Cheap Cool Cards #11: SkyMint Coin/Cards

In the midst of the insert craze... Fleer/Skybox created two cards that are unique... sweet... and surprisingly affordable.

I say "surprisingly", because these cards were only available if you pulled an exchange card from either 1995/96 Fleer Metal hockey or 1996 Skybox Impact football. Both of these exchange cards expired in January of 1997, so the window was small... but what made these even more scarce was the fact that they were inserted at a ratio of 1:360 packs.

Had I not pulled the Metal exchange card of Joe Sakic, I might not have ever found out about these beauties. But a few weeks ago... I was looking up Joe Sakic cards and I came across one of these:

As soon as I saw it... I submitted an offer and after going back and forth... we settled on $5. I'm stoked, because I'm not sure if I still have my original card/coin from 15 years ago. One of these days, I'll check my parents' house to see if it's sitting in one of the boxes I have stored over there.

After receiving my COMC package, I decided to see if I anyone else was selling these cheap on the web. While conducting my search, I discovered that Skybox created a Brett Favre card/coin back in 1996. I immediately headed over to Ebay... found one... and made an offer of $3.51 (+ $3.49 shipping). The guy accepted my offer, but unfortunately it wasn't in the greatest condition.

Luckily, I found another one up for auction and won with a winning bid of $2.47 (+ $2.95 shipping). This one is a little nicer:

So what do you think? Aren't these cards cool? I love that they inserted a coin into the card and held it in with some type of cellophane wrapper. It's almost like those Pinnacle Mint coins, but they're a lot smaller.

I've recently started to appreciate 1990's insert cards... and these are definitely two of my favorites. They're perfect for any Avalanche, Sakic, Packers, or Favre collectors. They're pretty scarce in comparison to most 90's inserts. They're unique and interesting. And best of all... they're affordable.

It's a shame that Fleer/Skybox didn't produce a baseball or basketball version of these. I would be all over Tony Gwynn and Michael Jordan SkyMint cards. Maybe a card manufacturer will read my blog and decide to create something similar to these. I guess all I can do is sit back and cross my fingers.

So what do you think of these?

Thumbs up... or Thumbs down?

You know how I'm voting ;-)

TGIF... have a great weekend everyone. Sayonara!