The Great Zo
Verified Trader,
I didn't originally plan it out this way, but I'm going to end the year with two heavily-themed mail posts, focused on one of my largest collections: Tim Thomas. I haven't posted any new Tim Thomas items in my mail posts since the end of July, so this is basically a comprehensive review of every Thomas card I've received in the past five months. This post (part one) contains a pretty random assortment of items, and I'll go through them roughly in reverse chronological order.
Mail Post #18 for 2014
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10-11 Dominion Dale Hawerchuk (40/99)
06-07 Upper Deck Victory Evgeni Malkin RC
10-11 SP Game Used Gold Nick Palmieri (03/50)
11-12 Panini Limited Banner Season Gold Spotlight Corey Perry (23/25)
11-12 Upper Deck UD Exclusives Jonas Gustavsson (028/100)
11-12 Panini Limited Ruby Spotlight Nazem Kadri (19/49)
I'll begin with this haphazard mix of numbered parallels, which will be heading to my tradelist. The seventh card in this very inexpensive ebay lot is below.
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11-12 Score The Franchise 2011-2012 All-Star Tim Thomas (1/5)
Yes, it's a show stamp card, but the price I paid for the whole batch made it easy to justify. Although this is my first stamped version of this particular insert, I do have a couple other All-Star stamped Tim Thomas items.
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14-15 O-Pee-Chee Rainbow 29 Jamie McGinn
14-15 O-Pee-Chee Rainbow 67 Wayne Simmonds
14-15 O-Pee-Chee Rainbow 99 Joffrey Lupul
14-15 O-Pee-Chee Rainbow 121 Mike Santorelli
14-15 O-Pee-Chee Rainbow 155 Josh Gorges
14-15 O-Pee-Chee Rainbow 185 Ryan Murray
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14-15 O-Pee-Chee Rainbow 218 Steve Ott
14-15 O-Pee-Chee Rainbow 282 Kevin Shattenkirk
14-15 O-Pee-Chee Rainbow 340 T.J. Oshie
14-15 O-Pee-Chee Rainbow 342 Seth Jones
14-15 O-Pee-Chee Rainbow 398 Claude Giroux
14-15 O-Pee-Chee Rainbow 468 Keith Yandle
14-15 O-Pee-Chee Rainbow 481 Duncan Keith
Here's another huge lot that I purchased for the sake of getting one Tim Thomas card. The other 13 cards have been added to my tradelist.
-------------------------------------------------------
14-15 O-Pee-Chee Rainbow 319 Tim Thomas
This may be one of the easier parallels from O-Pee-Chee, but it's hard to justify paying the cost of the card and shipping to win one on ebay. Getting this card with a bigger assortment for my tradelist made a lot of sense.
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14-15 O-Pee-Chee Black Rainbow 319 Tim Thomas (025/100)
Moving up a level, here's the Black Rainbow version, with only 100 copies printed.
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14-15 O-Pee-Chee Red Border Tim Thomas
Stepping things up again is the Red Border parallel. These cards were only available through a Canada-exclusive wrapper redemption program. They don't have a stated print run, but I would estimate that they are a little tougher to find than the Black Rainbow parallels.
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14-15 O-Pee-Chee Retro Blank Back Tim Thomas
Finally, I'll jump to the toughest of all O-Pee-Chee parallels -- the Retro Blank Back! Interestingly enough, this was the first one I purchased, and it was actually the first 14-15 product year card I owned. This card hit ebay within a week of the product being released, and I have yet to see another copy.
-------------------------------------------------------
TWO PACKS -- 1991-92 Parkhurst Series 1 (American)
Base Cards
Rob Pearson RC
Russell Romaniuk RC
It wouldn't be one of my mail posts without something random like this! Although these free packs of 91-92 Parkhurst aren't exactly the most interesting things in the world, I was able to find something of value -- two RCs I'll keep for my collection.
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13-14 Panini Totally Certified Scottie Upshall
13-14 Panini Totally Certified Jacob Markstrom
These two Totally Certified base cards were included with the Parkhurst packs, along with the next card in the mail post.
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13-14 Panini Totally Certified Jersey Patch Gold TC-TTH Tim Thomas (05/25)
This is a decent Tim Thomas patch card -- a nice swatch (yellow patch / white patch / black jersey) on a somewhat boring design. The one thing I do like about this set is the boldness of the colors, especially when the different versions are contrasted. I already have the Jersey Red and Prime Blue (/50) parallels.
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13-14 Score Signatures Tim Thomas
This card was part of the Score Signatures update set, released in Panini Rookie Anthology. The Tim Thomas card is listed as a short print, with only 75-100 copies produced. Honestly, it wasn't very hard to find -- many copies hit ebay, and it was just a matter of waiting for a price I was happy with.
-------------------------------------------------------
13-14 Score Black 665 Tim Thomas
On the other hand, the Score Black parallels -- even from the Rookie Anthology update set -- are very tough to locate! Panini did not release any odds or print run information for these cards, but they're pretty similar to things like O-Pee-Chee Retro Blank Backs and Upper Deck Victory Black parallels. This is the only copy of the Tim Thomas card that I have seen.
-------------------------------------------------------
13-14 Panini Contenders Gold Tim Thomas (098/100)
Here's a slightly easier parallel from Panini Contenders. This card doesn't look that much different from the base cards, but the front is shiny, and the card contains gold holofoil highlights.
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13-14 Panini Prime Holo-Silver Tim Thomas (03/50)
Speaking of holofoil, here's one of two parallels I picked up from Panini Prime.
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13-14 Panini Prime Holo-Gold Tim Thomas (01/10)
Here's the other one -- though, to be honest, they look almost identical. Veteran collectors will know what I mean when I refer to these as "Pacific parallels" -- outside of the print runs, a simple foil color shift is the only difference. These are not among my favorite items in this mail post.
I have yet to get the base card, which is limited to 299 copies.
-------------------------------------------------------
13-14 Panini Prime Seams Incredible Tim Thomas (01/10)
This card, however, is an example of why the rest of the Panini Prime product was thought of so highly. The card contains a swatch from the seam around the inside of the jersey collar, with the word "Reebok" perfectly centered in the oversized swatch window. This is the first of this type of card that I've owned, and it's one of the more unique entries to my Tim Thomas collection.
I also think it's neat that I have two cards numbered 01/10 from 13-14 Panini Prime.
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13-14 Panini Playbook Tim Thomas (054/249)
From Prime to Playbook, here's a simple base card, limited to 249 copies. I don't think Panini did enough to differentiate the Prime and Playbook base sets and parallels, which share visual elements and are numbered to similar quantities. For Playbook, the base set uses silver foil.
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13-14 Panini Playbook Gold Tim Thomas (09/25)
From base to parallel, here's the gold foil version of the above card.
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13-14 Panini Playbook Limited Edition Prime Tim Thomas (09/25)
I picked up the jersey #/99 version of this card in June. Unlike the simple memorabilia cards from Totally Certified, which were color-coded by variation, these poorly-titled "Limited Edition" jersey inserts from Playbook did not use any changed design elements at all. Outside of the swatch, the numbering, and the card's thickness, the two versions are identical.
The swatch on this card has a big yellow seam with black jersey.
-------------------------------------------------------
13-14 Panini Playbook Autobiography Tim Thomas (13/99)
I don't mind this card at all -- it's a simple hard-signed autograph, with a clean signature and a reasonable print run. It was also inexpensive, which is always a bonus.
The 1/1 parallel to this card has been on ebay a few times. Until the seller realigns his or her expectations with reality, it won't sell.
-------------------------------------------------------
13-14 Select Prizms Tim Thomas
I'm really happy that Tim Thomas was included in the Panini update sets, even if that meant that I'd have a few more cards to add to my wantlist. I think this year's Select and Prizm cards are really attractive, so I'm glad he earned a few -- while also avoiding the insane number of parallels from the original products!
I missed chances to get the Gold #/10 and Finite 1/1 versions of this card. I don't yet own the base version either.
-------------------------------------------------------
13-14 Panini Prizm Prizms Tim Thomas
The basic Prizm parallels for both of the Select and Prizm update sets were not easy to find. I would estimate that the print run is under 100 copies for each of these, but Panini didn't provide any information to help make that determination. Regardless, this is the least scarce of the Prizm update cards in my Tim Thomas collection -- I don't have the base for this one either.
-------------------------------------------------------
13-14 Panini Prizm Gold Prizms Tim Thomas (10/10)
However, I did pick up the Gold version, which is extremely bright and shiny! It's a really nice-looking card, and with only 10 copies made, it's probably one of my favorites in this entire mail post.
I also own the cracked ice parallels to both of these cards, which were released at the 2014 Spring Expo in Toronto.
-------------------------------------------------------
12-13 Panini Certified Tim Thomas (659/999)
Jumping back to the 12-13 product year, here's the Tim Thomas base card (part of the Masked Marvels subset) from 12-13 Panini Certified. This is the easiest of eight different versions of the card.
* Base #/999
* Mirror Red #/100
* Hot Box #/75
* Mirror Blue #/50
* Mirror Gold #/25 (not owned)
* Mirror Emerald #/5 (not owned)
* Mirror Black 1/1 (not owned)
* Mirror Ice Tag 1/1
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12-13 Panini Limited Duels Gold Tim Thomas (03/10)
This insert parallel from 12-13 Panini Limited is another extremely tough card to find, with only ten copies made. I already own the Silver #/99 version, so it's nice to have them both.
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11-12 The Cup Jersey Quads (08/10)
-- Tim Thomas (Black Jersey) / Zdeno Chara (White Jersey)
-- Milan Lucic (Black Jersey) / Tyler Seguin (Black Jersey)
Here's my first four-player jersey card from The Cup, with four Bruins who won the Stanley Cup in 2011. As much as it pains me to purchase a card featuring one of the few NHL players I legitimately do not like (Milan Lucic), it's a pretty impressive add for the Thomas collection.
This card is a sibling (or perhaps a cousin) to the two Cup Trios #/25 cards I already own from 11-12 -- Thomas / Krejci / Chara, and Thomas / Rask / Chara.
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11-12 SP Game Used Authentic Fabrics Six Jersey (4/7) (UDC113900)
-- Carey Price (Blue) / Michael Cammalleri (Red) / P.K. Subban (White)
-- Tim Thomas (Yellow) / Milan Lucic (Black) / Zdeno Chara (Black)
Acquiring this card puts an old failure of a purchase to rest -- something that was very important for me to do.
In February of this year, I acquired a copy of this card (5/7) with COA sticker number UDC113901. However, the seller had lost the COA card, and I decided to return the item for a refund. It was hard to give up on a Tim Thomas card with only seven copies printed, but I felt like I had only acquired half of what I was supposed to get.
Thankfully, many months later, two more copies showed up on ebay. One of them was listed for a ridiculous price, but this one came for just a little more than I had paid originally. I'm now happy to own a six-jersey card with five swatch colors, and only seven copies printed -- six if you exclude the one I returned!
-------------------------------------------------------
10-11 Between The Pipes Stick Save Silver Tim Thomas (1 of 24)
Moving back another season, here's a card that I'm disappointed it took me so long to get. I really like game-used stick cards, and the swatches ITG's used in the past five years have been some of the largest and most colorful I've ever seen. This Tim Thomas stick piece has three colors, aligned in horizontal stripes -- white, black, and yellow.
Comparing this card to the version from 09-10, I greatly prefer the 10-11 version. The design is slightly cleaner, and the addition of the player picture is a big improvement.
I don't believe that I've seen the Gold 1/1 parallel to this card.
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11-12 Dominion Printing Plates Yellow Tim Thomas (1 of 1)
Part one of the big Tim Thomas end-of-year mail extravaganza will end with a 1/1 -- my second plate from 11-12 Dominion! I also own the Magenta version. This won't rank among my favorite Tim Thomas 1/1s, but it's an important item for my collection, and closing things out with a 1/1 is fun whenever I can do it. I'm up to a total of 75 true 1/1s for my Tim Thomas collection.
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News and notes:
** Part two of the Tim Thomas post will be coming next week, along with my end-of-2014 top 10 card list.
** I also received some packs of cards for Christmas, but I'll save those in my first mail post of 2015.
That'll be it. Thanks everyone!
--Andy
http://www.thegreatzo.com/cards/
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Mail Post #18 for 2014
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10-11 Dominion Dale Hawerchuk (40/99)
06-07 Upper Deck Victory Evgeni Malkin RC
10-11 SP Game Used Gold Nick Palmieri (03/50)
11-12 Panini Limited Banner Season Gold Spotlight Corey Perry (23/25)
11-12 Upper Deck UD Exclusives Jonas Gustavsson (028/100)
11-12 Panini Limited Ruby Spotlight Nazem Kadri (19/49)
I'll begin with this haphazard mix of numbered parallels, which will be heading to my tradelist. The seventh card in this very inexpensive ebay lot is below.
-------------------------------------------------------
11-12 Score The Franchise 2011-2012 All-Star Tim Thomas (1/5)
Yes, it's a show stamp card, but the price I paid for the whole batch made it easy to justify. Although this is my first stamped version of this particular insert, I do have a couple other All-Star stamped Tim Thomas items.
-------------------------------------------------------
14-15 O-Pee-Chee Rainbow 29 Jamie McGinn
14-15 O-Pee-Chee Rainbow 67 Wayne Simmonds
14-15 O-Pee-Chee Rainbow 99 Joffrey Lupul
14-15 O-Pee-Chee Rainbow 121 Mike Santorelli
14-15 O-Pee-Chee Rainbow 155 Josh Gorges
14-15 O-Pee-Chee Rainbow 185 Ryan Murray
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14-15 O-Pee-Chee Rainbow 218 Steve Ott
14-15 O-Pee-Chee Rainbow 282 Kevin Shattenkirk
14-15 O-Pee-Chee Rainbow 340 T.J. Oshie
14-15 O-Pee-Chee Rainbow 342 Seth Jones
14-15 O-Pee-Chee Rainbow 398 Claude Giroux
14-15 O-Pee-Chee Rainbow 468 Keith Yandle
14-15 O-Pee-Chee Rainbow 481 Duncan Keith
Here's another huge lot that I purchased for the sake of getting one Tim Thomas card. The other 13 cards have been added to my tradelist.
-------------------------------------------------------
14-15 O-Pee-Chee Rainbow 319 Tim Thomas
This may be one of the easier parallels from O-Pee-Chee, but it's hard to justify paying the cost of the card and shipping to win one on ebay. Getting this card with a bigger assortment for my tradelist made a lot of sense.
-------------------------------------------------------
14-15 O-Pee-Chee Black Rainbow 319 Tim Thomas (025/100)
Moving up a level, here's the Black Rainbow version, with only 100 copies printed.
-------------------------------------------------------
14-15 O-Pee-Chee Red Border Tim Thomas
Stepping things up again is the Red Border parallel. These cards were only available through a Canada-exclusive wrapper redemption program. They don't have a stated print run, but I would estimate that they are a little tougher to find than the Black Rainbow parallels.
-------------------------------------------------------
14-15 O-Pee-Chee Retro Blank Back Tim Thomas
Finally, I'll jump to the toughest of all O-Pee-Chee parallels -- the Retro Blank Back! Interestingly enough, this was the first one I purchased, and it was actually the first 14-15 product year card I owned. This card hit ebay within a week of the product being released, and I have yet to see another copy.
-------------------------------------------------------
TWO PACKS -- 1991-92 Parkhurst Series 1 (American)
Base Cards
Rob Pearson RC
Russell Romaniuk RC
It wouldn't be one of my mail posts without something random like this! Although these free packs of 91-92 Parkhurst aren't exactly the most interesting things in the world, I was able to find something of value -- two RCs I'll keep for my collection.
-------------------------------------------------------
13-14 Panini Totally Certified Scottie Upshall
13-14 Panini Totally Certified Jacob Markstrom
These two Totally Certified base cards were included with the Parkhurst packs, along with the next card in the mail post.
-------------------------------------------------------
13-14 Panini Totally Certified Jersey Patch Gold TC-TTH Tim Thomas (05/25)
This is a decent Tim Thomas patch card -- a nice swatch (yellow patch / white patch / black jersey) on a somewhat boring design. The one thing I do like about this set is the boldness of the colors, especially when the different versions are contrasted. I already have the Jersey Red and Prime Blue (/50) parallels.
-------------------------------------------------------
13-14 Score Signatures Tim Thomas
This card was part of the Score Signatures update set, released in Panini Rookie Anthology. The Tim Thomas card is listed as a short print, with only 75-100 copies produced. Honestly, it wasn't very hard to find -- many copies hit ebay, and it was just a matter of waiting for a price I was happy with.
-------------------------------------------------------
13-14 Score Black 665 Tim Thomas
On the other hand, the Score Black parallels -- even from the Rookie Anthology update set -- are very tough to locate! Panini did not release any odds or print run information for these cards, but they're pretty similar to things like O-Pee-Chee Retro Blank Backs and Upper Deck Victory Black parallels. This is the only copy of the Tim Thomas card that I have seen.
-------------------------------------------------------
13-14 Panini Contenders Gold Tim Thomas (098/100)
Here's a slightly easier parallel from Panini Contenders. This card doesn't look that much different from the base cards, but the front is shiny, and the card contains gold holofoil highlights.
-------------------------------------------------------
13-14 Panini Prime Holo-Silver Tim Thomas (03/50)
Speaking of holofoil, here's one of two parallels I picked up from Panini Prime.
-------------------------------------------------------
13-14 Panini Prime Holo-Gold Tim Thomas (01/10)
Here's the other one -- though, to be honest, they look almost identical. Veteran collectors will know what I mean when I refer to these as "Pacific parallels" -- outside of the print runs, a simple foil color shift is the only difference. These are not among my favorite items in this mail post.
I have yet to get the base card, which is limited to 299 copies.
-------------------------------------------------------
13-14 Panini Prime Seams Incredible Tim Thomas (01/10)
This card, however, is an example of why the rest of the Panini Prime product was thought of so highly. The card contains a swatch from the seam around the inside of the jersey collar, with the word "Reebok" perfectly centered in the oversized swatch window. This is the first of this type of card that I've owned, and it's one of the more unique entries to my Tim Thomas collection.
I also think it's neat that I have two cards numbered 01/10 from 13-14 Panini Prime.
-------------------------------------------------------
13-14 Panini Playbook Tim Thomas (054/249)
From Prime to Playbook, here's a simple base card, limited to 249 copies. I don't think Panini did enough to differentiate the Prime and Playbook base sets and parallels, which share visual elements and are numbered to similar quantities. For Playbook, the base set uses silver foil.
-------------------------------------------------------
13-14 Panini Playbook Gold Tim Thomas (09/25)
From base to parallel, here's the gold foil version of the above card.
-------------------------------------------------------
13-14 Panini Playbook Limited Edition Prime Tim Thomas (09/25)
I picked up the jersey #/99 version of this card in June. Unlike the simple memorabilia cards from Totally Certified, which were color-coded by variation, these poorly-titled "Limited Edition" jersey inserts from Playbook did not use any changed design elements at all. Outside of the swatch, the numbering, and the card's thickness, the two versions are identical.
The swatch on this card has a big yellow seam with black jersey.
-------------------------------------------------------
13-14 Panini Playbook Autobiography Tim Thomas (13/99)
I don't mind this card at all -- it's a simple hard-signed autograph, with a clean signature and a reasonable print run. It was also inexpensive, which is always a bonus.
The 1/1 parallel to this card has been on ebay a few times. Until the seller realigns his or her expectations with reality, it won't sell.
-------------------------------------------------------
13-14 Select Prizms Tim Thomas
I'm really happy that Tim Thomas was included in the Panini update sets, even if that meant that I'd have a few more cards to add to my wantlist. I think this year's Select and Prizm cards are really attractive, so I'm glad he earned a few -- while also avoiding the insane number of parallels from the original products!
I missed chances to get the Gold #/10 and Finite 1/1 versions of this card. I don't yet own the base version either.
-------------------------------------------------------
13-14 Panini Prizm Prizms Tim Thomas
The basic Prizm parallels for both of the Select and Prizm update sets were not easy to find. I would estimate that the print run is under 100 copies for each of these, but Panini didn't provide any information to help make that determination. Regardless, this is the least scarce of the Prizm update cards in my Tim Thomas collection -- I don't have the base for this one either.
-------------------------------------------------------
13-14 Panini Prizm Gold Prizms Tim Thomas (10/10)
However, I did pick up the Gold version, which is extremely bright and shiny! It's a really nice-looking card, and with only 10 copies made, it's probably one of my favorites in this entire mail post.
I also own the cracked ice parallels to both of these cards, which were released at the 2014 Spring Expo in Toronto.
-------------------------------------------------------
12-13 Panini Certified Tim Thomas (659/999)
Jumping back to the 12-13 product year, here's the Tim Thomas base card (part of the Masked Marvels subset) from 12-13 Panini Certified. This is the easiest of eight different versions of the card.
* Base #/999
* Mirror Red #/100
* Hot Box #/75
* Mirror Blue #/50
* Mirror Gold #/25 (not owned)
* Mirror Emerald #/5 (not owned)
* Mirror Black 1/1 (not owned)
* Mirror Ice Tag 1/1
-------------------------------------------------------
12-13 Panini Limited Duels Gold Tim Thomas (03/10)
This insert parallel from 12-13 Panini Limited is another extremely tough card to find, with only ten copies made. I already own the Silver #/99 version, so it's nice to have them both.
-------------------------------------------------------
11-12 The Cup Jersey Quads (08/10)
-- Tim Thomas (Black Jersey) / Zdeno Chara (White Jersey)
-- Milan Lucic (Black Jersey) / Tyler Seguin (Black Jersey)
Here's my first four-player jersey card from The Cup, with four Bruins who won the Stanley Cup in 2011. As much as it pains me to purchase a card featuring one of the few NHL players I legitimately do not like (Milan Lucic), it's a pretty impressive add for the Thomas collection.
This card is a sibling (or perhaps a cousin) to the two Cup Trios #/25 cards I already own from 11-12 -- Thomas / Krejci / Chara, and Thomas / Rask / Chara.
-------------------------------------------------------
11-12 SP Game Used Authentic Fabrics Six Jersey (4/7) (UDC113900)
-- Carey Price (Blue) / Michael Cammalleri (Red) / P.K. Subban (White)
-- Tim Thomas (Yellow) / Milan Lucic (Black) / Zdeno Chara (Black)
Acquiring this card puts an old failure of a purchase to rest -- something that was very important for me to do.
In February of this year, I acquired a copy of this card (5/7) with COA sticker number UDC113901. However, the seller had lost the COA card, and I decided to return the item for a refund. It was hard to give up on a Tim Thomas card with only seven copies printed, but I felt like I had only acquired half of what I was supposed to get.
Thankfully, many months later, two more copies showed up on ebay. One of them was listed for a ridiculous price, but this one came for just a little more than I had paid originally. I'm now happy to own a six-jersey card with five swatch colors, and only seven copies printed -- six if you exclude the one I returned!
-------------------------------------------------------
10-11 Between The Pipes Stick Save Silver Tim Thomas (1 of 24)
Moving back another season, here's a card that I'm disappointed it took me so long to get. I really like game-used stick cards, and the swatches ITG's used in the past five years have been some of the largest and most colorful I've ever seen. This Tim Thomas stick piece has three colors, aligned in horizontal stripes -- white, black, and yellow.
Comparing this card to the version from 09-10, I greatly prefer the 10-11 version. The design is slightly cleaner, and the addition of the player picture is a big improvement.
I don't believe that I've seen the Gold 1/1 parallel to this card.
-------------------------------------------------------
11-12 Dominion Printing Plates Yellow Tim Thomas (1 of 1)
Part one of the big Tim Thomas end-of-year mail extravaganza will end with a 1/1 -- my second plate from 11-12 Dominion! I also own the Magenta version. This won't rank among my favorite Tim Thomas 1/1s, but it's an important item for my collection, and closing things out with a 1/1 is fun whenever I can do it. I'm up to a total of 75 true 1/1s for my Tim Thomas collection.
-----------------
News and notes:
** Part two of the Tim Thomas post will be coming next week, along with my end-of-2014 top 10 card list.
** I also received some packs of cards for Christmas, but I'll save those in my first mail post of 2015.
That'll be it. Thanks everyone!
--Andy
http://www.thegreatzo.com/cards/
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