big step in my player collections courtesy of Shot not Taken

Since I got back into collecting I mostly have been interested in set collecting. I'm probably working on about 10 different sets and subsets right now and sometimes it feels like 100.

Because of that I've pretty much neglected doing the player collection thing until recently. I came across a post on A Shot Not Taken late last year and Ray is looking to complete the Propaganda subset from 2009 Update and Highlights.

Earlier in the year I had the pleasure of trading with Ray. He sent me a beautiful Adrian Peterson jersey card for some sketches and cards he needed.

Here's the card again. You can never have too much A.D.




Anyway, I wasn't expecting anything in return, but he sent over some really nice cards that all fit into my different player collections.

Since this hasn't been much of a focus until now I was really happy to get these cards.


First up is a card of a former OU and current NFL star, Adrian Peterson.


I've had my eye on this card for a while, but have never pulled it from a pack of cards. Looks like he's in mid-juke here.


A couple of Bowman reprints of Mickey Mantle.


A nice MMHR chrome card of the Mick!


And something new for me is a couple of nice Blake Griffin cards.


He was a standout at OU for a couple of seasons and was the top pick in the draft. He sat out last year with an injury.

He's back now and looks to be doing pretty good for an otherwise crappy team. Poor Clippers.
This is a Passing the Torch card detailing at that time how these guys were the past two (at the time) NCAA Player of the Year award winners.


This is nice posed dunk shot of Mr. Griffin. As of Jan 10th he's leading the NBA in dunks with 88. Up until this point I only had one Panini sticker and one EEE card of Blake. Now I've doubled my collection in only one trade.

Lastly was this gold bordered card of Koyie Hill. I was wondering why a Cub would be in the pack. I did not realize that he was an Oklahoma guy.


He was born in Tulsa and graduated from Lawton Ike. That's not the interesting part about this guy: apparently he got into an accident with a table saw and it cut into his thumb and apparently severed part or all of the remaining 4 fingers. He saved them long enough for the doctors to reattach them.

Reminds me of a Bill Brasky fact:


Watch Bill Brasky-Brasky Buddies in Entertainment  |  View More Free Videos Online at Veoh.com


Thank you very much for the cards Ray! They will be a significant part of my collection.

Trade with Shot Not Taken

I'm not sure if ya'll have had the chance to check out the blog Shot Not Taken. I have passed by a few times. I'm not sure if I've commented. I'm a pretty bad commenter sometimes. I feel like saying something, but I know that I really have nothing of note to contribute, so I move on to the next blog or get back to crafting these wonderful blog posts on this here blog that nobody reads.

Anyway, I hope he doesn't mind but I'm going to upload his banner. I love anything to do with art so I'm going to show it off for everybody.

It's from a Lichtenstein painting entitled "Whamm". It was taken from the DC comic All American Men of War. Pretty cool banner. I've been meaning to do a banner for about 8 months now and I haven't gotten around to doing it.

But this isn't all about me, this is about a cool offer of football memorabilia and auto cards that Ray was offering up for trade.

As soon as I saw an Adrian Peterson card up for trade I had to make an offer. After much searching I realize I had absolutely nothing for him in trade.

So as a last ditch effort I offered up the services of my amateurish sketch art skills. He was cool with it and this is what I got in return for my two sketch cards.


My first ever(and probably only) Adrian Peterson relic card.

It's from 2008 Mayo. It's a stark contrast from the '09 version of Mayo that has white borders on the base and relic cards. The Peterson card is the best looking card from that year. I'm probably biased in my opinion because he's one of my favorite all time players, but I think it's really true. Most of the cards that I've pulled or seen online have a weird look to them and they're not all weird in the same way. It's almost like a fake textured look. Sort of the same fakeness you can see on some of the 2008 A&G cards.

But this card looks cool. The swatch is even purple so that's nice. The black border and desaturated colors really make the purple swatch stand out.

It will be the cornerstone of my A.D. collection. This is the card that I will pull out and show off to people when they ask about my cards.

Thanks again for the cool card Ray!!