deepbluejacket
Verified Trader,
This is the 2nd case of 1990-91 Pro Set Series I that I've broken, the first being in 2013 or so. And truth be told, I broke this in 2017 or 2018, but I didn't sort it and put it away until this week. And let me tell you, putting a case of Pro Set away is no small chore. Each case has 20 boxes in it, and each box has 36 packs of roughly 15 cards each. That's over 10000 cards.
Why break a case of Pro Set?
It's kind of like playing the lottery. Boxes can be had for under $10 each - shipped! - and I've been able to secure cases for $125 or so all told. The Stanley Cup hologram is the main prize. For an investment of $8 or so, you can pull a $300 card. Depending on the condition and the timing, it can go for a lot more, but not much less than $150. And there are FIVE THOUSAND of them. I repeat, FIVE THOUSAND. The trouble is, no one knows how many cases there are. It wouldn't surprise me to learn there are 50000, which puts a hologram at 1 out of 10 cases.
Additionally, there is a shot at a rare variant. This series has scarce errors and scarce corrections. The furor around the Paul Gillis bloody nose error had subsided, but it's still a solid $40-60 card. Again, depending on who's looking when you make it available, other cards can pull in decent returns. A Ray Bourque correct sold for $47 this year before a different seller unleashed a batch of them to cool the market.
Is there anything that distinguishes an error box from a correct box?
Not that I am aware. There are no marks on either the case of box that I've seen. But the packs can tell a story. Per Sal Barry at puckjunk.com, Pro Set used a 'silver lining' on the first runs, which prevent you from seeing through the pack. Later runs are transparent. A silver lining pack is far more likely to contain errors, while the transparent is more likely to be corrections. But there is no hard and fast rule. Cases, boxes, and yes, even packs (albeit very messed up ones) can return both variants of a card.
Case Break
This case had transparent packs, and true to form, it contained many corrections and no rare errors. Unfortunately, it was not correct enough. The best correct cards were of Phil Bourque, Brian Bellows, and the two Kurris.
Worse, this case had many boxes with bad distribution patterns. A well packaged box is stratified - each slot in the pack should represent one of 27 cards and only those 27 cards should appear in that slot. But one of those slots was missing in many boxes with a different slot appearing twice. This led to extreme shortages of some players. So extreme that the case yielded NO complete sets.
I repeat, there was no complete set in the entire case as there were 0 copies of Ulf Samuelsson. In what is likely coincidence, there are only 6 Joe Nieuwendyk AS cards in this case - the same amount as my first case. I do not believe this implies a short print - just bad luck. (Average case count per card is around 27 copies.)
There was no hologram, which now puts me around 0 for 50 boxes. (Maybe more, I don't know how much I opened back in 1990-92.)
But there was very slim silver lining. As I mentioned back when I cracked case #1, I encountered a strange variant in the bio of the Duane Sutter corrected card. The corrected card tells us that Sutter retired in the "off-season." But 5 copies printed it as "off- season", while the other 8 lacked the space.
This case also had many Sutter corrected cards:
"off-season": 35 (seen above)
"off- season": 3
"off season": 1
Yup, now there's a non-hyphen version! Is it a print variation? [sighs] I don't know. It seems ridiculous in the extreme for Pro Set to have pulled a Billy Ripken trying to 'correct' this mistake, but I don't have any other examples - in over 25000 cards - of a hyphen dropping.
In any event, I'm keeping it.
So, basically a dud case. But don't let it discourage you. A box of 1990 Series 1 is a fun little gamble that won't set you back, and unlike me, you can just throw the cards directly into the trash can with little remorse. There's always more of it. I suspect future human settlements on Mars will find random boxes of this product on it. It breeds in the dark.
Mike
Why break a case of Pro Set?
It's kind of like playing the lottery. Boxes can be had for under $10 each - shipped! - and I've been able to secure cases for $125 or so all told. The Stanley Cup hologram is the main prize. For an investment of $8 or so, you can pull a $300 card. Depending on the condition and the timing, it can go for a lot more, but not much less than $150. And there are FIVE THOUSAND of them. I repeat, FIVE THOUSAND. The trouble is, no one knows how many cases there are. It wouldn't surprise me to learn there are 50000, which puts a hologram at 1 out of 10 cases.
Additionally, there is a shot at a rare variant. This series has scarce errors and scarce corrections. The furor around the Paul Gillis bloody nose error had subsided, but it's still a solid $40-60 card. Again, depending on who's looking when you make it available, other cards can pull in decent returns. A Ray Bourque correct sold for $47 this year before a different seller unleashed a batch of them to cool the market.
Is there anything that distinguishes an error box from a correct box?
Not that I am aware. There are no marks on either the case of box that I've seen. But the packs can tell a story. Per Sal Barry at puckjunk.com, Pro Set used a 'silver lining' on the first runs, which prevent you from seeing through the pack. Later runs are transparent. A silver lining pack is far more likely to contain errors, while the transparent is more likely to be corrections. But there is no hard and fast rule. Cases, boxes, and yes, even packs (albeit very messed up ones) can return both variants of a card.
Case Break
This case had transparent packs, and true to form, it contained many corrections and no rare errors. Unfortunately, it was not correct enough. The best correct cards were of Phil Bourque, Brian Bellows, and the two Kurris.
Worse, this case had many boxes with bad distribution patterns. A well packaged box is stratified - each slot in the pack should represent one of 27 cards and only those 27 cards should appear in that slot. But one of those slots was missing in many boxes with a different slot appearing twice. This led to extreme shortages of some players. So extreme that the case yielded NO complete sets.
I repeat, there was no complete set in the entire case as there were 0 copies of Ulf Samuelsson. In what is likely coincidence, there are only 6 Joe Nieuwendyk AS cards in this case - the same amount as my first case. I do not believe this implies a short print - just bad luck. (Average case count per card is around 27 copies.)
There was no hologram, which now puts me around 0 for 50 boxes. (Maybe more, I don't know how much I opened back in 1990-92.)
But there was very slim silver lining. As I mentioned back when I cracked case #1, I encountered a strange variant in the bio of the Duane Sutter corrected card. The corrected card tells us that Sutter retired in the "off-season." But 5 copies printed it as "off- season", while the other 8 lacked the space.
This case also had many Sutter corrected cards:
"off-season": 35 (seen above)
"off- season": 3
"off season": 1
Yup, now there's a non-hyphen version! Is it a print variation? [sighs] I don't know. It seems ridiculous in the extreme for Pro Set to have pulled a Billy Ripken trying to 'correct' this mistake, but I don't have any other examples - in over 25000 cards - of a hyphen dropping.
In any event, I'm keeping it.
So, basically a dud case. But don't let it discourage you. A box of 1990 Series 1 is a fun little gamble that won't set you back, and unlike me, you can just throw the cards directly into the trash can with little remorse. There's always more of it. I suspect future human settlements on Mars will find random boxes of this product on it. It breeds in the dark.
Mike
