New basketball cards for a newer season.
The 2021-22 NBA season begins anew tonight! A couple of weekends ago, I actually found brand new unopened basketball cards in a retail store for maybe the second time in the past couple of years. Granted, these are 2020-21 cards, but it doesn't look like we are going to have any 2021-22 NBA cards for quite some time so we'll take what we can get.
I picked up a hanger box of Panini Select from Barnes & Noble of all places. This is the first time the set has been available at the retail level, and all of the base cards are blue instead of their normal (hobby) silver. They're not the best things I've seen, but beggars can't be choosers at this point. Let's check out what I got.
Here's a rookie and a former MVP from years ago. As you can see, the retail cards are a pretty serious blue, not just a sky blue.
A couple of LA team guys, although Williams had already moved on to the Hawks at this point.
On average, about half of the base cards were rookies.
The big base card is the rookie cover dude here.
An idiot and a Kiwi walk into a bar... there's probably a joke here, somewhere.
A couple of rookies here. Josh Green (boring name!) and Isaiah Joe (two first names!)
RJ Barrett is here on the apparently rare Courtside design along with superstar Luka.
Each hanger box promises some exclusive red, white and orange "shimmer" parallels. I was fortunate enough that two of these are team collection needs, including this rookie Elleby card.
This is the first Norman Powell card that's headed for my Blazers binders.
The third exclusive "shimmer" parallel was none other than Kristaps Prozingis.
Midseason Pacers acquisition Caris LeVert rounds out the group of shimmers.
Here's some bonus Luka!
The last two cards were color base parallels.
The blue Prizm parallel shows off the retail exclusive design a lot better than the non-Prizm cards.
Enjoy the games tonight... and the season!
I hope those shimmer cards look better in real life than on the computer screen.
ReplyDeleteI like the look of that Paschall card, though I have no idea who he is.
Doncic and Porzingis are good gets. Irving would have been.
No up to date season cards yet. This reminds me of the 70s and 80s when Basketball cards would not come out until like December or January.
ReplyDeleteAlways nice to see the Select name out there. Thanks for sharing.
ReplyDeleteWhen I got a Select baseball card in your generous box, it was the first I was aware of that it had returned.
ReplyDeleteI'd like to think Duncan Robinson's parents were huge Spurs fans. :)
ReplyDeleteThanks for showing off the cards!