A Final Visit to my LCS

Several weeks ago, I dropped by the LCS near my work. Detailed here by Zippy Zappy at Torren' Up Cards, Chameleon Cards & Comics was a 10-minute walk from my office and around the corner from Topps' headquarters. Unfortunately, the landlord decided to hike up the rent, and they had no option but to close--their last day was March 30th. 

Of course, this was beyond disappointing, especially since I had only recently discovered this LCS and it was by far the best NYC has to offer. Their unfortunate demise, however, resulted in a ton of cheap cards, something my frugality certainly appreciated. 

There wasn't a whole lot left by the time I made it into the store, but they still had several boxes of Series 1 hanging around. I had most of the Dodgers out of the set by this point, but it's not often I get to rip hobby packs for a buck each. (I'm still chasing a pair of Dodgers to finish up the Series One set.)

I bought close to twenty packs of Flagship, though I didn't pull anything staggering. This Robin Yount '84 is one of those 150th Anniversary parallels, meaning it's numbered to 150 (I think). Not bad. 

I failed to pull any short prints or #'d parallels other than that Yount, but I did get a Yoan Moncada relic. Not very exciting. Maybe he'll finally break out this year and I can flip it to help pay off student loans. A man can dream, right?

While ripping those packs, I noticed a pack of the Topps Silver promo set hanging out behind the register. I asked the clerk about it, and he said it was mine for five bucks. Sign me up!

The silver packs feature shiny chromium "mojo" cards, and the 50-card set list features current and past stars. Each pack includes four cards, and there is a decent shot at pulling some autos and numbered cards. Of course, as a big fan of the '84 design and a bigger fan of chromium/shiny/refractory cards, I was thrilled to rip the pack. 

This pack netted me the Mike Trout at the top of this post, as well as the sweet green parallel of Kyle Schwarber you see above. It's #'d /99 and will surely make a Cubs fan happy. 

The shop happened to have three more packs, so I bought those, too. 

A great mix of all-time greats (Henderson, Ripken, Mattingly), productive veterans (Posey, Altuve, Yelich) and young studs (Soto, Baez). 

These are some of the coolest cards I've ever seen, and the chromium finish really makes the colors pop. I'm hoping to get these on a scanner soon because my phone's camera is certainly not doing these cards justice. 

Despite the brilliance of the card fronts, the backs are slightly disappointing. Every card comes with the same boilerplate description of the 1984 set (which, fine I guess) but I was hoping Topps would do more to individualize these cards.  

While I walked away from the shop with a ton of great new shiny cardboard, this Ohtani takes the cake. I've been following Ohtani's career for nearly six years now, hoping for the longest time that the two-way phenom would sign with the Dodgers last year. And though he signed with the wrong Southern California team, it's hard not to root for the guy. I've been considering starting an Ohtani PC, though his cards are quite pricy, so I've been hesitant to jump in. 

I was considering collecting the entire set but decided against it. I plan on holding on to the Ohtani, but the rest of these are fair game for anyone that wants to trade out there. 

I only dropped by Chameleon Cards & Comics a handful of times, but I'm sad to see them go. For the city that claims to have it all, it's quite the wasteland for solid card shops. I'm glad I was able to stop in one last time.