 12 Tony Pena

2009 Upper Deck Football Heroes Retail

As I patiently wait for Allen & Ginter '09 to hit retail stores, I've been keeping busy with this year's Football Heroes set from Upper Deck. Here's one of the many packs I've purchased this week.

#46 AJ Hawk

My only beef with the design is the border overruns the card.

#13 Drew Brees

#195 Tyson Jackson

Jackson was the Chiefs' first round pick...

#153 Josh Freeman

I went to graduate school with a guy named Josh Freeman...I never saw him throw a football but I doubt he was as good as Kansas State's Josh Freeman.

#248 Jack Ham

My favorite cards in this set are the Legends...they should really just make an "old timers" set one day.

#471 Joe Namath/Brett Favre
Artist: Ron Adair

I can't talk about this card.

2008 Press Pass Football Cards

This is about as good a pack as I could hope for short of getting some kind of hit...plus I got Aaron Rodgers backup, Matt Flynn.

#12 Matt Ryan#97 Matt Flynn/Early Doucet Teammates

#80 Chris Long All Americans

#39 Andre Caldwell

2006 Fleer Tradition

Tradition is not to be confused with regular Fleer, also available in bargain bins everywhere. The regular version has the matte finish we all know and love from the mid to late ’90s Fleer sets, though the checklist is no more impressive than the set you see featured here.



The front of the pack says to ” Catch a collectable themed card, a sepia toned parallel, or black and white parallel in every pack”. In Fleer speak, that means an insert in every pack. The back makes no insertion promises other than “this pack contains a random assortment of Fleer Tradition Baseball trading cards.”

Fair enough. Let’s rip!

#19 Casey Kotchman, #60 Carl Crawford, #18 Francisco Rodriguez. I wonder how Crawford will go down in history; he’d already be a mega star if played anywhere but Tampa Bay. As for Rodriguez, I just wrote about the save being arbitrary and overrated. I’m not impressed with his single season record.



#61 Scott Kazmir, #79 Travis Hafner, #107 Lastings Milledge. Milledge doesn’t seem like he’ll ever put his skills to use, and if he’s not good enough for the Nationals, he’s not good enough anywhere. Time to pull the plug on him, I think. Remember when Hafner was good? He sure experience a mysterious drop in power…



#197 Gary Sheffield, #164 Kendy Morales, #122 Brian Giles. Sheff has a shot at the Hall of Fame, but I can just as easily see him being kept out because of his link to steroids and PED’s. Giles wouldn’t be on a major league roster anywhere but San Diego, so I don’t think this should count as one of the ten cards.



#GR-24, Chris Carpenter. Ah, the one-per-pack themed card. Carpenter’s career looked a lot more promising a few years ago, didn’t it? I’m usually a fan of Fleer’s inserts, but this one… not so much.



This was an exceptionally good pack... in 2006. Hindsight tends to have more of a negative effect on our perceptions of cards than a positive one. But considering I got this from the dollar bin at my card shop, the retro-y look and bright colors make for a decent pack.

2008 Topps Mayo Football

So most people had a problem with this not featuring many of the promised autographs, but I bought it anyways...

#21 Zach Miller

#33 Sidney Rice

#243 Kevin Curtis

#328 Xavier Omon (great portrait, but not so much a great card picture)

#31 DeAngelo Williams mini (yay minis! But why does it make the mini appear larger than a normal card...?)

#SB41-B Super Bowl XLI (I do like getting actual cards as decoys)

#85 John Beck (looks kinda bored)

#97 Vince Young (three guys in one pack looking away to the side. Minor observation)

2009 Topps Allen & Ginter

Today was not supposed to be a day of participation for me. Today was for vicarious living and spectating. A winning scratch-lottery ticket changed that. I had money to burn and so off to the hobby store I went. Fresh out of the box is this;


The very first card in my very first pack of 2009 A&G belongs to...........

Jose Lopez from Seattle.


The pack quickly turns towards mound magicians and pretty much stays there now. Next up we have another Mariner in the left-handed Erik Bedard and all six-foot-three of the Giants' Matt Cain.


A quick note here to Upper Deck. If you notice the first three cards are posed and quite possibly studio poses as well. However, you will notice that attempts have been made to not necessarily make that fact too obvious. The abomination you call OPC makes no attempt to mask it. As it stands right now, Topps 3 UD 0.

This next card began life as C.C. Sabathia. However, being that I am not a Yankees fan and the gracious owner of my local hobby store, All-Star Cards, knows this, it quickly turned into Roy Halladay.
Thanks Glynn!!


This next card was first seen by the previously mentioned shop owner. I try my hardest to mask what I pull so it appears right when it should. It makes it feel more magical. Anyway, like I said, I'm not a Yankees fan so this Bronx Raspberry was aimed right at me. Still a cool card though.


My first A&G mini is yet another hurler. Cincinnati's Aaron Harang.

And, lastly, the 'National Pride' card of the pack represents Panama and the Houston Astros, Carlos Lee.


This was a great way to start out the 2009 Allen & Ginter season. The first pack with some Hideki-mojo was still a cool rip. I am looking forward to the next few days as the box breaks roll out and the blogosphere explodes with reviews and scans. I bought 4 packs in all and will post the rest of the interesting/noteworthy cards on my blog sometime later. This, however, was the best pack of the four.

Cheers,

2008 Topps Rookie Progression Football

I'm still looking for 2008 rookies from Michigan, so here goes!

#12 Kellen Clemens (the back says he is "considered their (the Jets) quarterback of the future." Seriously, this stuff writes itself)

#80 Ryan Grant

#164 John Carlson

#146 David Patten Bronze Parallel #'d 186/389

#219 Matt Forte

Well, I did get a rookie I've heard of at least!