Some new COMC loot & Topps Bunt

Quick update to increase my postcount for October as I have been slacking a lot again in recent weeks and of course busy following the World Series. I was hoping for some Cubs magic and Rizzo with some HRs but instead they are behind 3-1 so a mountain to climb.

On the card collecting front I have downloaded Topps Bunt but not sure what to make of it just yet. Any of you active with Topps Bunt ? Any view on it, worth time spend on it or should I not invest in time in the App ?

Anyways, I just received a COMC package. Here is some of the loot, a few Glavine and Blyleven cards !!

Thanks for visiting my blog again !

My last batch of Kershaws

The last batch of COMC Kershaw cards arrived last week. As I announced recently, I am letting go of my Kershaw collection and are planning so sell most of the cards over the next few quarters and years, whenever there is interest. So if you are interested in some of these do let me know. My complete collection of Kershaw cards can be found here.

 Thanks for visiting my blog today !

Game of Thrones

Usually I don't do much non-baseball cards but when it comes to Dutch actors I make happily make exceptions !! One of which is Carice van Houten in Game of Thrones. I love this series and she plays a cool part as well.



So when I noticed one of the auto cards on eBay I chased it quickly !! Here's it is, my latest addition to my collection !!

Any of you fans of Game of Thrones ?

Group Break Loot !!

A few months ago I participated in one of Chris' Group Breaks at Nachos Grande. If I remember correctly the group break was for a few boxes of Finest as well as some boxes of Donruss. I got the Dodgers in the break and was allocated the Indians as well. Here's some of the loot !

First up a few Corey Seager cards, both from the Donruss boxes !! The Elite Series cards looks pretty cool and is numbered to 999.

Next up a cool insert card from Topps Finest, Franchise Finest ! I always like the look and feel of Topps Finest cards.

Another insert came my way, I USA Baseball card of KJ Harrison. It looks kinda cool !

I even was lucky enough to get one of the hits !! A Topps Finest Auto of Indian Kluber !!

All cards are for trade so let me know in case of any interest. Thanks Chris for a fun break, looking forward to the next one !

Thanks for visiting my blog today !

Oops, some more Kershaws

Oops, I forgot some Kershaws that were on the bottom of a pile. Here they are, all for sale !

Enjoy the weekend !

Jeroen

Some more Kershaws !!

As you might have seen a few days ago, I made the most difficult decision in my card collecting career: Giving up on Kershaw ! As a result all my Kershaw cards are for sale (see above for my collection). However, a fewe days ago I received a COMC package which was still in transit. This one as well included some Kershaw cards. See below for the cards, all are for sale so feel free to let me know if you are interested in any of them.

Enjoy the weekend !!

Exit Kershaw !!

So yesterday I promissed everyone some big news so here we go ! My break was a time to rethink my collection and the future direction of it. Of course I will continue to focus on Glavine and Blyleven, I love these pitchers and the outstanding base of cards are manageable and potentially reachable, no tons of color variations etc. As I do want to collect a current player I am continuing my Rizzo Collection. 

I have, however, decided that my Yankees collection will be toned down and only will chase some fun cards and that's it. An even bigger decision was to stop my Sabathia as well as my Verlander collections. I return I will focus more on sets like A&G and GQ.

And now for the really big decision....I have decided to quit Kershaw. This was really the most difficult decision as I have been collection Kershaw from the start, when he was still to win his first CY award. Prices for Kershaw cards just have become too high to get much joy out of collecting them. Given that I have just moved house, selling my Kershaw collection can actually bring in some good funds to finance the rest of my collection and some of my moving costs.

So there it is, the word is out, Kershaw is going to be out and some are already on COMC. I will likely only keep a few really cool ones for sentimental value (likely some of the A&G ones), everything else can go. If you are interested in some make me a good offer or tell your friends and fellow collectors. Given that I can use the money and there is still some sentimental value I am going to only go for strong offers (so apologies in advance in case I come over difficult :-)). Below my last Kershaw count, 567 cards of which 134 auto cards and 17 1/1s, still a nice achievement if I may say so !! All of them can be found above or using this link.

I am back & some big news !

Wow, I realized this weekend that my last post was dated May. In other words, dated 3 months ago, my longest break ever !! Life got in the way with several big events. First I moved jobs which made life much more busy. This was quickly followed by the unexpected death of my father. Although we did not see each other much as he lived in another country it came as a shock to all of us. As you can imagine this let to a little bit of chaos in my life. This was also quickly followed by us moving house (so if you were planning to send me anything ask me for my new address!!). Wow, does moving involve a lot of hard work, it took me since early July to get up and running.

Anyways, of course I kept following all your blogs and was able to leave a comment here and there. At the same time, I am very happy to now finally be able to leave a post myself to say "hi" and let everyone know that all is oke (except for my father passing away of course).

My break also gave me some time to think about my priorities and collection. It resulted in a big decision, a decision I will follow-up on in my next blog post and for some of you this can be a big opportunity !!

Anyways, good to be back and as every post deserves a card, here's my latest Glavine. A "metal" mini card numbered to 16 from the latest Goodwin Champions.

Thanks for sticking with me and visiting my blog !!

Breaking some GQ boxes from the LCS !!!

During my holiday in Orlando last year I visited a few LCS in the area, in search for packs and boxes of course. This year was no different and, like last year, I decided to visit Orlando Sportscards. The kids in a chase for soccer cards and me in search for some new additions to my collection. Its a nice LCS shop with a good collection of cards, boxes and supplies.

Given it's Gypsy Queen season my key goal was to get a few hobby boxes. The first visit was a success for the kids with loads of soccer cards. However, no Gypsy Queen boxes in sight. However, I tried again a week later and the owner Kendall indicated that a few boxes would be delivered later that morning so we decided to stick around for these. So here they are, 2 boxes of GQ, let the fun begin !!








Given that I am posting again using the on-the-road blogger app let me stick to the hits of the 2 boxes. Let's have a look at the first box.






Not a bad score, a Yankees auto (Refsnyder), a Cano relic to /50, a Marte mini relic to /50 and a green O'Brien auto crd to /99. Furthermore, some nice minis AND a bonus printing plate (James McCann). Most are for trade of course.

Was that box one I hear you ask. Not yet, we still have a mini box wth 10 exclusive cards, i.e. Normally the photo variation minis. However, only 1 card was in this mini box !?!? Did I get screwed ??

Well actually, an awesome card came out, totally unexpected. Meet Frank Thomas !! A mini relic/auto booklet numbered to only 20 !!!












An awesome HoF booklet to finish off box number 1 !!!

Let's move to the 2nd box and again focus on the hits of the box.






Another Yankees auto, Greg Bird !! The 2nd auto was Franco from the Phillies while the 2 relics were Cano (again!) and deGrom. Some cool minis finished off the box, including a Peralta yellow/gold mini.

Overall, not as great as box 1 but it was difficult to top that one given the Frank Thomas booklet ! All in all, GQ continues to be one of the best box breaks in my view, together with Allen & Ginter !

If you are in the Orlando area I can recommend the Orlando Sportscards shop, below the details !





Thanks for visiting my blog today. Hopefully I can add the 2016 GQ to my Want List but it may take a little as I am in the middle of moving house. In any event, always happy to set up a trade !

Meeting Kershaw !!

So during my visit to Orlando I took the opportunity to attend two games of the Tampa Bay Rays. First game was last Sunday against the Blue Jays. The 2nd one was yesterday against the Dodgers. Clearly I was hoping to see Kershaw in action but it wasn't meant to be. Lets start with Sunday's game against the Blue Jays. We had fairly good seats and was joined by my wife and two kids.







It was a fun game although scoring was a bit slow. Below one of the action shots I was able to take. The Blue Jays won in the end (5-1) with HRs by amongst others Tulo and a good game by Stroman. Longoria also had a solo HR for the Rays. All in all, a good game to watch.






There was plenty of entertainment during the game, the most popular being "running the bases", here's my two kids in action after a 30 minute que !





Last night was my 2nd game, this time against the Dodgers. As Kershaw already played last Sunday he was not in the line-up. Below was his only action of the evening, catching some balls in the outfield. So actually I didn't really meet him but hey, you guys never use some click bait :-))






It was a good game to watch with a lot of scoring on both sides with the game ending 10-7 for the Dodgers. Below some more Kershaw action !






All in all, a fun two games and great to, for my first time, see the Dodgers play live.

Looking forward to my next visit to the USA, hopefully seeing Kershaw actually pitch himself !

Thanks for visiting my blog today !

Topps Now - Is this For Real ??

So I have been checking out the new Topps New concept. For the ones that are unfamiliar with this new Topps program, Topps basically selects a few great moments from yesterday's games and makes a Topps Now card out of these which you can buy from the Topps site for a limited amount of time (I think it is 48 hours following the game). The concept I actually like as you can capture some of the cool moments in baseball quickly on a card.

In the last few weeks I was waiting for a cool Rizzo or Kershaw card and try out the program. Yesterday it happened, Kershaw made it onto a card after an awesome games including 14 Ks and the winning RBI.




Apologies for the size of the photo but I am not able yet to adjust these photos with the Blogger app I am using on the road here during my holiday !

Anyways, I decided to try it out, putting in the order at an already steep $9.99. However, when trying to check out I needed to specify the shipping I liked. Of course, the shipping only started at $6.80, yes you read it correctly, $6.80. So not only does Topps charge $9.99 for a single piece of non-auto, non-relic, cardboard, it also charges shipping, starting at $6.80 (running up to over $100 actually if you really want the card safe and quickly!).

So this piece of cardboard already adds up to $16.79. On top of that, and specific to me, I use a COMC mailbox (or else Topps would not even accept my order), which charges me another $1 for handling and later on some costs for shipping it in a batch to the Netherlands.

So all in all this card comes close to $20 and in the end will likely be having a print run of 300-500+.

Of course I don't have to buy the card, and in the end I didn't given the costs, but it is such a shame in my view as I really like the concept and they could have really added some value to the loyal baseball card collectors. In it current form, to me it feels too much as a rip-off. Clearly a missed opportunity for Topps in my view.

Let me stop my rant here :-) Any of you do feel these are proper prices and I should simply not complain about them ?

Thanks for visiting my blog today and apologies for the negativity ! Be on the look out for a post on the Rays - Blue Jays game review from last Sunday !