2008 Heritage Pack #4 - Pay Dirt and a Lesson Learned

Last night I had the opportunity to crack open pack number 4 of my "one pack a day" pledge for the week. I have actually been doing pretty good midway through the experiment, and have enjoyed slowing down a bit to look a little more closely and appreciate the cards.

The first thing I noticed when I cracked the pack, was a serial number on the last card? A hit in a retail pack? Right on. I quickly flipped it over an wanted to save the surprise for the end. Here are the cards in order.


Craig Munroe

Sean Marshall

Aramis Ramirez - I have probably pulled more cards of Aramis than any other cubbie other than Soriano.

Erick Threets - Okay, I thought I was just being Naive when I did not know this player, but then I tried to pull him up in Yahoo and he is not even listed there. Most prospects are at least listed in Yahoo with an NA next to their name, so my guess is that Threets is buried deep down in A or AA at this time.

Mark Reynolds, Reggie Willits, and Jason Bartlett. This is NOT exactly what you would call a stellar pack of Heritage by any means.

So how about that hit?

The reason for the crazy coloring is that I tried to angle the card on the scanner to pick up some of the shine. It came out kinda looking like a pastel blurry rainbow, so let me describe the card:

This is an Alex Rios #/592 (weird, eh) and is a chrome refractor card. Now the border is actually pink, and when you angle the card, inside the image there are little pink sparkles mixed in with the crazy refractor rainbow effect. It is a very, very bright and reflective card...

...and you know what?

I love it!

It took me awhile to figure out why I was so drawn to a loud, pink, sparkly, should-have-been-in-a-Hannah-Montana-set type card. I am not really a pink kinda guy, but I quickly slipped this card into a sleeve. Why?

Then it hit me!

Since I have put myself on a pack a day restriction, I have loaded up on retail packs. I did not have any hits on my football cards, and no hits on my first three packs of Heritage. The closest that I can think is going bananas about pulling some short prints.

So when I pulled out that shiny chrome refractor, it was the coolest thing since sliced bread because it was completely unexpected, it was not only a chrome, but a chrome refractor (1:50..oh yeah, I checked). A nice little treasure in the bottom of a pack.

Why am I dwelling on this? I thought about all of the relics, and autographs, and serial numbered parallels and butterflies and horsehair and cut autos that people have come to expect from their hobby boxes. It consumes many of us, including myself, to get the "big hit". 99% of the time you wind up disappointed an saying to yourself "I can't believe I just threw down $100 bucks and ended up with two lousy relics".

Now take this situation. I dropped a grand total of $15.90 on a weeks worth of retail packs. I expected nothing more than a few cards to scan and share with my readers. So when I got that one card it was exciting and fun.

I guess the point that I am trying to make is that when Michael Eisner announces wanting to return the collecting hobby to the kids, I can suddenly see this working. If I were a little kid and I had very little income to spend on cards, then I would be thrilled to find a refractor chrome in a pack. I can suddenly see the light as to where lower-end products CAN work and kids (and adults) CAN find joy and excitement in the hobby without all of the fireworks and "hits".

Don't get me wrong, I still am going to continue to buy hobby boxes and will do a jig every time I pull something nice, but I think my self-imposed daily allowance has taught me a valuable lesson about collecting. Man I hate it when that happens! But I tell you what though, after pulling that shiny pink chrome refractor last night, I can't wait to get home tonight and try my luck again!