2024 Allen & Ginter

2024 A&G:  These hit our local shelves last week.  We'll kick it off with Red Sox great Wade Boggs.  He never played for the Yankees, just saying.  Okay maybe he did but I won't recognize that. He retired with a .328 career batting average and 3010 hits.  His last hit was in a Tampa Bay uniform.

The design is fine.  Not outstanding but it works for this brand.  

My rookie card pull.  Same basic design.

The back talks more to the dog show as opposed to Josh himself which was a bit disappointing.

I pulled two retired greats on my minis.  Pops is on a Gold Border Mini Parallel.

The backs are what we are used to.

That Jackie Robison is my Chrome insert.

For the Oregon Zoo inserts we get X-Rays of their animals.  These are actually pretty cool.  The front of the cards is made of plastic which work into the X-Ray theme.  I like them.  Was glad to see A&G hit the shelves.  Always fun.  

BREAKDOWN:

14 – Total Cards

6 – Retired Greats

3 – RC

2 – Mini

1 - Chrome

1 – Gold Border Mini

Red One

Red One:  Watched this one on Friday with the seven-year-old grandson.  He liked it and I think I liked it more than most.  The reviews have been mixed to say the least.  They take a very different take on Santa Claus, The North Pole, and Christmas.  I do think they overthought it a bit too much, it could have kept it a basic action-adventure comedy and played up more of the supporting characters.  The movie is PG-13 but the movie feels like it didn't know what audience it was going for.   Me and the grandson also agreed some of our favorite characters didn't get enough screen time.  I did like the characters, the plot and this different take.  The execution just left a little bit to be desired.  I definitely think it will go into the rotation for the boys.  I look forward to hearing what others thought.

2024 Prestige Football Blaster

2024 Prestige:  Donovan McNabb was an excellent quarterback in the league for a long time.  He took the Eagles to the Conference Championship four times and to one Super Bowl.  Sure, Philly fans will always think they should have won a Super Bowl during that era, but it really was a good run for the Eagles.

I like the design this year.  Different from what were used to with Prestige lately, but it works for me.  It is missing the team logo.  You'll see the logo on the rookie cards but for some reason they are omitted here.  Plenty of room in the corners to add one and bummed they didn't do that.

A little different look for the rookie cards which I like.

Some inserts.  I like Alma Maters but Panini no longer has NCAA licenses so we don't see the alma mater's logo.  Still not sure about Time Stamped or Youth Movement but less questions about the latter.

Three of the Xtra Points inserts including a Green Parallel #/299.  I like these but I have gone back and forth on my opinion some.

I like For the Record.  Anything showing records, highlights, etc.  Prestigious Pros is an okay design.

Who doesn't love retired greats on new cardboard?

The backs are fine.  Nothing special but plenty of color and the basics.

I'll probably pick up more of this.  I like the look and want to see more.

BREAKDOWN:

66 – Total Cards

10 – RC

10 – Retired Greats

5 – Xtra Points

1 – Alma Maters

1 – Time Stamped

1 – For the Record

1 – Prestigious Pros

1 – Youth Movement

1 – Green Parallel #/299

 

 

Random Wax: 1990-1991 SkyBox Basketball (3 Packs)

90-91 SkyBox:  Patrick Ewing is a player I never really cared for but there's no denying how good he was.

These are such fun cards.  They were like nothing we'd seen before, and it seemed basketball was a great place to use the design.  Good pull as always including one of my favorite big men of all-time, Jack Sikma.  Kevin McHale had one of the uglier looking games of all-time but man he was great.

More big man love including my #2 favorite all-time player, Buck Williams.  Love the photo and graphics on Willis' card.

Ewing and his signature smile.  Kelly Tripucka always had a strong hair game.  Laimbeer fishing?  Who knew?  The photos for these backs are a big part of why this set is so good.

Johnny Moore had career averages of 7.4 assists and 2 steals per game.  Five different seasons he averaged 9 or more assists per game.  His high was 10 assists per game in the 1984-1985 season.  He also averaged 15 assists over 6 playoff games in 1983. 

This set is so much fun.  The memories hit hard for me as I'm such a fan of so many of these players.  We'll end it with a talented group of scorers who all did it in different ways.  Hornacek and Hawkins were great shooters.  Dantley was great at scoring at the rim, getting to the free throw line and had a good mid range shot.  Drexler had it all going for him.  Clyde Drexler is another player who averaged 2.0 steals per game for his career.

BREAKDOWN:
45 – Total Cards
1 – Checklist

2024 Stadium Club Blaster

2024 Stadium Club:  Paul Skenes is the presumptive National League Rooke of the Year.  Amazing rookie season for Skenes who was 11-3 with 1.96 ERA and 170 strikeouts over 133 innings.  The Rookie of the Year awards will be announced on November 18.

I enjoy this year's design.  The last name and player position stand out on a colored background with the first name in the foil we're used to in Stadium Club.

Great photo here which we have come to expect with this brand.  I'll point out the "team collation" in this box was crazy skewed.  Here's the breakdown:  Yankees – 10  Rangers – 7  Mets – 6  Orioles – 5  Braves – 4  Diamondbacks - 3.  28 of my 40 cards were from those first four teams.  25% were Yankees alone.  Maybe I don't bring it up if 10 of my cards are Braves or Red Sox but for 17 to be Mets and Yankees makes it tough.

We love our retired greats.  Sixteen in this pack which is a win.  I really like that Mike Schmidt card.  The full beard wasn't a look we saw from him much.  Fun Matsui card as well.

The inserts aren't bad.  I like Special Forces.  Still a bit bright for this brand but I'm okay with it.  You get one Chrome in each blaster pack.  Great Corbin Carroll photo.  I don't like the Chief Fantasy Professionals insert name but it's okay.

This Chrome Green Refractor parallel comes 1:32 blaster packs.

The backs are fine.  Plenty of color and most info we want sans stats for each season.

My Sepia insert.  The name and logo are green foil which best I can tell is standard for these.

I pulled six of these Red Foil parallels.

I really like this Ozzie Albies photo.

Fun box of cards even with the heavy New York presence.  I'll look for more of these.

BREAKDOWN:
40 – Total Cards
16 – Retired Greats
6 – Chrome 
6 – Red Foil
4 - RC
1 – Sepia
1 – Special Forces
1 – Green Refractor
1 – Chief Fantasy Professionals

Battle Over Britain (2023)

Battle of Britain:  This movie is simple but it's a good look at weary pilots defending their country from the vicious aerial attacks by Germany in World War II.  Set over 24 hours, you'll get a sense of what it was like to be flyers who went in the air on a moment's notice over and over.  It's not a big budget movie but we still get to see what dogfights might look like from the pilot's advantage as well as how they handled this routine.  I like this movie.

Random Wax: 2023 NASCAR Donruss

2023 Donruss:  Four-time NASCAR champion Jeff Gordon knows a thing or two about racing for championships.  Today NASCAR will crown the 2024 champion at the race in Phoenix.  This is a cool looking Metal Masters insert.

I really like the 1990 Donruss throwbacks in this set.  Danica Patrick is on the base design.

These Revved Up inserts are another colorful insert I like.

I enjoy the retired greats in the set.  Feels like they could have done more with the Royalty inserts.  Power Squad is pretty good.  Two Optic cards in this pack.  

This Race Kings design is not a favorite of mine but it's a play off of NASCAR's 75th Anniversary.  I get it, but it's bland.  We'll end it with Kurt Busch, another past champion who's making his third appearance in this pack.

BREAKDOWN: 

30 – Total Cards

8 – 1990 Donruss

4 – Retired Greats

3 – Race Kings

3 – Carolina Blue Parallel

2 - Optic

2 – Metal Masters

2 – Bronze Parallel

1 – Royalty

1 – Revved Up

1 – Power Squad

1 – Silver Parallel 

1 – Checkers Parallel