Anyone notice those three BBCE wrapped wax boxes sneak by yesterday for $1937, $2081 and $2134? Hope someone here got one (or all) and is ripping. Its almost affordable at that price (comparitively speaking).
The handwriting on the labels on two of them did not match Steve's or anyone else's at BBCE.
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.
Has the BBCE logo always been present on their shrink wrap? I looked at the subject wax boxes and they appear to be wrapped in a clear shrink wrap; no logo or print.
Has the BBCE logo always been present on their shrink wrap? I looked at the subject wax boxes and they appear to be wrapped in a clear shrink wrap; no logo or print.
Steve used to shrinkwrap boxes in clear wrap before using wrap with the bbce logo a couple years ago. I remember way back when he didn't even use stickers~he'd simply place gold business cards on bottom of the box underneath the clear shrink wrap.
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.
Originally posted by: Dakillo Anyone notice those three BBCE wrapped wax boxes sneak by yesterday for $1937, $2081 and $2134? Hope someone here got one (or all) and is ripping. Its almost affordable at that price (comparitively speaking).
The handwriting on the labels on two of them did not match Steve's or anyone else's at BBCE.
Tim, You are spot on. I noticed the same thing.
Thanks,
David (LD_Ferg)
1985 Topps Football (starting in psa 8) - #9 - started 05/21/06
I was going through the 75 Mini registry this morning, and noticed that a number of folks are actively working on their sets. I also noticed some new sets, and that the number of current sets is now at 80 which seems near an all time high for this set. Given that there hasn't been much activity in this thread lately, I thought it would be good to hear from some collectors of the set (both registry and non-registry) as to how things are going with collecting Mini's.
As for me, I've completed my registry set, but I still pick up a few updates or upgrades from time to time if both the card is nicer than what I have and is priced right. Case in point, I just picked up a #258 Dave LaRoche in PSA 8 this past week that I think looks nicer than the one I already have. I should get it in the mail later today. For whatever reason, that card has not come up too often in the last 2 years in a grade of PSA 8, although I've bid on and lost out on a couple of 9's this year. I think I was outbid at about $45 or so on one of the 9's last Spring. It's somewhat of a difficult card to find centered correctly from top to bottom, so perhaps this is why it doesn't come up often.
This spring, I had kicked around the idea of building a second registry set of Mini's in an average grade of PSA 7 or thereabouts, but bailed out on it at the beginning of the summer. I had over 100 cards in the set, but I have too many other projects going and decided to abandon it.
It seems that the pace of newly graded Mini's has slowed substantially in the last 1-1.5 years, especially from the big sellers like 4SC. And it seems like the already graded ones remain locked up in collections. I have not submitted a Mini to be graded in almost a year. I just haven't been able to find any in substantial enough numbers to warrant sending them in. I also noticed with the last couple of my submissions, quite a bit of attention was paid to the surface of the Mini's, more so than I had been used to seeing. The result was that most of the cards I thought were 8's, were judged to be 7's, which I don't collect and don't sell for enough to warrant the grading fee.
So how about other collectors of the set. How is it going, and how did you get started collecting the set? It would be nice to hear from you. And where's Henry these days? Whether or not anyone responds, good luck with your set building!
Good to hear from you, Nick, and hope all is well. I've been slowly upgrading my set over time, selling off a few self-submitted lower pop 10s in favor of 9s and upgrading my 8s to 9s with nicer eye appeal and without tilt, which are very tough to find these days. I have about 15 minis at PSA now as part of a group submission, but haven't submitted much in the past year or so, either. Prices have remained strong for tougher examples but have softened a bit for other mini cards that were overvalued, imo. I believe Henry is still waiting for the Armegeddon he predicted to happen in fall/winter of 2015, lol...
I've also been selling off a couple larger lots of pack fresh singles and putting together a couple of sets in binders, which I am enjoying. I have a couple of packs to open up on a rainy day, too.
I also picked up a real nice Killebrew at a good price recently. I had been searching the past several years for a tilt-free, full-sized example.
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.
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 was wondering when this thread would come back to life? Welcome new (to the registry) collectors. I agree, would be great to hear your stories.
Tim, that Killebrew is definitely one of the better examples. I'll admit I was tempted to bid a little higher on that one, didn't want to appear greedy. Nice pick up!
No surprise, I've been working on my 2nd collection. Picked up a nice #80 Carlton Fisk PSA 9 last night for quite the bargain, under $70. Thought I might snag that #660 Aaron PSA 9 for a nice price as well, but it was not to be. It's been very slow going on upgrades to my 1st collection. Though I did pick up a PSA 10 of #616 Rookie Jim Rice recently. The example selling last night went for a little under what I paid. 3 have sold in the past several months for between $2,400-$2,900. The one before those sold for over $3,500 I believe.
Long time no write, but I thought I would share. Just bought a raw mini set and a quick look through looks very promising. Will try to get a few scans up when I'm not exhausted. Just grabbed a small group and saw they were sharp and well centered, including a very well centered, full sized Gullett. Fingers crossed :-)
Good to hear from you, MD. And thanks for sharing about your recent pickup. I wish you well on subbing the Gullett and any other gems you find in that set.
Here is the latest addition to my Mini collection. The "Big Bopper" Mini can be a challenge to find centered correctly without a tilt. As soon as I saw this one, I just had to have it. I just love the rich color on this example!
Incidentally, May played 18 seasons and hit 354 homeruns in his career, although he struck out frequently (over 1,500 times). I remember him best as a power hitting Oriole. He finished out his career with the Royals in 1982.
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.
Thanks guys. I picked up two more cards this past week from the PWCC auction. One of them was this Dick Lange card #114 in PSA 9. I had owned another 9 a couple of years ago that someone (I can't remember who) had thrown, free of charge, into a PSA 8 Mini lot I purchased. I never really liked that 9 due to the card being diamond cut, so I sold it. I've been looking for a replacement for two years or so now. As I recall, I lost an auction for one earlier this year, but finally won this one.
Incidentally, Dick Lange only played in the Majors for 4 seasons, all of which were for the Angels. He had 9 wins and 15 losses in his career with an ERA of 4.47. During the 1975 season, his last, he went 4 and 6 with 1 save, 45 K's, and 53 walks. He has a 1976 Topps card, but this one is the last card in a season in which he played.
I'd been looking for a higher end PSA 9 Carter RC for quite a while~one that both fills the holder and is well centered with minimal tilt and was pleased to land this one from the PWCC set break, as well.
Also was happy to land this Pinson at a very reasonable price~another card that had been on my watch list for some time.
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 always like to find out where the rookies on a 2 or 4-card panel ended up in their career. Carter, of course, was very successful. Marc Hill played many seasons with multiple teams, finishing out with the White Sox in 1986. Danny Meyer went on to play two seasons with Detroit, five with the Mariners, and four with the A's finishing in 1985. Leon Roberts played for the Tigers, Mariners, Rangers, Jays, and Royals, concluding his playing career after the 1984 season. Given the long careers of all 4 players, I guess you could say that is a really good 4-panel of rookies.
That is a beauty, Jeff! Congrats on a monster pickup!
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 have the following cards available and plan on listing soon, but I'd like to make them available here first. Email me at jeff_shamrock2112@yahoo.com if you would like to make an offer.
First, congrats on pulling the Brett! My thoughts are that the left/centering will hold it back to at best, a 9 OC or, if you request no qualifiers, a 7. If it were me, I would submit it and accept any qualifier. A 9 OC will generally sell for more than a 7. Again, nice pull!
To my fellow Mini collectors, I want to share with you two examples from my latest Mini grading submission this past week. To preface, what I've noticed over the last 1.5 years or so, is that red/yellows and green/yellows having what I would term mild PD on the card front (typically, "snow" or "black ink spray"), have been receiving 6's when I've requested no qualifiers. This has been a repeated surprise to me, because I had been used to receiving 7's or in some cases, even 8's, for these. This week, wondering the reason for the apparent change, I finally decided to click on the PSA page describing the grading standards, and now I understand (why I didn't think of this before, eludes me, lol). Cards with "printing defects" cap out at a 6. See this page (click the PSA 6 example):
Cards with mild "printing imperfections" can go higher (7 for example). So, it appears that the typical "snow" pattern on the red/yellows and green/yellows are now being interpreted as "print defects" and capping out at PSA 6. Incidentally, an example of such a card with snow is shown with the description of a print defect - it's that typical snow pattern we see on these Minis quite often - on this page (scroll down to the printing defect description and example):
In no way, do I think my cards are being "picked on." And this post is not at all a complaint. It make sense to me, based on my read of the standards, why I've been receiving 6's for card that otherwise have untouched corners/edges and are well-centered, but have print defects.
Perhaps many of you have already figured this out, but given that I don't submit as many Mini's as I used to, this is new to me. Below are my two latest examples that I submitted for my second set. Despite the PD, I still think they look awesome and are a great fit for my second set. Visually, these are still highly collectible and are perfect for those collecting on a (relatively) limited budget or just don't care to spend more than a few dollars for a graded Mini common. Had I submitted these to sell, I would have been disappointed, because there is no way I could recover the grading fee by selling the card. But, either way, it's a been a great learning experience over the last 1.5 years now, and these two (along with the others) have confirmed my suspicions noted above. I share this, because it's good for all of us to be informed in deciding what to submit and for what purpose. Enjoy the scans!
Very insightful post, Nick! Those are two tough cards with lower technical grades but superior eye appeal! I have noticed that PSA was a bit more lenient in years past with PD or snow vs today, though there are exceptions. In addition to snow, I have always thought that the stray ink "spatter" you see usually near the top of the card ought to also be considered when assigning a grade, though I do see cards with this issue in higher grade, even PSA 9 holders, like this Jim Todd:
Personally, I believe PSA should be tougher on surface issues like that for cards in the Mint 9 range.
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.
Thanks for the info on the print defect assessments. I've been sitting on several cards to submit and now fewer will be making the journey...
Has PSA changed the inside dimension of the holders for mini's? It appears there are a several slabbed cards that do not fill the holder currently on ebay. Or, are the not adhering to the 80 mm minimum size that was debated a couple years ago? Here's the best / worst example:
@sbtrailrider said:
Thanks for the info on the print defect assessments. I've been sitting on several cards to submit and now fewer will be making the journey...
Has PSA changed the inside dimension of the holders for mini's? It appears there are a several slabbed cards that do not fill the holder currently on ebay. Or, are the not adhering to the 80 mm minimum size that was debated a couple years ago? Here's the best / worst example:
I am wondering the same thing. There was a PSA 10 pop 1 McRae card that I also noticed this about, too, particularly on the reverse. I haven't submitted any 75 minis in a while and not sure if the dimension of the inner space in the newer holders has changed~perhaps Nick can chime in here.
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.
The vertical dimensions of the inner space in the holders for #127 and 649 shown above are 81 mm, which is what they have been as far back as I can remember.
An 80-81 mm Mini will fill the holder very well with very little to no hint of a gap (in the vertical direction) within the inner portion of the plastic case. The Borgmann above is at about 80 mm tall, and the Heidemann is closer to 80.5 mm, which is somewhat tall for a green/yellow that typically maxes out at about 80 mm. The Heidemann shows no gap, and the Borgmann a very, very tiny amount.
BTW, great to hear from you all again. There hasn't been much activity here in a while.
@CalamityTodd said:
Couldn't they be cards that had been graded 10 in the past, then re-holdered??
The cert # indicates when the card was originally graded in the case of a newly reholdered 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.
I would like to thank all of the forum members who regularly contribute to this thread. It is easily my favourite.
I have been looking to aquire this set in PSA 8 or better and am considering options to do so. If any of the regular members are interesting in selling their set I would definately entertain offers. I have already completed a 1975 Topps set (8 or better). Recently I started compiling a 1975 O-Pee-Chee (8 or better) and would be interested in acquiring singles from it as well, or a complete set at the right price.
I look forward to many more posts to this thread and wish everyone here the best of luck with their collections.
I logged in tonight to report I have all the graded cards to complete the set (California Mini's, ranked #14) at better than 8.00 cumulative GPA, but in reviewing my set I think back to my original plan of 8's or better for all cards. Along the way I realized the low pops or high price of some cards meant accepting 7's and certainly there are many 7's that look better than some 8's in my set. "Buy the card and not the holder" was the first mantra of card collecting I picked up on these boards. Yet, instead of being done I see there are about 25 more spots to fill if I really want to have 8's or better.
Perhaps it could be done if I just wanted to throw money at it. For example, there were three PSA 8 Terry Hughes cards for sale last week. All overpriced considering the pop of 8's has grown considerably in the past few years. At the start of 2014 there were 45 cards with a grade of 8 or better making it a challenging card to find. Today there are 61 NQ examples in that range. No doubt it's still a difficult card to find centered and sharp but asking prices are higher than other lower pop cards.
I'll admit I'm torn by this idea of 8's or better. Given the subjective nature of grading perhaps it's only right to accept the obvious defects of qualified cards - OC, MC, ST - as being objectively defective. The PD designation is vexing. There are 4 cards in my set with 9PD and I really don't see the issue. I'll keep them. The two 8OC will be updated.
For me the fun has been the chase and the moment of cheer when a submitted card comes back with an 8, or a 9. (An 8.5 is great too, but I always wonder why it's not a 9.) And winning an auction is always a fun moment, too. There's a trade off on buying graded cards. While secure in getting the grade you want, the card will never come back from PSA as better than what it is on the day you got it. I've enjoyed buying raw cards or packs and sending in subs. With grading fees moving up and card values down I got away from subs a couple years ago. Still, there's one more sub of 100+ cards I'm ready to send in on the next monthly special. I'd love to land another card like the raw Alou that came back a 9, only one-of-nine 5 years ago and today there are only 10 examples and zero 10's.
So to the new poster - Sportscardguy - good luck and best wishes on collecting the set. If you plan to go for an all-at-once buy there may be a few sets out there, just a question a price. If you plan to build the set over time, I've got duplicates and I'm sure most of us on the board can help.
Here's my upgrade list to complete my set in 8's or better. PM if you have sale or trade, or raw. Thanks!
23 Bill Russell
25 Lee May
31 Dave Rader
53 Dave Giusti
55 Bobby Bonds
58 Chuck Taylor
143 Cliff Johnson
150 Bob Gibson
156 Dave Kingman
162 Willie Montenez
191 MVP 1953
228 George Brett
230 Catfish Hunter
237 Carl Morton
245 Mickey Lolich
302 Rick Burleson
311 ERA Strikeout leaders
421 Mets team
454 Claude Osteen
477 Tom Hutton
517 Checklist
559 Bob Montgomery
564 Tommie Davis
612 Terry Hughes
Population reports don't tell the whole story. Using Hughes for example, many, many of those Hughes in 8 are either naturally short or have that yellow stripe across the stop, or commonly both. A full sized, clean Hughes is rarer than a Pop 61 or whatever it is today. It's up to the market to decide if that continues to matter, but it has to this point (i.e., the selling prices tend to be lower for naturally shorter cards with the yellow stripe and hence the lower average selling price).
So, "buying the card not the holder" works both ways in terms of valuing a card.
Hello Fellow Min-Heads, It's been a while since I have posted a thought. I was compelled to throw out some words after seeing an extraordinary lot of minis coming up for sale in a future PWCC auction. I may be wrong, but it looks like Henry's masterpiece. If so, it is sad to see that set broken up. Nonetheless, I wish you lots of luck with the auction Henry and I hope all is well. (Although luck will most likely not be needed with that set, which in my opinion consists of some the single best examples of 75 Mini's I have ever seen.)
Yes, it is his set. Many of those PSA 10s are cards I popped and sold to him over the years. My last deal with him was not entirely pleasant, but I wish him well. Maybe he's still stacking silver and waiting for Armegeddon, lol..
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.
@grote15 said:
Yes, it is his set. Many of those PSA 10s are cards I popped and sold to him over the years. My last deal with him was not entirely pleasant, but I wish him well. Maybe he's still stacking silver and waiting for Armegeddon, lol..
Tim,
Maybe he ran out of room to store the mini set and had to sell it. After a while, all that silver will take up a boatload
of room. Plus, if you are looking to keep just the essentials in the bunker, 1975 Topps Mini's would not qualify
unless you become leader of the new world.
I guess he consigned the set so he would not have to deal with customers wanting money back for no reason.
I'm sure its a headache he didn't want. After all, customers like that stink! Right!?
That was an epic Mini auction last night as the quality of those Mini's was incredible. Henry put together such a fine set. It's sad to see another great one retired, although I realize that this is the cycle of life for a PSA set registry. As I've been doing with other great Mini sets that have been retired, I picked up a few cards from Henry's set to add to my own as a way of remembering the set. I look forward to see how the Mini registry sets reorganize themselves in the next week or so as they absorb Henry's cards.
After a taking an extended hiatus from collecting the minis, Henry's set break brought me back in. I picked up about 25 cards last night that will be nice upgrades for my set.
Some of the examples I didn't win were absolutely amazing. I was the underbidder on a few, but got blown away on many of them. Congrats Henry on a successful break and to all the mini collectors who picked up some new additions.
i wound up winning a total of 27 cards, primarily lower pop PSA 9s to ugrade my set. I was pleased to win the cards I did, some of which I had been hunting for quite a while now, at fairly reasonable prices. Congrats to all who purchased cards~I agree with Nick it was an epic break and one that generated a lot of excitement from multiple participants, both old and new. The mini set remains a unique set in that regard.
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'm new on the scene here and I wanted to share a little of how my collection is going. Mine is a non-registry set which I started almost exactly one year ago. My collection started as a mistake purchase, believe it or not. After being out of the hobby for over 20 years, I was still shaking off the cobwebs and wasn't paying close attention to what I was purchasing. My original goal was to collect a small amount of common Topps cards from each year of the 70s. When I purchased a lot of 18 cards from 1975, imagine my surprise when I opened the package to find a lot of Minis. Being an average, part time collector at the time, can you imagine I never even heard of them before?
I put them away for a little while before they started to pique my interest. It didn't take me very long to figure out that the cards were special. So I figured maybe 100 non-graded raw commons would be enough so I began to purchase various small lots here and there. But the more that I bought, the more interested I became in them. Then I won a lot of 245 raw commons and that's when it started. There isn't a whole lot of information in one spot about this set in particular, but this forum has helped alot. I've learned so much from reading through all of the posts here.
So between a year ago and up to today, I have 641 cards so far. Like I mentioned before, my set is non-registry for now. I want to complete the entire set before I start going back through and slowly upgrading to PSA level. There may be a few in my set that qualify for a low PSA score (5 or 6) and most are VG-MT with a few Fair to Poor. I just recently purchased a decent MT #1 Hank Aaron that I've had my eye on for quite a while. Getting these last 19 cards is proving to be very interesting, especially #223 & #228. I'll keep you posted on how it's going.
New to this forum, but interested in learning more about these cards. My dad collected them since the 70's. Just gave one complete set, and one nearly complete set to a seller to sell on consignment for me. Also gave him extra hall of famer cards in addition to the sets. Sounds like he's sent 50 cards out for grading so far and may send more if those come back good. Has anyone else sold cards this way before and had success with it?
Comments
Anyone notice those three BBCE wrapped wax boxes sneak by yesterday for $1937, $2081 and $2134? Hope someone here got one (or all) and is ripping. Its almost affordable at that price (comparitively speaking).
The handwriting on the labels on two of them did not match Steve's or anyone else's at BBCE.
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.
Has the BBCE logo always been present on their shrink wrap? I looked at the subject wax boxes and they appear to be wrapped in a clear shrink wrap; no logo or print.
Steve used to shrinkwrap boxes in clear wrap before using wrap with the bbce logo a couple years ago. I remember way back when he didn't even use stickers~he'd simply place gold business cards on bottom of the box underneath the clear shrink wrap.
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.
Anyone notice those three BBCE wrapped wax boxes sneak by yesterday for $1937, $2081 and $2134? Hope someone here got one (or all) and is ripping. Its almost affordable at that price (comparitively speaking).
The handwriting on the labels on two of them did not match Steve's or anyone else's at BBCE.
Tim,
You are spot on. I noticed the same thing.
Thanks,
David (LD_Ferg)
1985 Topps Football (starting in psa 8) - #9 - started 05/21/06
As for me, I've completed my registry set, but I still pick up a few updates or upgrades from time to time if both the card is nicer than what I have and is priced right. Case in point, I just picked up a #258 Dave LaRoche in PSA 8 this past week that I think looks nicer than the one I already have. I should get it in the mail later today. For whatever reason, that card has not come up too often in the last 2 years in a grade of PSA 8, although I've bid on and lost out on a couple of 9's this year. I think I was outbid at about $45 or so on one of the 9's last Spring. It's somewhat of a difficult card to find centered correctly from top to bottom, so perhaps this is why it doesn't come up often.
This spring, I had kicked around the idea of building a second registry set of Mini's in an average grade of PSA 7 or thereabouts, but bailed out on it at the beginning of the summer. I had over 100 cards in the set, but I have too many other projects going and decided to abandon it.
It seems that the pace of newly graded Mini's has slowed substantially in the last 1-1.5 years, especially from the big sellers like 4SC. And it seems like the already graded ones remain locked up in collections. I have not submitted a Mini to be graded in almost a year. I just haven't been able to find any in substantial enough numbers to warrant sending them in. I also noticed with the last couple of my submissions, quite a bit of attention was paid to the surface of the Mini's, more so than I had been used to seeing. The result was that most of the cards I thought were 8's, were judged to be 7's, which I don't collect and don't sell for enough to warrant the grading fee.
So how about other collectors of the set. How is it going, and how did you get started collecting the set? It would be nice to hear from you. And where's Henry these days? Whether or not anyone responds, good luck with your set building!
Nick
I've also been selling off a couple larger lots of pack fresh singles and putting together a couple of sets in binders, which I am enjoying. I have a couple of packs to open up on a rainy day, too.
I also picked up a real nice Killebrew at a good price recently. I had been searching the past several years for a tilt-free, full-sized example.
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.
ON ITS WAY TO NEWPORT BEACH, CA 92658
Thats a sweet Killebrew!
Thanks!
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.
Tim, that Killebrew is definitely one of the better examples. I'll admit I was tempted to bid a little higher on that one, didn't want to appear greedy. Nice pick up!
No surprise, I've been working on my 2nd collection. Picked up a nice #80 Carlton Fisk PSA 9 last night for quite the bargain, under $70. Thought I might snag that #660 Aaron PSA 9 for a nice price as well, but it was not to be. It's been very slow going on upgrades to my 1st collection. Though I did pick up a PSA 10 of #616 Rookie Jim Rice recently. The example selling last night went for a little under what I paid. 3 have sold in the past several months for between $2,400-$2,900. The one before those sold for over $3,500 I believe.
Heehee! Minis and Silver baby!
aconte
Long time no write, but I thought I would share. Just bought a raw mini set and a quick look through looks very promising. Will try to get a few scans up when I'm not exhausted. Just grabbed a small group and saw they were sharp and well centered, including a very well centered, full sized Gullett. Fingers crossed :-)
ebay id Duffs_Dugout
My Ebay Auctions
Good to hear from you, MD. And thanks for sharing about your recent pickup. I wish you well on subbing the Gullett and any other gems you find in that set.
Here is the latest addition to my Mini collection. The "Big Bopper" Mini can be a challenge to find centered correctly without a tilt. As soon as I saw this one, I just had to have it. I just love the rich color on this example!
Incidentally, May played 18 seasons and hit 354 homeruns in his career, although he struck out frequently (over 1,500 times). I remember him best as a power hitting Oriole. He finished out his career with the Royals in 1982.
That's a beauty, Nick!
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.
Sweet Lee May!
aconte
Thanks guys. I picked up two more cards this past week from the PWCC auction. One of them was this Dick Lange card #114 in PSA 9. I had owned another 9 a couple of years ago that someone (I can't remember who) had thrown, free of charge, into a PSA 8 Mini lot I purchased. I never really liked that 9 due to the card being diamond cut, so I sold it. I've been looking for a replacement for two years or so now. As I recall, I lost an auction for one earlier this year, but finally won this one.
Incidentally, Dick Lange only played in the Majors for 4 seasons, all of which were for the Angels. He had 9 wins and 15 losses in his career with an ERA of 4.47. During the 1975 season, his last, he went 4 and 6 with 1 save, 45 K's, and 53 walks. He has a 1976 Topps card, but this one is the last card in a season in which he played.
Nick
Nice pickup, Nick!
I'd been looking for a higher end PSA 9 Carter RC for quite a while~one that both fills the holder and is well centered with minimal tilt and was pleased to land this one from the PWCC set break, as well.
Also was happy to land this Pinson at a very reasonable price~another card that had been on my watch list for some time.
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.
Very nice cards, Tim! Congrats on the pickup.
I always like to find out where the rookies on a 2 or 4-card panel ended up in their career. Carter, of course, was very successful. Marc Hill played many seasons with multiple teams, finishing out with the White Sox in 1986. Danny Meyer went on to play two seasons with Detroit, five with the Mariners, and four with the A's finishing in 1985. Leon Roberts played for the Tigers, Mariners, Rangers, Jays, and Royals, concluding his playing career after the 1984 season. Given the long careers of all 4 players, I guess you could say that is a really good 4-panel of rookies.
Finally able to pick up the Yount.... Have not received in the mail yet, but should be here in time to put in my Christmas stocking!
That is a beauty, Jeff! Congrats on a monster pickup!
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.
Congrats on that very nice Yount Mini!
What a great looking Yount.
Thanks,
David (LD_Ferg)
1985 Topps Football (starting in psa 8) - #9 - started 05/21/06
I have the following cards available and plan on listing soon, but I'd like to make them available here first. Email me at jeff_shamrock2112@yahoo.com if you would like to make an offer.
Opening another BBC Exchange box tonight.... Found this in the 6th pack opened.... Any thoughts on grade?
First, congrats on pulling the Brett! My thoughts are that the left/centering will hold it back to at best, a 9 OC or, if you request no qualifiers, a 7. If it were me, I would submit it and accept any qualifier. A 9 OC will generally sell for more than a 7. Again, nice pull!
To my fellow Mini collectors, I want to share with you two examples from my latest Mini grading submission this past week. To preface, what I've noticed over the last 1.5 years or so, is that red/yellows and green/yellows having what I would term mild PD on the card front (typically, "snow" or "black ink spray"), have been receiving 6's when I've requested no qualifiers. This has been a repeated surprise to me, because I had been used to receiving 7's or in some cases, even 8's, for these. This week, wondering the reason for the apparent change, I finally decided to click on the PSA page describing the grading standards, and now I understand (why I didn't think of this before, eludes me, lol). Cards with "printing defects" cap out at a 6. See this page (click the PSA 6 example):
psacard.com/resources/gradingstandards/#detail
Cards with mild "printing imperfections" can go higher (7 for example). So, it appears that the typical "snow" pattern on the red/yellows and green/yellows are now being interpreted as "print defects" and capping out at PSA 6. Incidentally, an example of such a card with snow is shown with the description of a print defect - it's that typical snow pattern we see on these Minis quite often - on this page (scroll down to the printing defect description and example):
psacard.com/resources/gradingstandards/#detail
In no way, do I think my cards are being "picked on." And this post is not at all a complaint. It make sense to me, based on my read of the standards, why I've been receiving 6's for card that otherwise have untouched corners/edges and are well-centered, but have print defects.
Perhaps many of you have already figured this out, but given that I don't submit as many Mini's as I used to, this is new to me. Below are my two latest examples that I submitted for my second set. Despite the PD, I still think they look awesome and are a great fit for my second set. Visually, these are still highly collectible and are perfect for those collecting on a (relatively) limited budget or just don't care to spend more than a few dollars for a graded Mini common. Had I submitted these to sell, I would have been disappointed, because there is no way I could recover the grading fee by selling the card. But, either way, it's a been a great learning experience over the last 1.5 years now, and these two (along with the others) have confirmed my suspicions noted above. I share this, because it's good for all of us to be informed in deciding what to submit and for what purpose. Enjoy the scans!
Very insightful post, Nick! Those are two tough cards with lower technical grades but superior eye appeal! I have noticed that PSA was a bit more lenient in years past with PD or snow vs today, though there are exceptions. In addition to snow, I have always thought that the stray ink "spatter" you see usually near the top of the card ought to also be considered when assigning a grade, though I do see cards with this issue in higher grade, even PSA 9 holders, like this Jim Todd:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/1975-Topps-Mini-519-Jim-Todd-RC-PSA-9-Cubs-Rookie-RF-/122340732504?hash=item1c7c136e58:g:cUkAAOSwUKxYlMzE
Personally, I believe PSA should be tougher on surface issues like that for cards in the Mint 9 range.
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.
Thanks for the info on the print defect assessments. I've been sitting on several cards to submit and now fewer will be making the journey...
Has PSA changed the inside dimension of the holders for mini's? It appears there are a several slabbed cards that do not fill the holder currently on ebay. Or, are the not adhering to the 80 mm minimum size that was debated a couple years ago? Here's the best / worst example:
A PSA 10 Brett:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/1975-Topps-Mini-George-Brett-ROOKIE-228-PSA-10-GEM-MINT-/182461108750?hash=item2a7b87920e:g:qQYAAOSwFdtXyjsa
1975 mini's
1954 Wilson Franks
I am wondering the same thing. There was a PSA 10 pop 1 McRae card that I also noticed this about, too, particularly on the reverse. I haven't submitted any 75 minis in a while and not sure if the dimension of the inner space in the newer holders has changed~perhaps Nick can chime in here.
http://www.ebay.com/itm/1975-Topps-Mini-268-Hal-McRae-PSA-10-gem-mint-pop-1-/371858354818?hash=item56947c3282:g:yPUAAOSwImRYlmCe&nma=true&si=CgQBYh13%2FJ0DSzoh0lyfo1Btr9o%3D&orig_cvip=true&rt=nc&_trksid=p2047675.l2557
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.
The vertical dimensions of the inner space in the holders for #127 and 649 shown above are 81 mm, which is what they have been as far back as I can remember.
An 80-81 mm Mini will fill the holder very well with very little to no hint of a gap (in the vertical direction) within the inner portion of the plastic case. The Borgmann above is at about 80 mm tall, and the Heidemann is closer to 80.5 mm, which is somewhat tall for a green/yellow that typically maxes out at about 80 mm. The Heidemann shows no gap, and the Borgmann a very, very tiny amount.
BTW, great to hear from you all again. There hasn't been much activity here in a while.
Nick
Couldn't they be cards that had been graded 10 in the past, then re-holdered??
The cert # indicates when the card was originally graded in the case of a newly reholdered 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.
I would like to thank all of the forum members who regularly contribute to this thread. It is easily my favourite.
I have been looking to aquire this set in PSA 8 or better and am considering options to do so. If any of the regular members are interesting in selling their set I would definately entertain offers. I have already completed a 1975 Topps set (8 or better). Recently I started compiling a 1975 O-Pee-Chee (8 or better) and would be interested in acquiring singles from it as well, or a complete set at the right price.
I look forward to many more posts to this thread and wish everyone here the best of luck with their collections.
I logged in tonight to report I have all the graded cards to complete the set (California Mini's, ranked #14) at better than 8.00 cumulative GPA, but in reviewing my set I think back to my original plan of 8's or better for all cards. Along the way I realized the low pops or high price of some cards meant accepting 7's and certainly there are many 7's that look better than some 8's in my set. "Buy the card and not the holder" was the first mantra of card collecting I picked up on these boards. Yet, instead of being done I see there are about 25 more spots to fill if I really want to have 8's or better.
Perhaps it could be done if I just wanted to throw money at it. For example, there were three PSA 8 Terry Hughes cards for sale last week. All overpriced considering the pop of 8's has grown considerably in the past few years. At the start of 2014 there were 45 cards with a grade of 8 or better making it a challenging card to find. Today there are 61 NQ examples in that range. No doubt it's still a difficult card to find centered and sharp but asking prices are higher than other lower pop cards.
I'll admit I'm torn by this idea of 8's or better. Given the subjective nature of grading perhaps it's only right to accept the obvious defects of qualified cards - OC, MC, ST - as being objectively defective. The PD designation is vexing. There are 4 cards in my set with 9PD and I really don't see the issue. I'll keep them. The two 8OC will be updated.
For me the fun has been the chase and the moment of cheer when a submitted card comes back with an 8, or a 9. (An 8.5 is great too, but I always wonder why it's not a 9.) And winning an auction is always a fun moment, too. There's a trade off on buying graded cards. While secure in getting the grade you want, the card will never come back from PSA as better than what it is on the day you got it. I've enjoyed buying raw cards or packs and sending in subs. With grading fees moving up and card values down I got away from subs a couple years ago. Still, there's one more sub of 100+ cards I'm ready to send in on the next monthly special. I'd love to land another card like the raw Alou that came back a 9, only one-of-nine 5 years ago and today there are only 10 examples and zero 10's.
So to the new poster - Sportscardguy - good luck and best wishes on collecting the set. If you plan to go for an all-at-once buy there may be a few sets out there, just a question a price. If you plan to build the set over time, I've got duplicates and I'm sure most of us on the board can help.
1975 mini's
1954 Wilson Franks
Here's my upgrade list to complete my set in 8's or better. PM if you have sale or trade, or raw. Thanks!
23 Bill Russell
25 Lee May
31 Dave Rader
53 Dave Giusti
55 Bobby Bonds
58 Chuck Taylor
143 Cliff Johnson
150 Bob Gibson
156 Dave Kingman
162 Willie Montenez
191 MVP 1953
228 George Brett
230 Catfish Hunter
237 Carl Morton
245 Mickey Lolich
302 Rick Burleson
311 ERA Strikeout leaders
421 Mets team
454 Claude Osteen
477 Tom Hutton
517 Checklist
559 Bob Montgomery
564 Tommie Davis
612 Terry Hughes
1975 mini's
1954 Wilson Franks
Population reports don't tell the whole story. Using Hughes for example, many, many of those Hughes in 8 are either naturally short or have that yellow stripe across the stop, or commonly both. A full sized, clean Hughes is rarer than a Pop 61 or whatever it is today. It's up to the market to decide if that continues to matter, but it has to this point (i.e., the selling prices tend to be lower for naturally shorter cards with the yellow stripe and hence the lower average selling price).
So, "buying the card not the holder" works both ways in terms of valuing a card.
The Pop in PSA 8 for the Hughes is 56.
Sbtrailrider,
Sent you a PM regarding PSA 8's
Hello Fellow Min-Heads, It's been a while since I have posted a thought. I was compelled to throw out some words after seeing an extraordinary lot of minis coming up for sale in a future PWCC auction. I may be wrong, but it looks like Henry's masterpiece. If so, it is sad to see that set broken up. Nonetheless, I wish you lots of luck with the auction Henry and I hope all is well. (Although luck will most likely not be needed with that set, which in my opinion consists of some the single best examples of 75 Mini's I have ever seen.)
Yes, it is his set. Many of those PSA 10s are cards I popped and sold to him over the years. My last deal with him was not entirely pleasant, but I wish him well. Maybe he's still stacking silver and waiting for Armegeddon, lol..
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.
>
Tim,
Maybe he ran out of room to store the mini set and had to sell it. After a while, all that silver will take up a boatload
of room. Plus, if you are looking to keep just the essentials in the bunker, 1975 Topps Mini's would not qualify
unless you become leader of the new world.
I guess he consigned the set so he would not have to deal with customers wanting money back for no reason.
I'm sure its a headache he didn't want. After all, customers like that stink! Right!?
aconte
That was an epic Mini auction last night as the quality of those Mini's was incredible. Henry put together such a fine set. It's sad to see another great one retired, although I realize that this is the cycle of life for a PSA set registry. As I've been doing with other great Mini sets that have been retired, I picked up a few cards from Henry's set to add to my own as a way of remembering the set. I look forward to see how the Mini registry sets reorganize themselves in the next week or so as they absorb Henry's cards.
After a taking an extended hiatus from collecting the minis, Henry's set break brought me back in. I picked up about 25 cards last night that will be nice upgrades for my set.
Some of the examples I didn't win were absolutely amazing. I was the underbidder on a few, but got blown away on many of them. Congrats Henry on a successful break and to all the mini collectors who picked up some new additions.
Ryan Hoge - PSA President, IG: @maysmantle
i wound up winning a total of 27 cards, primarily lower pop PSA 9s to ugrade my set. I was pleased to win the cards I did, some of which I had been hunting for quite a while now, at fairly reasonable prices. Congrats to all who purchased cards~I agree with Nick it was an epic break and one that generated a lot of excitement from multiple participants, both old and new. The mini set remains a unique set in that regard.
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.
Show em when you get em guys. Always nice to see mini gems.
Hello All;
I'm new on the scene here and I wanted to share a little of how my collection is going. Mine is a non-registry set which I started almost exactly one year ago. My collection started as a mistake purchase, believe it or not. After being out of the hobby for over 20 years, I was still shaking off the cobwebs and wasn't paying close attention to what I was purchasing. My original goal was to collect a small amount of common Topps cards from each year of the 70s. When I purchased a lot of 18 cards from 1975, imagine my surprise when I opened the package to find a lot of Minis. Being an average, part time collector at the time, can you imagine I never even heard of them before?
I put them away for a little while before they started to pique my interest. It didn't take me very long to figure out that the cards were special. So I figured maybe 100 non-graded raw commons would be enough so I began to purchase various small lots here and there. But the more that I bought, the more interested I became in them. Then I won a lot of 245 raw commons and that's when it started. There isn't a whole lot of information in one spot about this set in particular, but this forum has helped alot. I've learned so much from reading through all of the posts here.
So between a year ago and up to today, I have 641 cards so far. Like I mentioned before, my set is non-registry for now. I want to complete the entire set before I start going back through and slowly upgrading to PSA level. There may be a few in my set that qualify for a low PSA score (5 or 6) and most are VG-MT with a few Fair to Poor. I just recently purchased a decent MT #1 Hank Aaron that I've had my eye on for quite a while. Getting these last 19 cards is proving to be very interesting, especially #223 & #228. I'll keep you posted on how it's going.
New to this forum, but interested in learning more about these cards. My dad collected them since the 70's. Just gave one complete set, and one nearly complete set to a seller to sell on consignment for me. Also gave him extra hall of famer cards in addition to the sets. Sounds like he's sent 50 cards out for grading so far and may send more if those come back good. Has anyone else sold cards this way before and had success with it?
Welcome to the forums, both of you.
bobsbbcards SGC Registry Sets