Baseball packs from the Alley family

In the early days of this blog, back in 2008, I was contacted by a reader whose boys were mad football (soccer) fans. They supported Everton and had difficulty purchasing football related items and since I was in the United Kingdom would I mind sending some soccer 'stuff' their way. In exchange they would send me some baseball 'stuff'.
This seemed like a nice arrangement, so I duly obliged and send football magazines, stickers, packs and a badge or two.
Little did I expect to receive a large assortment of baseball packs in return.
Packages go back and forth between us about two or three times a year, when new football cards or stickers are released a package works it way to North Carolina and then a baseball package will find its way to Westgate-on-Sea. I look forward to these surprise packages immensely, always jam packed full of baseball pack loveliness.
This Saturday another Alley pack arrived on my doorstep.
The contents:
5 packs 2013 Topps Heritage
3 Jumbo packs of 2013 Opening Day
6 packs of 2013 Opening Day
2 rack packs of 2013 Topps Series 1
2 packs of Topps Series 1
1 block(60 cards)  of 2013 Topps Series 1
1 pack of 2012 Triple Play
1 pack of 2012 Opening day
1 pack of 2011 Opening day
1 rack pack 2011 Bowman
2 packs 2011 Topps Chrome
1 pack of 2008 UD First Edition
1 pack of 2008 Topps
1 pack of 2007 Fleer Ultra
2 packs of 1989 Donruss

So there is some junk wax, who cares, these are packs of baseball cards.

You just have to love the internet and how it connects people from all over the world.

Topps Attax Doctor Who

Yes you heard correctly. Topps has finally produced a Doctor Who set of collectable cards. It may be in 'Attax' form but it is still The Doctor. Pity Topps couldn't produce some dalek relic or Rose Tyler DNA cards, those might be interesting to collect. The Topps Alien Attax coincides with the 50th anniversary of Doctor Who television show.
If your a fan of The Doctor, you would have already realised that this year is a special year in the Doctor Who calendar. On the 23rd of November 1963  the first Doctor Who episode 'The Unearthly Child' was broadcast, although eclipsed by other historic events, the show pulled in a decent audience.
In 1973, on the tenth anniversary of the show, a series of episodes called 'The Three Doctors' was made.
In 1983, on the twentieth anniversary, a special called 'The Five Doctors' was made.
In 1993, although Doctor Who series had been on temporary leave since 1989, a Children in Need special called 'Dimensions in Time' was broadcast.
Unfortunately in 2003, the Doctor was still off the air, so to speak, but roll on 2013 The Doctor has never been more popular, which means there is a flood of Doctor Who celebratory merchandise available - Royal Mail stamps (which are pretty cool even for a non stamp collector), cups, mugs T-shirts, miniature TARDISes, (is there a plural for TARDIS?), hats, figures, you name it.

The Alien Attax set contains 240 cards to collect which includes 16 rainbow foil cards and 32 mirror foil cards.

The collector pack comes with the collection folder, checklist, battle mat and a 'special' 3D Matt Smith card. 

The rest of the 240 cards are divided into groups of Aliens, Humans, Humanoids, Doctors, Companions, Robots, etc. Thankfully the set includes the very lovely new assistant Clara/Oswin Oswald played by Jenna-Louise Coleman.

There has never been a shortage of Aliens in the Doctors past, whether they were the creepy sort to keep you up in the night such as; Snowman, Weeping Angels or gas-masked children,

 Or just downright weird like the Face of Boe, The Ood or Sulirians

 Although there were some that would barely past the Alien screening process. Really- an alien made from Liquorice Allsorts.

I am pretty close to completing this set, so if you want to fill any empty spaces, just contact me. 



2013 baseball World Classic Update Pool B

In Taichung, Taiwan the pool was much closer. there was not overall convincing winner as there was in Pool A.The only disappointment was Australia's failure to win any match.
The three other clubs hypothetically tied for first- each winning 2 games and losing 1.The eventual winner and pool team to go through was Chinese Taipei, who won the Asian qualifying round in style, back in November 2012. During the qualifying campaign they didn't allow a run, winning all games: 10-0, 16-0 and 9-0.
Chinese Taipei's wins over Australia and the highly favoured Dutch put them on course for another three straight wins.

 

The second team through to the second round was the impressive 'Kingdom of the Netherlands' or Holland as we say in Europe. Possibly the best of the European teams in the competition. Although they beat South Korea convincingly in the first game, they let a 3-1 lead slip to Chinese Taipei. Their final game against Australia, they didn't look back after securing a 4-0 lead. They should do well in the rest of the competition.

 

The South Koreans must feel unlucky. Winning as many games as Holland and Chinese Taipei but still not getting through to the next round. Losing without scoring against Holland (5-0) was eventually their downfall.

 

 

 

The biggest disappointment, for me, was the Australian team, who only scored 2 runs in their three tournament matches. This is the same nation who set the record for most hits (22) in a past Classic, when they beat Mexico 17-7 in  2009. Despite have a professional league and many players in the MLB, they didn't deliver at all this year and will need to go through qualification for the next Classic. Three games, 3 losses.

 

2013 World Baseball Classic update Pool A

So a quick update of the 2013 World baseball Classic- Pool A and Pool B has been decided.

In  Fukuoka, Japan, the Cubans were relatively comfortable winners of Pool A, winning all three games and proceed to the next round. The Cubans made mincemeat of the Chinese in an almost completely empty Fukuoka Stadium, which doesn't say a lot for the future of the Classic.

 

Japan also move to the second round having lost only to Cuba, although their wins were less than comfortable.

The third team in the group China, are a growing nation in the sport. Although convincingly defeated by Cubans, they went on to beat the Brazilians.



 

Unfortunately for Brazil, who had advanced through last years qualifiers and were playing in their first Classic, the competition was tough and they lost every game (if only by a few runs.)

 

 

(I know its not a Brazilian player- do you really care?)

 

2013 Baseball World Classic

Here in the UK there has been barely a ripple of interest in this baseball competition,even in the preliminary rounds where the United Kingdom featured.
Although their participation was short lived, the UK played three games in the qualifying rounds against: Canada, Czech Republic and Germany. These games took place back in September in the premier European baseball stadium in Regensburg, Germany called the Armin-Wolf Baseball Arena. It is also the largest stadium specifically for baseball in Germany, pretty impressive it is too.

 

The United Kingdom team were comfortably defeated by both Canada 11-1 and Germany 16-1, but overcame the Czechs in a hard fought game, 12-5. Canada made light work of the Germans 11-1 to advance to the World Classic Pool stage.
In another of the qualifying rounds in Florida,  saw more European teams: Spain, France and Israel (well they participate in the Euros in football) battle South Africa for another of the empty pool stage places. The plucky Spaniards overcame Israel 9-7 to advance.
Brazil advanced from the South American qualifier in the Rod Carew Stadium in Panama City beating Colombia, Nicaragua and Panama.
Chinese Taipei advanced from the Asian qualifier beating baseball giants the Philippines, Thailand and New Zealand in Xinzhuang Stadium, Taiwan.
All these qualifiers took place late last year (September and November) in preparation for the World Classic in March 2013.

There are four pools of four teams in the World Baseball Classic, taking place in different parts of the World. There are possibly only a few countries in the world that have enough baseball stadiums to host the classic in a similar fashion to football, cricket and rugby, which take place usually in one country).

Pool A 
Japan, China, Cuba and Brazil
Games are played in Fukuoka, Japan in the Fukuoka Yahoo! Japan Dome.




Pool B
South Korea, Holland, Australia and Chinese Taipei
Games are played in Taichung, Taiwan.



Pool C
Venezuela, Puerto Rico, Dominican Republic and Brazil
Games are played in San Juan, Puerto Rico at the

Hiram Bithorn Stadium

 

 

 

Pool D

USA, Mexico, Italy and Canada

Games played in Phoenix, Arizona.

 

 

Is there any interest in these ganes at all?

2013 Topps Heritage 1964 card design

 

So there is a great deal of talk about 2013 and what that means as a collector.

Put aside all the other sets that I am trying to complete, that are accumulating year on year - for me 2013 will be all about Topps Heritage and the 1964 design.

If I try to ignore the 75 short prints, the Action Image variations and Colour variations and just aim for the 425 base set, there is a chance that I can complete before 2013 is out. (Funny I remember saying something very similar about the 1980 design in 2012 Archives). It will be difficult to ignore the Venezuelan parallel, as this black back variation was actually available in 1964, as opposed to the mini parallels and chrome parallel rubbish.

Some of the inserts look interesting too-1964 Baseball Flashbacks, 1964 News Flashbacks, Then and Now 1964/2012 and let's not forget the 1964 Bazooka and Tattoos. 

So anyone else going to 'show the love' for 2013 Topps Heritage or is just me?

 

Topps 2013 Football Stickers

The biggest number of views that I have on this blog are always related to posts about stickers, in particular football stickers. While other posts get maybe 80 views, football, whether it be Match Attax, Topps stickers or Panini stickers, get in excess of 300 views. Compared to many other blogs this is not many, but I have 30 followers-not 200+.

This years sticker book is free, yes free. You purchase 4 packs of stickers for £2 and receive the sticker book gratis. A clever ploy or marketing technique, either way it works for me.

There are 352 stickers to collect, which includes 16 stickers per team- 2 of which make a squad picture plus a sparkly star player, 20 kit stickers- half size stickers as per last year and 20 international players.

Topps do stickers well, so there is no real change this year, (Why fix something that isn't broken?), thankfully they dropped the 3D stickers from a few years back.

I have 5 packs to showcase, purchased from Tesco supermarket in Broadstairs.

 



 

Pack 1:

#61 Darron Gibson Everton

#137 Steven Taylor Newcastle

#252 Matthew Etherington Stoke

#258 Simon Mignolet Sunderland

#301 Gareth Bale Tottenham star player

 

Pack 2:

#148 John Ruddy Norwich

#200 Alejandro Faurlin QPR

#212 Reading team part 1

#223 Pavel Pogrebnyah Reading

#345 Antolin Alcaraz Wigan

 

Pack 3:

#7 Arsenal team part 2

#49 Oscar Chelsea

#82 Hugo Rodallega Fulham

#308 West Bromwich Albion team part 1

#319 Peter Odemwingie West Bromwich

 

Pack 4:

#14 Theo Walcott Arsenal

#93 Joe Allen Liverpool

#113 Mario Balotelli Manchester City

#237 Richie Lambert Southampton star player

#281Jonathan De Guzman Swansea

 

Pack 5:

#44 Frank Lampard Chelsea

#54 Everton team part 1

#174 Karim El Ahmadi Morocco international star

#170 Sunderland/Swansea kit

#259 John O'Shea Sunderland

 

So there you have it, 5 packs of 2013 Topps football. A cross section of the stickers available but no Manchester United and one Manchester City- the most hated man in football.

Contact me if you would like an album some stickers,

Big B I have already posted yours.

1964 Topps

If there was an ultimate set of baseball cards that you could collect, what would it be?
I'm not talking a money is no object set, like a complete set of T206. I'm talking an obtainable goal. The set could include a few difficult, rare, possibly expensive cards that you needed to hunt down, bid and lose/win or trade for.
A set that, for whatever reason, really interests you. Are you thinking 1952 Topps, 1951 Bowman, 1954 Red Heart dog food set, maybe? Or are you tastes more recent like 2005 Bowman Heritage.
For me it was the 1980 Topps set, mainly for sentimental reasons and I achieved that goal with a little (or big) help from my friends. In fact while attempting this feat I was contacted by a fellow 1980's set collector who was after a slabbed version of each card. There's a goal and a half.
Now I am turning my attentions to the 1964 Topps set, again for sentimental reasons. 1964 was the year of my birth. I also hope to, at some point, to obtain a 1964 Topps wrapper .
I will be honest and say that I think this will be one of those life long goals. This will not be time limited as there are a number of difficult, as well as very expensive, cards to obtain. Mickey Mantle and Hank Aaron are the first to come to mind. Pete Rose, Willie Mays, Roberto Clemente, Sandy Koufax, Roger Maris......the list goes on. I have already bitten off a small chunk of the 'cheaper' base so I'm on going in the right direction! Hoping to pick up a few 1964 coins, Bazooka, Topps Giant and Stand Ups along the way.

 

A few weeks ago Wax Fantastic (amongst others) revealed the Topps sell sheet for 2013 Topps Heritage. If you keep up with Heritage then you know why this product would be of interest.

The design used/ recycled  for 2013 Heritage will be a 'throwback' to 1964 Topps.
 

It is great to see the inclusion of some original 1964 cards however 1964 Bazooka are a buyback insert as are 1964 Tattoos. Luckily the 1964 Venezuelan variation, complete with black rather than orange backs, are an insert, although limited. 1964 Topps Giants are included as box toppers and 1964 Topps coins will be embedded in a relic limited to 5 copies. Why not include the coin inserts in packs as they did in 1964? 1964 Topps Stand ups were already included as an insert in 2011 Topps Lineage.

 

Back to the original question- What would be your ultimate set to collect?