The Ultimate Ginter Mini Set Bracket: Seeding Vote #5 (2011)

Before we get to the next vote, we ought to update ourselves on some previous votes!

For 2009, a big congrats goes out to Creatures of Legend, Myth, and Terror.  That set won in a landslide in the 2009 voting.  Also worth noting, the year 2009 had our first two sets that didn't get a single vote (Extinct Animals and Inventions of the Future, both stealth minis no less)!

Moving on to 2010, we had our first tie for first place (actually, a three-way tie) between Lords of Olympus, National Animals, and World's Greatest Wordsmiths.  Thanks to Matt's early vote for the Lords of Olympus it's the Greek Gods who walked away with the highest seed out of the 2010 set. 

Now, let's get to the next installment of the Ultimate Ginter Mini Set Bracket!

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Welcome to the fifth of my Ultimate Ginter Mini Set Bracket posts!

For the first part of the bracket creation, we need to seed the various mini insert sets.  I thought it'd be fun to first have a vote for the best mini set within each year and use each vote winner as a top seed.  From there, I'll fill in the rest of the bracket with some of the non-winning mini sets and then the entire bracket will be set and we can have our giant vote-off!

I also hope that each of these Seeding Vote posts give you a bit of information about each of the mini sets for a specific year.  That should help with your voting as we move forward into the heart of the Ultimate Ginter Mini Set Bracket.  I laid out the rest of the ground rules in my introductory post so feel free to check that post out as well.  Now, we move on to the good stuff (and remember to vote at the bottom of the post)!

The Ultimate Ginter Mini Set Bracket:  Seeding Vote #5 (2011)

The 2011 Allen & Ginter set returns to "normal" in some sense of the word in that we are back down to under 100 total mini insert cards to chase (unlike the previous year which had over 180 minis).  Topps still produced a whole bunch of mini insert sets but most of them are relatively small which does help make this set "feel" more collectible than the previous year.

Here's the running tally of mini sets and total number of mini cards in each year's edition of Allen & Ginter:

• 2006:  0 sets, 0 total cards
• 2007:  3 sets, 65 total cards
• 2008:  6 sets, 107 total cards
• 2009:  5 sets, 90 total cards
• 2010:  9 sets, 181 total cards
• 2011:  8 sets, 95 total cards

And now, let's take a look at each of the mini sets from 2011!

Animals in Peril

The Animals in Peril cards were seeded 1:12 packs which is the most common insertion ratio for minis in 2011.  The Animals set is the largest of all 2011 mini sets (coming in at "only" 30 cards).  As you could probably guess from the set's title, the subjects of each card in the Animals in Peril set are animals which are facing extinction.

While I don't have all of the 2011 mini sets (as you'll see in a moment), I can at least say that my Animals in Peril set is 100% complete.  This set wasn't terribly difficult to finish off back in 2011 since the Animals in Peril were the most common mini inserts that one could find (hobby or retail). 

Complete checklist:

AP1 Siberian Tiger

AP2 Mountain Gorilla

AP3 Arakan Forest Turtle

AP4 Darwin's Fox

AP5 Gharial

AP6 Vaquita

AP7 Dhole

AP8 Blue Whale

AP9 Bonobo

AP10 Ethiopian Wolf

AP11 Giant Panda

AP12 Snow Leopard

AP13 African Wild Dog

AP14 Indian Rhinoceros

AP15 Philippine Eagle

AP16 Markhor

AP17 Orangutan

AP18 Grevy's Zebra

AP19 Tasmanian Devil

AP20 Bengal Tiger

AP21 Whooping Crane

AP22 Sea Otter

AP23 Red Wolf

AP24 Key Deer

AP25 Black-Footed Ferret

AP26 Amur Leopard

AP27 Anderson's Salamander

AP28 Greater Bamboo Lemur

AP29 Hawaiian Monk Seal

AP30 Kakapo

Fabulous Face Flocculence
Note:  No scans because I don't own any of these!

I may have completed the 30 card Animals in Peril set without much issue but the 10 card Fabulous Face Flocculence set ended up proving way too elusive for me (I own zero of these cards and I've decided not to bother trying to chase the set).  This was one of the stealth inserts that Topps included and while the word Flocculence is kind of cool (and was new to my vocabulary - flocculent means "resembling wool especially in loose fluffy organization"), I'm not a beard guy so this set wasn't high on my collecting priorities.

Complete checklist:

FFF1 "The Lincoln" (Abraham Lincoln)

FFF2 "The Ironing Board"

FFF3 "The Conscientious Objector"

FFF4 "The Bib"

FFF5 "The Darwin" (Charles Darwin)

FFF6 "The Neckbeard"

FFF7 "The Goat Patch"

FFF8 "Burnside's Sideburns" (Ambrose Burnside"

FFF9 "Thunderchops"

FFF10 "The Closer" (Brian Wilson")

Fortunes for the Taking

Note:  No scans because I don't own any of these!

My father-in-law is obsessed with the Oak Island Money Pit show that is on TV.  For that reason alone, I should probably try and track down that particular card from the Fortunes for the Taking.  As it stands at the moment though, I don't actually own any of these.  This was another one of the stealth inserts (just like the Fabulous Face Flocculence set) and like that beard set it too has a whopping ten cards to collect.  That was all the reason I needed to skip out on this set as well back in 2011.

Complete checklist:

FFT1 The Oak Island Money Pit

FFT2 Captain Kidd's Treasure

FFT3 The Beale Ciphers

FFT4 The Amber Room

FFT5 The Devonshire Treasure of Cocos Island

FFT6 Blackbeard's Treasure

FFT7 The Treasure of Lima

FFT8 Montezuma's Treasure

FFT9 Butch Cassidy's Loot

FFT10 The Lost French Gold of Ohio

Flora of the World

The Flora of the World set has a gimmick where each card can actually be planted in the ground and (supposedly) flowers will bloom from it.  You might think that this is another stealth insert but as it turned out, Topps actually used this set as a sales driver for the set (that said, the cards were very rare, seeded 1:144 packs)!  Topps would go on to repeat this gimmick in a future Allen & Ginter set but we will get to that in due time as I progress through the sets year by year.

It should be noted that the Flora of the World cards do feel different in hand.  They appear to be almost like a stiff paper towel in texture, sort of fuzzy as compared to regular cards.  I assume that's because they need to disintegrate when placed in soil (and watered).

As for me, I do own this entire set despite each cards general rarity.

Complete checklist:

FOW1 Black-Eyed Susam

FOW2 Spurred Snapdragon

FOW3 Shirley Poppy

FOW4 Mexican Hat

FOW5 Sweet Alyssum

Portraits in Penultimacy

Another set that I have completed, the Portraits in Penultimacy basically celebrates the runners-up or the sidekick to the story's hero.  This ten card set was seeded 1:12 packs originally which meant it was by far one of the easiest to complete via ripping packs.

Complete checklist:

PP1 Antonio Meucci

PP2 Mike Gellner

PP3 Dr. Watson

PP4 Igor

PP5 The Hare

PP6 Tonto

PP7 Antonio Salieri

PP8 Sancho Panza

PP9 Thomas E. Dewey

PP10 Toto

Step Right Up!

Another ten card set that I've managed to build in its entirety, the Step Right Up! set was a bit rarer (seeded 1:15 packs) but it was still manageable if you were an active trader (and bought enough packs, I suppose).  The set has a strong circus theme to it both in terms of the subject matter but also the general card design.

Complete checklist:

SRU1 The Bed of Nails

SRU2 Fire Breathing

SRU3 Fire Eating

SRU4 The Flea Cius

SRU5 The Human Cannonball

SRU6 The Human Blockhead

SRU7 Snake Charming

SRU8 The Strongman

SRU9 Knife Throwing

SRU10 Tightrope Walking

Uninvited Guests

The Uninvited Guests set is another ten card insert set (a common theme in 2011) which was seeded 1:12 packs making this as easy to complete as the Portraits in Penultimacy.  This set celebrates all that is spooky and/or a little creepy all around the country.

Complete checklist:

UG1 Bachelor's Grove Cemetary

UG2 Bobby Mackey's Music World

UG3 Waverly Hills Sanatorium

UG4 Villisca Axe Murder House

UG5 The Amityville Haunting

UG6 The Lemp Mansion

UG7 Alcatraz

UG8 Winchester Mystery House

UG9 RMS Queen Mary

UG10 The Lizzie Borden House

World's Most Mysterious Figures

Finally, we make it to our last mini insert set from 2011:  the World's Most Mysterious Figures.  This ten card set (like Step Right Up!) was seeded 1:15 packs which means it's a bit tougher to complete than some of the other sets, but not so tough to complete that I gave up on it.  That's right, this is another set that I have managed to collect in its entirety which means that other than the two stealth insert sets I've completed the 2011 mini sets!  

Complete checklist:

WMF1 Rasputin

WMF2 The Poe Toaster

WMF3 Kasper Hauser

WMF4 Fulcanelli

WMF5 D.B. Cooper

WMF6 The Count of St. Germain

WMF7 The Man in the Iron Mask

WMF8 Nostradamus

WMF9 The Babushka Lady

WMF10 Captain Charles Johnson

And that does it for 2011!  Now it's your turn to cast your ballot in the comments below for your favorite mini set from the year 2011.  Vote now!