Baseball from the budget boxes

In case you haven't heard, there's a World Series going on, with that in mind, I thought it would be an appropriate time to show off some of the baseball cards that I got at the big show a couple of weeks back.

I did pretty good at this show as far as not spending too much on a single item goes (well, other than the Bob Woodward autograph), in fact everything in this post (and the coming basketball/football posts) came from either a dime box, 5/$1 box, or a 6/$1 box. It was definitely a good show for the budget collectors (they always are, but this one was better than usual), I know this because a) I found a boatload of cheap things, and b) I encountered quite a few other people who were doing quite well for themselves just by sticking to the budget boxes.

I was a big fan of Jose's as a kid, this '86 Topps Traded was still a $20+ card during my peak baseball card collecting years, I never owned a copy back then because of it's hefty price tag, now thanks to a 6/$1 box... I own three!

Someone can correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe this Bo is still up there when it comes to one of the more popular cards from the overproduction era.

Here's a couple of lower end, but still very fun, inserts.

The previous couple of shows had been pretty good Ichirowise, this one not so much, although it's entirely possible that I just wasn't looking at the right tables. I also broke my streak of finding/getting copies of his 2012 Topps Chrome refractors, but I still managed to find at least one shiny, and one not so shiny (unless you count gloss as shine), Ichiro.

Cheap Junior inserts are always a good thing, especially now that I'm sort of collecting him again.

I'm not entirely sure as to whether or not I want to collect the 2013 Cooperstown Lumberjacks anymore, but either way, I was gonna be passing these up at 15 cents apiece. I actually found ten of them, with the four shown being the best (see, I'm trying).

Double the sexy!

I showed great restraint by not buying every single one of the 2013 Emerald Green's that I came across, the same thing could be said about the Platinum Diamond Anniversary's above, because there was plenty of each to be had... another sign that my set collecting days are coming to an end.

There's always plenty of cheap shiny cards to be had at pretty much every show, everywhere! This is a small sampling of the bright stuff that I brought home with me.

I thought I'd do something a little different to finish off this post, something that's sort of Fuji-esque, and count down my top three favorite baseball cards from this show:

3. 1997 Topps Stadium Club Rey Ordonez Patent Leather: This is just a really cool insert, and it was the first time that I had seen one in person... it didn't disappoint!

2. 1995 Score Bo Jackson Gold Rush: What's not to like about this card, it's a Bo sunset card, and it's gold (it also had a bunch of dust on it that I didn't see until I added the image to the post).

1. 1987 Topps Jackie Gutierrez: Now I know some of you are probably going "Whaaaaaaa???????????", before any heads start exploding, let me just turn this bad boy over and show why it's #1...

... now do you get it? If you've been coming around here for awhile, than you already know of my affinity for blank backs -- if you're new to these parts, well, I have quite the affinity for blank backs! Finding a true blank back in the wild has become pretty uncommon for me, so this was very unexpected, and pretty much worth the trip alone (and yes, I know it's not really worth anything, but that's not the point).

For anybody who's waiting to see the basketball and football portion of things, I have no idea when I'll be getting to those, I don't plan on going to another show for a couple of months, so I'm not in much of a hurry to get those two posts done.


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One man's collective is another man's collection

Thanks to a busier than normal weekend, today's post is going to be a bit of a quickie (but still a goodie).

Not too long ago I had the good fortune to receive an email from Greg -- of everyone's favorite Borg themed sports card blog, The Collective Mind -- asking if I'd be interested in making a trade.

He and I hadn't traded before, but I know of his stellar reputation, so even though I'm not a huge fan of formal trading, I found that resistance was indeed futile (Next Generation reference!).

 The bulk...

 ... of the package...

 ... was made...

 ... up of...

 ... 2012 Panini Cooperstown! Greg really decimated the needs list, but from what I've been able to gather, that's just what he does.

Greg also helped out with my 1976 Wonder Bread set, by providing four of the seven that I need. I will most likely try to upgrade two of these at some point, but they'll certainly do for now.

And finishing up with my two favorite cards from the package, which also happen to be two for set needs. I missed out on a bunch of Kimball Champions at the last card show, so this David Wright was very much appreciated. And without looking, I think that my 2001 Upper Deck set is now around the halfway point... maybe a little more!

Greg, thanks again for the trade! And thank you too for initiating said trade, as my anxiety can make it very difficult to make first contact (ah, worked in another Star Trek TNG reference right at the end).


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I need more time!

I don't know if it was his intention or not, but Daniel -- from It's like having my own Card Shop -- seems to have inspired a blog challenge/bat around, the goal being to try and write a post in five minutes. All the cool kids seem to be doing it, hopefully that means it's alright for one of the uncool kids to give it a go as well. So let's fire up the old stopwatch (people still have those, right?), and see how far I can get:

A couple of weeks ago, The Lost Collector, provided a PSA by tweeting about a one-day only special code on eBay in which you could save $5 on any purchase of $5.01 or more. I was one of the many people who were able to save a couple of bucks thanks to AJ, and it seems like this challenge is the perfect vehicle to show off my purchase.

Henry Winkler -- portrayer of a beloved television character, producer, all-around good guy, and possible national treasure -- is my 22nd auto from the 2013 Panini Golden Age set.

I won this card on the same as the big card show, less than two weeks later, another copy sold for over $25 more, which makes me extremely grateful to have gotten it when I did.

I already said it once on Twitter, but I'll... My five minutes are up, so I guess I'm done here.


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COMC Sunday's: 1966 Topps Batman (Red Bat)

It's been a few months since the last time I did one of these Sunday posts, you can be chalk that up to me being stupid and thinking that I can wait until Saturday night to write them, which never works. But I'm actually thinking ahead for once, and writing this on a Thursday!

So today I've got a few cards from the second of the five Batman sets that Topps released in 1966, which was due in large part to the success of the Adam West television series.

The second series -- also known as the Red Bat set -- was a lot more over the top than the first series, which I'm assuming, made it very appealing to kids at the time.

Thanks to the sensationalized nature of it's subject matter, this is by far my favorite of the three Norman Saunders Batman sets.

Young me is screaming from the past "Why didn't we have this card 25+ years ago?", to which I have no answer, other than maybe it's because it was more expensive in the pre-internet era... and a little more difficult to find.

A back, just in case anyone cares.

Batman looks like he's in the process of filling up his tights, not that I blame him though... I'd probably do the exact same thing if I was out on a burning rope that high above the city.

 Where do I sign up to get a portable bat signal of my own?

Sometimes giant snakes need hugs too!

"Dang it, Joker! I've told you a thousand times, leave the room before you do that!".

Some might disagree with me, but imagewise, I think that this is the most iconic/memorable card from the set, so much so, that I'm of the opinion that it should've been card #1 (or rather, card #1a).

If I can duplicate the success that I had with writing this one earlier in the week, come next Sunday, I might just have a few cards to show from what is possibly the most famous 1960's non-sport set.


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Broder's, "hits", and other card show miscellany

It looks like it's time for another series of card show recaps, the giant 180-table show a couple of weeks back was quite bountiful (as they always are), so there is much to get to.

Usually I use the first post to set scene, but is seems like there isn't too much to set-up this particular time -- Lots of dealers, lots of tables, and an obscene amount of people -- that about covers it!

I was a bit surprised to see that a few of the sellers who you always see at the big shows weren't there, but they aren't anybody who I normally buy very much from anyway, so it really wasn't a big deal. I had heard a few times that this show had been sold out for over a year, which made me think that they just didn't reserve their space in time.

The only thing of note that happened --which isn't going to be terribly interesting to anyone but me -- was that I actually left home on time for once (I'm perpetually 10-20 minutes behind schedule). I got out of here at 4:50 (in the AM), and got there at 6:35 (still in the AM). This was very nice, because even though there was already a lot of people there, I did at least get there before the main throng.

As you may have been able to deduce from the title, this first post is going to cover the stuff that doesn't necessarily fit into the five food groups.

Until the second to last show, I had never seen a Bo Jackson Broder before. Nick mentioned that Bo was the most common player for him to find in Broder form, for me it's always been Griffey and Jordan. But either way, I found three more to add to my unplanned mini-collection of Bo Broder's, including another copy of the Diamond Sports card.

Here's an image that a few of you might recognize! I knew from the glossiness that they weren't the original Score card before I even picked the first one up, but I don't know if they are a Broder or not...

... for one thing, this back doesn't look very Broderish. They're also a little thicker than your usual Broder. Google has provided absolutely no assistance (what else is new), so for now I'll just have to wonder what they are, Broder or some sort of giveaway (from The National?)? Whatever they are, I couldn't not leave them in the 5/$1 box that I was looking through.

I'm not a Jordan fan, but for some stupid reason I still feel inclined to buy at least one copy of every MJ Broder that I come across. These came from one of Jim's 6/$1 boxes, and speaking of Jim...

... he also had a number of parallels from some of the recent Star Wars sets in those very same boxes. I'm not really a fan of much of the post original trilogy stuff, but this Darth Bane X-Fractor (#'d to /99) sure is attractive.

I bought about ten more parallels thinking that I could send them out to some of you. Most of those are already designated for someone else, but I couldn't figure out who might want these two (the one on the left is a refractor, and on the right is another numbered X-Fractor), so if anyone's interested, you know what to do.

Normally I'm not much for anything Olympics related, other than following the 1992 Dream Team, it's just something that's never really been of interest to me. With that being said, I was kind of excited to find this Mariel Zagunis A&G framed mini-buyback for about 15 cents. Mariel is from Oregon (Beaverton to be exact), therefor I'm quite familiar with her career, as is not often that a native Oregonian wins an Olympic gold medal, or in her case, multiple gold medals! Her first gold medal win in 2004 is notable too, because she became the first American in a hundred years to win a gold medal in fencing.

I never knew that A&G had included her in one of their sets, I see that she has an autographed mini in the 2009 set as well, I guess one of these days I'll have to try and pick that one up too

I don't come across too many IP and TTM autographs any more, they were much more common at the Portland show, here not so much. So I was a little surprised to find this group of signed cards from the 1991 Quarterback Legends set (never heard of it) in a 5/$2 box. From the top left there's Joe Ferguson, Vince Ferragamo, Dan Pastorini, Jim Hart, and Gifford Nielsen. I've looked at all of the signatures, and they seem to match up perfectly with authenticated versions, so I'm like 99.9% sure that they're legit... which is good enough for me!

 I just got one of these Oregon Ducks 2016 Panini Black Gold Quad Materials from Jim about six months ago, but that doesn't mean I can't have another one, right? At $4, this one was a dollar more than the last one, but it's still worth it. That's 2 down, and only 197 to go! (I'm only semi-joking about that).

Jim had like 4 or 5 piles of wrestling relics, and even though my obsession with all things professional wrestling ended a long time ago, I figured I'd look through the stacks and see if I could find anything for some of my blogging friends. There was one small problem though, the bulk of the relics were from the last couple of years, and I didn't recognize a single name! So I guess for future reference, if you are one of my blogging friends who likes wrestling, you should probably let me know who out of the modern guys and gals it is that you're interested in, that way I can add the info to the list I keep on my phone.

All was not lost though, as the last stack had not only names that I recognized, but a set that I recognized as well. Some one can correct me if I'm wrong, but I think this 2001 War Booty set was the first for WWF related memorabilia.

I would hazard a guess, and say that the Chris Benoit might be the rarest card from this set. Not the most interesting swatches in the world, but for $2.50 apiece, I had to get all of the one's that were there. As of right now, I'm not entirely sure if I'll be keeping these or not, so like with a lot of other things as of late, I will tentatively hang on to them until I figure it out.

This was my last purchase from the show, it was either this card, or go find some random vintage, obviously Bob won out. It seems likes there is a lot of other people who are working on the Golden Age autograph sets all of sudden, so it's been a little more difficult for me to add needed cards as of late. Bob Woodward has been eluding for years, he's one of the names that doesn't show up on eBay very often, so to be able to get this one for over 25% less than the last one sold for was pretty neat. This same dealer had few more that I need, but I only had enough left for one, so I went with the rarest available need.

In the coming weeks I'll have a separate post for each of the three major sports, and thanks to all of the recent replies that I got, they will be whittled down some, so you'll be seeing what I consider to be the best of the best.


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Tales from the Thrift Store vol. 8

This past Saturday's 50% off sale at Goodwill wasn't quite as bountiful for me as it usually is, in fact, it initially looked like I might not be bringing anything home with me.

The video section wasn't particularly well stocked this time, which was a little disappointing since that's my primary reason for going. The selection was such that I ended up not getting a single video!

But all was not lost, as I did manage to get three DVD's for a $1 each, and a video game for $3.

What I'm about to say might come as a shock to a few of you, but I've never seen this movie! I have been meaning to for years, but the opportunity to do so just hasn't presented itself. On a side note, seeing that this movie came out in 1999 makes me feel very old.

And here's one that I've never even heard of before! I like Dennis Quaid though, so I'm hoping that it won't be too bad.

Finally, something I've actually seen! The DVD selection as this Goodwill isn't very good, and the stuff that is there, tends to be very mainstream in nature (The Matrix, Will Ferrell movies, etc.), so being able to find something a little out of the ordinary was a nice surprise.

They have a shelf right above the records (or vinyl if you prefer) that usually has maybe 15-20 video games, almost always of the Xbox (original) and PS2 variety. Most of the time the selection is made up of just unwanted sports games, but this time they had a few non-sport titles, and since I've been feeling very Xboxy (Xboxey?) as of late, this was a good thing.

I'm probably only one of a few people (video game people) who has never played Splinter Cell, so since the disc looked pristine -- and it had the manual -- I figured for three bucks it was about time for me to give it a try. I almost bought one of the Madden games too, but that disc was scratched to hell (how does that even happen?), so definitely not worth trying for $3.

So there you have it, my shortest thrift store post yet. After leaving the Goodwill, I did go to a Big Lots that I had never been to before, a few fun things were found, but I'll save those purchases for another day.


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A little bit of everything

During my recent two-week break from the blog, I spent some time going through, and trying to clean up, my photo/scan folders. I also went through my draft folder, which was starting to get a little out of hand.

All in all, it was time well spent, as I was able to delete quite a few folders. Some of the stuff was just to good (my opinion) to delete before sharing it with everyone, so I figured I might as well throw all of said good stuff into one post, and call it good. Most of the cards that you'll be seeing are just some smaller purchases that have accumulated over the last couple of months, and the couple of non-card items mentioned at the end are all from the last two weeks.

2008 Topps Chrome Trading Card History refractor #'d to /400

This Ichiro refractor might look a bit familiar, as it's only the third time that I've shown it here on the blog, but what hasn't been shown here before, is...

... two Ichiro Trading Card History refractors! After doing the red card themed Blog Bat Around a few months back, I decided that I would like to have another one of these refractors, which was easier said than done. The only one that I could find for sale, was on Sportlots, since you're seeing it, obviously I bought it. I don't know why a card that is numbered to /400 is so hard to find, but it is, so good luck if you decide to seek one out.

Getting this second card seems to have triggered a new collecting interest as well, which is... seeking out duplicates (and triplicates, and quadruplicates, etc.). As a set collector, I've never really had much in having more than one of any particular card, but my interest in set collecting is almost non-existent as of late, and my interest in duplicates has gone through the roof. This will be very evident when I get around to showing some of the stuff from the most recent card show, as well as when I get my COMC horde at the end of the year. I don't know if anyone is going to care or not, but sometime in the very near future, I will be adding a new tab for cards that I'm looking for multiples of, I just haven't figured out what to call it yet -- "cards that I'm looking for multiples of " seems awfully long for a tab title.

1955 Topps All American

Back in February or March, I bid on around a dozen cards -- all of the vintage variety -- from a seller on eBay. Not willing to overbid like some of the other folks seemed to be doing, I only ended up winning one, this one.

This was my first, but hopefully not the last, card from the All American set. For just a little over $3, with free shipping, I thought it was a pretty solid get. I'm never gonna try to work on this set, but at some point I'd like to get all of the cards that feature a player in the act of kicking.

2005-06 Topps 1952 Style Fan Favorites Autographs

At one time I was collecting this set, but about a year ago I realized that there are just too many cards with black backgrounds that were signed with blue ink (on said black backgrounds) for my liking. So I ended up going through what I had, keeping most of the guys that you don't see autographs from in every single new set, and sold the rest in a lot right before last Christmas.

I don't really seek out cards from the set anymore, but a couple of months ago I did come across this really cool Em Bryant on eBay that I just had to have, and luckily, the final price ended up being only about half the normal going rate. This is one of those cards that was supposed to get it's own post, but I had already talked about Emmette twice in the previous year, and I just couldn't come up with anymore to say about him.

1960 Topps

I think this card might've come from a card show, and for whatever reason, ended up being forgotten about when it came time to do a recap post.

2016 Rittenhouse Star Trek 50 Autographs

At a little under $4 with free shipping, this was another cheap eBay purchase. Thanks to my mom, I grew up watching the original Star Trek in syndication, and have been a fan of the series for just about as long as I can remember. I'm not a Trekkie by any stretch of the imagination, but I do have a few collectibles pertaining to the original series, including about a dozen autographed cards. For the price, I just couldn't pass up this Barbara Luna.

1972-73 Topps

I think this may have been another card from a show that somehow didn't make it into a recap post. I don't have much to say about it, other than it was a big time set need.


2001 Playoff Absolute Memorabilia Ground Hoggs

My semi-recent love for the 2001 Ground Hoggs set has been well documented here on the blog, so it should come as no surprise that I just recently picked up another one. The piece of shoe might look kind of boring, but it's actually an outer piece of the tongue, which is really cool -- it also happens to be my first piece of game used tongue :p

This is also my favorite one so far, because I was a big fan of "Mr. Third Down", it's just too bad that he spent his whole career with such a sucky team. And I don't know why, but for some reason, even with a $3.50 starting price (w/free shipping), nobody else ended up bidding on this one.


2014 Panini Golden Age Historic Signatures

Another cheap eBay win, how cheap? Around $4 with free shipping! With this card, I'm now have 17 of the 49 autos from the 2014 set. I also now only need more Globetrotter (Geese Ausbie) to complete their portion of the 2012-14 Historic Signatures checklist.


2016-17 Panini Select Copper Prizm #'d to /49

This card...

2017 Panini Prizm Purple Crystals Prizm

... and this card, came from a show a couple of months back. I was thinking about doing a multi-sport serial numbered frankenset (inspired by Robert), but ended up deciding against it, as I don't really want to take on any more card projects right now (maybe someday though). Oh, and how beautiful is that Watt?

Now for a couple of non-card items:

Last week I saw my first, and most likely last, Luna (two Luna's in one post) moth of the year. Even though they're not super rare or anything, you still don't see a lot of them around here, and when you do, it's usually when they're closer to dying (their wings start deteriorating) -- this one on the other hand, was very much alive, and as gorgeous as ever. It's hard to tell from the picture, but this one measured in at almost exactly four inches long (they can be over 5"). Definitely one of the highlights from last week!

I already showed these on Twitter, but they were met with virtual crickets, so I'm showing them again on here. These are the only two figures from Mego's recent 2nd wave that I had to have, and the cool thing was, that the Target I go to in Knoxville had these on the shelves over a week before the official release date.

And finally, I found this really neat chair at the dump last week. It's kind of fancy, what with the contoured slats for your butt and all. There's absolutely nothing wrong with it, save for needing a new stain, or a new coat of paint. I didn't really need any more winter projects, but I just couldn't not bring it home with me.

I always enjoy doing these kinds of posts, the more variety there is, the easier it is for me to put words on the screen, so hopefully everyone enjoys reading them just as much.


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