Tuesday, May 27, 2014

Mailday Freebies ... #2 blew me away!

Last week, I was approached by a few folks on here that have been checking out some of my custom work. They asked if I wanted a few things for free. I'm going to start off with the first.

1) ajw9356 contacted me saying he had a few older shirts he was going to get rid of that had some nice patches on them of FSU and the Braves. He asked if I wanted them to make customs out of later. He cut them out of the shirts and sent them on his dime. How cool is that?!? Thanks ajw9356!!! Here is a pic. I don't have any ideas how I'm gonna use them just yet, but here they are ...



Next up ... gotta say ... I'm kind of blown away.

2) Cnewby told me that he went to a Clippers game in 1995, and ran into someone who played baseball.

The player signed his clippers program. Well, cnewby contacted me and asked if I wanted it. I asked what I had to do to get it, and he said to just send him my address. Well, I did, and it showed up today.

here is a pic:



AHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!

Do you know who this is? I'll give you a hint. His name starts with a D, and ends with an erek Jeter!!!

Needless to say, I'm beside myself. Again ... this was sent on his dime. Blown away. Thanks so much cnewby. I am PUMPED to be able to create a custom cut card with this puppy!

Oh, and in other news - these came in exchange for some Star Wars customs:

The Cespedes is on card autographed, and # to 25 ... the Hoffman is 1/1. The Sanders is ... well ... the iconic 89 Score rookie :)

 Last but not least, for the TTM activity today, I only got out one ... Britney Spears. Don't laugh. I heard she signs so I tried for it. I should have several more requests going out tomorrow.  I'm trying to streamline my messages while still doing everything by hand.

Monday, May 26, 2014

Reseller's Lot w/Pics & Video 1969-2014 + Kitchen Sink!

Reseller Lot 1969-2014 - Comes with everything including the kitchen sink!*

*kitchen sink not included

This is probably the 60th or 70th resell lot I've sold here online, and the others went pretty dang quickly, so here is the latest.  It includes stars, rookies, inserts, refractors, serial # cards, variations, high numbers and vintage.  Several Jeter Abreu Pujols Appel Bryant and LOADS of others.  Here are the pics and the vid!

SOLD















Sunday, May 25, 2014

How to make 140,000 cards disappear

Today was a rather busy day. After church, I was to go to a card show, then to a dealer friend's storage unit to pick up about 140,000 cards, and come back home to sell some card holders to someone coming from over an hour away.

 Originally I was just planning on going to the storage unit, but another dealer friend alerted me on my blog to there being a show in town. I was going to say no as it was about 45 minutes away, but it turned out it was only 3 minutes down the road from the storage unit.

 Cool, huh? I got to the show and it was a very small one. Admission was $2, so I paid my dues and walked around to see some of the tables. I burned through the hour I had allotted myself there quickly. I ended up dropping five big ones for these guys:
 

Nothing too crazy, but probably about $25 in sell value here. I mainly got them because they are all very nice looking cards. Some nice eye candy for my desk while I wait to flip them. I also sold the Maury Wills bat card.

 This doesn't have anything to do with the flip, but I might as well finish the story. I can see you now biting your nails "What is going to happen with the 140,000 cards? What about the dude with the holders??? THE SUSPENSE!!!!"

 I picked up the cards and threw them in the cardboardmobile (my gold minivan that is now pushing 153,000 miles). Beautiful sight, isn't it?

 

Knowing that I was supposed to meet someone, I called them when I had just finished loading up the cards to let them know they can begin making their 1 1/2 hour trek to my neck of the woods to grab my excess card holders I had for sale. Then it hit me ... why don't I ask if they want to buy the cards I just got?

 So as I was just getting on the street, I pitched it to him. I told him my minivan was packed with sports cards and asked if he wanted them. He said he probably wouldn't because of price, and I said no worries - see ya in a bit!

 Immediately, he called back and said "my wife says I should get these so I will!" This is quite possibly the quickest flip away from a card show ever! I met them at the corner gas station, and they pulled up in an Impala ... with THREE people inside. GREEAAAATTTT ... looks like this isn't going to happen. He asked if I thought they would fit, and I responded "where there is a will, there is a way." Throw in my standard "time to put our tetris skills to use" comment and we were off.

 Amazingly enough, it all fit! I was thankful for this sell too, because when I had come home, my wife and son were in the front yard and garage trying to shoehorn / clean so we could get the new cards, yesterday's garage sale pickups and her sister's stuff that was just brought over.

 All in all, it was a great day (even though our pappa john's pizza coupon didn't pan out *grumble*) That's okay, there is always tomorrow! Speaking of which, a friend is coming in the morning to bring over a nice little lot I'll likely purchase off of him, so we'll have even more goodies for this flip quest!

So, here is where we are at!

DEAL TRACKER
CARDS
2011 Leaf Metal Bubba Starling auto
2013 Heritage Gold jersey Max Scherzer hand #/99
2008 SP Legendary Cuts Fergie Jenkins GU #/35
1993 Topps Jeter Rookie BGS 8.5
2002 Leaf Limited Threads Hank Blalock Patch #/100
2002 Leaf Limited TNT Bat/Patch #100
2003 Leaf Certified Materials Rickey Henderson Jersey #/102
2002 EX Rickey Henderson Jersey
2002 Topps 206 Arod Bat
2003 Leaf Fabric of the Game Manny Ramirez Jersey #/100
Fabric of the Game Rickey Henderson Jersey
Fabric of the Game Rickey Henderson Jersey
Fabric of the Game Rickey Henderson Jersey
Fabric of the Game David Cone Jersey
Fabric of the Game Willie McCovey Jersey
Fabric of the Game Eddie Murray Jersey
1995 Leaf Golf Leaf Rookie Derek Jeter x3
1998 Score Stargazing Griffey
1969 Deckle Edge Bob Gibson
1969 Deckle Edge Carl Yastrzemski (I promise I spelled that w/out looking!)
Finest auto/jsy Middlebrooks [PENDING]
SP Signature Edition Harmon Killebrew auto [PENDING]
2013 Bowman Chrome Avisail Garcia auto [PENDING]
Museum Salvador Perez Patch [PENDING]

NON CARDS
Picnic Table
Cozy Coupe
Epson Printer
61 Serving Platters
3 Home Security Cameras
Panthers Jersey
Paula Deen autographed menu
Windows Vista
Mega Bloks Barn Set
Scrapbooking Machine

Cash
$541.66 total

Keepers (for now)
2013 TTT Cespedes GUx3 Auto
Fabric of the Game Canseco Jersey
Absolute Heroes Canseco Jersey / Cap
2 Security Cameras
6 plates (wife let me know that we will be keeping 5 of the plates!)      

Saturday, May 24, 2014

My flip quest has taken quite the unconventional turn ...

For those of you who have participated in, or have been following along with my flip quest you have seen that it has changed quite a bit recently. It went from just baseball, to baseball, soccer, hockey, football, racing, basketball, etc.

 Well, folks - we have reached another level.

 This might give you feelings like Allen & Ginter did when they started introducing duck callers with a piece of their flannel into their boxes, but here it is for better or for worse. I personally think it is better, because it diversifies things so much more.

 I want to keep this mainly baseball, but last night, I was considering going with my wife to garage sales in the morning. After a string of bad luck at them, I decided to take a breather from them. I was having too much fun making cards Saturday mornings anyway! Then it hit me - I am sitting on a good amount of cash generated from my flip quest to re-invest. I have a small card show tomorrow, and a bigger one the next weekend (Tri-Star ... my Christmas!) but thought about something else. Why not use some of the money to invest in garage sale goodness?

 So I did.

 Some of you might think I'm looney for getting this stuff. And please, don't try this at home - leave this to the professionals, or you may get strange looks from your wife asking why you bought a 20 foot tall blow up cake to re-sell. (No, I didn't get a 20 foot blow up cake ... this time.)

 I was considering not showing what I paid for each thing, but what the heck ... I loathe when people post pics of what they bought, and leave out what they paid! I'll get straight to it. Today, I invested $68 into the following items to re-sell or trade:

 Some kids play things: ($5)



Epson Ultra Hi-Definition Printer (no usb cord) $20 - this was purchased at a fund raiser for a child in need of medical attention.

61 serving plates from an Applebee's restaurant $8 - this is my "WHAT THE HECK AM I DOING?" purchase for the day - I have at least one each time I go out garage saling!

5 security cameras $15 - I am probably going to keep one for my family, and give one to my folks

Medium Panthers jersey #23 .50

Laminated autographed menu by Paula Deen and her sons .50 - I forgive you for all the racial things you said, Paula ... as long as the menu sells!

Windows Vista $1

Mega Bloks set $2

Scrapbooking Machine $16

Over all, I feel like I did pretty good! Some items may take some time to sell, but hopefully they will all sell VERY QUICKLY and for A LOT so I can roll it all back into my flip quest! 

So, here is where we are:

DEAL TRACKER
Here are the card/cash totals I have currently to deal:
2011 Leaf Metal Bubba Starling auto
2013 Heritage Gold jersey Max Scherzer hand #/99
2008 SP Legendary Cuts Fergie Jenkins GU #/35
1993 Topps Jeter Rookie BGS 8.5
2002 Leaf Limited Threads Hank Blalock Patch #/100
2002 Leaf Limited TNT Bat/Patch [URL=http://www.freedomcardboard.com/forum/usertag.php?do=list&action=hash&hash=100]#100[/URL]
2003 Leaf Certified Materials Rickey Henderson Jersey #/102
2002 EX Rickey Henderson Jersey
2002 Topps 206 Arod Bat
2003 Leaf Fabric of the Game Manny Ramirez Jersey #/100
2001 SP Legendary Cuts Maury Wills Bat
Fabric of the Game Rickey Henderson Jersey
Fabric of the Game Rickey Henderson Jersey
Fabric of the Game Rickey Henderson Jersey
Fabric of the Game David Cone Jersey
Fabric of the Game Willie McCovey Jersey
Fabric of the Game Eddie Murray Jersey
Finest auto/jsy Middlebrooks [PENDING]
SP Signature Edition Harmon Killebrew auto [PENDING]
2013 Bowman Chrome Avisail Garcia auto [PENDING]
Museum Salvador Perez Patch [PENDING]

Non Cards
Picnic Table
Cozy Coupe
Epson Printer
61 Serving Platters
3 Home Security Cameras
Panthers Jersey
Paula Deen autographed menu
Windows Vista
Mega Bloks Barn Set
Scrapbooking Machine

Cash
$543.24 total

Keepers (for now)
2013 TTT Cespedes GUx3 Auto
Fabric of the Game Canseco Jersey
Absolute Heroes Canseco Jersey / Cap
2 Security Cameras

Friday, May 23, 2014

I just caught the TTM bug! (TTM is Through the Mail Autographs)

I remember the first time I tried to send out a baseball card through the mail to get it signed.  It was (of course) Jose Canseco.  My prized 1989 Fleer card was taken and wrapped in cellophane for protection (at the recommendation of my mom, I'm sure - I was 9 or 10 at the time and wouldn't ever admit to such a thing!)

I began the long process of writing the letter, the address, the SASE and stuffing it all in an envelope.  Not to mention the gut wrenching task of spending 50 cents on 2 stamps which could have gone toward a pack of Topps, Fleer, Score or Donruss!  

It felt like decades, but after probably only a few months, I got it back!  I opened the envelope and there it was ... my 1989 Fleer Jose Canseco card signed .... ON THE CELLOPHANE!!!

I was happy the card came back, but was bummed out that it was on the cellophane.  It is funny to me to think that back then I wouldn't have just tried again with a card sans the cello, but it never occurred to me.  

Does anyone have a time machine?  If so, if I could borrow it and send like ... 100 of those things to him.  Surely he won't sign anymore free TTM.  

Fast forward about 25 years later, the internet is all a buzz about getting autographs through the mail.  From your favorite baseball player to an actor you can't get enough of.  There are several out there!  A free resource you can try is here:  http://www.sportscardforum.com/ttm.php

I have been meaning to try this myself ... just throw a ton out there, and see what sticks.  I have started out with using some customs of Cespedes, Gray and Donaldson:



I hand write the letters and envelopes because that apparently is the best practice for TTM.  I have one huge thing going for me - my chicken scratch writing hasn't changed much in the past 25 years - the players may think I'm a 10 year old ... with very bad handwriting!

I started thinking to myself - WOW this is going to be a *ton* of work if I keep sending out customs like this!  So I decided to send some paper clippings.  This picture may not make sense ... YET.  I will post an article later whenever show you what I have done with them.



The main challenge for me was this:  If I'm sending out a lot, I don't want a lot of time spent in making custom cards, and I don't want to get a huge picture that I can't cut the auto out to put in a custom cut auto card that I can make.  That would be a bummer!  Don't get me wrong - any type of autograph would be fantastic, but it would mean so much more if I could create a beautiful art piece - a custom pc card out of it.

SPEAKING OF WHICH - here is a sneak peek at what I've been up to:

2014 EXQUISITE CUTS 1/1 TED WILLIAMS CUT nAUTO



I've been trying to do a nice design with some cut autos. This is a nAuto ... not-auto (get it? ha!) - I just printed the autograph out and created the design around it. I think it came out great.  It is a little scary at how good the signature looks though.

Okay, back on point.  Over the past few days, here are a few folks I've sent mail and email to in hopes of getting back an autograph:  Donaldson, Cespedes, Gray, Will Clark, George Bush, George W Bush, Gina Carano, Pat Sajak & Vanna White, Hugh Laurie, Nick Offerman and others.  I can't wait to see what I come up with!

PLUS ... I have a few things coming in the mail to me which I will be pretty excited to show once they get here.  One of which being an autograph that I am getting for free from an online forum member which I will reveal soon.

Okay, back to writing letters!

Tuesday, May 20, 2014

Flip Quest Update + Other Various Musings

Okay, several things to cover:

Flip Quest: I sold almost everything, and the majority of what is left over is pending. Here are a few items I got in the mail yesterday, though:

 





A few notes: the TTT card above ... cool beans! The Cano auto is my fave through this haul and #ed to 56. How can you beat a Spring Fever design with an auto ... of Cano?!?! The Fergie is # to 35 and the Scherzer is hand #'ed to 99. BTW, the Pink A-Gon is now A-Gone.

I have made a quantum leap with this flip quest, which you can see where we are at by clicking the flip quest link .  It just might be time to buy daddy something nice for his pc.  Me being daddy, of course!

Next up:  Remember that stockpile of boxes?  I am FINALLY in the black.  Yes, I have over 300 boxes that are now free and clear (pops champagne!)  It is a very good feeling, though not nearly as satisfying when selling them, since I have already hit my goal.  I guess the goal has now shifted to exclusively getting rid of them all.  Let's bring on the trades!

This is actually a perfect segway into my next item of discussion: CUSTOMS!  I traded one of my boxes for a nice autographed baseball of Ken Griffey Jr.



Wait a second!  "What's that next to it?"  It is a 1989 Upper Deck MINOR LEAGUE Ken Griffey Jr. Custom Rookie, of course!



The Kid gave an interview recently and said that Upper Deck had photoshopped out his minor league logo for Mariner duds so he could dawn the 89 Upper Deck set as a major leaguer.  I decided to just photoshop it back in and make it a real card.



Could you imagine the moola this puppy could go for if it were a real card produced by Upper Deck, and only a few made it into circulation?  I think it would make the '90 Topps Frank Thomas NNOF card look like a 1989 Topps Mike Gallego!  No offense to Gallego, btw - I like him!

Then I wondered, what if Griffey had played for my favorite team, the A's?  So I got a little goofy ...



The whole world may like the minor league card so much more, but as an A's fan ... well ... this one takes the cake!

Did I mention I did some 1993 SP Foil customs?  Derek Jeter who?  When you have Craig Biggio ...



And this hot rookie ...

 

Finally, I shall close with a football card:

THICK National Treasures card with a piece of the glove embedded in it (the NFL Shield is part of the glove)





The more I do this, the more I enjoy it. For some reason, this scratches the itch that the major companies just can't get at, because they are custom made for personal collections. They also have seemed to have done a great job of bringing people closer to the game by being a great conversation piece between player and fan. I'm truly grateful to be able to make these!  




Friday, May 16, 2014

Update to the flip quest

Once again ... everything previously shown is pending! I got some goodies in the mail yesterday as well though. Here are the new things: I did a deal with Nervo and got these:
 

He also sent me along these for free! (these freebies are pending now, btw)



THANKS NERVO!!! Another deal I did was with mgugs46



I know I've gotten some Mantles and such, but the card that has caught my eye the most out of this entire flip quest is the Cespedes TTT in the pic above! I love it. An autograph, with green, white and gold jersey pieces! It is pretty much perfect. I'm keeping the Cespedes for now just so it can sit on my desk and I can stare at it for a while :) Thanks for the deal mgugs46!! I love all the cards you sent, and hope you enjoy yours as well!

Thursday, May 15, 2014

Rollin' with Nolan - I met him, got 6 autos including a custom book ... pics inside!

As an avid reader of Beckett when I was a child, I absolutely loved an article they did entitled "Rollin' with Nolan". It was an interview-style article, which highlighted Nolan offering pitching lessons to a baseball card dealer in exchange for his own rookie card. He cited the reason his offer instead of cash was because of how expensive the card was.

 The article ended up being an April Fool's joke, but it stuck with me. Fast forward to this past weekend. We went to a book shop about a half hour away for our friend's book release party. I got to talking to her dad, and the book shop was going to have Nolan Ryan do a book signing session.

 Nolan ... freaking ... Ryan!
 

The Ryan Express. The man who has 7 no-nos, over 300 wins and over 5,000 K's. Never in a million years would I have thought that I would have been able to get the chance to meet him.

 I've had autographs of him before, but that is just a "think". Seeing one of baseball's biggest pitching legends and having him sign for you is a completely different animal. This book is NOT something for the health conscious person, by the way. Here is some evidence of that:

 

Sing it with me in the tune of Batman ... duh nuh nuh nuh nuh nuh nuh nuh nuh nuh nuh nuh nuh nuh nuh TACODOG!!!!!!!!!!!!

 It doesn't really excite me to bring a baseball to have signed, or anything like that. I, of course, want my own custom art to be designed. Many of you have seen the first two, and I'm happy with how they came out, but the booklet that I did has got to be one of my favorites! So, we got in line ... it started at 6, they told us to be there at 7, and we got there at 6:30.
 

See? I'm a gentleman ... I blocked out ... no ... I Nolan'ed out all of the people's faces in line. This pic doesn't do justice to show how many people were there. They were VERY specific - if you buy one ticket, you get one book signed and one memorabilia piece signed. You cannot buy 64 books yourself to get 64 things signed. So, I did what any sane person would do, and bought three!

 

My gracious wife, and didn't-have-a-say-in-the-matter son came along. It took forever, and though someone tried to cut in front of us, we cut right back, and got our autos! The book shop said I was fortunate to have snagged the last tickets - PHEW!

 We did have to jump a few hurdles first though. There was talk that after 8pm, it would be cut off ... the time was getting VERY near to the end. The other issue was that there was discussion about if he was signing the book AND the piece of memorabilia, or just one or the other.

 My whole reasoning for getting three tickets is I figured that I would be able to sell the books, and have myself 3 nicely autographed customs for free. The last thing I want to do is sink $80+ on this.

 Suddenly, all my worries melted away ....
 

NOLAN!!!!!!! My dreams of sitting in his lap for him to tell me about all of his favorite pitching stories were quickly dashed, when a military-like order list came about.

 

My confrontation was reduced to a "Hi, Nolan how are you?" "Fine, and yourself?" I told him I created the cards I was having him sign, and told him that I made a refractor for him to keep. He thanked me, and after the signing we went to the side where I carefully, yet frantically waved the cards in the air to dry them before they went back in their sleeves ... with my hands still shaking.

 

Here are all 3 books signed!

 

But oh no!!!! He is signing in a black sharpie. NOT A BLACK SHARPIE!!!!! Thankfully, I came prepared. If you look at this next pic, you will see a few different color sharpies - why? Because I'm difficult like that.

 

I busted my hump the entire day of the event to get the booklet done. The others were done already in anticipation of the event, (plus you may have already seen them) so I'll show those first: The first one, is a 2013 Topps Chrome Football style (an abomination, I know!) refractor. The border goes from red to orange to yellow.

 I just had to do the football style of it, because I absolutely LOVE the design. The bottom artwork is so intricate, it took forever, but I think it came out mahveleous. I had Nolan sign in blue to complement the reds/oranges/yellows.

 

You will see that the card is #'ed 2/2. The card #'ed 1/2 is in Nolan's possession. We are the only two that have this card. He has it displayed on his night stand, no doubt. I say night stand, because after 2 hours of signing, the man looked to be out on his stool, and ready for bed. (BTW, THANK YOU Nolan for signing!)

 

I had dreamed of that card - how beautiful it would look with a color matching refractor that gradiates from red-orange-yellow, with the Astros uni. I'm glad I made that one. The next one is a "card that never was". If you recall, 1968 Topps is his rookie. He shared it with Jerry Koosman. I really wished that Topps didn't do this to all the rookie youngsters of the 60's. No collector wants to have their guy sharing cardboard real estate with someone else!

 Nolan first played in 1966, so I thought ... why not have a 1966 Topps Nolan Ryan? And sign it in red? And make it a 1/1? And slightly fade at the bottom so the auto can pop more? Heck, why not have him sign in RED? The purple/blue on the card looks nice, but I thought the red would really make it stand out. I think I like this better than the refractor. Just the novelty of it being a "card that never was" and the red auto. Love it!

 

The back has a few things to note. First, I like how it ended up looking like an authentically aged back. In the holder, that is - it is a gloss type of card, like my cards are, but it doesn't matter one lick, since all my cards are in holders anyway - you can't tell the difference!

 

If you notice the cartoon of the players holding a sign - it says 108 mph. Nolan is (or at least was) marked for the fasted pitch thrown at 108.1 mph. I wanted to put that in there as a piece of little known history. This was something that the Guinness book of World Records had him in for - they measured the speed at the time the ball went out from his hand, as opposed to how fast it crossed the plate.

 The second thing is that it is #'ed 599 - the '66 Topps set only had 598 cards. Lastly, here is the booklet. My prized piece of the whole day! I did a lot of photoshopping and tests to get this right:

 

I couldn't get it to print right at first, and had some cutting / scoring issues, so it netted me a pile of trash:

 

I used a piece of the trash to do a test to see if red or blue would look best.

 

When the paper scrap settled, I ended up with this:

 The outer front: 7 stars for 7 no hitters.

 

The outer back: WINNER replaced the typical CONGRATULATIONS because I really wanted to keep in line with my western / carnival theme.



Binding:



Inner left: 1/1 woohoo! Lucky me :)

 

Inner right: The whole reason for this creation ... BAM!





You may recall the pic on the right of him with the high leg kick. Topps used it for one of their cards a while
back...


 So, there it is - a summary of a fantastic night, with 3 cards that bring me joy that no pack pulled or ebay purchased Nolan Ryan card ever could!