The Chrome break where I hit a high value auto had the other half of the case up for auction. I bought the team that had the auto in the second half as well. Nothing special, though I did get one colored refractor. The other team I had in the first half hit an auto this time.
The auto is in hand. It's a Mike Gillislee red auto 5/5. It's for sale.
I bought 2 teams in another 6-box 2013 Topps Chrome FB ebay break. Got a colored and a regular refractor from each.
I bought 9 cheap players in a 5-case 2013 Bowman Draft ebay player auction. Got a gold refractor /50 and a red wave /25, plus silver ices and blue (/500) and orange (/250) parallels.
My 11 players from the 10-case Bowman Draft break arrived. Only 1 blue wave, but 6 blue /500 and 2 orange /250, as well as 9 silver ices.
Bought 1 strong team each in 2 different 1-box 2013-14 Dominion hockey ebay breaks. It's highly risky (6 cards total per box), but if the price is low enough, it's worth the risk. I hit on one of the 2 - a jersey card that cost me $3.58. The other came up empty, but all I lost was a little over $2. That was my first Dominion break going hitless.
I also bought 2 decent teams and the USA relic/auto spot in a 5-box ebay break of 2013 Elite Extra Edition baseball. One of the teams yielded an auto, some decent inserts, and a lot of base. The other team just had 1 notable insert and base. The USA slot had 4 regular jerseys, a numbered patch, and an auto. Long-term, if the guys on the patch or auto hit it big, they're great cards. The team with no auto was my first Elite EE team without an auto. Not an awful break, but the disappointing part was watching a team where I got sniped end up with 4 autos, including a die-cut /50 and 2 Elite Series autos of top prospects.
Went to the well again on the team that I had a 2013-14 Dominion hockey hit from yesterday - I bought it in another ebay box break from the same seller (same case). Nothing this time. I'm out $3.50. It was still a logical move based on the team strength.
I also bought a strong team in a full case ebay break of 2013-14 Dominion for a decent price. Very happy with the results - 2 base cards, a nice relic, and a plate (of a star player). Any 1/1 makes for a decent break.
I also bought 6 decent to strong teams in a 5-box ebay break of 2013 Limited football, at good prices overall. 2 teams got nothing, 1 got a rookie ( I think /299), 1 got a legend (I think /349), 1 got a base /399 and a Spotlight parallel /49, and the 6th got a legend and a rookie auto (not a high-value one). It was a lousy break generally - there were only 2 very good hits overall - a HOFer on-card auto /10 and a double rookie auto (not #'d, but star rookies). There were a lot of base and jerseys from weak teams.
<< <i>Went to the well again on the team that I had a 2013-14 Dominion hockey hit from yesterday - I bought it in another ebay box break from the same seller (same case). Nothing this time. I'm out $3.50. It was still a logical move based on the team strength.
I also bought a strong team in a full case ebay break of 2013-14 Dominion for a decent price. Very happy with the results - 2 base cards, a nice relic, and a plate (of a star player). Any 1/1 makes for a decent break.
I also bought 6 decent to strong teams in a 5-box ebay break of 2013 Limited football, at good prices overall. 2 teams got nothing, 1 got a rookie ( I think /299), 1 got a legend (I think /349), 1 got a base /399 and a Spotlight parallel /49, and the 6th got a legend and a rookie auto (not a high-value one). It was a lousy break generally - there were only 2 very good hits overall - a HOFer on-card auto /10 and a double rookie auto (not #'d, but star rookies). There were a lot of base and jerseys from weak teams.
Nick >>
Are you finding these casebreakers on ebay alone? I've debated jumping in some of these here and there just to give it a try.
<< <i>Went to the well again on the team that I had a 2013-14 Dominion hockey hit from yesterday - I bought it in another ebay box break from the same seller (same case). Nothing this time. I'm out $3.50. It was still a logical move based on the team strength.
I also bought a strong team in a full case ebay break of 2013-14 Dominion for a decent price. Very happy with the results - 2 base cards, a nice relic, and a plate (of a star player). Any 1/1 makes for a decent break.
I also bought 6 decent to strong teams in a 5-box ebay break of 2013 Limited football, at good prices overall. 2 teams got nothing, 1 got a rookie ( I think /299), 1 got a legend (I think /349), 1 got a base /399 and a Spotlight parallel /49, and the 6th got a legend and a rookie auto (not a high-value one). It was a lousy break generally - there were only 2 very good hits overall - a HOFer on-card auto /10 and a double rookie auto (not #'d, but star rookies). There were a lot of base and jerseys from weak teams.
Nick >>
Are you finding these casebreakers on ebay alone? I've debated jumping in some of these here and there just to give it a try. >>
The vast majority of my group breaks are from ebay. Blowoutcards forums are second. If I find a deal I like from a seller who has their own site, they probably underpriced that team compared to what others are asking and getting.
I bought 9 cheap players in a 5-case ebay player auction break of 2013 Bowman Draft baseball. 3 colored refractors (1 gold /50, 1 green /75, and 1 blue /99), plus an unknown number of ice and waves to go with the refractors and base cards.
I'm also buying spots in a 15-case player draft break of Bowman Draft - 9 spots so far (all low ones); none have come up to pick yet.
Meanwhile, I bought an OK team in a 1-box break of 2013-14 Panini Totally Certified hockey where base doesn't ship. It has a high gambling aspect (figure 8-10 rookies/parallels/hits from the box, so most teams get nothing, but at $0.99 for the team I bought (Hurricanes), it's not a bad bet. I didn't hit anything.
I also bought 3 OK to good teams in a full case (15-box) ebay break of 2013 Panini Limited football. One was quite disappointing (a rookie relic), another had a really nice card that isn't worth too much (low #'d jumbo veteran relic), and the third did fine for quantity but not so great for quality (low #'d rookie auto, rookie auto jumbo relic, veteran relic, and 1 base - but the autos aren't of great players). I paid about 10% more than the cost of a box (when you buy at the current price, not MSRP), so I did OK - If you had a box with my 2 autos and 2 veteran relics, that would be considered a strong box. I got sniped by less than a full bid increment on a team that cleaned up (low #'d HOF auto, several other autos or relics), which is always annoying.
Limited can be a rough break even if you do well. It's one of the Panini products that don't seem to do well on the secondary market. But some of those cards look really, really nice.
I bought a tenth spot in the Bowman Draft break. The last picks will happen today, but so far I have Alex Murphy, Jake Sweaney, Mark Montgomery, Alec Grosser (technically, I picked Kendall Coleman but am trading that pick for Grosser, as there was a miss from the preranked list I sent in), Roel Ramirez, and Conner Greene.
I bought 2 decent teams in another 15-box ebay break of 2013 Limited football. One team got a base card /399, a rookie jumbo relic, a veteran relic, and a rookie auto relic. The other got 2 legends (shortprinted base /349) , 2 rookie Spotlight parallels (same player), and 3 rookie autos, one of which is low numbered (2, including the low numbered one, are of the same player the parallels are of). For under $47, that's a decent haul - though the main rookie is a highly speculative guy. The breaker gave away by random drawing a box of 2012 Prime Signatures FB to a participant. It went to someone who had a normally very strong team that did poorly overall. Hits were fairly well spread around, although the same team got a HOFer jumbo relic and a HOFer cut signature.
I also bought a spot in a hit draft break of the new Panini Prizm World Cup set. My draft spot will be randomly assigned. I normally don't like this kind of break, but for this set, I decided to do one. It doesn't lend itself well to breaking in any other fashion (it's players from teams around the world, and Panini hasn't released too many checklist details so far), and if I'm right, will be a very hot set due to international interest.
I made my other 4 picks in the Bowman Draft break - Drake Britton, Matt Derosier, Jared Wilson, and Cody Harris. Nothing big through 3 of the 15 cases, but I have gotten a few ice and colored base so far.
I bought into 2 different 5-box ebay breaks of 2013 Limited football. In the first one, I had 3 good to strong teams. One had a rookie jumbo relic, a nice veteran jumbo relic, and a base card. The other 2 got nothing. It was a weak break overall. I'm obviously not happy about coming out with nothing from 2 of my 3 teams, but the third at least did all right (I'm really happy with the veteran relic). In the other break, I had 2 good teams. One got a rookie auto, a rookie parallel /49 (of the same player), and 2 legends /349. The other team got a nice rookie auto relic and a base card /399. This was an even weaker break overall, and one team (one of the strongest) had 5 of the 15 hits - 1 per box. I'm actually happy with my results from this one. For under $20, I got good cards.
Bought the Ducks very cheaply in a 2-box 2013-14 Dominion ebay break - $5.95 is below what teams with half as many possible hits were going for. Got nothing, but it was still a sensible bet.
Bought the Jaguars in a 5-box 2013 Limited football ebay break for $6.99. It wasn't a great buy, but an OK one by my value estimates. Got nothing - and the break overall was really weak. I probably should leave Limited alone at this point unless I get amazing deals.
Bought a very strong team in a 1-set 2013 Bowman Chrome Mini baseball ebay break - you get the base cards plus any refractors for your team. Did great - got 5 total refractors, including a fairly tough one of a star - that card alone has sold a couple times on ebay for more than I paid for the team. Bought 2 strong teams in a 3-box 2013-14 SPx hockey ebay break. Did all right - each team had a rookie, and one team had a relic (I believe a veteran dual jersey), but I'm not impressed with this set.
Bought a very strong team for a great price in a 6-box 2013 Bowman Draft baseball ebay break. Didn't get anything major (one colored Bowman parallel, and at least 1 good rookie refractor), but just the base and Chrome have strong value from this team. The big hit of that break was a Bowman Scout auto /25. It was randomed off among everyone. I didn't win it.
Meanwhile, through 9 cases of the 15-case Bowman Draft player break, I have 6 color refractors - 1 black /35, 1 gold /50, and 4 green /75 (plus however many color Bowman, ice, and waves - I don't know these numbers). It's an amazing break overall - Marco Gonzales superfractor auto was pulled in the 10th case, another superfractor was pulled, a Bowman black (1/1), 4 regular printing plates, including Clint Frazier, and a Clarkin plate auto, plus 3 Frazier autos, 4 autos each of Dominic Smith and Austin Meadows, a Jonathan Gray red refractor /5, and a Kris Bryant AFLAC auto.
The Bowman Draft 20-case break completed. I got 10 colored refractors among my 10 players, plus an unknown number of refractors, waves, silver ice, and colored Bowman parallels to go will all my base cards. 3 guys had 2 colored refractors each, and 3 didn't get any.
I also bought 4 teams in a 1-set 2013 Bowman Chrome Mini baseball ebay break - 1 very strong, 1 strong, 1 OK, and 1 weak. Got great prices on the 2 stronger teams. The weak team just got me the base cards. The OK team got me a top prospect colored refractor, and the other 2 teams combined for 5 refractors and colored refractors, including a very good prospect colored refractor. I'm quite happy with the results - the refractors alone sell on ebay for more than I paid for the teams.
I bought 4 teams in a 12-box (case) 2013-14 Panini Playbook hockey ebay break. I bid a few dollars more on one of the teams than I had planned to, as when I was outbid and decided to bid again (1 more increment), I didn't realize that the bid had jumped several dollars due to a new bidder while I was clicking the bid again button. I also bought 3 other decent to strong teams at very good prices. 2 of my strong teams got shut out. The weaker team that I overpaid for got 2 serial numbered base cards /249. The 4th team got me 2 rookie auto relic booklets, a dual rookie relic booklet, and I won a random for a low numbered single-player dual team booklet with multiple nice patch relics (and it's a future HOF player). Even a full case is a risky bet for any team - there are 36 cards promised per case (although a few boxes will have 1 extra card). Overall, I did very well - I believe I came out ahead in ebay value from what I paid (no sales yet on the top card), but that took winning the random for the top card. Based on purchasing a box, I destroyed the odds - for less than the cost of a box, I got 2 base cards and 4 booklets, as compared to the expected 1 base card, 1 auto or jersey, and 1 booklet.
I think this set will flop, even though it has some amazing cards and most of the booklets look great. You don't get enough bang for your buck. Figure $5 for the base card, $10 for a jersey relic, and $20 for a good rookie auto relic booklet, and your basic box will return you 1/3 or less in ebay value. And in group breaks, 90% of the teams will come up empty in a 1-box break, so large breaks are almost a necessity, but those cost quite a bit of money and have a more limited audience.
I got the #11 spot in the 96-spot random for a case break on Blowoutcards of Panini Prizm World Cup Soccer, which should get me a very nice card or team base group.
I also bought a pre-random spot in a player/insert 10-case break on Blowoutcards of 2014 Bowman baseball - I was on the backup list, and ended up getting a spot after someone didn't pay for their spots and one of the people on the backup list ahead of me wasn't around to pick up the empty spots. This random was not good for me - I ended up with the #226 spot out of 250. I have bought another late spot (#230) postrandom, and may buy some more. The only saving grace is that only people already in the break have the ability to buy spots from others.
I also bought the same (strong) team in a 4-box ebay break and an 8-box ebay break of 2013-14 Dominion hockey. Got a rookie auto relic /299 (with a nice patch swatch) in the 4-box break, and a base card /249 and a sweet rookie auto relic redemption in the 8-box break. Decent results, as the redemption is of a player I'm very high on, and my guess is that it will be a great looking card.
I bought a good team in another 5-box ebay break of 2013 Limited football. I gota rookie #/299. This may be the break that cures me of buying Limited. Half of the big hits were low demand cards (mediocre veteran auto /10 and mediocre veteran patch auto /10), and the rookie jerseys and autos were full of Rookie Premiere guys who haven't done anything in the NFL. It wasn't an awful break for me (paid under value and didn't get shut out), but it has been a while since I've come away happy from Limited.
I got my Playbook cards in the mail. I did better than I had realized - I got a jersey card /249 from one of the 2 teams I thought went hitless for me. I also found out that the superstar patch booklet was numbered to the player's jersey # on his older team on the card. If I were to sell the card, it might add a premium to the price.
I bought 2 so-so teams in a 1-set 2013 Bowman Chrome Mini BB ebay break. No refractors, but I do get 16 base cards for my $ (under $10).
I bought 1 OK team in another 1-set 2013 Bowman Chrome Mini BB ebay break. Hit 2 refractors (I believe 1 color and 1 regular) to go with my 10 base cards. Nice result. From the same seller, I got 35 players in a 2013 Bowman Draft baseball 5-case player auction ebay break. Most are lower-end players, and all went cheaply. I don't know the full results yet, but I got 2 purple ice /10 and 5 colored refractors to go with my waves, ice, and colored paper (plus refractors and regular chrome). I should end up with around 40-45 special cards, plus 10-11 chrome and 2-3 refractors per player on average.
I bought 4 teams, ranging from so-so to pretty good, in another 1-set 2013 Bowman Chrome Mini BB ebay break. Each team hit at least 1 refractor, with one team hitting 3 and the weakest team getting 2. I got 2 golds /50 and at least 2 other color. I also get over 40 base cards. Another nice result.
In the Panini World Cup Prizm break where I got a good spot in the random, I traded it for 2 lower picks plus cash. That break won't be for a few more weeks, as the product release date has been pushed back.
I also bought 2 teams in a 1-case (12-box) ebay break of World Cup Prizm. No checklist is out, but 1 team is pretty weak and the other should be fairly strong (and is more popular in the U.S. market than in Europe, which makes any possible resale easier). I'm guessing that it will be strongly represented in the autograph checklist, and hope to hit one.
Joined my first-ever box break last week. It was a fixed-price, random spot in a 5-box break of 2012 football, including Panini Gridiron, Panini Prominence (x2), Panini Playbook, and Topps Valor. Unfortunately, the team assigned to me was the Lions. Got some Calvin Johnson base cards and schmoes. Best item I received was an insert numbered xxx/697 of a Barry Sanders card from the Panini Prominence box. It was fun to try and I may give it another go sometime.
I bought a decent team in a jumbo case (8 boxes) ebay break of 2014 Bowman baseball. The break hasn't happened yet, but I got a great price - the seller did another presale break the next day and that team went for 50% over what I paid.
I bought a so-so team in a 1-box ebay break of 2013-14 Totally Certified hockey where base doesn't ship. Got nothing (there were 10 "hits" - 2 parallels, 4 rookies, and 4 auto &/or GU cards), but all I spent was 99 cents, so it was an OK risk.
I bought 4 teams - 2 decent and 2 so-so - in another 1-set Bowman Chrome Mini BB ebay break. 1 team didn't get a refractor, but it was cheap and I still get 7 base cards. The other cheap team got 2 colored refractors - a gold /50 of a pretty good prospect and a green /75. One of the two fairly strong teams only got 1 refractor /125, but the other got 2 blues /99 and an orange /15.
I can't seem to leave 2013 Limited FB alone - I bought 3 good to very strong teams in another 5-box ebay break. 1 team got a rookie auto (I think /299), while a second got a rookie /299, a legend /349, a base card /399, and a rookie jumbo relic that I think is /99, and the third got a rookie /299, a legend /349, and a rookie auto relic (redemption, so I'm not sure of the #). No huge hits in the break, but for under half the price of a box, I got more than the average box.
I bought 5 teams fairly cheaply in a 4-box ebay break of 2013-14 Panini basketball. Have a whole bunch of base coming, plus some inserts and at least one parallel, plus the best card of the break IMO - a HOFer auto!
I got outbid on everything I went after in the 100-case Bowman auction. Looking back at it, I should have bid on some of the rookie slots that went cheaply - a number of them are very good prospects.
I made my draft picks in the 10-case player draft. With the pick I got via the random, I took Kenny Giles. With the pick I bought later, I took Brandon Cumpton. Considering we're talking about picks 226 and 230 out of 250, I think I got steals. Cumpton just got called up to the Pirates as an emergency starter, and pitched all right (though he took the loss). It's his first card other than minor league team sets, so there is major appreciation potential.
I also bought 7 true player slots (all parallels and inserts included) in another 10-case (5 hobby and 5 jumbo) ebay break of 2014 Bowman BB. 4 are veterans that aren't anything special unless I get colored parallels or ice (though they were cheap, so it's a low-risk bet), but the other 3 are prospects that went at fairly low prices. All have serious downside risk, but I didn't spend much on any of them, and I should get 2-3 color, ice, waves, or colored paper per prospect.
The seller who had the Bowman Chrome Mini break where I just did well had another. I got outbid across the board, as the teams generally went for quite a bit more than they usually do. I watched the break. It was lousy. 1 red and 1 orange, no purples, plates, or superfractors, and the players with refractors missed all the big stars. Oscar Mercado might have been the top player with a refractor.
After reading your thread I decided to give one of these case breaks a shot. I found a seller on eBay who was breaking Panini Elite basketball 1/2 case at a time. The first half of the break I purchased the Clippers. I overspent a little to get that spot and did not get much to show for it other that a stack of base and insert cards (I think I got over excited and bid too strong at the end of the auction). The first half of the break didn't seem to yield great hits (there were the right number of hits, but not a lot of star power). I decided to keep my eye out for the second half and tried to put a better strategy together. I again got the Clippers (they have a lot of hits in this product) and I also picked up slots for the Warriors, Bulls and Hornets.
The second half of the case went as good as it could have for me as I hit 2 auto and a Patch hit. Again I missed on the Clippers other than base and inserts, but I got 3 hits out of 4 teams which I think is strong out of 6 boxes of product. Included in my hits were an Auto RC of Draymond Green, a Dennis Rodman Patch card and the best auto in the case break Anthony Davis. The Davis alone pays for all the slots.
All in all, I think I did well, partially because I picked some good teams based on number of potential of hits and got good value on my slots. Of course, I really just lucked out and got, arguably the best possible player to get an auto from in the box (which I am guessing you can't count on every time). Nick, Do you have much experience with basketball breaks? I notice you don't seem to do many basketball breaks. Do you not collect basketball as much as the other sports, or is there just not much value in basketball breaks?
I don't collect as much basketball as baseball or football, but I still collect it a fair amount. I just have not found much value in basketball breaks, as I feel much of this year's Panini product is way overpriced for what you get. I also don't search as frequently for basketball breaks, as often the ebay search reveals almost nothing but 1-box breaks (apparently a lot of other people aren't finding much value in breaking basketball either).
People love to put down the 2013 football rookie class, but the basketball rookie class was worse. There were a lot of lottery picks who were unimpressive, and a lot of autos of scrubs and D-League guys.
There were several sets where I did fine in a break but don't really care to break it again because the break overall looked very weak. Elite was one of those. Totally Certified was another, even though I got 2 retired player autos for the team I had.
I'm way behind in posting my results, but hope to get much of that done this weekend.
I did find out that ebay will be removing most group break listings as chance auctions, which is bad news for breakers and will certainly cut down on my breaking purchases. I think ebay is wrongto do it, as a pick-your-team break isn't a game of chance. There's no random event (except in the rare cases of multiplayer cards, and even then, you could avoid that with a break rule such as card goes to team of player on left or top). The cards are already packed. You're just buying and selling based on very incomplete information. A couple of guys I have bought spots from have sent emails that they will be closing up shop. With ebay gone for most types of breaks, prices for pick-your-team breaks will seldom offer good deals, and when they do, they will go very fast.
Thanks for sharing your thoughts on the breaks. I am very new to that type of collecting. I can see how it can very fun, especially if you're a team collector it definitely is a good way to get lots of cards of your favorite team. It does seem like basketball is a bad value proposition. I hit arguably the best RC auto in the set (it is either Anthony Davis or Kyrie Irving) as well as another auto and a patch and if I didn't hit the Anthony Davis auto it would probably have been a losing value bet for me. I really wish the NBA would license Topps again as I don't think having any one manufacturer controlling the sole license is good for collectors. Besides just being overpriced on product, I think there is a certain amount of collector fatigue when all the products come from one manufacturer. I will have to look into breaks for other sports. It is too bad as I am mainly a basketball collector as that is my favorite sport.
I agree with you about the 2013 RC classes. Basketball had one of their worst classes. Football at least had a few guys who may still turn out decent. This year's football should have a much higher ceiling than last year though. Lots more skill players in the first couple rounds. Last year half the first round picks were linemen, which may work well for building winning teams, but is unlikely to generate much cardboard excitement. The 2013 basketball products are definitely hampered by the dreadful rookie class. 2012-13 is the basketball product to get as it has the double RC class, headed by Anthony Davis and also Kyrie Irving and Damian Lillard (although I think Lillard didn't sign much for Panini as he was exclusive to Leaf for some time IIRC).
First, some ugly results. I bought the Red Sox in a 4 box ebay break of 2014 Topps Archives baseball. I made a mistake, and bid based on the value I assigned to the Reds, who are a great team in that set. I looked too quickly at my notes. The Red Sox don't have that many inserts or autos, though they have a lot of SPs, while the Reds are one of the strongest teams. I bombed. 1 insert (Ortiz All-Star Glossy), and 29 base cards. No SPs. About half the teams did very well in that break - multiple tough inserts, #d parallels, or autos, while the other half came up pretty dry. At almost $28, that hurt. Even at a more accurate reflection of how I value that team, it still would have hurt.
I bought 5 strong teams at very good prices in an 8-box break of 2013 Certified football (direct from the seller, who had a temporary discount going on his breaks) - the Dolphins, Chargers, Raiders, Eagles, and Chiefs. From that, I should have been looking at about 7-8 hits minimum, plus #'d rookies and Immortals, #d parallels, and hotbox (Platinum) parallels. I paid a bit under $60 for the 5 teams. Not even close. For the Raiders, I got a Mychal Rivera Mirror Red #/250. For the Eagles, I got 3 rookies #/999 - but all 3 were Jordan Poyer. For the Dolphins, I got a Dion Jordan #/999, as well as 3 Platinum Reds (including Marino). From the Chargers, I got a Mirror Blue rookie #/100 - but it was Brad Sorensen, as well as a Lance Alworth Immortals #/999 and 4 Platinum Reds (including Fouts and Alworth). The Chiefs were the only team that came out OK for me - Jonathan Baldwin and Eric Berry jerseys #/299, plus a Tyler Bray Platinum Red and Tyler Bray Mirror Red #/250. To make matters worse, Panini shorted a hit in 2 of the 8 boxes.
The same seller put up a 15-box (case) break of 2013 Limited football. I bought a so-so team at a very good price. There were a lot of other teams that were worth buying, but I spent too much lately on breaks, with too many weak results. I haven't gotten the cards yet, but I watched the break, and there were a lot of very nice hits. I believe I got a veteran jersey #/99 and a veteran (star) patch #/49. Certainly not bad for $9, but I passed up teams that I knew were good buys and did quite well.
I also bought a very strong team in a 2-box ebay break of 2013 Topps Platinum FB and an OK team in a 3-box ebay break of 2013 Totally Certified FB. I got good prices on both ($9.75 total). The Totally Certified team was the Ravens, and all I got was 1 base card. I was underbidder on 4 teams that had huge hits. Topps should be ashamed of themselves for the Platinum boxes - 1 of the boxes was missing 1 of its 3 hits, and 2 of the hits were garbage rookie autos that don't belong in any set beyond SAGE or Press Pass. I had the Cowboys, and got a Joseph Randle xfractor, 4 veteran base, and 2 veteran blue (thick) parallels.
I bought the Raiders at a good price in an 8-box break of 2013 Prizm football (direct from the seller). There were a lot of great hits in that case. I didn't have anything special, but I got 6 rookies (1 Hayden, 2 Wilson, and 3 Vernon), 3 Rookie Impact Wilson inserts, and 1 Decade Dominance Casper insert, plus a lot of base cards.
In my Prizm World Cup break where I bought 2 teams, the teams were Mexico and Australia. I paid about $42 for the pair (mostly for Mexico). It would have worked out quite well if I had hit an auto from Mexico. I didn't. I did get a lot of base cards (from 4 to 9 of each player), team card inserts for each team, 4 other Mexico inserts (Guillermo Ochoa Guardians, Javier Hernandez Netfinders, and 2 Hernandez World Cup Stars) plus 4 Prizm inserts - Red/White/Yellow Pulsar and Red/White/Blue Wave of Oribe Peralta, Red/White/Blue Xfractor Rafael Marquez World Cup Stars, and a Red Hernandez World Cup Stars #/149.
In the Prizm World Cup hit draft break, trading the spot turned out to be a very good move IMO. It was a snake draft, and each of my 2 slots yielded 2 picks. I ended up with team base lots for 4 countries - Russia, Switzerland, Algeria, and South Korea (from 3 to 9 of each player).
The first 2014 Bowman break where I had a team for a case has turned into a problem. The video cut off after 5 of the 8 boxes, my hits did not arrive (I know I had a blue refractor #/99), and while the seller responded to my question with an apology that they were still sitting there and would be sent that day, they still haven't arrived, and we're now several days with no response to my email asking for a tracking number. Somebody's probably going to be hit with a PayPal claim soon.
I bought the Rays in a 12 hobby box (case) 2014 Bowman ebay break cheaply - $13.49. The seller even threw in a Bowman regular pack - which yielded a State & Hometown parallel (Gus Schlosser). The Rays aren't a great team for prospecting in that set - only 2 prospects with Chrome cards, but they have a strong base contingent, and some auto possibilities. It worked out all right for me. No auto, but 5 Chromes of Ryne Stanek and 4 of Dylan Floro, 3 State & Hometown parallels (Myers, Price, and Stanek), a lot of Bowman base, a silver Ice Floro, a blue Chris Archer #/500, an orange Enny Romero /250, and a Gold Top 5 Prospects mini of Jeff Ames /25. The Ames is probably a nicer hit than a base autograph.
I have several large 2013 Bowman Draft break results to detail. My most recent was buying 1 slot in a 10-case true player random on Blowout (I still hate randoms, but I wanted to be able to buy other slots after the random took place), and then buying 14 other players post-random. With my initial slot, I had a lousy random - Tyler Vail. This does not lead to happy feelings when you spent $46 on a slot. However, things worked out. You can lose the random and still win the break, if your player hits big. I did. I got a printing plate of Vail, as well as a green refractor #/75. Most of my other players did well too. In a 10-case break from this set, you'll average 20 Chrome and 4 refractors per player, plus whatever special cards (ice, wave, color paper, color refractors) come along - that's normally at least 2 per player, but is much more highly variable. My 15 players got me a total of 43 special cards - just under 3 per player. Juan Avila - black /35, gold /50, and green /75 refractors, orange/250 Aaron Blanton - blue /99 refractor, silver ice Tyler Brosius - blue /500 Alec Grosser - black /35 refractor, red ice /25, 2 orange/250, silver ice Jon Keller - blue /99 refractor, red ice /25, orange/250 Corey Knebel - blue /500, silver ice Mark Montgomery - gold /50 refractor, orange/250, 2 blue /500, silver ice Roel Ramirez - 2 green /75 refractors Chris Rivera - green /75 refractor, orange/250, black wave refractor, 3 blue wave refractors Tyler Skaggs - blue /500, silver ice Gabe Speier - silver ice Niko Spezial - orange/250, blue /500 Tyler Vail - cyan plate, green /75 refractor, blue /500 Taijuan Walker - orange /25 refractor, blue /500, black wave refractor, 2 blue wave refractors Chad Christensen had no special cards.
I set a floor price in the break thread I'd pay for any slot, and had some takers. Others I made offers on or bought at the seller's asking price. I was happy with the prices I paid on everyone, and happier with the results.
I bought 35 players in a 5-case ebay break of 2013 Bowman Draft BB. As always, you average 10 Chrome and 2 refractors per player. It was somewhat disappointing in terms of number of special cards - only 7 low numbered hits and 34 special cards (average by odds would have been at least 10 low numbered hits and at least 45 special cards), but there was some really nice quality in it, and my price per player was very low. The 7 big hits were 3 blue refractors /99 (Ethan Carnes, Brennan Middleton, and Aaron Blanton), a green refractor /75 of Matt Derosier, a black refractor /35 of Jacob Nottingham, and purple ices /10 of Alex Murphy and Derosier. I also got 12 silver ices, 11 blue /500, 2 blue waves (Austin Kubitza and Jordon Austin), and 1 black wave (Sean Nolin), but only one orange /250. The purple ices are big hits (and Murphy is a pretty good prospect), so the break worked out nicely for me.
The 10-case 2014 Bowman BB player draft break on Blowoutcards was another where I lost the random but won the break. With my assigned spot, Kenny Giles yielded 51 Chrome, a refractor /500, a black refractor /99, and a gold refractor /50. With the spot I bought after the draft order came out, Brandon Cumpton yielded 47 Chrome. Getting even one refractor in a spot was beating the odds, let alone 3.
I bought the Raiders in a 15-box (case) ebay break of 2013 Limited football for a good price (about $23). It was a solid break generally, but all I got was a D.J. Hayden auto /299. Oh well.
I have been buying a lot of teams in 1-set ebay breaks of 2013 Bowman Chrome Mini BB. You get the team set plus any refractors, and the average team will end up with about 1 refractor per break on average (except for the Yankees, who will average sbout 2 and a half per break, even the strongest other teams will average only about one and a half per break). Most of the time, I have at least hit the average number I'd expect - 2 recent exceptions come to mind, a break where I had 6 teams with an average expectation of 7 refractors and got 3, and a break where I had 10 teams with an average expectation of 11-12 refractors and got 7, but in both of those, I hit big low-numbered refractors (there have been several breaks where I had the lowest numbered card or 2 lowest numbered cards). I haven't gotten a superfractor yet (I saw the Zach Wheeler pulled) or been in an xfractor set break. The breaks run together a lot for recordkeeping, but my average cost tends to be about $4.50 for a team with about 11 cards in the set (which is an average team). Not counting the last break I was in, where I had 11 teams and got 15 refractors including the lowest numbered card, here are my recent results: 1 printing plate (Cody Asche Cyan). 1 purple /5 (Tyler Vail) 2 red /10 (Thomas Milone and Andrew Knapp) 4 orange /25, including Gustavo Cabrera, Stephen Piscotty, and Braden Shipley 3 black /35, including Evan Gattis and Courtney Hawkins 10 gold /50, including Jonathan Gray, J.P. Crawford, Courtney Hawkins, Lucas Giolito, and Jonathon Crawford (and 2 Roman Quinn) 4 green /75, including Ryan McMahon 10 blue /99, including Ivan Wilson, Corey Knebel, and Cord Sandberg 6 refractors /125, including Chris Stratton (and 2 Jake Lamb) The Braves have been the most frequently purchased team, but the Tigers, Phillies, Giants, Padres, Nationals, Diamondbacks, and White Sox have also been purchased multiple times.
My most recent Bowman Chrome Mini break arrived. I'll take 15 refractors any day, especially with a few very nice hits. My haul was (in addition to the team base sets), a purple Kris Hall /5, 2 gold /50, 4 green /75, 2 blue /99, and 6 refractors /125, including Henry Owens and Teddy Stankiewicz. I paid under $50 for everything.
I also realized that I misplaced the refractors from the first set of this - which include a Lucas Giolito green /75.
<< <i>My most recent Bowman Chrome Mini break arrived. I'll take 15 refractors any day, especially with a few very nice hits. My haul was (in addition to the team base sets), a purple Kris Hall /5, 2 gold /50, 4 green /75, 2 blue /99, and 6 refractors /125, including Henry Owens and Teddy Stankiewicz. I paid under $50 for everything.
I also realized that I misplaced the refractors from the first set of this - which include a Lucas Giolito green /75.
Nick >>
I wonder if Teddy Stankiewicz is related to Andy Stankiewicz,his son perhaps? Andy played for the Yankees in the 90's.
Successful transactions:Tookybandit. "Everyone is equal, some are more equal than others".
As if 35 players in a 5-case ebay break of 2013 Bowman Draft wasn't enough, I also bought 50 players in another 5-case ebay break of it (from the same seller). I hit 65 special cards in addition to the Chromes and refractors: 24 blue /500, 11 orange /250, 8 silver ice, 4 blue waves (Jake Sweaney, Kaleb Cowart, Tyler Austin, and Tyler Wade), 1 black wave (Trey Williams), 5 blue refractors /99 (Brandon Easton, Adam Westmoreland, Matt Derosier, Taylor Guerrieri, and Matt Magill), 3 green refractors /75 (Tyler Austin, Guerrieri, and Magill), 5 gold refractors /50 (Josh Phegley, Brennan Middleton, Jorge Perez, Scooter Gennett, and William White), 1 orange refractor /25 (Cowart), 1 red ice /25 (Gennett), and 2 silver waves /25 (Guerrieri and Sweaney).
The 2013 Limited FB break where I had 3 teams and got a bunch of lower-end cards broke down as follows: from the Eagles I got an Earl Wolff auto /299; from the Raiders I got 3 base cards (Tim Brown /349, Nick Kasa /299, and Darren McFadden /399) and a Tyler Wilson jumbo 2-color photo shoot patch /99; and from the 49ers I got 2 base cards (Steve Young /349 and Eric Reid /299) and a Quinton Patton Material Phenoms (auto relic) rookie redemption (I think /299).
From the break of Limited where I got 1 Card but won a giveaway, I had the Raiders and got a Mychal Rivera rookie /299, and the card I kept from the giveaway (technically 2 giveaways, with livebroken 2012 Bowman packs) was a RGIII All-American Football Stars insert (the base cards from the packs were donated to a children's charity).
The 10-case ebay player break of 2014 Bowman BB worked out OK for me. Bowman base cards shipped along with Chrome prospects and inserts/parallels, so I have large stacks of all 7 players. For the veteran players (no Chromes of them), I got 2 State & Hometown (S&H, for short) parallels of Carlos Santana, 1 of Marco Scutaro, and 3 of Michael Cuddyer, plus a blue /500 Cuddyer and a yellow /99 Bartolo Colon. For the rookies I bought, Jordan Paroubeck yielded a S&H, a silver ice, and a blue wave refractor, Brian Ragira yielded 2 S&H and a blue wave refractor, and Anthony Aliotti yielded 3 S&H and 2 refractors /500. Not bad, especially if any of the 3 prospects pan out.
The Panini basketball ebay break where I mentioned a big hit involved 5 teams for me. The Hawks gave only base cards, but they were extremely cheap. The other teams had inserts to go with their base cards - the Kings had 2 Top 10 Rookies of Ben McLemore, the Bucks had a Top 10 Rookies of Nate Wolters and a gold parallel of Ersan Ilyasova, the Bulls had 2 Bird's Eye View and 2 Knight School inserts of Derrick Rose, and the Knicks had a Hall of Fame Signatures (sticker) auto of Walt Bellamy, who died earlier this year. That was by far the biggest hit of the break.
I also had the biggest hit of a 2013 Prizm FB case break (direct from the seller). I got 2 teams for $20 - the Redskins and the Chiefs. Both teams had from 4 to 7 base cards of every player. The Chiefs had 3 rookies each of Tyler Bray and Eric Fisher, 2 rookies each of Travis Kelce and Knile Davis, a Rookie Impact insert of Davis, a Brilliance insert of Jamaal Charles, and an orange die-cut Prizm /50 of Donnie Avery. The Redskins had 4 rookies of Jawan Jamison, 2 rookies each of David Amerson, Jordan Reed, and Phillip Thomas, a Prizm of Santana Moss and 2 Prizms of Thomas, 2 Decade Dominance inserts of Art Monk, Brilliance inserts of RGIII and Alfred Morris, Monday Night Heroes inserts of RGIII and Pierre Garcon and. . . a Finite Prizm Auto of Leonard Hankerson 1 of 1.
The last 2 Dominion breaks where I had mentioned hits were both for the Ducks. The 4-box break yielded a nice Viktor Fasth rookie patch auto (3 color patch with black/gold/black/white), while the 8-box (case) break yielded a Corey Perry base card /299 and a redemption for an Emerson Etem Ice Level Autograph /50. . The Etem should be a great card.
The 15-case Bowman Draft break where I drafted 10 players broke down as follows for special cards: Alec Grosser: 2 silver ice, 2 blue /500 Alex Murphy: green refractor /75, blue refractor /99, 2 orange /250, 3 blue /500 Cody Harris: 2 silver ice, orange /250, blue /500 Conner Greene: green refractor /75, 2 blue waves, silver ice, orange /250, blue /500 Drake Britton: black refractor /35, silver ice, orange /250, blue /500 Jake Sweaney: gold refractor /50, black wave, blue wave, silver ice, orange /250 Jared Wilson: 2 green refractors /75, 2 silver ice, 2 orange /250, 2 blue /500 Mark Montgomery: black refractor /35, blue wave, silver ice, orange /250, blue /500 Matt Derosier: blue /500 Roel Ramirez: 2 green refractors /75, 2 silver ice, blue /500
That was 49 special cards, or an average of over 1.6 special cards per player per 5 cases- and it would have been over 5 per player for the break if Matt Derosier hadn't been almost absent - and he had fewer Chrome than anyone else and only 1 regular refractor.
Nice recaps Nick. I was heavy into breaking a few months, ended up tucking my tail and running. Playing again this weekend, mostly for fathers day packs.
Collecting PSA graded Steve Young, Marcus Allen, Bret Saberhagen and 1980s Topps Cards. Raw: Tony Gonzalez (low #'d cards, and especially 1/1's) and Steve Young.
Thanks. I bought a spot in a 5-case player draft break on BO of 2014 Bowman FB, and had great luck in the random - pick 20. That will get me a pretty strong autograph opportunity (like a late round QB or 2nd or 3rd round WR or RB) if I keep it, but I'm currently working on selling it or trading down.
I also put down a deposit on a team in a 5-case team random break on BO of 2014 Topps Chrome FB - I think this will be a very hot set due to the draft class and prices will go up substantially from the presale price, such that most teams at this price will turn out to be decent value propositions.
And Teddy is not related to Andy Stankiewicz, at least if the draft article I found is right.
Catching up on some more past breaks: I bought 14 spots post random in another 10-hobby case true player draft break on Blowoutcards of 2013 Bowman Draft. I actually traded down from #96 to #109 with one of the spots and picked up some cash back in the process. At the time of the trade, I had a group of guys I was considering at #96, but felt the value difference between one of those players and what I could still get at #109 was less than the money. It worked out fine for both me and the guy I traded with - he took Anthony Rendon at #96 and ruined the plans of the guy who had pick 97. I would have taken Archie Bradley at pick 96 (and gotten a black refractor), but Mike Zunino was still there at pick 109, and I did fine with him (in a true player draft, you get the insert cards of that player too), as I got a gold refractor /50 of him and also 7 Future of the Franchise mini inserts. I didn't have many colored refractors, but I did fairly well in special cards overall, in addition to the usual 20 Chrome and 4 refractor averages. Juan Avila: 3 silver ice Kendall Coleman: 3 blue /500, 3 silver ice Conner Greene: black wave, blue wave Alec Grosser: green refractor /75, orange /250, blue /500 Luis Guillorme: orange /250 Jason Kanzler: silver ice Justin Maffei: 2 orange/250, 3 blue /500, silver ice Mark Montgomery: silver wave /25, blue refractor /99, 3 blue waves, blue /500 Travis Ott: black refractor /35, green refractor /75 Roel Ramirez: orange /250, blue /500, silver ice Allen Webster: blue wave Mike Zunino: gold refractor /50, 2 blue /500 John Costa and Nathan Karns didn't get any special cards. I actually bought Costa post-break, so both the seller and I knew he didn't have any colored refractors or numbered waves or ice (and I got him very cheaply).
In my first ebay set break of 2013 Bowman Chrome Mini wher I bought a team, it was theBraves, and I got 3 refractors /125 and 2 gold refractors /50, including Evan Gattis. In the other early one where I got refractors, I had 2 refractorless teams (Giants and Padres) and 6 refractors among my other 3 teams: Lucas Giolito green /75 for the Nationals, a blue /99 and a refractor /125 for the Braves, and 3 hits for the Tigers - Jonathon Crawford refractor /125, Corey Knebel blue /99, and Austin Kubitza orange /15.
The Dominion 2-box break where I got a decent jersey card was a Viktor Fasth jersey (event-worn) /99.
Picture 1 is my World Cup Prizm inserts and the Justin Williams autos from Bowman Sterling (redemptions from a group break fulfilled)
Picture 2 is my Prizm FB hits - Hankerson 1/1 auto, Avery orange /50, and regular Prizms
Picture 3 is the Walt Bellamy auto from Panini basketball, the D.J. Hayden auto from Limited FB, and some of my Dominion hits - Etem auto redemption, Fasth rookie patch auto (from quite a while ago), and Perry base card.
Picture 4 is the Fasth jersey from Dominion and 2 fulfilled redemptions from breaks (plus one from a retail blaster) - Poe Limited auto, Kozma Prizm auto (retail blaster pull), and Vatanen Peerless Patches from Dominion - an amazing patch.
I traded down 3 times from the #20 pick in the 2014 Bowman FB 5-case player draft break, ending up with the #32 pick, a couple later picks, and some cash. I also bought quite a few later picks. Normally, I put a lot of effort into my drafting, but the delay in release meant that the draft would happen while I was on vacation and out of internet communication - and the checklist had not even been released by the time I left the U.S. I left a list for the #32 pick, and draft instructions for the other picks as best I could. Topps botched the rollout of the checklist. It originally read that all 110 of the rookies had autographs. This wasn't true. Only the 80 shown on their facebook page did. This caused a lot of people to draft some rookies way too high, thinking that they would have autos. Meanwhile, my instruction list assumed all the 80 rookies with autos would be long gone by the time my next picks rolled around (115 and 116), so I didn't mention anything about picking a rookie with auto potential. Several were still available at the time (some were available into the 130s). I did get veterans with jersey potential at those picks. I watched the recap videos. Many of the top rookie autos appear shortprinted - 7 of the top 20 picks in the draft didn't get any autos, and many of the lesser names (especially the undrafted rookies) got 4 or 5 autos. I took Austin Seferian-Jenkins at #32 (2nd round pick TE for Tampa), and he yielded a numbered mini insert auto and a numbered color auto. Not bad results. I don't even know all the numbered parallels yet, and won't until I get the cards in hand.
I bought into a few breaks recently - a 10-case player random of 2014 Bowman BB on BO, a 1-case 2013-14 Dominion HK break direct from the breaker, and a couple others that haven't started yet (a team in an ebay 2013-14 Panini Preferred BK 5-box break, and a slot in an upcoming 5-case Topps Chrome BB player draft on BO).
My Dominion break was great - a pair of rookie patch autos /299 (1 is a redemption, but the card is live, so it will be a quick turnaround), a jersey /99, and a multi-relic of a future HOFer #/25.
In the Bowman BB break, the spot I got in the random is called the "high-risk" spot for Case 4. That includes AFLAC autos, Lucky Redemptions, Bowman Black autos, dual autos, and (I think) certain boxloaders. I also bought a few lower-end player spots from other people. Through the first 5 cases, 2 of the 3 spots I bought from others had hit colored refractors and refractors. But the high-risk spot is the story here. A little over half of them hit (the rest come up empty), and the average hit is a pretty good prospect's auto #/225 (Ball, Owens, Justin Williams, etc.). I had 2 hits - a Bowman Black auto #/25, and a Lucky Redemption card. All of those are redeemable for Kris Bryant refractor autos. The Bryants are live, and are selling for over $500 on ebay.
I've gotten into two ebay 5-box breaks of 2013-14 Preferred basketball that were broken at the National. Luck has not been with me. In break 1, I had a very strong team. It got 2 spots in a 7-spot random for a booklet card. I didn't win the random. In break 2, I had the strongest team and 2 mediocre teams. The strongest team lost a 2-way random for a booklet card. One of the other 2 teams got shut out, while the other did get me a rookie auto and a retired player auto.
Had I reversed the breaks, I would have done much better. The team I had in break 1 got 2 retired player autos in break 2. The strongest team I had in break 2 would have gotten me a jersey booklet card, 2 current player autos, and spots in randoms (which it didn't win). The other 2 teams would have each gotten a rookie auto (one would have been the same guy, and I think out of the same serial number, as that team got in break 2).
I do get a 2011 Topps Update pack from the break where I was shut out.
Preferred is grossly overpriced for what you get. $180 for a 4-card box can easily leave you with $25 or less in resale value.
I paid good prices for the teams I bought. I just wasn't lucky.
I'll probably continue with this set if the prices are right.
I've also bought a decent team in a 6-box ebay break of 2014 Elite FB that will happen from the National. Veteran base won't ship from that break, but the team has strong hit and rookie content, and the price was great IMO.
Bought 3 teams in another 5-box ebay 2013-14 Panini Preferred BK break. One team went hitless (2nd time it has done so for me), another got a nice fairly low-numbered HOFer on-card auto (though someone who's autos are cheap) and a spot in a 6-way random for a nice booklet card. The third team only got me a spot in that same 6-way random. It was actually the winning spot. Through 3 breaks from this set, I have gotten 3 autos and 1 booklet - which is the contents of one box. My spending has been about $100. Box MSRP is $180. Breaks haven't been great for me, but I can live with these results.
I also bought a decent team in a 3-box ebay break of 2013-14 Select BK. Great results. I hit a rookie auto relic, a jersey card (of a star), a #'d parallel Prizm rookie and a Prizm insert, plus rookies and base cards. Probably the best overall team result in the break.
My Elite FB break happened. I got a nice veteran jersey card, a #d rookie, and an insert. There was one 150 point Panini Rewards card, which was randomed off. I didn't win it. Not a great result, but not bad either.
Picture 1 is my recent results from the Ducks in my latest Dominion break: a Sami Vatanen jersey /99, rookie patch autos of Vatanen (redemption) and Viktor Fasth /299, and a Complete Sweaters 4-relic (2 jerseys, 2 patches) of Teemu Selanne /25. They cost me $40.
Picture 2 is my results from the last Dominion case break before that - Emerson Etem rookie patch auto /299 (redemption) and from the full case break of 2013 Limited football where I had the Ravens: Ray Rice jersey /99 and Joe Flacco patch /49. The Ducks cost me $40, and the Ravens cost me $9.
Picture 3 is my results from the Select basketball break. I believe the Wizards cost me $7.25 or so. Glen Rice Jr. auto jersey, John Wall jersey, Glen Rice Jr. blue Prizm /49, and Otto Porter Draft Selections Prizm. Not pictured are rookie and veteran base cards (I don't think rookies are SP in this set).
Picture 4 is my results from my 3 Preferred breaks. In break 1, I got shut out with the Rockets (they lost a random), though I get a 2011 Topps Update BB pack (hasn't come in the mail yet). In break 2, I got shut out on the Mavericks and Knicks (the Knicks lost a random), and got an Archie Goodwin Crown Royale auto /75 and a Dick Van Arsdale auto /99 for the Suns. In break 3, I got shut out on the Mavericks again, got an Adrian Dantley blue auto /25 for the Clippers, and the Knicks won a random for me (Clippers gave me another spot in it) for a 6-jersey booklet /199 (James/Paul/Anthony/Wilkins/Laettner/Dumars).
The final cases of the 2014 Bowman player random break yielded a color refractor from the one spot I bought that didn't yet have any. I also have bought slots or teams in several other breaks that haven't happened yet: My random slot in Topps Chrome BB ended up #169 out of 220. I have bought 3 other slots. The player draft won't happen until after the checklist comes out. I also bought a team that I think will be fairly strong for a good price in an upcoming 2013-14 National Treasures hockey case break (direct from breaker) and a hit draft slot in a 2013-14 National Treasures hockey case break (on Blowoutcards). I had great luck in the random on the hit draft - #5 pick of 25. I have also reserved spots in a couple baseball breaks on Blowoutcards that haven't filled yet.
Picture 1 is some redemptions from prior break hits that were fulfilled: Justin Hunter and Le'Veon Bell rookie auto relics from 2013 Totally Certified FB and Denard Robinson rookie patch auto from 2013 Limited FB, plus hits from having the Chiefs in a 6-box break months ago of 2013 Topps Chrome FB - Knile Davis insert, Tyler Bray blue refractor /199, Jamaal Charles camo refractor /499, and 2 refractors.
Picture 2 is my hits from a 6-box (IIRC) break of 2013-14 Totally Certified hockey several months ago where I had the Stars and Devils. Base cards aren't pictured. I got 4 rookies and a Jamie Oleksiak red parallel rookie /100. Not good results, even though I got both teams at good prices.
Picture 3 is my cards from a case break of Dominion hockey where I had the Ducks for a little over $40. Getzlaf and Silfverberg base /299, Jonas Hiller Mammoth jersey /50, and Corey Perry 1/1 printing plate.
Picture 4 is my hits from my one SPx break. Tanner Pearson and Justin Schultz rookies, Taylor Hall Ice insert, and Jeff Carter dual jersey. I think I paid around $9 combined for the 2 teams.
Pictures 5 and 6 are my hits from the 2nd and 3rd cases of Totally Certified I did this year where I had the Ducks. I had 6 autos or relics from one case and 3 from the other. I initially thought I had 7 from one case, but the player was in a Ducks jersey but with a different team logo on the card (traded last offseason), so the card went to that team. Base cards aren't pictured, and I did very well ($30 per case for the team) - Jonas Hiller jersey, Dustin Brown/Corey Perry dual jersey (won the random), Viktor Fasth and Emerson Etem patches /50, Richard Rakell and Hampus Lindholm rookie auto relics, Lindholm auto, Frederik Andersen and 2 Lindholm rookies, Ryan Getzlaf blue parallel/50, Lindholm red rookie auto relic /50, and Rakell rookie patch auto /25. Pictures 7 and 8 have my hits from the Playbook hockey break I did. The Kings were hitless for me, but the Panthers got me an Aleksander Barkov jersey /199, the Canucks got me base cards /249 of both Sedin twins, and the Ducks got me rookie auto relic booklets /199 of Hampus Lindholm and Sami Vatanen, a Prime Dual Rookie Classbook booklet of Lindholm and vatanen - 4 2-color patches for each player, and a Then and Now Booklet of Teemu Selanne (won the random between his teams) with 7 2-color patches of him 13/25 (his jersey # with the Jets). Picture 8 also has my hits from a Totally Certified case break where I had the Hurricanes (base didn't ship) - a Jared Staal rookie auto relic, and rookies of Elias Lindholm and Ryan Murphy.
Pictures 1 and 2 are my hits from a Limited FB break in early April, where I had the Raiders and Chiefs. Brice Butler auto /299, Latavius Murray auto /299, Murray Gold Spotlight auto /25, Knile Davis Gold Spotlight rookie patch auto /25, Davis jumbo relic /199, Tony Moeaki jersey /99, 2 Murray Silver Spotlights /49, Dave Casper and Bo Jackson /349, and Jamaal Charles /399.
Pictures 3 and 4 are my hits from a Limited FB break in February where I had 7 teams (1 went hitless). I didn't realize initially how many base and parallels I got. Redemptions for Denard Robinson rookie patch auto (I think /299) and Silver Spotlight RPA (either /49 or /99), Dan Marino 4-color jumbo patch /25, Maurice Jones-Drew auto jersey 2/5, Michael Vick Field Vision, Dexter McCluster jersey /99 (it's actually a patch), David Wilson Gold Spotlight /25, Travis Kelce /299, Tim Brown /349, and Alex Smith and Dwayne Bowe /399. The Marino is a monster, and the MJD is a really nice hit too
Pictures 5 and 6 are my bigger hits from a 5-case player draft break of Topps Chrome FB months ago. Carson Palmer gold ref /50, pink ref /399, camo ref /499, and blue wave ref; Antonio Gates black ref /299 and camo ref /499; Johnathan Hankins blue wave ref; Sharrif Floyd prism ref /260; Xavier Rhodes black ref /299, pink ref /399, and blue wave ref; Greg Jennings sepia ref /99, pink ref /399, camo ref /499, and blue wave ref; Steve Smith prism ref /260, Datone Jones 2 prism refs /260, 2 pink refs /399, camo ref /499, and blue wave ref. Not pictured are base and regular refractors (2 David Amerson, 4 Kevin Minter, 4 Floyd, 3 Jennings, 2 Hankins, 2 Jones, 4 Smith, 4 Gates, 2 Palmer, 2 Bjoern Werner, and 2 Rhodes). Picture 6 also has my bigger hits from a 10-case player random of 2013 Bowman Draft months ago - Conner Greene orange ref /25 and Thomas Milone blue wave ref. Not pictured are base or the regular refractors (6 Greene and 3 Milone).
Pictures 7, 8, and 9 are my bigger hits from several other 2013 Bowman Draft player draft breaks (both ebay and Blowoutcards). Not pictured are refractors, base Chrome, and 14 Bowman blue /500 and 6 Bowman orange /250. The one team break I had was the Cardinals in a 6-box break, and I got a blue /500 and 2 refractors (not pictured). Pictured are Nathan Karns red wave ref /25, gold refs of Alec Grosser, Josh Phegley, and Niko Spezial /50, Alen Hanson orange ref /25 and black ref /35, green refs of Ian Stiffler and Steven Negron /75, blue refs of Roel Ramirez and Tyler Wade /99, blue wave refs of Karns, Stiffler, Wade, and Austin Kubitza, and 12 silver ices
I bought a decent team in a 1-case ebay break of 2014 Finest baseball. Got a very good price, and did fine - rookie auto, #d refractor, 2 refractors, and an insert (plus base). Meanwhile, another team that went fairly cheaply and which I had been considering bidding on, but didn't, got a top tier HOFer auto.
The 2 pictures are my hits from the first Bowman Draft player draft break I did. Not pictured are regular refractors (about 10 per player), base (about 40 per player), or the Dual Draftees inserts (none of the super-rare card, but 4-7 of everyone else). Ice and colored paper cards went to other spots, but I got black wave and blue wave refs of Casey Meisner, 3 blue wave refs of Jacob Nottingham, blue /99, black wave and 2 blue wave refs of Nick Franklin, a blue wave ref of Trey Williams, orange /25 and 2 blue waves refs of Nathan Karns, red /5 and 2 blue /99 refs of Alec Grosser, and black /35 and green /75 refs of Jason Martin. Scooter Gennett had no color for me.
Nice stuff Nick. I always get so confused with all the different versions of cards these days. My son would probably love some of those though. Anything with a Met on it and he has to have it.
"The woods are lovely, dark and deep. But I have promises to keep, And miles to go before I sleep, And miles to go before I sleep."
"Life is what happens to you while you're busy making other plans."
Collecting: Any unopened Baseball cello and rack packs and boxes from the 1970's and early 1980s.
Bought a fairly strong team at a pretty good price in a 3-box ebay break of 2013-14 Panini Crown Royale hockey. Too small a break for my taste - 60 total cards, with 12 hits. I got 3 base cards. I was not very impressed with the set. Too many of the hits were plain jersey cards. Oh well. Bought an OK team in a 1-jumbo case ebay break of 2014 Bowman baseball, and then got another (weaker, but not awful) team at a cheaper price direct from the breaker after it went unsold. The team I originally bought got me a printing plate. The other team got me 2 numbered color Bowman parallels and a color Bowman Chrome refractor - and one of the color parallels and the color refractor were of a player I've started PCing. I also got some other parallels and lots of Chrome and Bowman base. Very happy with the result. Bought 3 decent teams in a 5-hobby box ebay break of 2014 Bowman football, and then got another (fairly weak) team at a cheaper price direct from the breaker after it went unsold. 2 of the teams got me autos - and one was a color refractor auto of a pretty high draft pick. I also got a bunch of inserts and colored parallels (some of them numbered) to go with a lot of base cards. I'm happy with the result.
One of the breaks I reserved a spot in on Blowoutcards forum filled up, so I've paid, and the random assignment should be conducted tomorrow. It's 2013 Bowman baseball.
Such a shame that supposedly chrome football is going away. They look so much better than most of the panini football. The Charles horizontal camo chrome is great
The random on 2013 Bowman baseball was good for me. I got the Patrick Wisdom auto slot. I've traded that for the Yordano Ventura and Dane Phillips regular slots. I've also purchased a bunch of other player slots, and may still buy a few more. I'm also possibly buying some more slots in the 2014 Chrome BB player draft.
Meanwhile, here are pictures of some past break results. The first picture is hits from the second time I bought the Ducks for 2 cases of 2013-14 Totally Certified hockey from the same breaker. The second picture is the rest of the hits from those 2 cases, plus my hits from 2 other breaks: the Flyers in a case of 2013-14 Dominion hockey and the Flyers in a 2-box break of 2013-14 Totally Certified hockey. The Ducks in Tot. Cert. yielded a case-exclusive purple parallel /35 of Teemu Selanne, an auto jersey of Viktor Fasth, autos of Jakob Silfverberg, Richard Rakell, and Igor Bobkov, a Francois Beauchemin jersey, and 2 rookies each of Rakell, Emerson Etem, and Hampus Lindholm (plus base cards not pictured). They were $30 a case. The Flyers in Tot. Cert. yielded a Mirror Gold parallel /5 of Sean Couturier and a Mark Howe jersey card. I hit it big for $3 and change. The Flyers in Dominion yielded a quad jersey card of Matt Read/Scott Laughton/Sean Couturier/Tye McGinn /50. It wasn't a great result for $35 or so, but it's a decent card.
Bought a very strong team in a 5-box ebay break of 2013 Panini Limited FB. Got a legend /349 and a nice rookie jumbo event patch /99. I got a good price on the team, so even though it wasn't a great result, I didn't do too badly. I was the underbidder on 3 teams that did a lot better - one got a HOFer auto /25, another got 4 cards, including an auto and 2 relics, and the 3rd got a rookie patch auto /49 and lost a random for a dual HOFer patch card /25.
I ended up with 14 players in the 2013 Bowman player random. Through the full break (3 cases and 2 hobby boxes), I think I have 1 blue refractor /250 and 1 refractor /500 for everyone combined. Meanwhile, Patrick Wisdom, who I traded away, has 2 refractor autos /500 and 3 base autos. I don't regret the trade, because I'm not high on him as a prospect, and I'm very high on Yordano Ventura (who I believe has a refractor for me).
The 4 pictures below are my bigger hits from the 2014 Bowman FB player draft, where I did a lot of wheeling and dealing. Besides buying a bunch of spots, I picked up a couple lower spots and cash to trade down from pick 20 to pick 32 (3 different trades). At pick 32, I took Austin Seferian-Jenkins, who got me 4 minis, a mini auto /99, a gold refractor auto /75, a gold foil /399, and 2 blue /499. A few of my later picks had no big hits, but Alshon Jeffery and Arian Foster hit jersey cards, Arian Foster had orange and orange ice cards (both /50), Wes Welker had orange /50 and gold /75, Denarius Moore and Rob Gronkowski each had a gold /50 and a gold foil /75, Chris Johnson had a gold foil /75, Robert Quinn had a gold /75, Cecil Shorts had an orange ice /50 and a blue /99, and there were 4 blue die-cuts /99 (2 Gronkowski, Knowshon Moreno, and Demaryius Thomas). Not pictured are all the regular die-cuts (as many as 5 of a player), silver ices, black foil, black, and base cards.
Comments
<< <i>Noticed this thread for the first time, and totally thought the title was "Adventures in cake baking" >>
If I were baking a cake, it would probably come out tasting like cards.
Nick
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The auto is in hand. It's a Mike Gillislee red auto 5/5. It's for sale.
I bought 2 teams in another 6-box 2013 Topps Chrome FB ebay break. Got a colored and a regular refractor from each.
I bought 9 cheap players in a 5-case 2013 Bowman Draft ebay player auction. Got a gold refractor /50 and a red wave /25, plus silver ices and blue (/500) and orange (/250) parallels.
My 11 players from the 10-case Bowman Draft break arrived. Only 1 blue wave, but 6 blue /500 and 2 orange /250, as well as 9 silver ices.
And my backlog for pictures keeps growing.
Nick
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I hit on one of the 2 - a jersey card that cost me $3.58. The other came up empty, but all I lost was a little over $2. That was my first Dominion break going hitless.
I also bought 2 decent teams and the USA relic/auto spot in a 5-box ebay break of 2013 Elite Extra Edition baseball. One of the teams yielded an auto, some decent inserts, and a lot of base. The other team just had 1 notable insert and base. The USA slot had 4 regular jerseys, a numbered patch, and an auto. Long-term, if the guys on the patch or auto hit it big, they're great cards.
The team with no auto was my first Elite EE team without an auto. Not an awful break, but the disappointing part was watching a team where I got sniped end up with 4 autos, including a die-cut /50 and 2 Elite Series autos of top prospects.
Nick
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I also bought a strong team in a full case ebay break of 2013-14 Dominion for a decent price. Very happy with the results - 2 base cards, a nice relic, and a plate (of a star player). Any 1/1 makes for a decent break.
I also bought 6 decent to strong teams in a 5-box ebay break of 2013 Limited football, at good prices overall.
Nick
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<< <i>Went to the well again on the team that I had a 2013-14 Dominion hockey hit from yesterday - I bought it in another ebay box break from the same seller (same case). Nothing this time. I'm out $3.50. It was still a logical move based on the team strength.
I also bought a strong team in a full case ebay break of 2013-14 Dominion for a decent price. Very happy with the results - 2 base cards, a nice relic, and a plate (of a star player). Any 1/1 makes for a decent break.
I also bought 6 decent to strong teams in a 5-box ebay break of 2013 Limited football, at good prices overall.
Nick >>
Are you finding these casebreakers on ebay alone? I've debated jumping in some of these here and there just to give it a try.
<< <i>
<< <i>Went to the well again on the team that I had a 2013-14 Dominion hockey hit from yesterday - I bought it in another ebay box break from the same seller (same case). Nothing this time. I'm out $3.50. It was still a logical move based on the team strength.
I also bought a strong team in a full case ebay break of 2013-14 Dominion for a decent price. Very happy with the results - 2 base cards, a nice relic, and a plate (of a star player). Any 1/1 makes for a decent break.
I also bought 6 decent to strong teams in a 5-box ebay break of 2013 Limited football, at good prices overall.
Nick >>
Are you finding these casebreakers on ebay alone? I've debated jumping in some of these here and there just to give it a try. >>
The vast majority of my group breaks are from ebay. Blowoutcards forums are second. If I find a deal I like from a seller who has their own site, they probably underpriced that team compared to what others are asking and getting.
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I'm also buying spots in a 15-case player draft break of Bowman Draft - 9 spots so far (all low ones); none have come up to pick yet.
Meanwhile, I bought an OK team in a 1-box break of 2013-14 Panini Totally Certified hockey where base doesn't ship. It has a high gambling aspect (figure 8-10 rookies/parallels/hits from the box, so most teams get nothing, but at $0.99 for the team I bought (Hurricanes), it's not a bad bet. I didn't hit anything.
I also bought 3 OK to good teams in a full case (15-box) ebay break of 2013 Panini Limited football. One was quite disappointing (a rookie relic), another had a really nice card that isn't worth too much (low #'d jumbo veteran relic), and the third did fine for quantity but not so great for quality (low #'d rookie auto, rookie auto jumbo relic, veteran relic, and 1 base - but the autos aren't of great players). I paid about 10% more than the cost of a box (when you buy at the current price, not MSRP), so I did OK - If you had a box with my 2 autos and 2 veteran relics, that would be considered a strong box. I got sniped by less than a full bid increment on a team that cleaned up (low #'d HOF auto, several other autos or relics), which is always annoying.
Limited can be a rough break even if you do well. It's one of the Panini products that don't seem to do well on the secondary market.
But some of those cards look really, really nice.
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I bought a tenth spot in the Bowman Draft break. The last picks will happen today, but so far I have Alex Murphy, Jake Sweaney, Mark Montgomery, Alec Grosser (technically, I picked Kendall Coleman but am trading that pick for Grosser, as there was a miss from the preranked list I sent in), Roel Ramirez, and Conner Greene.
I bought 2 decent teams in another 15-box ebay break of 2013 Limited football. One team got a base card /399, a rookie jumbo relic, a veteran relic, and a rookie auto relic. The other got 2 legends (shortprinted base /349) , 2 rookie Spotlight parallels (same player), and 3 rookie autos, one of which is low numbered (2, including the low numbered one, are of the same player the parallels are of). For under $47, that's a decent haul - though the main rookie is a highly speculative guy. The breaker gave away by random drawing a box of 2012 Prime Signatures FB to a participant. It went to someone who had a normally very strong team that did poorly overall. Hits were fairly well spread around, although the same team got a HOFer jumbo relic and a HOFer cut signature.
I also bought a spot in a hit draft break of the new Panini Prizm World Cup set. My draft spot will be randomly assigned. I normally don't like this kind of break, but for this set, I decided to do one. It doesn't lend itself well to breaking in any other fashion (it's players from teams around the world, and Panini hasn't released too many checklist details so far), and if I'm right, will be a very hot set due to international interest.
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I bought into 2 different 5-box ebay breaks of 2013 Limited football. In the first one, I had 3 good to strong teams. One had a rookie jumbo relic, a nice veteran jumbo relic, and a base card. The other 2 got nothing. It was a weak break overall. I'm obviously not happy about coming out with nothing from 2 of my 3 teams, but the third at least did all right (I'm really happy with the veteran relic). In the other break, I had 2 good teams. One got a rookie auto, a rookie parallel /49 (of the same player), and 2 legends /349. The other team got a nice rookie auto relic and a base card /399. This was an even weaker break overall, and one team (one of the strongest) had 5 of the 15 hits - 1 per box. I'm actually happy with my results from this one. For under $20, I got good cards.
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Bought the Jaguars in a 5-box 2013 Limited football ebay break for $6.99. It wasn't a great buy, but an OK one by my value estimates. Got nothing - and the break overall was really weak. I probably should leave Limited alone at this point unless I get amazing deals.
Bought a very strong team in a 1-set 2013 Bowman Chrome Mini baseball ebay break - you get the base cards plus any refractors for your team. Did great - got 5 total refractors, including a fairly tough one of a star - that card alone has sold a couple times on ebay for more than I paid for the team. Bought 2 strong teams in a 3-box 2013-14 SPx hockey ebay break. Did all right - each team had a rookie, and one team had a relic (I believe a veteran dual jersey), but I'm not impressed with this set.
Bought a very strong team for a great price in a 6-box 2013 Bowman Draft baseball ebay break. Didn't get anything major (one colored Bowman parallel, and at least 1 good rookie refractor), but just the base and Chrome have strong value from this team. The big hit of that break was a Bowman Scout auto /25. It was randomed off among everyone. I didn't win it.
Meanwhile, through 9 cases of the 15-case Bowman Draft player break, I have 6 color refractors - 1 black /35, 1 gold /50, and 4 green /75 (plus however many color Bowman, ice, and waves - I don't know these numbers). It's an amazing break overall - Marco Gonzales superfractor auto was pulled in the 10th case, another superfractor was pulled, a Bowman black (1/1), 4 regular printing plates, including Clint Frazier, and a Clarkin plate auto, plus 3 Frazier autos, 4 autos each of Dominic Smith and Austin Meadows, a Jonathan Gray red refractor /5, and a Kris Bryant AFLAC auto.
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I also bought 4 teams in a 1-set 2013 Bowman Chrome Mini baseball ebay break - 1 very strong, 1 strong, 1 OK, and 1 weak. Got great prices on the 2 stronger teams. The weak team just got me the base cards. The OK team got me a top prospect colored refractor, and the other 2 teams combined for 5 refractors and colored refractors, including a very good prospect colored refractor. I'm quite happy with the results - the refractors alone sell on ebay for more than I paid for the teams.
I bought 4 teams in a 12-box (case) 2013-14 Panini Playbook hockey ebay break. I bid a few dollars more on one of the teams than I had planned to, as when I was outbid and decided to bid again (1 more increment), I didn't realize that the bid had jumped several dollars due to a new bidder while I was clicking the bid again button. I also bought 3 other decent to strong teams at very good prices. 2 of my strong teams got shut out. The weaker team that I overpaid for got 2 serial numbered base cards /249. The 4th team got me 2 rookie auto relic booklets, a dual rookie relic booklet, and I won a random for a low numbered single-player dual team booklet with multiple nice patch relics (and it's a future HOF player). Even a full case is a risky bet for any team - there are 36 cards promised per case (although a few boxes will have 1 extra card). Overall, I did very well - I believe I came out ahead in ebay value from what I paid (no sales yet on the top card), but that took winning the random for the top card. Based on purchasing a box, I destroyed the odds - for less than the cost of a box, I got 2 base cards and 4 booklets, as compared to the expected 1 base card, 1 auto or jersey, and 1 booklet.
I think this set will flop, even though it has some amazing cards and most of the booklets look great. You don't get enough bang for your buck. Figure $5 for the base card, $10 for a jersey relic, and $20 for a good rookie auto relic booklet, and your basic box will return you 1/3 or less in ebay value. And in group breaks, 90% of the teams will come up empty in a 1-box break, so large breaks are almost a necessity, but those cost quite a bit of money and have a more limited audience.
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I also bought a pre-random spot in a player/insert 10-case break on Blowoutcards of 2014 Bowman baseball - I was on the backup list, and ended up getting a spot after someone didn't pay for their spots and one of the people on the backup list ahead of me wasn't around to pick up the empty spots. This random was not good for me - I ended up with the #226 spot out of 250. I have bought another late spot (#230) postrandom, and may buy some more. The only saving grace is that only people already in the break have the ability to buy spots from others.
I also bought the same (strong) team in a 4-box ebay break and an 8-box ebay break of 2013-14 Dominion hockey. Got a rookie auto relic /299 (with a nice patch swatch) in the 4-box break, and a base card /249 and a sweet rookie auto relic redemption in the 8-box break. Decent results, as the redemption is of a player I'm very high on, and my guess is that it will be a great looking card.
Nick
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I got my Playbook cards in the mail. I did better than I had realized - I got a jersey card /249 from one of the 2 teams I thought went hitless for me.
Nick
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I bought 2 so-so teams in a 1-set 2013 Bowman Chrome Mini BB ebay break. No refractors, but I do get 16 base cards for my $ (under $10).
I bought 1 OK team in another 1-set 2013 Bowman Chrome Mini BB ebay break. Hit 2 refractors (I believe 1 color and 1 regular) to go with my 10 base cards. Nice result. From the same seller, I got 35 players in a 2013 Bowman Draft baseball 5-case player auction ebay break. Most are lower-end players, and all went cheaply. I don't know the full results yet, but I got 2 purple ice /10 and 5 colored refractors to go with my waves, ice, and colored paper (plus refractors and regular chrome). I should end up with around 40-45 special cards, plus 10-11 chrome and 2-3 refractors per player on average.
I bought 4 teams, ranging from so-so to pretty good, in another 1-set 2013 Bowman Chrome Mini BB ebay break. Each team hit at least 1 refractor, with one team hitting 3 and the weakest team getting 2. I got 2 golds /50 and at least 2 other color. I also get over 40 base cards. Another nice result.
In the Panini World Cup Prizm break where I got a good spot in the random, I traded it for 2 lower picks plus cash. That break won't be for a few more weeks, as the product release date has been pushed back.
I also bought 2 teams in a 1-case (12-box) ebay break of World Cup Prizm. No checklist is out, but 1 team is pretty weak and the other should be fairly strong (and is more popular in the U.S. market than in Europe, which makes any possible resale easier). I'm guessing that it will be strongly represented in the autograph checklist, and hope to hit one.
Nick
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I bought a so-so team in a 1-box ebay break of 2013-14 Totally Certified hockey where base doesn't ship. Got nothing (there were 10 "hits" - 2 parallels, 4 rookies, and 4 auto &/or GU cards), but all I spent was 99 cents, so it was an OK risk.
I bought 4 teams - 2 decent and 2 so-so - in another 1-set Bowman Chrome Mini BB ebay break. 1 team didn't get a refractor, but it was cheap and I still get 7 base cards. The other cheap team got 2 colored refractors - a gold /50 of a pretty good prospect and a green /75. One of the two fairly strong teams only got 1 refractor /125, but the other got 2 blues /99 and an orange /15.
I can't seem to leave 2013 Limited FB alone - I bought 3 good to very strong teams in another 5-box ebay break. 1 team got a rookie auto (I think /299), while a second got a rookie /299, a legend /349, a base card /399, and a rookie jumbo relic that I think is /99, and the third got a rookie /299, a legend /349, and a rookie auto relic (redemption, so I'm not sure of the #). No huge hits in the break, but for under half the price of a box, I got more than the average box.
Nick
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I got outbid on everything I went after in the 100-case Bowman auction. Looking back at it, I should have bid on some of the rookie slots that went cheaply - a number of them are very good prospects.
I made my draft picks in the 10-case player draft. With the pick I got via the random, I took Kenny Giles. With the pick I bought later, I took Brandon Cumpton. Considering we're talking about picks 226 and 230 out of 250, I think I got steals. Cumpton just got called up to the Pirates as an emergency starter, and pitched all right (though he took the loss). It's his first card other than minor league team sets, so there is major appreciation potential.
I also bought 7 true player slots (all parallels and inserts included) in another 10-case (5 hobby and 5 jumbo) ebay break of 2014 Bowman BB. 4 are veterans that aren't anything special unless I get colored parallels or ice (though they were cheap, so it's a low-risk bet), but the other 3 are prospects that went at fairly low prices. All have serious downside risk, but I didn't spend much on any of them, and I should get 2-3 color, ice, waves, or colored paper per prospect.
The seller who had the Bowman Chrome Mini break where I just did well had another. I got outbid across the board, as the teams generally went for quite a bit more than they usually do. I watched the break. It was lousy. 1 red and 1 orange, no purples, plates, or superfractors, and the players with refractors missed all the big stars. Oscar Mercado might have been the top player with a refractor.
Nick
[edited for spelling]
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The second half of the case went as good as it could have for me as I hit 2 auto and a Patch hit. Again I missed on the Clippers other than base and inserts, but I got 3 hits out of 4 teams which I think is strong out of 6 boxes of product. Included in my hits were an Auto RC of Draymond Green, a Dennis Rodman Patch card and the best auto in the case break Anthony Davis. The Davis alone pays for all the slots.
All in all, I think I did well, partially because I picked some good teams based on number of potential of hits and got good value on my slots. Of course, I really just lucked out and got, arguably the best possible player to get an auto from in the box (which I am guessing you can't count on every time). Nick, Do you have much experience with basketball breaks? I notice you don't seem to do many basketball breaks. Do you not collect basketball as much as the other sports, or is there just not much value in basketball breaks?
People love to put down the 2013 football rookie class, but the basketball rookie class was worse. There were a lot of lottery picks who were unimpressive, and a lot of autos of scrubs and D-League guys.
There were several sets where I did fine in a break but don't really care to break it again because the break overall looked very weak. Elite was one of those. Totally Certified was another, even though I got 2 retired player autos for the team I had.
I'm way behind in posting my results, but hope to get much of that done this weekend.
I did find out that ebay will be removing most group break listings as chance auctions, which is bad news for breakers and will certainly cut down on my breaking purchases. I think ebay is wrongto do it, as a pick-your-team break isn't a game of chance. There's no random event (except in the rare cases of multiplayer cards, and even then, you could avoid that with a break rule such as card goes to team of player on left or top). The cards are already packed. You're just buying and selling based on very incomplete information.
A couple of guys I have bought spots from have sent emails that they will be closing up shop. With ebay gone for most types of breaks, prices for pick-your-team breaks will seldom offer good deals, and when they do, they will go very fast.
Nick
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Thanks for sharing your thoughts on the breaks. I am very new to that type of collecting. I can see how it can very fun, especially if you're a team collector it definitely is a good way to get lots of cards of your favorite team. It does seem like basketball is a bad value proposition. I hit arguably the best RC auto in the set (it is either Anthony Davis or Kyrie Irving) as well as another auto and a patch and if I didn't hit the Anthony Davis auto it would probably have been a losing value bet for me. I really wish the NBA would license Topps again as I don't think having any one manufacturer controlling the sole license is good for collectors. Besides just being overpriced on product, I think there is a certain amount of collector fatigue when all the products come from one manufacturer. I will have to look into breaks for other sports. It is too bad as I am mainly a basketball collector as that is my favorite sport.
I agree with you about the 2013 RC classes. Basketball had one of their worst classes. Football at least had a few guys who may still turn out decent. This year's football should have a much higher ceiling than last year though. Lots more skill players in the first couple rounds. Last year half the first round picks were linemen, which may work well for building winning teams, but is unlikely to generate much cardboard excitement. The 2013 basketball products are definitely hampered by the dreadful rookie class. 2012-13 is the basketball product to get as it has the double RC class, headed by Anthony Davis and also Kyrie Irving and Damian Lillard (although I think Lillard didn't sign much for Panini as he was exclusive to Leaf for some time IIRC).
First, some ugly results.
I bought the Red Sox in a 4 box ebay break of 2014 Topps Archives baseball. I made a mistake, and bid based on the value I assigned to the Reds, who are a great team in that set. I looked too quickly at my notes. The Red Sox don't have that many inserts or autos, though they have a lot of SPs, while the Reds are one of the strongest teams. I bombed. 1 insert (Ortiz All-Star Glossy), and 29 base cards. No SPs. About half the teams did very well in that break - multiple tough inserts, #d parallels, or autos, while the other half came up pretty dry. At almost $28, that hurt. Even at a more accurate reflection of how I value that team, it still would have hurt.
I bought 5 strong teams at very good prices in an 8-box break of 2013 Certified football (direct from the seller, who had a temporary discount going on his breaks) - the Dolphins, Chargers, Raiders, Eagles, and Chiefs. From that, I should have been looking at about 7-8 hits minimum, plus #'d rookies and Immortals, #d parallels, and hotbox (Platinum) parallels. I paid a bit under $60 for the 5 teams.
Not even close. For the Raiders, I got a Mychal Rivera Mirror Red #/250. For the Eagles, I got 3 rookies #/999 - but all 3 were Jordan Poyer. For the Dolphins, I got a Dion Jordan #/999, as well as 3 Platinum Reds (including Marino). From the Chargers, I got a Mirror Blue rookie #/100 - but it was Brad Sorensen, as well as a Lance Alworth Immortals #/999 and 4 Platinum Reds (including Fouts and Alworth). The Chiefs were the only team that came out OK for me - Jonathan Baldwin and Eric Berry jerseys #/299, plus a Tyler Bray Platinum Red and Tyler Bray Mirror Red #/250. To make matters worse, Panini shorted a hit in 2 of the 8 boxes.
The same seller put up a 15-box (case) break of 2013 Limited football. I bought a so-so team at a very good price. There were a lot of other teams that were worth buying, but I spent too much lately on breaks, with too many weak results. I haven't gotten the cards yet, but I watched the break, and there were a lot of very nice hits. I believe I got a veteran jersey #/99 and a veteran (star) patch #/49. Certainly not bad for $9, but I passed up teams that I knew were good buys and did quite well.
I also bought a very strong team in a 2-box ebay break of 2013 Topps Platinum FB and an OK team in a 3-box ebay break of 2013 Totally Certified FB. I got good prices on both ($9.75 total). The Totally Certified team was the Ravens, and all I got was 1 base card. I was underbidder on 4 teams that had huge hits.
I bought the Raiders at a good price in an 8-box break of 2013 Prizm football (direct from the seller). There were a lot of great hits in that case. I didn't have anything special, but I got 6 rookies (1 Hayden, 2 Wilson, and 3 Vernon), 3 Rookie Impact Wilson inserts, and 1 Decade Dominance Casper insert, plus a lot of base cards.
Nick
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In the Prizm World Cup hit draft break, trading the spot turned out to be a very good move IMO. It was a snake draft, and each of my 2 slots yielded 2 picks. I ended up with team base lots for 4 countries - Russia, Switzerland, Algeria, and South Korea (from 3 to 9 of each player).
The first 2014 Bowman break where I had a team for a case has turned into a problem. The video cut off after 5 of the 8 boxes, my hits did not arrive (I know I had a blue refractor #/99), and while the seller responded to my question with an apology that they were still sitting there and would be sent that day, they still haven't arrived, and we're now several days with no response to my email asking for a tracking number. Somebody's probably going to be hit with a PayPal claim soon.
I bought the Rays in a 12 hobby box (case) 2014 Bowman ebay break cheaply - $13.49. The seller even threw in a Bowman regular pack - which yielded a State & Hometown parallel (Gus Schlosser). The Rays aren't a great team for prospecting in that set - only 2 prospects with Chrome cards, but they have a strong base contingent, and some auto possibilities. It worked out all right for me. No auto, but 5 Chromes of Ryne Stanek and 4 of Dylan Floro, 3 State & Hometown parallels (Myers, Price, and Stanek), a lot of Bowman base, a silver Ice Floro, a blue Chris Archer #/500, an orange Enny Romero /250, and a Gold Top 5 Prospects mini of Jeff Ames /25. The Ames is probably a nicer hit than a base autograph.
I have several large 2013 Bowman Draft break results to detail. My most recent was buying 1 slot in a 10-case true player random on Blowout (I still hate randoms, but I wanted to be able to buy other slots after the random took place), and then buying 14 other players post-random. With my initial slot, I had a lousy random - Tyler Vail. This does not lead to happy feelings when you spent $46 on a slot.
However, things worked out. You can lose the random and still win the break, if your player hits big. I did. I got a printing plate of Vail, as well as a green refractor #/75.
Most of my other players did well too.
In a 10-case break from this set, you'll average 20 Chrome and 4 refractors per player, plus whatever special cards (ice, wave, color paper, color refractors) come along - that's normally at least 2 per player, but is much more highly variable.
My 15 players got me a total of 43 special cards - just under 3 per player.
Juan Avila - black /35, gold /50, and green /75 refractors, orange/250
Aaron Blanton - blue /99 refractor, silver ice
Tyler Brosius - blue /500
Alec Grosser - black /35 refractor, red ice /25, 2 orange/250, silver ice
Jon Keller - blue /99 refractor, red ice /25, orange/250
Corey Knebel - blue /500, silver ice
Mark Montgomery - gold /50 refractor, orange/250, 2 blue /500, silver ice
Roel Ramirez - 2 green /75 refractors
Chris Rivera - green /75 refractor, orange/250, black wave refractor, 3 blue wave refractors
Tyler Skaggs - blue /500, silver ice
Gabe Speier - silver ice
Niko Spezial - orange/250, blue /500
Tyler Vail - cyan plate, green /75 refractor, blue /500
Taijuan Walker - orange /25 refractor, blue /500, black wave refractor, 2 blue wave refractors
Chad Christensen had no special cards.
I set a floor price in the break thread I'd pay for any slot, and had some takers. Others I made offers on or bought at the seller's asking price.
I was happy with the prices I paid on everyone, and happier with the results.
Nick
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I bought 35 players in a 5-case ebay break of 2013 Bowman Draft BB. As always, you average 10 Chrome and 2 refractors per player. It was somewhat disappointing in terms of number of special cards - only 7 low numbered hits and 34 special cards (average by odds would have been at least 10 low numbered hits and at least 45 special cards), but there was some really nice quality in it, and my price per player was very low.
The 7 big hits were 3 blue refractors /99 (Ethan Carnes, Brennan Middleton, and Aaron Blanton), a green refractor /75 of Matt Derosier, a black refractor /35 of Jacob Nottingham, and purple ices /10 of Alex Murphy and Derosier. I also got 12 silver ices, 11 blue /500, 2 blue waves (Austin Kubitza and Jordon Austin), and 1 black wave (Sean Nolin), but only one orange /250.
The purple ices are big hits (and Murphy is a pretty good prospect), so the break worked out nicely for me.
The 10-case 2014 Bowman BB player draft break on Blowoutcards was another where I lost the random but won the break. With my assigned spot, Kenny Giles yielded 51 Chrome, a refractor /500, a black refractor /99, and a gold refractor /50. With the spot I bought after the draft order came out, Brandon Cumpton yielded 47 Chrome. Getting even one refractor in a spot was beating the odds, let alone 3.
I bought the Raiders in a 15-box (case) ebay break of 2013 Limited football for a good price (about $23). It was a solid break generally, but all I got was a D.J. Hayden auto /299. Oh well.
I have been buying a lot of teams in 1-set ebay breaks of 2013 Bowman Chrome Mini BB. You get the team set plus any refractors, and the average team will end up with about 1 refractor per break on average (except for the Yankees, who will average sbout 2 and a half per break, even the strongest other teams will average only about one and a half per break). Most of the time, I have at least hit the average number I'd expect - 2 recent exceptions come to mind, a break where I had 6 teams with an average expectation of 7 refractors and got 3, and a break where I had 10 teams with an average expectation of 11-12 refractors and got 7, but in both of those, I hit big low-numbered refractors (there have been several breaks where I had the lowest numbered card or 2 lowest numbered cards). I haven't gotten a superfractor yet (I saw the Zach Wheeler pulled) or been in an xfractor set break.
The breaks run together a lot for recordkeeping, but my average cost tends to be about $4.50 for a team with about 11 cards in the set (which is an average team).
Not counting the last break I was in, where I had 11 teams and got 15 refractors including the lowest numbered card, here are my recent results:
1 printing plate (Cody Asche Cyan).
1 purple /5 (Tyler Vail)
2 red /10 (Thomas Milone and Andrew Knapp)
4 orange /25, including Gustavo Cabrera, Stephen Piscotty, and Braden Shipley
3 black /35, including Evan Gattis and Courtney Hawkins
10 gold /50, including Jonathan Gray, J.P. Crawford, Courtney Hawkins, Lucas Giolito, and Jonathon Crawford (and 2 Roman Quinn)
4 green /75, including Ryan McMahon
10 blue /99, including Ivan Wilson, Corey Knebel, and Cord Sandberg
6 refractors /125, including Chris Stratton (and 2 Jake Lamb)
The Braves have been the most frequently purchased team, but the Tigers, Phillies, Giants, Padres, Nationals, Diamondbacks, and White Sox have also been purchased multiple times.
Nick
Edited for typo
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My haul was (in addition to the team base sets), a purple Kris Hall /5, 2 gold /50, 4 green /75, 2 blue /99, and 6 refractors /125, including Henry Owens and Teddy Stankiewicz. I paid under $50 for everything.
I also realized that I misplaced the refractors from the first set of this - which include a Lucas Giolito green /75.
Nick
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<< <i>My most recent Bowman Chrome Mini break arrived. I'll take 15 refractors any day, especially with a few very nice hits.
My haul was (in addition to the team base sets), a purple Kris Hall /5, 2 gold /50, 4 green /75, 2 blue /99, and 6 refractors /125, including Henry Owens and Teddy Stankiewicz. I paid under $50 for everything.
I also realized that I misplaced the refractors from the first set of this - which include a Lucas Giolito green /75.
Nick >>
I wonder if Teddy Stankiewicz is related to Andy Stankiewicz,his son perhaps? Andy played for the Yankees in the 90's.
The 2013 Limited FB break where I had 3 teams and got a bunch of lower-end cards broke down as follows: from the Eagles I got an Earl Wolff auto /299; from the Raiders I got 3 base cards (Tim Brown /349, Nick Kasa /299, and Darren McFadden /399) and a Tyler Wilson jumbo 2-color photo shoot patch /99; and from the 49ers I got 2 base cards (Steve Young /349 and Eric Reid /299) and a Quinton Patton Material Phenoms (auto relic) rookie redemption (I think /299).
From the break of Limited where I got 1 Card but won a giveaway, I had the Raiders and got a Mychal Rivera rookie /299, and the card I kept from the giveaway (technically 2 giveaways, with livebroken 2012 Bowman packs) was a RGIII All-American Football Stars insert (the base cards from the packs were donated to a children's charity).
The 10-case ebay player break of 2014 Bowman BB worked out OK for me. Bowman base cards shipped along with Chrome prospects and inserts/parallels, so I have large stacks of all 7 players. For the veteran players (no Chromes of them), I got 2 State & Hometown (S&H, for short) parallels of Carlos Santana, 1 of Marco Scutaro, and 3 of Michael Cuddyer, plus a blue /500 Cuddyer and a yellow /99 Bartolo Colon. For the rookies I bought, Jordan Paroubeck yielded a S&H, a silver ice, and a blue wave refractor, Brian Ragira yielded 2 S&H and a blue wave refractor, and Anthony Aliotti yielded 3 S&H and 2 refractors /500. Not bad, especially if any of the 3 prospects pan out.
The Panini basketball ebay break where I mentioned a big hit involved 5 teams for me. The Hawks gave only base cards, but they were extremely cheap. The other teams had inserts to go with their base cards - the Kings had 2 Top 10 Rookies of Ben McLemore, the Bucks had a Top 10 Rookies of Nate Wolters and a gold parallel of Ersan Ilyasova, the Bulls had 2 Bird's Eye View and 2 Knight School inserts of Derrick Rose, and the Knicks had a Hall of Fame Signatures (sticker) auto of Walt Bellamy, who died earlier this year. That was by far the biggest hit of the break.
I also had the biggest hit of a 2013 Prizm FB case break (direct from the seller). I got 2 teams for $20 - the Redskins and the Chiefs. Both teams had from 4 to 7 base cards of every player. The Chiefs had 3 rookies each of Tyler Bray and Eric Fisher, 2 rookies each of Travis Kelce and Knile Davis, a Rookie Impact insert of Davis, a Brilliance insert of Jamaal Charles, and an orange die-cut Prizm /50 of Donnie Avery. The Redskins had 4 rookies of Jawan Jamison, 2 rookies each of David Amerson, Jordan Reed, and Phillip Thomas, a Prizm of Santana Moss and 2 Prizms of Thomas, 2 Decade Dominance inserts of Art Monk, Brilliance inserts of RGIII and Alfred Morris, Monday Night Heroes inserts of RGIII and Pierre Garcon and. . . a Finite Prizm Auto of Leonard Hankerson 1 of 1.
It's my biggest hit ever in a pack.
Nick
Edited for typo
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The last 2 Dominion breaks where I had mentioned hits were both for the Ducks. The 4-box break yielded a nice Viktor Fasth rookie patch auto (3 color patch with black/gold/black/white), while the 8-box (case) break yielded a Corey Perry base card /299 and a redemption for an Emerson Etem Ice Level Autograph /50.
The 15-case Bowman Draft break where I drafted 10 players broke down as follows for special cards:
Alec Grosser: 2 silver ice, 2 blue /500
Alex Murphy: green refractor /75, blue refractor /99, 2 orange /250, 3 blue /500
Cody Harris: 2 silver ice, orange /250, blue /500
Conner Greene: green refractor /75, 2 blue waves, silver ice, orange /250, blue /500
Drake Britton: black refractor /35, silver ice, orange /250, blue /500
Jake Sweaney: gold refractor /50, black wave, blue wave, silver ice, orange /250
Jared Wilson: 2 green refractors /75, 2 silver ice, 2 orange /250, 2 blue /500
Mark Montgomery: black refractor /35, blue wave, silver ice, orange /250, blue /500
Matt Derosier: blue /500
Roel Ramirez: 2 green refractors /75, 2 silver ice, blue /500
That was 49 special cards, or an average of over 1.6 special cards per player per 5 cases- and it would have been over 5 per player for the break if Matt Derosier hadn't been almost absent - and he had fewer Chrome than anyone else and only 1 regular refractor.
No huge hits, but certainly a lot of small ones.
Nick
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Raw: Tony Gonzalez (low #'d cards, and especially 1/1's) and Steve Young.
I also put down a deposit on a team in a 5-case team random break on BO of 2014 Topps Chrome FB - I think this will be a very hot set due to the draft class and prices will go up substantially from the presale price, such that most teams at this price will turn out to be decent value propositions.
And Teddy is not related to Andy Stankiewicz, at least if the draft article I found is right.
Nick
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I bought 14 spots post random in another 10-hobby case true player draft break on Blowoutcards of 2013 Bowman Draft.
I actually traded down from #96 to #109 with one of the spots and picked up some cash back in the process. At the time of the trade, I had a group of guys I was considering at #96, but felt the value difference between one of those players and what I could still get at #109 was less than the money. It worked out fine for both me and the guy I traded with - he took Anthony Rendon at #96 and ruined the plans of the guy who had pick 97. I would have taken Archie Bradley at pick 96 (and gotten a black refractor), but Mike Zunino was still there at pick 109, and I did fine with him (in a true player draft, you get the insert cards of that player too), as I got a gold refractor /50 of him and also 7 Future of the Franchise mini inserts.
I didn't have many colored refractors, but I did fairly well in special cards overall, in addition to the usual 20 Chrome and 4 refractor averages.
Juan Avila: 3 silver ice
Kendall Coleman: 3 blue /500, 3 silver ice
Conner Greene: black wave, blue wave
Alec Grosser: green refractor /75, orange /250, blue /500
Luis Guillorme: orange /250
Jason Kanzler: silver ice
Justin Maffei: 2 orange/250, 3 blue /500, silver ice
Mark Montgomery: silver wave /25, blue refractor /99, 3 blue waves, blue /500
Travis Ott: black refractor /35, green refractor /75
Roel Ramirez: orange /250, blue /500, silver ice
Allen Webster: blue wave
Mike Zunino: gold refractor /50, 2 blue /500
John Costa and Nathan Karns didn't get any special cards. I actually bought Costa post-break, so both the seller and I knew he didn't have any colored refractors or numbered waves or ice (and I got him very cheaply).
In my first ebay set break of 2013 Bowman Chrome Mini wher I bought a team, it was theBraves, and I got 3 refractors /125 and 2 gold refractors /50, including Evan Gattis.
In the other early one where I got refractors, I had 2 refractorless teams (Giants and Padres) and 6 refractors among my other 3 teams: Lucas Giolito green /75 for the Nationals, a blue /99 and a refractor /125 for the Braves, and 3 hits for the Tigers - Jonathon Crawford refractor /125, Corey Knebel blue /99, and Austin Kubitza orange /15.
The Dominion 2-box break where I got a decent jersey card was a Viktor Fasth jersey (event-worn) /99.
I'll be adding some pictures tonight.
Nick
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Picture 2 is my Prizm FB hits - Hankerson 1/1 auto, Avery orange /50, and regular Prizms
Picture 3 is the Walt Bellamy auto from Panini basketball, the D.J. Hayden auto from Limited FB, and some of my Dominion hits - Etem auto redemption, Fasth rookie patch auto (from quite a while ago), and Perry base card.
Picture 4 is the Fasth jersey from Dominion and 2 fulfilled redemptions from breaks (plus one from a retail blaster) - Poe Limited auto, Kozma Prizm auto (retail blaster pull), and Vatanen Peerless Patches from Dominion - an amazing patch.
Nick
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Pic 4 is from the recently broken-down Limited FB break where I had the Eagles, 49ers, and Raiders.
Pic 5 is from the recently broken-down Certified FB break where I had the Eagles, Raiders, Chargers, Dolphins, and Chiefs.
Nick
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Pic 2 is the key cards from my 2014 Bowman break where I had the Rays.
Pics 3 through 10 are the key cards from the recently broken-down 2013 Bowman Draft breaks, arranged by color.
Yes, those are 4 Roel Ramirez green.
Nick
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Normally, I put a lot of effort into my drafting, but the delay in release meant that the draft would happen while I was on vacation and out of internet communication - and the checklist had not even been released by the time I left the U.S. I left a list for the #32 pick, and draft instructions for the other picks as best I could.
Topps botched the rollout of the checklist. It originally read that all 110 of the rookies had autographs. This wasn't true. Only the 80 shown on their facebook page did. This caused a lot of people to draft some rookies way too high, thinking that they would have autos. Meanwhile, my instruction list assumed all the 80 rookies with autos would be long gone by the time my next picks rolled around (115 and 116), so I didn't mention anything about picking a rookie with auto potential. Several were still available at the time (some were available into the 130s). I did get veterans with jersey potential at those picks.
I watched the recap videos. Many of the top rookie autos appear shortprinted - 7 of the top 20 picks in the draft didn't get any autos, and many of the lesser names (especially the undrafted rookies) got 4 or 5 autos. I took Austin Seferian-Jenkins at #32 (2nd round pick TE for Tampa), and he yielded a numbered mini insert auto and a numbered color auto. Not bad results.
I don't even know all the numbered parallels yet, and won't until I get the cards in hand.
Nick
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My Dominion break was great - a pair of rookie patch autos /299 (1 is a redemption, but the card is live, so it will be a quick turnaround), a jersey /99, and a multi-relic of a future HOFer #/25.
In the Bowman BB break, the spot I got in the random is called the "high-risk" spot for Case 4. That includes AFLAC autos, Lucky Redemptions, Bowman Black autos, dual autos, and (I think) certain boxloaders. I also bought a few lower-end player spots from other people. Through the first 5 cases, 2 of the 3 spots I bought from others had hit colored refractors and refractors.
But the high-risk spot is the story here. A little over half of them hit (the rest come up empty), and the average hit is a pretty good prospect's auto #/225 (Ball, Owens, Justin Williams, etc.).
I had 2 hits - a Bowman Black auto #/25, and a Lucky Redemption card. All of those are redeemable for Kris Bryant refractor autos.
The Bryant is my best modern card.
Nick
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In break 1, I had a very strong team. It got 2 spots in a 7-spot random for a booklet card. I didn't win the random.
In break 2, I had the strongest team and 2 mediocre teams. The strongest team lost a 2-way random for a booklet card. One of the other 2 teams got shut out, while the other did get me a rookie auto and a retired player auto.
Had I reversed the breaks, I would have done much better. The team I had in break 1 got 2 retired player autos in break 2. The strongest team I had in break 2 would have gotten me a jersey booklet card, 2 current player autos, and spots in randoms (which it didn't win). The other 2 teams would have each gotten a rookie auto (one would have been the same guy, and I think out of the same serial number, as that team got in break 2).
I do get a 2011 Topps Update pack from the break where I was shut out.
Preferred is grossly overpriced for what you get. $180 for a 4-card box can easily leave you with $25 or less in resale value.
I paid good prices for the teams I bought. I just wasn't lucky.
I'll probably continue with this set if the prices are right.
I've also bought a decent team in a 6-box ebay break of 2014 Elite FB that will happen from the National. Veteran base won't ship from that break, but the team has strong hit and rookie content, and the price was great IMO.
Nick
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I also bought a decent team in a 3-box ebay break of 2013-14 Select BK. Great results. I hit a rookie auto relic, a jersey card (of a star), a #'d parallel Prizm rookie and a Prizm insert, plus rookies and base cards. Probably the best overall team result in the break.
My Elite FB break happened. I got a nice veteran jersey card, a #d rookie, and an insert. There was one 150 point Panini Rewards card, which was randomed off. I didn't win it. Not a great result, but not bad either.
Nick
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Also probably time to start cutting down on buying into breaks, since after the Bryant auto I'm ahead by most measures of calculating value.
Nick
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Picture 2 is my results from the last Dominion case break before that - Emerson Etem rookie patch auto /299 (redemption) and from the full case break of 2013 Limited football where I had the Ravens: Ray Rice jersey /99 and Joe Flacco patch /49. The Ducks cost me $40, and the Ravens cost me $9.
Picture 3 is my results from the Select basketball break. I believe the Wizards cost me $7.25 or so. Glen Rice Jr. auto jersey, John Wall jersey, Glen Rice Jr. blue Prizm /49, and Otto Porter Draft Selections Prizm. Not pictured are rookie and veteran base cards (I don't think rookies are SP in this set).
Picture 4 is my results from my 3 Preferred breaks. In break 1, I got shut out with the Rockets (they lost a random), though I get a 2011 Topps Update BB pack (hasn't come in the mail yet). In break 2, I got shut out on the Mavericks and Knicks (the Knicks lost a random), and got an Archie Goodwin Crown Royale auto /75 and a Dick Van Arsdale auto /99 for the Suns. In break 3, I got shut out on the Mavericks again, got an Adrian Dantley blue auto /25 for the Clippers, and the Knicks won a random for me (Clippers gave me another spot in it) for a 6-jersey booklet /199 (James/Paul/Anthony/Wilkins/Laettner/Dumars).
The final cases of the 2014 Bowman player random break yielded a color refractor from the one spot I bought that didn't yet have any.
I also have bought slots or teams in several other breaks that haven't happened yet: My random slot in Topps Chrome BB ended up #169 out of 220. I have bought 3 other slots. The player draft won't happen until after the checklist comes out. I also bought a team that I think will be fairly strong for a good price in an upcoming 2013-14 National Treasures hockey case break (direct from breaker) and a hit draft slot in a 2013-14 National Treasures hockey case break (on Blowoutcards). I had great luck in the random on the hit draft - #5 pick of 25.
I have also reserved spots in a couple baseball breaks on Blowoutcards that haven't filled yet.
Nick
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Picture 2 is my hits from a 6-box (IIRC) break of 2013-14 Totally Certified hockey several months ago where I had the Stars and Devils. Base cards aren't pictured. I got 4 rookies and a Jamie Oleksiak red parallel rookie /100. Not good results, even though I got both teams at good prices.
Picture 3 is my cards from a case break of Dominion hockey where I had the Ducks for a little over $40. Getzlaf and Silfverberg base /299, Jonas Hiller Mammoth jersey /50, and Corey Perry 1/1 printing plate.
Picture 4 is my hits from my one SPx break. Tanner Pearson and Justin Schultz rookies, Taylor Hall Ice insert, and Jeff Carter dual jersey. I think I paid around $9 combined for the 2 teams.
Pictures 5 and 6 are my hits from the 2nd and 3rd cases of Totally Certified I did this year where I had the Ducks. I had 6 autos or relics from one case and 3 from the other. I initially thought I had 7 from one case, but the player was in a Ducks jersey but with a different team logo on the card (traded last offseason), so the card went to that team. Base cards aren't pictured, and I did very well ($30 per case for the team) - Jonas Hiller jersey, Dustin Brown/Corey Perry dual jersey (won the random), Viktor Fasth and Emerson Etem patches /50, Richard Rakell and Hampus Lindholm rookie auto relics, Lindholm auto, Frederik Andersen and 2 Lindholm rookies, Ryan Getzlaf blue parallel/50, Lindholm red rookie auto relic /50, and Rakell rookie patch auto /25.
Pictures 7 and 8 have my hits from the Playbook hockey break I did. The Kings were hitless for me, but the Panthers got me an Aleksander Barkov jersey /199, the Canucks got me base cards /249 of both Sedin twins, and the Ducks got me rookie auto relic booklets /199 of Hampus Lindholm and Sami Vatanen, a Prime Dual Rookie Classbook booklet of Lindholm and vatanen - 4 2-color patches for each player, and a Then and Now Booklet of Teemu Selanne (won the random between his teams) with 7 2-color patches of him 13/25 (his jersey # with the Jets). Picture 8 also has my hits from a Totally Certified case break where I had the Hurricanes (base didn't ship) - a Jared Staal rookie auto relic, and rookies of Elias Lindholm and Ryan Murphy.
Nick
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Brice Butler auto /299, Latavius Murray auto /299, Murray Gold Spotlight auto /25, Knile Davis Gold Spotlight rookie patch auto /25, Davis jumbo relic /199, Tony Moeaki jersey /99, 2 Murray Silver Spotlights /49, Dave Casper and Bo Jackson /349, and Jamaal Charles /399.
Pictures 3 and 4 are my hits from a Limited FB break in February where I had 7 teams (1 went hitless). I didn't realize initially how many base and parallels I got.
Redemptions for Denard Robinson rookie patch auto (I think /299) and Silver Spotlight RPA (either /49 or /99), Dan Marino 4-color jumbo patch /25, Maurice Jones-Drew auto jersey 2/5, Michael Vick Field Vision, Dexter McCluster jersey /99 (it's actually a patch), David Wilson Gold Spotlight /25, Travis Kelce /299, Tim Brown /349, and Alex Smith and Dwayne Bowe /399. The Marino is a monster, and the MJD is a really nice hit too
Pictures 5 and 6 are my bigger hits from a 5-case player draft break of Topps Chrome FB months ago. Carson Palmer gold ref /50, pink ref /399, camo ref /499, and blue wave ref; Antonio Gates black ref /299 and camo ref /499; Johnathan Hankins blue wave ref; Sharrif Floyd prism ref /260; Xavier Rhodes black ref /299, pink ref /399, and blue wave ref; Greg Jennings sepia ref /99, pink ref /399, camo ref /499, and blue wave ref; Steve Smith prism ref /260, Datone Jones 2 prism refs /260, 2 pink refs /399, camo ref /499, and blue wave ref. Not pictured are base and regular refractors (2 David Amerson, 4 Kevin Minter, 4 Floyd, 3 Jennings, 2 Hankins, 2 Jones, 4 Smith, 4 Gates, 2 Palmer, 2 Bjoern Werner, and 2 Rhodes).
Picture 6 also has my bigger hits from a 10-case player random of 2013 Bowman Draft months ago - Conner Greene orange ref /25 and Thomas Milone blue wave ref. Not pictured are base or the regular refractors (6 Greene and 3 Milone).
Pictures 7, 8, and 9 are my bigger hits from several other 2013 Bowman Draft player draft breaks (both ebay and Blowoutcards). Not pictured are refractors, base Chrome, and 14 Bowman blue /500 and 6 Bowman orange /250. The one team break I had was the Cardinals in a 6-box break, and I got a blue /500 and 2 refractors (not pictured). Pictured are Nathan Karns red wave ref /25, gold refs of Alec Grosser, Josh Phegley, and Niko Spezial /50, Alen Hanson orange ref /25 and black ref /35, green refs of Ian Stiffler and Steven Negron /75, blue refs of Roel Ramirez and Tyler Wade /99, blue wave refs of Karns, Stiffler, Wade, and Austin Kubitza, and 12 silver ices
Nick
[edited for typos]
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The 2 pictures are my hits from the first Bowman Draft player draft break I did. Not pictured are regular refractors (about 10 per player), base (about 40 per player), or the Dual Draftees inserts (none of the super-rare card, but 4-7 of everyone else). Ice and colored paper cards went to other spots, but I got black wave and blue wave refs of Casey Meisner, 3 blue wave refs of Jacob Nottingham, blue /99, black wave and 2 blue wave refs of Nick Franklin, a blue wave ref of Trey Williams, orange /25 and 2 blue waves refs of Nathan Karns, red /5 and 2 blue /99 refs of Alec Grosser, and black /35 and green /75 refs of Jason Martin. Scooter Gennett had no color for me.
Nick
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But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep."
"Life is what happens to you while you're busy making other plans."
Collecting:
Any unopened Baseball cello and rack packs and boxes from the 1970's and early 1980s.
Bought an OK team in a 1-jumbo case ebay break of 2014 Bowman baseball, and then got another (weaker, but not awful) team at a cheaper price direct from the breaker after it went unsold. The team I originally bought got me a printing plate.
Bought 3 decent teams in a 5-hobby box ebay break of 2014 Bowman football, and then got another (fairly weak) team at a cheaper price direct from the breaker after it went unsold. 2 of the teams got me autos - and one was a color refractor auto of a pretty high draft pick. I also got a bunch of inserts and colored parallels (some of them numbered) to go with a lot of base cards. I'm happy with the result.
One of the breaks I reserved a spot in on Blowoutcards forum filled up, so I've paid, and the random assignment should be conducted tomorrow. It's 2013 Bowman baseball.
Nick
Reap the whirlwind.
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I've also purchased a bunch of other player slots, and may still buy a few more.
I'm also possibly buying some more slots in the 2014 Chrome BB player draft.
Meanwhile, here are pictures of some past break results.
The first picture is hits from the second time I bought the Ducks for 2 cases of 2013-14 Totally Certified hockey from the same breaker. The second picture is the rest of the hits from those 2 cases, plus my hits from 2 other breaks: the Flyers in a case of 2013-14 Dominion hockey and the Flyers in a 2-box break of 2013-14 Totally Certified hockey.
The Ducks in Tot. Cert. yielded a case-exclusive purple parallel /35 of Teemu Selanne, an auto jersey of Viktor Fasth, autos of Jakob Silfverberg, Richard Rakell, and Igor Bobkov, a Francois Beauchemin jersey, and 2 rookies each of Rakell, Emerson Etem, and Hampus Lindholm (plus base cards not pictured). They were $30 a case.
The Flyers in Tot. Cert. yielded a Mirror Gold parallel /5 of Sean Couturier and a Mark Howe jersey card. I hit it big for $3 and change.
The Flyers in Dominion yielded a quad jersey card of Matt Read/Scott Laughton/Sean Couturier/Tye McGinn /50. It wasn't a great result for $35 or so, but it's a decent card.
Nick
[edited to fix pictures]
Reap the whirlwind.
Need to buy something for the wife or girlfriend? Check out Vintage Designer Clothing.
I ended up with 14 players in the 2013 Bowman player random. Through the full break (3 cases and 2 hobby boxes), I think I have 1 blue refractor /250 and 1 refractor /500 for everyone combined. Meanwhile, Patrick Wisdom, who I traded away, has 2 refractor autos /500 and 3 base autos. I don't regret the trade, because I'm not high on him as a prospect, and I'm very high on Yordano Ventura (who I believe has a refractor for me).
The 4 pictures below are my bigger hits from the 2014 Bowman FB player draft, where I did a lot of wheeling and dealing. Besides buying a bunch of spots, I picked up a couple lower spots and cash to trade down from pick 20 to pick 32 (3 different trades). At pick 32, I took Austin Seferian-Jenkins, who got me 4 minis, a mini auto /99, a gold refractor auto /75, a gold foil /399, and 2 blue /499. A few of my later picks had no big hits, but Alshon Jeffery and Arian Foster hit jersey cards, Arian Foster had orange and orange ice cards (both /50), Wes Welker had orange /50 and gold /75, Denarius Moore and Rob Gronkowski each had a gold /50 and a gold foil /75, Chris Johnson had a gold foil /75, Robert Quinn had a gold /75, Cecil Shorts had an orange ice /50 and a blue /99, and there were 4 blue die-cuts /99 (2 Gronkowski, Knowshon Moreno, and Demaryius Thomas). Not pictured are all the regular die-cuts (as many as 5 of a player), silver ices, black foil, black, and base cards.
Nick
[edited to correct numbering]
Reap the whirlwind.
Need to buy something for the wife or girlfriend? Check out Vintage Designer Clothing.
I've enjoyed your quest - especially the BB.