Pressing Needs

After reading Night Owl's post about receiving a card he didn't know he needed, I thought I would revisit a set that I believed to be long completed.  As a child I had the peculiar habit of organizing team sets alphabetically by last name, instead of numerically.  I always had a good knowledge of the Braves' roster so I thought I knew what I was doing.  Now, when I have the time I periodically go in and rearrange those sets.  Today I found some glaring holes in one of my all-time favorite sets: 1993 Upper Deck.  With the aid of The Trading Card Database, I realized that I need the following three cards:

24, 426, 459

This hurts.  On the bright side that second Chipper is pretty sweet.  If anyone out there has one or all of these, please let me know.  This will definitely be one of those collecting things that eats away at me.  I've also put the '93 UD inserts on my wantlist.  Hit me up!

Newest Braves

Yesterday, I featured some vintage cards received in a trade.  Today we're looking at the opposite end of the spectrum.  Tom, from Waiting 'til Next Year, sent over another stack of cards off my wantlist.  He sent some extra cards including most of the '15 Allen & Ginter Braves.  I wasn't planning to put together the team set but I've changed my mind.  My wantlist has been updated accordingly.  You can see my end of the trade here.

Tom also sent cards of two of the newest Braves prospects:

2015 Panini USA Stars and Stripes #58 and #65

Tom was correct in assuming that I knew that Kolby Allard and Lucas Herbert were the first two selections made by the Braves in the 2015 draft (14th and 54th respectively).  It is worth noting that they were both class and battery mates at San Clementine High in California.  Both players have signed so it should be fun to see how they develop together.  Hopefully I'll soon get a chance to see them play with the Rome Braves.

But wait, Tom also sent this:

I'm always down for a parallel even if I don't know what to call it!  I'm not much for prospecting but these cards are definitely welcome in my collection.  Thanks Tom!!

Vintage Braves

I haven't been posting too often here but I've been lurking around comment sections making trades.  I recently traded with Charlie at Lifetime Topps Project and Mark of My Best Friend Collects Chipper Jones.  Both took huge chunks out of my wantlist.  Additionally they sent extra cards that I just have to show off here.  I haven't much ventured into the realm of vintage cards.  (For me that's anything pre-1981.)  So I was pretty pumped to receive these.  Lets have a look, going back chronologically.  These first cards are from Mark:

1972 Topps #74 and #172

My experience with this set is limited to the '72 mini inserts in the 2013 Topps flagship.

1971 Topps #52 and #81

I've read a lot about the '71 cards on the blogosphere but I've never held any in my hands.  Love them.

1969 Topps #489

Very cool!

And from Charlie:

1965 #407

I only have one other Milwaukee card so this is a very very cool addition to the collection.

These cards almost make me want to abandon the quest for endless parallels.  I'll always put together the most recent Topps base team set but maybe next year I'll take shot at finishing some of the older sets.  For now that means '80s and '90s but I'll eventually make it further back.  These cards represent a pretty good start.  Charlie and Mark, thank you so much!

I'm eager to move all non-Braves cards out of my apartment so I'm open to any and all trades.  Hit me up!

He Waves Goodbye to Symmetry

'15 Topps Jason Heyward #181 "Waving" Variation.

Acquiring this card caused me to have page order angst.  Until now I had avoided putting the "sparkle" variation into the binder.  But I figured with this card it was time.  I have a thing about base and parallel pages being identically arranged.  I don't consider the variations to be inserts so I've decided to keep them with the base team set.  That throws off the aforementioned symmetry that I keeps me sane. Also, should this card come before or after the "sparkle" variation?  (I still don't understand the hidden gem thing)  These are the things I think about at night.

At any rate I'm happy to have all three Heyward cards in my possession.  I still have a few more flagship variations to track down.  Then I can turn to more pressing matters, like figuring out all the Update variations.

Throwback Gold

As promised, here are the most interesting cards pulled from my first packs of Update.  I'm feeling too lazy to scan so these are borrowed from Ebay.

Noah Syndergaard US157 Gold 0765/2015

 US406 Jon Lester "Throwback" Variation

To my untrained eye this originally looked like another gold card.  But no, there are apparently throwback logos thrown in for good measure.  I also got a stack of inserts but see above laziness.  These are of course up for trade.  Drop me a line if interested.

Early Update

'15 Update arrived a couple of days early at my local big box store.  I don't think I ever bought packs of update as a kid so this is a new experience.  I'm only looking for Braves so everything else will be up for trade.  I'll prob end up buying a few more packs at Target, next week.  I've already updated my wantlist accordingly.  I'll do a separate post if I get anything interesting.

Sparkle Sparkle!

I told myself I wouldn't, but here we are:

2015 Topps #181, "Sparkle" variation.  I won't say how much I paid but it was probably too much for this:

You got me Topps.