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25 April 2013

Challenge Accepted, Again

Yes, things have been slow on this blog.

Yes, there is still a void on my desk where a printer-scanner once took up entirely too much real estate.

And yes, I will continue to try and post things here and there until there is a new scanner, preferably wireless, taking up precious real estate somewhere in the house.

While the last two Topps releases were duds, I've been picking up some singles here and there, some from ebay (though that has become infuriating), others from a very awesome card show and some from a  few trades which have been completed recently.

Yet with many of recent ebay seller jackholing (which, of course, I blame more on ebay than on sellers trying not to go under), I still managed to make a couple big adds this weekend with what you may call "good to very good" seller conduct.

The first of which, was this:


Jonathan Griffin is a 1B prospect in the Arizona Diamondbacks organization. Currently, he's playing with the Mobile Bay Bears (AA). The Missoula Osprey were his home in 2011 where he killed the Midwest League to a .295/18/59 line in only 71 games.

In 2012, he was even better with the Visalia Oaks - hitting 26 HR with 98 RBI (archaic stats, yes, but advanced ones are hard to find on low-minors players) in (mostly) full season of 128 games.

Before looking up his stats, I knew nothing about him - but it looks like this guy can mash low-minors pitching. Hopefully for him and the Grindin' Diamondbacks, he can carry it into the Bigs.

This also showed up today:


Mini Salvador Perez. Nothing about Perez is mini (ladies ;).) Dude is a monster behind home plate, and moves surprisingly quick for an Easter Island model. But why am I showing this card? Because it was a free throw-in. Which I love. Free things. I love them.

It was thrown in to possibly distract me from this awesome:


Oh, Sweet Baby Ray's barbecue sauce that is a fine-looking card.

When I bid on this, I didn't expect to get it. Salvador Perez cards are pretty hot, even with his "slow" start to 2013 (the three weeks of sky is falling!). Like I mentioned above, Perez is a big dude. I cannot imagine him trying to use his bear paws to grip a tiny Sharpie to sign this card, let alone a sticker auto. So of course, he took up the whole thing, writing across the gaudy-yet-glorious gold foil facade.

This card has inspired me.

A box of 2013 Topps Tribute will set you back $275 at Dave & Adam's.

In one box of Topps Tribute, you will get six packs of five card, for 30 total cards.

What has this disaster inspired me to do?

Reverse-assemble a box of 2013 Topps Tribute for less than $275.

How I will do it: purchase six hits from this set.

Purchase 25 base cards from this set, 20 regular and 5 parallels.

Ideally, I'd like to go after players I enjoy. I mean, why spend so much time and effort looking for shitty autos?

This Perez will be my first towards this odyssey. It took me $12 to acquire.

$263 to go. 

3 comments:

  1. Very cool project! I'm eager to see how it all goes down. That auto is very sweet indeed!

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  2. That's an awesome idea. Can't wait to see what you add to your box.

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  3. Oh man, you're going to make that purchase price look ridiculous with what you'll cherry pick. Dig the project.

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