Quick Review: 2010-11 Panini Rookies & Stars

Panini's second release of the year (at least I think that's right) is Rookies & Stars. I'd been itching for something besides Prestige, so I've picked up a few packs. Here's a quick review of one of them. The wrapper features rookie of the year candidate John Wall of the Wizards and some guy named Kobe from the Lakers. This pack should be full of Rookies and Stars I'm assuming.

This is what the base cards look like. I actually like them. Again Panini has used a pretty bland, monochromatic background with a cropped player, but for some reason they work a lot better than last year to me. My kids think I'm nuts, but something about the players on these cards looks "different". I'd almost swear they have some sort of slight sharpening filter or something added to them that give them a very slight painted look or something. I noticed it with their football set too. Or maybe I am nuts and am just seeing things. Anyway, I like the look, though the team logos could be a little larger and I'd prefer one of the logos at the top be moved to the bottom so they don't bookend the players heads.

This is what the backs look like. Here Panini gives us a splash of team colors and instead makes the player black & white. We also get the standard one line of stats and blurb of info. By the way, this pack wasn't FULL of rookies & stars. We got 1 rookie (Fields), 3 or 4 stars (Duncan, Howard, Deron Williams & Bogut, I guess) and several other guys I'll call good players.

This is the only insert card in the pack, a Dwight Howard Stardom card. Not a terrible design and this is actually a numbered variation for some reason, but I can't remember what it's numbered to. This design doesn't have too much empty space expecting a swatch or auto, at least it's better than most. I keep waiting to see rack packs of these, you know, 40 cards for $5 like Panini did with Prestige. If I see them I'll probably pick up a few more, otherwise I'll go the singles route and just pick and choose. That's all I've got for now. Later.

New Big D Custom Basketball

Here are my latest. Let me know what you think of them.

Later.

Check Out Some More of My Cards from COMC.

By now, I think most everyone know about the greatness that is Checkoutmycards.com. It's probably my favorite place to buy cards online because of it's simplicity and I really like that every card is scanned front and back. This leads to no questions about what you are getting, although it does add to the "handling" fees adding up, which is COMC's only real downside in my opinion. I usually just do $20 sprees at a time. Here's what I got from a COMC spree a while back.

2 young/youngish stars of the American League Champion Texas Rangers. Elvis is a big part of the future of this franchise and one of the youngest Rangers as well. He is also Nobie's favorite Ranger. David Murphy isn't quite as young age wise, but he's still pretty young from a games played perspective. Murphy is a solid 4th outfielder and got a lot of playing time this year due to injuries to Nelson Cruz and Josh Hamilton. He is also Baby Peas' favorite Ranger.

I picked up 3 new cards for the Kurt collection including a USA jersey swatch, a Turkey Red and a base card from the blacked out Walmart set.

When I was a kid I loved the Kellogg's 3D cards. Actually, I still do, so I picked up a couple of my Cardinal faves. I never managed to build a whole set of these, just gathered some here and there, none of which I can seem to find now. I do have a whole set of 82s (I think that's the right year), but I ordered those as a whole set. I really wish MLB would scrap the exclusive Topps deal and get these things back in cereal boxes.

While rummaging through COMC is stumbled upon what I thought was a Kellogg's football card of Charlie Joiner. Turns out its actually from Stop-n-Go. It's pretty much the exact same thing as the Kellogg's cards though. I also grabbed this Kellen Winslow to help quench the nostalgia I was having for the Air Coryell days.

My current favorite player is Jason Witten of the Cowboys so I picked up a couple of his Finest. The blue refractor is especially nice looking. The other one makes it look like Jason is a member of the Red Lantern Corp or something.

Of course, if I'm gonna pick up some football, I can't do it without adding a few Elways to the collection. Nothing overly exciting, but all cards I didn't have including a nice Sportflix.

My original favorite Maverick is Mark Aguirre and I'm quickly running out of cards of his to collect. This is one I didn't have and I'm not sure where it comes from exactly. I'm not sure if it was part of a set or maybe came as a tag on a shoe or what. Except for the pricey Star cards from the early to mid eighties, I've pretty much got all of Mark's cards, although if I checked some Beckett list or something, I'd probably find that I'm not as close as I think.

Last, but not least, I grabbed a handful of the greatest Maverick ever, Dirk. The Topps Echelon or whatever its called in the upper left hand corner is kind cool. It reminds my of on old TV screen. The card next to it is an Upper Deck 3D stars Sportflix type card that Dirk shares with Jason Kidd. They're kind morphed together in that picture. The diecut Unstoppable is also cool, though it would be neater if it wasn't a smooshed stop sign shape. Anyway, there's what $20 can getcha on COMC. Later.

Awesomest Hockey Card I Own!

We don't keep up with hockey much in our household. When the Stars first came to town I was into them a lot more and during their Stanley Cup season I saw the majority of their games, but I just don't have that much free time these days, so hockey is a little ways down the list. When Goose was very small (like 4 or 5) he wanted to play hockey very badly, but we didn't let him because it was too expensive. We put him into soccer instead and now we pay just as much for him to play big time soccer as we would have to for hockey! Oh well. During his early years of hockey love, we collected hockey cards for a little while. That's when we picked up this beauty!

Ooohh, look how shiny and swirly it is! Awesome, right? This card features the greatest Star ever of course, Mike Modano. I still can't get used to seeing him in a Red Wings sweater. It would have been nice if he could have retired as a Dallas Star.

Pacific sure made some cool cards back in the day. These Revolution ones are some of the neatest in my opinion. I've also got an Elway one that is very similar that is one of my favorites. Maybe Panini will bring back this set like they did with Crown Royale and do it up right. (Though I won't be holding my breath. Panini and do it up right, don't always go hand in hand.) Later.

What Will It Take To Re-sign Lee? Lyrics, Dude!

Nolan and the Rangers are currently in a battle with the rest of MLB (but mostly the Yankees) to sign Cliff Lee. Who knows what the final cost will be, but I know something that will help... a song with thoughtful lyrics!

Check it out, it helped Bill & Ted land the princesses...




and it helped the Mavericks resign Dirk!



So, there you have it Rangers. If you want to keep Cliff, you'd better get workin' on a song quick! Later.

Panini Season Update - Mavs Edition

I picked up this team set of Mavericks on ebay a few weeks ago. I guess the 2009-10 Season Update set must be hobby only, because I haven't seen any packs of these at Wal-mart or Target.

I actually like the design of this set and don't really have any "I can do better" points to make. I'm just glad they put out another set that actually includes the background of the photos. My only complaint is that there aren't enough Mavs in the set.

This fault seems to have carried over into the 2010-11 sets as well. So far, Prestige and Rookies & Stars are only featuring 5 or 6 guys per team including some retired guys. Since it doesn't look like Panini is going to put out a "flagship" set this year, I'm not sure where I'm going to get my JJ Barea and Rodrique Beaubois cards among others this year. I really think they should put out at least one set where you know your going to get at least 10 if not more of the guys on your favorite team. I mean, you gotta give the bench guys a little love, right? Later.

1 Pic Pack Rip

I stole this idea from someone, but I can't remember who. Sorry. Anyway I picked up a pack of Prestige a couple weeks ago and what do you know. A Wally World hit!

Unfortunately, it doesn't look like I'll be able to repeat my luck with the Rookies & Stars packs at the same Wal-mart. Some tool has already opened all the thick packs and left them behind. What an a-hole. By the way, Mr. Pierce is for trade if ya got a Dirk or some other Mav relic you can send my way. Later.