1995 Excalibur Sword & Stone - need info

[RustyGreerFan]

Right now there are two Jake Reed BINs on ebay for $6 apiece. One is a Sword & Stone Silver and one is a Sword & Stone silver diecut.

I never understood what Sword & Stone even were. Were they redemption sets? What is the diff/print run between bronze, silver, silver diecut, and whatever other versions?

 

[mintman2]

I don't have any specific knowledge about those cards but to me it looks like silver and stone was an insert and the die cut version was a more limited parallel.

 

[TheDogHollerer]

As you can see there are silver stamps on both cards... no cards released in packs had those stamps. Which means they are either a redemption set, which I find unlikely, or a never released insert/parallel set which found it's way to the market. I find the latter to be more probable, because in the late 90's Collector's Edge was notorious for selling cards to dealers and companies like Vintage for repacks, and many of these cards were never officially released... which is why you'll never find them in year in guide. I have a few from CE Black Label, Advantage and Odyssey that I should try to dig out to show....

 

[JamesNevans]

Sword are numbers 1-75 while Stone was 76-150, die cuts are the parallels.

 

[TheDogHollerer]

Sword are numbers 1-75 while Stone was 76-150, die cuts are the parallels.

That is the the regular base sets, series 1 (sword) and series 2 (stone), and die cuts were inserted 1 in 9 packs... but none of those had the silver S&S the two cards in question have...

 

[Dilferules]

These were not inserted into packs, but my memory is foggy on how exactly they were distributed. I can't remember if they inserted redemption cards for the various sets in packs or if you had to send in a whole set and then it was stamped and sent back (like '97 Playoff Absolute). I do know they were only available as a complete set with all of the inserts stamped as well.

The cards all had a little foil stamp in the corner, and the different variations were Bronze, Silver, Gold, and Diamond (holographic flecks). I don't remember where I got this information from, probably an old Beckett annual, but the print run for the Diamond set was supposedly 6(!) and 22 for the Bronze set, with the others somewhere in between. I'm not sure if they are that rare (they are not serial numbered), but they are definitely very hard to find. Below is a picture of the Trent Dilfer Diamond, Silver, and Bronze cards. I haven't found the Golds for a good price.

 

[AUTaxMan]

They were probably sold as a set on the Home Shopping Network.