Box break - 1991 Donruss Series 1 and 2 Baseball

THE PRODUCT: 5 boxes of 1991 Donruss Series 1 and 2 Baseball

While I broke five boxes for this post, I only show two here.  One (yellow) is Series 1, and the other (green) is Series 2.

1991 Donruss Series 1 and 2 baseball boxes

Each box contains 36 packs.  Each pack contains 15 cards and a 3-piece puzzle card.

1991 Donruss Series 1 and 2 baseball packs

THE BIG HITS: serial-numbered Elite inserts

In 1991 Donruss inserted one of the landmark sets of sport cards, the Elite cards.  With a total of 10 cards, eight were numbered to 10,000.  One, a "legends" card, was numbered to 7,500.  The last was autographed and limited to 5,000.  While these kinds of print runs seem preposterous today, it was considered small in 1991.  Because these cards were printed in ridiculous amounts, the Elite cards are still a tough pull.

THE CONTENTS

Even with five boxes, I didn't sniff a single Elite card.  The base cards are typical early 90s junk.  The Series 1 cards have blue borders, and Series 2 cards have green borders.

89 - Nolan Ryan

648 - Rickey Henderson

There are some subsets mixed in with the base cards.  The most famous subset is the Donruss Diamond Kings.  I can't stand these things.  Every player seems to have a mustache.  Aside from the Elite insert set, the Bonus Cards are the only other subset.  These cards are season highlights.  Series 1 has 10 Bonus Cards, and Series 2 has 12.

16 - Diamond Kings Edgar Martinez
Bonus Cards - 1 - Langston and Witt

CONCLUSION

Boxes of 1991 Donruss can be found in the $5 range on eBay.  You get what you pay for.

Box break - 1997 Upper Deck Football

THE PRODUCT: 1 box of 1997 Upper Deck Football

This box might look hefty, but it's just a 20-pack retail box.  Much of the volume is from a styrofoam insert in the bottom of the box.

1997 Upper Deck football box

Here is a retail pack, which is conveniently labeled "retail" in the lower left corner.  There are 12 cards per pack.

1997 Upper Deck football pack

THE BIG HITS: Game Jersey relic inserts

Upper Deck jumped on relic cards quickly and had relics in all its products by 1997.  The football relics were just a small set of 10 cards.  They were tough to pull with an insertion rate of 1:2,500 packs.  This box has less than a 1% chance of having a relic card.

THE CONTENTS

This box held no pleasant surprises - just lots of base cards and dime-a-dozen inserts.  The base cards mostly fall under three subsets - the standard base cards, game dated cards recalling a special player performance, and star rookies.

139 - Deion Sanders

191 - Barry Sanders

35 - Jerry Rice

I only pulled two different types of inserts from this box.  One is the Teammates insert.  These are die-cut cards that are made to join together into one wider card when you get two matching cards.  The box contained four of these cards.  I also pulled a Star Crossed insert.

Teammates - TM51 - Steve Young
Star Crossed - SC19 - Drew Bledsoe

CONCLUSION

This wasn't the most exciting box.  The relics in this set are such a long-shot that it's hard to have much hope that you'll get lucky.

Box break - 1997 Stadium Club 2 Football

THE PRODUCT: 1 box of 1997 Stadium Club Series 2 Football

Here is a nice series 2 box for 1997 Stadium Club.

1997 Stadium Club Series 2 football box

Each box contains 12 packs, and each pack has 15 cards.  Some people call these jumbo packs, but Topps calls them the Home Team Advantage (HTA) packs.  Most Stadium Club products can also be found in a retail and hobby format.  HTA is like hobby deluxe.

1997 Stadium Club Series 2 football HTA or jumbo pack

THE BIG HITS: printing plates

Only in HTA packs can printing plates be found in Stadium Club products.  The insertion rate on these plates is astonishingly high at 1:69 packs.  That's one per six boxes.  I wish that all the special cards that I chase on this blog were as easily found.

THE CONTENTS

No plates here, but the base cards are pretty nice.  The Stadium Club cards from the late 90s all seem very thick and super glossy.  What I don't like is that the base cards are embossed around the player name.  The embossing makes the card surface a bit rougher, and the super glossy cards feel like their scratching each other.  Sorting through the stack, I feel I'm scratching the hell out of the cards.

46 - Marshall Faulk

70 - John Elway

220 - Transactions Rod Woodson

While I didn't get any plates, I did pull three different types of insert cards.  I pulled three of the Never Compromise cards, two Bowman's Best Preview cards, and one One of a Kind card.  The One of a Kind set is a full parallel of the base set.

Never Compromise - 37 - Darnell Autry
Bowman's Best Previews - BBP4 - Tony Gonzalez
One of a Kind - 262 - Jeff Herrod

CONCLUSION

I have to admit that I'm disappointed in not pulling a printing plate.  The odds are only 1:6, but that is so good compared to the others boxes I rip on this blog.

Box break - 1990 Upper Deck High Series Baseball

THE PRODUCT: 2 boxes of 1990 Upper Deck High Series Baseball

Here they are... two boxes of 1990 Upper Deck High Series Baseball.  The easiest way to tell these high series boxes is the nice red "Find the Reggie" marking on the front.

1990 Upper Deck High Series baseball boxes

Each box contains 36 packs.  Each pack contains 15 cards.  Of the 15 cards, two are from the high series (701-800) and the rest are from the low series (1-700).  Odd but true.

1990 Upper Deck High Series baseball pack

THE BIG HITS: serial-numbered Reggie Jackson autographs

In the high series of its 1990 baseball product, Upper Deck inserted the first serial-numbered autographed cards in packs.  Reggie Jackson was the featured player.  He signed 2,500 samples of the last card in a special insert set dedicated to him.  I have no idea what the odds of pulling one of these autographs are.

THE CONTENTS

No surprise, but I struck out on these boxes.  No autographs, and, surprisingly, not even very many high series cards.  At two per pack, that's 144 between the two boxes.  I didn't even get a full set of the high series.  Bummer.

Here are a couple high series cards.

745 - Dave Winfield

774 - Gary Carter

The Reggie Jackson insert set consists of nine cards.  This is #9, and Reggie signed 2,500 of these.

Reggie Jackson Baseball Heroes - 9 - Reggie

CONCLUSION

I hate white borders.  They're a pain to crop and insert into a post.

Box break - 1990-91 Pro Set 1 Hockey

THE PRODUCT: 3 boxes of 1990-91 Pro Set Series 1 Hockey

Here are three boxes from the heart of the junk wax era.

1990-91 Pro Set Series 1 hockey boxes

Each box contains 36 packs.  Each pack contains 15 cards plus 1 NHL product discount card.

1990-91 Pro Set Series 1 hockey pack

THE BIG HITS: serial-numbered holographic Stanley Cup cards

Every sport has its holy grail card.  For hockey, the holographic Stanley Cup cards are right up there.  They are numbered to 10,000, and (I think) they are only found in Series 1 packs.  Due to overproduction, lots of these cards are almost certainly tucked away in unopened packs, boxes, and cases.

THE CONTENTS

I found plenty of cards but no holographic trophy cards.  Several packs were short a card, and one of the boxes contained an extra pack.  Otherwise, it was just lots and lots of base cards.  I'll show just a few cards.

Here is "The Great One."

118 - Wayne Gretzky

Patrick Roy.  I don't know why, but I couldn't stand him.  He was a really good goalie though.

157 - Patrick Roy

Finally, here is Brett Hull - the "Golden Brett."

263 - Brett Hull

In addition to the Stanley Cup card, these boxes can contain some very rare error cards.  I didn't do an exhaustive search, but I don't think I had any big rarities.  A great site for checking on the scarce varieties is over at Junk Wax Gems.

CONCLUSION

The best thing I'll say about this product is that these packs are very easy to rip.  Something about the plastic wrapper makes it easy to rip right along the back seam of the pack.  Otherwise, these cards are pretty boring.

Box break - 1997 Upper Deck Victory Circle Racing

THE PRODUCT: 1 boxes of 1997 Upper Deck Victory Circle Racing

This is a retail box, but I'm not completely sure what the differences are between the retail and hobby boxes are.  I think the insertion ratios are the same.

1997 Upper Deck Victory Circle Racing retail box

Each box contains 28 packs.  Each pack contains 10 cards.

1997 Upper Deck Victory Circle racing retail pack

THE BIG HITS: A Piece of the Action relic inserts

Inserted into these packs at a rate of 1:699 are early relic cards.  The "A Piece of the Action" set consists of nine cards.  Each card includes a race-used swatch of a racing suit, racing glove, or shoes from a NASCAR driver.

THE CONTENTS

At a rate of 1:699 packs, I had a 4% chance of finding a relic insert in this box.  I didn't find one.  What I did get was a near complete set of cards.  The full set is 120 base cards.  I got 118 different base cards with lots of duplicates.

The base cards consist of essentially three subsets.  The main set is the first 50 cards.  These are standard shots of drivers.

6 - Mark Martin

The next 50 cards are of the driver's cars.

56 - Mark Martin's Car

The last 20 cards are mostly Local Legend tribute cards listing the hometowns of different drivers.

109 - Mark Martin

The other cards in the packs were all inserts.  These are pretty standard fare, although all have horizontal formats.  The Predictor card has a die cut.

Championship Reflections '96 - 4 - Dale Earnhardt
Generation Excitement - 3 - Johnny Benson
Predictor - 1 - Jeff Gordon

 
CONCLUSION

I have never opened a box of racing cards.  These were alright, but they would have been better with a relic card.

Box break - 1998 Pinnacle Baseball

THE PRODUCT: 1 box of 1998 Pinnacle Baseball

This isn't just any 1998 Pinnacle box.  It's a Power Pack box.  This is basically Pinnacle's version of a jumbo pack.

1998 Pinnacle baseball Power Pack box

Each box contains 12 packs with 21 cards each.  The jumbo packs also contain an oversized card from the base set.  The oversized cards are 3.5"x5".

1998 Pinnacle baseball Power Pack

THE BIG HITS: printing plates

Pinnacle was the first company to put out printing plates.  The plates were first included in 1997 products, and continued into 1998.  (Pinnacle folded in late 1998.)  Pinnacle's plates were inserted at a rate of 1:1,250 packs.  Pinnacle's plates are interesting because samples were issued for both the front and back of the cards.  Also, plates were issued for all the insert sets.  In all, including fronts, backs, base cards, and inserts, Pinnacle produced 2,272 plates for their 1998 baseball set.

THE CONTENTS

No plates.  This box had lots of base cards - 170 of 200 for 85% of the set.  In 1998 Pinnacle issued it's base cards with three back styles that differ in what stats are shown.  One version has a player's full season stats, another has home stats, and the last has away stats.  This box was about a 50:50 mix of home and away.  I didn't get a single full season stats back in the box.

This is a nice, clean set with full bleed photographs.  I like it.

23 - Barry Bonds

64 - Derek Jeter

173 - Todd Helton

182 - Alex Rodriguez Field of Vision
193 - Ken Griffey Jr. Goin' Jake

Aside from the plates, there are no full parallel sets.  The two partial parallels are Museum Collection and Artist's Proofs.  These are very sparkly.

Museum Collection - 98 - Ray Lankford Goin' Jake
Artist's Proofs - 46 - Tim Salmon

The set includes a few insert sets as well.  The insertion rates on the partial parallels and inserts into Power Packs are higher than the standard 10-card hobby and retail packs.

Spellbound - 9 - Roger Clemens O
Hit It Here - 1 - Larry Walker
EPIX Orange Play - 23 - Paul Molitor

CONCLUSION

This was a great set.  It's too bad that Pinnacle couldn't stay afloat.  I will definitely break more of this product and enjoy hunting for some plate cards.

Box break - 1991 Score 2 Baseball

THE PRODUCT: 3 boxes of 1991 Score Series 2 Baseball

These three boxes show different players on the front - John Olerud, Kevin Mitchell, and Barry Larkin.  I don't know how many other box varieties exist.

1991 Score Series 2 baseball boxes

Each box contains 36 packs.  Each pack contains 16 cards plus 1 Magic Motion trivia card.

1991 Score Series 2 baseball pack

THE BIG HITS: serial-numbered Mickey Mantle autographs

In Series 2 boxes in 1991 Score inserted a special Mickey Mantle tribute set of seven cards.  A grand total of 38,500 cards were produced.  Mantle autographed 2,500 samples of the seven cards.  According to the pack wrappers, the odds of pulling a Mantle insert are "no less than 1 in 2,000."  The odds for pulling an autographed cards are "no less than 1 in 30,000."  Even with three boxes of 1991 Score 2, the odds are way against me for pulling something decent.

THE CONTENTS

As expected, this boxes had lots of base cards but no inserts, let alone autographed inserts.  The first box afforded 365 different cards of the 452 needed for Series 2.  That's 81% of the complete set.  I also picked up 31 different trivia cards toward the full set of 56 (55%). Once all the dust had settled I was short 5 base cards (447 of out 452) and lacking 4 of the trivia cards (52 out of 56).  (Note that Beckett says that there are 72 trivia cards, but that's just for Series 1.  The Series 2 trivia cards are complete at 56.)

Despite the fact these boxes only contain base cards, this is one wild and crazy set.  All the base cards have one of four different background colors - blue, teal, white, and black.  The blue and teal cards are all just vanilla player cards.  A couple are shown below.

550 - Orel Hershiser

554 - Fred Lynn

The white cards are exclusively a complete mess of subsets.

669 - Eric Davis
671 - Chipper Jones
685 - Doc Gooden

690 - Jose Canseco
702 - Dave Stewart
768 - Gary Disarcina

The black cards are largely simple player cards, but they also include a number of special tribute-type cards.

773 - Bo Jackson
788 - Curt Schilling
795 - Reds' October

815 - Ryne Sandberg
841 - The Griffeys
858 - Ken Griffey Jr.

The series ends with a handful of Dream Team cards.  These have a black-and-white or sepia appearance.  Most are nice shots, but the Rickey Henderson card is a bit creepy.  Are these baseball cards or a product of Playgirl?

890 - Rickey Henderson

CONCLUSION

I can't be surprised at striking out on this break, but there are plenty more 1991 Score 2 boxes on eBay.