2013 Panini Cooperstown Gold Crystal Parallel

Year: 2013

Manufacture: Panini

Set: Cooperstown

Card Number: 97

Card Type: Base Parallel

Parallel Set: Gold Crystal

Card Attributes: Serial Numbered

Serial Number: 265/299

COMC Black Friday Haul #19

For me it seems Cooperstown was a set that always had one more parallel to find.  Well I can say that with this Gold Crystal parallel I finally have all the parallels, except the Black Crystal 1 of 1.

I was just reminiscing the other day that it's been quite a while since we've had a HOF dedicated set.  Not that I'm pining for another Panini effort, but it would be nice to see a very decent effort by Topps for such a set.  Maybe now that Topps' golden cow will be entering the hall we'll see one.

The 2013 Coopertown set wasn't bad.  Panini using black and white photos eliminated them having to skew the colors of player uniforms and the close cropped faces meant they didn't need to airbrush out logos.  Panini probably could have found a worse picture of Robin to use for his card, but they also could have found one a little better.  A nice touch on the back of the card having the box score from the 1992 game against Cleveland where Robin hit his 3000th hit.  And a great piece of trivia is that Cleveland was the team that Robin got his 1000th and 2000th hits as well.

2013 Topps Sticker

Year: 2013

Manufacturer: Topps

Set: MLB Stickers

Card Number: 206

Card Type: Base Sticker

COMC Black Friday Haul #18

It was just coincidence that I featured a card yesterday that had the exact same image on it.  I also pointed out in the post how over used this one image is.  I haven't been keeping track, mainly because I gave up caring about it, but Topps has used this and a few other images over and over again.  

Last year I made it a point to try and track down some of Robin's stickers that were missing from my collection.  Most of those were from the '80s and '90s, but I did finally pick up this modern 2013 sticker for the old collection.  

The overall stickers from the set had a very basic, yet visually appealing simplicity to them and of course the same over used image. I tried searching Getty Images to see if I could find this exact image and maybe some notes, but came up empty (although I didn't try too hard).  

Regardless even lowly modern stickers have a kings seat in my collection and I'm glad to have this one crossed off the needs list.

2012 Topps Triple Threads Flashback Relics

Year: 2012

Manufacturer: Topps

Set: Triple Threads

Card Number: TTFR-21

Card Type: Insert Relic

Insert Set: Flashback Relics

Card Attributes: Relic, Serial Number

Relic Type: Bat

Serial Number: 09/36

COMC Black Friady Haul #17

I picked up a couple nice relics of Robins this past year.  This card was by far the lowest numbered relic of the bunch.  Again this card was purchased months before the Black Friday event, but was included in my yearly shipement afterwards.  I can remember when these came out back in 2012 and thought they were really cool.  I love the double sided relic, although I'm fairly certain it's the same hunk of wood seen from both sides.  The card highlights Robin's nicknames at the start and end of his career.  Nicknamed the Kid when he broke into the majors, a nickname that has been shared by many players before and since.  And of course Rockin' Robin.  Both sides feature images that were very overused that year and have been since.

I'm not ashamed to say I paid just over $6 for the card.  To me that's  a great price for this very low numbered card of my favorite HOF player and to think this was a hit out of a $100 plus box of cards.  Seems I made out OK on the deal.

2019 Topps Series 2 150th Anniversary Commemorative Patch Card

Year: 2019

Manufacturer: Topps

Set: Flagship

Card Number: AMP-RY

Card Type: Retail Insert Manu-Relic

Insert Set: Professional Baseball 150th Anniversary Commemorative Patch Manu-relic

Card Attributes: Manu-relic

COMC Black Friday Haul #16

This year I picked up almost all my 2019 Yount cards off of COMC.  This is another one of those cards from the haul that was part of my big yearly shipment, but not actually purchased on Black Friday.  This card was picked up 3 days before the event, but I had a hard time passing it up for the price.  

Some people really hate these manu-relics, some love'em.  I'm very middle of the road and it really depends on the card.  Topps in the past has done some really nice manu-relics.  This one I'm not quite sure of.  These cards were blaster bonuses for Series 2 and the term patch is a little misleading or maybe just used wrongly all together.  The manu-relic really isn't a patch, at least in anyway I think of patches or swatches.  It looks to be made of plastic or foam.  It doesn't look terrible just seems kind of, well kind of pointless or maybe redundant.  That being said it most definitely has a place in my collection and the overall look of the card isn't terrible.

Topps 2020 Series 1 Robin Yount Checklist and Gallery

Continuing from last year Topps has included Robin in a bunch of the insert sets.  If this is any indication we should be seeing a lot of Robin again this year.

Here is the checklist, I'll update with images as stuff starts to pop up.


2020 Topps Series 1  #149 Legends Variation
2020 Topps Series 1 - 1985 Topps Baseball #85-61
2020 Topps Series 1 - 1985 Topps Baseball #85-61 Blue
2020 Topps Series 1 - 1985 Topps Baseball #85-61 Black #/299
2020 Topps Series 1 - 1985 Topps Baseball #85-61 Gold #/50
2020 Topps Series 1 - 1985 Topps Baseball #85-61 Red #/10
2020 Topps Series 1 - 1985 Topps Baseball #85-61 Platinum #/1
2020 Topps Series 1 - 1985 Topps Baseball Relics #85R-RY
2020 Topps Series 1 - 1985 Topps Baseball Relics #85R-RY Black #/199
2020 Topps Series 1 - 1985 Topps Baseball Relics #85R-RY Gold #/50
2020 Topps Series 1 - 1985 Topps Baseball Relics #85R-RY Red #/25
2020 Topps Series 1 - 1985 Topps Baseball Relics #85R-RY Platinum #/1
2020 Topps Series 1 - Decades Best #DB-49
2020 Topps Series 1 - Decades Best #DB-49 Blue
2020 Topps Series 1 - Decades Best #DB-49 Black #/299
2020 Topps Series 1 - Decades Best #DB-49 Gold #/50
2020 Topps Series 1 - Decades Best #DB-49 Red #/10
2020 Topps Series 1 - Decades Best #DB-49 Platinum #/1
2020 Topps Series 1 - Decades Best Autographs #DB80-RY #/25 (or less)
2020 Topps Series 1 - Decades Best Chrome #DBC-49 (Retail Tin Exclusive)

2015 Topps Archives Gold

Year: 2015

Manufacturer: Topps

Set: Archives

Card Number: 32

Card Type: Base Parallel

Parallel Set: Gold

Card Attributes: Serial Numbered

Serial Number: 40/50

COMC Black Friday Haul #16

Patience. As far as card collecting is concerned I've learned to have a lot of patience.  There were days not too long ago that I would have jumped all over any and all parallels for Robin right when they were released.  It's a  conundrum at times, because the time you see the most of any one particular card, parallel wise, is at release, that's also the time when prices are highest.  As I've gotten older, married, and become a father, my priorities have shifted, as well as, my extra cash.  So I wait.  I'll probably harp on this a little more, but I quit eBay, both buying and selling early last year.  While eBay may still be the largest online market place for just about everything, the fees and predatory buyers made selling a hassle and the increase in postage made buying single cards even more expensive.  Hence why I've picked up the majority of new additions via COMC.  What does this card have to do with patience?  Well everything.  I sure didn't pounce on one of these low numbered parallels when the set was released and I still hadn't purchased one for over 4 years.  But patience paid off and I found this card for a great price a couple months before Black Friday.  It's another reason I love shopping on COMC.  While deals can be elusive at times, with a little work and patience they can be had.  

2019 Topps Faces of the Franchise

Year: 2019

Manufacturer: Topps

Set: Flagship (Series 2)

Card Number: FOF-16

Card Type: Insert

Insert Set: Faces of the Franchise

COMC Black Friday Haul #14

Last year Robin was featured in quite a few inserts in all three Topps Flagship series.  And of course those inserts, at least most of them, have parallels.  One of my favorite inserts from Series 2 is this Faces of the Franchise.  Since joining the Brewers in 2018 Christian Yelich has replaced Ryan Braun as the face of the current Brewers, at least on cardboard. I'm a big fan of this trio, however I would argue that Rollie is out of place.  If I would have put this card together Fingers would have likely been replaced with Braun, or if we're going old school Molitor.  Not that I'm complaining, as a Rollie Fingers collector I like cards that do double duty for my Player Collections, however if we go by All-Star Appearances Braun's 6 would supplant Yelich, but the write up on the back also highlights MVP awards and Braun's is controversial.  

On a side note I had though I had picked this card up with the rest of my team set from cardbarrel.com, but when I got the Faces of the Franchise card from them I notice it was actually the blue parallel and not the base.  It was an easy mistake since the only real difference between this card and the blue parallel is the top portion of the card is blue and pretty much the same blue as the bottom of this card, and it's unnumbered.  Regardless this was a cheap and easy pick up during COMC's Black Friday sale along with another parallel I'll feature later.