Some cool pickups!

So, I've been on a bit of a buying binge! 

When I was in San Antonio on vacation with the family, I met up with a guy on the way out of town, on our way home and picked up these beauties:

 

We will forget the fact that on the way, I backed into a concrete wall.  It's ok - I was only going a few miles an hour, and besides, I didn't buy the cardboard-mobile for her pristine looks!  The back fender was disjointed, and I was bummed, but decided to take a knee to it, and it popped back in place.  Now, she has a matching scar next to what my wife did to her a few years back. 

Anyway, back to the cards ...

I flipped them pretty quickly, which was kind of nice because it helped pay for a bit of the vacation!  Plus, I don't know why, but I always have some sort of satisfaction in having owned some of these cards before - I don't always have to own these items myself to feel fulfilled.  If only I can be that way about eating!  You know - take a bite of cheesecake, then spit it out instead of swallowing. 

Jordan Brown, a baseball player for the Marlins called me up and talked to me about the USA autographed baseball I had.  He said he was interested in trading for it, and mentioned he was talking about it with his hitting coach ... Tino Martinez!  How cool is that?  Martinez resigned today, apparently, due to some internal problems. 

Anyway, I ended up selling it to someone else, but thought it was cool that I got to talk to a ball player for a while about it...who called me ... AND who spoke to Tino Martinez about my ball. 

With my family out of town this weekend, I found myself doing a lot of buying ... and talking to my dogs, but that is neither here nor there. 

I was trying to clean out my office a bit, and remembered a purchase from January's card show that was overshadowed by meeting Jose Canseco.  A 1986 Mother's Cookies promo with Jose Canseco and Will Clark that was signed by Canseco! 

It has just been sitting behind an always open closet door of mine, so I decided to get creative.  A month or so back, I grabbed a framed movie poster of Mandy Moore that was autographed.  I took it out, rolled it up, and put the Canseco item in its place.  it was much smaller than the poster, so what I did was I ended up pulling a few Mother's Cookies cards from my collection, and put them in at the top!  These cards were obtained by me as a child by trading with neighborhood friends, a kid from my little league team and opening Mother's Cookies boxes with my dad.  With all that said, here it is!

This may just be Canseco's biggest rookie card ever!  The cards I put in there will serve as a reminder of how fun it was collecting cards as a child.  My Canseco collection are the only cards I have left from my childhood.  Nothing else is off limits when it comes to selling!

So, back to my buying spree.  Here are a few other items I bought this weekend!

 



Autographs of HOF'ers Lefty Gomez, Steve Carlton, Don Sutton, Lefty Gomez and Billy Herman.  The Herman has an AWESOME inscription.  I've never seen one like it!



Yogi Berra Autographed Baseball



Ralph Branca / Bobby Thomson Autographed Baseball - Thomson hit a homer off Branca in the 1951 Playoffs to give the New York Giants the win against the Brooklyn Dodgers.  It was dubbed "The Shot Heard 'Round the World".

Jim Palmer - An inscription that I think has something to do with his alma mater.

 

Don Drysdale!

 



Sandy Koufax!!!

Pee Wee Reese

1996 Orioles team signed baseball with Cal Ripken Jr. 

I was most excited about the Drysdale / Koufax autographed baseballs.  Truly iconic and dominant pitchers for the Brooklyn / LA Dodgers. 

I also picked up nearly 10,000 cards which are mostly 2013's.  This is a bit of a gamble here, because I don't know too much of what is in them. 

I am still waiting for my autographs and cards to come in.  I can't wait!  I may possibly check out someone's 75,000 card collection this evening or week.  Apparently it is supposed to be all stars, rookies, inserts, etc.  So we'll see what happens. 

You know you are a collector from the 80's & 90's when...

I run into people all the time who are coming back to the hobby, be it for themselves or for their children.  I thought it would be fun to put together a list, so feel free to add to it!

You know you are a collector from the 80's & 90's when...

1. You carefully inspect each corner of a 25 cent card before buying ... with a magnifying glass.
2. Your retirement plan consists of a closet hoard of 1988 Donruss complete sets, and a nice stash of guys like Mo Vaughn & Albert Belle
3. You still refer to Todd Van Poppel & Shawn Green as hot prospects.
4. The card you always wished you had was a 1986 Donruss Jose Canseco rated rookie
5. You think your '85 Topps McGwire is worth $200.
6. You have an impressive run of Becketts from 1986 to 1996
7. That Kid Griffey sure is something, isn't he?
8. Your go-to haggling argument always starts with "but the book value is..."
9. Super collecting a player means you have over 100 of his base cards and one, MAYBE two of his autographs
10. The cards of Phil Plantier, Mike Greenwell, Tino Martinez, Kevin Mitchell, etc. that are in holders are worth less than the holders they are in.
11. You got angry when Score entered the picture, because it made collecting complicated.  Topps Fleer and Donruss are enough!

Mining for Black Diamonds and the Case of the Missing Bautista

Greetings from hot San Antonio!  As I write this, I am in the hotel with my family.  I took them for a vacation to Sea World this 4th of July weekend.  I have been meaning to update my blog, so with my wife passed out on the bed from lack of sleep, and my son on his ipod, I figured this would be the perfect time!

This past week has been another busy one.  First off - a few gems!  I picked up a cool small collection of autographs.  A Nolan Ryan autograph, a Tom Seaver vintage autographed baseball, a Whitey Ford autographed 3x5 and this ...

A game used 1984 USA Olympics baseball signed by the whole team!  Yes my friends, that means that the signatures of Mark McGwire, Will Clark and Barry Larkin, among others are on it!  Very pumped to have this in my collection .... until it finds its rightful owner!  :)

Now, onto a few others pickups here.  I found a few people selling their collections.  One was about 30,000 and the other, about 100,000.  I decided to drive one evening to check out both in one swipe. 

The 30k collection was asking a good amount.  She was a reseller, but didn't know much about cards.  She mentioned that the cards would go for much more on ebay.  I told her cards are my bread and butter, so I would let her know if it were true or not.  Right off the bat, I opened up a 1987 Donruss set, and sure enough, a few of the sealed packages were open.  I told her the McGwire rookie was missing, so probably others were too ... though the Bo Jackson was there. 

I went through a few of the mix boxes and noticed a few Jeters, so I thought it would be worth a try, provided she accepted a fraction of what she offered them up for.  I'm definitely not into picking up collections unless I have an interest in them and can make money on them! 

I got home, and was pleasantly surprised!  A few of the boxes were nothing but the red 2000 black diamonds.  Not too big of a deal, but these boxes yielded over 50 each of Jeter, Bonds, Ripken, Clemens, Griffey, Maddux, etc!  There were some SP Authentic of the same guys, as well as some inserts.  Nothing high end, but about 800 cards of super stars.  I was very happy. 

The next collection was interesting.  The guy claimed he had cards from the 50's to about 2005.  He said this was his collection; that he hadn't looked at it for years and years.  That he bought packs and that is how he got most of the cards.  Something seemed strange, but I figured why the heck not ... so I decided to check it out.  He mentioned most were 2000-2005 and not many at all were 80's to 90's junk.  He mentioned there will be a lot, and I mean a lot of good rookies from the 00's. 

On my way out the door, I noticed the email address ... remember this story?  Yeah, the lady who I was speaking with via email was the same lady who offered the mis-cut Cobb that someone else had offered.  Something is up. 

I went over there and the husband mentioned he was moving.  I asked where to, and he said he didn't know.  He said that he used to buy a few storage units a week and such, too. 

I dove into the cards, and you guessed it ... cherry picked to the bone.  Much of it being 80's 90's stuff!  I find it hard to believe that a collection had not been gone through ... and recently ... when you go through a box of rookies where there are multiples of everyone, except for Jose Bautista ... the star player who has only emerged worthy of being pulled from such a box within the past few years. 

Very interesting.  /strokes chin.

The one thing that saved it for me is that I was able to get them for a price decent enough, and that one box had about 2,000 cards from the 70's.  There were a small handful of 50's and 60's cards. 

This was only part of the story, due to my limited writing time today, but I continue to be baffled by the people that continue to lie.  It seems like every time I buy a collection, someone is trying to bs.  I don't get it!  Come on people - that is not how to treat others. 

Anyway, in the end, I am happy with the purchases, and I got a few good stories/experiences out of them.