Top 20 Intermission - The Braves Spectrum of Shinyness

Back to more card show stuff. Here are all the Braves cards (not featured in other posts) that I found at the show listed in decreasing order of Shinyness. This post may be used as a Shinyness meter if you ever need to rate your own shiny cards. Note: these are all base, insert and parallel cards. Autographs, relics and vintage are on entirely different planes of Shinyness.

Chipper Jones in the Yar's Revenge Victory screen is just about the shiniest thing ever.

Diamond Shiny is pretty darn close though. Did you know Nate McLouth is one of the better Braves hitters so far this season? That is why we are in 4th place.

J-Hey Chrome rookie! I'm not sure if this is the actual Chrome or the Update Chrome RC. Not sure it even matters at this point. This card would probably be #1 on the Shinymeter if Jason was hitting above the Mendoza line.

This McCann Ultimate Collection card doesn't have all that much foil on it, but Mac has taken over for Chipper as Best Player On The Team and that means something. Especially when you're talking about obscure base cards from a high-roller set.

Glowy Knucksie on a Topps Tribute card. This card probably throws off more radiation than anything else in this post, but Topps has bungled the Tribute brand so badly that it loses some luster.

Refractors are always the baseline of Shinyness on cards. Jair is kicking ass early on this season, now if we can just keep him on the field.

Another refractor. Nate McLouth cards are dirt cheap right now for some reason.

Of all the many, many flavors of Baseball Heroes parallels, this Cobalt Blue is easily my favorite.

Proof that Shininess does not equal attractiveness. This Eddie Mathews Elite insert is a damn mess.

Eddie beats Tom because Mathews was never a Met. That's right, I hold grudges.

Here's another Gawdawful Donruss design. Now I know this is technically not a Braves card, but Tim has an A on his cap so it's close enough for government work.

Proof positive that you do not need foil of any kind in order to be Shiny. Shiny is a state of Being. 2003 Playoff Portraits is one of the best sets ever and Greg Maddux shines all by himself. In fact, bump Greg up above those ugly Donruss cards.

Everyday Jonny Venters in Topps Gold version. Does anyone care about Topps Gold anymore?

Here's a Gallery short print of Spahnnie. For some unknown reason Topps only put foil stamping on the Galley cards of Hall of Famers that year. It doesn't look as good as the Maddux card with no foil though.

It's amazing how foilboard can make a card less shiny. I still don't understand why this Mike Minor card from 2010 was a prospect card and not a Rookie card.

More needless busyness from Donruss drops this otherwise utterly fantastic card down the Shiny Scale.

This is probably the best of  the many, many Legends sets put out in the late '90s. The patented Upper Deck textured two-tone foil is nifty.

I pretty much cringe when I pull one of these Topps 60 cards from a pack, but this one of Murph I have to admit is nice.

Topps Archives cards generally have negative Shininess but Holy Crap look at the sluggers on this card.

Reprinting card designs from the late '80s just doesn't seem as good an idea now as it did back then.

A foilboard minor league insert card of a draft pick that topped out at AAA is about as unshiny as you can get. Alec Zumwalt apparentiy flipped from the outfield to pitching in 2002.

This card is a hot mess and doesn't have the shiny foil of Elite to save it. Sad, concidering Wave of the Future used to be one of Fleer's more innovative inserts.

Reprinting card designs from the early '80s just doesn't seem as good an idea now as it did back then.

A Topps '52 Rookie card of Nate McLouth just may be the unshiniest card in existence. This card acts as a Shiny black hole, sucking in the shininess from other cards into its faux-vintage abyss. Not saying this is necessarily a bad thing, just that you have reached the absolute end of the Shinyness index. Scroll up if you need a shiny fix after this.