One More

One more set completed:

This Brett Hull RC(which I still swear is airbrushed) was the last card I needed for 1988-89 Topps, the first hockey cards I encountered as a kid. After a couple months of browsing Brett Hull RCs at $15-20 each I came across a 65-card lot of the "Golden Brett" for $6.95 + shipping.

 

Sitting right on top of the stack was a slightly off-center Topps RC. Everything else was a bonus.

The back of the RC is pretty bad. I might have to upgrade someday.

I set these aside as keepers and I'll send the rest to my eBay seller friend B, as a thank you gift. My latest purchase from B is a 1986-87 Fleer basketball sticker of a Hall of Famer. That should arrive this weekend. 

My active set builds are nearing an end. Among the three remaining hockey cards needed to finish three different hockey card sets is one more Brett Hull. I wasn't expecting this lot to have his 2003-04 Topps Lost Rookie Cards insert... and it didn't.

B has been a fan of the Oakland A's since we were high school classmates in Connecticut. I hope he's able to go to another game or two by the end of this season. If he does, I'll ask him to take some pictures for the conclusion of my Athletics series... which will debut this Saturday. (I'm already working on part II.)

I've got one more idea for a series. It's a big one. But I might have to wait until September. I'm not sure how many people would want to read a daily series this early in the summer. 

My goal is to reach 700 posts by the end of this year. I'm 44 away, and if both series are completed according to plan, that will cover 38 of them. It would be nice to hit 100 followers too, but I don't see that happening. I just hope there's a few of you still around to read the next six posts...

Thanks for reading!

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Saturday Show and Tell

Before the second half of NBA Week begins I thought I'd squeeze in a recap of all the cards that have arrived at Collector HQ this week. We'll start with the first pair of PWEs for the Swap Meet:

The mysterious Elliptical Man who never provides a last name sent 15 singles, including loads of legends:

I knew Moses Malone was great - but I didn't realize just how dominant he was until researching my 1982-83 "Topps" Basketball set. Tim Hardaway will be a Hall of Famer eventually.. right?

Very nice mix of cards here. Thank you Brendan!

Jeff, author of the blog Wax Pack Wonders, contributed 14 cards:

1980's Fleer! I'm now back up to 32% of thie 1988-89 set, after purging some PSA singles.

These six Reggie Miller cards bump Karl Malone off the top spot in my collection; I have 54 Mailmen and I now have 56 Millers - not including his cameo in the Hardaway card.

Six Hakeem Olajowon cards round out the PWE.Thank you Jeff!

I bought a pair of hockey cards from Harris Sports Cards on eBay:

Tyler Seguin is the 27th card I've added to my 2015-16 Exquisite set build. There are 30 cards in this subset/base set, but try telling that to TCDB. I was excited to add the Whalers logo sticker to my order for $1. Couldn't find it at any of the online retailers I frequent, and no one had it for trade on TCDB.

I tried filling sets through Sportlots. Bandit24 offers free shipping if you order more than 80 cards from him.

I ordered 109.

My 1986 Topps Football set is complete; these are all upgrades. Pat McInally invented Starting Lineup figures.

My wife had about 80 of the 180 cards in the 1994-95 Upper Deck SP insert set and I've nearly completed it for her. I'm down to just 8 needs, with one card on the way from Baseballcardstore.ca.

2013 Topps is almost complete. I just need three Mike Trout cards, the Manny Machado rookie, and nine other randos. 2013 Topps Update is less complete. I'm at about 85% of the 330-card set.

Another very ambitious set build I'll probably never finish - 2018 Topps Chrome. The good news is I've got 61% of the set. The bad news is I still need the Ronald Acuna RC, the Rafael Devers RC, and the Shohei Ohtani RC. Yikes.  The Ron Artest Hoops Decade RC has a roller mark on it. I'll probably have to upgrade.

1995-96 Playoff One on One is another one of wifey's starter sets I'm trying to finish. I've added about 40% of the 2019 Score football set over the past couple of months - and at far less than the cost of a blaster.

I picked out a couple of cards for my team PCs, including a Xander Bogaerts insert and an Aaron Rodgers base card. By the way, every single card in my order was 18 cents.

Except for this Wayne Gretzky sticker from 1985-86 Topps. This was kind of an impulse buy at $3.95.

I made some room in my Hartford Whalers binder (by taking out New Haven cards) so I started filling in those empty slots. Also picked up a couple of Colorado Rockies cards. I might add the Rockies and Scouts to my list of team collections, since they are part of the Devils' lineage.

Made some progress on my 1988-89 Topps set build - but not quite as much as I intended.

How did I manage to order two Rick Vaive cards? I could have filled in another need. Oh well :/

These are all in nice shape, but the Hrudey is way off center on the back. I might have to upgrade that one.

Finally, the main focus of this order was finishing off my 1992-93 Topps Archives basketball set. I needed 15 cards and Bandit24 had them all. They were the first cards I placed in my cart. Everything else was secondary.

Feckin' hell. Gold parallels.

All of them were gold parallels. It's a nice bonus, I guess. But now I have to go get those 15 base cards.

I've already spent the $1.98 in loot (and a $0.36 refund) on more cards from Bandit - but I didn't bother trying to order these again. 

Have you ever received parallel cards when ordering base set fillers? Did you notify the seller?

Thanks for reading!




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First!

 The first sports card I ever remember seeing is this 1985 Topps Bob Baumhower single:

It was wedged in the back seat of my parents' station wagon. My dad never mentioned collecting football cards; it might have belonged to my (half) brother. I can't imagine how seeing this helmetless, non-descript headshot of a non-descript player, whose name is listed sideways on a black-bordered card, got me interested in the hobby.

The first hockey card I ever remember seeing is this Ulf Samuelsson single from 1988-89 Topps. It was one of a pack's worth of cards scattered in dad's sock drawer, along with an Old Spice shaving kit, weed rolling papers, and a couple pairs of socks. My dad never mentioned hockey and I never saw any packs of 1988-89 Topps anywhere. Ulfie probably wasn't the first card I saw but it's the one I remember because I recognized the Whalers logo.

I do remember my dad bringing home a pack of 1988-89 Fleer basketball cards one day. I don't think I had any interest in the NBA until the next year, and I didn't recognize any of the names.

One of the cards in that pack was Milwaukee Bucks center Randy Breuer. If I focused really hard I might be able to remember another card or two. (I'm almost certain there was an All-Star subset card in that pack.)

I don't actually remember the first baseball card I ever saw. I do remember that the first packs of baseball cards I came across were also Fleer products. We were in a WaWa and I spied an opened box of 1986 Fleer adjacent to the shelf with Wonder Bread. I picked one off the top and brought it home. Really wish I could remember any specific card I pulled for certain, the logos were more interesting to me than the players. I know I pulled an Expo and a Pirate. I don't think I pulled a Yankee.

I'm about 98% sure Pat Clements was in that pack. 

Do you remember your first sports cards?

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A little pitchy, dawg

I have no idea how, or why, but I was somehow able to use the eBay $25 off code twice. Kinda.

I was at my mom's house in Connecticut when I learned about the coupon code. Her desktop computer was displaced because she is in the process of moving out of the house she's lived in for nearly 40 years. And so I placed an order on eBay using the app on my daughter's tablet computer.

My order consisted of two graded cards from two different sellers, neither of which were over $25 individually, though they would have totaled over $40 combined.

When I got home the next day I went on my more familiar desktop computer and found that my purchase of the second card (a Kevin Lowe OPC single) was not successful. It was still available, and still on my watch list, but for some reason eBay did not allow me to purchase the card. However the purchase of the first card was successful:

This Randy Jackson is sharp, though the top left and bottom right corners aren't. Also there is a scratch on the PSA holder. The centering on both sides is really nice; I'm a little surprised it's not a 7. Jackson was an All-Star with the Cubs in 1954 and 1955. Chicago traded him to the Dodgers in December of '55, which explains that airbrushed 'B' on his cap.

It still confounds me that I was not able to purchase the Kevin Lowe card - but when I entered the coupon code I got $15 off the Jackson. And I was able to use the code again on another purchase (which should arrive next week.)

 

In other news, some trades came in the mail today. These are from TCDB user wbaker01:

I'm a looong way from completing the 1987 Topps football set (haven't even hit 10% yet) but it's nice to pick up some HOFers in exchange for hockey dupes. Speaking of hockey...

These eight singles from 1988-89 Topps helped me cross the 25% line. I now have 50 of 198, including Billy Smith's sunset card. Thankfully I don't need to acquire this awful airbrush job..

..because it's only in the O-Pee-Chee set.

 

I started a second blog, but before I post any content I need a banner image. If anyone would like to volunteer their Photoshop services (basically all I need is five images arranged around a short title) I can send a PWE of cards your way. Here's a preview:

 

 

Thanks for reading and enjoy the long Labor Day weekend!

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The Second Wave

The second wave has arrived...

I made a large trade with TCDB user Randylaw. His wantlist contained over 400 cards on my tradelist and I was happy to offload a full box of my duplicates in one shot. I shipped his cards last week and received mine sometime overnight or very early this morning (the box was sitting on my porch when I left for work at 8:45 a.m.)

I picked up plenty of stars and Hall of Famers. 

 

Red Sox, Royals, and Redbirds. The Mike Greenwell glossy at the top left is creased :/

Relievers. I tried to balance out the list of cards I requested with some "junk wax" from sets such as 1989 Score.

The Tigers were well-represented.

About half the cards I received were baseball. I got a nice chunk of singles from the other major sports, too.

The 1978 Topps Greg Pruitt was part of a replacement lot as Randy no longer had 16 of the cards I requested.

 

Many of the cards Randy sent were pack-fresh, including these gems. One of my collecting goals as a kid was to own a Jim McMahon Starting Lineup figure with the Chargers. However Kenner faked me out; McMahon was listed on the 1989 checklist as a Charger but he was still a Bear when the figure was produced.

These basketball singles pair nicely with the Secret Santa gift I received from Mark Hoyle.

More Hall of Famers here, including a Charles Barkley Fleer sticker.

A new set build perhaps?

These are just some of the cards in The Second Wave. There's plenty more up ahead. Brace yourselves ;-)

Thanks for reading!



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