Some PSA Goodness

I turned in my last final a couple of hours ago. I turned in grades for the class I taught a bit earlier in the day. What does that mean? I'm officially done with the semester!!!

Well, I have a bunch of research to do over the break, but that's the life of an academic. Always trying to plan ahead for tenure.

Regardless, this is the first opportunity I have had in a while to post. So I'm not going to miss the opportunity.

A wihle back, I threw some cards into my LCS owner's PSA order. I got them back a couple weeks ago, and I was stunned.

First up, I included this Phil Bickford team omission auto from '16 Heritage Minors:

The guy had some promise, but was suspended for the first 50 games of next season for his second failed drug test. C'mon, man....I hope he gets his act together. Drugs lead people down bad roads.

Next up was this Tyler O'Neill green bat variation from 2016 Heritage Minors:

I don't know much about O'Neill, other than that he is supposedly one of the Mariners' top prospects. MLB.com ranks him as #2, behind Kyle Lewis. This leaves me in a dilemma: I want him to do well so the card increases in value, but, as a Mariners prospect, I also want him to fail miserably (relax, I don't really want him to fail...I just don't want him to succeed against the Rangers).

Next up, Jon Daniels GM Signature card from 2012 Topps:

This is one of my favorite cards in my collection. I wanted it for a while before I finally got it. When I got back into collecting, the first auto I pulled from flagship was the GM auto from now-former DBacks GM Josh Byrnes. It was one of the pulls that brought me back to the hobby.

Lastly, I sent in my Cole Hamels Real One auto from '16 Heritage:

Anyone see the problem with this?????

For some reason, the grader at PSA decided that Cole Hamels was demoted and listed this as a Minor League Real One Auto.

I just double checked, and PSA still has it listed with the error. eBay 1 of 1, anyone??? But seriously, is there an eBay market for PSA errors?

Anyway, back to the main story. The thing that shocked me about this order? All of my cards came back Gem Mint 10s. That's kind of crazy, right? I'm definitely not complaining.

Well, that's it for now. It is officially almost 2 a.m. my time. I am going to do a few things to clean up my desk and then I am off to bed. I hope everyone is well!

A Few Boxes of 2016 Heritage Minor Leagues

I've got to get this out: I hate the Blue Jays. For numerous reasons. I cannot stand them. Their fans are pretty awful - I've already received a handful of hateful/threatening tweets since the game ended just a few minutes ago. Stay classy, you keyboard warriors of Toronto.

Okay, I feel slightly better, but not a lot.

On to something that will make me feel better. This year, my box opening has decreased dramatically. This is due to a combination of being on a tighter budget and the fact that Topps products are becoming more and more disappointing.

However, when I saw that Heritage Minor Leagues would have an on-card auto and a relic card in each box, I knew that I was in. The best part? A box only runs about $50. So I set aside some money to purchase two boxes, as I thought that would guarantee a full set. Spoiler alert: it didn't.

I bought my first two boxes at my LCS in Lubbock. My relics weren't bad - at least I've heard of these guys:

My autos? Well, they were a different story. I haven't heard of either of these guys:

I also pulled a few of the blue-border parallels:

And I even snagged a peach-parallel (can we please call it something else???) numbered to 25:

However, the "big hit" of my two boxes was this:

The Tyler O'Neill "green bat" variation (thanks to eBay for the photo - I'll explain momentarily). So far, only three of these types of variations have been found. It's cool to pull one.

A few days later, I was back in DFW and I decided to stop in and visit with Duane of Duane's Sports Cards. After the initial hand collation of my first two boxes, I had only about 66% of the set. So I decided to buy another couple boxes.

My relics were decent:

I've heard of these guys, too. How about the autos?

Wait - another Jackson auto??? Okay, that sucks. What about the blue-border parallels?

That Blandino looks familiar...oh yeah, I pulled the same card in my first round. I also pulled a peach parallel (still sounds stupid):

Hey, that isn't too bad.

And I also noticed that one box had two autos in it. You may have seen the tweet:

Forgot to post this earlier. Pulled Phil Bickford SSP no team name auto from '16 Heritage Minors. pic.twitter.com/zqUhIbzkUT

— My Cardboard Habit (@cardboardhabit) October 2, 2016

Sweet! One of the "SSP" no team name autos of Phil Bickford!!!! I didn't realize Bickford was traded to the Brewers earlier this year, but this is still a sweet card.

When I returned to Lubbock, I stopped by my LCS and dropped off the Bickford and O'Neill to be sent into PSA for slabbing and grading. I don't care so much about the grades (I expect both to be 9's), but I love seeing a Heritage card in a PSA slab. I guess it's an OCD thing.

I also collated my new boxes to finish off my set. But wouldn't you know, I am STILL a few cards short. Most annoyingly, I need card number 107. I shouldn't need ANY base cards after buying four boxes. Ridiculous. Beyond that, I need three short prints: card numbers 203, 206 and 212. If you have any of those, let's talk!

Lastly, each box comes with two cards that offer chances at winning a day to "make your pro debut." Each card has a code that is revealed by scratching the coating and entering the code on the website www.topps.com/promotions. The card looks like this:

I had eight of these cards. I never win anything, so I threw the cards away. Then I decided, what the heck? I pulled the cards from the trash bin next to my desk and scratched them and began entering them one-by-one into the system. Loser after loser. On the sixth entry, though, I actually won! The system said I was a winner and then asked me to answer a few short questions about my love of baseball. Sweet!

So, what exactly did I win?

It appears as if I won either a hat or a pin! Cool deal! I seriously doubt that I will win the grand prize, so I will take whatever I do win and be extremely happy!

So, overall, I love the set. Heritage in all of its variations is one of my favorite product lines. However, this set is a major disappointment in its collation issues. I shouldn't have to buy four boxes to put a set together, and if I did buy four boxes, I should have the entire set! I was not so fortunate. Receiving the same autos and parallels was just a coincidence - or at least that's what I'm telling myself.

Anyway, I am off to bed. Hope everyone is well!