Buyback Franken-set: Hand-picked Half Dozen

Just a quick post today, featuring half a dozen buybacks that I hand-picked from various sources over the last year or so.  Let's see how we do...

1969 Topps #349 - Dick Williams

Coming out strong with a recent eBay pick-up, a 2018 Topps Heritage 1969 buyback of the great Red Sox skipper Dick Williams!  Dick has pretty much been a household name among die-hard Red Sox fans since he led the team during their 1967 "Incredible Dream" season.  Was psyched to be able to land a buyback of the manager, especially one from his days with Boston.

I don't usually make a habit of showing the backs of the buybacks, but the '69 manager card backs are just too cool for me to leave this one out of the post.

So, does this one make the franken-set?

Rick Camp's 1978 issue stands in its way...

...but not for long.  Easy choice there for a Red Sox fan like myself to go with the Williams over Camp.

1985 Topps #785 - Tony Armas

How about consecutive Red Sox buybacks to start today's post?  I like it!  I don't recall exactly where I picked this one up, but I remember why I grabbed it.  I was attracted by the fact that it was such a high number at 785.  My instincts were correct when I grabbed it too, as it fills an open slot in the binder and is actually the second-highest number I've picked up for the project so far.  Nice to fill in an empty pocket in the binder's final page!

1959 Topps #143 - Willie Tasby

Next up is another Heritage buyback, this one from the Sporting News Rookie Stars subset of the 1959 Topps release.  I love the '59 set, but the Rookie Stars cards aren't my favorites to be brutally honest.  Don't know much about Willie Tasby either, though he did play about half a season with the Red Sox in 1960 before the upstart Senators grabbed him in the expansion draft.

Already had this '76 Jerry Grote in slot 143.

I'm gonna stick with the Grote, as I really love the photograph on that card for some reason.  Willie Tasby becomes one of the oldest buybacks in the reject box!

1959 Topps #137 - Dick Ricketts

Here's another '59 Rookie Stars buyback; I think I picked this one up in the same lot as the Tasby above.  This is a very cool buyback because, although Dick took the mound only 12 times in his MLB career, he was a successful pro basketball player as well!  In fact, the Milwaukee Hawks selected him with the very first pick in the 1955 NBA draft.  Dick was a first-team All-American in basketball with Duquesne prior to being drafted, and his number is actually retired at the school.

Al Bumbry has been illustrating how to choke up on the bat in slot 137 for a good long while.

Ricketts displaces him though.  Two-sport pro athletes are pretty interesting to me, more so than this Bumbry card anyway.

1967 Topps #406 - Lee Elia

Lee Elia wasn't much of a player in MLB from what I can tell, though to be fair I was born a couple of decades after he hung up the spikes.  He's remained close to the game through the years though, managing the Cubs and the Phillies in the '80s.  He was a Major League coach as recently as 2008, and is still employed by the Braves organization today at age 80!

Steve Arlin's '74 Topps release previously occupied slot 406.  While I don't have a ton of attachment to either card...

...I'm going with Lee Elia.  Good chance to get a '60s buyback into the binder at a number greater than 400, that was basically the deciding factor here.

1990 Topps #386 - Julio Franco All-Star

Last card for today, a buyback from my beloved 1990 Topps set.  This was the first baseball card set I collected as a kid, so it scores a 10/10 on the nostalgia scale for me.  So much so that I've actually started a separate buyback project where I'm trying to complete this entire set in buyback form.  For me, this card also doubles as a great addition to my "ageless wonders" collection of guys who played professionally well into their 40s.

So, what's the fate of Julio here?

Well, I already had this wonderfully colorful buyback of the Big Cat in slot 386.  Works out just fine...

...as Julio slides right into an open pocket in my burgeoning 1990 Topps buyback binder!

Not a bad round today for just half a dozen new cards, as I added one new number each to the franken-set and the 1990 Topps set.  On top of that the Dick Williams card and the multi-sport star Ricketts, while not new numbers, certainly improved the quality of the franken-set binder on the whole.

Thanks as always for stopping by!

Franken-set Progress: 607/792 (76%)
1990 Topps Buyback Set: 65/792 (8%)
"Rejected" Buybacks: 465
Total Buybacks in Collection: 1,137