Additions to the Pirates Gold Room

I often struggle to understand my identity as a collector. Wether its on the blogs or on Twitter, I feel like I often come across collectors who are very specific and intentional with their collections. 

Sure, I collect the Pirates. Yes, there are certain players that I prefer over others. Yes, there are cards I stay away from and cards that I'm drawn towards.

At the end of the day, I'm not too specific. I don't have a favorite player. I rarely build sets. 

However! If there's one thing that I love above all else, it's Pirates gold refractors. I've been making a point to acquire gold refractors as often as possible. Typically, Topps gold refractors are serial numbered /50. That's a good sweet spot for me. Only 50 copies makes it decently rare - but not impossible to find. Prices can get steep, but I haven't seen anything too outrageous.

Here are some of my recent pickups:

2019 Bowman's Best Mitch Keller Rookie - Gold Refractor #49/50

2019 Bowman Chrome Prospects Ke'Bryan Hayes - Gold Shimmer Refractor #40/50

2017 Bowman Chrome Tyler Glasnow Rookie - Gold Refractor #46/50

2019 Topps Update Bryan Reynolds - Gold Refractor #/50. This is the latest addition to my  Bryan Reynolds rainbow. I'm only missing Orange #/25 and Red #/5.

I've really enjoyed chasing after these. I feel like it's given me some purpose when it comes to "what to chase," and as we know, the chase is half of the fun. 

Ripping 2 Jumbo Packs of 2019-20 Panini NBA Hoops

Each time I'm near a Target or Walmart, I still make a point to swing through to check for Prizm. There weeks ago I found two blasters of Prizm at Target but I've had no luck since. If I recall correctly, there were several blasters there that day and I'm starting to regret not grabbing more.

With my recent shortcomings at finding more Prizm, I decided to settle for some NBA Hoops.

Pack one highlights:

Each pack had several rookies, and I'm excited that the RJ base made an appearance. I imagine this picture was taken during some kind of photo shoot. Gesturing to your make-believe teammates to set a screen for you in a photoshoot is a weird thing to do... but I guess it comes natural to RJ. Also making an appearance is Coby White who could be one of the best rookies in this class.

Both of my backs contained a teal explosion parallell, so I'm going to assume these fall one per jumbo pack. Jarrell Brantley was the 50th overall pick out of the College of Charleston. By no means a household name, but at least it's a rookie to stash away.

Likely the best pull of the pack, Ja Morant base card. Not Zion, but a nice consolation prize.

On to pack two:

Barrett makes another appearance, this time on the Tribute base card. Jaxson Hayes shows up as well. I'm high on him as well. He has the athleticism to be the best big man in the draft.

This pack's teal explosion was... extremely underwhelming. 

However, I was lucky to pull a orange explosion of Jazz legend John Stockton. It's tough to see, but if you look closely near John's right bicep, you'll notice this card is serial numbered #/25. Orange can be a tough color for parallels, but somehow this looks pretty sweet. I think it's the 90's design paired with the 90's player. A worthy tribute to Stockton. Well done, Panini.

So for two jumbo packs, this turned out pretty well. 

Thanks for reading!