Signature Sundays - Wade Boggs

Today's Signature Sunday post features a recent eBay win, and one of the players that I've wanted a hard signed auto of most for quite some time now, Wade Boggs:

This is an on-card buy back auto from the 2012 Leaf Memories baseball set, serial numbered to 26 copies.  I didn't really hear much about this set when it was released, which isn't surprising considering I get most all of my hobby news from the other blogs I read, and I don't think too many of them featured this product.  I can certainly understand why this set fell on deaf ears, as they ask a whopping $140+ for a box that contains 10 base cards and 2 autos.  What a joke!  That being said though, there were a number of stars who autographed original 1990 Leaf cards to be reinserted into the 2012 Memories set.  When I found out that Wade was one of them, I knew I wanted to make a play at picking up his auto.

It's unlikely that us baseball fans in New England will ever see another player who could hit for average like Boggs could.  In his 11 seasons with Boston, he hit .325 or higher 9 times, and .349 or higher 6 times!  He won 5 batting titles with Boston, including 4 in a row from 1985 through 1988.  Boggs would have won a 6th had he simply made more plate appearances during his rookie season of 1982 (he hit .349 that year).  Only Cobb, Hornsby, Carew and Gwynn also captured 4 straight batting titles in their careers.  Boggs is a member of the esteemed 3,000 hit club and is enshrined in both the Red Sox and MLB Hall-of-Fame.

I think I got a real score on this card compared to what I've seen others go for.  When I first learned of the card, there were only two of the 26 copies available for sale on eBay.  I watched eagerly as the first copy climbed well outside my price range, ultimately finishing at $52 and change.  You can imagine how shocked I was when just 30 minutes later I won this one for a mere $23 even, less than half the price that the other one went for.  Since then I've seen just one other copy sell for $42.11.  A fourth copy sits on eBay right now with a Buy-it-Now price of $44.99.  I'm not sure I'll ever see one sell for as little as I snagged this one for.

It feels great to finally add a Wade Boggs auto to my Red Sox collection.  Though it's very early, I'd imagine this card will be in the running for my best new Red Sox card of 2013.  So, how about you, have you purchased any Leaf Memories cards?