Now for something completely different! And that's no bull!

Okay, basketball is done (Frickin' Spurs) so let's move on. I'm really hating that Topps is the only licensed maker of baseball cards. We've got Series 1 built, don't care for Heritage and Finest is too expensive except for singles here and there. We need more variety!! Well, since they won't give it too us, we'll have to find it ourselves. Which we did!
I'd seen these packs of PBR cards for awhile at our local Target, so I grabbed a pack just for kicks. They're made by Press Pass and have 5 cards per pack. The odds are pretty low on the back of pulling autos and event used equipment such as shirts, pants, hats, ropes, etc. We didn't get any hits, but I'll show you what we did get. (By the way, Nobie loved the cards and wants to go after the set now.)

We don't follow the PBR per se, but I have watched my fair share of rodeos over the years, both on tv and in person. I've even made a special trip to Cheyenne for the Daddy of 'em All before.
The card stock is pretty average stuff, but with a nice glossy sheen. The Rider cards have a different full bleed photo on the back (sorry, forgot to scan) with a little write up. Interestingly enough, some of them, like 'ol Sean here have a list of injuries sustained. During the 2007-2009 time span Sean endured a strained right forearm, sprained high ankle, bruised left ankle, concussion and a strained left groin on his way to earning close to $1 million. Maybe it was all worth it after all.

We also got a clown card, though I'm pretty sure they prefer the term bullfighter. Flint here, used to be a schoolteacher. I think I'd rather pal around with bulls, too!

This Luck of the Draw card recaps the legendary match up between Chris Shivers & Mossy Oak Mudslinger. (Don'tcha just love sponsorships?) Chris would have won $1 million dollars for the one 8 second ride, but the 3 time "Bull of the Year" bucked him off in 2 seconds. Not much of a match I'd say!

This Bulls card was Nobie's favorite and we got a good one in our first pack! Code Blue here has never been ridden in 14 tries including 3 "outs" at the 2009 PBR World Finals. He's a Bad Ass! Maybe Night Owl should add him to his "I'm a Bad Ass and You're Not" Club

The last card in the pack was a nice little Spur (man I hate that word) Crazy insert. It didn't scan well, but it is quite shiny! This card is of a retired rider by the name of Cody Lambert, who if I'm not mistaken, was one of the characters in the movie 8 Seconds. That movie focused on the short life of Lane Frost (played by Luke Perry) who was tragically killed while competing. Cody Lambert was one of Lane's "sidekicks" who liked to dabble in poetry (at least in the movie). It's a pretty good flick if you haven't seen it.

So, there you go. Something a little different. Like I said, Nobie wants to collect the set. It's 100 cards I think and I checked the "stats" of a hobby box and you get 3 autos and 3 relics in 24 packs, which seems pretty good to me. I don't know if we'll ever pull the trigger or not, but we'll see. Later.

NBA Playoff Word Scramble For You

NOS FO A IBTCH!

Don't count us out just yet!

Thanks to a monster night (finally) from Caron Butler the Mavs are still alive. It was good to see them much more aggressive in getting to the basket and it payed off big time. The Mavs routed the Spurs to close the series to 3 games to 2 with another big showdown in San Antonio on Thursday. Besides Butler, Dirk had a solid if not spectacular outing and Haywood was much more effective than Dampier has been. Now we just need a repeat performance on Thursday. Can't wait! Later.

Big Box from Tim!

I went to the mailbox the other day and pulled out an unexpected box. It was from Tim at the Great Sports Name Hall of Fame.

Packed in side were all kinds of cards for me and the boys. I've got a lot of pictures to show, so I'll go easy on the words.

I hope Tim's health is fine, because he seems to have left his entire Jake Peavy collection to Nobie. He sent enough cards for not one...

not two...

but three photos! Nobie was shocked and didn't have most of them.

Nobie also scored cards of Ryno...

several mini Cubs (wait, aren't all cubs mini?)...

and new Hall of Famer "The Hawk" and friends.

Tim made sure to throw in a few of my faves as well. Gotta love the 90s cheese fest that is Pacific Crown-whatever.

We also got a big 'ol pile of old school Rangers, most of whom I don't really remember much about.

Ah, but not these guys. These guys I know. These are some of the cleanest guys in baseball history. Played the game the way it was meant to be played with a lot of hard work and integrity. The billboard between Juando and Jose's heads says it all. POWER. I wonder where all that power came from?

Cowboy superstar QBs were also in the box along with...

some Hall of Famers...

a bunch of Metal Men...

and some random gladiators of the gridiron. Thanks a ton for all the cards Tim! Hope you make a speedy recovery! Just kidding. No, wait, I'm not kidding, am I? I mean, if you're really on your deathbed, I do hope you pull through. I'm pretty sure you're fine though, so there's no need for a recovery. Is there? Later.

Switching Gears.

Okay, so basketball is pissing me off royally at the moment, so let's try something a little different. I grabbed a pack of 2010 Press Pass Nascar cards the other day, just for kicks. Now, this may seem like a stretch since I've never mentioned my liking of motor sports on this blog before, but it's really not.

When Texas Motor Speedway opened however many years ago, I had season tickets for the first few years. I was (notice I said was) also a big time die cast car collector back then and I also dabbled in cards a little. I even sent Tim from the Great Sports Name Hall of Fame his firs Dick Trickle cards. I used to TAPE ON VHS every Winston Cup, Busch Series and Craftsman Truck race and watch them every weekend as well as all the Indycar races. Needless to say, that was before the kids got so involved in activities, so I don't have time for that anymore, but I still follow racing and watch ON DVR what I can. So like I said I enjoy racing so let's see what we got here.

Here is the wrapper featuring "Smoke" himself. I've liked Tony Stewart since his Indycar days and hated to see him leave that series, but he's done well for himself in Cup. I'd still like to see him try the Indy 500 again some day though. The wrapper says we'll get 6 cards inside.

I scanned the back so you can see the odds on the inserts and hits. They are much smaller that anything you see in the big 3 sports. The largest odds of anything is 1:600. Man, that's practically 1 per pack compared to some of the odds I've seen on baseball wrappers. Let's check out the cards.

Rookie Recap card of Scott Speed. With a name like that, what else are you gonna do for a living? The cards are a little on the thin side stock wise, but do have a little splash of foil decent enough design. The backs typically show some portion of the car rather than repeat a photo of the driver. Gotta keep those sponsors happy!

Here Tony shows off the size razor he needs to keep that 5 o'clock shadow at bay.

These two base cards feature Mark Martin and one of my favorite drivers, Elliot Sadler, though I hate to say his career hasn't amounted to much. He's got a great Virginia accent though, love to hear him talk. Mark Martin has never been one of my favorites, but I respect his ability and he's really had a resurgence of sorts since driving for Hendrick Motorsports. He still looks about 15 years older than he really is though.

It's hard to tell, but this card here is a blue parallel. They are retail inserts that fall one per pack. The foil on the MPH and the speedo are blue. Dumb thing is, Cup cars don't have speedos, just tachometers. Oh well.

This next card is a Jimmie Johnson Unleashed. The Unleashed cards are kinda neat, they are foily and embossed, but don't scan well. They fall 1:6 packs. Jimmie has won the last 4 Cup Championships which ties him with mentor Jeff Gordon for 3rd on the all-time list, if I'm not mistaken. I wonder how soon till Jimmie is considered the master over Jeff. They have been feuding publicly with each other the last couple races. I don't think they are on such friendly student/teacher terms anymore. It makes for nice drama though!

So there you go. Something you probably didn't expect from me, but I've got a couple other racing packs to review in the next few days or so. I haven't seen anyone else reviewing racing cards, but to be honest, I haven't really been looking either. Later.

WTF, Mavs? George Hill? Seriously?

I don't even know what else to say. This sucks!!!

New Releases! Big D Customs.

Okay, I've got a new batch of customs to show you guys, but before I do, I want to point out a new feature to the blog. (Well it's been here for a few weeks, but I've made some updates.) For those of you who don't know, I like to create my own cards. In order to make them easier to share, I created a Picasa album which you can find by clicking on the bigD logo to the right. It looks like this:

In the album you will find all the latest bigD cards, assuming I manage to keep it updated. I have created several cards with specific bloggers in mind. Once I figured out how to make the virtual cards a reality, I started sending some out. If you check below some of the images you can find a link to the lucky recipient's blog, where you can then read about their impressions of what they received. I think everyone digs them, at least that's what they let on.

Okay, now for the new releases I promised. First up is a Ryan Howard Big Piece of the Puzzle. I made a Nyjer Morgan for this set as well, which now has a new home. This design is something I guess I would imagine as an insert set.


This Ichiro is my idea of a Topps Gallery type of card set. Different players depicted in various artistic styles.

The last card features my first mash-up of sorts. Pablo Sandoval kinda burst on the scene last year I guess it was and somewhere acquired the nickname Kung Fu Panda. I couldn't resist combining Pablo and his nickname and this is what I came up with:

Kinda crazy looking isn't it? As always, load up the comments section with your reviews, I love to hear your opinions. Also, be on the lookout for an upcoming bigD customs sweepstakes giveaway (is that redundant?), if I can drum up interest that is. Later.

Maybe Upper Deck will try this!

Got another yellow envelope in the mail the other day. This time it was from Ryan at The Great Orioles Autograph Project. That guy is nuts, trying to collect an auto of every Oriole ever! Good luck man, I'd drive myself nuts with the seeming impossibility of it. Ryan sent us a few cards for the only two insert sets we are collecting in 2010 Topps, Peak Performance and Toppstown.

Here we have a nice Ryan Braun. Apparently, Topps got this photo from Upper Deck since there are no visible (well, barely Mr. Prosecutor) logos. Originally, we were only going for PC cards from this set, but Nobie wants them all now.

Ryan also sent 3 gold Toppstown cards of Ichiro, Wright and Halladay. Topps went one further than Upper Deck on the Wright card by not only showing no logos, they didn't even bother with his face! Maybe that will be what we get from UD next. A complete set of logoless, faceless players. Wouldn't you love a box of that? Thanks Ryan for getting us a little closer to finsihing these sets. Later.

Now that's a mask!

I've mentioned it before, but whatever happened to the customized catchers masks? Several years ago when catchers began using the "hockey" style mask they were often smartly decorated just like hockey goaltenders do. Take this one for example, worn by Bengie Molina while a member of the Jays. Sweet, no?


Now it seems the majority of this type of mask are just plain. Someone suggested that it's because catchers switch teams so much, but surely not. These guys make plenty of dough. It shouldn't be too expensive to just get a new paint job or new mask completely. I think it would make for a cool collection. Is there some MLB rule against customizing them now? Anyone know for sure?

All of these cards came in a trade from reader Jason. All the other catchers he sent are simply wearing the old school catchers helmet and separate mask. Funny thing is, I think these are almost exclusively used in the pros. Nobie does some catching for his team and wants to use this style, but I haven't seen them anywhere, even online. I'm not sure it would even be legal in his age group anyway.

We sent Jason a few Heritage he was needing and he sent the catchers along with these 3 cards of dudes we collect. Thanks for the trade, Jason and if anyone knows the answer to my mask question, let me know. Later.

Pack Rip 2007-08 Topps Chrome Basketball

I picked up two packs of 07-08 Topps Chrome Basketball from the Target discount box the other day. These cards look decidedly more chromey than most years because of the thick chrome border. The only bad thing is the text is only outlined, which makes it hard to read. Let's see what we got.

Pack 1

Sweet. Nice start with a Steve Nash. Paul Pierce, Jameson Curry & Andrew Bogut round out the pack.

Pack 2

Bill Sharman starts it off. Don't really know anything about him, though. I also got Andre Iguodalla, Corey Brewer and some guy named LeBron.

Well, nothing outstanding here, but we will be keeping the Nash and Lebron. Everything else is up for grabs if you see anything you want or need. Later.

Mavs Win! Check Out My Cards!

Well, the playoffs finally got underway this weekend and thanks to another great performance from Dirk, the Mavs are up on the Spurs 1-0. I think as long as Dirk can have his way with the Spurs, the Mavs should be able to take the series and advance to round 2. I don't really think the Spurs have anyone who can contain him. Caron Butler had a good night with 22 points and Kidd was two rebound shy of another triple-double. Can't wait for the next one!

Recently I made another trip through the virtual aisles of COMC. As you can see, I was mostly on a Dirk run. I picked up several inserts from various Panini sets, as I haven't bought many packs from them this year. I'm only building the base set. The rest of their sets don't hold much appeal for me, they're all kinda the same. Too much boring photography. I do like a lot of their inserts, however, so I'm trying to get all of those.

All but 1 of the cards that aren't from Panini, came form Upper Deck. Man, it really sucks that they aren't gonna be doing much of anything anymore. What a mess they've gotten themselves into. They really made a lot of great things over the years and I miss them already. The baseball selections alone this year are borrring!

Besides Dirk, I picked up a nice Roddy B jersey card. I really like this kid, though I doubt we'll see him much in the playoffs. I also got a new Mark Aguirre card. It's getting really hard to find any new cards of him that I don't have. There just aren't that many cards of him around. I guess basketball cards weren't much of an item in the '80s. The last bball card I picked up was a red border Turkey Red of my man Michael Finley.

After filling my card with basketball selections, I figured I should get at least a few baseball cards, so I added some new Youngs to the collection. Michael's started a little slow this year, but I have now doubt he'll end up over .3oo when all is said and done. It was nice to see him get his first home run of the season this weekend even if the Rangers as a whole didn't look so hot. Well, that's all I picked up this time. Go Mavs!! Later.

2010 Topps Heritage Pack Analysis

I picked up a pack of 2010 Heritage from Wally World the other day. Here is my in-depth analysis of the entire pack.

This is the wrapper. It's red and exclusive. It says there should be 8 Major League Baseball cards inside. At least it won't have any cards from whatever league that is in the Upper Deck packs. Man, I was totally confused when I opened a pack of those. Oh yeah, it also says there should be gum inside. Let's check.

Sure enough, there was gum. Serial numbered gum at that. We got piece #8273, not sure out of how many. Anyone want to trade? What are these going for on ebay?

Next, we have the 7 regular base cards included in the pack. We don't collect any of these players or teams, so that kinda sucks. Marco Scutaro looks really happy, but he doesn't realize what a doucher he looks like wearing his button down, generic businessman oxford underneath his jersey. Lame-O!

The eighth card, however, is awesome. This guy we do collect and it's a Short Print to boot. I hate short prints, but this is one we need so it's all good. Feliz has already replaced Frankie Francisco as closer for the Rangers after just one week, as 'Ol Ron Wash panics to save his job before the season even gets started. You can tell it's a Short Print because it's white on the back, not that grey cereal box interior looking stuff. At least that's what people say on the internet. For all I know white backs could actually be 1 of 1s or Cards Yo Momma Threw Out or something. Anyway, we're keeping it.

The last item in the pack was not even listed in the odds on the wrapper. It's the anti-theft device which I think are inserted into every 5th pack or so. Sweet pull, right? It also works like a charm as the nice elderly greeter at the door politely asked to see my receipt as the buzzer went off when I exited the store. She asked if I had any electronics or perfume or something in my bags. I said, "No, just food and baseball cards." She looked at me like I was speaking a foreign language. This has happened to me before, they never suspect the cards for some reason. Maybe Walmart needs to have the greeters review the potential causes for setting off their alarms. She looked over my receipt and mumbled something, then let me go. Whew! Close call.

So there you have it, my in-depth pack analysis of 2010 Topps Heritage. Grab a pack or two sometime, but make sure you pack search for the anti-theft device and leave those behind. It'll save you a potential frisking by an elderly lady. Later.

Topps Series 1 Base Set Complete! Thanks to Chris!

Thanks to reader Chris we have completed the base set of 2010 Series 1. This is the first year Nobie and I have tried to build the Topps set. We bought one box and several individual packs ourselves and the rest have come from trades with our "buds". The only subset we decided to collect completely was the Toppstown cards. We were only going after a select few of the Peak Performance cards, until Nobie just now looked over my shoulder and said, "Dad, I wanna get all of the Peak Performance cards. I like that set." I guess we'll have to update our list then!

Along with the last 2 cards of the base set, Chris sent us 3 gold Toppstowns and a Pujols Peak Performance. We also received a handful of Rangers.

We got 3 2010 Opening Day Topps including hot hitting Nelson Cruz. Nellie and Vlad are almost unstoppable at the moment, though I didn't get to see tonight's game, so maybe they bombed. I was instead out watching Goose's soccer team bomb in their last regular season game. Oh well, at least they kept their Division 1 spot for next season. As I've mentioned before, I think Topps dropped the ball on the Opening Day cards. They are way too similar to the regular set. They put in totally different inserts, so now they just need to do the same with the base set. So, on to Series 2 in a month or two. Thanks a ton, Chris! Later.