In 2017, I was minding my own business, when pictures of the 1/1 Leaf Q Jumbo patch Jose Canseco showed up online before it was even signed.  Though unlicensed, it was a card that made my jaw drop like no other.  I can’t think of a single licensed card that captured my attention quite like this one when I first laid my eyes on it.  

Thus began a long struggle in my mind trying to justify how I could love an unlicensed card so much – after all, I’m *supposed* to like licensed cards more … right?  

It didn’t matter.  The more I looked at the airbrushed picture, the more the nostalgia bug bit me. It harkens back to the time when the game’s biggest stars would make mom’s grocery trips so much more exciting.  You do remember that, right?  Getting cereal, sausages, pepsi, mootown snackers etc., and finding your favorite player sans the team logo – did you care? If you were like me, you didn’t.  In fact, I probably cherished them more because they added variance to my meager collection.  

I remember those times well – they are bright spots in my childhood memories. 

This card somehow perfectly captures that for me while also being everything you could want in a high end card.  When I first laid my eyes upon it, the gold foil somehow seemed to shine brighter than other foil.  The jumbo sleeve patch both pops and matches the theme of the card, while defying the logo licensing rules without actually doing so. To top it off, it has the most perfect signature on card, and the famed 1/1 serial numbering.  

I remember when I was on vacation during thanksgiving at Legoland.  Fun, right? Absolutely – maybe a bit stressful because I knew it was about this time the Leaf product was about to drop, so I had to keep my eyes and ears opened at all times.  As I was obsessively checking my phone like a maniac at Legoland, it finally popped!  I made an offer, but ended up just hitting the buy it now button, and the rest is history.  PHEW!  Here is a pic of my son and I back in 2017 enjoying some Legoland Apple Fries minutes after I won the card. 

This card is one of the very few that survived by first big sell off and I’m so thankful it did!  Eventually, I did end up completing the rainbow, too!

So that is the story of the single card that made my jaw drop the hardest when I first saw it.  What is yours?