Football Pirates

Another busy weekend at Bob Walk headquarters.  The Mountaineers have a night game so that will make Saturday an all day party.  I'm hosting friends once again and often they like to pretend they are in school still by partying it up.  Good times, but extremely tiring.

Card wise I've been very productive lately.  I sent out 15 packages on Monday and have another 7 or so almost complete.  I'm on a personal no buy November, but I did make a few purchases to round out some trade packages.  Those should be in the mail sometime next week.

The last couple of months have been pretty barren in terms of new Pirate purchases.  Many great trade packages came in, but I really haven't chased anything other than a few 90's parallels.  It seems all my purchases centered around my Alma Mater.

This is probably the fanciest of my most recent purchases.  I think I won this card back in September.

Charles Sims only played one year at WVU but was an impact player right away.  He has shown some nice promise in the NFL, but can't seem to stay healthy.

Obviously this card is unique because of the patch.  The Bucs have some great patch cards out there. I'm hoping to one day get a similar card that has the pirate ship patch.

My WVU collection is perfect for me to chase these type of cards. A card like this for a decent Pirate rookie would be $100+.  Washed up or low end rookies in the NFL are very affordable and many of them get high end releases like National Treasures.

Enjoy your weekend!

Flying the Colors

I don't really go out of my way to show pieces of my WVU collection until football season starts. I know many of you are active watchers of football so if there is ever an appropriate time to showoff some collegiate cardboard it would be football Saturdays.

This Tavon Austin card was the main event of my card shop purchase when I was in Rhode Island.  Little did I know that all WVU football cards end up there.  The good thing about this card is that it looks super fancy, but didn't carry a fancy price.

The Rams just gave Tavon a bunch of money but still have yet to figure out a way to get him the ball. I think this is mainly due to the fact that Case Keenum is their quarterback.  Tavon has already scored touchdowns in his career via reception, rush, punt return and kick return.  Get him the ball.

My true passion when collecting WVU guys is when they are featured in their college colors.  This great card features Kevin White and Charles Sims. Both play a vital part in their respective teams offenses. The WVU gold always looks good in relic cards.

WVU is playing a neutral site game against BYU today in Landover Md where the Redskins play. This really isn't much of a neutral site for WVU as the DC area is the biggest alumni chapter for WVU and only ~ 3hrs away from Morgantown.  Should be a solid showing from the WVU fans.

Enjoy the baseball and football today! Go Mountaineers, beat BYU.

A Morgantown Tradition

The first WVU football game is always a fun time of year.  Since we live so close to the stadium our house becomes the meeting place/tailgate area for many of our out of town friends. Day full of beer, unhealthy food and sports is a good day! 

I shared this picture on Twitter yesterday.  It is a small miracle that I got a picture where other people have actually said "hey that looks cool." As you can see it was an absolute perfect day in Morgantown.

This was a good IPA that my buddy Keith brought back from his homeland of New Jersey. Kane is a pretty hyped brewery in which you can only buy their beer on site.

 Breakfast Stout might be my overall favorite beer.  I finally got to try out my new mug!

 The label is pretty nondescript, but this one of the more complex beers I've ever had.  It is made by Lickinghole Creek brewery in Virginia.  It is a rum barrel aged quad called Coconut Delight.  Coming in at 12% you will want to share this bad boy, but holy smokes was it good.  My wife even liked it.

2015 Panini Immaculate Charles Sims Auto Jersey /99

I don't really have any set rules with my WVU collection, but when possible my preference is to get items featuring the WVU uniform. This was a nice addition and only cost around $5. Charles Sims had a really nice year backing up Doug Martin last year and has been kind of a sleeper pick in fantasy drafts this year.  

Hope everyone enjoyed the games yesterday.  I hope my Buccos can turn it around soon as they seem to fading down the stretch. 

Thanks for reading! 

Playing the Odds

The Mountaineer basketball team won the Las Vegas Invitational tonight beating Richmond and San Diego State and decisive fashion. Nice to win that thing for a change. We had made the championship twice before and lost in 2008 and 2012.

I'll be attending the final regular season WVU football game this afternoon. While some people are viewing the season as a disappointment, it really has played out exactly how the odd makers said it would. The Mountaineers 4 losses were all in a row and to high tier opponents. I think the sequencing just left a bad taste in peoples mouth. We lost in overtime to Oklahoma State and had to play on the road against Oklahoma, Baylor and TCU.  On a positive note the home games next year are going to be top notch!

On a side note former Mountaineer and current St Louis Ram Stedman Bailey was shot twice in the head a few days back. Miraculously he is expected to recover. The situation is still being investigated so no details have been released.

Here is the last card I picked up of Stedman.

2014 Panini Limited Geno Smith/Stedman Bailey/Charles Sims Auto /5

Pretty sharp looking card of three former Mountaineers. I went hard after this card since I wasn't sure if another copy would show up. Thankfully the final total was only around $30 which is a pretty high end purchase for my WVU collection but a nice centerpiece. At the beginning of the year this card would have carried more of a premium as it was looking like Geno was going to start and Sims was going to play a prominent role in Bucs offense. Now with Geno riding the bench and Doug Martin regaining his form from a couple of years back the value of this card is only driven up by die hard WVU fans. Plus it helps not having Tavon Austin who continues to sell pretty well. 

Thanks for reading.

Adventures in Ebay Packaging #2 (Toploader addition)

Another classic adventure in eBay packaging. Thankfully as was the case with my last adventure the card in question arrived just fine. I was a tad bit more angry about this one....

2014 Topps Finest Charles Sims Auto/Patch

Here is the card. Pretty nice looking card that cost me $2.99 + $3.25 shipping.  With a shipping charge of $3.25 as I buyer I have certain expectations. For one the card should be sent in a bubble envelope. Second the card should be in a toploader.

Well........

The envelope itself was more along the lines of something that would be sent interoffice mail at my job. It was folded in the middle and taped.  Very odd....but not as bad as this.

This is what was used in place of a toploader.  That is a napkin and two pieces of cardboard.  The card itself had the napkin wrapped around and was placed in the middle of the two pieces of cardboard. Blue painters tape was used to keep everything together. 

The seller has only 90 feedback, but it was all positive. My guess since the Sims card was so thick he didn't have a toploader that fit. I actually laughed when I pulled the card out. My first thought was that I was going to find a toploader that was too big, but quickly discovered no toploader at all. 

All that matters is that the card arrived safely, but for $3.25 shipping I think it is reasonable to expect a bubble envelope and a toploader. I probably deserve this for stating how lucky I've been with shipping lately.  

Let's Go Mountaineers!