Sportscard Project Question #2 - What's your best sports collecting discovery?
SportscardProject
Posts: 20
Thanks to all who contributed to my first question on books and websites.
My second question is what's your best sports collecting discovery?
It could be an attic or basement find, a garage sale "sleeper", something passed on from a relative, a forgotten item that survived dozens of spring cleanings or even something found at a trade show or a shop that seemed much more special than the seller realized . It doesn't have to be of great monetary value; just something interesting and it could be memorabilia as well as sportscards.
My second question is what's your best sports collecting discovery?
It could be an attic or basement find, a garage sale "sleeper", something passed on from a relative, a forgotten item that survived dozens of spring cleanings or even something found at a trade show or a shop that seemed much more special than the seller realized . It doesn't have to be of great monetary value; just something interesting and it could be memorabilia as well as sportscards.
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buy Mr. Mints book..."True Mint"
Once again....do you have a hobby background? Do you currently collect cards?
across a huge group of 1952 Topps baseball cards. They were scattered
everywhere, some in big piles, as if they were beds of cardboard coral.
Unfortunately, they were pretty soggy, so I just left 'em!
But seriously... If I remember correctly, T206museum.com has a couple
good stories of people making monumental finds. One regarding a few
T206 Cobb red portraits with Cobb backs, and another about the find
of the T206 Wagner proof strip. I realize you might be shooting for
more personal stories, but other than the one I mentioned above, I have
yet to make a real "find".
Jery
He's a shameless self-promoter and he leaves a bad taste with a lot of people - but as he puts it on his web-site... He's the Indiana Jones of baseball card finds and I would have a tough time arguing. So, I've got to agree with Basilone.
Here's a link to the "finds" portion of his website - although his book goes into much more detail. You can pick it up use on Amazon or Barnes & Noble for under $10.
Mr. Mint's Finds
Sets - 1970, 1971 and 1972
Always looking for 1972 O-PEE-CHEE Baseball in PSA 9 or 10!
lynnfrank@earthlink.net
outerbankyank on eBay!
I'm sure you will have dealers knocking at your door to be interviewed, etc. for the piece. (as long as its a fair portrayal of the hobby)
A recent "find" ( not really a big deal, but pretty good ) I had the pleasure of getting was thiis:
My wife goes to gararage and estate sales often and knows I am a collector nut. She has bought a few fair-valued items in the past and never spends too much as she knows little about cards. However about a year or two ago she got two 600 count boxes of sportscards at a sale.
The boxes were 80% Baseball and about 20% FB, all fairly recent, 1979 to 1987. They were marked 5 bucks each, she haggled a price of 8 dollars for both. No great cards overall about half were ex-mt shape and ALL superstars were gone , only commons and semi-star types left, so the seller had some idea about possible value. Anyway after originally thining what a waste, I looked closer at the entire lot, I selected 25 of the best conditioned ones, sent to PSA along with other cards. Of the garage sale submissions I got 1 5, 1 6, 2 8s, 17 9s, and 4 10s, No earth shattereing windfall but certainly worth more than the 8 dollar investment.
On the other hand, I have made many significant “finds” in my lifetime. In most cases hours of research and planning was put into each hunt and sometime the payoffs were minimal, while other times, the “finds” were quite rewarding. In each of these cases, the seller never solicited me for business. I searched and I found. Here is a brief resume of my true “finds”:
The 1970 Pittsburgh Find – One of my earliest, and certainly a good one for an eleven year old kid. A schoolmate of mine invited me to come to his house to listen to some of this records and I brought some of mine. While in his bedroom listening to some albums, I noticed a large box of Topps baseball cards ranging from ’65 to ’69. I asked if he was interested in selling me that entire box. He insisted on a trade, and I gave him a brand new Three Dog Night album for the entire box. When I got home and sorted through them, it had most of the ’67 Topps set including just about every high number. The cards were a bit tired looking, but many years later I sold and traded off all those cards for well over $1,000.
The 1991 Houston Find – Met a person who had a pristine vending run of 1969 Topps 3rd Series common cards. The seller was tough, and I had to pay around full Beckett ($0.75 each) for those bad boys, but many years later I graded them and a significant portion graded PSA 9 and the rest PSA 8.
The 1999 Houston Card Shop Vending Find – I hit paydirt on this one. I had frequented this local shop for many years and knew that the owner had over 12,000 vending cards from 1968, 1969 and 1970 in storage but he never had any interest in selling them. The star cards were pulled years before. In the Spring of 1999 when grading ‘60s commons was just in its infancy, I convinced the shop owner to sell me a portion of those cards. I bought over 1500 cards for $3600 over several visits. Over 1,000 cards were later submitted to PSA and at least 800 graded PSA 9 and even better 45 graded PSA 10! I sold all the duplicate graded cards and raw cards and made a killing. I’ve screwed up many times in my life when it comes to money, but this made up for all of them!
The 1999 Southern California Card Shop Vending Find – Another mother lode of vending cards were found at this shop. This store had a tall chest of wide wooden drawers full of vending cards from 1964-1973. I cherry picked their inventory over two days time and maxxed out two credit cards in the process. Many graded PSA 9 and with a few 10’s. The irony of it all is that many of those PSA 9 and 10 cards were sold to people on eBay who frequented that shop and never knew that those raw cards were in that wooden cabinet.
The 2000 Anaheim Find – Spent 3 days at some place in Anaheim and bought about 400 raw cards, many of which were straight out of vending and while others were just pulled from some nice high-end sets. Again, many of these cards graded 9 and also pulled three PSA 10s. Some were put in my collection while duplicates and cards from years I didn’t collect were sold off.
The 2001 Cleveland Find – Spent 2 days at some place in Cleveland and bought about 300 raw cards. These were not quite as nice as Anaheim, but still worth the trip. I still got a lot of cards that graded 9, but didn’t get any 10’s. I could see the well was starting to run dry. I did find one dead centered ’68 Topps Norm Cash which later graded 9 and bought 3 – 1972 Frank Robinson cards which all later graded 9 plus a bunch of other '72s that later graded 9.
The 2001 Ft. Washington Find – Spent 2 days at some place in Ft. Washington, Pennsylvania and bought about 250 raw cards. Found very little in the years I collect, but I did buy a nice run of ’65 Topps baseball that I had graded and got about fifteen PSA 9’s and flipped the 8’s to some guy from Stafford, TX. I also found some stunning ’68 and ’72 Topps football which graded mostly 9 with one PSA 10: ’72 Ken Houston AP.
The 2002 Chicago Find – Spent 3 days at some place in Rosemont Village, IL and bought about 350 raw cards. The highlight was buying about 80 – 1969 Topps Baseball cards for $300 that were absolutely gorgeous and well centered and very tough to find in high grade. About 30 graded PSA 9 and even today those cards are still very tough to find including #25 Roy White.
There many more “finds”, but these are only the ones that I can think of off the top of my head.
My best find was a few years ago at a thrift shop - $225 for 6 3200-card boxes of assorted '70s Topps baseball, mainly in ExMt or better condition (including a lot of regional stars and lesser HOFers), 2 file boxes each containing 9 600 or 800 count boxes of reasonably desirable '80s and '90s cards (such as an '82 Donruss set minus only the Ripken, Ryan, and Rose and a '90 Leaf set minus only Thomas, Sosa, and 5 other stars), another file box full of small sets and oddball items ('97 Skybox Premium FB, '93 Stadium Club Series I FB, several dozen promo cards, 3 sets of '94 Classic NFL draft, etc.), and a plastic tub with loose items ranging from vintage sports magazines to a Mickey Mantle store model glove to several dozen ExMt and NM condition '60s and '70s HOFers and major rookies ('65 Gibson, '72 Plunkett, '72 Topps FB high numbers, etc.) to a 6-card uncut panel of '75 Topps including Fingers and Brooks Robinson.
Most of my thrift store, rummage and garage sale, and used bookstore finds have been rather small - vintage programs and yearbooks, gloves and bats with player names on them from the '60s and '70s, and the like.
My only real card show find of note was a '32 U.S. Caramel Paul Waner in F condition in a dealer's junk box for a quarter. Even as a 12-year old kid, I knew that card was authentic, old, and worth a good deal more than what I paid.
I have dozens of ebay steals I could mention, but I'm sure most other people do too (although most of mine are from finding poorly listed items, like the lot of 11 serial numbered Bowman's best football rookies I just won for a dollar where the seller didn't list any player names in the title, so unless you went and looked at the auction page or searched title and description, you wouldn't know that it included Jamal Lewis, Jerry Porter, and Todd Pinkston, among others).
Nick
Reap the whirlwind.
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Anaheim wasn't a store. It was more like a big flea market with a lot of guys with bad toupees near DisneyLand. I think I heard someone call it "The National?"
The Southern California place was indeed in a shop but I don't remember the name of the town, but if this helps it's one of those Spanish sounding California towns.
I found that if i don't stop spending so much on cards im going to go broke.