Here's this month's roundup of items that have recently caught my eye as a buyer ...

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PARALLEL POWER?
The Card: National League Wins Leaders (Spencer Strider, Zac Gallen, Justin Steele) 2024 Topps True Photo variant & Gold Foil parallel
The Price: About $11 total
Why it’s Buzz-worthy: The concept of this one is simple and it's striking -- knock off the border of a base card completely, using just its photo -- and I think it works. But there's also one thing here that's striking -- and not in the best way. These are arguably too rare to make that big of an impact with me and I think perhaps other collectors who might not bother to grab their players or even think about a team set or full set. How rare? They are one in 677 hobby packs and I'm confident they'd be more popular if people could reasonably collect a team run or set. Why? Because they're something dramatically different and you can compare the regular card and this version side by side. I also grabbed a Gold Foil parallel for this one this time after I bit on the variant ... just to say I had one. Even paying $10 for this was a stretch for me ... and those odds and that price might say that these aren't as popular as they could/should be. These are one in basically every third hobby case.
Grab a box right here: MLB cards are here.

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Buzz buys and busts a lot of boxes right here for Buzz Breaks, but one of my goals is to rip a little less and talk more about cardboard that I -- and you -- might like. One way to do that? Simple show and tell -- present a few pick-ups and say why they captured my attention.

So, with all that said, here are a few Buzz Buys ... a mix of newer pick-ups and some retro/oddball finds.

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A SIMPLE VARIATION
The Card: Bryce Young 2023 Panini Prizm Draft Picks Variations Silver parallel
The Price: $9.99
Why it’s Buzz-worthy: This one caught my attention out there in the world with it being the antithesis of a lot of draft cards these days -- a helmet-less studio portrait -- so I bit. It looked clean and potentially slab-worthy but after how his rookie season went I might wait and see if others go the slab route and I'll pick theirs off rather than sub this one. Or, over the long haul, maybe this will make its way into my submissions -- but it's not a priority at the moment. We'll see. Either way, I like this card and no matter what he does in the NFL he's always got a spot of some sort in the school ties part of my collection.
Grab a box right here: BlowoutCards.com

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Buzz buys and busts a lot of boxes right here for Buzz Breaks, but one of my goals is to rip a little less and talk more about cardboard that I -- and you -- might like. One way to do that? Simple show and tell -- present a few pick-ups and say why they captured my attention.

So, with all that said, here are a few Buzz Buys ... and this time around it's a big one to end the year.

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HIS TIME OF YEAR
The Card: Nick Frost as Santa Claus 2018 Topps Doctor Who Signature Series Autographs
The Price: About $20
Why it’s Buzz-worthy: This set is a loaded one in terms of its depth for the long-running, multi-generational UK television series that has a number of stars in it where you may also know them from elsewhere. One of those names? Nick Frost, who you might know as Simon Pegg's right-hand man in hits such as Shaun of The Dead, Hot Fuzz and Paul. He's a veteran actor and star in the UK so he's got far more notable credits than those and then, of course, this smaller spot in the Who universe that got him this card. He's got about 20 total certified autos from three Doctor Who releases and this is the newest one. I grabbed it months ago -- they may have dried up since then -- to drop this right here this time of year.
Grab a box right here: None for this one ... see non-sports boxes here.

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