Another Project: Randall Update?!

Somehow in the span of a week, we have another Randall Cunningham 2021 Topps Allen & Ginter update. 

 

Thanks to another TCDB trade, I am able to check one more card off of the list. It's a tad bit more boring than last week's, although the Chrome minis look pretty nice as they're all refractors by default.

I've been extremely passive in this effort since my initial excitement over seeing the cards on the checklists, but I think it's probably time I hit eBay and maybe initiate some trades on my own.

Randall Cunningham #277 - FULL CHECKLIST: (bold means I own it)

• Base
• Silver Foil (Hot Box)
• Glossy (1/1)
• Mini Base
• Mini A&G Back
• Mini Black Border
• Mini No Number (print run: 50)
• Mini Brooklyn Back (/25)
• Mini Wood (1/1)
• Mini Glossy (1/1)
• Mini Framed Printing Plate(s) (1/1)
• X Base
• X Mini Black
• X Mini Red (/5)
• X Mini Silver (1/1)
• Chrome
• Chrome Refractor
• Chrome Blue Refractor (/150)
• Chrome Gold Refractor (/50)
• Chrome Green Refractor (/99)
• Chrome Orange Refractor (/25)
• Chrome Red Refractor (/5)
• Chrome Superfractor (/1)
• Chrome X-Fractor
• Chrome Mini
• Chrome Mini Gold Refractor (/50)
• Chrome Mini Orange Refractor (/25)
• Chrome Mini Red Refractor (/5)
• Chrome Mini Superfractor (/1)

Randall Cunningham - AUTOGRAPH CHECKLIST: (bold means I own it)

• Dual Autographs (w/ Vashti Cunningham) DA-CC
• Framed Mini Non-Baseball Autographs FMA-RC
• Framed Mini Non-Baseball Autographs Red Ink FMA-RC
• Framed Mini Non-Baseball Autographs Black Frame (/25) FMA-RC
• X Silver Frame Black Mini Non-Baseball Autographs FMA-RC
• X Silver Frame Black Mini Non-Baseball Autographs Black Frame Black FMA-RC (/10)
• X Silver Frame Black Mini Non-Baseball Autographs Silver Frame Gold Ink FMA-RC (/5)

Project: Randall (August 2023 Update!)

 

The latest update on my quest to own all of the Randall Cunningham cards from 2021 Topps Allen & Ginter. 

 

It's been quite awhile since the last update, but thanks to the magic of TCDB, I have acquired a pretty big one. Behold - the mini gold Chrome refractor!

I really need to get to work on this.

Randall Cunningham #277 - FULL CHECKLIST: (bold means I own it)

• Base
• Silver Foil (Hot Box)
• Glossy (1/1)
• Mini Base
• Mini A&G Back
• Mini Black Border
• Mini No Number (print run: 50)
• Mini Brooklyn Back (/25)
• Mini Wood (1/1)
• Mini Glossy (1/1)
• Mini Framed Printing Plate(s) (1/1)
• X Base
• X Mini Black
• X Mini Red (/5)
• X Mini Silver (1/1)
• Chrome
• Chrome Refractor
• Chrome Blue Refractor (/150)
• Chrome Gold Refractor (/50)
• Chrome Green Refractor (/99)
• Chrome Orange Refractor (/25)
• Chrome Red Refractor (/5)
• Chrome Superfractor (/1)
• Chrome X-Fractor
• Chrome Mini (in transit)
• Chrome Mini Gold Refractor (/50)
• Chrome Mini Orange Refractor (/25)
• Chrome Mini Red Refractor (/5)
• Chrome Mini Superfractor (/1)

Randall Cunningham - AUTOGRAPH CHECKLIST: (bold means I own it)

• Dual Autographs (w/ Vashti Cunningham) DA-CC
• Framed Mini Non-Baseball Autographs FMA-RC
• Framed Mini Non-Baseball Autographs Red Ink FMA-RC
• Framed Mini Non-Baseball Autographs Black Frame (/25) FMA-RC
• X Silver Frame Black Mini Non-Baseball Autographs FMA-RC
• X Silver Frame Black Mini Non-Baseball Autographs Black Frame Black FMA-RC (/10)
• X Silver Frame Black Mini Non-Baseball Autographs Silver Frame Gold Ink FMA-RC (/5)

The Night Owl Express

Another smooth @nightowlcards delivery. 

 

Hall of Fame blogger Night Owl Cards has sent me many, many envelopes of things over the years. The cards we're looking at today came over here back in November, as I slowly but surely catch up on a few stacks of cards that have been sitting around somewhat neglected.

The number of Topps Sapphire cards in my collection is very low, since I don't usually go after fancy versions of base cards that tend to cost more than a pack itself. I do seriously appreciate getting these in trades, though, since they're not something I'm typically going to find in a quarter box at a card show.

A whole Cardinals set with pink borders would be an interesting looking thing. The team would need to be decked out in red to really make it pop, of course.

This sure is vibrant! I am willing to bet that I have more Dylan Carlson cards with an RC logo on them than cards of many of the team's stars from the '80s. Of course, I still probably need hundreds more of them.

Noooooooooooooot! That is all.

There were a couple of cards of the retired Cardinals legend. I've always had a weird affinity towards the 2002 Victory set. I wouldn't mind opening a box someday, if that's even possible. It feels like most older unopened stuff either ended up some hoarder's basement or was opened during the pandemic.

The rainbow foil effect gives this All-Star flashback card from 2020 Topps Update a bit of a shine.

Night Owl also sent a pile of Allen & Ginter needs, as is customary. Here's a couple of non-baseball athletes on the mini black border design from way back in 2010.

The bulk of the rest of the cards came from the 2021 Ginter set. I've relied heavily on others to put together this set as well as the 2022 set. For some reason, when it's not released in summer, my enthusiasm for opening A&G blasters really tends to wane. Will this be the year that the manufacturing delays finally start to subside?

Like most baseball fans, my first recollection of Edgar Renteria was his heroic performance in the Florida Marlins first championship season. He'd later, of course, become a key player for the Cardinals.

Thanks again to the Night Owl!

More Buried Treasure

I found some more cards! 

 

I uncovered another lost pile of cards that was hanging out beneath, well, other cards. This batch of baseball players came from big Orioles fan Ryan H. I believe I reached out to Ryan over the summer because the O's were among a handful of teams where I had a glut of extra cards, and he responded to my offer with some of my needs.

Topps sometimes makes poor choices when selecting photos to be featured on their horizontal cards, and I believe this is one of those times. This is a Prizm Chrome refractor, however, so it's a nice pick-up nonetheless.

Since the Stadium Club Chrome inserts are basically indistinguishable from the Stadium Club Chrome base cards (completely different set), I'm just going to go with this being one of those. If I flipped a coin over this, I might win?

After basing a set on T-206 in 2002, the following year saw Topps release this tribute to T-205. Instead of doing something similar the next year, they seem to have dropped this idea. Eventually, the Turkey Red and Allen & Ginter sets would launch, but these days they seem more focused on cannibalizing their own designs from the past.

It's that time of year once again where I declare my hope for big things out of Jack Flaherty this season. Please, just let this happen! 

Here's one of those old Topps designs that's been beaten into the ground over the years.

Ryan also sent over a bunch of set needs, including this apparently rare People on Bicycles insert from the 2013 Allen & Ginter set. I believe this is the first one of these in my collection, and judging by prices online it might have been a case hit.

I still haven't finished off the 2009 Turkey Red inserts run, but I'm slowly inching closer and closer.

Here's a pair of Hall of Fame sluggers batting from opposing sides of the plate.

This was one of my favorite Allen & Ginter insert sets in recent times, but I felt like they included too many newer players. It's more fun when you see the older players as rookies.

Project: Randall (Update!)

A framed autograph from @flywheels updates the Collection of Cunninghams from 2021 Allen & Ginter. 

 

Thanks to a huge trade with Colbey from Affordable Group Breaks / Cardboard Collections, I finally have an update to last year's project to collect all the Randall Cunningham cards from Allen & Ginter.

Unfortunately, I'm having to add even more cards to my want list than I subtracted here, due to the release of the Allen & Ginter Chrome set. Yikes! I should really get going on this project, especially with baseball getting shut down and leaving a bitter taste in my mouth. It's probably time to focus on other things, like this.

If you happen to run into any of these cards (aside from those in bold), let me know as I'd love to own a copy.

Randall Cunningham #277 - FULL CHECKLIST: (bold means I own it)

• Base
• Silver Foil (Hot Box)
• Glossy (1/1)
• Mini Base
• Mini A&G Back
• Mini Black Border
• Mini No Number (print run: 50)
• Mini Brooklyn Back (/25)
• Mini Wood (1/1)
• Mini Glossy (1/1)
• Mini Framed Printing Plate(s) (1/1)
• X Base
• X Mini Black
• X Mini Red (/5)
• X Mini Silver (1/1)
• Chrome
• Chrome Refractor
• Chrome Blue Refractor (/150)
• Chrome Gold Refractor (/50)
• Chrome Green Refractor (/99)
• Chrome Orange Refractor (/25)
• Chrome Red Refractor (/5)
• Chrome Superfractor (/1)
• Chrome X-Fractor
• Chrome Mini
• Chrome Mini Gold Refractor (/50)
• Chrome Mini Orange Refractor (/25)
• Chrome Mini Red Refractor (/5)
• Chrome Mini Superfractor (/1)

Randall Cunningham - AUTOGRAPH CHECKLIST: (bold means I own it)

• Dual Autographs (w/ Vashti Cunningham) DA-CC
• Framed Mini Non-Baseball Autographs FMA-RC
• Framed Mini Non-Baseball Autographs Red Ink FMA-RC
• Framed Mini Non-Baseball Autographs Black Frame (/25) FMA-RC
• X Silver Frame Black Mini Non-Baseball Autographs FMA-RC
• X Silver Frame Black Mini Non-Baseball Autographs Black Frame Black FMA-RC (/10)
• X Silver Frame Black Mini Non-Baseball Autographs Silver Frame Gold Ink FMA-RC (/5)

Project: Randall

Collecting all the Cunninghams from 2021 Allen & Ginter with a head start from @weavahVBC and @JasonSowinski -- can you help?

 

Normally I'm pretty excited about a new Allen & Ginter release, but Randall Cunningham's surprise (to me) inclusion on the checklist gave me another reason to collect. I'm not going to use the term "chasing the rainbow" (not only because there aren't colored parallels in this, but also because I hate it), but I do want to collect as many of the Randall Cunningham cards that I can.

I now have my first three Randalls, thanks to some friends of Crackin' Wax. I still need another dozen or so, depending on how many printing plates were used and how many parallels there are in the new Allen & Ginter X set. A lot of these are 1/1 cards, though, so I probably won't be shelling out big bucks for them if they ever appear. Also, there will probably be a Chrome set again. Yeesh.

The A&G mini back is kind of interesting this year. It feels like they put a lot more effort into the design than usual, although I still miss the creepy Ol' Planter.

Here's the hot box silver foil edition. Not bad!

If you happen to run into any of these cards (aside from those in bold), let me know as I'd love to own a copy.

Randall Cunningham #277 - FULL CHECKLIST (?): (bold means I own it)

• Base
• Silver Foil (Hot Box)
• Glossy (1/1)
• Mini Base
• Mini A&G Back
• Mini Black Border
• Mini No Number (print run: 50)
• Mini Brooklyn Back (/25)
• Mini Wood (1/1)
• Mini Glossy (1/1)
• Mini Framed Printing Plate(s) (1/1)
• X Base
• X Mini Black
• X Mini Red (/5)
• X Mini Silver (1/1)

Randall Cunningham - AUTOGRAPH CHECKLIST: (bold means I own it)

• Dual Autographs (w/ Vashti Cunningham) DA-CC
• Framed Mini Non-Baseball Autographs FMA-RC
• Framed Mini Non-Baseball Autographs Red Ink FMA-RC
• Framed Mini Non-Baseball Autographs Black Frame (/25) FMA-RC
• X Silver Frame Black Mini Non-Baseball Autographs FMA-RC
• X Silver Frame Black Mini Non-Baseball Autographs Black Frame Black FMA-RC (/10)
• X Silver Frame Black Mini Non-Baseball Autographs Silver Frame Gold Ink FMA-RC (/5)

Allen & Ginter is Alright

A #CrackinWaxMailDay look at the 2021 Allen & Ginter set from a @CrackinWax case break. 

 

I was feeling a bit underwhelmed when it came to last year's Allen & Ginter set. For whatever reason, I wasn't a big fan of the design, and it came out during a time last year when I was just beginning to accept that buying cards on the retail market wasn't going to be a viable option for me anymore. One year later, things have only gotten worse in terms of retail availability, but the latest Ginter offering at least brings something familiar to the table. It's comforting, I suppose. I do feel like the design is a bit of an improvement over last year's as well.

I bought into a case break over at Crackin' Wax, one of a number of Ginter-related happenings at the long time break-focused website. The big dance, of course, is CW's annual charity event where a lucky donor can win a prize pack that includes a bunch of cards, supplies and unopened wax. They're still taking donations through Monday (8/30) and it's for a good cause, so I highly encourage you to check it out.

As I said, the design is... not bad. This is the 16th edition of the set that originally paid tribute to an old line of tobacco cards. This means a lot of gold lettering this time around, but again... I feel like it works.

This Bob Gibson mini probably ended up being my best "pull" of the case as it's an unnumbered mini with a print run of just 50. How does everyone else feel about unnumbered low print run cards (versus serial number stamped cards or hand numbered cards?)

I think I ended up scanning more of the mini cards than the full sized base for this post, because they just end up filling out the card design a bit better. Both of the Cardinals Hall of Famers that passed on last year are represented on the Cardinals team checklist, along with Mark McGwire and some active players.

This one scanned a little darker as it's one of the silver foil "hot box" parallels. I believe there's usually one "hot box" allotted per case, but I believe this case actually had two. Because of this, I'm only two silver parallels short of the team set, which means an eBay visit isn't out of the question.

I love that they're still making David Freese cards in 2021. This is one of the more common inserts from the set. We've seen very similar insert concepts in the Topps flagship set before, so this doesn't seem like anything novel. Still, it's a 2021 Freese card!

The black border mini design looks as bougie as ever.

Full-sized relic cards in Allen & Ginter are kind of a bore, but at least this KK jersey swatch is powder blue to spice things up a bit.

Big Mac shows up on the insert checklist as well, with a card commemorating that fateful HR chase. One of the interesting things about that chase for me was seeing an out-of-playoff-contention Cardinals team show up on national TV almost every night for awhile. FOX even put some of the games on its main network in prime time. Joe Buck was there! You guys like Joe Buck, don't you?!

Since I'm never going to end up owning even 50% of all of the Ozzie Smith cards ever made, I can always give a thumbs up to more cards of the Wizard. This was from the time where folks were implored to "go crazy" by Joe Buck's dad.

Might this be some sort of alternate Allen & Ginter design? This is one of the box toppers, which uses the same portrait photo as the base cards. These are pretty nice looking even if they likely have nothing to do with the original tobacco card concept.

This is what the same photo looks like in color, of course.

I will be collecting this set... well, more like slowly accumulating it. I managed to buy a couple of blasters from Target's website and, assuming availability, I could see me picking up a couple more at some point.

2021 Allen and Ginter

Want List: 

(SP Rookie Variations)

105 Akil Baddoo

184 Yermin Mercedes

252 Jarred Kelenic

(Historical Hits)

HH-8 Hank Aaron

HH-31 Johnny Bench

HH-36 Joe Morgan

(T51 Murad Reimagined)

MR-2 Randy Johnson

MR-4 Cal Ripken Jr.

MR-7 Luis Robert

MR-18 Jacob deGrom

MR-20 Rickey Henderson

MR-28 Nolan Ryan

MR-29 Bo Bichette

MR-33 Harmon Killebrew

MR-42 Bobby Dalbec

MR-47 Derek Jeter

(Mini - HAVE:) 9, 10, 14, 17, 20, 24, 25, 28, 30, 35, 37, 42, 48, 49, 50, 52, 54, 57, 60, 62, 65, 67, 73, 75, 82, 88, 89, 92, 93, 95, 100, 110, 116, 118, 120, 122, 123, 131, 137, 139, 140, 141, 145, 147, 148, 151, 155, 162, 163, 170, 171, 175, 176, 177, 179, 185, 187, 188, 190, 196, 198, 199, 200, 201, 204, 207, 208, 209, 212, 214, 219, 228, 229, 230, 233, 236, 237, 238, 240, 241, 248, 254, 259, 266, 268, 269, 270, 275, 278, 280, 282, 289, 293, 294, 296, 298, 301, 302, 303, 304, 305, 307, 308, 310, 311, 313, 314, 317, 318, 321, 322, 323, 327, 331, 332, 340, 342, 343, 344, 345, 347, 350

(Mini A&G Back - HAVE:) 5, 15, 16, 18, 20, 24, 28, 46, 47, 54, 55, 56, 60, 62, 64, 70, 77, 78, 82, 83, 84, 88, 89, 91, 101, 105, 107, 111, 114, 120, 122, 123, 124, 129, 133, 145, 152, 154, 156, 157, 161, 163, 164, 176, 182, 190, 193, 195, 203, 208, 212, 216, 228, 233, 236, 237, 238, 240, 243, 247, 251, 253, 254, 256, 262, 265, 266, 270, 272, 273, 282, 285, 290, 294, 295, 296, 301, 314, 330, 349

(Mini Black - HAVE:) 5, 26, 36, 67, 68, 76, 110, 123, 142, 143, 150, 182, 184, 190, 191, 213, 233, 234, 236, 240, 243, 244, 246, 263, 274, 283, 305, 318, 321

(Mini Brooklyn Back - HAVE): 162

(Mini No Name - HAVE:) Lucas Giolito

(Far Far Away - HAVE:) Complete!

(Good for You - HAVE:) GFY-15

(Hats Off - HAVE:) MHO-3, MHO-4, MHO-14

(Mascots in Real Life - HAVE): MMI-10, MMI-12, MMI-19

(Rookie Design Variation - HAVE:) MRD-1, MRD-2, MRD-3, MRD-5, MRD-6, MRD-7, MRD-8, MRD-9, MRD-10, MRD-12, MRD-13, MRD-14, MRD-15, MRD-16, MRD-17, MRD-18, MRD-19, MRD-20

(World Leaders - HAVE:) MWL-3, MWL-7, MWL-12

(World's Largest - HAVE:) MWL-15

[updated 6/29/26]