This Is Cool

I went online shopping. 

I'm really bad at showing off my online purchases, but then I came across this classic card from the 1980-81 Topps NBA set that just needed to be shown. Kobe Bryant's father and Kareem on the same card! This is a cool card. But of course, I just snagged this (and a bunch of others) from COMC for the man on the far right, one Calvin Natt. Natt was one of the Blazers leading scorers when I was a child until he was dealt in a controversial 5-for-1 trade that brought Kiki Vandeweghe to Portland. Natt was popular, Fat Lever was popular, Wayne Cooper was popular... hell, if you put on a Blazers jersey, you were popular. That's just how it worked. Clyde Drexler would soon emerge as the franchise star for the next decade, so the trade is mostly just a footnote at this point.

More cards! These are mostly of the Blazers variety, because I've been working on organizing this particular part of my collection lately. I think now is probably the time to start picking up Brandon Roy stuff on the cheap. Roy's #7 is unofficially retired by the team as far as I can tell, and if there was any justice in the world he would have played long enough to have it be an official retirement.

I don't know this dude, but that's a cool pose.

I guess this is kind of, sort of the hoops equivalent of Diamond Kings. Maybe that's what Panini was going for here.

I couldn't afford the Stadium Club Beam Team inserts as a kid, and one of the best things about shopping as an adult is finding that sort of stuff that was just out of reach in your youth.

While perusing Blazers cards of yesteryear, I'm discovering some of the oddball releases I missed out on back in the day. I'm pretty sure if any SkyBox so-called prototypes had been available at any local card shows way back when, the Blazers cards would have been priced at something like $50. This definitely set me back less than a buck.

Obligatory Dame card! He's been tearing it up lately as the team makes a late push for the last playoff spot. This is the Prizm version of his Prizm card, which is kind of like a Refractor with a redundant name.

They aren't the most attractive things in the world, but I really like these insert cards in the 2016-17 Hoops set, documenting last season's playoffs all across the league. Last season's Most Improved Player has improved again in 2016-17.

A Cardinal?! Baseball? How did this get in there? Actually, I'm quite sure I bought this by mistake. O'Neill has been out of pro ball for a year or two now. This is numbered to 75, though.

Theo Ratliff blocked a whole bunch of shots upon arriving from Atlanta in the early part of last decade. I found him to be an interesting inclusion in a somewhat recent (2013-14) set. It was a cheap certified autograph from a guy whose cards I don't have too many of.

More 1990-91 SkyBox weirdness. I don't remember these minis at all, but they are roughly the size of those old Topps Cracker Jack baseball cards from around the same time period and were apparently available through some Canadian food snack package.

Dave Twardzik was the starting point guard on the Blazers sole championship team and his number is hanging in the rafters at the (formerly known as) Rose Garden just across from the arena where said championship was one. This card is from a current season release. I really like that Panini has a diverse selection of retired players in their products, unlike a certain company with a certain exclusive baseball card license.

With any chance I get to buy cards from COMC, I make sure to pick up at least one old Star card. They are expensive, and it's getting next to impossible to find anything I need that sells for less than $1 -- my usual threshold for buying single cards.

Finally, here's a Waino Topps rookie card. I didn't even own it. I don't even own the Chrome version of this. What is wrong with me? Still, I thought it best to go out on a baseball note. Opening Day/Night/Whatever is less than a week away!