One shot deal

If you have followed WWE for the last decade or so, you'll recognize RVD who was famous for one shot deals, coming back to the company for one offs here and there. I'm not sure he ever reached the relevance in WWE that he did back in the real ECW of the 90s and putting that company on the map. Not to take away from his time in WWE, but I don't think he was quite there as being the man as he was ECW.

I wonder how much Stevie Ray and X-Pac are thought of as legends due to their friends than anything else (Booker and the Cliq)....great guys, but not sure I would call either legends...

The pack has another Anti-Authority insert.



Here's the first bronze parallel I've got, and two packs in which is right on par as these are every other pack.



We finish with huglife - Bayley back when she was the big fish in a small pond. A bit disappointing she hasn't translated to the main roster as well as some others like Charlotte, Becky now, or even Sasha, but hopefully her time will come!

2 pack, 14 cards, 42 points.

2016 Topps WWE Wrestling Blaster

Today, we start in with the 2016 base Topps set for WWE. Not sure what to expect, other than, I really like the base set and hope to get a good start on this one since I have absolutely zero of the base cards going in.

The box is standard fare with the big names pictured, and Andre for the historical aspect.

As for the packs...

We flip Macho Man onto the pack with Cena and the Rock, so this pack and the relic go to the unopened pack collection leaving 9 packs, 63 cards in total...my guess being about 40 base cards of the 100 will be collected here.

Without further ado - let's get to pack one after a quick reminder of the scoring...

Base card - 1 point (yes, all cards get a point)
Base card need - 3 points
Base variation card - 20 points
Insert Card bonus - points based on odds - if 1 in 4 - worth 4 points

Pack 1:

As usual, we get a bunch of hall of fame calibre legends in the set, and the standard Topps design used on the baseball flagship set for the same year.

As in the past, the NXT insert set with up and coming and rookie NXT players, such as Dash here, who is now on the main roster as half The Revival tag team.

An Anti-Authority Ring Report on Triple H. Interesting insert set that looks at the authority, and anti-authority side for each superstar. A nice pic of his Wrestlemania entrance that year.

We end the pack in BRIE MODE! Brace yourself.....

1 pack, 7 cards, 21 points.

Pack Attack - 2007-08 Upper Deck Victory Hockey

Before the pack - a little organization sharing. I finally took the time to go through TCDB and get my want list - more or less - in place for Magic Cards. Not an easy task as it meant going into each and every set and every insert/parallel, and find the artifact cards as that is what I collect. Not a perfect job because there are some small sets and promos, and such which I probably missed the artifacts for, but probably caught 95% of it, so yay for that.

I think my wants are basically up to date across baseball, hockey, and Magic now - wrestling is still a work in process though.



Nothing too fancy in Victory as it is a good set for started, but not one I have too much out of either.

The keepers...


Rookies fall every other pack, so nice to get one. With a career still going at the NHL level, Gilbert is definitely a "hit" pick for being a rookie card.

Though there were a couple dupes...


Didn't quite get the right odds on this one. The Face Off cards fall one every 10 packs, and there are 6 cards in the set, so basically, one in 60 packs would have the Staal card - and I already had it (the only one of the Face Off insert set), and poof.

Not a great pack unfortunately, but it'll have to do. Tomorrow...another blaster from Dave & Adam's!

Pack Attack - 1996-97 Pinnacle Mint Hockey

Today, we open a pack I have never opened before...



There are only two cards to go with the one coin, and since I don't really care about the coins, that's reason why I haven't bothered much with these packs, but, now is as good a time as ever I guess. I will say, you can feel the plastic holder for the coin in the pack, so I give them full marks on packaging before opening this up.

So, odds of getting something interesting (see - "hits"), seem to be about 1 in 20 packs at best, so with the number of different items, let's call it one in 17 or 18 packs for the coins that are not just base brass.

Let;s see how I fair, and take a good look at these cards...



Always nice when you get a checklist added in. As you can see, being a Toronto fan, I have 2 in 30 that I really care about.

As for the coin...

Base brass, but a nice Iginla which does a decent job on the look of him.

As for the to cards...


Nice! I didn't have Mats here, the base version with a hole for the coin (which I do not yet have), and a bronze parallel of Johnny, so keep that as an insert. A good little pack. Heck, the plastic insert was a win too because it holds a coin well, and I have the Mats coin from 1997'98 which needed something nice to put it in, so there we go!

4 Packs and a hit

A break between boxes, another Target pick up from last August to finally open today...


In Canada, these things can be up to $20 CDN, so I don't usually bother, but even with the exchange, they are a few bucks cheaper in the US, so I figured, why not?



So, with the four packs, I get two more adds to the unopened pack collection - both 2017-18 packs, go figure. I have opened a Victory 2007-08 pack before, but never a Pinnacle Mint, but we will do both shortly....like, the next couple days, because I want to end on the autograph, and I doubt either of those packs will top a hit...

As for the autograph...



Almost a Toronto Maple Leaf card, but not quite. Keith started with Toronto playing about half the games over a couple seasons before being move to Tampa Bay as shown here.

Even though it is a sticker auto and not SN, it is still a pretty nice card. The back could be a bit better, but all in,I am pretty happy with this one, and the box in general, and that is before opening the couple packs.

Absolutely, perfect

Sometime you get just that card to make a pack perfect....other times, you just happen to come along with Mr. Perfect on a card....




Doesn't hurt when he shows up with a bunch of legendary friends - though really nice to see him shown with the IC belt as that is one of the people I think about long term as IC champs...actually Honky Tonk too.

I will say - I honestly never remember Volkoff and Shiek being referred to as the foreign legion. I know now that they were for a time, but I guess because they were accomplished singles wrestlers, the name never stuck with me.



Well, the black parallels are one in six odds, so right on the money there, though many others I would have preferred to get ahead of Ryback.



Back in the day, Diesel was so much cooler than Sting to me, but I think Sting now makes up for it.

Well, that ends this shorter blaster...

6 packs, 54 cards, 169 points.

So average it out and the box comes out to a 3.1296. Standing for 2019 boxes is as follows...

1)	2015-16 Upper Deck Portfolio Box	3.6067
2)	2016 Topps WWE Road To WM Blaster 1	3.2222
3)	2015 Topps WWE Heritage Blaster 1	3.1296
4)	2016 Topps WWE Then Now Forever Blaster 1	3.0317

I continue to think that this is pretty reflective of my feelings, and of how these have gone. I expect the blasters which I do second, where I open the relics will be much further ahead with taking that scoring into effect - but I figured that would be the case.

Happy Valentines Day

Given the pack of 2015 heritage cards today, I can't help but ask, on Valentine's day....do you want to see my snake?



Yeah, and two in a single pack - I would say that makes it a Jake The Snake hot pack, but...



It also has two Emma cards...so...an Emma hot pack?



Then we have a bunch of hall of fame power in the base cards too with the Outsiders, Austin, Mark Henry and future HOFer Daniel Bryan. Then we finish with what might be another...



The extra facial hair does make him seem a bit older.

5 packs, 45 cards, 139 points.