2019 Panini Diamond Kings Hobby Pack

 Stopped by one of my LCS's, Bosco's, here in Anchorage to check out the Geek Swap Meet and I also picked up a couple packs of 2019 Diamond Kings. Nothing crazy out of either pack, but I'll feature the best one out of the two and as a bonus I'll show off the insert from the second pack so you can get a look at that.  Here are the odds on the pack.

First up is my lone Brewer card, one of three featured in the 150 card set, and it's Christian Yelich's SP card.  As a matter of fact two of the three Brewers cards in the set are SPs.  Overall I think the cards are beautiful.  This set probably suffers the least from the lack of logos and the card are well designed and have a canvasy feel to them.

 Let's check out the rest of the pack.

 I do love that this set features not just current players, but also lots of HOFers, and lots of prewar guys to boot.  Panini hasn't done a Cooperstown themed set in a few years.  Maybe it's time they give it a go again.

 I just realize that this pack actually had 3 rookies in it.  Not too shabby.

 My pack hit was this Shohei Ohtani DK205 insert.  A nice looking homage to the 205 set.  As a matter of fact the set features lots of vintagey inserts.

 My other pack hit was this Lefty Williams 1919 Diamond Kings insert, which answers the questions what would Diamond Kings looked like 100 years ago and who would they have featured.   I like it.  There are also lots of other retro sets from Donruss past sprinkled through the product.

2005 Topps Chrome Series 1

How about an old pack of Topps Chrome?

141 - Aaron Guiel - Huh?

219 - Steve Doetsch - Buh? In hindsight, maybe the "rookie card" rules that were instituted the year after this were a good idea. These sets are full of guys who stayed down on the farm.

155 - Trot Nixon - This one is a little more recognizable, with the Red Sox of the mid-'00s being all over the TV.

193 - Mark Mulder - Mulder was a two-time All-Star.

Here's a look at the back. The second photo was a nice touch, but I can't see Topps ever doing that again.

2018 Topps Series 1 Rack Pack

Greetings...

Hope everyone is doing well.  These pics were still in my Scan folder, so since it's been while since we had a post here, I might as well break the drought.  It's a 2018 Topps Series 1 Rack Pack!

The boys each got me a pack of cards for my birthday last year.  My older son (the baseball loving one) got me a pack of Series 2.  My younger son (the baseball meh one) got me this one.  Here's what I got:

#270 – Jackie  Bradley Jr.

#303 – Luis Severino

#142 – Adam Jones

#345 – Jose Reyes

#24 – Martin Maldonado

I think everything that needs to be typed about Series 1 has been typed already, so I see no need to 

type a whole lot.

#170 – Christian Yelich

#50 – Anthony Rizzo

#350 – Clayton Kershaw

#18 – Rafael Devers (RC)

I really had no clue that Yelich had MVP caliber stuff.  Maybe it was because he played for the 

Marlins?

#276 – Ozzie Albies (RC)

#139 – Zach Davies (League Leaders)

#114 – Cody Bellinger (League Leaders)

#34 – Luis Severino (League Leaders)

Here come the inserts:

#SSS-18 – Felix Hernandez (Superstar Sensations) 1:3

#83-95 – Francisco Lindor 1:2

#LTM-CB – Cody Bellinger (Legends In The Making) 1:4

#KB-27 – Sets Cubs Rookie RBI Record 1:4

The Superstar Sensations came 1 in 3 packs, while the 1983 insert came 1 in 2.  Both the Legends and KB inserts came 1 in 4 packs.

#MLM-BP – Buster Posey (Major League Materials) (12/50) 

Woo!  Retail mojo!  If I read the odds on the back right, Major League Materials came 1 in 947 packs.

When I showed the boys the card, my eldest freaked out...that's part of Buster Posey's bat!  He used it in a game!  He held that piece of wood!  I wasn't going to go into the controversies about relics with the kid; I was more concerned at the time about making sure he didn't take the card from me and put his dirty paws on my relic card.  I asked my younger kid, who chose the pack for me, what he thought of the card.

"He's good, right daddy?  That's a good card?"

#159 – Joc Pederson

#160 – Masahiro Tanaka

#231 – Joe Mauer

#138 – Luiz Gohara (RC)

#95 – Tyler Mahle

#118 – Ian Happ (Future Stars)

#8 – Detroit Tigers Team Card

#2 – Clayton Kershaw (League Leaders)

#120 – Carlos Carrasco

#220 – Nelson Cruz

#69 – Jed Lowrie

#103 – Christian Vazquez

#131 – Jonathan Schoop

#340 – Gary Sanchez

#5 – Chris Tillman

#13 – Jay Bruce

Here's a bunch of backs because Buster Posey's good:

Anyway, that's the pack.   A cool pack to get for my birthday, even if it was from the non-baseball crazy kid.  More eventually...thanks for reading!

1993 Topps/Coca-Cola Commanders of the Hill Baseball

A quick scour of the Google-verse tells me these were likely issued at military bases in 1993 with the packs attached to certain Coca-Cola products.  Can anyone confirm this?  Packaged in non-descript glossy black wrappers, these cards were likely hot commodities 25 years ago which might explain the use of the Army's old desert  uniform pattern (if you haven't been to the Middle East, it is freaking hot) for the borders on the cards.  Each pack has five cards and each card depicts each of the 30 MLB teams' 1992 ERA leaders which makes them their respective commander of the baseball mound/hill. The backs do a good job of detailing each of their 1992 outings on the mound.  Look at how many Innings Pitched these guys had compared to the game that baseball has evolved into now.

Up first is Card #15, Juan Guzman of the Blue Jays: 1992 ERA = 2.64

Card #6, Chuck Nagy: 1992 ERA = 2.96 with almost 10 complete games!!!

Card #18, Tom Glavine: 1992 ERA = 2.76 with 20 wins!

 Card #27, Bob Tewksbury: 1992 ERA = 2.16 with 16 wins!

Card #9, Bill Wegman: 1992 ERA = 3.20...not a great year for the Brewers.

Here is an unopened pack.

Have an awesome weekend watching baseball!

2019 Topps Opening Day Red Parallels

Just in time for Opening Day, we have an exclusive pack of 2019 Topps Opening red parallel cards from the Mega Boxes. These are similar to the blue foil parallels found in both hobby and retail packs, well, just red.

The red foil looks really sharp in person and looks better for some teams more than others, like the Gnats and Philthies.

Pretty simple, pretty cards. Have you found the Opening Day Mega Boxes in your neck of the woods?