Optic Opulence: Card Show Recap #26 Part 2

I've been teasing the 2nd of my card show recap posts from last Sunday's show since, well, last Sunday, but I ultimately decided that the end-of-year posts, like set rankings and analyzing my card collecting goals, would take priority.

Now, several days later, I'm ready to finish up my card show recap posts and before getting right into 2020 by setting roughly 7 card collecting objectives for the new year.

Although it may be January 3rd, think of today's post as a transition between 2019 and 2020, and what better way to do it than by showing the highlights from some packs that I brought back from Sunday's trip.

As you can tell by the title, the post is centered around Panini Donruss Optic, 2018 to be exact. I did not, however, buy a hobby box of this stuff. Rather, it's a retail box of 12 rack packs, each containing 16 cards.

You've probably seen one of these online instead of at your local Target/Walmart. Regardless, the price of this retail box was extremely fair, especially given the caliber of the 2018 rookie class, and I thought it would be an enjoyable alternative to the traditional blaster and hobby boxes.

Once I took off the factory seal, moreover, I learned that each 16-card value pack contained 4 purple parallels. As you can imagine, I ended up with a large stack of them that I'll get to towards the end of the post.

The design, as far as non-licensed cards go, isn't too shabby. The set design certainly works a lot better for Optic than it does for standard Panini Donruss. Usually, I'm not overly fond of Panini's card backs, but they did a respectable job with the 2018 Optic set.

Despite the sleek, silver lines that run across the card and the grey banner on the lefthand side, the cards aren't too busy, in my humble opinion. A fair amount is going on, but that's what's supposed to happen when it comes to chrome cards.

Obviously, these cards would be elevated to another level if they had logos, and just because it's a new year, it doesn't mean I'll stop pleading for Panini to get the MLB licensing rights.

Another nice touch is the inclusion of retired players in the base set, and a large number of them to boost. Whether you're looking for 70s stars like Reggie Jackson or 90s Hall of Famers like Barry Larkin, Panini's got you covered with a base set featuring dozens of legends.

I always love to see Tony Gwynn get some love, but the Jackson card is easily my favorite of the group. Despite the blankness of his helmet, the angle is perfect so that you almost can't notice the missing logos. Not to mention, the gold and green look spectacular on chrome card stock.

Inserts ran at approximately 1 per pack and, like the retired players' cards, I ended up with a wide variety. As far as I know, these cards are based on inserts from the initial '18 Donruss release, only they're enhanced with beautiful chrome card stock.

Seeing these in past trips to the dime boxes as well as pulling them from packs has given me an idea of which 2018 Donruss Optic inserts I like the best. The Long Ball Leaders cards are a vibrant, unique take on an ordinary idea, but if I were to choose a favorite, it would be Out of this World.

The Ken Griffey Jr insert from that set, in particular, is magnificent and can be found at the top of this post.

As I mentioned earlier, purple parallels were the rack pack-exclusive in 2018 Donruss Optic, running at 4 per pack. Thus, I ended up with 36 refractors at the end of the break, and despite the absence of logos, I find this shade of purple superior to the one used in Topps Chrome.

There's a purple parallel for every base card in the set, including Diamond Kings, Rated Rookies, All-Stars, and veteran base. As I opened the packs, I was searching mainly for big-name rookies in addition to players I collect.

Here's a closer look at one of the rack pack-exclusive purple parallels which is more of a magenta shade while Topps Chrome is definitely pure purple.

Because Topps Flagship hasn't had borders in years, Chrome refractors have appeared significantly different than how they did in the first half of the 2010s. Panini, however, uses borders in Donruss, so by the time Optic rolls around, the colored parallels look more traditional, and that's another thing I appreciate about their cards.

Optic parallels may not carry as much value as Topps Chrome refractors, but if there's one veteran you'd want to pull above all others, it's Angels superstar Mike Trout. In addition to the purple parallel on the right, I landed a holo refractor of the same card which, to my knowledge, is also an action image variation.

After checking with COMC, I can confirm that neither one of these cards is all that valuable whereas a Topps Chrome base and pink refractor would be worth a little more, but this retail box was also significantly cheaper, so I'm not going to complain.

Both 2018 Donruss and Optic were loaded with variations that were noted with a filled-in Baseball on the back of the card. You can also tell a variation by the front, such as Mickey Mantle's "The Mick" and Clint Frazier's "Red Thunder."

Variations, as a result, were not only prominent among the base cards in the 12 rack packs that I opened, but in regards to the purple parallels as well.

Seriously, imagine trying to explain the words "2018 Panini Donruss Optic Purple Parallel Mickey Mantle "The Mick" Variation" to someone who hasn't collected cards since the 1980s. They'd be absolutely lost, and understandably so.

Like I said before, there's not a whole lot of value with Optic or many unlicensed cards come to think of it, but any type of Ronald Acuna Jr rookie card is pretty sought after, so I was stoked to land a purple parallel of his base rated rookie.

I also ended up with a handful of Albies, Ohtani, and Torres cards, but it just so happens that Acuna Jr is one of the hottest players in the game.

People are expecting him to be a perennial MVP candidate for the next several years, so high value or not, this card will be an excellent addition to that player collection.

4-Color Magic

It's become somewhat of a tradition here on Cardboard Greats. A quick trip to my LCS for supplies leads me to search through the various bins set up around the shop and before I even know it, I have new cards to go with the top-loaders that I bought. Then, the cycle repeats itself all over again a few weeks later.

If nothing else, the unplanned purchases provide content for the blog, and it's not like I'm choosing cards just for the heck of it. I think very closely about what I believe is reasonable when buying singles at my LCS, and I always try to walk away without breaking the bank.

Today, for instance, I needed some 130-pt and 180-pt top-loaders to store my abundance of new Red Sox autographs. I knew full well that this store has the best prices for supplies aside from the weekly card show, so I picked up what I needed and, while I was there, searched through the 50-cent box.

The card at the top of this post will let you know what direction I went in from there. Indeed, there was a handful of 2019 Panini Prizm parallels in that box, a no-brainer for me to scoop up to make progress with this mission of mine.

I've had much more luck with Prizm parallels over the past few weeks than I had during the 2 months prior. I wasn't able to find any while walking the floor of The National, but a casual trip to the card show as well as my LCS landed me some singles for the project.

The red and blue parallels are common to both retail and hobby boxes, so I've accumulated more of these 2 refractors than most others in the set. Still, the checklist consists of 300 cards, so completing any complete set rainbow will prove challenging, nevermind 27 of them.

Still, I envision having this project for many, many years as something that I can always add to or work on. It'll take me as far as it takes me, and I know I'm going to have fun doing it.

Plus, the missing logos and team names make the cards a bit more affordable, hence why each card in this post was found in the 50-cent bin.

Today was actually a pretty big day for the 2019 Panini Prizm project in that I picked up my very first purple parallels, cards that I believe to be blaster box exclusives.

It seems that each medium of Prizm retail has its own exclusive parallel, including different colors depending on what store you buy it from. For example, Target's mega box exclusive is pink, but I've seen other stores with cosmic haze Prizms instead.

I don't know if this will positively or negatively affect the price point of the cards, but it is going to make tracking them down a bit more challenging, hence why I hadn't come across a purple parallel until today.

The parallels themselves, nonetheless, are stunning, some of my favorites from the set thus far. Although they aren't serial numbered, you rarely see this shade of purple make it onto a sports card (Topps' shade of purple is much darker; this is more of a magenta).

The unconventional parallels, from this distinct shade of purple to the zebra stripe and snakeskin cards, are what inspired me to begin this project in the first place.

Panini makes up for not having the MLB license through their creative cards, and I hope that, even if they come to an agreement with MLB, they never lose this uniqueness.

The last of the 4 Prizm parallels that I found today is pink from the previously mentioned Target mega boxes. Unless I'm forgetting something, I only had the 8 from the box that I opened going into today, so any addition to that list would surely help.

The various tiers in this set (I-III) still feel extremely unnecessary. Though it doesn't affect the print-run of each card, it makes some base cards more expensive than others, and it could be impacting the price of parallels for all I know.

Still, I don't exactly know where this Panini Prizm project is going to take me or how close I'm going to get to complete the whole thing. It's projects like this, however, that make Baseball card collecting such an enjoyable thing for me.

I truly love finding new parallels from this set and watching them accumulate as I sort the piles by player. Granted, I may never complete all 300 of the rainbows (I'm excluding cards with print runs <25), but I'm going to do everything I can to make it happen.