2022 Chronicles Football

2022 Chronicles:   My first look at these cards and we'll kick it off with a cool shot of Patrick Mahomes on this Bronze Parallel Photogenic.  Mahomes also took top honors in the other pack I picked up with another good-looking card.

The base cards are okay.  The design is what we are used for Chronicles base cards.  Always happy to pull Brady and Watt cards.

Here you have two Gridiron Kings and a Desmond Ridder Panini.  I like the Gridiron Kings but would like to see some veterans on them.

Luminance goes horizontal with this nice-looking Kenny Pickett card.

These see through cards are Clear Vision and Magnitude offerings.

I'm happy with Chronicles this year.  A few designs click for me and I like the photography.  Wish the packs had more cards but that isn't in the cards.  No pun intended.  We'll end it with another good Photogenic showcasing Justin Herbert.

BREAKDOWN:
15 – Total Cards
7 – RC
3 - Chronicles
3 – Photogenic
2 – Panini
2 – Luminance
2 – Gridiron Kings
1 - Prizm
1 - Magnitude
1 – Clear Vision
1 – Bronze Parallel

Fame Movie (1980) and Television Series (1982-1987)

 Just remember "random" is in the name of the blog.  Fame was a favorite of mine when it came out in 1980.  I believe I first saw it on HBO at a friend's house.  I know the music appealed to me, especially the title track.  But I liked the movie.  It was gritty and adult themed.  Definitely not anything that I could relate to personally, but I liked it.  The soundtrack had a few catchy tunes but they aren't all hits.  I I memorized Fame the song and was also a fan of Dogs in the Yard.  The movie did well at the theater grossing five times its budget of $8M.  I don't think it's a cult classic.  I never here it come up. You'll recognize a few stars including Irene Cara and Paul McCrane but few others that I really remember.  Debbie Allen is in the movie for a blink of the eyes but makes her mark in the series.  There are some good performances here which help the story tremendously but not all the characters are wins to me.  I won't try to analyze the movie but I'm putting something here as I've recently finished watching the movie and first two seasons of the series.

Speaking of the Fame television series, only two seasons ever made it to DVD.  Unsure why but I assume it's due to a lack of folks buying the first two.  The TV series is definitely not as gritty as the movie but does try to take on issues found within society at the time.  The series is okay but didn't age well.  The characters, whether played by returning actors or new actors, were good but it just wasn't the same as the movie.  

I'm not telling folks to go out and watch either the movie or series but Fame was something to me.  Not a top 10 movie for me by any means but here I am writing about it.  I'm curious if anyone else watched this back in the day.

Random Wax: 2022 Topps Baseball Archives Blaster

2022 Archives:  We'll kick off this blaster for a nice-looking Mike Schmidt card.  Many consider him the best third baseman of all time.  I don't think I'd put up much of an argument with them.

Really good pull in this box.  Here we have the '63 design. Not my favorite look but I'm good with it.

This '78 design is pretty nice and has more players like Trout and Altuve who are always good pulls.

The Astros would go on to win the 2022 World Series so these '87 cards are appropriate to share.  Jeremy Pena hasn't lived up to his playoff exploits but it was still fun.

One of the Big Foil inserts.

Wander Franco is another guy still figuring it out.  He's only 22 so there's still time.

The back of the Postcard insert for Joey Votto.  Twenty-five home runs in 230 at bats?  Wow.

Of course the retired greats are a huge draw to this set.

Greatness.

This was a fun box.  You get the variety that comes with Archives, great players and fun designs from the past.

BREAKDOWN:
56 – Total Cards
18 – 1987
17 – 1978
17 – 1963
16 – RC
15 – Retired Greats
3 – Big Foil
1 – Postcard
1 - 1961 Topps MVP
1 – 1955 Topps Scoop
1 - 1992 Topps Major League Debut

Kawhi Leonard 56 Card Lot

Picked up this 56 card Kawhi Leonard lot off eBay last week for just under $20.  The price was right as was the variety of cards.  We'll kick it off with this 2018-2019 Contenders which is a nice looking card.  

Kawhi's my favorite player in the league today.  Unfortunately, he continually deals with injuries but when he's healthy he's one of the best in the league.

I'm not great at looking for these types of card lots but if you are patient they can present themselves.

The call him The Claw for his large hands and they are shown off on that last Prizm card.

I'll let the rest of the cards speak for themselves.  No regrets picking these up.  Plenty of good-looking cards.

Oppenheimer

Oppenheimer: Saw this one on Friday.  I knew there was a lot of hype around it but really hadn't thought about watching it but it's a good movie.  Though I like history quite a bit I wasn't familiar with Oppenheimer.  This movie centers on him and the effort to build the first atomic bomb.  While that is the basics it really drills into his open mindedness about different ideologies and views and how that affected how people and the government looked at him.  Really fascinating.  Good story, good characters and good acting.  I don't know what else I can say really.  I'll be curious what others think of it.

Random Wax: 2021 Contenders Football

2021 Contenders: I like Contenders and I like this Gladiators insert.  The colors and background are good to me.  Couple that with Jerry Rice and it's a good start to the day.  It would be fun to see him in his Raiders uni on some new cardboard.  Sacrilege to 49ers fans but he was still really good with Oakland.

I'm really curious as to what Derek Carr can do in New Orleans.  I'm higher on him than many.  Time will tell.  Gronk is always fun.

That MVP Contenders has lots of color but it works for Kirk Cousins.  Willis McGahee?  Curious inclusion.  He had some nice years with the Ravens but still.  I'm good with the Legendary Contenders going black and white.

The backs have plenty of color and look good even if you don't have all the stats we crave.

Nice pack of cards.  I'm a Contenders homer so you'll always see them here.  We'll end it with Joe Burrow.  Love seeing his success and can't wait to see if he can get them past the Chiefs soon.

BREAKDOWN:
22 – Total Cards
3 – Retired Greats
1 – Gladiators
1 – Power Players
1 – MVP Contenders
1 – Legendary Contenders

 

Random Wax: 2022 Topps Baseball

2022 Topps:  Always a good start with this guy especially when combined with a nice-looking Stars of MLB Chrome insert.  Shohei Ohtani really is a unicorn.

Freddie is having another great year and it still hurts that he's no longer a Brave.  This design is pretty good so I don't shy away from these cards.

Nice looking photo on this horizontal offering.

I like the Alfaro photo.

This was a small pack but it packed some punch with the Ohtani, Freeman, Pujols and Soto cards.  No complaints here.

BREAKDOWN:
14 – Total Cards
2 – RC
1 – Team Card
1 – Future Stars
1 – Stars of MLB
1 – Stars of MLB Chrome