2009 Allen & Ginter Box Break: Pack 2

Due to time constraints, I'm going to do the box break a pack or two at a time until this weekend. I just don't have the time I used to. Also: five scans per post. No more than that. People who use Blogger will know why. Ok, here's pack 2:

198 Raul Ibanez
215 Jed Lowrie
160 Max Scherzer
71 Albert Pujols
30 Ryan Howard
80 Joe Martinez RC
126 Trevor Crowe RC mini
NP64 Francisco Liriano National Pride

Jeez, Pujols and Howard in the same pack. That's some serious firepower there. Plus Ibanez is having a hell of a year for the Phillies. Funny how they took so much crap from the pundits for signing Raul early for a lot of dough when guys like Dunn Burrell and Abreu were available for a long time and took less money. Who's having the career year though? It's taking me some time to get used to this set. After some minimalist design with lots of white space the past few years, the pastels are somewhat overwhelming. They look good, it's just taking me a while to get used to 'em. I really like the action shots in the set. They are a great contrast from all the posted portraits. The Max Scherzer card is very nice looking and the Pujols card is amazing. I'll bet that looks great on the mini card. I'm not sure who the rookies are and I'm too tired to look 'em up at the moment. Crowe did not make the mini binder cut unfortunately. A 2007 black border Carlos Beltran kept slot 126 I'll say this for Topps: they hit a home run on the National Pride set. I'll bet a few collectors eschew the base set and just go after the National Prides. .