Have You Got a Kenny Powers Rookie Card?

If you sneezed you probably missed the first season of HBO's Eastbound & Down, which charted the return to reality of a John Rocker-esque Big League pitcher named Kenny Powers. Broke and broken, Powers returns to his hometown in North Carolina to teach middle school P.E. He's one cocky S.O.B. who thinks that he's still the king of the world even though his fastball clocks in at less than 80 miles/hour.

Powers is played by Danny McBride, or the drug dealing chubby buddy from Pineapple Express or the special effects guy that likes to blow stuff up in Tropic Thunder. The show was great, although the first season only went six episodes - by choice, not by cancelation.

When the show launched I saw a few places posting pictures on downloadable online cards that looked strikingly familiar. Well, look what I found:

Foil be damned, this here is a pack of real Eastbound & Down cards. Let's tear in and see what glories are within:

As a huge fan of the show, absolutely fricking brilliant! Riffing off of recent Topps designs, these cards truly tell the career of Powers. Notice that each year he's with a different team. Also note the declining numbers after starting out on fire. The card-back biographies are equally hilarious and showcase many memorable moments and tidbits.

There are some inconsistencies though. Check the facsimile autographs. Yup, they're completely different. And if you look at a close-up of the 2004 card front, you'll see the ball has another take on his "signature."

Still, the final card of Powers kicking his glove is an instant entry into my own personal Cardboard Hall of Fame.

Promo packs can be found somewhat easily on eBay, although prices seem to be all over the place with packs/sets selling anywhere from $0.99 all the way up to almost $20.00. Oddly, more recent sets seem to be creeping higher.

Card Gallery: 1991 Fleer ProVisions Baseball

I'm not ashamed to admit that there was a time when I rushed to the store with my lawncutting cash to buy packs of 1991 Fleer Baseball. Yes, those ugly pieces of cardboard with the bright yellow borders. I can only imagine that someone at Fleer became jealous of the popularity of the red borders found in 1990 Donruss and wanted to get the jump on yellow before anyone else did.

Today I approach that yellow set much like I do yellow snow: acknowledge that it's there but just keep on moving. However, within those packs was something brilliant and gorgeous. They were works of art - literally. I'm speaking of the ProVisions inserts.

The 12-card painted set features the fantasy artwork of Terry Smith and captures the game's biggest stars of the time in a fantastical sense. Smith blends a realistic style with a symbolic approach to what made his subjects so good. The cards are numbered 1 of 12 through 12 of 12. Seeing as how inserts were pretty new to the hobby in 1991, no insertion rates were announced.

I just discovered that four additional cards were inserted into factory sets, numbered F1 through F4. Seeing as how they're numbered differently, I'm considering them a different set, although I did go out and grab three of them. If anyone has an F4. Dave Stewart available, please let me know.

ProVisions became a part of the base set in 1992 and were inserts again from 1993 through 1995.

 

  

  

  

  

 

Survivor Winner Jenna Morasca in New TNA Knockouts Set

Jenna Morasca, winner of reality juggernaut Survivor: Amazon, which aired in 2003, recently began expanding her 17 minutes of fame when she joined TNA Wrestling. Browsing eBay tonight I came across this card from the new TNA Knockouts set:

That didn't take long for her to go from her TNA debut to a card. I also noticed an autographed event-used card and I'm sure there's a base card or two of her as well.

Although she won Survivor, probably her most famous moment on the show was when she stripped naked for the camera for a taste of peanut butter with fellow tribe mate Heidi Something-or-Other. After the show finished, the pair stripped again, this time for Playboy. Jenna returned to her Survivor roots for Survivor: All-Stars but quit to go with her ailing mother.

These aren't the first Survivor-related autograph cards. Upper Deck produced a collectible card game based on the show that had some signed cards. Here's a small sample:

And if you're really into reality TV, particularly Big Brother, here's a scantily clad Janelle Pierzina who participated in Big Brother 6 and Big Brother: All-Stars where she finished third both times.

The card is from Bench Warmer 2004 where it's all ladies in skimpy outfits.

One Last Go With Inkworks

A little more than a week ago I received what will in all likelihood be my final pair of redemptions from Inkworks. I bought a couple boxes of The Spirit a couple months ago and by the time I finally got around to sending them off, Inkworks had announced they were shutting their doors.

Crap!

Luckily they were still honoring the redemptions for The Spirit and will continue to do so until the announced expiration date of June 30, 2009. Yes!

The cards arrived less than a month after I sent them from the Great White North. That's astounding considering the fact it often takes envelopes a good couple of weeks to go one way to and from the US from here.

I was a little concerned with the plain white envelope they were sent in, but then again I wasn't lucky enough to pull a Samuel L. Jackson. Instead I got the following pair:

 

  

The first is Gabriel Macht who played the lead character. If I were a big fan of the movie this would be cool, but it looks pretty bad. Macht has been in a few movies here and there but nothing that gets me too excited.

The second is one of the ones from the set that I was really looking forward to. Dan Lauria might not sound like a familiar name and he's not really all that famous. Save for one role: Kevin's dad on the classic TV show The Wonder Years. As I continue to lament the loss of Inkworks, let's listen to a little Joe Cocker.

 

Farewell, hole-punched Inkworks redemption card.

Heavenly Metal

Last week I received a package from Mario at Wax Heaven that had some good ole' wrasslin cards and this thing of beauty:

 

Bon Jovi in trading card form. It comes from Impel's 1991 Mega Metal set, which after doing a little research has a Skid Row hologram. There's boxes on eBay for under $20 so I think I may have to dip in and get my 80s hair metal nostalgia going one of these days.

The big finds of the box were a trio of hits from TriStar's recent TNA: Cross the Line set.

 

 

The dual event-used card and the Dutt autograph are both numbered /50. I haven't seen a lot of TNA wrestling yet but I do know that all three of these guys featured do have some good moves. Whether or not they become stars on a bigger stage remains to be seen.

Here's some more TNA:

 

We've got old man Foley who just won TNA's big belt last weekend over Sting (no, this isn't 1997). Then we have a funky art card of an all-time favorite of mine, Christian who recently returned to his WWE roots and even more recently (yesterday) won the ECW Championship.

Oh, yeah, there was also this:

 

That, my friends, is Don West captured in a rare moment where he was at a loss for words.

Mario didn't neglect the wrestling big leagues either. He also sent me some WWE cards I hadn't seen in person yet: a handful of Topps' UK-exclusive Slam Attacks. They're a CCG that are meant to be played with. Topps recently brought the line over to North America with a baseball set that I haven't seen or played. Here's a sample:

You can never go wrong with Jimmy Snuka and the Ken Kennedy is a foil - not sure if it's a parallel or just something fancy. These have a nice clean look to them.

Thanks a bunch, Mario!

Captain Canuck Goes Green and Loves "My Secret Identity"

A short time ago I got an email from fellow Canadian Captain Canuck over at Waxaholic asking me if I collected John Jaha. Heck, yeah. He said there was a little something for me in the mail that he picked up at the card show.

Oooooo, non-descript in-coming surprise package. How intriguing. Well, that little something turned into a fun little package of goodies somewhere along the way. The first thing that popped out was a pack of 1991 Donruss Series Two Baseball, featuring the super-appropriate green borders seeing as how it was Earth Day a couple days back (random mid-sentence thought - Why do we only set one day a year aside to celebrate the environment? Make me a new Powerpoint, Al Gore!).

Here's the findings:
756. Bill Doran
747. Matt Stark
742. Jose Rijo "World Series"
736. Kelly Mann
751. Gary Sheffield
730. David Segui
438. Kevin Mitchell "All-Star"
408. Darryl Strawberry "MVP"
432. Mike Benjamin "Rated Rookie"
BC-22. Willie McGee "Highlights"
760. Checklist
755. Randy Veres
750. Doug Drabek "Award Winner"
746. Thomas Howard
741. Jeff Reed
Clemente Puzzle: 34-36

Next up, Star Wars Clone Wars STICKERS from Merlin:

17 "Foil", 163, C8, 180, 27, 99

I don't know much about this set but my daughter and I did watch the Blu-ray of the movie. It sports a pretty cool look but the story was pretty bad - even for the current Star Wars scene, which isn't exactly known for its great writing.

But I'm a sucker for Star Wars and combine it with the fact that these are from a sticker album set and I might just have to track down some more of these to bust with the kids.

Keeping with the non-sport theme, next up we have a pack of Sliders. This is a show I only saw a couple of times and have been meaning to pick up on a cheap DVD sale but haven't gotten around to it. It starred Jerry O'Connell who I still think of from two things: being the dorky follower on Stand By Me and as a child superhero on TV's My Secret Identity. Both we pretty dorky. But I guess O'Connell grew up all right because here's his wife (minus the blue skin and the Stamos name from her first marriage):

 
Sliders was one of the first sets Inkworks put out. There were no autographs or major hits to be found so the focus was on the set itself. Go figure. From what I can gather from this single pack, there was a good mix of show synopsis stuff and artwork. Some of the art seems a little dated but that's simply a sign of changing styles and trends. For those keeping track, here's the pack breakdown: 61. Trouble in the Rubble, 49. Damnation, Sliders Gear Order Form, 47. Harvest Times, 41. Kromagg's Rule!, 15. A King's Ransom, 9. Hygenically Approved, 8. Call Me Comrade, 58. Too Cool! Too Bad.

So what about this mysterious Jaha-ian card show find? Here it is:

An autograph 1992 Donruss rookie. A very cool find indeed. What it was doing at a card show in hockey haven Calgary? I have no idea but I'm very excited to have received it.

The Captain also included some Canadians to add to my collection including my first run in with 2008 Upper Deck Heroes Baseball and they're seemingly infinite number of parallels.

 

  

Thanks a bunch Captain Canuck, both for thinking of me at the show and the wonderful package of goodies!

The Autograph Lineup for the New Star Trek Movie Set

For whatever reason I've never watched a lot of Star Trek. I'm not against it and I like a lot of sci-fi, but I just haven't devoted a lot of time to it. That said, the new movie that comes out on May 8 looks pretty darned good. Lots of things blowing up, a director that has a good sense of modern storytelling and Shaun from Shaun of the Dead.

Rittenhouse Archives has a set based on the movie scheduled for release on May 6, a couple of days before the movie launches. Each box promises two hits of either autograph or costume cards. While I like costume cards in non-sport sets, I'm always more eager to see what signatures there are. Seeing as how the cards haven't been released yet, here's candid shots of who's signing for Rittenhouse's set - and let's just say this checklist is pretty close to perfect as far as possibilities go.

 

Chris Pine (whose body of work includes the classic Just My Luck with Lindsay Lohan) as Kirk

 

Zachary Quinto (Sylar from Heroes) as Spock

 

That's not a Ferris Bueller clone but rather Anton Yelchin as Chekov

 

Karl Urban as Bones

 

Bruce Greenwood as Captain Pike

 

Zoe Saldana as Uhura

 

Eric Bana (Hulk, Munich, Troy, lots of other stuff) as Nero

 

Faran Tahir (was in Iron Man last year and 24 a few season back) as Captain Robau

 

Chris Hemsworth as George Kirk

 

Jacob Kogan (the creepy kid from the crappy remake of The Omen) as Young Spock

  

HAROLD! John Cho as Sulu

 

SHAUN! Simon Pegg as Scotty

 

J.J. Abrams - Director

 

Roberto Orci, Alex Kurtzman - writers

A couple of observations:

• You get Simon and Harold in the same set!
• It looks like the whole main deck crew is here.
• Lots of guys, one girl.
• Lots of pretty-boy messy hair.
• Although not a lot of directors sign cards, this is acutally Abrams second autograph card. He signed back in 2002 for Inkworks' Alias: Season One set.