2010 Topps Football - - My first packs

Now that the 2010 Topps Football has permeated it's way through all the store shelves and all the blogs, I decided enough was enough and I wasn't about to get left behind.  I finally took a stab at a few packs.

I decided about a year or so ago that since I build sets and I need the most bang for my buck, retail shelf rack packs were always my best bet.  Some argue that these are the worst because the odds are different for the "hits" but you get the most for your money out of these packs because of the sheer number of cards and price per card.

Feel free to disagree as I know many of you will but when you have very little access to a card shop and means out of my own control preventing ordering hobby boxes online, retail is sometimes your only option.  Since I can't bring myself to trust loose packs on the shelf or those nifty gravity boxes because of all the pack searchers, I keep returning to the rack packs.  Sure, blaster boxes can get you some guaranteed hits as well as some increasingly fair collation over the last few years.  But the cost per card is higher than a rack pack and I'm really not interested in anymore of these "hits" that contain plain white swatches of bench players (regardless of sport) or prospect autographs of guys that will never get off their minor league islands.

Did I mention I picked up a few packs?  Well I did.  10 to be exact.  At $4.99 a pop, that was a nice piece of change until I realized all the trading cards were an additional 30% off.  Sweet, $3.50 a pack!!  There were only 10 or else I would have picked up a few more.  At any rate, I'll get this out of the way real quick...there were no autos, no game used, no super short prints, and no rookie variations.  Instead there were tons of base cards that put me well on my way to putting the set together, 10 Gridiron Lineage cards, 10 Topps Attaks/Toppstown cards, 10 Peak Performances, 2 Topps Gold /2010, 3 75th Anniversary Draft cards, 10 '52 Bowman reprints, and 2 55th Anniversary reprints.  Plus, out of 10 packs, I pulled 7 Gridiron Giveaway cards.

These are what I wanted to focus on because everyone out there has already seen the base and the inserts a hundred times.  Not being one to allow anything to sit more than 10 minutes, I immediately logged into the TGG site, surprisingly using my same ID and PW for the TMCG site.  I checked their "transmogrifier" for any recent trends in new vs. old and noticed it was a pretty even mix so I figured why not?  Here they are in no particular order...

1988 Jim Covert

2006 Doug Gabriel

1979 Lenvil Elliott

1979 Raymond Clayborn

1959 Joe Fortunato (R)

1984 Garry Cobb

1999 Travis Hall

This was a pretty interesting mix.  Better variety than the over-abundance of 1985-1989 on it's baseball counterpart.  I unlocked 2 cards from the 70s, 2 from the 80s, 1 from the 90s, 1 from the 2000s, and my one and only card from the 50s that I own that isn't a Pittsburgh Steeler.  Joe Fortunado's rookie card, as it appears to be, is probably still a common by all other standards but since I live in the Chicago area, he's at least a guy I have heard of.  Playing 12 seasons for the Bears, he made the Pro Bowl 5 times and is considered one of the top 300 players of all time.  He was named to the All Decade team of the 50s.  

I have already sorted my base cards but I haven't made a list of what I need yet.  That will go to my set needs page as soon as I have an opportunity.  I also pulled a small pile of doubles and a few triples surprisingly so if anyone else is putting this together, let me know.

I know, I know.  I said I wasn't picking up anything new for awhile a few posts ago but the urge to bust wax overcame me and I caved.  It won't happen again...today.