*WANTLIST* My Mountains to Climb in 2013 Set List

Tuesday, 22 January 2013

One of my Mountains to Climb in 2013 was to finish off at least 12 of 15 sets that I am closest to completing.  I didn't finish this goal last year, but I am updating the list for 2013 and will hopefully be more successful.  If you have any of these and want to trade, just comment below.  I have many dupes from each of these sets if you are building them or I have many dupes from several other sets in the 1986-1993 time period.  I could even hook you up with a starter set if there is one you are interested in building.

1984 Topps - COMPLETE

1986 Fleer

108 218 365 369 370 374 382 385 405 644 646

1987 Donruss

14COR 14ERR 22COR 25ERR 175 180 267 269 270 287 288 291 306 308 332 420 519 535 549 553 556 571 572 574

1988 Fleer

21COR 68ERR 425ERR 462ERR

1989 Donruss - COMPLETE

1991 Donruss

50COR 57COR 388 436COR 436ERR 488 494 497 574 673 718 12BC ERR 15BC

1992 Donruss - COMPLETE

1992 Score

1 162 168 186 294 364 483 488 492 494 496 499 699 716 725 728 759 765 768 781 783 787 794 802 814 822 839 842 845 847 850 851 853 870 871 883

1994 Topps

75 85 90 117 144 147 157 175 181 183 188 191 239 244 253 283 332 348 374 399 401 404 406 408 410 413 415 416 418 425 426 430 432 439 443 445 446 451 453 456 462 463 465 468 472 481 483 490 491 492 494 495 496 497 498 500 501 502 505 510 515 516 529 531 536 539 542 548 554 555 564 565 566 568 569 574 576 581 583 587 591 598 600 601 605 609 613 619 627 631 638 639 642 651 653 654 657 660 663 664 670 673 674 676 679 681 683 691 693 694 698 701 702 703 704 705 706 707 708 709 711 714 716 719 720 722 723 725 726 727 734 736 737 739 744 750 751 753 754 756 757 759 761 762 763 767 777 778 781 782 784 785 787 789

2005 Topps Rookie Cup - COMPLETE

2006 Topps

83 106 151 177 297 337 374 416 424 426 504 532 552 635 643

2008 Topps Heritage

11 12 16 21 24 40 68 69 90 92 155 180 224 225 228 301 323 334 335 426 427 430 431 433 434 436 437 441 445 449 451 452 453 454 455 456 457 461 462 463 464 465 466 467 468 469 470 472 474 475 479 480 482 483 485 489 490 491 492 493 496 498 499 500

2008 Topps Update - COMPLETE

2009 Topps - COMPLETE

2009 Topps Update - COMPLETE

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Mountains to Climb in 2013

Sunday, 6 January 2013

Even though I am a bit late with my goals for 2013 due to my schedule of the Quarry Unlimited set, I am still going to lay out my Mountains to Climb in 2013.  Last week I examined my Mountains to Climb for 2012 and was left wanting for the most part.  Hopefully this year will bring a little more success for me and my readers.  I have already gotten the year off to a bit of a change with the newly designed header for the blog.  What do you think of it?

As far as my goals, once again I have divided them into "Rockies Goals" and "Other Collection Goals."  I left out the third category of "Blog Goals" which I will explain below.  Take a read through my Mountains to Climb in 2013 and hopefully be entertained and maybe inspired to set some goals of your own.

ROCKIES GOALS

1. Get to a total of 10,000 unique Rockies cards.
This goal will be fairly difficult.  I started being a Rockies team collector around the same time I started this blog in January 2011.  I ended 2011 with approximately 3,000 cards and 2012 with a shade under 6,100 cards, so I need to get 3,900+ cards this year in trades, purchases, and pack pulls.  It will be difficult, but so was completing my yearly want lists and I am almost done with that. 

Perceived toughness 7/10  Perceived cost 7/10

2. Complete every Pacific base Rockies team set.
Last year I worked on Topps, this year I will work on my second favorite card maker, the under appreciated Pacific card company.  This goal will not only encompass the flagship Pacific set, but every Pacific made team set.  There were 40 different offerings from Pacific between 1993-2001 with names such as Aurora, Revolution, and Omega.  Of those 40, I currently have 4 complete base Rockies team sets complete.  36 to go.

Perceived toughness 5/10  Perceived cost 3/10

3.  Collect 100 unique cards of 20 different Rockies.
Last year my goal was 15 different Rockies with me starting at 3 and the #15 guy (Jeff Francis) sitting at 39.  I failed that goal.  This year I am going to set the goal at 20 different Rockies with me starting at 10 and the #20 guy (Aaron Cook) sitting at 58.  I feel I have a good shot at this one, especially if I complete goals #1 and #2.

Perceived toughness 5/10  Perceived cost 4/10

4.  Complete 50% of the 1993 Rockies team sets.
I'm not sure if any of you noticed, but on each of my Rockies want lists I have a tally at the top of the page that tells me the percentage of team sets from that year that I have complete.  I wanted one goal tied to that tally and while 50% of the 1993 team sets sounds like a lot.  However, the Rockies didn't begin play until 1993 most sets didn't include them.  There were only 76 sets (including insert sets, parallel sets, and oddball sets) that included Rockies in 1993 and I have completed 26 of them.  The goal here is to complete at least 12 more.

Perceived toughness 2/10  Perceived cost 2/10

5. Successfully complete a full rainbow with one of my 1/1's.
I have three 1/1 cards (1 Ubaldo Jimenez, 1 Brian Fuentes, 1 Christian Friedrich) for the Rockies which fall into a rainbow collection.  I want at least one of these rainbows completed by 2013, but it won't be easy because the easiest of the three still require tracking down a card #'d to 25.  I repeated the goal, so I figured I should repeat the write-up as well.

Perceived toughness - 8/10   Perceived cost - 6/10

6. Complete checklists of Rockies managers as players and get to a total of 250 unique cards.
One of my goals last year was to start player collections of each of the managers in the history of the Rockies.  I technically started those collections, but I wanted to up the ante this year and set a number on it.  With the addition of Walt Weiss, now there are six current and former managers of the Colorado Rockies and the collection will entail their playing careers.  With the Weiss collection, I am only going to count non-Rockies cards because his Rockies card are part of my bigger collection.  I will not be acquiring a second copy of each because I consider this a subsidiary collection rather than a separate one. 

Perceived toughness - 3/10   Perceived cost - 3/10

OTHER COLLECTION GOALS

7. Complete the Rookie Cup collection from 1980-2013 fully AND finish 7 rookie cups sets from 1970-1979. 
I wanted to continue with this goal as well, but with some additional years added.  There is only one difficult (read: expensive) card for me to get from 1980-2013, the 1982 Cal Ripken.  The seventies has 4 sets (1974, 1975, 1976, and 1977) that won't be expensive to complete and 2 sets (1970 and 1972) that have a couple of high numbers to track down, but they aren't great players.  Those six are the most likely to be completed.  That leaves 4 sets with big ticket players (1971 Munson, 1973 Fisk, 1978 Murray, 1979 Ozzie).  I will need to finish at least one of them (I think 73 will be the cheapest to get, but who knows? ).

Perceived toughness - 4/10   Perceived cost - 5/10

8. Get to 50% complete on the 1974 Topps Set.
This is the only vintage set that I am currently working on.  I started it last year and am currently at 18% complete (119/678 including 16 Washington variants and 2 corrected errors).  There are three major rookies in the 1974 set that I do not yet possess.  For this goal to be completed part of the 50% that I have must include either the Dave Winfield rookie or both the Dave Parker and Ken Griffey rookies in at least decent condition. 

Perceived toughness - 3/10   Perceived cost - 6/10

9. Finish 12 of the following 15 sets: 1984 Topps, 1986 Fleer, 1987 Donruss, 1988 Fleer, 1989 Donruss, 1991 Donruss, 1992 Donruss, 1992 Score, 1994 Topps, 2005 Topps Rookie Cup, 2006 Topps, 2008 Topps Heritage, 2008 Topps Update, 2009 Topps, 2009 Topps Update.
I added 5 sets to the list and upped the final total to 12.  The least number of cards needed is 1 (89 Donruss Gary Carter) and the majority of these sets need less than 20.  This goal will be quite the challenge, and I will be very pleasantly surprised if I get to 12 this year.  But I'm still going to try.  I should have an updated want list within a week or two.

Perceived toughness - 6/10   Perceived cost - 3/10

10. Start a "One of" collection for five teams and get to 50% complete on each of them.

This one I will go into more detail about in a couple of weeks, but I think it will be a very nice side collection for me.  The five teams will involve one team from each division (excluding the NL West).  I am still working on which of the five teams to include, but like I said I will be going into more detail after I finish with the Quarry Unlimited set in a couple of weeks.

Perceived toughness - 5/10   Perceived cost - 2/10

FINAL THOUGHTS

I'm not going to do any blog goals this year because I want to keep that loose.  I will say that I hope to have at least one post in September 2013, because I didn't post in either September 2011 or 2012 due to other circumstances.  I do have a few plans for this upcoming year though.


Will my goals be at successful as 2011 or as much of a disappointment as 2012?  It will probably fall somewhere in the middle, but I have high hopes because in January the new year can ALWAYS be the best year of your life.



Thanx for reading.

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2012 Mountains to Climb - A Review

Sunday, 30 December 2012

At this time of year, it is only natural for the media to reflect on the year that was.  I am going to do that as well.  At the beginning of the year, I outlined a group of collecting and/or blog-related goals for the year 2012 called Mountains to Climb in 2012.  I figured today would be a great day to show my work, so to speak.  I will score myself in the same manner as I did in 2011, on a 10 point scale.  Just to end the suspense, I did not as well as my 85% score in 2011.  However, read along and see how close I came.

ROCKIES GOALS

1. Complete the Rockies team set in every flagship Topps set (1993-2012).

Status - COMPLETE (well, sort of)

This was my biggest goal of the year, and I finally got it finished in late October when I was sent card #696 from 2003 Topps.  Who would have thought a Todd Helton All Star card would be so hard to track down?  The caveat of  "well, sort of" refers to my still missing 3 cards from 2002 Topps Traded.  I didn't include the Traded and Update sets in the original goal language, but to be honest I intended them to be included.  To be fair in the other direction, the three I am missing from that set (#35 Kent Mercker, #67 Gabe Kapler, #97 Todd Zeile) are all from the short printed first 100 cards.  Those short prints are RIDICULOUS to track down, but I did find 3 of the 6 Rockies.

Final Score - 10/10


2. Have 100 cards of 15 different Rockies players.

Status - INCOMPLETE

I was really trying to get this one finished, but came up a bit short.  At the beginning of the year, I started with 100 cards of only Todd Helton, Larry Walker, and Troy Tulowitzki.  At the end of the year, I finished with 100 cards of 10 different players with Dexter Fowler and Brad Hawpe close behind at 98 and 96 respectively.  I also added an additional 100 cards to the Helton, Walker, and Tulo collections for whatever that is worth.  My #15 guy was at 39 in January.  Currently, my #15 guys (Preston Wilson and Jason Jennings) are at 69. 

Final Score - 7/10


3. Successfully complete a full rainbow with one of my 1/1s.

Status - UNCHANGED

I never really got going on this one.  Call it lack of funds or working on other goals.  I will be making this a goal for 2013.

Final Score - 0/10


4. Start player collections for Rockies managers: Don Baylor, Jim Leyland, Buddy Bell, Clint Hurdle, Jim Tracy 

Status - RELATIVELY UNCHANGED
 
Another goal that never really got off the ground in 2012 was the player collections of all the Rockies managers.  I pulled out a few cards, but never got any checklists made or anything else.  I will continue this goal with the newest addition of Walt Weiss in 2013.

Final Score - 2/10

OTHER COLLECTION GOALS

5. Start and get to (at least) 75% complete of 1974 Topps set.

Status - INCOMPLETE

I started out okay on this goal until my job issues came about.  I did start the set and I accumulated 119 of the 678 cards in the set (including major variations) for around 18%.  So I didn't get to my pie-in-the-sky goal of 75%, but I do currently have my biggest chunk of any pre-1983 set and a realist goal of completing it in the next year or two.  I am still happy with my progress.

Final score - 5/10

 
6. Complete Rookie Cup collection from 1980-2012.

Status - INCOMPLETE

I figured this one would be a lot easier to finish than it was.  I still need a couple of big one such as the 1982 Cal Ripken and the 2002 Albert Pujols, but I also need relatively mundane ones such as 1983 Tom Brunansky and 2000 Chris Singleton.  Out of the 33 years that were in my original goal, 20 are complete with another 6 within 1 card of completion.  So all in all, I didn't do that bad with this one.

Final score - 7/10


7. Get Tony Delk collection to over 150 cards.

Status - UNCHANGED

This is another one that I just didn't get around to working on in 2012.  My Kentucky basketball collection is what originally got me back into cards in 2008, but has taken a back seat to my Rockies collection over the last 2-3 years.  I did manage to get most of my checklists updated and accurate with the Beckett website, so I did do a little something.

Final score - 1/10


8. Finish the following sets: 1984 Topps, 1986 Fleer, 1987 Donruss, 1988 Fleer, 1989 Donruss, 1991 Donruss, 1992 Donruss, 1992 Score, 2005 Topps Rookie Cup base set, 2008 Topps Heritage.

Status - INCOMPLETE

This is a goal that looks to be unchanged, because technically I have none of these 10 sets completed.  However, I did take a big chunk out of most of them including getting 89 Donruss down to a single card.  I am disappointed that none of them are finally off of my things to do list, but each of them is closer.  I will continue this goal in 2013.

Final score - 0/10 (I still didn't complete any of the 10)

BLOG GOALS

 

9. Get to 500 total posts by the end of the year.

Status - CAME UP SHORT

This post is a nice round number, but it is only post #400.  I came up 100 short and the biggest factors were the two months I spent without internet access and my one month absence due to my father's passing.    With those three months, at an average of one a day, I would have been very close and probably would have made it.  I am still very proud to be at 400 posts considering I rarely post more than once a day and most of my posts are relatively large. 

Final score - 8/10


10. Hold 4 group breaks throughout the year.

Status - NOT GOING TO HAPPEN

This goal is the only one of my goals that I didn't work on that I do not plan to continue in 2013.  I still may run a group break at some point in the next year, maybe even more than one, but it isn't necessarily a goal.  There are several other blogs that are doing the group break thing right now, so you guys still have plenty of choices.

Final score - 0/10


Final thoughts
Last December when I made these goals, I did not anticipate how personally and financially difficult this year would be.  I intended for the goals to be extremely challenging and they were.  I am very happy to now own every Rockies card in the Topps flagship set along with every card I have accumulated.  I am not currently where I intended to be at this time last year, but without down years you couldn't have great years.  I'll be back and better than ever in 2013.  I will have my 2013 goals ready this time next Sunday.

Final score - 40/100
By god, I am STILL happy.

Thanx for reading.

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*WANT LIST* Rockies Topps Flagship Sets

Tuesday, 10 January 2012

Some of you may remember my biggest Mountain to Climb in 2012 was to complete every Rockies team set from each Topps flagship and Traded/Update set.  I figured the easiest way to do that was to get a want list rather than wait five years to get my yearly want lists finished.  I was actually surprised by how few team sets I actually had completed.  You should be able to spot the weakest years in my collection here as well.

If you have any of these cards and would like to make a trade, email me at hiflewATyahooDOTcom or make a comment down below.  Thanx for reading.

red = pending arrival


38/39 = 97.4% COMPLETE

1993 Topps - COMPLETE

1993 Topps Traded - COMPLETE

1994 Topps - COMPLETE

1994 Topps Traded - COMPLETE

1995 Topps - COMPLETE

1995 Topps Traded - COMPLETE

1996 Topps - COMPLETE

1997 Topps - COMPLETE

1998 Topps - COMPLETE

1999 Topps - COMPLETE

1999 Topps Traded - COMPLETE

2000 Topps - COMPLETE

2000 Topps Traded - COMPLETE

2001 Topps - COMPLETE

2001 Topps Traded - COMPLETE

2002 Topps - COMPLETE

2002 Topps Traded

97

2003 Topps - COMPLETE

2003 Topps Traded - COMPLETE

2004 Topps - COMPLETE

2004 Topps Traded - COMPLETE

2005 Topps - COMPLETE

2005 Topps Update - COMPLETE

2006 Topps - COMPLETE

2006 Topps Update - COMPLETE

2007 Topps - COMPLETE

2007 Topps Update - COMPLETE

2008 Topps - COMPLETE

2008 Topps Update - COMPLETE

2009 Topps - COMPLETE

2009 Topps Update - COMPLETE

2010 Topps - COMPLETE

2010 Topps Update - COMPLETE

2011 Topps - COMPLETE

2011 Topps Update - COMPLETE

2012 Topps - COMPLETE

2012 Topps Update - COMPLETE

2013 Topps - COMPLETE

2013 Topps Update - COMPLETE

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Mountains to Climb in 2012

Wednesday, 21 December 2011

I had a very successful 2011 with regards to my card collecting endeavors.  As I recently showed, I hit nearly every one of my Mountains to Climb in 2011.  The great thing about a new year (yeah I am a little early) is I get set some new goals for the upcoming future.  I never really have been much of a written goal setter in life, but I find myself really attracted to the process with cards.  I am going to try and set at least one goal for every section of my collection.

ROCKIES GOALS

1. Complete the Rockies team set in every flagship Topps set (1993-2012).
This is going to be my biggest goal this year.  If I want to consider myself a team collector, I MUST have a complete Topps team set for all 20 sets that have featured Rockies. 

Perceived toughness - 2/10   Perceived cost - 1/10

2. Have 100 cards of 15 different Rockies players.
This one should prove do-able.  Currently, I have over 100 Rockies cards of three different players and my #15 guy is at 39.  It will not be guaranteed easy, but it should be completeable.

Perceived toughness - 6/10   Perceived cost - 5/10

3. Successfully complete a full rainbow with one of my 1/1s.
I have three 1/1 cards (1 Ubaldo Jimenez, 1 Brian Fuentes, 1 Christian Friedrich) for the Rockies which fall into a rainbow collection.  I want at least one of these rainbows completed by 2013, but it won't be easy because the easiest of the three still require tracking down a card #'d to 25.

Perceived toughness - 7/10   Perceived cost - 6/10

4. Start player collections for Rockies managers: Don Baylor, Jim Leyland, Buddy Bell, Clint Hurdle, Jim Tracy

I really wanted to get an under-appreciated player collection or two started and I kicked around several names including Dave Parker, Mark McLemore, Sal Fasano, and Ramon Ortiz.  While I may do that in the future, for 2012 I am going to work on former (and hopefully soon to be former) Rockies managers in their playing careers.  Obviously some of these (Baylor, Bell) will be bigger than others (Leyland with just 3 minor league cards).  I may put their managers and/or coaches cards in with them as well, but I am not real sure yet.

Perceived toughness - 2/10   Perceived cost - 1/10

 

OTHER COLLECTION GOALS

5. Start and get to (at least) 75% complete of 1974 Topps set.
I really wanted to begin a 1970s set this year.  My first two choices were 1977 and 1973.  These were chosen by Night Owl and Crinkly Wrappers respectively (trade with them, they are great guys).  While I could still collect them since they did make more than one set, I figured I would blaze my own trail with another of my favorites.  I currently own 2 (yes 2) cards from the set, Willie Stargell and Bill Russell, so this will be quite a challenge.

Perceived toughness - 8/10   Perceived cost - 8/10

6. Complete Rookie Cup collection from 1980-2012.
I was debating this goal and whether to include the entire run or a partial.  I went partial because I don't think I will be able to fully complete the whole run with all the other goals on this list.  I decided to make it 1980-present mainly because of the Ozzie Smith I still need to track down in 1979.  This should prove no problem, but there could be a few tricky ones in there as well.

Perceived toughness - 4/10   Perceived cost - 2/10

7. Get Tony Delk collection to over 150 cards.
After getting my Jamal Mashburn collection over 500 in 2011, I wanted to bump up another of my Kentucky players as well.  Tony Delk is probably my second favorite former Wildcat after Mash.  I am currently sitting at 126 out of a possible 298 that I know of.  150 will give me a nice 50% and could be accomplished.

Perceived toughness - 2/10   Perceived cost - 1/10

8. Finish the following sets: 1984 Topps, 1986 Fleer, 1987 Donruss, 1988 Fleer, 1989 Donruss, 1991 Donruss, 1992 Donruss, 1992 Score, 2005 Topps Rookie Cup base set, 2008 Topps Heritage
The only major blemish on my 2011 Mountains to Climb was my set collecting.  As I looked back at the goal, I realized I wasn't very specific also which made for a bit of a struggle when checking to see if I made my goal.  These are the 10 sets which I am fairly close to finishing and want lists will be listed in the right sidebar soon.

Perceived toughness - 5/10   Perceived cost - 3/10

 

BLOG GOALS

9. Get to 500 total posts by the end of the year.
I really intend to maintain an active presence throughout the year, so barring unforeseen circumstances, this won't be a problem.  Nonetheless, I still want it written down because sometimes I might need that little nudge when I am getting a bit lethargic with my writing.

Perceived toughness - 1/10   Perceived cost - 0/10

10. Hold 4 group breaks throughout the year.
One of my favorite blog activities last year was holding less expensive, older group breaks.  I pulled some really great cards for some people (Hey Potch) and was able to knock out some needs of my own.  I want to do this again if I can get enough support from you guys, which shouldn't be a huge problem. 

Perceived toughness - 2/10   Perceived cost - 1/10



Will 2012 prove to be as big of a success card-wise for me as 2011?  I hope so, but I also think these goal are a little bit tougher than 2011's as well, especially since one of them was to have fun.  Even if I can only hit a few of these, I guarantee you I will have a ball doing it.

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2011 Mountains to Climb - A Review

Monday, 19 December 2011

One thing I simultaneously love and hate about the month of December is the abundance of retrospectives from the prior 11 months.  I do love looking back and taking stock of how things went, but sometimes it does get a bit much.  I have proven that myself in the past week with my entry in the Blog Bat Around regarding the best of 2011 in cards.  This December offers me a chance to actually score myself on my hobby.  When I started this blog way back in January of this year, I set a list of goals or Mountains to Climb this year.  Now is the time to look back and see how I did or score my hobby.

1. Get one card of every Rockie in a Rockie uniform.
This is one of those unreachable goals, because of the abundance of players that never had a Rockies card made.   Of the 412 players that had played in a Rockies game, I now have a Rockies card of 229 of them.  Since I made my goal 28 new players joined the club and I already have 14 of them, so I currently have 243 out of 440 Rockies.  Currently, the maximum I can get is 302, so with that number in mind I have 80% of the Rockies currently available.

Score: 8/10


2. Finish off twelve of my partial sets this year.
This is probably going to be my weakest score because I didn't really work that hard on sets this year with a couple of exceptions.  Since the goal was for partial sets, I won't count any sets starting with 2011 obviously.  I finished 1990 Topps, 1993 Topps, 1988 Donruss.  That's about it.  So I finished three, although I did get a lot closer with a few others.

Score: 3/10


3. Complete 50 trades with fellow bloggers / readers.
This is my favorite part of blogging.  I honestly stopped counting around the time of my break in August, but I had already passed 50 at that point.  If I were to estimate I would guess the number is close to 100 if not over.  You guys are great.

Score: 10/10


4. Organize a Rookie Cup card collection from my vast doubles.
Done and done.  I am so glad I completed this one because this was my primary use for the Diamond Giveaway site.  I was not collecting any older sets and my team started in 1993 so I needed to find something to collect with all the codes I received this year.  The Rookie Cups worked very well.  In fact it worked so well that I could conceivably finish this collection in 2012.

Score: 10/10


5. Have 200 posts on this blog.
I was rolling toward doubling this goal in midsummer while I was hosting group breaks, but then came my fall disappearance and it looked like I was going to fall short.  Then, earlier this month I posted about a minor trade the Rockies made and at the time I didn't even realize it was #200.  I am thrilled I made it and maybe next year even more.


Score: 10/10



6. Get enough supplies for organization.
This goal is a little difficult to quantify, but I think I will try.  I purchased a case (12) of albums and a case (1000) of pages in summer.  Then in September/October, I actually had a lot of time to kill so I got myself organized.  Most of my Rockies are bindered up and all are organized as I explained here.  I still need to organize my trade stuff ao not a perfect score, but I think this was a passing grade.

Score: 8/10


7. Start and finish the 2011 Topps Heritage set.
This is the goal that I am proudest of.  There are a lot of great bloggers out there that still have wantlists for this set, which really drives home the point to me of how difficult a Heritage set is to complete.  I worked very hard on this set and actually completed in way back in late May.  I couldn't have done it without you guys, well I could've but it would have been a helluva lot more expensive.  Thanx loads.

Score: 10/10


8. Get my Jamal Mashburn collection over 500.
When I first got back into collecting in 2006, baseball was not on the top of my list.  Honestly, it wasn't even on the list.  My reason for getting back into cards was to collect NBA cards of former Kentucky basketball players.  I have a pretty big collection of every former Wildcat star from the Joe B. Hall / Eddie Sutton / Rick Pitino era at UK ranging from Sam Bowie and Rex Chapman through Tayshaun Prince and Rajon Rondo.  My biggest single player collection is by far Jamal Mashburn.  My collection now sits at 502, goal achieved.

Score: 10/10


9. Find and work on a set I like from 1996-2005.
This goal was one of the harder ones.  Like I said earlier I stepped back a bit from set collecting and focused on my Rockies.  I did find one set that I thought would be an interesting long-term collecting project in this box break from May.  Yes, I think the 2005 Topps Rookie Cup master set would be a very difficult project to undertake, but if I wanted easy I would buy a 1999 factory set and be done with it.  I want a challenge.  Aside from that one box, I didn't work any more on this set, so I will score myself accordingly.

Score: 6/10 (since I got 60%+ of the base set complete)


10. Continue having fun with this great hobby.
As great as it is to complete goals, if collecting cards wasn't a fun thing to do I don't think any of us would be doing this.  Even when I stepped away from the blog I continued with my collection and reading everyone else's blogs.  After having tried my hand at several "adult" hobbies (not dirty, just things adults are supposed to interested in), I was dying a slow death from boredom.  I decided to come back to my "kid's" hobby and I am thrilled and I don't care whether anyone thinks I am too old for it or what have you.  This is MY hobby (well OUR hobby) and WE LOVE IT!

Score: 10/10



Final Thoughts
I actually did much better with this project that I ever thought I would.  Finishing Heritage turned out to be much easier than I thought in January since there was no High Numbers this year, but it was still hard.   The only one I really didn't complete proved to not be that important to me this year.  It would still be nice to finish off 87 Donruss and a few others, but as long as I have my Rockies collection going strong I am a happy camper.

Final Score:  85/100
Happiness galore.

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2011 Topps Heritage Box Break (Woohoo I'm not last with this one...just close)

Tuesday, 22 March 2011

I got back from work today to find that my 2011 Topps Heritage retail box had arrived.  I am so looking forward to this set, because I love the 1962 design.  It is probably my favorite design of the 1960s, although 1965 is a close second.

I am planning on buying 3 boxes of Heritage (plus one high #s when it comes out) this year, because one of my Mountains to Climb in 2011 is to get this set completed.  I had a choice to make, $90 for a hobby box or $70 for a retail box plus shipping of course.  Since I have very little interest in any of the hobby exclusive inserts, saving the extra seemed to be the no-brainer solution.  I got one box off eBay and if it works out well I will buy the other two as retail also.  If not I will get 2 hobbys a little later.  Let's see how this box goes.

24 packs 9 cards per...I am not going to list every single card, just the highlights

THE WRAPPER

 

I don't dislike Halladay or any of the Phantastic Phour (better nickname than the silly R2C2) except Hamels, but I liked him a lot more when he was in Toronto shutting down the Yanks and Red Sox.

THE HIT

David Wright with a solid BLACK jersey.  You don't see the solid black jerseys that much let alone on the Mets (or maybe YOU do but I don't).  This is much better than the two Clubhouse Collection cards I got from the 2008 set, which were the last boxes of Heritage I bought.  Greg Zakwin collects Wright and displayed a lovely Troy Tulowitzki card a few days ago.  Me thinks we have a nice trade here.  If for some reason Greg doesn't want it, I'm sure someone will.  HINT: rhymes with DJLenny.

THE SHINIES

Woohoo, aside from the Ubaldo Jimenez, this was the Chromie that I wanted most (no, not the Chris Johnson).  TWO Rockie great floating heads + two players that aren't Giants or Dodgers...can there be a better card?

THE SHORTIES

YES, the box is working out pretty good.  Getting one of the 3! Rockie short prints (Street and Tulo AGAIN are the others).  Actually, Card #441 (JDLR) was listed on the sell sheet as a checklist.  I am happy it wasn't.  I am on the fence on the team cards, I sorta like them but it looks like the front row is sitting on air, weird.  I LOVE the floating head rookies, although I don't think there is a Rockie in there this year.  Maybe next year with Friedrich, Matzek, and Rosario.

THE INSERTS

This year features the usual suspects as inserts in Heritage.  They look pretty good, but maybe a new idea every now and then could work.  I do love getting another JFK card though.

ROX IN THE BOX

Only two base Rockies were in this box.  Normally I would be disappointed, but with the shortie and shiny Rockie I am okay with this.  Todd Helton is three years older than me.  Why is he not losing his damn hair?  I like the design of the All Star cards as well, the NL were not short printed, but the AL were.  Odd.

ROOKIE CUP CARDS

I got 5 of the rookie "cup" cards, although calling these cups is stretching it.  Rookie trophy cards would seem to fit better, but I am sticking with cup.  I like the two red gloves on Garcia and Feliz, nice and different.

ONE I WAS SURPRISED I LIKED

 Yep, I like this checklist card.  The best part is these are not part of the set or considered as an insert.  They are just randomly thrown into about every 1 in 8 packs.  I got cards 1, 2, and 6.  They really remind me of being a kid, plus these are a thousand times better than putting twice as many checklist cards in a set but only using the back.

Overall, I am thrilled with this retail box and will buy two more without a doubt.  Save $20 and miss out on what a chance at a coin card or some stamps.  I can always use the $60 to buy whatever Rockies (I don't think many) are in those hobby exclusives and with the leftover buy another box (or two) of something else.

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Mountains to Climb in 2011

Saturday, 15 January 2011

 One of my favorite features in my readings in Blogland is the collecting goals of my fellow bloggers.  I figured since I started this one early this year, I would try my hand at this on my limited budget. 



1. Get one card of every Rockie in a Rockie uniform.
This one might prove tough as I didn't realize how many people played partial seasons with the club, but I am still going to try it.
Perceived toughness - 9/10 Perceived cost - 3/10

2. Finish off twelve of my partial sets this year.
This is an important one for me and shouldn't prove that difficult.
Perceived toughness - 5/10 Perceived cost - 4/10

3. Complete 50 trades with fellow bloggers / readers.
Given the friendliness of this community I don't see this being a problem at all.
Perceived toughness - 3/10 Perceived cost - 1/10

4. Organize a Rookie Cup card collection from my vast doubles.
Should be one of the easier goals on this list.  I already have most of my dupes organized by player.
Perceived toughness - 2/10 Perceived cost - 0/10

5. Have 200 posts on this blog.
With the time I have available now this shouldn't be a problem.
Perceived toughness - 4/10 Perceived cost - 0/10

6. Get enough supplies for organization.
Another key mountain for me is getting everything I have organized.
Perceived toughness - 3/10 Perceived cost - 7/10

7. Start and finish the 2011 Topps Heritage set.
I love the 1962 Topps design so this is the only must build set coming out in 2011 for me.  I haven't really liked the past two years of Heritage mainly because I didn't like the design of 1960 and 1961.  Finishing this one might be tough with all of the SPs and inserts but it will definitely get started.
Perceived toughness - 9/10 Perceived cost - 9/10

8. Get my Jamal Mashburn collection over 500.
This shouldn't be a problem, but I am mostly stuck getting parallels now so it will probably cost a little bit.  I am currently at 476. 
Perceived toughness - 2/10 Perceived cost - 4/10

9. Find and work on a set I like from 1996-2005.
There are definite holes in my set collection from the period I wasn't collecting.  Suggestions are welcome and encouraged.
Perceived toughness - 1/10 Perceived cost - 4/10

10. Continue having fun with this great hobby.
This will obviously prove to be the easiest goal I have ever set.
Perceived toughness - 0/10 Perceived cost - Priceless

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