5 Packs of 1997 Donruss Preferred

WARNING!!!

This post contains graphic subject matter and disturbing images. 

Reader discretion is advised

Recently, I was talking with my girlfriends little brother (and by little, I mean a 16 year old who's 6'5'') and he was telling me about how he's been going paintballing recently. I used to play paintball every weekend when I was in high school, but haven't really played since about Junior year, 8 years ago. I still had all of my guns and equipment, nothing that I would want to sell but would gladly pass on to someone else who would be able to enjoy them the way I did. I asked him if he would want all of my old gear and he couldn't have been happier to hear that. The next time I saw him I gave him two guns, two masks and some other gear. Because my tanks were so old, we went to a paintball shop to pick one up. The best part is that the paintball shop also doubles as my LCS!

The guns were filthy and needed to be cleaned and oiled so we picked up some oil, a couple O-rings, allen wrenches, a new CO2 tank and 5 packs of 1997 Donruss Preferred! As we were walking to the register I stumbled upon a clearance table that had a bunch of football packs, some oddball stuff and a ton of '97 Preferred tins- all for $1 each!!! I picked up five tins and couldn't wait to get back to my girlfriends house and bust them open on her bed!

(editor's note: you are officially a dork when the thing your excited to "bust open on your girlfriends bed" are baseball cards.)

I've opened packs of Preferred before, so I knew what to expect, card wise. There are two installments of Donruss Preferred: 1997 and '98. Both sets were "Tiered", '97s theme being Bronze (5:1), Silver (1:3), Gold (1:12) and Platinum (1:48). Piazza is, of course, within the Platinum set. The big "Chase" was that each card had a parallel which was made from the actual metal depicted on the card. All the "Bronze" cards were made from actual bronze, the "Platinum" cards made from actual platinum! Each pack was issued within a metal tin that featured a player on the tin, 25 in all. Each tin also had a few parallels, Gold being the most common, found one per box and #'d/1,200. Sitting on top of all the other was a Ryan Sandberg Gold Tin!

 

The other four I picked were Ken Griffey Jr., Frank Thomas...

...Ivan Rodriguez and John Smoltz

The first one I wanted to open up was, of course, the Sandberg Gold. I opened up the tin and staring back at me was something I could have never expected. Something that had me starring, blankly, muttering over and over to myself "No, no, no. This can't be happening. This can't be right."

The tin was, empty. Like, completely fucking empty. I quickly checked all the other tins.

Nothing! In any of them!!! I felt dizzy, and nauseous and began to break out in a cold sweat. This is every card collectors worst nightmare come true. A completely empty pack. And not just one, but five!!! I couldn't believe it. Nothing in my life made any sense at that point. I frantically tried to find some sort of reason and figured the internet would be find me solace. 

The most popular musician is some lesbian named Justin?

One of the world's most beautiful women is some guy named Rihanna???

 
(...Joe)