eBay Bargain Hunting - Part 2

A week or two ago I completed another eBay purchase from a seller offering cheap singles that I had a great experience with recently.  This time probably half the cards I purchased were for others (Douglas at Sports Cards from the Dollar Store and Mark Kaz at This Way to the Clubhouse).  I did keep 10 for myself though...

A short-print of the Wizard from 2013 Allen & Ginter for 50 cents?  Yes please!  Ozzie is one of those players I casually collect and I love the photo Topps selected for this one.

How about a Rickey Henderson short print from the same set.  This one was even cheaper at just a quarter.  Both of these auctions were actually for two of each card, so for .75 cents total I got two Allen & Ginter short prints and a spare copy of each for the trade box.

Giancarlo Stanton is one of the best pure power hitters in the game today.  I couldn't leave behind a copy of his Topps Chrome rookie for just .50 cents.

I picked up maybe 10 Blue Jays cards in this order, and every one of them is headed north of the border to Douglas at some point, save this one.  I've got a serious soft spot for the Cognac Diamond Anniversary parallels from 2011 Topps, particularly the retired players.  I was surprised to take this one home for the opening bid of a quarter.

A nice, shiny refractor of one of the game's best hurlers will get my attention at .50 cents...

...especially when it's paired with an X-Fractor!  These may end up as trade bait someday, but I'm hanging onto them for now.

The most expensive card of the ones I kept was this Nolan Ryan Gypsy Queen insert from the 2013 set, which set me back a whole .55 cents.  I guess I could have waited and eventually landed this one cheaper, but I've wanted a copy since the set came out last year and figured it was as good a time to pick one up as any.

I decided in 2012 that I was going to collect the Archives set, including all the short prints.  I've sort of soured on the set over time, but I wasn't going to pass up this Andy Van Slyke SP that I needed for just a quarter.  If I could find more of these at this price I might actually finish this one off after all...

I'm not really sure why I grabbed this Johnny Cueto purple refractor.  He's having a solid season so I think I might throw this one in my trade box and see if I get any takers sometime down the line...

Last but not least, a 1990 Score Traded Frank Thomas.  Fitting time to post this card with The Big Hurt entering the Hall of Fame just yesterday.  I'm not sure if this counts as a true rookie since Thomas was on the checklist for the standard 1990 Score set, but it will pair nicely with my Eric Lindros card from this same release.

My total for these 10 cards was under $4, not too shabby!  Sadly it looks as though this seller has stopped listing new cards as of a couple weeks ago.  I did manage to get in one final batch though before he called it quits.  Hopefully those cards will be arriving in the next week or so...

Signature Sundays - A Pair of Whalers from Contenders

Today I've got the two Whalers Classics Signatures autographs that were included on the 2013-14 Panini Contenders checklist...

First up is an absolute beauty of a card featuring fan favorite Kevin Dineen.  There's something about the really crisp photo, all the green on the card, and the blue autograph that ties in nicely with the blue in the Whalers uniform that results in a very nice piece of cardboard.  Kevin provided a great autograph too, chewing up a good portion of card space and including his uniform number as well.

Very happy to have this autograph of the second most successful Whaler, statistically anyway, behind Ron Francis.

Ray Ferraro played well over 400 games in a Whalers sweater, and is 10th all-time in points for the New England Whalers/Hartford Whalers.  He really embraced the on-card autograph here with a giant signature.  Like the Dineen, I love that Panini chose a photo from the "all green" days.

That's all for today!

1953 Topps Project - Preston Ward

Another day, another 1953 Topps card...

Preston Ward is probably one of the more forgettable guys in the '53 Topps set.  His career was relatively short, he was sort of a utility player, and he didn't swing much of a bat.  Though he's depicted with the Cubbies here, he would be dealt to Pittsburgh before the conclusion of the 1953 season.

He did get one of the more interesting backgrounds in the set though, with a nice, large scoreboard depicted over his shoulder.  Gotta love that Cubs logo as well.  I guess this is a decent example of why I like the '53 Topps set so much, even though I've never heard of Preston before this is still a beautiful vintage card if you ask me.

I love the cartoon on the back, and of course overall I think the '53 Topps backs are some of the greatest of any Topps flagship effort.  A nice large cartoon, the best card numbering scheme I've ever seen with the large, easy-to-read baseball, and I love the red facsimile signatures used as watermarks beneath the write-up.  Not to mention fielding statistics!

Set Progress:  72 of 274 (26%)

Pack Rip - 2009 O-Pee-Chee Retail

A month or two ago I put in an order at Dave and Adam's Card World to re-stock my unopened wax shelf in my office/hobby room.  One of the items I picked up was a blaster of 2009 O-Pee-Chee baseball:

Yes, there is a $20 sticker on the front of this box, but no, I did not pay $20.  Thanks to a Memorial Day weekend sale this entire blaster set me back just $7.95.  In retrospect I wish I would have picked up a couple more, given that it comes to about 50 cents a pack at this price.  I wasn't big on this product when it first hit the shelves for some reason, but as the years have gone by I've come to appreciate it more and more.  I could see myself trying to complete the 600-card set someday.

The back of the blaster contained a nice omen for a Red Sox fan like myself, in the form of Dustin Pedroia's fantastic base card from the set.  Unfortunately the packaging was damaged enough that even using my wife's paper cutter (she's into cards of a different sort, greeting cards) I was unable to salvage Dustin.  Maybe I'll pull the card from one of the 15 packs inside and it won't matter...

I like spreading things out over time, so I'm only going to rip and post the first pack for today.  Six cards in each, with one being a black-bordered parallel.  Let's see what's inside...

2009 was the final year in probably the best four-year stretch of Morneau's career.  He hit at least .270, had at least 23 home runs, at least 30 doubles, and at least 100RBI every year from 2006 (when he won the AL MVP award) through 2009.  He's with the Rockies now, and seems to be enjoying Coors Field as most hitters do.

To me, the cards that feature in-game action are far more interesting.  The portrait shots have grown on me some though.  This one, however, is pretty lackluster.

I think these parallels are a big part of the reason the product tanked overall.  They were initially supposed to be a retro O-Pee-Chee design but I seem to recall some legal snafu, and the end result was the parallels that collectors were super excited about ended up being nothing but base cards with black borders.  Chris Volstad is apparently playing in Korea now, this one is definitely off to the trade box.

Normally I'm irked when a multi-set insert like this one takes up one of the cards in my pack, especially in a pack with just six cards to begin with.  In this case, I'm pumped.  What a great shot of the Splendid Splinter in mid-swing at Fenway Park!  A great new addition to my Red Sox collection for sure.

First it was Pedroia on the back of the box, and now I've pulled back-to-back Red Sox cards in the first pack.  I think this is going to prove to be a winning box for this Sox fan, even if this particular card is a double...

Closing out the pack we've got a nice horizontal card, which I think work particularly well in this set.  I was shocked to see how many teams Nady has signed with since this card was released (Cubs, Diamondbacks, Nationals, Giants, Royals, Rockies, Padres and Mariners!).  His career may be over as he's currently a free agent after exercising an opt-out clause in his contract with Seattle just last month.

A great start to this blaster, I'll be sure to show at least a few more packs in the coming weeks and months...

Billy Werber - Another Diamond Star

Here's the third Diamond Stars card I've been fortunate enough to land in recent months, #61 Billy Werber:

Billy, or "Billie" as National Chicle referred to him as in 1935, actually began his career with the Yankees before being dealt to Boston during the 1933 season.  Apparently he was sort of your typical utility infielder/speedy base-runner.  He led the league in stolen bases his first two full seasons in Boston, and played multiple infield positions during that stretch, though he was primarily a third baseman.

The card's a little off-center, but other than that is in better shape than the majority of my cards that are this old.  Many of the cards from this set have art-deco, cityscape backgrounds but in this case it's sort of an odd rainbow-style set of stripes.

Werber lived a very long life, making it to the century mark before passing away in 2009.  A bit of bar room trivia...he was the last living teammate of the great Babe Ruth!

Since there are only six Red Sox on the checklist, this card puts me at 50% of a team set with three in the bag.  At around the cost of a blaster ($21), it was a no-brainer.  Hopefully I'll pick up one or two more before 2014 comes to a close!

In Case You Didn't Get Your Fill of Jeter Last Week...

If you watched the MLB All-Star Game last week, you might have heard a word or two about this guy Derek Jeter.  He plays shortstop for the Yankees, apparently.  I guess he's retiring after this season or something.  Oh, and Adam Wainwright served him up a couple of meatballs at the beginning of the game, so if the Cardinals lose the Series in 7 this year you can blame him for allowing Derek Jeter to get a double and thus losing home field advantage for the NL.

Anyway, I may be a Red Sox fan but I don't discriminate against the Yankees when it comes to my collection.  In fact, as a fan of baseball I can appreciate that they are one of, if not the, most significant franchises in baseball history.  I decided that after all these years watching him play (pretty frequently too, as a fan of another AL East team), it was high time to add a Jeter rookie card to my collection.  Here's what I ended up with:

I'm not even sure if this qualifies as a rookie, as it's from the 1994 set, and he had numerous cards issued in '93.  I can tell you that it features a young, fresh-faced Jeter in a classic baseball pose, indicates that he's a top prospect, and was issued long before he ever appeared in an MLB game.  That counts as a rookie in my book.  Throw in the fact that my copy is an "Electric Diamond" parallel and I couldn't resist picking this one up.

This card is a shining example of why I'll probably never finish half of my card-related collections/projects.  If I had unlimited time and were to list out in chronological order every single card I would want to own, this guy would probably come in somewhere around number 8,479.  Yet I went out of my way to spend $3.01 of my monthly hobby budget on it.  At least I got free shipping.  Besides, I think keeping things varied is what keeps me interested in the hobby and coming back for more year after year.

So, I gladly welcome this card of Red Sox nemesis Derek Jeter to my collection.  He's been scanned in, put in a toploader, and is now sitting in a monster box alongside my Nomar Garciaparra rookies!

Signature Sundays - Another Trio from Contenders

Panini sneakily included a bunch of hand-signed Classics Signatures cards into their 2013-14 Contenders release, so now I'm chasing these autographs all over again just as I was about to wrap the series up.  Here are three more knocked off the list...

One of the greatest American-born defenseman to play the game, Derian was inducted into the US Hockey Hall of Fame in 2010.  A first round draft pick for the Stars franchise in 1990 (when they were still in Minnesota), he would become captain of the team and lead them to Stanley Cup glory in 1999.  There is a whole lot going on with that autograph, that's for sure.

640 career goals and well over 1,300 points.  Finally won a Cup with Tampa Bay at the tail end of his career.  I guess the argument you could make against him (and probably the reason he's not in the Hall) is that his numbers are based largely on longevity.  He played the sixth most regular season games of anyone ever, and never had a single 100 point season despite playing in a highly offensive era.

Here's a guy you wouldn't want to see lined up across the ice from you.  Twist was regularly mixing it up with opponents, and by all accounts threw one of the hardest punches of his time.  Just type his name into YouTube and you'll quickly see what I mean.  I'm surprised he even had the hand strength to sign this card after punching all that face over the years.  He retired at a relatively young age when a serious motorcycle accident forced a premature end to his career, but he's remained involved in the world of sports as an analyst/radio show host.

Maybe not the biggest names, but three interesting players nonetheless...

Flipping Dupes for Flair, and a Magnificent Matsuzaka

As Zistle has grown in popularity, having my collection (and more importantly my want and trade lists) on the site has really paid dividends.  I would say at least once a month now I'm contacted by someone looking to give me some cards I want in exchange for some I don't.  The latest trade to fall into my lap in this fashion was with user 'hpennington22', whom I've traded with once before.

This time around our trade involved many more cards.  I think I cleared about 80 cards from my doubles box!  In return I got a variety of things, but what I was most excited about were the 45 cards that got knocked off my 1993 Flair want list!

This set was something else back in the day.  It was so "exquisite" that each pack came in its own little box, and I can vaguely recall single packs selling for close to $10 shortly after the set hit the shelves.  When I got back into collecting in 2007 and found out I could have an entire hobby box for $25, I was sold.  I've been lazily accumulating the cards I didn't pull in my box ever since...

I still think these look pretty great, and have stood the test of time.  At the very least they're significant in the history of our hobby as one of the first "super premium" sets.  Fleer's answer to the Finest cards from Topps I guess.

With this giant stack crossed off my list I'm down to just 13 cards to complete the 300-card set.  I do have a couple of bigger names left, like Griffey and Clemens, but even those can be found easily for less than a dollar nowadays.  Finishing this one off shouldn't be too difficult now.

Another set I'm not really collecting actively but will gladly accept any new cards from is the 2008 Upper Deck Baseball Heroes release.  There were 9 new cards from this set in this trade package.  I guess this one was the best, but I never understood these combo cards at the end of the set.  Aside from all being really, really good players, what do these four guys have in common?

Of course there were some Red Sox included as well, like this pair that I still needed from last year's Archives set...

Here's one for the team collector only.  An unlicensed product, and a guy with exactly 9 games of Major League experience (with the Orioles mind you, not the Red Sox).

I've got the majority of these 1972 Topps Mini inserts from last year's Series 1 flagship product, but Henry managed to send me three I still needed.

I'm at 43/50 for this set now!  The problem is they continued them in Series 2.  I have exactly 0 of those.

I just got the Opening Day version of this great Youkilis card from Mark Kaz the other day, and now the standard base version can accompany it in my collection.

A pair of 2013 Heritage Sox.  I have nearly a complete team set now, just a couple more to go, all done through trading.

I was really surprised that I still needed this 2008 Allen & Ginter card, but in fact I did.  Down to just Tim Wakefield and three short prints to put this team set to bed.

The 2009 Goudey set is most well known for having images that look nothing like the players.  This is a prime example, that just does not look like Jed Lowrie in any way, shape or form.

Others, like this one, don't look half bad.

I saved my single favorite card in the entire package for last:

The 2008 Opening Day set from Topps is a thing of beauty for a Red Sox fan like myself.  The color scheme is perfect, the roster chock full of stars, and the team was just coming off of a World Series Championship in 2007.

That's all for today, another great swap courtesy of Zistle.  Thanks for the cards Henry!