I'm very excited to announce that my 2012 Topps Heritage Carl Yastrzemski 1963 Quarter card has arrived!!  The Topps website said that it wouldn't arrive until early-mid August, so I was shocked to see that the card arrived early.

Sorry for the poor picture quality, but I don't have a working scanner at the moment.  I plan on buying a new printer/scanner/etc. this weekend, so expect better quality pictures and COOL updates to the Personal Collection page in the near future.

Until next time, have fun collecting and feel free to provide some feedback, comments or thoughts!

July 10, 2012 is officially Topps Allen & Ginter Day this year.  Allen & Ginter is easily my favorite product of all time and I'm very excited for this year's release.  More than past years, Topps has really added a TON of great players and non-sport stars to this year's release.

According to a preliminary checklist posted on Sports Collectors Daily, here are a few of the retired player additions in this year's set: Johnny Bench, Mickey Mantle (as usual), Jackie Robinson, Al Kaline, Reggie Jackson, Brooks Robinson, Stan Musial, Sandy Koufax, Carl Yastrzemski (YES!), Jim Palmer, George Brett, Tom Seaver, Don Mattingly, Ty Cobb, Willie Mays, Ken Griffey Jr (still can't believe he's retired), Hank Aaron, Roberto Clemente, Bob Gibson (SP), Cal Ripken Jr. (SP), Frank Robinson (SP) and Nolan Ryan (SP)!  Although there are a few too many Yankees for my taste (as usual with Topps), that is quite an impressive list of additions to this year's set.

The non-sport additions this year are also impressive and full of "name" individuals, including Michael Phelps (again), Kate Upton (yum!), Bob Knight, Erin Andrews (yum, pt.2!), Curly Neal and Arnold Palmer.  Am I the only one hoping for a Bob Knight relic of his famous IU sweaters?  Hopefully it won't be a letdown like last year's Shawn Michaels used camo (how do you NOT have wrestling trunks?).

Overall, I think this year's release will come as close to replicating the excitement of 2006's release.  I bought my case...have you?  Who are you looking forward to getting from the 2012 Allen & Ginter release?

I was thrilled to open my mailbox today and see that my most recent eBay purchase had arrived.  I purchased a 1950 Bowman card (ungraded) of Mr. Boston Red Sox himself, Johnny Pesky.  I had the opportunity to meet Mr. Pesky in person at an autograph signing and he couldn't have been a nicer guy (he was quick to complement my wife on how beautiful she was too!).  Johnny has been a staple with the Boston Red Sox for almost his entire career and I always love to see him at games when he's able to attend.  I'll eventually send this in to Beckett for grading/encapsulation.  The card is in pretty good shape considering it's a card from 1950.  

It's been a few days, but I was happy to see that a few of my recent eBay purchases arrived today.  For starters, my 1976 O-Pee-Chee (OPC) Carl Yastrzemski BVG 9.5 arrived in the mail today.  There were two of these up for auction at the same time this week (different sellers), so I'm happy that I was able to get one of these at around the same price as the other one that was listed.  As a collector of Carl Yastrzemski, I'm shocked that I was able to land this OPC version in a BVG 9.5 for the price that I did.  WINNING!

I also received two cards that are part of a project that I started working on at the beginning of the year.  I'm not a fan of PSA graded cards, but I decided to try and put together a 1952 Bowman team set of cards graded by PSA (to help ensure the quality of the card).  I figured I'd start with a low grade that I can find and afford, with the chance to always upgrade individual cards when possible.

After my two arrivals today, I'm currently five cards shy of the sixteen card team set.  One of the cards was a pure upgrade, a 1952 Bowman Johnny Pesky PSA 6 that will replace the PSA 3.5 I had in my collection.  I was able to add the Maurice McDermott PSA 6 to my collection as well, so currently 10 of the 11 cards that I have are at least a PSA 6.  With a few months to go until 2013, I'm feeling pretty good about my odds of completing this team set before the end of the year.