So Hurricane Irene has come and gone and hopefully everyone who was in its path made it through safely. I personally was super lucky in that my house escaped 100% unscathed. I think the worse thing that happened was some of my garbage cans blew over, spilling grass clippings everywhere. Things in my corner of the world are mostly alright but a lot of the areas mass transit is still down and my kids day care is closed due to lack of power. I guess being forced to take a day off of work and stay home with my kids is not the worse thing to come out of a hurricane.

Anyway, I was just telling you about some interesting junk wax cards that I picked up for a mere 18¢ each off of Sportlots recently. Well, those weren’t the only cards I snagged for a mere 18¢ each. I also got a bunch of cards that I needed for my Mets collection.

If you recall, a lot of the 80’s/90’s cards that I got as part of this pick up were rookie cards of stars and semi-stars. You might think that was why I grabbed this guy. It’s not always all about Roy Oswalt. Sometimes it’s about Pat Strange. I needed him for my 2001 Mets team set. I must admit though, I don’t mind having Roy Oswalt’s rookie. Kind of like how I don’t mind having Tony Oliva’s rookie.

I was also able to kill of a few Mets team sets that have been haunting me for a while.

2007 Topps Update was one of those sets. Here’s some nice All-Star cards, which were among the cards that I needed to kill this particular set.

I was also able to polish off my 2009 team set.

I almost actually finished this one off by ripping packs alone, but it started to get to that point where out of 12 cards  that came in the pack, 11 or 12 of them were doubles. I just wasn’t able to pull these final 2. Normally, I don’t mind buying singles to polish off sets, but there’s something satisfying about finishing off a set just by buying packs. It’s a little bit frustrating to get so close and not be able to finish.

I also put a nice little dent in the 2010 Topps Update Mets cards that I still needed, including these 2 Ike Davis cards.

For the most part I find those Rookie Debut cards a little unnecessary, but in the case of Ike, I kind of like it just because I very clearly remember watching that game. I happened to be on vacation down in Florida but I knew Ike was supposed to play his first game and it was kind of a bitch to find a bar that had the Mets game on. It was the first time since Reyes that I remember being excited about watching a Mets game because a prospect was due to play. It also happened to be my wife’s birthday. Eagle eyed viewers will notice that Ike is sporting #42. Normally Jackie Robinson Day is on April 15, which is the date he made his debut, but the Mets happened to be on the road so they weren’t able to host their own Jackie Robinson Day until they returned to Citi Field on the 19th.

I also got my first taste of the 2011 Topps flagship set. That’s right. I haven’t bought any 2011 Topps until August.

My general impression of this set, as if anyone cares at this point, is kind of positive. I sort of dig the circle with the team logo but do not like the curved bar with the players name. Judging by the very small sample size that I have (which are all Mets of course) and whatever I’ve seen roaming around the web, it seems the photography in this years set is pretty damn good, which in my book almost makes up for a crappy design.

Finally, I was bale to fill in some blanks as far as Mets retro cards.

The Jason Bay, much like Jason Bay himself since he joined the Mets, is pretty uninspiring and little boring. But hey, I needed it. The 2 Gypsy Queen cards, however are pretty awesome. They’re actually my first exposure to Gypsy Queen and i’ve got to say, it’s pretty nice. Whatever Photoshop filter they used on the photos is pretty well done and I like the tombstone design. It’s just a little more understated than the other so-called tombstone design, but I like it.

You know, sometimes I get so caught up in the whole vintage thing that I feel like I tend to ignore newer cards, and sometime forget that they can pretty cool too. I think what makes them particularly cool is that the guys on them are (for the most part) still on the team, and win or lose, I’m actively rooting for them. It’s quite a different card collecting experience than amassing cards of guys who I’ve never even seen play. I mean as much as I’ve been conditioned to love Ed Kranepool because I grew up a Mets fan, he was long gone by the time I was old enough to follow baseball. Same thing with other Mets idols like Seaver, Buddy Harrelson, Cleon Jones, Jerry Koosman and Tommie Agee. As much as I think all the cards of those guys are cooler than modern cards, just the fact that the modern ones have all the Wrights and Reyes’ and Davis’ and Dudas makes them pretty cool, too, even if they don’t look as good.

Tags: 2001 Topps, 2007 Topps Update, 2009 Topps, 201 Topps Update, 2011 Gypsy Queen, 2011 Topps, 2011 Topps Heritage, Adam Dunn, Angel Pagan, Brian Schneider, Carlos Beltran, Carlos Delgado, David Wright, Dillon Gee, Ike Davis, Jason Bay, Jon Rauch, Jose Reyes, Pat Strange, R.A. Dickey, Roy Oswalt, Ryan Howard
Filed Under: Some Cards by slangon
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