2024 Topps Allen & Ginter (Fat Pack)

 

Got a fat pack of this year's Topps Allen & Ginter during Black Friday. There are 14 cards and what silly inserts are in this.

14 - Curtis Mead

98 - Sal Frelick

122 - Jose Reyes

238 - Todd Radom - graphic designer who have created team logos

182 - Dylan Cease

202 - Mark Feinsand - MLB Executive Reporter

208 - Usain Bolt - the greatest sprint runner with long line of Olympic gold medals and world records

265 - Ryan Murphy - another Olympian, this time in swimming, with multiple medals

34 - Jose Tnea (chrome)

257 - Greg Attonito (Mini AG Back)

107 - Cal Raleigh (Mini Gold Border)

323 - Fred McGriff

Buz-4 - Carpenter Bee - Buzzin' insert card featuring bees

SOS-32 - Pineapple - Star of the Show insert set featuring dogs that won the best in show of The Westminster Kennel Club. I wish they mention what year it won

This pack got the usual quirky variety featuring baseball players, baseball reporters, graphic desginer, Olympians, and critters.

2024 Topps Stadium Club Rack Pack

Greetings!

Hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving!  Before you know it, it'll be 2025.  That must be Topps' thinking when it comes to their releases post-pandemic.  Sure, The Virus pushed everything back a bit, but by now the Topps Release Schedule should be close to being back to where it was.  

"Sure, Stadium Club used to be a summer release, but the pandemic pushed us back, I'm sure we'll be back on track in no time...what, it's Thanksgiving already?"

Stadium Club was released on November 6...back in 2019 it was released in June!  $7 for 15 cards, 3 of which are Pink Foil Parallels.  Blaster boxes were $25, I got one of each...maybe I'll show off a Blaster pack one of these days.

Here's what I got:

#99 - Gabriel Moreno

#94 - Corbin Carroll

2 Diamondbacks start off the pack.  Kinda wierd, but it'll get wierder.

#12 - Jordan Lawlar (RC)

#104 - Joe Ryan

Hey if you're a D-Backs guy you're pleased with the first 3 cards.  Joe Ryan of the Twins ends the streak...

#188 - Byron Buxton

#154 - Pablo López

And starts a new one?  Real odd setup here.

#244 - Ichiro

#270 - Ken Griffey Jr.

2 Hall of Famers end the insanity.  But does that mean...

#247 - Cal Raleigh

Yep.  9 cards, 3 teams.

I think I've mentioned it before, but suppose this is your only baseball card?  Cal's a decent player so he'll get lots of cards, but suppose he was a September call up who had a game-winning hit at the end of the season, never played again, and this was his card?

#SF-10 Manny Machado (Special Forces) 

#290 - Vladimir Guerrero Jr. (Red Foil Parallel)

Hey, it's 2 new teams here in the insert section.  Special Forces come 1 in 8 packs, while there's a Red Foil parallel in each Rack Pack.  That Vladdy looks like he's 20 feet tall!.

By the way, there's 300 cards in the set.  Time for the Pink Foils...

#261 - Albert Pujols (Pink Foil Parallel)

That's a nice Albert.

The design is standard minimalist Stadium Club for sure.  The script used for the first name can be hard to read at times.  

#298 - Sonny Gray (Pink Foil Parallel)

#275 - Nolan Arenado (Pink Foil Parallel)

You've got to be kidding.

12 cards, split evenly over 4 teams?  I checked around and it appears this isn't an isolated incident.  The blaster box I opened did have it's own oddities (guess that means I will actually have to show a blaster pack eventually).

#237 - Paul Skenes (RC)

You get a Chrome card in each Rack Pack, and it's the last card.  Is it pack searching if you can easily see the name of the player?  If it means anything, this was the first pack I picked up so it wasn't like I was going through stacks of packs.  I didn't get a Skenes in Topps Update, so this will have to do.

Here's the backs because tryptophan:

Anyway, that's the pack.  So, this team collation thing is pretty bad.  And it appears that there's not as many great photos of players this time out; there's more pointing and yelling and pitching and batting than unique shots.  But it's Stadium Club, so overall it's still a solid release.

Enjoy the holiday season, and thanks for reading!

2023-24 Panini Haunted Hoops

Greetings!

Hope everyone enjoyed Halloween 2024.  Back in 2022, Halloween-themed Pokemon cards were released, which caused a mini-frenzy amongst collectors.  You got alot of packs to hand out to the kiddos, but there were only 30 cards or so in the set, so collectors would get tons of extras.

It took longer then I thought it would for the sports card industry to give it a shot; this year Panini released a football and a basketball version of Halloween cards for the people.  Since Ol' Jafronius prefers basketball over football, I forked over the 21 bucks for some Haunted Hoops!

120 cards for 21 bucks isn't bad, but I had some immediate buyer's remorse when looking at the pack.  

While the 2024 Score-a-Treat release is based on 2024 Score Football, Haunted Hoops is based on 2023-24 Hoops.  Why are they using last year's Hoops set for a Halloween-themed release for the 2024-25 season?  I mean, they're playing games right now, where's this year's Hoops set?

Bummed at the realization that the basketball cards aren't from this year, my reaction was slightly improved by remembering that last year's set had some hot rookiez, including the hottest of hot rookiez, Victor Wembanyama.

The 40 packs were stacked in 3 piles in a cardboard sleeve.  I decided to show the best pack in each stack.

Left Stack:

#91 - Mike Conley

#32 - Jamal Murray (Orange Parallel)

You get 2 base cards and then one parallel in each pack.  The Orange parallel is the most common one.  Notice the spooky slime and cobwebs!

The parallel is the last card in the pack, so what was the middle card?

#282 - Victor Wembanyama (RC - Rising Stars)

There's 2 Wemby RCs in the set, the base and this one, part of the Rising Stars subset (the closest thing to an insert in this release).  1 down, 1 to go!

[Narrator:  Unfortunately, Ol' Jafronius didn't get that second Wemby.]

Here's the backs for those interested:

Scary pumpkins!  Evil circles!

Notice the stats on the back were from 2022-23.  I was hoping that at least they would have last year's stats since they were spooking it up for the holiday, but no.

Center Stack:

#212 - Tobias Harris

#190 - Grayson Allen

Zombies filling the seats!  Scary!

Unlike the Pokemon release, there's 300 cards in the set.  There's 279 base cards and 21 Rising Stars.

#162 - Kyle Kuzma (Holo Webs Parallel)

Since Panini never tells us the odds, I'm not sure how rare the Holo Webs are.  You can see the slight shine on the card, making the card extra eerie!

Here's the back of the Kuzma card:

Right Stack:

#93 - Cameron Johnson

#257 - Scottie Barnes

Also of note, the cards are real flimsy, so maybe the cardstock is a lesser quality than normal.

#295 - Paolo Banchero (Rising Stars - Slime Parallel)

I got a couple of the Slime cards, so I will assume the Holo Webs is rarer than the Slime.  And of course there'd be parallels of the subset cards.

Since I was still kinda bummed Panini used last year's Hoops set for this year's release, I wondered if they used the same image for the player - that would be scary lazy!

#180 - Nikola Jokic (2023-24 Hoops)

#1 - Nikola Jokic (2023-24 Panini Haunted Hoops)

Good on Panini for using a new image, but how about the back?

Yes, the stats are still morbidly depressing, but hey, the write-up was updated as well.

I searched for one more, just in case Panini was picky with their updates:

#31 - Bennedict Mathurin (2023-24 Hoops)

#254 - Bennedict Mathurin (2023-24 Panini Haunted Hoops Slime Parallel)

So yes, it does appear that they updated all the images and write-ups for the release.

Anyway, those are the packs.  To me, using last year's set is a big minus, but the different image and write-up are decent pluses.  You get a lot of cards for your money, and I got no duplicates in my box.  I'll leave it up to you if you want to pass them out to the kiddos, or keep them for yourself!

Trick or Treat everyone, and thanks for reading!

2019 Wizards of the Coast Transformers - War for Cybertron: Siege II TCG Booster Pack

Greetings!

Hope everyone is doing well.  While I was putting together my last post, the 40th anniversary of the Transformers animated series was celebrated by fans everywhere:

On September 17. 1984, the first episode of the 3-parter "More Than Meets The Eye" began airing on US TV.  I don't think kids back then could have conceived that 40 years later, Transformers would be as prevalent in pop culture as it is currently.  Belated happy birthday, Transformers!

I posted the booster pack for War for Cybertron: Siege I a while back, and since today is the 13th anniversary of my first post here on APTBNL, it's time to post Siege II:

War for Cybertron: Siege II was released back in November of 2019.  Continuing from Siege I, the gimmick they had for this release was the inclusion of mini-Transformers called Micro Masters and Battle Masters.  

Each pack contains 8 cards.  You get 2 Transformers in a pack, the regular large character card and the "small" character card, and 6 battle cards.  The battle cards are the size of regular baseball cards and are wrapped in clear plastic.  The 2 character cards are not in plastic and are protected by 2 pieces of cardboard; this time both pieces have ads on them:

This time, there are 52 Characters and 64 battle cards in the release.  Here's the battle cards:

#55/64 - Stable Cover

#53/64 - Soldier's Blaster

As usual, the Commons start the pack.  You can see this is Wave 4 on the bottom left.  Again, those colored pips in the upper right affect the Transformer's attack or defense.  

#54/64 - Special Delivery

#6/64 - Battlefield Incursion

Interested in seeing the card list?  Click here to see the Battle cards.  There's there link on the page where you can see the Character cards.

#20/64 - Erratic Cannon

#13/64 - Crude Club

Hey cool, my Rare card is a club!  Let's see what mini-Transformer I got:

#22/52 - Private Seawatch

Seawatch is a Common card, and just like in Siege I, the characters are assigned military rankings.  I don't think I had this little guy when it was released back in the late 80's.

How about the main Transformer, you say?

#47/52 - Sergeant Thundercracker

Woo, got a Rare one!  Thundercracker's plane mode matches his pre-Earth form.

The robot side for both cards are all foiled up and looks nice.  

Anyway, that's the pack.  The artwork for these character cards are still great, even though I'm still not a big fan of the military ranks.  And yes, I still haven't played the game; I pick these up because I'm a fan of the Franchise.  

Happy birthday to the Transformers, happy 13th blogiversary to Ol' Jafronius, and as always, thanks for reading!

1993 Topps Football Series 2

Greetings!

Hope everyone is doing well.  Today is my eldest son's 17th birthday.  Nothing big planned for today since school's in session.  The Wifey talked about taking him out to breakfast when I get home from work, assuming he gets up in time.  He's a good kid; a little too messy for my tastes. but he's a teenager, so that makes it OK, I guess?

NFL season is upon us again, and with Week 2 in the books, it's time for a football pack.  The local-ish LCS recently switched from the big green tub of loose packs to monster boxes full of them; I picked up this one on a trip there to pick up some card auction winnings.

Professional...as opposed to Amateur Football cards

In my post from (holy crap) over 12 years ago, I noted that I paid a buck for Series 1.  Don't know if it's inflation or if the local-ish LCS always had Series 2 for 2 bucks, but here we are.  15 cards per pack, just like Series 1.  Here's what I got:

#600 - Rick Mirer (Draft Pick)

#605 - Ronnie Lott

Mirer was the 2nd overall pick in the draft and started off strong for Seattle.  Per TCDB, there was a Rick Mirer card in Series 1, so this is not his Rookie card.  OK then.

I don't know if I ever knew that Ronnie Lott was a Jet.

#649 - Steve Everitt (Draft Pick / RC)

#637 - Dan Williams (Draft Pick / RC)

There are 330 cards in Series 2.

Everitt played for 4 teams between 1993 and 2000.  Williams started with Denver and ended with Kansas City in 2001.

#551 - Roosevelt Potts (Draft Pick / RC)

#519 - Robert Delpino

Where did the Bronco go on Delpino's helmet?

#480 - Andre Rison

#506 - Chuck Cecil

Andre Rison was a stud back then, nice looking card.

#499 - Michael Brooks

#591 - Marco Coleman

Brooks gets the one per pack Topps Gold treatment (GOLD!), which isn't a bad parallel but makes for a bad picture.  

#601 - Richard Dent

#595 - William Fuller

Great shot of the Hall of Famer.  Dent's taunting Fuller (Houston Oilers!) and he's having none of it.

#615 - Merril Hoge

#564 - Sean Landeta

It's been 7 years since Hoge was analyzing games for ESPN; he joined the Mothership back in 1996 and didn't make it past the layoffs in 2017.

And...Punter cards!

#500 - Jerry Rice

Last card in the pack is a guaranteed winner.

Here's some backs because football:

Look at them stats!  USFL stats!  College stats!  Punter stats!

Anyway, that's the post.  Hope you all enjoyed this retro pack.  Good luck in your Fantasy leagues, and thanks for reading!