So I gotta say, I absolutely LOVE the 2022 Clearly Authentic 1955 re-images. When I first saw this card, I immediately fell in love and added it to the personal collection:
I love that card SO much. Pedro's amazing smile, a perfect action shot on the right, and a bright blue auto. Of course I researched the other Sox who have these 1955s and got them promptly added (Fisk, Nomar, Boggs; Papi hasn't popped up anywhere that I've seen yet). I also grabbed an Eck (A's), and will add a Rickey Henderson and a few others. Honestly, they are outstanding cards. This year also has a 1987 re-imaging, but honestly that doesn't do much for me. I didn't really like those cards when they came out when I was 13.
Of course this led me to check the 2021, 2022, 2019, and 2018 lines...and they all have re-images from past Topps sets. The 1954s from the 2021 sets are pretty damn nice and I will be adding the Sox and possibly a couple others. I also like a couple of the 1986s from the 2021 line and have already snagged a Xander.
I know people's opinions on acetate cards are pretty varied, and indeed acetate cards are fragile as hell and who knows how the autographs will hold up over time. BUT...man. Right now they are SO beautiful.
After going through my collection over the past few weeks and sorting, cleaning, etc...I've come to the conclusion that I want to somewhat limit myself and focus a bit more on quality. I think going forward, I'm going to try to collect only one single "important" card, and one single autographed card, for non-Sox stars. So for example I'd keep a Mark McGwire 1985 Topps USA Baseball card, and one of the 1955 re-imaged 2022 autographed card. Everything else doesn't matter, just common city, and I'd obviously keep collecting the cards with the cool pictures and whatever. As for Red Sox, I'll do it similarly and get one good important and one good auto for each, but won't necessarily shy away from buying anything Sox related because I gotta be honest, I see a cool Sox card I gotta have it. I try to get the cheapest version possible each time, but if that card has three on-card autos what can I do, ya know???
Lastly, some folks have mentioned wanting to do another break. I know it's been a few months, but I'm assuming those people would still be in. I'm in and I'd go a step further and consider hosting the break. I've never done it, but it's something I've always wanted to do. I have the technical setup ready to go, and I have a friend who is a HUGE collector (I rode with him to the card show I bought the Stadium Club box from this past weekend) and would love to help. I know we had PE host in the past, but it seems he's been offline for a while. Hopefully everything's OK on his end of course! But yea, I'd be down for getting a case of Stadium Club or whatever and SoSH that mutha out.