2009 Topps Chrome Part 2

This post is in honor of my triumphant Rose Bowl win. Well, not really my win. All I did was sit on my couch and hope like hell that the Buckeyes didn't get embarrassed again. So I sat there drinking beer and eating junk food and tried to keep my ulcer in check.

On top of it I had the now famous Rose Bowl Bet with Joe Collector. The bet was for a box of cards of the losers choosing. A few days (weeks?) ago my prize (which I had forgotten about) was revealed. I can only assume that all of you were stricken mute (or even catatonic) with jealously due to the fact that none of you even bothered to comment on my awesome prize. (Yeah, but I noticed damn near 40 of you left a comment to get a free set of 2008 Masterpieces.)

2010 Topps Chrome is the prize. Yes, Stusigpi knows what I like. Awesome. I'm not sure if he knew of my love for Chrome from my blog and the numerous questions and advice that I'd asked him about the product, or if he figured that since I was from Ohio I probably liked shiny things. Probably a bit of both.

Well, since you know that Chrome isn't due out for a few months or more, I decided to bust one of the boxes I have left of 2009 Chrome. (Coincidently I bought 3 boxes from Blowout through a sale on I Am Joe Collector).

Here is what transpired:

John Smoltz Base

I wasn't going to scan a base card, until I saw this one. This card just looks awesome with the red background and all. I'm not a fan of Smoltz. Nothing against him. He was great. I just never cared about him much one way or the other.

But this card looks great. So there it is.
Yang Yang WBC

If you think I scanned this card for any reason other than the dude's name is Yang Yang, you haven't read me very much. Not that I'd blame you.

For the record (as if anyone cared about such things as my "record"), I went to high school with a guy named Ken Kenny. I also was in college a few years behind some dude named John John John. I didn't type that wrong. John John John. John cubed for short. I didn't know him personally. But I don't know Yang Yang personally either. That doesn't prevent me from enjoying his name.
Tommy Hanson Auto

I didn't know any of those MmmBop kids played ball. Far out.

(Yes, I'm aware of how lame that joke was. What the hell else am I supposed to say about Tommy Hanson?)
Chen-Chang Lee WBC Blue Refractor 009/199

Not as interesting as Yang Yang. But it is a blue refractor, so that's nice. I'm also excitted that they put the 00 in front of the 9. I don't know why.

I also like that 199 is divisible by 9. That's exciting too.

George Kottaras Auto

This dude is apparently Wakefield's personal catcher or something. Of course that may be completely wrong, but that's how the back of the card makes it sound. I'm not going to look it up. That's George's big claim to fame according to Topps. He can catch a knuckleball without retiring the way some other nameless catcher did.

(let's see if that earlier math thing generates any comments)
Dustin Pedroia Magenta Printing Plate 1/1

Cool. I guess. I was super excited to get a Sizemore printing plate in one of Joe Collector's breaks (it was actually traded to me). I'm still excited to have it. But I have a few of these now and they really aren't that cool. Not sure what the appeal is, other than that they have 1/1 written on them, as if that's a big deal any more.

Still, better than a base card, though.
Howie Kendrick Red Refractor 16/25

Now, this is cool. Almost as cool as if they had called it a scarlet refractor instead of red. Either way it looks awesome. Especially after Topps screwed me out of a Red Refractor redemption in 1009 Finest (or maybe not). I was really excited to pull the red one. Kendrick is not bad either.

His name is Howie. So you know I like that.

Still one box to open and a shiny new 2010 box down the road, the spoils of war. Or at least the spoils of two middle aged white guys with the ability to watch athletic college kids play football on TV.

I thought it was a good box. What do you guys think?

2009 Topps Chrome

A while back, Stusigpi over at I Am Joe Collector finagled his way into Blowout Cards offering Topps Chrome at the low low price of $43 a box. It was cheaper than I'd seen it by far, before or since. So I picked up a few boxes.

Because I love sparkley things.

Here are some highlights of the first box. You might want to pay close attention because you probably haven't seen a 2009 Topps Chrome break anywhere.

Hung-Wen Chen World Baseball Classic

This is my favorite card of the whole bunch. Look at that guy. Is that the worst picture they could have found of this poor guy or what? Plus, his name is Hung.

But the best thing about the card? The first sentence on the back is "Chen missed the 2009 World Baseball Classic,..." What? Why is he on a card then?

He's in the Cubs organization so hopefully this isn't the last we've seen of Hung.
Fu-Ti Ni World Baseball Classic Blue Refractor 168/199

Hung and Fu are teammates. Fu is in the Tigers organization. This card is great for many reasons. I love the name Fu almost as much as Hung. Fu actually has a baseball picture instead of a mug shot. The only thing to distinguish it as a blue refractor is the little stripe at the bottom. It is miscut, I think. There is a small silver stripe at the top that looks out of place.

Mark Buehrle Blue Refractor 184/199

Can you believe this guy pitched a perfect game? Not that he's bad or anything, but man. I thought this guy was only good against the Indians.

Walter Silva Gold Refractor 29/50

Isn't Chroma awesome with their shiny colorful cards. I love this card. Even if the guy on it kind of sucks, I love it anyway.

Will Venable Auto

OK, OK. Not bad. I've heard of him. Cool looking sig too, even if it looks nothing like his name.

Trevor Crowe Auto

Alright now! An Indian. Even if it is Trevor Crowe. I used to have high hopes for Trevor, a first round draft pick. At this point, at the age of 26, he has pretty much cemented himself in that 4th outfielder at best level. But (much like Gregg Jefferies) I still get a little excited when I see one of his cards. I can't help it.

The good thing about a guy like Trevor is I never have to worry about a club like the Yankees ripping him away. The rub is that I wouldn't really care if they did.

Not bad I guess. A few cool parallels and an Indians Auto.

Shiny as hell too.

Back with a few more down the line.

Amazing Blaster of Chrome

My wife goes to Target the other day and she returns home with the usual stuff, plus a blaster of 2009 Chrome. My wife rules.



I'm about to bust it open last night while watching the Tribe and Royals battle it out for 4th place in the AL Central and I mention to my wife that I sure how I get an Xfractor. She smiles at me and says that she hopes so too, as if she has any idea what I'm talking about. Or even cares a little bit, for that matter.

I scanned one of the refractors above because it looks like Derek Lowe is pitching in some kind of Donny Darko like time warp or something. Either that or the card is just screwed up for some reason and that isn't really the distortion of space/time protruding from his back.

I didn't get any Indians (except Justin Masterson, but he's in a Red Sox uni) so I didn't scan any of the base cards.

Let's see if I got any Xfractors.











Yeah, I guess you could say I got my share of Xfractors. 9 in all. In one blaster.

Is that the most kick ass blaster ever? I have no idea what the average is but it can't be more than 1 or 2, can it? Another goofy thing is that the first pack had 5 cards instead of 4. I thought I was going to really make out but the 5th pack only had 3 so it evened out. I was in Xfractor heaven by then so I didn't even care.

Has anyone else had a blaster like this? Are they all like this and you guys think I'm an idiot...or more of an idiot than you already knew me to be?

Well, I did what any good collector would do. I told my wife that she has to run up to target tomorrow to get the rest of the blasters there.

I'm pretty sure she said: "Not only will I go to Target and get you all of the cards you want; I will also stop at Victorias Secret and get something really sexy so that I can sit on your lap and feed you grapes while you open your cards."

Only it sounded more like: "You're such a dork. Why don't you do something constructive sometimes."

Nah, I'm pretty sure it was the first one.

Seriously though...9 Xfractors. How great is that?

2009 Chrome Legends

Here is a cool little set of cards for you. A few months ago Dayf went over all of the different ways that you can get Topps cards and what to expect in each kind of pack. He went over Hobby, retail, rack packs, blasters,...everything. He also talked about these $10 "cereal boxes". I didn't know what the hell he was talking about. Cereal boxes are big. Did they put some cards in boxes of cereal or something? What kind of cereal. I was very confused. It didn't make sense to me. If I would have read Dayf's post more closely I probably would have figured it out, but I didn't. I'm a lazy man and to tell you the truth, my ignorance didn't bother me a whole hell of a lot.





Fast forward to a few weeks ago. I'm in Walmart or Target or something and I see all of the different configurations of cards. And there's this little box that is obviously Topps, but I hadn't seen before. "Hey, that looks like a little cereal box" me thinks.

"HEY! THAT"S WHAT DAYF WAS TALKING ABOUT!" It's all coming together.

Well $10 seemed a little steep for 55 cards plus some stupid chrome refractor thing. But hey, why not? I love shiny things.

Well, I'm glad I did because I LOVE these Chrome cards. Looking back on it, I don't know why I was skeptical. I just love Chrome in general.




So I've picked up a few more of these cereal boxes, basically for the Turkey Red and the Chrome. These are the 2 I've pulled so far and I have 1 box I've yet to open. Also, apparently there are two different 10 card sets. One for Target and one for Walmart. One is gold, the other silver. I'm not sure which is which. I could look it up, but, what the hell do you want from me? Reliable information? You can get that somewhere else. I've got idiocy to offer here. Take it or leave it.

This brings me to a genius plan that I've hatched. The Beckett book value of all of these cards is astronomical. The least valuable one is George Sisler at $8. The others go up to $40! So I plan on buying all of these $10 cereal boxes in existence, opening them, and selling all of the Chrome cards for a profit. So I take a $2 hit on the Sislers. Big deal. I make $30 above cost every time I pull a Ripken JR!

It's a can't miss, unless BV is off. But how could it be? Anyway, it doesn't matter what the ebay value is. The BV is right because I CHOSE TO BELIEVE! I'm a genius. I'm going to be rich!

I might even save a set of these for myself. I really do like them a lot. There are 20 cards in all. I have 3 of them (unless the unopened one is a double.) If anyone has extra of these and wants to complete their 1989 Topps set I have a lot to offer in trade. Let me know.

UPDATE!!

The veritable tidal wave of comments has prompted me to actual do about 2 minutes of research on this after all. The following are the Beckett values of these 2 sets:

Target set: (these are the gold ones)
Ted Williams is the only one with a price and it is $10
All other players are "N/A"

Walmart set: (silver ones)

1. Ted Williams $25
2. Jackie Robinson $12
3. Babe Ruth $20
4. Honus Wagner $10
5. Lou Gehrig $12
6. Nolan Ryan $25
7. Mickey Mantle $25
8. Thurman Munson $15
9. Cal Ripken Jr. $40
10.George Sisler $ 8

Curiously, the walmart set has a price for every card, but the value of the entire set is "N/A".

High Beckett value was used because that is what I Choose to accept as accurate. And as we all know, if we all want Beckett to be correct hard enough, it will make it true.

As you can surely see, my plan is foolproof.