So Swell

 I am not sure about you, but when someone mentions baseball cards and a yellow border, my first thought always goes to 1991 Fleer - a design that is overshadowed by a poor colour choice. When I try to think of a yellow border set that I really like, that's when I think of Swell.

This 1991 Swell set of baseball greats is a wonderful set. I love the sets looking at past stars, and this one is done right. The yellow and red card colours - which scream Hulk Hogan to me by the way - work well for this set. The player choices are all great ones, and even the backs as shown below, are solid for what they are.

I have about a third of the set, so a bit bummed it was just the three additions above, and the dupes shown below with the backs, but that doesn't take away from the greatness of this little set.

The one line lifetime stats is fine since we aren't dealing with ongoing careers, though for some of the players, a year by year stat listing would have meant getting rid of the decent write ups, so I can live with that choice here. The team play history is nice too. I know I never saw these cards at the time, only picking them up in lots like this, but if I ever focus in on some baseball set completion, this would be one of the sets I would work to trade for and get more of.

A Dribbling

 Well, no better term for a bunch of basketball cards coming out of the COVID lot than a dribble I guess.

If  I was going to get some basketball cards, 1991-92 Upper Deck is as solid a set as any to get, and if you are going to cover All Stars and the Collector's Choice artwork, those would be a great couple subsets to cover. I really like the Wilkins and Worthy.

Isiah's brings out his smile, and Hakeem just looks dead on for the mad, same with Mr. San Antonio.

I shouldn't be surprised to see some more 1992-93 Upper Deck as well I guess since there has been a bit of it as well. Not complaining, just a statement. Not the most exciting bunch for me personally, but maybe there's something in here for you? Let me know!

From 55% to 98%

In brief - WWE last night in Toronto was fun as expected. My son enjoyed it as his first live wrestling show, once he realized the announcing only happen on TV but nor house shows.

Only down point was the lack of Bray Wyatt, as he was looking forward to seeing Bray.

Many pluses though as Rhea Riply and Raquel Rodriguez were great, Braun Strowman was high energy, Sami and Ronan had a great main event, so all good.

Will have to look into doing it again soon.

Oh...cards.  cutting right to the chase with this one now - in a single bunch of cards, my base set collection for this one went up to just needing 8 more base cards. I could go through all the keepers, but the Leafs, error and few traders will be enough to give flavour for the set if you don't know it - 1991-92 Pinnacle.

I know it's a set from the mass production era, but I was still surprised that every single rookie card in the subset of the base set was here, as well as the other subsets. I figured at least a couple would have been pulled, but apparently not. As you can see, all the Leaf content was included too from those.

A Lidstom EUR card to boot, and we have a set with less than 10 cards left to finish now. All those are on my want list at TCDB and shouldn't be too hard to trade for, but time will tell.

There were a few dupes for me as I had a few cards already from this section of the set - see below.

Very awesome though to go from missing almost half the set to less than 10 cards - woohoo!

Fillin' Holes

 It may not be a set I collect, or overly like, but I have seen a bit of 1992 Pro Set Football in this lot, and we get a small bunch today which look to be base cards which just got separated from the rest of the pack.

Okay, so Browns cards may not be the best finds for a football set in the early 90s, but the Troy Aikman card is solid. I was never a big fan of his, but being on the Cowboys, he has his fans, so that card should move somewhere.

I know I've shown the backs before, but in case you missed the earlier post, or needed reminding, here they are again for your enjoyment.

So all in, Troy is definitely the star of the cards today. In posting these to my trade list in TCDB, I noticed I have moved some of the cards I already picked up from here, so some good chances most of these will move too.

I have a feeling, an early though on my 2024 goals will be to go the route of minimal new cards, and make it all about moving traders to see how much I can move in a single year. I just don't focus all my time on it right now because with the lots, I have so much to catalog and I don't want to trade for cards I actually have here, but just don't know about yet.

Leafy Goodness

 Here I thought I'd be sharing the excitement of getting to go to the live WWE event Saturday evening with my son (his first such event, I have been to about 5 in my life), but card wise...this day was an exciting bunch from the COVID lot with a nice chunk of Leaf cards.

I figured most will end up being Leaf cards I have already, but happily, both 1995-96 Ultra cards were needs, and the Jonsson Four Sports was apparently a dupe, but did show me I have all three Leafs from it, so have that team set done (yay!).

Team set finishing is happily a bit of a theme with the cards today. 2007-08 O Pee Chee was all finished up with Vesa here and...

2007-08 Victory was completed as well. I may not have needed 4 copies of Kaberle, as one would do, but 4 is a sweet add!

Will et you know how my son enjoys the WWE event - I will have fun of course, and think he will really like it too. Out tickets are front row off the floor, so close enough to see everything, but won't be right on top of it. Sure it will be a blast.

Surprise Gold

 It's been nice to see some baseball cards come out of the COVID lot lately as there was a good run of hockey (which is also good) just before that. We get to cover some 1994 Topps today, and though I am not collecting this set, we have a few keepers.

Hidden among the cards were two parallel Gold cards which are keepers for me, and two uncorrected error cards. I am not a fan of the front design of the set which is why I haven't tried slow collecting this one.

Though I not a big fan of horizontal cards, the Ozzie is a pretty good one. The horizontal framing does work nicely with extended bats sometimes.

Always love seeing Doug Drabek - my "I don't PC but if I did, I would PC this guy" guy.

Okay, I will give credit for a standout photo with Roger here. Just chillin', definitely not the usual photo for a baseball card...makes me think of something I'd expect to see in a Stadium Club set.

The Grind

 Well, start of March, and happily this busy season for me so far, has been improved over the last couple of years. Our staffing in the tax department is better than it has been in a number of years, so I am busy, but not yet worked an 80+ hour week. I am hoping I can actually get a day off each weekend in March, whereas last year I worked all 31 days (actually every day in April too except one). The burn out from last year has been bad enough I knew I couldn't do anything like it again this year, and work has been very appreciative and understanding.

Grinding at work is one thing, another is grinding through a set. If it's one you enjoy, the collective grind of building a set is awesomely fun, and that's what we have today from the COVID lot.

1993 Topps is probably now considered a classic design and has shown up in recent sets given Topps liking to use throwback designs in certain products. Funny seeing them presented that way and knowing the original design. It's been that way for a number of years, but I still find it odd knowing other younger collectors don't remember the originals.

It is a set I am backburner building, and as it turns out, all keepers in the small pile today...

Personal fave player of the bunch has to be Andres shown here after his run with the Expos.