I was able to pick up the next to last card needed for a full run of Herschel Walker cards in the 2023 Panini Legacy series. This is the Indigo version of this card, which is serial numbered to 25. This example is #15. That leaves just the Black, which is a one of one. Already in the Hoard is the base card with the white border; the Blue (sn 50), the Green (sn 100), the Orange (sn 199), the Red (sn 299), the Yellow (sn 150) and the Violet (sn 10).
After a nearly three-month dry spell, with no new additions to the Hoard, I was fortunate enough to come across this 1992 Wild Card Stat Smashers 5 Stripe card of Herschel Walker.
This card could easily have been a Top Ten Most Wanted card. In fact, I had selected a Field Force and Running Wild Stripe card for that honor, but the Wild Card Stat Smasher Stripes are no easier to find. Along with this 5 Stripe, I also have the 100 Stripe and the 1,000 Stripe of Herschel in the Stat Smashers subset. I'm lacking the 10, 20 and 50 Stripes. You would think the higher numbered versions would be tougher to locate, but that has not been my experience.
It's frustrating that it takes so long to find a card such as this, but you know they're out there somewhere and when one does pop up, it's a feeling that drives me to keep up the chase. I really enjoy my niche of collecting, which is basically trying to find cards of a single player that most would deem worthless, but which for me, mean a great deal of satisfaction. Happy Collecting!
There's a lot to discuss regarding this particular Herschel Walker card. First, it's far and away the most I've ever spent on any one card, and I don't really know why. It is a very attractive image, it is low numbered (serial # 1 of 5) and it features Herschel in his college uniform, which always go for more than his pro cards. Apparently, someone else really wanted this, because the bidding on it was fast and furious from the jump. Towards the end, I decided to make what I though was a crazy high bid. I ended up winning the auction, but at a much higher price than I thought it would go for. I'm not sorry I bid on it. I can afford it, but it just fascinates me how some cards go for pennies and others for dollars. Many, many dollars. At any rate, it is a nice addition to the Hoard. The base of the 2013 Retro set as well as three parallel sets have 50 players in each. I have the base, teal and this magenta and only lack the gold, which is a one of one.
The other thing that is strange about this set is that it's called 2013 Retro- '98 Metal Universe, yet Herschel Walker didn't appear in the 1998 Metal Universe set at all. Often times, manufacturers, Topps, in baseball, for example, will reissue a card with the same design as one made decades before. I'm not exactly sure what the tie in is here.
I picked up another parallel in the many parallelled series which is 2023 Panini Prizm Draft Picks. This time, it's a Neon Pink Pulsar card of Herschel, which is serial numbered 13 out of 15. The serial number is very difficult to see on this card. It is located on the card back, in the black bar at the bottom, just above the copyright information.
The Hoard is still short about a dozen cards in this series. Some are 1 of 1's or if not that, very low serial numbered, while others, such as the Red Finite version, have relatively high serial numbers (125), yet don't appear on the secondary market very often.
For the second straight post, I became aware of a card from Herschel's playing days, which was a variation I'd never heard about in all my years of collecting Walker cards.
Above is a 1989 King B Disc Square featuring Herschel Walker. He is # 6 in the 24-card set. The difference between these and the regular 1989 King B Discs, is, 1: These have square borders, rather than the circular discs in the standard set and 2: The lettering on the back of each of these cards is in blue, rather than the black on the regular discs.
I didn't do the best job of scanning this card, but it measures 2.5" by 2.5" square. The image is exactly the same as the regular discs. These are sometimes referred to as proofs and are also available in an uncut sheet.
The TCDB got started in 2003. I joined in 2012 and posted an image of Herschel's 1989 King B Disc card in 2013. It's now July of 2025 and less than a month ago, was the first time the blank space for this variation has shown up on the site. It's kind of hard to believe that so much time could pass without one of the many collectors on the TCDB not adding the checklist for a set that came out in 1989.
In any case, I didn't have the card in the Herschel Hoard. I was able to locate one and am happy to fill in another blank space in the Herschel Walker image gallery at the Trading Card Database.
This card suddenly popped up on the TCDB, Herschel Walker page and I must say, I was completely unaware of its existence. This is a 1992 Pacific Team Statistical Leaders card of the Minnesota Vikings. Each card shows four different team members, who led their squads in certain statistical categories. John Randle graces the front of the card as the Vikings sack leader, with 9.5. Herschel makes the cut as the rushing yardage leader, with 825. Quarterback, Rich Gannon and wide receiver, Cris Carter are also shown.
These 30 card sets were issued randomly, one per factory set. Another collector had already posted this image on Walker's page. I went to Ebay and found several for sale and so, picked one up for the Hoard. These are white border cards, which appear washed out in these scans.
It's frustrating just how much of a dry spell it's been trying to find new Walker cards to add to the Hoard. There are currently 1,465 cards listed on Walker's TCDB page. I have 1037 of them. That leaves 428 cards. I would say, conservatively, 200 of those are 1 of 1's. That still leaves approximately 228 cards out there, which I need. Just try and find them, though. I had a couple of 2022 Mosiac parallels on my watchlist, which were for sale, but they were three figure cards, and I just couldn't justify paying that price.
I'll keep searching and perhaps a card I've been hoping for will show up.
I added another card in the 2023 Panini Draft Picks Prism line. This is the Orange Finite parallel, which is serial numbered to 39. I'm slowly chipping away at this series, but even the ones that have higher serial numbers don't pop up too often. On this card, the serial number can be seen on the card back, inside the black bar near the bottom.
