Normally when you come across something on COMC that's listed as 'poor to fair', it's not hard to see why. Whether it's the rounded corners, noticeable creases, paper loss, etc., you're not usually gonna be left wondering why it's earned this particular distinction -- but sometimes, and it doesn't happen very often, you are. Such was the case back in November during the Black Friday sale when I found two 1975 Hostess panels from the same seller, both being listed as poor to fair, with neither having any obvious flaws.
When it comes to questionable items, I rarely take chances on that site anymore (they're missing a lot more creases than they used to), but again, these two panels looked fine to me, and nobody else was buying them, so I figured I'd give them a go.
I haven't really talked about it much, if at all, but I am collecting the Hostess sets in single and panel form. I don't actually believe that I'll ever complete any of the sets in panel form, but I like the way that they present, and am always curious to see who was paired with who. The above Carlton/Cey panel is my first one that still has a bunch of the box attached, which I do really like, but those seem to usually carry a bit more of a premium.
It took a bit of searching once they arrived, but I did find a small wrinkle (that doesn't go through to the back) on the upper right part of Steve Carlton's card. And while I'd prefer that it wasn't there, it's not egregious, and I don't think that that alone should've knocked it down to the lowly poor to fair category.
From what I've been able to gather, both of these panels are two of the more common ones from the '75 set, but at $2.80 apiece, I'm awfully glad I decided to take that chance.
Nice find! COMC tends to be very hit or miss with condition notes. As you said, they miss a lot of obvious issues and overstate others. I was fortunate enough to grab this 1911 Tobacco card at an affordable price because it was marked 'poor to fair'.
ReplyDeleteAt least from the front, that card definitely doesn't look poor to pair. Now I'm curious to know how much you were able to get it for?
DeleteThat was definitely a SWEET deal on them.
ReplyDeleteI own both those panels as I'm trying to do the same thing you are (though I haven't been too serious about the panels). I actually had a Cey-Porter-Carlton panel that was definitely poor as there was a major width-wise crease through the whole thing. I upgraded though and cut the other one into individual cards.
ReplyDeleteI like them in panel form more, and do look; I just haven't had great luck in getting very many.
Delete"neat and pretty cool" is a great grade to use in general. Dodgers got the best photos on those.
ReplyDelete👍
ReplyDeleteMaybe the poor to fair grade is because they were removed from the box? They look good to me!
ReplyDeleteYou may be on to something with that.
DeleteIntact panels for $2.80 each? I'd grade those purchases at super cool to totally awesome. Congratulations on finding these. A few years ago (before the pandemic) I too wanted to build complete panel sets of Hostess panels, but I haven't even looked lately.
ReplyDeleteI wasn't looking for panels pre-boom, so I have no idea what they were selling for then. Probably cheaper than they are now.
DeleteI have only ever added a couple cards from the comc website back when I won a gift card for NFL pick em. I had a big issue with a rodney hampton, fortunately they refunded me without having to return the card after sending them pictures.
ReplyDeleteThey don't usually do that. They've made it a lot more difficult to return things in recent years too. I think there's been too many people trying to game the system since the boom started.
DeleteNeat to pretty cool indeed!
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