Still Tearing up Wrappers... Pack #23 of 1997 Pinnacle X Press

We are all the way up to pack #23 of 1997 Pinnacle X Press… I am on a roll folks! It is a brisk 29 degrees out here in the parking lot at work, but I just exited the rest room which has one of those forced air hand dryer/warmer thingies so I am ready! Here we go:
#56 Ken Caminiti San Diego Padres (Talk about a career year… 1996 brought Caminiti these numbers-.326, 40 homers and 130 RBI. He won a Gold Glove, Silver Slugger, was an All Star and won the NL MVP Award. Never again did he come close to those stats, but 2 writers chose him on their HOF ballots in 2007-I suppose he does beat David Segui-in addition, I will say this card showing him swinging from the left and right side is pretty sweet!)
#74 Mike Mussina Baltimore Orioles (I hadn’t seen a Moose card in years and he appears in consecutive packs… I scanned the back of this one to show how poorly a great pitcher could pitch in 1996. 19 wins with a .275 batting average against and a 4.81 ERA? That WAS the mid-90s)
#80 Gary Sheffield Florida Marlins (The Fish were Sheff’s 3rd team, he is up to 8 now… His 1996 numbers were just as grand as everyone else-.314/42/120)
#28 Dante Bichette Colorado Rockies (Dante only had 31 bombs, but he drove in 141, which still wasn’t enough to lead the NL-oh, sorry about the sloppy scans...)
#??? Swing for the Fences Game Card Bernard Gilkey New York Mets
#77 Travis Fryman Detroit Tigers (Travis drove in 100 runs in ’96 and didn’t crack the top-20)
#97 Joey Hamilton San Diego Padres
#123 Vladimir Guerrero Montreal Expos (He’s a Ranger now, he was an Expo then)
That was quick! Now I just to post 13 more of these and I am done with X Press! On that note, I might be done for the night... Troll out!

1994 Pinnacle Series 2 Baseball, the FIRST Pack is Ripped!!!

Well, we have three different boxes in this group break and it is now time that we tear into the box of 1994 Pinnacle Series 2 and start ripping up these 14-card-foil-packs. The bad thing is a lot of these cards are stuck together and it takes a while to carefully open a pack. The good thing is the photography is amazing, the color and composition is great and the Museum Collection parallels were what made me love Pinnacle brands. Let’s go with the first pack!
#492 Spike Owen Cal Angels (one of my favs as a kid playing for his 3rd team in 3 years. By ’94 Owen was a part time player, mostly at 3rd base, but he played at all 4 infield positions for the Angels)
#310 Larry Walker Montreal Expos (Walker stole 29 bases in ’93)
#324 Billy Ashley LA Dodgers (had a career high 9 homers in ’96-had more Hot Prospect cards than career homers)
#303 Danny Darwin Boston Red Sox (DD won 15 games for the Sox in ’93)
#528 Tony Longmire Phil Phillies
#384 Fred McGriff Atlanta Braves (showing off his golden glove)
#506 Mark Portugal San Francisco Giants (was 18-4/2.77 ERA for Astros in ’93, he won Silver Slugger Award in ’94 batting .354 with a .500 SLG%)
#449 Pat Listach Milwaukee Brewers (extreme close-up of a man and his toothpick)
#461 Mike Stanton Atlanta Braves (saved 27 games for the ’93 Braves)
#346 Dante Bichette Colorado Rockies (this guy did it all back then, great photo)
#382 Kirk Rueter Montreal Expos
#411 Julian Tavarez Cleveland Indians (his 828 career games is 7th among active pitchers-this guy scared the stuff out of me in postgame interviews!)
#390 Alex Arias Florida Marlins (was still with the Fish as a utility infielder when they won it all in 1997)
#439 Tom Pagnozzi St Louis Cardinals MUSEUM COLLECTION! (so stoked we got one of these in the very first pack I ripped. Odds are 1:4. Scans don’t do these justice, they are really neat! I remember paying 25 bucks for a Griffey JR Museum Collection card back in ’95-I never did finish the set… This card is courtesy of Pinnacle’s patented Dufex Technology.
The other hot parallels in this set are the Artists Proofs. They don’t look near as cool and the odds are 1:26-in other words, we will PROBABLY get one… So what does everyone think of the ’94 Pinnacle? 1994 was the year that I re-discovered card collecting, fell in love with the sport and the hobby, then suffered through the strike, and then tried my luck at playing the game myself. Glad that card collecting was still there when I woke up from that fantasy… I will post up as many packs as I can before work. This process may take me a while. Keep on checking back. I love this hobby, troll out!

1997 Pinnacle X Press-Ripfest, Pack Number 4!

Moving right along… I can’t stop ripping these ’97 X Press! I am getting pretty into it considering I don’t really get to keep any of them… I bought the only box the guy at the card shop had. I am getting pretty into this design. I wonder how cheap boxes are online? I think I wanna try and track down some more and try to build the set. I have finished Pinnacle Series 1 and 2 from 1995 and am still in progress on 1995 and 1996-maybe this one would be a good one to add to that wing of my collection… Anyway, let’s see how the collation is as we rip open the fourth pack. Here is what we got:
#142 Randy Johnson Seattle Mariners PEAK PERFORMERS (the back of the card cites that Johnson started off the ’97 season 10-1. Wow! That also tells us this product was a late season release…)
#1 Larry Walker Colorado Rockies (Rockies, Rockies everywhere! Walker only drove in 58 runs in ’96, yet he got card #1? Again, late season release. He was on his way to a monster year in ’97. He started in the All Star game, won the NL MVP Award and batted .366 with 49 homers and 130 RBI. Gotta love Coors Field numbers!)
#78 Dave Nilsson Milwaukee Brewers (Nilsson hit .331 in ’96)
#63 Jermaine Dye Kansas City Royals (another card for me! Dye already 325 career homers, good for 95th All Time and he’s only 35 and should have a few more good years left)
Swing for the Fences game card, Moises Alou, Florida Marlins
#28 Dante Bichette Colorado Rockies (The Blake Street Bombers put up HUGE numbers in the late 90’s-Bichette drove in 141 in ’96)
#133 Matt Morris ROOKIE St Louis Cardinals (Morris was 12-9 as a rookie in ’97 and finished 2nd in Rookie of the Year voting. He won 22 games in 2001)
#83 Bobby Higginson Detroit Tigers (I think this is the first Tigers card pulled so far. Higgy would finish the ’97 season batting .299 with 27 homers and 101 RBI.)
#56 Ken Caminiti San Diego Padres (He was the NL’s reigning MVP. Batted .326 with 40 homers and 130 RBI in ’96. Caminiti played 15 seasons in the big leagues and that was the ONLY time he topped 100 RBI)
That pack was seriously loaded with sluggers-most of whom had very short flashes of greatness. The more I see of these cards, the more I like ‘em! I have 32 more packs of X Press to rip. I will either be completely obsessed or totally sick of them by the time I am done. I love this hobby, troll out.