Atomic holds up

Personally, it feels like Chrome products have been lackluster the past few years. Pricy, hard to find, and when one does find it, it feels like a dud. Buyer's remorse happens almost instantly. There have even been a few Topps Chrome group breaks I have passed on because I just didn't feel like the product was worth it.

That's not just Topps Chrome, either. Bowman Chrome seems to be in the same boat.

But that's why we have eBay and the ability to go back and purchase cards from better years and better efforts. If today's shiny doesn't do it for you, there's always a surplus of something from the golden era of cardboard.

For example, 24 years ago, Topps rolled out this:

Atomic Refractors were still fairly new, but man, is this Bowman's Best nice. The background textures add a depth and dimension that makes the grid-like refractor pattern just pop off the card. It's crazy we had this in 1997, yet don't get much new in 2021. 

Plus, this card set me back less than $2. I'd rather spend my money on that than today's unimagined Chrome products.

I hope the Pacific is as blue as it has been in my dreams

One of my favorite scenes in The Shawshank Redemption is within the last few minutes of the film. Red decides to cross the border to reunite with Andy breaking his parole in the process. One line always sticks out to me:

"I hope the Pacific is as blue as it has been in my dreams." 

I'm not sure why that line is memorable for me. I have connection or love for the Pacific Ocean. Sure, I've seen it and been in it a few times, but it looks just like he ocean over here on the East Coast.

However, that line once again popped into my head when my newest Tino Martinez card arrived, a 1998 Pacific Platinum Blue.

Nice card. The window behind Tino is translucent, and the blue is fairly striking in person. It's not a bright blue, but more of a Carolina-blue with some metallic flair to boot.

Pacific churned out some great cards, and Invincible was always one of those sub-brands that looked great each year. I look back with nothing but fondness on Pacific, and wish they were still making cards today.

Until then, even 20 years later, I'm still picking up cards from them that I didn't have, so I guess it's not all that bad.

Jeter and Mick...no, not that Mick

Similar to my blogging, my card-related pickups having really been coming to a halt. In both August and September, I sold more on eBay than I spent. Let's hear it for positive cash flow!

October is likely trending in this direction as well. Candidly, there's just nothing I want right now. No product excites me, no player excites me, no potential pick up excites me. Maybe that'll change, and I hope it does.

That doesn't mean I don't have envelopes coming in every now and then. Once in a while, when it feels like the right thing to do, I'll still pick up a Topps NOW card. I never buy directly from Topps. While that takes me out of the running for parallels and such, it keeps me in the $5 per card range. Sometimes, that can even be steep, but I don't buy these like I once did back in 2017 when Aaron Judge had one come out every day.

The first I picked up was an easy choice: Derek Jeter holding his plaque from Cooperstown. I'm not sure how many more cards will feature Jeter in this fashion. There will be probably a 30-card Target set in next year's Series One or something. But still, it was a no-brainer for me to pick up a card featuring Jeter holding his likeness that will hang in Cooperstown forever.

The next is a bit more of an off-the-path card for me, but I snagged a Mick Schumacher Topps NOW rookie card commemorating his appearance in the Belgian Grand Prix. I've actually bought a few F1 Topps Now card, including the first Lewis Hamilton last year...a card that cost me $5 at the time and now fetches toward $1K. It seemed logical to buy at the time since he's one of the most popular athletes in the world.

Similarly, Mick's father, Michael Schumacher, was one of the greatest F1 drivers of all time. He was just the subject of a Netflix documentary about his life on the track, which was an enjoyable way to spend 90 minutes. I recommend it if you haven't seen it. It was definitely a puff piece, but reminded me of how great he truly was. Mick is young and has shown a good ability, so I figured it was wise to snag a RC.

I know F1 cards have gotten very popular, although I don't plan on collecting or buying them frequently. Although I am a racing fan, I don't love F1. It's basically a glorified time trial and the cars are a bit too tech-advanced for me. It doesn't really feel like racing as much as it does space travel. I have a family member who races F4, and that's more my speed. Still, there is no denying how popular it is, and the drivers are some of the biggest international stars in the world. 

Two vastly different subjects, but from the same card concept. And to me, a decent way to spend $10.

A pink card for October

As per October tradition, Collecting Cutch is once again showing off pink cards to raise awareness for breast cancer.

While he also shows some very attractive subject matter, I'm going to stick to cards here. My newest Tino Martinez card, as luck would have it, is nothing but pink:

This is from 2020 Topps Chrome Update. Obviously this was a disaster of a set, but with the inclusion of Tino Martinez, gave me many parallels and refractors to chase down. This is the pink refractor, not to be confused with the pink wave refractor.

While my card-buying, collecting habits, and desire to run a blog all but vanish, once in a while I still surf eBay and this card was a minimal price, so I snagged it. I have a stack of about 20 Tinos I have yet to add my to my 'have' list, both on my blog and on TCDB. This is one of them, but I'll be sure to update that in the near future.

My October posting will likely continue to be sporadic, but I strongly encourage you to go check out Collecting Cutch's blog for his excellent cause all month long.