It's Inevitable

Cards from buckstorecards turn the heat up!

We're passed the point of no return and there's no coming back. Summer is inevitable. It's busy. It's impossible to stop. There's a lot going on right now, both in and out of the sports realm. Baseball arms are falling off, as they are wont to do. Video game consoles are being cranked out to the masses. Rock bands are doing their band things. While I have a minute to stop and take a breath, let's check out another bundle o' cards from the Dollar Store (note: not actually a dollar store.)

It's a side-by-side look at a pair of Victor Scott Stadium Club rookie cards. On the left is the sepia parallel and on the right is the base card. I'm not totally sold on Scott as being a future cornerstone of the franchise out in CF yet, but he's swiped enough bases to stick around my fantasy team's lineup at least.

Here's another pair of Cardinals cards, this time from different eras. I was surprised to learn that I didn't yet own this Co-Signers Chris Carpenter card. Cards from the '00s are starting to become tougher to come by these days.

I also landed a copy of one of these wacky Topps Tek cards. It's some sort of "blue rainbow diffractor" parallel (whatever that means) with a print run of just 75 copies.

Kwame Evans Jr. kicks off the duck-billed portion of the trade package. Evans carved out a nice role as a sixth man type last season and is expected to be back with the team's second season in the Big 10 after making it to the round of 32 in March Madness.

I also got hit up with this two-packs of Oregon autos from the 2023 Topps Chrome McDonald's All-American set. I don't have a formal collection of Oregon women's basketball player cards (yet!) aside from a very tiny amount of Sabrina Ionescu cards, but I will definitely start looking for more and more of these especially with the WNBA set to return to Portland very soon.

A 20+ CFL card?! Yes, please! McCullough took over as the lead back at Oregon towards the end of my time in Eugene, and he doesn't have many cards, so this is a treat.

Of course, this is a much newer CFL card (check the date!) of another Ducks alum. Upper Deck started "game dating" their photos in some sets back in the latter half of the '90s, and I really wish that this had become more of a common practice over the years as it's always nice to know what specific game a given photo comes from. Of course, with most of the stuff that Topps puts out these days, they've completely washed out or cropped out the backgrounds so as to make the event they came from fairly meaningless.

(New) Leaf puts out some weird stuff, but here's a perfectly colored autograph that goes quite well with the green on Breeland's uniform here.

I just discovered recently that Panini put out an "Unparalleled" brand NFL set for a number of years that closely mirrors the Revolution brand they use for basketball. I'm not sure why they chose different brand names here, but it's always tough to figure out what Panini is doing.

Speaking of which, Chris Boucher seems to be standing in front of some sort of planet-shaped energy orb here on this parallel Recon card numbered to 199.

It's a token Blues card! Shattenkirk was with the Blues during a good chunk of time in the 2010's and just announced his retirement late last year.

The last card up is one of the best, with a nice addition to my Randall Cunningham PC. This one is from 2012, but I've noticed he's found his way to some more recent checklists, which is always a nice thing.

Good Luck Ducks, Week 4: Wazzu

 

Oregon faces an early road test in the Northwest as the conference schedule begins. 

 

It still feels like summer in the Pacific Northwest, but Pac-12 conference play starts today in earnest. The Ducks are up in Pullman, WA today to take on the Washington State Cougars. The Cougs are off to a 3-0 start, with their big win coming in a squeaker at Wisconsin. Meanwhile, Oregon is feeling pretty confident today after dominating BYU in their second straight strong performance after the Georgia debacle.

We've reached the point in the season where you look around the conference and say "hey, looks like everyone is really good this year." Well, almost everyone. (Sorry, Colorado.) Of course, the Pac-12 has taken quite a beating in recent years, especially in the media. It's also been shut out of the playoffs for the past few seasons, and a couple of mediocre schools decided to leave. Also, their current TV deal is pretty dreadful. Still, this is a conference with a lot of history, and a 3-0 start by any school is nothing to sneeze at. The Cougars are known as a quarterback school and are led by Cameron Ward, a transfer from an FCS school in San Antonio (Incarnate Word). Let's hope that the Ducks continue to disrupt the passer and bat down the balls in the air.

Notes and other things:

• WSU is expecting a sellout today, which is always a good look for a rivalry game.
• The Cougars seemingly had the Ducks number for a few years there while a young Justin Herbert was still at UO, but the last three games have gone Oregon's way.
• I'm always going to feel better about playing in Pullman in September than November, when cold weather and sometimes snow is a big factor.
• I think I probably gave up my right as a Duck to talk about "Coug'ing it" after the years 2015 through 2018, but it's always going to be there somewhere in the back of my brain.
• I haven't talked a lot about Bo Nix yet, but after wanting to bleach my eyes during that first game, he's been pretty close to perfect. I'm not sure adversity is going to be his strong suit (is it anyone's?), but if he can continue to play near the level he's been at in the two victories, Oregon isn't going to lose many games.
• Big thanks to Dennis for today's card. He sent a few other really nice ones along with this one which I promise to show off soon.
• Game time is 1:00 PM PDT on FOX in Pullman. Go Ducks!