Pack – 1999 Paramount

Beckett Set Notes (from set page)

“The 1999 Paramount set was issued in one series for a total of 250 cards and distributed in six-card packs with a suggested retail price of $1.49. The set features color action photos of some of today’s biggest superstars and tomorrow’s up-and-comers in their 1999 uniforms. As was typical with 1999 Pacific products, a Tony Gwynn Sample card was produced and distributed to dealers and hobby media several weeks prior to the product’s release. The large “SAMPLE” text running across the back, and lack of a card number make this an easy card to distinguish.”

Pack Contents

6 card

Cost

$0.25 (part of a large group of packs picked up at a show)

Description

Whoo hoo!  A pack from 1999 – absolute top shelf material for this blog.

Insert / Parallel List (taken from the pack)

Platinum Blue parallel – 250 cards – 1:73 packs
Copper parallel (hobby) – 250 cards – 1:1 packs
Gold parallel (retail) – 250 cards – 1:1 packs
Holographic Silver parallal (hobby) – 250 cards – unknown
Holographic Gold parallel (retail) -250 cards – unknown
Team Checklists – 30 cards – 2:37 packs
Personal Bests – 36 cards – 1:37 packs
Fielder’s Choice – 20 cards – 1:73 packs
Cooperstown Bound – 10 cards – 1:361 packs

Base cards

220 – Alex Rodriguez (front and back)

14 – Luis Gonzalez (front only)
49 – Lance Johnson (front only)

169 – Ryan Christenson (front only)
220 – Dan Wilson (front only)

Inserts and parallels

235 – Copper Parallel – Rusty Greer (front and back)

Comments

I have recently liked just about everything that I’ve opened.  From packs of newer stuff to boxes of junk, I have found something redeeming in all of it.  It stops here.  This product, 1999 Paramount, is lousy.  Allow me to elaborate.

The white borders don’t work well.  I have never liked new, glossy cards with white borders.  I think these cards look like some lame effort from Topps.  (That might be hitting below the belt.)  Look around your house.  Are there any pictures framed in a white mat?  No.  Frames are dark.  Maybe in the 70s white borders were OK and accepted without question.  Even I like the look of the 1973 and 1977 sets.  But, by 1999, the white border looks washed out.  (Glossy white borders are also hard to crop and trim in scans.)

What else don’t I like?  Let’s see, the backs don’t look like real card backs.  The font size is so big that I feel like I’m in the third grade.  Maybe the writers at Pacific didn’t feel like creating too much text.  Maybe these cards are designed for the visually impaired.  Whatever the reason, the backs just don’t feel like real backs.  (Whatever that means.)

A final point is that I have no idea whether I opened a retail or hobby pack.  The one insert card looks like a Copper parallel, which would make the pack a hobby pack.  Then again, the insert could be a Gold parallel, which is retail only.  Gold and Copper are kind of hard to differentiate based on foil lettering alone.

In conclusion, this pack is kind of a bust.  Pacific put out a ton of different sets in the late 90s.  They can’t all be great products.

Other 1999 Paramount pack rips or box breaks

Pack Rip by The Priceless Pursuit

Part of a box break by Nachos Grande

Advertisement

Break – 1998 Pacific

Stats

base cards: 320 of 450 – 71.1% complete (71 doubles or triples)
Silver parallel set: 36 of 450 – 8.0% complete
Platinum Blue parallel set: 1 of 450 – 0.2% complete
Gold Crown Die-Cuts insert set: 1 of 36 – 2.8% complete
Team Checklists insert set: 1 of 30 – 3.3% complete
Latinos of the Major Leagues insert set: 3 of 36 – 8.3% complete
Home Run Hitters insert set: 0 of 20 – 0% complete
In the Cage insert set: 0 of 20 – 0% complete
Cramer’s Choice insert set: 0 of 10 – 0% complete

Selected Base cards

188 – Randy Johnson (front and back)

262 – Dave Burba (front and back)

Selected insert and parallel cards

14 – Latinos in the Majors – Moises Alou (front and back)

17 – Latinos in the Majors – Edgar Renteria (front and back)

30 – Latinos in the Majors – Joey Cora (front and back)

29 – Gold Crown Die Cuts – Ken Griffey Jr. (front and back)

5 – Team Checklists – Cleveland Indians (front and back)

Comments

• base cards
  These are pretty nice cards.  The second language takes a little getting used to, but the cards themselves are alright.  Among the base cards is a nice mix of vertical and horizontal poses.  One weird thing – the horizontal cards, if held so that the back of the card has the same orientation as a vertical card, has the player name upside down.  Otherwise, these cards are fine.
• subsets
  This set has no subsets, and I really like it.  They are just player cards.  What a great idea.
• parallel cards
  I don’t know why, but when I was scanning these cards, I missed getting the Silver and Platinum Blue parallels.  Since they are parallels, you are not missing much.  The Silver parallels have the player name in silver foil.  The Platinum Blue parallels have the player name in a bluish-silver foil.  (What the hell is Platinum Blue?)  Otherwise, the parallels are identical to the base cards.
• insert cards
  I pulled five inserts from three different insert sets from this box.  That’s pretty much on target based on the published odds.  The Latinos in the Major Leagues cards are pretty cool.  The front of the cards has the player’s national flag as the background.  The background has a texture that feels a big like fabric (plastic-coated fabric).  It’s pretty cool.  The die-cut Home Run cards are OK, although they’re a big gaudy for me.  The Team Checklist cards are pretty plain.  Note that all the cards of a given team are numbered sequentially in the set.

Conclusion

I had no idea what to expect in my first bilingual baseball card box break.  Overall, I was pleased.  There is nothing fancy about this product.  It tries to be glam with all the gold foil, but it’s just a simple product.  Actually, that’s the best part about it.  It’s not so tricked out such that it gets in its own way.

Other blogs’ breaks/rips of 1998 Pacific

To my knowledge, nobody has posted a box break or pack rip of 1998 Pacific.  Don’t I feel special right now?

Haul from the show

After going to a local card show this past weekend, I’m going to have a special week with more than my usual three posts.  This is my first show post, and it describes the sizable bag of booty I took from the show.

My goal for the show was to pick up some unopened packs.  I didn’t care what I got as long as it was a nice mix, preferably from the 90s.  I only saw boxes of packs at tables for two dealers.  I was worried that the selection would be weak, but I was pleasantly surprised.

The first dealer’s box was strictly late 80s/early 90s junk – stuff like 1990 Score Football.  This wasn’t exacly what I wanted, but it was at least a big variety.  I picked up 20 packs for $5.  The second dealer’s box had just about everything – rack packs, non-sports, and stuff from the late 80s to around 2005 or so.  I passed on the Pocahontas packs but went crazy on everything else.  I got around 25 packs for $5.  With admission, I dropped a total of $15.

The three pictures below show what I got.  There is some duplication, but I have plenty of material for my Monday pack rips until next spring.

This batch is mostly from dealer #1.

This batch is mostly from dealer #2.

This is a mix of non-baseball stuff from both dealers.