Taste of Gypsy Queen + Why Matt Carpenter is the Worst

Hey guys, Drew back here! It may or may not be a good thing that my new job is located at my local mall, along with my closest Target. I've been tempted for over a week to check out the new Gypsy Queen product, and I finally got around to giving it a try; purchasing a hanger pack with 3 retail packs and a 3 card pack of Target exclusive parallels. I could not resist Ozzie Smith being on the pack covers, and I've always liked what Topps has done with the set year after year.

Pack 1:

- Matt Carpenter

- Ty Cobb

- Mookie Betts Mini

- Yan Gomes

- Starling Marte

- C.J. Wilson

Matt Carpenter and I are foes all thanks to fantasy baseball. I really want to like the guy, he's a great run scoring leadoff hitter on a team I have always found respect for. However, in September of 2013 I was playing in my main fantasy baseball league championship against the kid comparable to Ruxin from "The League"; who had won two consecutive seasons and was seeking a three-peat. On the last day of the season, I was barely ahead, until the Cardinals played that Sunday night. My opponent played Matt Adams and Carpenter while I had Yadier Molina as my final player of the season. I was winning the batting average category by percentage points, and Molina's 1 for 3 performance that night put me up just enough where I thought I could hold on. I also was winning by 1 home run, and was worried that Matt Adams could be the guy to hit the tying bomb, since he is more of a power hitter and was on a tear at the moment.

Adams stunk it up on Sunday Night Baseball, striking out 3 times in an 0-5 performance. However, Matt Carpenter did just enough to crush my spirits. In his first at bat, he barely knocked the ball over the fence to tie the home run category at 12 each. At this point, I had the score at 5-3-2 (our league plays Head to Head based on categories), and after Molina's hit I thought I would still be able to hang on. But Carpenter wasn't done, and in one of his later at bats he knocked a base hit barely above a leaping Scooter Gennett at second base that gave him a batting average lead of .3121 to .3117, which he was able to hold on to to tie the overall score, 4-4-2. Yeah. A tie. In the championship. And since his team had a better overall regular season record than me, he won the tiebreaker, and the championship.

But that's not all. After having to hear him brag about Matt Carpenter winning him the cheapest championship in fantasy sports history, I decided to give him a shot the next season. If anyone else reading had Carpenter on their team last year expecting what he did in 2013, you can see why I still couldn't change my mind about him. This year, he's back on the dark side, and of course, he's performing whenever my arch rival wants him to. So, long story short, Matt Carpenter, you're the worst.

Pack 2:

- Cal Ripken Jr.

- Matt Adams

- Johnny Cueto Mini

- Mike Moustakas Glove Stories

- Daniel Murphy

- Jake Odorizzi

Sorry for the rant before, I just can't help but get frustrated whenever I see Matt Carpenter dominating. As for the Gypsy Queen set itself, I'm a fan of the base cards with the exception of that distracting loop on the upper left side of each card. It bothers me, especially when they don't make use of it to include more of the photo in it. The Carpenter and Marte cards in Pack 1 look better to me than what Topps did with Daniel Murphy and Cal Ripken's cards, because the space is unnecessary and takes away from the overall design. I think they wanted to make a substantial change this year because the product was beginning to lose its appeal, and I really have to be honest, I'm not sure if it worked well at all.

Pack 3:

- Howie Kendrick

- Allen Craig

- Matt Garza Mini

- Alex Gordon Walk-Off Winners

- Jean Segura

- Anthony Rendon

I'm also starting to get a bit sick of mini cards. I have never known what to do to store minis properly, and I've had stacks of different years of minis laying around in my basement for a while now. I always have to put them separately in card boxes because if I try to put a player's cards in order, the minis always seem to fall out and it becomes a process. If anyone wants a significant amount of my mini cards, feel free to comment on this post. 

One thing I can say Topps does a good job with in Gypsy Queen is how they can photoshop players in new uniforms. Obviously, there is no perfect way to do this, but I think the Howie Kendrick card looks presentable without a doubt, and it was my favorite card of the pack. A lot of this has to do with the artistic approach to contrast and shadows that has been Gypsy Queen's draw for years now.

Retail Exclusive Parallels:

- Mookie Wilson
- Yu Darvish
- Satchel Paige

Call me hypocritical, but the weird loop in the design looks fantastic on these parallels. The pictures are set into the cards and these are on thick card stock, and I think the shining gray foil used displays the pictures really well. The Satchel Paige is a beautiful card, and the other two don't look that bad either.

Something did feel a bit off with Gypsy Queen this year, and I can say of the three products I've checked out in 2015, it has been my least favorite. I'm looking forward to Series 2 of the flagship set!

What do you think about this year's Gypsy Queen? And, do you have any players you can't like no matter how hard you try?

See Ya!

My First Taste of 2015 Topps!

Hey guys, Drew back here! Last week, I gave myself a little love and picked up a few 2015 Topps hanger boxes and a retail jumbo pack at Target! I've been seeing the new set all over the Internet and although I wasn't a fan at first glance, my opinions took a complete 360 turn in just about no time. So, Mr. Puig and I had a nice date in the Target parking lot during my break between classes in the midst of a snow storm (nothing new there).

My first card of 2015 was of Giants shortstop Brandon Crawford. The Giants are my second favorite team now after visiting San Francisco last summer, and I like this kid a lot. I'm more than content to start the year in this fashion.

Jumbo Pack:

It may not be a classy design, but its the way Topps has had to go with their flagship product for years now. In this age of advanced technology, it was only right that the product should be designed with color and flair to depict the time we live in. The photography is excellent as it has been for a few years now, and I absolutely love how there the border colors match the team colors! Hopefully this means we're slowly working towards less pointless parallels. My first Yankee card is of now ex-Yankee Martin Prado. I was bummed to lose him this offseason, but I'm excited to see how Eovaldi will fare in the Bronx next season.

My one gripe with the new product is something that has been a consistent Topps downfall of mine in recent memory: too many inserts. I like the concepts of some of them; particularly the Robbed in Left, Free Agent 40, and First Pitches, but the rest do absolutely nothing for me. The Archetypes cards look cool but have no meaning whatsoever in my opinion. And god- whoever decided to put Austin Mahone in a card set needs to reexamine their life choices (I'll definitely take the Jack White card though).

Hanger Box 1:

Boy oh boy do I love that Jeter card. Not only was it so appropriate to give him card #1 this year, but the picture to top it off just astounds me. I wouldn't be surprised if that is still one of my all time favorite cards years down the road. Another small complaint though is with the "Future Stars" cards, and I think a lot of you have vouched for this earlier. The foil does not look good at all. I'm so glad Topps went without foil for most of the base cards this year, but that was really unnecessary. All or nothing, guys.

I didn't pull anything spectacular in this box, but it was fun to go through. The Jackie Robinson inserts are neat, but I feel like the days of having a full insert set all given to one player should be coming to an end soon. The parallel I pulled of Sal Perez is beautiful looking, and has me excited for Topps Chrome!

Hanger Box 2:

I ran into some serious collation problems between the jumbo pack and this box in particular. Of the 157 total base cards I added that day, there were over 30 doubles including a few triples. With a set 350 cards deep, I shouldn't have come home with that many doubles, but what can you do. Those Hunter Pence and Cole Hamels shots are really sweet though; again, excellent photography.

We conclude with another relatively underwhelming collection of inserts. The dual past/present cards have passed their prime, but this year's Inspired Play is certainly the nicest design they've used for that template yet. The gold cards stand out this year more than in year's passed, and the history cards are interesting too.

Topps is never going to please everyone; and while I'm torn on some things with this product, I do really like it as a whole. I doubt I'll be buying much more due to financial constraints, but I'm happy with what I came home with. Over anything else, I wanted some cards to send out TTM, and I wanted to see the base cards for myself.

Very well done Topps, you're heading in the right path without a doubt! See Ya!

WalMart Stop: Series 2 Blaster + Value Box Break!

Hey guys, Drew back here. About a week or so ago, right before I left for New Hampshire, we stopped at Wal-Mart for some groceries and other stuff. I hit up the card aisle and walked home with a blaster of the new 2011 Topps Series 2 baseball, as well as the collector's recent hit, the Topps "Value Box". I haven't bought much of anything new card wise this year, but I definitely wanted to check out the new series as well as the recent rave over the actual "value" in the Value Boxes. Take a look at how I did:

I first tried out the series 2 blaster box, and here were just a few of the notable base cards. I didn't pull a single notable American League player, and if you may have noticed, this blaster was filled with stars of the NL East! My favorite base card I pulled was either the pumped up Huston Street or the Jose Reyes. The cards look pretty good as always, but there still was a lot of typical, boring pictures.

Also, a staple in the Wal-Mart Topps products is now the black back cards, where only the player is shown in color but the rest of the card, including the border, is black. I pulled some decent ones in the 2 packs that are like this, but none that I really want to hang on to. 

Next were some of Topps' inserts, many of them have already been extremely overdone. But, wait, is that shiny I see? Topps introduced the "Diamond Stars" insert in this series, and I pulled Ichiro and Ryan Howard. I actually really like the looks of these cards, but everything else is very boring and redundant. 

Hey look, more reprinted boring cards! Sigh. When will Topps learn that I really don't reprints of cards from the past 10 years. Next year, I will get on my knees and pray that us collectors won't be fooled again! 

Next is by far my favorite insert of the year, the new Kimball Champions set. While Series 1 was mostly devoted to current players minus a few legends, Series 2 is all former greats of the game. As you can see, I pulled some pretty good ones, in Ruth, Maris, and Robinson! 

Next are the parallels, which are pretty nice. The gold cards are getting very bland and unexciting now, and while Topps thinks its a great idea and a tradition, it's old, and boring, like that sandwich you'd find in your locker on the last day of school that's been rotting there for months. The diamond cards are new and very nice looking, but I sure hope after this year is over that they won't go back and make another "tradition" of them.

Finally, my commemorative patch pull was of Athletics pitcher Brett Anderson. I don't quite get these cards very well. If you're going to feature an old school logo, this being from the 1967 A's, why wouldn't you feature a player from that team? The patch looks cool, but throwing Anderson on there does not quite make sense to me. Oh well, I guess you win some and lose some, especially in this hobby. 

After a very "meh" blaster, we move on to the value box. In this box you get 5 packs of 2011 Topps Series 1, as well as two packs of this year's Topps Heritage, 2 diamond giveaway code cards loose in the container, and a Legend Chrome Refractor.

Also included is this MLB Collector's Guide, which brings collectors through every year of Topps' history, spanning a different star player for each year. It's a great way to teach the younger audience about the hobby, in case you were looking in getting a son or someone you know interested in the hobby. 

I know you are all sick of seeing these same Series 1 cards over and over again, but 1 thing I do want to tell you is if you need help with your Topps set, send me a wantlist and I can help you out, because, since I won the factory set, most, if not all of my base are for trade. 

My chrome refractor turned out to be of Jackie Robinson, rather than Babe Ruth or Mickey Mantle. While I would have much preferred one of the Yankees, you can't not like a card of Jackie Robinson. The card looks beautiful under a light, with great reflection and shine to it. If anyone has a Mantle or Ruth I would trade this for it though.

Here are the same old inserts as always, with a Toppstown in each pack (didn't scan Mike Stanton), and some diamond inserts of Brandon Morrow and Billy Wagner. 

Minus the lower group of cards in this scan, here are the better looking inserts I pulled. I love the Mantle "The Lost Years" insert, and I wish that was a real card and not just a made up insert. The Rivera Kimball Champions is a favorite of mine as well, definitely staying in my collection for a while. The Diamond Giveaways were all accumulated through both boxes, and there were 4 total. I was hoping to pull a Diamond card but instead I pulled a few cards from 1973, Danny Cater and Alex Johnson. 

While the flagship product didn't treat me overly well, Topps Heritage certainly did. In the 2 packs, I pulled a Then and Now insert of Mantle and Fielder, as well as some star players and solid rookies. 

I got very lucky in one of the Heritage packs as well, pulling this bat card of Jacoby Ellsbury! Talk about some good value! Ellsbury has been excellent this year for Boston, and it's a pretty good pull if you ask me. It's for trade for any Yankee though, since you all should know how I feel about Boston!

All in all, the value box, which was $5 less than the blaster, certainly had more value than the blaster, so keep that in mind the next time you visit a retail store. Again, most every card that isn't of a Yankee is for trade, so please contact me at yanks1996wsc@gmail.com. For most of the base/inserts I'd be interested in trading for anything in my wantlist on the sidebar. Thanks everyone!

See Ya!