Just One Pack of 2014 Stadium Club

Along with the box of 2014 Upper Deck CFL, I picked up one pack of 2014 Stadium Club, just to see what it was like. Glossy stock, photos are very sharp and pop off the card. First card was Alex Gordon, hoping for a little Royals mojo to keep the Giants from having yet another parade.

2014 Upper Deck CFL Box Break and Review

It was not big news in the hobby world by any means, but a few us north of the border noticed when Upper Deck secured the rights to make Canadian Football League cards away from long-time CFL partner JOGO. All-World, Extreme and Pacific have all tried their hands at CFL cards, but JOGO has been the only one to stick around, although limiting their products to factory sets recently.

I have always though of Upper Deck as a quality brand and was pretty excited to break some, and with a trip to the big city, I stopped in at the LCS and picked up a box.

The "base set" is broken down into three groups, 1-100 being all offensive players, 101-150 being defensive players shortprinted to one per pack, and 151-180 being Star Rookies falling at 1 every 4 packs. Also included are autographs (1:192 packs), Relics and a few other inserts.

2013 Gypsy Queen Complete

Not much of a post, just taking a minute to celebrate the completion of 2013 Gypsy Queen including short prints. The cards are all in hand and in binder on the shelf with 2011 and 2012 complete sets.. The last card I needed was Nolan Ryan and that just leaves 2014 to pick away at, including two of the pricier cards in the set, Masahiro Tanaka and Jose Abreu.

Ramiel Tapia Bowman Black Collection Auto

Another Bowman Black Collection autograph to add to the collection. This was the one player I was hoping would get one of these cards this season. Tapia is a prospect that a lot of guys are really high on and some are not, seems like a really high ceiling low floor player, but with the way the Rockies seem to develop hitters this kid has a chance to be good, although as a 20 year old who just finished his second season in the States, he is still a ways away from Coors Field.

Zistle Trade #30

After being fairly quiet for a while, the trade winds are blowing again, starting with this package from kesslerm through zistle.com. Starting off with a couple nice horizontal shots, a great double dip from Jason Bates and one of my favorite inserts from the last few years with a CarGo chase it down.

Just when you thought I couldn't post any more of these

A pretty exciting addition to the collection, joining the 2013 Ramon Hernandez rainbow, the black printing plate used to make the cards. I know the magenta has been pulled and sold on ebay before I started this project and is probably stashed in someones collection, and I had all but given up finding one of the other three, so I was trilled just to get 1 of the 4, and who knows maybe the rest will pop up eventually.

More Weird Catcher Relic Pick-ups

While not usually a fan of relics, Tools of the Trade did some things that are just to awesome it ingore. The above John Buck with pieces of shin guard, glove, chest protector and steel bars from a mask is one of those cards that there was no way I was going to pass up.

The Ivan Rodriguez switches out the shin guard for a piece of jersey but is the first mask card I have seen with hollow bars, and is the first from a traditional catcher's mask and not the goalie style that Buck wears.

These join the Johnny Estrada I picked up last year and as far as I can tell I am only missing a Paul Lo Duca mask card to have one of each from the Tools of the Trade sets.