Black Friday Cubs

I love Black Friday, yet I've never battled the human elements of Black Friday shopping at retail stores. The holiday season is my favorite time of the year, and Black Friday is the kickoff to the shopping season. It's a very festive day.

Most of my adult life was spent in a basketball gym on Black Friday. I worked in radio for 10 years, and spent four years working in a college athletics department. There's nothing very festive about having Thanksgiving dinner at a restaurant with a college basketball team, then waking up at 4:30 a.m. to catch a flight to Savannah, Georgia. 

Now I work on Black Friday, but I wake up early to check out Blowout Cards' Black Friday extravaganza. Then I go into the office for half a day, which is basically spent answering two emails the entire day and cleaning my desk. 

A box from Blowout Cards arrived when I got home from work. It was from one of their presales last week. 

Two boxes of Topps Gold Label were ripped live on Twitter Friday afternoon. These are such a fun break for just $40 per box. Gold Label has three classes to their base cards: Class 1, Class 2, and Class 3. Class 1 are the most common, while Class 3 are the least common. 

Anthony Rizzo, Ian Happ, and Ernie Banks Class 1 were pulled. Each player has one card from each class and they are very similar. The bottom right photo is the same, while the larger image on the left is different, as you can see the difference between the Ian Happ above and the Class 2 Happ below.

I also pulled a Ryne Sandberg Class 2.

There are also serial numbered cards, and I added another Sandberg (91/150) to my PC.

Two boxes of 2013 Panini USA baseball arrived. These were like $20 per box. I ripped one and I'm leaving one unopened and will dig in on a rainy day. This product also has me at a crossroads with my Cubs collection. The players are featured in Team USA uniforms. I've always kept the 1988 Topps Traded Ty Griffin in my Cubs collection, so this 2013 version will go in.

And I'll add Addison Russell, too.

But I paused at Derrek Lee. In the end this card will go into my Cubs collection, but I didn't add Joe Carter. And that's kind of a problem for me. Carter was drafted by the Cubs and spent his entire minor league career with the Cubs. Lee came up with the Padres and later joined the Marlins before finally arriving in Chicago. My thought is Lee is much more recognized as a Cub, while Carter is not. 

Albert Almora, Dillon Maples, and Keegan Thompson were here.

Another crossroads is do I add the autograph of Johnny Field? I'm still undecided.

I picked off a card from my want list on eBay two weeks ago. Unfortunately, it was an unfavorable buying experience despite the card arriving safely. 

I've been on the hunt for a decent priced 1963 Topps Lou Brock, and found one for $20 plus $3 shipping. It was during a 10% eBay Bucks deal so I have $2 added to my eBay Bucks account. 

The card had still not arrived earlier this week, and wasn't marked shipped in the eBay system. I messaged the seller asking if it had been sent. He replied it was shipped Tuesday, but did not provide tracking. It finally arrivived Friday...in a plain white envelope.

I'm not against PWE shipping at all. In fact, I sell many cards (with free economy shipping) for low prices using plain white envelopes, and have had the same amount of issues as I've had with bubble mailers. But I would never ship a $20 card in a PWE, and I would never charge an extra $3 shipping and send in a PWE. That's very bad business. I'm also a believer that I paid for a product to arrive in a condition specified. This card did arrive undamaged, so it's my belief that negative feedback is not warranted. I also don't believe positive feedback is warranted, rather honest neutral feedback. I stated it was slow shipping and charged $3 for plain white envelope. I'm not the first to have this problem as this seller has 152 negatives and 110 neutrals in the past 12 months. 

Finally, a small flat rate box came packed with 1977-79 Sportscaster cards. To this point I just had one Cubs in my collection: Rick Reuschel. This box came from an auction in a Facebook group. I paid $10 shipped for a stack of about 75 of these, and didn't know what I was getting. I was hoping a Cub or two would be included, some I could sell, and some would be used for trades. 

I'm happy I won! Ernie Banks! 

And another Cub, Bobby Thomson.

The stack was filled with stars from all sports, and the baseball featured Nolan Ryan, Hank Aaron, Willie Mays, Mickey Mantle, Stan Musial, Babe Ruth, Johnny Bench, and so many more. 

One Million Cubs Project Stats

Friday's (11/23/2018) Cards: 16

Friday's (11/23/2018) Packages: 3

Weekly Count: 1,572

Total Count: 224,776