The Lost Collector Sends Steel and My First Griffey 1/1

AJ aka The Lost Collector sent me a bunch of unique Griffey fodder this past week.  Wanna see?

This is a tin that holds a small handful of cards and a damn cool way of packaging them.  It's a good thing too as the cards from this set are especially sensitive to damage. I remember when these came out, but I think they were always out of my price range. 

Inside this were - you guessed it - Griffeys!

I love that Hitters Inc subset from Score.  It's a bright spot in an otherwise ho-hum set.


Poor AJ also had to find a way to package this:

Again, I remember when these came out.  I had one, but Lord knows what happened to it.  This one's going on the shelf.

My favorite item AJ a hand-made, one-of-a-kind work of art:

Dick Perez, eat your heart out.  AJ created this for my Ultimate Griffey Card Giveaway a few weeks ago, and the detail is amazing.  See the little old-school Mariners tridents in the corners?  Check out the shading and the back of his uniform.  This level of detail is tough to accomplish on that bumpy surface, but it turned out fantastic.

I've never even approached this level of skill.  If I ever tried to draw Junior, it would probably turn out like this:

 

And nobody wants that.

Thanks a lot, AJ!  This is my very first true 1/1, and as an avid art collector I appreciate great illustration.  It will get a place of honor in my Box of Griffeys That Are Too Good to Go in the Binders, which needs a new name.

Nachos Grande's 2013 Topps Archives Group Break

There was a three-box break recently over at Nachos Grande, card blog extraordinaire.  It was for 2013 Topps Archives, a set with a number of possible Griffey pulls and a bunch of autographs.  Plus it's made up of some classic designs of the overproduction era - I had to take a shot. 

My team of choice was the Mariners, and my randomized second team ended up being the Diamondbacks.  Let's see the latter first:

Arguably the best pull of the break (though I tend to like the autographs better), an Ian Kennedy true 1/1 printing plate.  I've never owned a printing plate, nor a 1/1 for that matter.  It was pretty exciting to see this one pop up in the group break posts.

Neat.....

Here's the rest of the Diamondbacks from the break:

Sadly the Mariners did not produce an insert, but they did produce a handful of Griffeys:

And isn't that what this whole thing is all about?

Here are the Mariners I pulled:

I ended up with one more surprise from the break:

I wish the 80's wasn't mentioned as one of the possibilities.  The 70's, too, for that matter.  Give me a soft-cornered post-war relic.  I'll be redeeming this tomorrow, so stay tuned for that.

Thanks, Chris!  Looking forward to the next break......