TTM Success Misty May Treanor

I think like everybody on the planet I watched a ton of the Olympics this year.  And of course one of the best parts of the Olympics is the women's beach volleyball.  It doesn't hurt that you have one of the best pairs playing for you country and that at least one of those woman signs through the mail pretty consistantly. I actually saw Justin's success over at his blog Justin's World a few months back and new that I had to send to Misty May-Treanor in my next round of TTM's.  

I dug through my Topps Olympic cards to see if I had an Misty May's and low and behold I had two.  So I wrote a nice letter and sent them off in early October and just got them back Monday.

TTM Stats
Date Sent 10/10/12
Date Recieved 11/5/12

Address used
Misty May-Treanor
2892 N Bellflower Suite #482
Long Beach, CA 90815-1125

Thanks Misty!!

Chips and Salsa: Part II - The non-Vegas Chips

I figured before I get to the meat of my Casino Chip collection, which is the Vegas chips, I'd show off my non-Vegas chips.  These are cool because unlike their Vegas counterparts they have different imagery one both sides.  The Vegas chips have the same image on both sides.

First up we have the French Lick Resort and Casino in French Lick, Indiana.  The only Indiana casino I've been too.  My wife is originally from Indiana and still has a lot of family there.  On one trip down we went down to French Lick to check out the West Baden Springs Hotel resort, which is really cool and also spent a couple hours playing craps at the casino a few miles away. I was the only one who made any money as my wife decided to just play slots.

Next up we have the Lac Vieux Desert Casino in Watersmeet, Michigan.  The hotel casino is also really close to the where the Watersmeet ghost lights appear.  I've only seen them once when I was in college and to be honest they look like someones front porch light in the distance, but did change color and then disappear.  Spooky.

This chip might be a table game $1. It's the same on both sided.

My only Arizona chip is from Camp Verde near Sedona where the wife and I spent a week earlier this year for our belated honeymoon.

Potawotomi Casino and Bingo in lovely Carter, Wisconsin.

And lastly we have a gaming token from the St Croix Casino in Turtle Lake, WI.  I  thought I had a table chip for this one too, but I couldn't find it.

Next up a run down of my Vegas chips.

Go Vote!!

Voted on the way into work to day to get it out of the way.  Feels good.  I'm not bragging, but I've voted in every Presidential election since I turned 18 and I vote in every local election I'm in town for.

So I implore you to exercise your civil responsibility and go vote.  I don't care where you stand, who you like or dislike, but if you don't vote you don't get to bitch.

Keep calm and relax no matter who wins it'll be ok.  Unless the world really ends Dec. 21st then it really doesn't matter at all.

One of my other collections, Chips and salsa anyone?

Like most collector's I have a couple small side collections.  One of those is Casino chips.  This started off with me playing poker.  Back when I lived in the small Alaskan town of Haines there wasn't a whole lot to do at night and a couple of the bars offered poker.  At one time you could almost play poker 7 nights a week in town.  Well the Harbor Bar got in on the nation wide poker league World Tavern Poker.  As luck would have it  I actually met my wife playing poker there.  Anyway, the league has 4 seasons and every 2 seasons they have an open. One usually in Atlantic City and the other in Las Vegas.  I was lucky enough to have won a few bar championships when I lived down there and the bar owner Mike use to put up 500 bucks for your travel and accomodations down to the open. For winning the bar championship or tournament of champions you also won the right to the big tournament at the open and the winner won a seat at the main event at the World Series of Poker. Not a bad deal right?  Well I never won the seat, but I have made some money playing poker.  Since I moved back to Anchorage my poker playing has been limited. .  So having been down to Vegas a few times, as well as, frequenting the casinos in my home state of Wisconsin and else where I started saving dollar chips from the different casinos I've been too.  I also started collecting the promotional chips and card savers that went along with the hobby.  So I thought I'd share that collection with you.  I'm going to break it up as I've got quite a few chips.

First I'll start with the World Tavern Poker chips and card savers I have.

A card saver is a chip you put on top of your cards to protect them from being mucked.  People use all sorts of things for card savers, but a lot of players have special chips they like to use. This is my 2008 Tournament of Champions card saver I won.

Here is my 2007 TOC Championship card saver. I also won a seat in Vegas winning this tournament too.

When you get to the open you get a goodie bag and inside are all sorts of things and usually they have at least one card saver made especially for the open.  This was the 2007 one.

And here is the 2008 open card saver.  Every open has a theme.  That year it was the Olympic Games.

Bars that host WTP have to pay the organization, but also get a kit every year with prizes and such too.  In 2007 one of the goodies that the bars got to give out where these Tournament champion chips.

Some years it was t-shirts and some years nothing.
When you go to the opens, there are lots of chip giveaways and exclusive chips to be found.  Some come in your goodie bag, others are given away as promotions by sponsors, some you get by entering tournaments and some you have to do something to get, like yelling "I SURVIVED THE WTP OPEN"

Which was the 2007 theme.

In 2009 the theme was the Wizard of Oddz and obvious take on the Wizard of Oz and a western theme.

This chip you got if you were in the National Championship tournament.

WTP also had some promos too.  Like this one touting its new online poker tourneys hosted by the All in Club.

You got this chip for signing with the Spade Club. I can't even remember what that was.

And there you have it.  I haven't gotten any more WTP chips since 2009. It's still going stong, but I just checked and there aren't any WTP tourneys in Anchorage anymore.

Next my non-Vegas Casino chips.

TTM Success Randy Couture

Got another great TTM return a couple days ago.  I'm not a huge MMA or UFC fan, but there are a few names I know and Randy Couture is one of them.  I also happened to have both his 2010 and 2011 Goodwin Champions cards laying around and decided why not send to him.

TTM Stats
Date Sent 9/27/12
Date Recieved: 11/1/12

Address used
Randy Couture
5620 Benevento Ct
Las Vegas, NV 89141

Thanks Randy.

2012 Topps Heritage High Number box

Wait is the party over already?  Yep I'm late again. But to be honest I was out of town when this came out.

But since I'm a sports card blogger I figure I should weigh in on this.  First off I like the idea of the throwback of just one small box set of update cards, excuse me, high number cards.  Back when Topps didn't throw out a whole extra set full of fluff at the end of the season.  But a few things bother me. First the price tag. $100 bucks is insane for a 100 cards. Yes I realize that they justify it by throwing in an autograph card and limiting it to only 1000 sets, but set builders are grinding their teeth right now.  Second do we really even need a heritage high number series. Didn't the set already contain 75 SP high number cards? Although I do like the idea of this over a whole extra release packed out with Update series cards like they did in 2008 and 2009.

And the fact that this product is already sold out on the Topps Online Store doesn't surprise me and this stuff doesn't even ship till next Tuesday  On the secondary market, sets without the auto are going for about 75 bucks and with auto about 150.

Sadly I decided to try and put this set together. Mainly because I really like the 1963 design.  Will I be going after this set?  Maybe, but not now. I'll wait a few years when I can pick up the set for a fraction of the cost. But to be honest since the numbering continues after the base set, but adds a U to the number I'm tempted to just write it off.  And while my first reaction when I read about this was anger, I've mellowed.  I think the reason I was so mad was as a set builder this just made Heritage, which is a tough set to build with the 75 SP's, even more expensive.  As a team set builder there is only one Brewer in the set so that shouldn't set me back too much.  Sorry I'm kinda rambling.

I'm not sure how I like this online exclusive Topps thing.  On the one hand it's open to everyone.  It's similar to exclusives you can get with other collectibles, like action figures and matchbox cars. And Topps has a monopoly on baseball cards so it can do whatever it wants.  I'm curious if this set counts against the number of products it's allowed to release with it's exclusive contract.

As for me I'm done for the year.  There are a few more sets coming out I'll chase team sets for, but I'm not going to try and build anymore full sets.  Although I'm excited about Topps Magic coming out in a release again, but it doesn't hit till January.

Alright I'm done. If you've read all the way down here, congratulation. Now get back to work!

cb out

Cynicalbuddha's Top 100 #70

Thought I'd add another entry into the Top 100.  I actually picked this up over a month ago and posted about it over at my Rollie Fingers blog.

I've yet to attend a National, although I'm trying to get my wife to agree to head down for next years in Chicago.

Anywho with out further ado.

#70 on the Top 100 (which is in no particular order)

2012 Leaf National Rollie Fingers Autograph card BA-RF1 #d 5/5

I picked up the base card almost right after the convention and I've seen at least one more of these autos out on the bay. But I think I got this card for a steal.

Here's what the base card looks like. It's very similar, but Leaf actually moves the name down to make space for the sticker auto.