1986 Fleer Baseball Star Stickers

Hello all. Today I have some stickers to open here on the Cafe. They are 1986 Fleer Baseball Star Stickers and are the same size as standard cards and are fairly rigid so they look and feel a lot like regular cards. 

1986 Fleer Baseball Star Stickers

No# Royals team logo

#64 Kent Hrbek (Twins)

I collect all teams logo cards so I was gaurenteed at least one keeper out of this pack.

#48 Ron Guidry (Yankees)

#78 Keith Moreland (Cubs)

One of my all time favorite Yankees.

#23 Gary Carter (Mets)

#9 Dennis Boyd (Red Sox)

Does anybody remember why they called him "Oil Can"?

 

The Royals team logos and Gary Carter backs.

BY THE NUMBERS:
Total Cards Stickers: 6

Teams Represented: 6
Rookie Cards: 0
Sub Sets: 0 
Parallels: 0
Inserts: 1 (Team Sticker Royals) 
Hits: 0
Keepers for Me: 3 (Royals, Carter, Guidry)

MY RATINGS:
Front Design: 7.5 out of 10 OK pictures, great design, no team logo.
Back Design: 7 out of 10 Nice design, good blue, black, and white color pattern, full career stats, no team logo.
Player Selection: 7.5  out of 10  Good, all relevant players to the 80's.

FINAL OVERALL RATING: Single up the middle. Half keepers and good players on the non keepers makes this pack a hit. I very much like the design of these cards and wish they did a full card set in this style.

Thanks for Reading!

1983 Donruss Hall Of Fame Heroes

Hello all. Today I have a pack of 1983 Donruss Hall Of Fame Heroes coming out of it's wrapper just for you all to see. There is another one to see over at A Pack To Be Named Later.

1983 Donruss Hall Of Fame Heroes

#43 Mickey Mantle Puzzle card (Yankees)

#33 Carl Hubbell (Giants)

#12 Lou Boudreau (Indians)

#2 Walter Johnson (Senators)

#36 Bob Feller (Indians)

#26 Bill Dickey (Yankees)

#16 Hank Greenberg (Tigers)

#6 Jackie Robinson (Dodgers)

Mickey Mantle Puzzle Pieces (#'s 49, 50, 51)

A couple of the backs.

BY THE NUMBERS:
Total Cards: 9

Teams Represented: 6
Rookie Cards: n/a
Sub Sets:  n/a
Parallels: n/a
Inserts: 1 (Puzzle) 
Hits: n/a
Keepers for Me: All!

MY RATINGS:
Front Design: 9 out of 10 Great  pictures drawn by Dick Perez, Excellent layout and design. 
Back Design: 8 out of 10 Nice design, simple yet fitting for the card style, great write up on the player, can't go wrong with red, white, and blue.
Player Selection: 9.5 out of 10 Great, all HOFers.

FINAL OVERALL RATING: 2 RBI Double down the line. I love this set and I have decided to try and build this 44 card set as well as the puzzle. Any help is greatly appreciated.

Check out the other pack over on A Pack To Be Named Later and a more detailed description of the set over on BA Benny's Baseball Card Buffet.

Thanks for Reading!

2004 Fleer Inscribed Hobby Edition

Welcome again to BA Benny's Pack Rip Cafe. Today I have a pack of 2004 Fleer Inscribed Hobby Edition for you all to enjoy. I got these in the mail for subscribing to Sports Card Girl's newsletter. If you believe her or not as far as her collecting passion or if you think it's just a gimmick to sell cards, you can't go wrong with a free pack of cards.

2004 Fleer Inscribed Hobby Edition

#9 Andruw Jones (Braves)

#39 Scott Posednick (Brewers)

#19 Magglio Ordonez (White Sox)

#64 Brett Boone (Mariners)

#34 Jeff Bagwell (Astros)

A couple of backs.

BY THE NUMBERS:
Total Cards: 5

Teams Represented: 5
Rookie Cards: 0
Sub Sets: 0
Parallels: 0
Inserts: 0
Hits: 0
Keepers for Me: 0

MY RATINGS:
Front Design: 8 out of 10 Good pictures, nice design, all action shots, the player portion of the pictures has a nice gloss,  small team logo.
Back Design: 6  out of 10 Nice design, team logo, only last 5 years of stats plus total, a bit plain.
Player Selection: 7 out of 10 Good

FINAL OVERALL RATING: Fly Out to deep left. I really wanted this pack to be a hit as I love the fronts on these cards but no keepers, inserts, hits, parallels, rookie cards, and only base cards make it an out.

2006 Fleer Hobby Edition

Hey again everybody. Today The Pack Rip Cafe offers up a pack of 2006 Fleer (Hobby Edition) for your viewing pleasure.

2006 Fleer Hobby Edition

#202 Todd Jones (Tigers)

#287 Kevin Mench (Rangers)

#66 Rafael Furcal (Dodgers)

#253 Trever Hoffman (Padres)

Not a bad group of players to start out the pack.

#32 Danny Haren (A's)

Lumber Company #LC-3 Alex Rodriguez (Yankees)

#59 Jeff Francoeur (Braves)

Not to shabby of a trio. The Lumber Company inserts are very nice looking.

#348 Craig Monroe (Tigers)

#127 Claudio Vargas (D-Backs)

#382 Mark Buehrle (White Sox)

Three pretty good players to round out the pack.

Two of the backs.

BY THE NUMBERS:
Total Cards: 10

Teams Represented: 9
Rookie Cards: 0
Sub Sets: 0
Parallels: 0
Inserts: 1 (Lumber Company)
Hits: 0
Keepers for Me: 1 (A-Rod, the rest are up for grabs)

MY RATINGS:
Front Design: 7 out of 10 Good pictures, all game action shots, team logos, old school type of design. 
Back Design: 7 out of 10 Nice design, large team logo, only up to 5 years of stats, old school type of design.
Player Selection: 7.5 out of 10 Good mix of established players.

FINAL OVERALL RATING: Infield Single. A nice mix of players, a great looking insert keeper, and a design I like squeaks out a hit.

Thanks for Reading!

1987 Topps

We are going back to the 80's today here on BA Benny's Pack Rip Cafe. Today we have a nice wax pack of 1987 Topps to rip open.

1987 Topps

#34 Jose Rijo (A's)

#404 Doug Zisk (Mets)

#196 Randy O'Neal (Tigers)

I love when you get a player on another team you didn't know they played for. I remember Rijo as a Reds player, not an A or even the fact he cane up with the Yankees.

#560 Glenn Davis (Astros)

#249 Jim Pankovits (Astros)

#309 Mike Young (Orioles)

Glenn Davis is the only player of these three I remember. He was a great player for the Astros before ending his career with the Orioles.

#32 Tim Leary (Brewers)

#500 Don Mattingly (Yankees)

#750 Steve Trout (Cubs)

Can Never go wrong with a Donny Baseball card even though I have several of these already.

#218 Sparkey Anderson (Tigers)

#697 Ed Lynch (Cubs)

Turn Back The Clock #312 Reggie Jackson (Yankees)

The Turn back the Clock subset was a favorite of mine. If I remember correctly, Reggie Jackson's base card for the set was him on the Angels.

#772 Harold Baines (White Sox)

#501 Craig Lefferts (Padres)

#427 Ed Nunez (Mariners)

Harold Baines had a 22 year career with five teams that began and ended with the White Sox.

#157 Danny Darwin (Astros)

#14 Dave Stewart (A's)

Spring Training Sweepstakes card

BY THE NUMBERS:
Total Cards: 17

Teams Represented: 11
Rookie Cards: 0
Sub Sets: 1 (Turn Back The Clock)
Parallels: 0
Inserts: 0
Hits: 0
Keepers for Me: 4 ( Zisk, Sparkey, Jackson, Mattingly)

MY RATINGS:
Front Design: 7.5 out of 10 Good pictures (some posed and some action), nice wood grain design, team logo.
Back Design: 7 out of 10 Nice design, team logo, good player info, gallery notes has interesting player facts, Another factoid related to the picture on front, only 1999 stats (broken down by each month). 
Player Selection: 7 out of 10 Good. Most of these players had established lengthy careers.

FINAL OVERALL RATING: Single over second base. 4 keepers and a good selection of well known players in their era. I also was a fan of the wood grain design of this classic set.

Thanks For Reading!

2005 Topps Updates and Highlights Hobby Edition

  Hey all. Today I have an Updates and Highlights Hobby Edition pack from 2005 Topps. This is one of two I have ripped. Check out the other one over at A Pack To Be Named Later.

2005 Topps Updates and Highlights Hobby Edition

#UH12 Woody Williams (Padres)

Prospect #UH92 Ervin Santana (Angels)

RC #UH226 C.J. Smith (Orioles)

#UH36 Ryan Langerhans (Braves)

#UH48 Shawn Estes (D-Backs)

#UH77 Jeff Cirillo (Brewers)

Home Run Derby #UH197 Carlos Lee (Brewers)

2005 All-Star #UH194 Chris Carpenter (Cardinals)

Prospect #UH91 Homer Bailey (Reds)

Postseason Highlights #UH130 Roy Oswalt (Astros)

Some backs

BY THE NUMBERS:
Total Cards: 10

Teams Represented: 9
Rookie Cards: 1 (Smith)
Sub Sets: 4 (Prospects, Postseason, All-Star, and Home Run Derby)
Parallels: 0
Inserts: 0
Hits: 0
Keepers for Me: 0 (All are available)

MY RATINGS:
Front Design: 8 out of 10 Good pictures (some posed and some action), team colors represented, good use of foil.
Back Design: 8 out of 10 Nice design, team logo on some cards, full career stats, good layout.
Player Selection: 6.5 out of 10 Good, decent prospects and all-stars.

FINAL OVERALL RATING: Fly Out to center field. Some good players and nice design are not enough to over come no keepers or true superstars.

Check out the other pack over on A Pack To Be Named Later, I think it might be better.

Thanks for Reading!

2004 Yak Pack

     Hey again all. Today I have kind of an odd pack to feature here on the Pack Rip Cafe. It is called a Yak Pack. These were repacks of cards from assorted years and brands. It appears they were used to promote a calling service for long distance company. Also featured is Rollie Fingers on the wrapper to promote a contest inside to win a trip to the World Series with him in 2004. That is the only reference to a year so I am assuming that is when they were released. I am not sure if other players were featured as well.

2004 Yak Pack

1982 Topps #726 Amos Otis (Royals)

1991 Score #369 Jeff McKnight (Orioles)

1998 Leaf #126 Darryl Kile (Astros)

Amos Otis had a nice career with the Royals. I like the design on the 98 Leaf.

1984 Topps #259 Sparkey Anderson (Tigers)

1982 Topps K-Mart #24 of 44 Pete Rose (Reds)

1981 Fleer #112 Don Sutton (Dodgers)

1984 Topps #441 Bob Lillis (Astros)

2 cool manager cards and a Rose fit into my collecting goals and Sutton was one of the underated greats.

For some reason they made the wrapper much taller then the cards.

Here are the contest / adds inside the pack.

BY THE NUMBERS:
Total Cards: 7

Teams Years Represented: 6
Rookie Cards: 0
Sub Sets: 0
Parallels: 0
Inserts: 0
Hits: 0
Keepers for Me: 3 (Rose, Anderson, Lillis)

MY RATINGS:
Front Design: N/A 
Back Design: N/A
Player Selection: 6.5 out of 10 Good

FINAL OVERALL RATING:  Single. 3 of 7 keepers with a good player selection make this pack a hit. I didn't know this was a repack since it was behind the glass of the Vend-O-Pack machine so I am glad they at least had some good players inside.

Thanks for Reading!

2002 Topps Series 2 Hobby Edition

Welcome back to the Pack Rip Cafe. Today we are back to baseball with a pack of 2002 Topps. I grabbed 2 of these out of the Vend-O-Pack machine a while back. I will do one here and one over on A Pack To Be Named Later.

2002 Topps Series 2 Hobby Edition

#486 Kyle Farnsworth (Cubs)

#447 Scott Speizio (Angels)

#551 Ugeth Urbina (Red Sox)

#493 Mark Johnson (White Sox)

No great shakes on the first four.

Prospects RC #679 Chris Tritle (A's)

#445 Orlando Hernandez (Yankees)

#524Terry Adams (Phillies)

 Ho Hum, well at least a Yankee for the book.

#471 Brady Anderson (Indians)

#633 Jermaine Dye (A's)

#432 Erubiel Durazo (D-Backs)

I do like these older sets when I see players on teams I didn't know they played on. Dye and Anderson in this group.

A couple of the backs.

BY THE NUMBERS:
Total Cards: 10

Teams Represented: 9
Rookie Cards: 1 (Tritle) 
Sub Sets: 1 (Prospects)
Parallels: 0
Inserts: 0
Hits: 0
Keepers for Me: 1 (Hernandez)

MY RATINGS:
Front Design: 7.75 out of 10 Nice in game pictures , nice design, team logo, not a great color for the borders.
Back Design: 8 out of 10 Nice design, team logo, good player fact, full career stats, easy to read print, same not so great color for the borders.
Player Selection: 5 out of 10  Fair

FINAL OVERALL RATING: Pop Out to third base. No Mets, inserts, parallels, or hits. One Yankee puts the bat on the ball but not much comes of it. Not a great pack overall.