Organizing my Player Collections

I have a question that I hope some people can help me answer. How should I organize my player collections? So far I have determined that:

In toploaders will be:

-Autos

-Jersey cards

-Serial #d

-RC cards of the ones likely to make the hall of fame

In semi-hard protectors will be:

-all other RC cards

-nice inserts

-higher end base cards

-SPs

-Variations and parallels

However, this is where the conflict arrises. I currently have all other cards of the players that I collect in individual penny sleeves. They are then organized by the priority in which I collect the player, and then finally by year.

This makes for a disjointed looking collection that is difficult to view. How should I change this?

I have formulated a couple ideas:

The first being: Keep the organization similar except have the cards in 9 pocket pages rather than penny sleeves.

Advantages: Cards are easier to view, I can leave blank spaces to indicate where cards that I am missing should be, and players can be separated by binder.

Disadvantages: Still reasonably disjointed, sets may end up divided across two pages in cases where the player has multiple cards in the set.

The second being: Using 9 pocket pages and binders, divide my collection predominantly by set and year rather than by player. Then organize the cards of each set by priority in which I collect the player.

For example: I would have a binder for 2009. This binder would be divided into sections for each of the 2009 sets. Then within the section for each set I would place all of the Derek Jeter cards first, the Ichiro cards after those, the Joe Mauer cards after those and so forth.

Advantages: Unified look, easy to identify which cards I need, spaces can be left for players that I am missing from each given set.

Disadvantages: The collection for each player will be scattered across multiple binders

I am leaning toward the second idea for the simple reason that this organization will serve only for the base cards of lower end sets. These are the cards that I don't care to "show off" as much and therefore it hardly matters that not all of the Jeters or Ichiros, or Mauers will remain together because the more rare and flashy ones will remain in their nicer protectors, and will be sorted by player.

What does everyone think? Questions? Comments? Suggestions? Is anyone confused?

A Merry Christmas to Me

For Christmas I was given a total of FOUR hobby boxes! I was sooo excited for every one of them. Before Christmas this year I had never before opened a hobby box, so you could imagine my sheer joy to now have 4 to open. They were all boxes that I had really wanted; however some of the turn outs were better than others.

The first of these boxes was 2007 UD Masterpieces. A year ago I had opened a blaster of this set and instantly fell in love with these cards. Hopefully I would come close to finishing the set with this hobby box.

I'm just going to show pics of the bordered parallels, the game used and the autos because I have a lot of other posts to get up. But I will be posting a needs list for this set very shortly.

The extra large box topper:

Wow, I had no clue that they were autographed!!! That's awesome! Sure, I don't have too much interest in Andy LaRoche but I really like this card. The painting looks that much better when enlarged to this size.

Btw, you can see the edge of a regular sized toploader on the right side of this picture, which will give you an idea of how large this card is.

I got a total of 5 green bordered parallels.

These are 3 that I was particularly excited for:

Tim Lincecum RC

Phil Hughes RC

and a Reggie Jackson

These are the other 2:

Jered Weaver

and Ryan Howard

I also got a blue sparkly bordered parallel

(not actually sure what this parallel version is called)

Delmon Young (RC) #d/50

Then there is the Auto:

Huh? I have never heard of Justin Hampson before. I love this auto set so I was disappointed to get an auto of someone that I had never heard of before. Oh well, them's the breaks

Ever since buying a Mariano game used card from this set on ebay I had been itching to get my hands on some more of them.

Darn, Scott Rolen is a little less than exciting pull for me. He was a premiere third baseman for a while but has since dropped off.

This one is pretty cool though, Gary Sheffield on the Yanks with a pinstripe right down the middle. Too bad they write that he is on the Tigers, kinda ruins the card for me a lil bit.

Woohooo, Ryan Zimmerman baby. I collect this guy. I was really happy to get this card!

Overall I thought that this box was definitely worth it. Great set of base cards and a couple nice hits. Even though it was a gift, I would definitely say that this box was worth the $45 that it was marked at on dacardworld.com

Thank you Mom and Dad

I will be posting a needs list shortly for the remaining basecards that I need to complete the set. In that post I'll be certain to include pictures of how great the cards in this set are.

Catch-up

I have a ton of stuff to post. There are several trade packages to post not to mention that I still need to get the return packages in the mail. My family is non-stop action during the holidays so forgive me when it comes to falling behind. I also had an awesome christmas filled with many baseball cards. Can't wait to show them off to everyone. Tonight I plan to have a trade post and a hobby box break post for you. Stay tuned

Calling all Diamond Kings

I'm kind of embarrassed for needing to post this want list because these are some of the most readily available baseball cards ever but here goes.

Donruss 1988: 1, 2, 3, 6-11, 13-17, 19, 20, 21, 23, 24

Donruss 1989: 1, 3-11, 13-20, 23, 24, 25, 26

Donruss 1990: 1-6, 9, 11, 12, 13, 15, 16, 17, 18, 22-26

Donruss 1991: 1-4, 6-11, 14, 19, 22, 23, 26

I'd love to trade for these cards if you have them available

Need List: 2008 Topps Wal-Mart Dick Perez

I have a huge pile of 2008 Topps so I'm trying to avoid buying another blaster, but I'm still trying to put together the rest of this small set of inserts. My mistake was buying loosie packs instead of going with the blasters right off the bat.

Here is one of the cards that I need:

The ones I need are in red, while the ones that I have are in black

WMDP1 Manny Ramirez

WMDP2 Cameron Maybin

WMDP3 Ryan Howard

WMDP4 David Ortiz

WMDP5 Tim Lincecum

WMDP6 David Wright

WMDP7 Mickey Mantle

WMDP8 Joba Chamberlain (on its way in a trade)

WMDP9 Ichiro

WMDP10 Prince Fielder

I only need three more, help a brother out and offer a trade

Mail from JD's Wild Cardz

Finally I'm back with a new post. Finals last week were killer but I made out pretty well overall. And of course as soon as I got home pa dukes had a pile of yard work for me to do. But I have taken the time to become reacquainted with my "home collection" and now I'll be posting a bunch of stuff. First we have some mail to post.

The other day I received a package in the mail from Mike from JD's Wild Cardz. I was only expecting a Roy Halladay jersey card, but it ended up being a hugely generous package. Let's get right to it then.

Four cards to add to PC's. I was actually surprised to find that I kinda like the UD Icons cards. It never before had struck me as something to delve into, but I'm certainly happy to have them for my PC's.

Three more cards to add to my 2009 Turkey Red collection. Slowly but surely I will collect them all. I really like the Wold Series Heroes cards below those. I have the 5 card set commemorating Roger Clemen's 300th win in this card design but never actually realized that there were more cards to the whole set. Always love to see DiMaggio, Gehrig and Mariano especially as world series heroes. Cool stuff

Then of course there were some cards from some of my favorite sets. The Ichiro will go toward building the 07 Masterpieces set, but the Jeter, Crawford, and Mantle will go to my player collections. I really like that Mantle insert, really nice looking card.

These were definitely exciting cause they are players I collect plus they will fill holes in my Goodwin collection. This way, if I ever throw up my hands and decide goodwin was too tedious to complete, I'll still have these beauties. I've bought 16 packs of goodwin and I down even have 45 base cards, and that includes the 6 from this package. That is an average of about 2.5 base cards per pack! Isn't that a lil ridiculous? Never mind the fact that I'll eventually start pulling crazy amounts of doubles. That's where you guys come in...

These cards are so nice looking! Way better than the Sweet Spot base cards of the past. All players that I love to collect.

And then of course, the finale....

Woah, awesome. Quad swatch #d/400 of Verlander, Billingsley, Carmona, and Chamberlain! Not to mention the Halladay and the Kendrick swatches. Great stuff!

Mike, Thanks so much for the cards man. Some really great stuff. It might take me a little while to pay back the quad swatch, but I'll definitely get you something nice. If for some reason you haven't seen Mike's blog, JD's Wild Cardz, go check it out.

I should have some more posts later today, and then some more throughout the week. Stay tuned

Mail from Chris OK

Thanks to Chris OK of Budget Baseball Cardboarding, I have completed my first trade. Chris helped me get my blog started and was the first to subscribe, so I owe him a big thanks. I sent him a package a while back and this what he sent in return.

Of course when it first arrived at my school mailbox I was away on thanksgiving break so it was great to return to find a package waiting for me. So here it is (it's a beauty):

2 Ichiros

1 Roy Halladay

3 Evan Longoria

This is pure generosity because Chris collects both Longoria and Ichiro, I sure hope he had doubs. I particularly like the Longoria Goudey; the Black border and the Halladay are also pretty cool.

1 Ryan Zimmerman

1 Mariano Rivera

1 Nick Markakis

3 Joba Chamberlain

More great stuff. I really like the Joba Heritage Chrome and the Mini Joba. I was really lacking when it came to my Joba Chamberlain collection but not any more.

Mantle, A-Rod and Hughes for my PCs

Chris must have seen my comment on his post about the Clemente card, cause here it is. This is one of my favorite cards of 2008. Awesome photo of an all-time great and great printing quality to boot. Can't get much better than that in terms of base cards.

In the top row we have some of my favorite Yankees ever! Tino, Paulie, and Pettitte. Gotta love Paul ONeill's intensity. The Justice art card is also a great touch; being an artist I dig these type cards.

Chris must have psychic powers cause this package hit the spot. He did a good job with variety, for some reason I always like to see a little bit of everything. Chris, come mid December when I'm home be on the lookout for another package. I'll have some good stuff for your player collections.