Thanks to Big80s & Grotes encouragment (thanks guys), I submitted a few '71's & received the box from PSA today:
The Cardinals team card is 1/1 with none higher.
Jones is also a 1/1 with only one higher (a PSA 9).
McDaniel is a 1/3 with one higher (an 8Q).
The populations for '71 OPCs is pretty sparce, so I'm not really sure what this means in terms of rarity / value. I may submit a few more. I really wish this Robinson card didn't have that tiny notch on center of the left edge. It's such a cool card.
Mike
"Must these Englishmen Live That I Might Die? Must They Live That I Might Die?" - The Blue Oyster Cult
Way to go on that Cardinals card, Ice!! Those 71 OPCs are almost non-existent in mint grade, much more difficult than Topps, and their value ought to be far higher, IMO. I'm virtually certain you will get at least an 8 (maybe even an 8.5) on the Robinson card even with that small notch, as I have a number of PSA 8s with a small notch on the top or side very similar to yours. PSA is generally more lenient on these issues than they'd be with Topps, as the OPC cards were cut with airplane wire and they are just not out there in smooth mint shape unless it's a sheet cut card. Thanks for sharing!
The Locker card has a shot at a 9, also, IMO. The Banks looks like an 8 at first blush. Good luck!!
Collecting 1970s Topps baseball wax, rack and cello packs, as well as PCGS graded Half Cents, Large Cents, Two Cent pieces and Three Cent Silver pieces.
In the 1980s, when I was growing up, the O-Pee-Chee Company dominated young boys’ imaginations. Not only did the London, Ont. firm make candy — beloved enamel-peelers like Fun Dips, Nerds and Gobstoppers — it also made bubblegum cards, a one-two punch that ravaged a boy’s resistance. I fondly recall my grandfather bribing my obedience with packages of E.T. cards, the 1982 Topps/OPC series that forever linked the adenoidal alien’s mug with the taste of stale gum.
London brothers John and Duncan McDermid opened their company inside the Somerville Paper Box factory in 1911. They named the new venture O-Pee-Chee after the joyous robin in Longfellow’s poem The Song of Hiawatha, rolling out confections at one end of the floor and paper products at the other — including, in 1933, hockey cards, sold in wax packages with a dusty stick of bubblegum.
The arrangement held until 1964, when O-Pee-Chee won the rights to print Beatles cards for the Canadian market. Like all things Fab, the 60-card set sold frantically, and it made the candymaker into a card shark overnight.
Sharing a license with its U.S. counterpart Topps, O-Pee-Chee became a proxy archivist of popular culture. It commemorated the moon landing with a set of cards in 1969 and the Mounties’ centennial in 1973. O-Pee-Chee had smaller print runs than Topps and managed to squeeze bilingual write-ups on every card, but like its southern twin, it faithfully mirrored the era’s amusements — Welcome Back Kotter in 1976, Star Wars in 1977, Michael Jackson in 1984, and many others.
There were original creations, too — like the Wacky Packages, a series of stickers that parodied such venerable consumer goods as “Blisterine” and “Retch-a-Sketch.” The series was designed by Art Spiegelman, a consultant for Topps who would later win acclaim (and a Pulitzer Prize) for his Holocaust comic book Maus. Spiegelman also created Wacky Packs’ cousin the Garbage Pail Kids — a gruesome spoof of that fatuous ’80s toy trend the Cabbage Patch Doll. (In 1988, a school board in Ontario petitioned the government to ban the Garbage Pail Kids, claiming the farcically fulsome stickers were too vulgar for the elementary students snapping them up. The plea was flatly refused, as my dog-eared collection proves.)
O-Pee-Chee’s crown jewels, however, were its hockey cards, which they produced periodically in the ’30s, ’50s and early ’60s until signing their deal with Topps in 1968, which made hockey cards a pillar of their business. Many of the cards are still prized today: a 1979-80 Wayne Gretzky rookie card — O-Pee-Chee No. 18 — recently sold for more than $62,000 US at a Chicago auction.
When the sports-card trade ignited in 1990, the field became crowded with glossy new sets. Though OPC’s lineup still assimilated the latest fads — Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, New Kids on the Block — a rash of new sports-card brands shattered the Topps/OPC hegemony. To appease this new collector’s market, O-Pee-Chee issued its 1992 hockey cards without gum for the first time in its history, after buyers complained the candy was soiling their investment. It was an ominous move.
The sports-card bubble burst just three years later. The industry in shambles, O-Pee-Chee announced it was leaving the collectibles racket to focus on, appropriately, candy. The brand was co-opted by Topps. In a final twist of irony, O-Pee-Chee was sold in 1996 — to Nestlé.
I know this is an old thread, but many of the 1960s and 1970s OPC discussed here are up on the next two Heritage Auctions!!! OPCs graded 7,8 and 9 of the major stars and rookies from all of the old sets!!
I found a 1990 OPC #93 Guy Carbonneau with an error on the back - an upside down Ron Francis back.
I'm mostly interested in finding if there are others, possibly how many and value - for myself. He's HOF so I'm going to get it graded for my collection anyway but I can't find anything on this card.
Collecting 1970s Topps baseball wax, rack and cello packs, as well as PCGS graded Half Cents, Large Cents, Two Cent pieces and Three Cent Silver pieces.
@jacobpmesser said:
I've got a question for anyone in OPC hockey.
I found a 1990 OPC #93 Guy Carbonneau with an error on the back - an upside down Ron Francis back.
I'm mostly interested in finding if there are others, possibly how many and value - for myself. He's HOF so I'm going to get it graded for my collection anyway but I can't find anything on this card.
Any help would be appreciated.
PSA won't grade the wrong-back you describe, but it is a fun one since both players are HHOF.
@hotmush said:
To answer an earlier question, in 1990 OPC did keep the Topps logo on the front for some reason.
The trick with the 1990 OPC set is that there are two different backs, a bright white back and a greyish back. Unlike the 81 OPC greybacks, you were able to get both back variants in each pack, with a ratio of about 2 white backs per pack. Very very very tough to put a set together of just white backs. They are tough to discern when looking at them flat on, but stacking the cards in a box, the difference is quite clear... almost the same as putting Topps traded vs regular Topps end to end. Just a little info.
(TOP is white-back)
(BOTTOM is grey-back)
Great vintage thread with fascinating info. Does anyone have photos of the 1990 OPC white and gray backs and how to tell the 2 apart?
@jay0791 said:
I collect 1971 OPC NY Yankees in psa 8. Love them. They are so scarce in this grade that I think they should be worth more than they are.
My gosh, Bob, I don't think that qualifier is deserving at all. The card is beautiful. If you ever find any duplicates from 1971 or 1974 OPC to sell, please let me know. I love these two sets.
Looking for high grade rookie cards and unopened boxes/cases
OC T/B usually is not as noticeable to the eye as OC L/R. I think that card is borderline for the qualifier. Compare the amount of black between the top of the team Yankees to the top edge and the bottom of the inner portrait and the bottom edge. It was also graded many years ago.
Collecting 1970s Topps baseball wax, rack and cello packs, as well as PCGS graded Half Cents, Large Cents, Two Cent pieces and Three Cent Silver pieces.
I've been scouring the universe for a high-end '66 OPC Koufax. They are nearly non-existent...working on a Koufax master set and could use some help. Much thanks.
Where are all of the 467 (listed in the POP Report) PSA 10 1977 OPC examples hiding?
There are currently zero examples on eBay.
Shameless request; I'd be interested if there are any sellers frequenting this thread.
I've been looking for this card FOR...EV...ER. I don't think it has EVER been on the open market....at least as long as I've been looking (the '90's). It's like a white whale....you hear about it but never really ever see one!
I'm guessing all the big money guys will take it out of us minions grasp....
@clarke442 said:
Not the 66-OPC Koufax, but a 66-OPC (and a "cousin") for a Showcase
You've exhibited your warped, dimented dive into insanity...WHO in their right mind attempts the venerable Venezuela Topps. That's a beauty....and a Hall of Famer to boot!!!!
Seems like a good place to ask OPC questions. I have always had some OPC cards that I have acquired in different ways throughout the years but have more recently started collecting them on purpose. I know that their grading standards are different than Topps. Is the card below a tough grade or do you believe it to be accurate? I really didn’t have any expectations when I sent it in but started trying to compare to other OPC cards that have recently sold.
PSA's grading standards do not vary by brand. Although severe rough cuts are much more prevalent among OPC than Topps, PSA does not penalize rough cuts for either brand. With respect to your '70 Aaron, there may be a surface issue or two that is not detectable by those of us viewing the scan on our monitors so it's not possible to determine exactly what led to the assigned grade other than the weak corners. While the l/r centering isn't great, had the rest of the card been stronger the centering would have allowed for the assignment of a grade higher than 5.
@reelinintheyears I appreciate your response. My post wasn’t to complain about the grade but rather to learn from this experience to be sure I am not wasting money on future grades. I got this card for a good deal and it’s worth well over what I have into it. Thanks again for your response.
Comments
PM me!!
Thanks,
Mark
O-Pee-Chee Junction
bucket
For Trade
The Cardinals team card is 1/1 with none higher.
Jones is also a 1/1 with only one higher (a PSA 9).
McDaniel is a 1/3 with one higher (an 8Q).
The populations for '71 OPCs is pretty sparce, so I'm not really sure what this means in terms of rarity / value. I may submit a few more. I really wish this Robinson card didn't have that tiny notch on center of the left edge. It's such a cool card.
Mike
The Locker card has a shot at a 9, also, IMO. The Banks looks like an 8 at first blush. Good luck!!
Collecting 1970s Topps baseball wax, rack and cello packs, as well as PCGS graded Half Cents, Large Cents, Two Cent pieces and Three Cent Silver pieces.
London brothers John and Duncan McDermid opened their company inside the Somerville Paper Box factory in 1911. They named the new venture O-Pee-Chee after the joyous robin in Longfellow’s poem The Song of Hiawatha, rolling out confections at one end of the floor and paper products at the other — including, in 1933, hockey cards, sold in wax packages with a dusty stick of bubblegum.
The arrangement held until 1964, when O-Pee-Chee won the rights to print Beatles cards for the Canadian market. Like all things Fab, the 60-card set sold frantically, and it made the candymaker into a card shark overnight.
Sharing a license with its U.S. counterpart Topps, O-Pee-Chee became a proxy archivist of popular culture. It commemorated the moon landing with a set of cards in 1969 and the Mounties’ centennial in 1973. O-Pee-Chee had smaller print runs than Topps and managed to squeeze bilingual write-ups on every card, but like its southern twin, it faithfully mirrored the era’s amusements — Welcome Back Kotter in 1976, Star Wars in 1977, Michael Jackson in 1984, and many others.
There were original creations, too — like the Wacky Packages, a series of stickers that parodied such venerable consumer goods as “Blisterine” and “Retch-a-Sketch.” The series was designed by Art Spiegelman, a consultant for Topps who would later win acclaim (and a Pulitzer Prize) for his Holocaust comic book Maus. Spiegelman also created Wacky Packs’ cousin the Garbage Pail Kids — a gruesome spoof of that fatuous ’80s toy trend the Cabbage Patch Doll. (In 1988, a school board in Ontario petitioned the government to ban the Garbage Pail Kids, claiming the farcically fulsome stickers were too vulgar for the elementary students snapping them up. The plea was flatly refused, as my dog-eared collection proves.)
O-Pee-Chee’s crown jewels, however, were its hockey cards, which they produced periodically in the ’30s, ’50s and early ’60s until signing their deal with Topps in 1968, which made hockey cards a pillar of their business. Many of the cards are still prized today: a 1979-80 Wayne Gretzky rookie card — O-Pee-Chee No. 18 — recently sold for more than $62,000 US at a Chicago auction.
When the sports-card trade ignited in 1990, the field became crowded with glossy new sets. Though OPC’s lineup still assimilated the latest fads — Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, New Kids on the Block — a rash of new sports-card brands shattered the Topps/OPC hegemony. To appease this new collector’s market, O-Pee-Chee issued its 1992 hockey cards without gum for the first time in its history, after buyers complained the candy was soiling their investment. It was an ominous move.
The sports-card bubble burst just three years later. The industry in shambles, O-Pee-Chee announced it was leaving the collectibles racket to focus on, appropriately, candy. The brand was co-opted by Topps. In a final twist of irony, O-Pee-Chee was sold in 1996 — to Nestlé.
Guy Leshinski is a Toronto writer.
Jeff
I know this is an old thread, but many of the 1960s and 1970s OPC discussed here are up on the next two Heritage Auctions!!! OPCs graded 7,8 and 9 of the major stars and rookies from all of the old sets!!
Hello all. I collect PSA high graded 1980 topps OPC baseball.
Terry Bradshaw was AMAZING!!
Ignore list -Basebal21
I collect 1971 OPC NY Yankees in psa 8. Love them. They are so scarce in this grade that I think they should be worth more than they are.
1948-76 Topps FB Sets
FB & BB HOF Player sets
1948-1993 NY Yankee Team Sets
I collect the 1978 OPC set.
What a cool thread. You can't get any better than vintage OPC hockey.
I've got a question for anyone in OPC hockey.
I found a 1990 OPC #93 Guy Carbonneau with an error on the back - an upside down Ron Francis back.
I'm mostly interested in finding if there are others, possibly how many and value - for myself. He's HOF so I'm going to get it graded for my collection anyway but I can't find anything on this card.
Any help would be appreciated.
Good lord, this thread was a long time ago
Collecting 1970s Topps baseball wax, rack and cello packs, as well as PCGS graded Half Cents, Large Cents, Two Cent pieces and Three Cent Silver pieces.
PSA won't grade the wrong-back you describe, but it is a fun one since both players are HHOF.
Great vintage thread with fascinating info. Does anyone have photos of the 1990 OPC white and gray backs and how to tell the 2 apart?
buying O-Pee-Chee (OPC) baseball
Not quite sure this one deserves an OC qualifier.
bobsbbcards SGC Registry Sets
Nice card. Technically the T/B is about 80-20
I have seen worse and not get the qualifier.
1948-76 Topps FB Sets
FB & BB HOF Player sets
1948-1993 NY Yankee Team Sets
My gosh, Bob, I don't think that qualifier is deserving at all. The card is beautiful. If you ever find any duplicates from 1971 or 1974 OPC to sell, please let me know. I love these two sets.
To me, it looks more like 65/35.
My feelings are on the "3 border" cards, the 3 should be equal.
That card doesn't look OC to me at all. A little bit low, but not bad eye appeal.
OC T/B usually is not as noticeable to the eye as OC L/R. I think that card is borderline for the qualifier. Compare the amount of black between the top of the team Yankees to the top edge and the bottom of the inner portrait and the bottom edge. It was also graded many years ago.
Collecting 1970s Topps baseball wax, rack and cello packs, as well as PCGS graded Half Cents, Large Cents, Two Cent pieces and Three Cent Silver pieces.
I've been scouring the universe for a high-end '66 OPC Koufax. They are nearly non-existent...working on a Koufax master set and could use some help. Much thanks.
Where are all of the 467 (listed in the POP Report) PSA 10 1977 OPC examples hiding?
There are currently zero examples on eBay.
Shameless request; I'd be interested if there are any sellers frequenting this thread.
Added Bert this week!
Beautiful Burt you have there. I just love the OPC cards.
Also, someone just turned me on to THIS....
https://memorylaneinc.com/site/bids/bidplace?itemid=76031
I've been looking for this card FOR...EV...ER. I don't think it has EVER been on the open market....at least as long as I've been looking (the '90's). It's like a white whale....you hear about it but never really ever see one!
I'm guessing all the big money guys will take it out of us minions grasp....
Sick card!
Not the 66-OPC Koufax, but a 66-OPC (and a "cousin") for a Showcase
You've exhibited your warped, dimented dive into insanity...WHO in their right mind attempts the venerable Venezuela Topps. That's a beauty....and a Hall of Famer to boot!!!!
Kudos to you clarke442!!!!
Seems like a good place to ask OPC questions. I have always had some OPC cards that I have acquired in different ways throughout the years but have more recently started collecting them on purpose. I know that their grading standards are different than Topps. Is the card below a tough grade or do you believe it to be accurate? I really didn’t have any expectations when I sent it in but started trying to compare to other OPC cards that have recently sold.
PSA's grading standards do not vary by brand. Although severe rough cuts are much more prevalent among OPC than Topps, PSA does not penalize rough cuts for either brand. With respect to your '70 Aaron, there may be a surface issue or two that is not detectable by those of us viewing the scan on our monitors so it's not possible to determine exactly what led to the assigned grade other than the weak corners. While the l/r centering isn't great, had the rest of the card been stronger the centering would have allowed for the assignment of a grade higher than 5.
@reelinintheyears I appreciate your response. My post wasn’t to complain about the grade but rather to learn from this experience to be sure I am not wasting money on future grades. I got this card for a good deal and it’s worth well over what I have into it. Thanks again for your response.
Nice Aaron!
Only Have two to show and I was lucky to get the Seaver.
sjjs28@comcast.net
Collector of 1964 Topps Stand Ups, 1965 Embossed, 1968 Topps Game and 1969 Topps Decals
Registered Sets: 1964 Stand Ups, 1965 Embossed, 1968 Topps Game, 1969 Topps Decals