More New Cards!

A series of envelopes have come in over the last three days to make up an order of miscellaneous 2008 cards off of Sportlots. For those of you that don't use it, Sportlots is a great way to pick up base/inconsequential cards for very cheap, and without crazy eBay shipping prices. My most recent order added another 17 cards to my collection. Here's what I got:

My first UD Documentary cards of the year, 8 in all:

From Grand Cards

Four more Moments & Milestones to chip away at my set:

From Grand Cards

The base card and Chrome version (#/1959) from Topps Heritage High Numbers:

From Grand Cards

Upper Deck First Edition:

From Curtis Granderson Collection

...and that set's accompanying Starquest Card (giving me all six):

From Curtis Granderson Collection

And last but not least, the Navy Blue version of UD Heroes (#/199):

From Curtis Granderson Collection

A few thoughts on these:

• I do not like the Documentary set, having now seen it in person. It is lame. Out of those 8 cards I have two different pictures and only one of the cards even mentions Curtis. From Game 33: "Detroit worked Daisuke Matsuzaka for eight walks (10 overall) but couldn't capitalize. Curtis Granderson continued his hot hitting with a two-run single in the fourth." That game was at home, but shows him in his away jersey, by the by.
  
• I'm slowly chipping away at the Moments & Milestones set. Please Help Me.
  
• I'm a big fan of the Topps Heritage stuff, especially the chrome.
  
• Upper Deck first edition is perfectly nice, but no different than Upper Deck. At least Topps Opening Day was distinguishable (albeit blinding and somewhat cheap looking)
  
• The Heroes set would be very tiresome to build, but it is a blast for a player collector. These cards are bright and vibrant and relatively inexpensive and make for a very cool Rainbow collection when put together.
  

Ultimate Checklist: 2008 Topps Moments & Milestones

For a set that everybody loves to hate, I have a dicey love/hate relationship with 2008 Topps Moments & Milestones. I don't know how it happened, but somehow I got a small lot of Granderson cards from this set for next to nothing (like 99 cents, or something like that). I thought, simultaneously, in a true feat of quantum mental bandwidth, "these cards are cool/these cards are stupid." First, the technicals: The "base" cards are all numbered to 150. There are parallels that are numbered to 25 (black), 10 (blue) and 1 (red).

Fine, that all seems pretty straightforward. So what's the problem? Why the love and hate? First, the love:

From Curtis Granderson Collection

From Curtis Granderson Collection

From Curtis Granderson Collection

From Curtis Granderson Collection

These cards are nice. I'm sorry. Look at them! There are four cards, four different pictures, design variations, nice color schemes--they're even printed on an excellent card stock. Its not too thin, its not too thick. I am a fan. Curtis Granderson's cards, numbers 38, 39, 40 and 41 are worth collecting.

Unfortunately, Card number 38 has a few variations. 38-1, 38-2, 38-3 etc. up to 23 for each home run. Card 39 has 26 variations, one for each steal. 40 has 23 variations for each triple and there are 38 versions of #41 for each double. So, Curtis Granderson has 4 unique cards that are great. Or, Curtis Granderson has 110 cards that are repetitive and mediocre.

That is the hate component of this set, and it is what everybody hates about this set. There is no reason to have 110 different cards that only have 4 different designs. There is really no reason to have 110 more that are numbered to 25, 110 more numbered to 10 and 110 more "1 of 1" cards. These are not one of ones. These are a joke. Moments & Milestones are a prime example of artificial scarcity and corporate greed that has frustrated collectors all year.

Still, for all the criticism that I have about this set, I must confess a sickness. I have an issue, which you will become familiar with over time, if you're not already, in which I must complete any collections that I start. The corollary of this is that I don't start collections that I'm not prepared to finish, which is why I don't collect the Black, Blue and Red versions of this set. However, I am stuck trying to complete the frustrating, annoying but addictively beautful "base" set of Topps Moments & Milestones.

With that, I need your help. I need the following cards (#/150) to finish my set (Updated 2/15/2011):
Home Runs (Card #38): 15
Stolen Bases (Card #39): 10, 19, 25, 26
Triples (Card #40): 4, 10, 11, 13, 18
Doubles (Card #41): 23, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37

I beg you. Let me put this sickness to rest.