It's been a blast to come back to the blogging community. I never
completely stopped reading, but it was definitely put on the back burner for a long time. But now I'm back, and surprise, surprise, I'm getting sucked back in to the sports card whirlpool!
In my time away, I occasionally looked at my cards, mostly the 8 large boxes that house what I think of as my 'keeper' collection. These are cards that I have no interest in trading away, and I treat those boxes like my 'real' collection. But I have a lot of other cards.
And that's where I'm going today! Though I don't remember where I got them, I recently went through two 5000 count boxes of dime box level basketball. Maybe only nickel stuff, I'll let you decide.
***I apologize for the pics, I really need to get better with my photography skills!
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| The actual boxes in question |
I had a blast! There were lots of reasons why I had such a good time. I picked a few of those reasons to highlight. The reasons I chose are
Nostalgia, Photography and Presentation, Insanity, Flabbergastedness, Fleer Metal, Bulls and Rookies. Here they are!
Nostalgia - Most of these cards were from the nineties. Some were more recent. But overall, they hit a lot of old timey feels from when I was still a young buck. Too many years, sets and cards to show much here, but here are a couple of pics:
Some Ultra inserts - there were lots of these, but only 2nd level stars
Some Fleer inserts - tons of these too
A few young guys all dressed up
Photography and presentation... Basketball cards are a great canvas for action shots and interesting framing. Unfortunately, I didn't think to pull good examples, but here are a couple I went back and grabbed real quick.
I especially like the Ray Allen. Perfect release, every time!
Insanity (weird cards) - same thing, only a couple of examples, but there was a TON of funky stuff
Shaq looks like a goober in both of those cards. Rodman looks like he is in a cartoon and a piano is about to fall on his head! The Fortson card confuses me. Is the shadowing supposed to highlight his muscles?
Flabbergastedness (*not a real word, do not use in sophisticated conversation!)
Soooo many Elton Brand RC's. I got all flabbergasted. The pic below is all Brand, probably 90% RCs. And that is only about half of what was in the boxes. When ESPN makes a 10 part Elton Brand retrospective, I'm gonna be rich!
Fleer Metal - I read on someone's blog (maybe Fuji?) that Fleer Metal was getting some extra love lately, mostly because of the insane prices that Metal Jordan's are going for. So I pulled some out. No real reason, I am not going to try to make sets, just... fun!
Bulls - The Last Dance and it's impact on the hobby has been discussed a lot. I won't add to it other than to say I pulled out a few Bulls to go through later.
Tons of Pippens
Some Rodmans
Kukoc rcs galore
And lastly, a couple that caught my eye. That horace just looks nice to me. Holding off a sepia tinted Dan Majerle. Cool. And then there is the Pink Panther. Um, I guess I missed that one! Did you all know that Kukoc was called the Pink Panther?????
Rookies!!! Tons and tons of rookies, even a very few that are a little bigger names...
That covers all the reasons that I enjoyed myself so much. But wait, there's more...
I even found a few cards I will keep! Check out this Slick Watts! Slick is and was a beloved Sonic. Maybe he's not as appreciated outside the Pacific Northwest, but up here, he has a small, but borderline cult following. When I saw the card, I did a double take. It immediately struck me that I didn't have any cards of Slick in my collection.
I looked up cards of Watts from his playing days, and it looks to me like there are no cards from then with his nickname of 'Slick' on them. They all seem to use his given name, Don. No matter, I still might see if I can get one or two.
So, lot's of good reasons, eh?
But the biggest reason is that I really enjoy cards. I enjoy looking, sorting, reading, researching and classifying them. I really wish I had 25 boxes like these basketball boxes to look through. By the time I got through with them, I'd be perfectly happy to start over with the first box again.
But I don't have any more, I'm out!! And I'm jonesing for more! I even got a little crazy and considered picking up some random boxes of cards off of Facebook Marketplace to feed the urge. I really wish that the card show scheduled for later this month could actually happen. It sounds like heaven to just spend a few hours picking through dime boxes.
But that reality is probably a long way off.
