Thrill of the Chase

A few weeks ago I popped into Target for a grocery run. It was my first time visiting my local Target since early-March and my first time spending substantial time away from the four-block radius around my apartment.

The Target was in a much better shape than it had been since my previous visit. Shleves were stocked, freezers were filled with food, and the checkout lines were organized and well-managed. This was not that case back in March during the nation's great chase for toilet paper, as the Target was flooded with hysterical people and not much else.

While my trip to Target was largely centered around restocking my fridge, I had ulterior motives. I very badly hoped to find some cards in the card aisle. Luckily for me, I managed to snag the last box of cards available...though it's not something I'd typically purchase. 

And here are the contents. pic.twitter.com/WYhjxtY8WT

— Alex Markle (@markle05) June 5, 2020

You might immediately notice that a couple of things from this repack have made their way into my prize pool for the contest I'm currently running, namely the 1988 Donruss hanger pack and the contents of the two Leaf Babe Ruth packs. 

It'd been along time since I last picked up a repack box, and I was hoping I might find some packs from earlier in the decade in there. No luck. I opened way more 2019 S1 than I needed to last year, so finding two packs in the box was a bit of a bummer. The 2019 S2 pack was welcome, as I'm still trying to track down all the Dodgers from that release (anybody have an extra Cody Bellinger 507 or Hyun-Jin Ryu 515?). That said, I didn't pull any Dodgers from the pack, so there was no help there. 

I've never been a big fan of Gypsy Queen, so I typically shy away from it on the shelves. It just feels like such an unnecessary set, and I've never fully understood its appeal. I did manage to pull a new Corey Seager card to add to the binder, so it wasn't all bad. 

My favorite card from the box came from the pack of 2019 Heritage. It's not autographed. It's not an SP. It's not a variation. It's a simple base card of Dodgers' reliver Kenley Jansen. I suppose the card itself isn't anything special, but it did finally prompt me to undertake another collecting goal I've been pondering for at least a year: collect all of the Dodgers team sets from Topps Heritage. 

I've historically been a player collector, but I've shifted away from that a bit over the last several years. I started my quest to collect all of the Dodgers from Topps Flagship a few years back (now the focal point of my collection), though I've never really chased any other sets (with a few exceptions). So now I'm adding another set to chase down, though I imagine it will be much easier and far cheaper to do so. 

I have added my needs (and there are a lot of them) to my Want List page. You can also access my spreadsheet directly here. I'm not sure how much effort I'll spend to chase these down, but my goal is to have at least 10% by the end of the year which is about 45 cards. 

Breaking Down the Box Break

I meant to get to this post out on Thursday, and then again yesterday, but here we are. I have everyone's cards packed up, they just need to be loaded into mailers and sent out. That will happen sometime early next week. Please send me your address if it has changed or if you don't think I have it.

The break was a success in the sense that I pulled quite a few good cards for myself. Of course, I had the Dodgers, but I also picked up the Nationals and received the Padres as my random team. My other random team went to Gavin of Baseball Card Breakdown, who chose the Angels. Unfortunately for him, there was no Trout auto. Next time.

Anyway, let's take a look at some some of the Dodgers I pulled.

I'll start with my favorite card I ended up with. I believe this was pulled from the second box we opened, but I am not positive. We pulled another Topps Shelf insert in the first box and I mentioned that I really wanted to pull a Kershaw one. A short time later my wish was granted and here it is. I really enjoy this card for a multitude of reasons: mainly the slick design and great choice of colors. I am really considering saving up for one of the auto versions of this card, but a few things have to go my way for that to happen. We'll see.

My good fortune continued on as we pulled a couple of sweet diecuts from the boxes. I am not a huge fan of these cards, but I can't deny shiny new Kershaw and Puig cards for my collection.

As if I didn't pull my fair share of cards already, this beauty dropped into my hands. I am a big fan of the 1989 Topps design, and it looks soooo much better on these chrome cards. Seriously, I love chrome. 

This man has 40 saves, and now I have his refractor card.

This man has a long name, and now I have his refractor card. 

Here are some of the better base cards from the Dodgers. I did get the entire base set, and a couple of dupes are headed out to fellow Dodger bloggers sometime next week.

I also pulled a Yasiel Puig Blue Refractor #'d/199, and an Onelki Garcia base auto. However, I pulled off a quick trade with Dodger Penguin and now they are his. In return I picked up his Braves cards from the break.

In addition to the Dodgers cards, I pulled some sweet Nationals cards. Specifically great Bryce Harper cards.

I really, really like these 89 inserts from Chrome. I considered myself lucky when I pulled the Kershaw insert, but I guess luck was on my side that day. 

Especially since I pulled another Harper insert, this time of the diecut variety. I like the shot they used for this card. Though I don't think there is a bad Bryce Harper card. Please let me know if you can find one. 

I finally pulled this shiny Bryce Harper refractor to go along with his base card. My Harper binder got some serious play the other night. 

My luck didn't stop with the cards above. I also received a few x-fractors of National players, as well as a Stephen Strasburg diecut. I don't know any Nationals collectors, so those may head to eBay unless someone wants to trade. 

Thanks again to those who participated for the opportunity to do the break. Although there were a few problems on my end, and apparently commercials in the middle, it was pretty successful. Some people were lucky enough to get some autos, inserts, and #'d cards, whereas a few of you seemed to get the short end of the stick. I tried to toss in a few cards to make up for the lack of cards for a few of you, but I didn't have cards that fit everyone's collections. Hopefully you all enjoyed it, and we can bust some more Chrome next year.