While I'm never happy my mailman just crams stuff in the mailbox, I was happy it arrived. Plus I knew and trusted it was packed carefully. So one box was all football, and the other was all Royals. I figured today I would show off the football cards since college began this past weekend (or 2 weeks ago for a some schools) and the NFL just finished their preseason.
When he mentioned the football cards, he made it known a lot of it was college and Oregon Ducks, so I somewhat knew what to expect since I collected college cards for a few years. The real reason I got them was because I have a friend who collects football and really likes the college cards, so I figured if I found a few I liked, I could give him the rest. I found a lot I liked though.
I totally forgot Panini made an Oregon Ducks set a few years ago, mainly because I never saw them around. Being in the Midwest I don't expect seeing them. At best I could hope for is some of the Kansas Jayhawks basketball sets or SEC cards. I really hope Mizzou makes a set of cards soon. Maybe a 200-300 card set featuring all sports, if I had my hand in it. Anyways, I like these Oregon cards. For as many flaws Panini has at times, they also seem to have a lot of strengths as well. Some could argue they should have used more photo and less border on the front, but I like the design. I'm not sure if I'd ever get around to it but a nice collection would be Stadium cards, so the one of Autzen Stadium is pretty cool. Even more so with the clouds in the sky.
As for the players, there aren't too many I collect, but I've heard of all of these, and Marcus Mariota is a borderline PC so while I don't plan on starting a full fledged collection with his cards, it was nice to get some from this package. To me though, my favorite is the D'Anthony Thomas card. While he doesn't get a lot of buzz these days, I'm still glad the Chiefs didn't cut him this weekend. I hope he has a great year. This might be my first Thomas card, but even if it isn't I know I don't have many.
When I saw these it reminded me of the Norm Stewart card I have from this set. I was happy to get these, but then I got a little bit of remorse. I really like the cards, don't get me wrong, but being a Mizzou guy for many years I had to witness Tom Osbourne and his Nebraska teams demolish the Tigers. While I was happy to see him retire I also knew he was one of the best college coaches ever. In fact some may disagree but I think he's better than Bobby Bowden. I'm still glad I have it though, but sometimes it brings back bad memories of the Big 12. Then I saw the Steve Spurrier. If he was only remembered for being with the Florida Gators, I'd LOVE this card. Unfortunately he later went to coach the South Carolina Gamecocks and is even depicted as such on this card. Since joining the SEC Mizzou hasn't done great against the OTHER team from Columbia so this card also brings back painful memories, these more recent. Having said that, if Steve stayed at Florida they would probably kill us every year, so there's that. Though I like all these cards for different reasons, I think I like the Osbourne card the best. However Vince Dooley might play a hand in how I rate these in a few years. Vince's son is Derek Dooley who is now the Offensive Coordinator at Mizzou. Derek was the Wide Receivers coach for the Dallas Cowboys the last 4 years and was also a former head coach in college, including Tennessee.where Mizzou's win over the Volunteers in 2012 lead to one of the reasons Derek was fired a week later. Now at Mizzou and with Drew Lock as the QB, he has a chance to lead the Tigers to greatness.
I've had a few of these Wild Card cards in the past, so it was fun to see them in the package. The bottom ones though I never had, so it was even better to see them. I was also pretty happy getting the Dan McGwire card as I don't have any of his cards in my collection. I might have when I originally collected, but while I've wanted to get on (again) it's never been a high priority. I really thought with the success of his brother Mark that Dan would be more popular and last longer than he did, but I guess Dan is to Mark as Ozzie Canseco is to Jose.
I was also happy to see these cards. I didn't expect so many of the older sets in this package, but I was very happy. I was also happy that I knew most of these guys. My favorite though is Tommy Maddox. I'm hoping one day I'll find an XFL card of him. While I remember a lot of the freakshow that the XFL was and became I remember very little about the actual football. I do remember seeing Maddox play though, so it was good to get this card.
Again, it seemed like every college got one of these sets except Mizzou. Alabama, Tennessee, Louisville, South Carolina, Auburn, Notre Dame, Michigan State... then again Mizzou football was bad back then. Though we still should have beat #1 Colorado in 1990, the needed a 5th Down to win that game, but anyways. While I never had any Auburn cards before from this set, I still am glad I got these. I liked the design of these cards and loved the Coca-Cola logo on them. Maybe Panini should work on a set like these as a throwback style.
Also got a Kentucky card or two as well, but no Coke logo on them. Hmm... Anyways fun to have. This batch is a quirky lot of cards from all brands. I'm not sure I've ever had a card that depicted Colgate before. I'm not sure how many players made it to the NFL, I guess I should brush up on that. I never cards for the Football Heroes cards, I just thought overall the design and everything about them was a miss from Upper Deck, but I remember Dennis Dixon, so that's a plus. The Press Pass cards are from just before I got back into collecting, but I remember both Antwaan Randel El and David Garrard so they were nice additions.
Star Pics is a love/hate set. I love it one day, and hate it the next. Today I love it, tomorrow who knows. I never knew I wanted or needed a Leigh Steinberg card, but here it is and I now have have. That is pretty cool I guess. I'm glad that didn't become a normal thing or else I'd probably have about 5000 Scott Boras cards I would have to find a way to get rid of.
Now some of these cards I remember having. Except for the Leaf Draft card, I like all these cards. In fact the Leaf Draft cards almost made me give up buying packs of college cards. I hardly buy any now, but if I do I know what the design is before I buy them. Possibly one of the 5 worst sets I've ever seen for football. My favorite design is the Upper Deck throwback one, even if it is of a guy I don't remember much of. Sorry Rahim Moore, I just never got into UCLA much. The Press Pass card is nice and I remember that set, but I was never a fan of Talib, even when I still like the Buccaneers and he was on the team. Now since he's on the Broncos I don't have to feel guilty not liking him.
I never saw the Mariota Football Heroes card before, but I really like it. It will fit in nice in the Quarterback section of my collection. It's where I put QB's who I haven't decided to fully PC yet. The Press Pass cards are nice but I didn't collect them at the time, so they are new to me. OOH, another Tommy Maddox card, nice! Also I remember Terrell Buckley as well, so while the Classic set wasn't their best effort, a nice couple cards. Speaking of not their best effort, Sage Hit has really nice sets sometimes. When they don't they are WAY off the mark. This is one of those sets. Having said that, I like both of these cards, so I can't complain a lot. The Royce Freeman card I might already have but I'll need to see. These days I am a fan of the SI For Kids cards, but still wish the cardstock was just a bit thicker. Though I noticed they aren't paper thin like they were a couple years ago, so it is a lot better.
More Ducks, and while they are random, I like all these cards for different reasons. My favorite is tough to decide, but I guess its DAT. The Upper Deck set is one I don't have a lot of but its nice. Plus he's more or less a PC, so it gets the nod over Jeremiah Johnson and the 2009 Sage Hit set. That was the first college set I bought a lot of packs for and almost completed. I probably wouldn't have if Chase Daniel or Jeremy Maclin weren't in the set, but it was still a nice set and still better than a lot of their most recent attempts. The Rocket card was a nice addition too since I don't have any. Probably use to, but good to get one back again.
From an overall standpoint, I think my favorite set of cards I pulled from this box is the Topps Magic cards. I don't think the design works all that well for other sports, but for football I think its perfect. I never went out of my way to collect any, but after seeing them again I may have to look at the set more closely. It was also fun to see the Miami Hurricanes cards. A few years ago these would have slid right into my Miami collection, but I don't have it anymore. When I got into college football in the 90's Mizzou sucked so I started rooting for the Hurricanes because they were on TV every week and probably because I didn't like Notre Dame, so until around 2006 or so I was a 'Canes fan first then Mizzou when it came to football. Then Mizzou started getting better and I went to my first college football game and they became my favorite team and Miami slowly started to fade away. Last year I started rooting for them again, and with Mark Richt as coach I hope they win a National Title someday soon, but hope Mizzou wins one first, but that seems more of a longshot.
We'll close it out with this nice mix of cards. When I signed up for the football cards, in the back of my mind I hoped to get some Mizzou cards, or if not maybe of players I saw play or at least heard of. I was happy with all the cards I got, but I admit I was most excited to see this Blaine Gabbert card. Not only is it a Mizzou card, its a parallel card and one I didn't have before, so I can add it to my collection. I gave Gabbert a lot of crap in college and even said it was a mistake to go pro early, but here it is 2018 and he's entering his 8th year in the league with like his 900th different coach. At some level you have to admit that's pretty good. Sure he was a bust to many (I still contend he wasn't ready, and they threw him to the wolves way too early in Jacksonville, which if they sat him longer to learn the system he'd have done much better), but most who are busts don't last 8 years in the league. He's even had a few starting stints in between. When you think about it, learning a new system every year sometimes more than once a year, and I have to admire his ability not to give up.
Having said all that, the 2011 Press Pass set was not a good one. Though I was happy to get these cards. Jake Locker was another guy who I thought would have a long career. I was wrong. The die cut cards on the bottom was cool to find too. It was almost like I got inserts in this box.
Overall I was very happy with the mix of cards and while going into it I knew I'd get a lot of Oregon cards, it wasn't as bad as I thought it was. I haven't decided which ones I'll give my friend yet, but quite a few of these I'm keeping. Thank you again to Cards on Cards for having this giveaway. Next post I'll show off the other box I got which was all Royals, and without looking into it too much, I already know I didn't have a lot of them so it will be fun showing them off. Thanks everyone for reading and have a great week. I joined a website recently and they have a 50 movie challenge, so I have a feeling that I'll be watching a lot of movies this week. I've watched 3 already this weekend, and my target goal is to watch 30, so one a day won't be too bad, but who knows. Since I have Netflix I might watch a few tonight. So I should be busy for a while if you notice I'm not posting much. Thanks everyone and have a great night.
