Ebay...Unsearched...Lesson Learned

Socalguy1967

I bought a rack box of 1984 Topps on Ebay. I only paid $50 for it, but with the current grading special, I decided to open it and submit the Mattinglys and Ryans..... problem is that in the entire rack box... no Mattinglys, Ryans, Hendersons, Roses, Gwynns, Sandbergs, Strawberrys, Boggs or Ripkens. Either I have incredibly bad luck or I got taken. It's only $50, and I will use the cards to make sets, but it just irritates the heck out of me. The seller was selling it as "Totally Unsearched". He had a 99.9% feedback with over 1200 transactions. I'm not saying he is the one that searched them, but it could have been whoever he got them from or even further back (years). Just be aware of what you buy on Ebay, even the cheap stuff. Even from people with great feedback.

storm888

"Just be aware of what you buy on Ebay, even the cheap stuff.
Even from people with great feedback. "

///////////////////////////////////////////

Yup.


BBCE is a good place to buy unopened stuff.

5STAT

Sounds like a Kruk's card box.....

I haven't opened a box/case from them yet that was "untouched"

DeutscherGeist

Its not worth buying something that old from ebay because the item passed through many hands already. I doubt the seller did anything, it must have been searched in the past when these cards were really hot.

I guess BBCE is the place to go. It seems like that seller looks at his products carefully before selling to the public. In cases where customers have found problems, he really does make it right without a hassle (he does not make you jump through hoops for a refund full or partial).

He had rack pack 1984 Topps in a box for sale at $50. I am surprised you did not buy it from him?

1989FleerBillRipkencollector

I used to buy boxes that sellers said were unsearched and it seems those were the ones searched. I would then ask sellers that didnt post that info if it was searched and if they replied No I cant search them their unopened...then bingo, sale. Or I would ask if box was backfilled. No response was a bad sign.

I only buy cases now and even those can be tampered with.

Nothing like spending $70 on 89 rack case of Fleer to get 4 Griffeys and 4 Johnsons.

rise2it

There's so much of this that happened 'back in the day' that it's tough to buy anything, even what is now considered 'junk wax' just for fun.

Racks than ran in sequence, 89 upper deck in sequence, 89 hoops in sequence (with see thru packs - I once bought a box with three Robinson RC's SHOWING), 90 donruss being put through metal detectors (in one case i know of, the candy distributor was doing that, so NONE of the boxes with Elite cards that were selling for many hundreds at the time EVER got out into certain areas), etc.

I can remember the late 80's/early 90's seeing a lot of topps wax (86, 87) that had already been searched and resealed, simply to have those hot $2 cards pulled out.

Many of these have just been passed around over the years from person to person to person...and it only takes one person along the way to ruin it.

Another example of something I just wouldn't trust now would be 91 stadium club football (again, you can see the bottom card, and usually make out what the top card in a pack is - favre was easy to pick once you opened a couple of boxes), with 432 cards in a box and 500 in the set, I'm sure many folks buy these boxes today and just chalk it up to 'bad luck'.