A weekend of meeting my childhood heroes - A story of customs and autographs

As a kid, you always dream of meeting your favorite ball players. I was fortunate enough to have met Jose Canseco twice over the past two years. Whenever someone would go to a show, I would always think that the people who paid these big bucks to get autographs were ... well ... nuts! Why pay $100 on an autograph, when you could get them on ebay for half or less?

As I have been creating custom cards over the past few months now, my eyes have been opened. What a rockin' ice breaker to be able to talk to players and be able to give them one of your creations. I mean, honestly ... it beats the heck out of them autographing a $215 jersey. If I'm paying to meet them, I want to do something special - something that I can give them and feel proud of. So, that is what I have been doing all week.

If you were a blog follower of mine, you have probably already read - and saw the customs I was taking to the show. Only IF I was able to get some other takers. Originally, I was just going to try and sell my Glavine ticket to get Thomas, but that didn't happen. Instead, I had two people get Thomas, and it helped fund get all THREE of the guys I was wanting to see. I'm so glad I wrote the last article, because had that not happened, I wouldn't have a great memory to hold onto for life.

So, let's start from the beginning, shall we? Friday afternoon, I was a few hours away from leaving my house to go to the card show in town. I got a call from my friend who was setting up. I had given him 69 of my unopened boxes of cards to sell for me.

"Tanner, you know I wouldn't call you unless it was an emergency."

My first thought was "OH NO!!!!!! Someone stole my boxes!!!!"

Thankfully, that wasn't the case!

"I was just about to setup and ... someone bought me out! Do you have anything that I can buy from you so I can fill up the table with? When can you be here? I need them asap!!!!"

Have no fear, carboard crack dealer is here! He told me he would get me a vendor pass, which would allow me to go in the back. #dreamcometrue

I scrounged up nearly everything I had and he bought pretty much everything I had on hand to fill up his cases. If you have been part of my flip quest, if you look closely, you may see some of your old cards in there!



It was great to be able to help out, even better to be bought out, but this ... this my friends is like superman's cape to me:



I may or may not have worn this to bed.

Ah yes - I'm finally able see the seedy underbelly of the band of gypsy-like card show dealers that travel from all over to setup and pedal their goods.

Someone walked up after I got there, and before the show started, someone grabbed about 29 boxes of stuff from me. Smashing success from a wheeling and dealing standpoint, right? Wrong!



The show was actually very, very weak. I got a handful of game used / autographed cards on saturday, and did a trade with my dealer friend for 11 2-row boxes of stuff. Part of a deal I did was for these 3 beauties:



they cost all of $3 and are screaming at me to make a triple jersey of the moneyball era pitchers.

The biggest and best deal though, actually came on friday ...



Some t205, t206 and t207 (love me some tobacco cards!) as well as a felt vintage card, a box of 50's to 70's stuff, and some BEAUTIFUL sets of '68, '72 and '75 Topps. I'm happy with the purchase. I'm selling, of course!

Thankfully though, all that had nothing to do with what made this show special.

Saturday rolled around, and they called Tom Glavine's name. YES!!!! It's go time. I got in line, and was very happy to see him actually standing up and posing for a picture with his fans after he was signing! Such a cool thing. As I was rehearsing with my son on how to take a picture, it was our turn in no time. I think he did great!



When I gave him the card to sign, I told him I made him one and gave it to him. He thanked me, and off we went to get it authenticated.



I think it came out fabulously ... oh, and I LOVE the back as well. The hologram POPS!



I went home after this a very happy camper. But not before I bought my tickets and authentication stickers to insure I was able to get Biggio and Thomas!

Some dude named JJ Watt was sold out. Whoever he is.

Ahhh, now to put the finishing touches on my Thomas and Biggio. Ahh, I'm out of ink and material. No biggie ... that's why I ordered backup.

IT ISN'T WORKING!!!!!!!!

I stayed up until about 2am to wrap these things up, and didn't get it done. It always seems that no matter how long I put into these projects, I am always pushing it to the last minute. I mean really, how long can one person really stare at two color gradient variations to determine which one looks better? I can answer that ... HOURS UPON HOURS!

I woke up early the next morning, extra groggy ready to get my cards ready to be signed. I ended up going to several stores, and none of them have the material up to my standards. Of course they didn't ... they were local, and that would be too easy, right? THANKFULLY, I got it all sorted last minute. I packed up, and headed out.

Here are all the mess ups. Sigh, this would actually make some pretty cool wallpaper, if it weren't for all the stress it caused me!



Shortly after I got to the show, they called Craig Biggio's line to start getting ready. I did it, and was only maybe 15 feet or so away from that JJ Watt feller they keep talking about. everyone was so eager to meet him.

Then ... Craig Biggio came out ... yeah! He had a nice little interaction with JJ, which I was fortunate enough to snap some (horrible quality) pics of:



Here, let me translate that for you:



Finally, FINALLY it was my turn to go up to Biggio and have him sign my custom card. I gave him one as well, to which he thanked me.



I was bummed because he was not taking pics with ANYONE in front of me. I mean no one. Surely that was the rule, because I mean ... everyone has a phone ... how could you not? I really wanted to get one with me.

So I asked.

And I received! :)



I just asked the dude behind me if he could hold my phone and take a pic. My plan was to just slide over by Craig and ask if I could take a quick pic with him while pointing to the dude that was holding my phone so it would only take a few seconds. Thankfully, he said yes and it worked out great!

If you read my previous blog, you might remember this card:



Well, I opted to go close up and go with a bit of blue instead. I'm happy I did!



Last, but certainly not least, my favorite of the whole weekend. FRANK THOMAS!!! The Big Hurt. I was fortunate to have a few people pickup some autographs of him from me, so I was able to get in line and wait until Frank came out.

Oh, by the way - I'm famous now. Someone that was in line asked if I was "the guy that makes custom cards". I have officially made it, my friends!

Back to my Frank story - he is a BIG man. A big, nice man. I told him I made the cards and he could have one. He was the best reaction out of the 3 - he said:

"Really man? These are great looking cards!"

WHAT DID YOU SAY? (I literally said that because I was stunned a bit.)

"I said, these are really some great looking cards!"

If I wasn't a Frank fan before, I am now! I told him one of them was his, and he thanked me.

Here he is signing them:







But Frank didn't stop there! He told me "say man, you are the artist. Why don't you sign them as well?"

When Frank suggests, you take it!

So, I signed right on top of his:



Okay, maybe that last part didn't happen :) No way in heck would I sign a card signed by the Big Hurt!







Altogether now!



Did Frank pose with me? You bet he did!

BOOM!



Needless to say, I'm one happy camper, though the show itself didn't have much to offer in the way of new inventory.

Here is a pic of the back of all of them:



The authenticator did a double take on these cards "WAIT A SECOND ... isn't this card supposed to be all red?" Hahaha - yeah. I look forward to seeing what the Tri Star Authentication code comes up with when they are entered in later this week!

I just had to take a pic of all three of my keepers - the latest additons of my PC:



It took forever for this project, but I think it ended up a huge success, and a great memory for me, to boot. I am never going to think anything negatively ever again about someone who wants to shell out the extra dough to meet a player in person to get their autograph.

So, after I got home, I kept thinking what could I do to wrap up this great weekend?

A picture! So, I tried a few:

Ehh, too tame
 

The "whasaaappp?" look
 

The party guy finger pointer look
 

Okay, that was a little too crazy. Let's tone that down a few notches and:

There it is.



Thanks for reading!

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.

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

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!)      

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