@GDM67 said:
Good luck with the Terry Harper. That's rather low pop in PSA 10.
You're the Braves guy. Do you have the Horner or Niekro in PSA 10? They both must be corner of the sheet. Centering is just atrocious on both of them.
Phil Niekro is indeed the upper left corner card on the sheet. Bob Horner is on the top row of his sheet, 3rd card from the left.
Thanks for this. Spent some time last night downloading pictures of all 6 uncut sheets from the set. Not sure why I never did this before. Great reference source. My initial take: any card placed in the corner of a sheet is very tough and any card placed on the top or bottom row and the far left and far right columns are at least decently tough. I know that's hardly a hot take, but it's just nice to see a card along the edge and say to yourself "Yep. No wonder the centering is so bad on like every copy of that card".
"I think the guy must be practicing voodoo or something. Check out his eyes. Rico's crazier than a peach orchard sow." -- Whitey Herzog, Spring Training 1973
The easiest way to check would be on the set registry. My set is called Mr. Peanut's 1983 Topps Set or something along those lines. I know this is 2019, but someone more tech savvy than I would have to post a link.
"I think the guy must be practicing voodoo or something. Check out his eyes. Rico's crazier than a peach orchard sow." -- Whitey Herzog, Spring Training 1973
"I think the guy must be practicing voodoo or something. Check out his eyes. Rico's crazier than a peach orchard sow." -- Whitey Herzog, Spring Training 1973
Next up is a Michigan wax box. I purchased the box off of eBay in September for $265.
I think I've had some pretty good luck this year, but this was a horrible box. In each pack when the sequence broke, the bottom half of the pack had an atrocious tilt cut.
The other half of the pack was no better with mainly poorly centered cards. I did pull a Sandberg and a Boggs.
Only two candidates for the grading pile, and I pulled the Rose out of the very first pack. I think the eye tends to get poisoned somewhat when the tilts are so bad and maybe you start to see everything with a tilt, so I may take a fresh look at some of these later on.
The final box of the year will be another vending box. The box is from the same source as the one I had such good luck with so I'm hoping for good things.
"I think the guy must be practicing voodoo or something. Check out his eyes. Rico's crazier than a peach orchard sow." -- Whitey Herzog, Spring Training 1973
I ripped this vending box a couple of weeks ago, but just getting around to posting the results. As I mentioned in my last post, this box was from the same source as the nice vending box I opened earlier this year. The box was purchased off of eBay for about $120 back in July.
A Gwynn and a Boggs were pulled, but not gradable.
I pulled 29 cards for the grading pile. Not as good as the other box, but still very good results.
Nothing too exciting. There's a Rickey and a Schmidt, and the Krenchicki is pretty tough.
That concludes another year of ripping. I've already secured a vending box, so I will be back next Winter for another round.
I've also got a sub that is due to pop imminently, so I'll be sure to post results and scans when it pops.
"I think the guy must be practicing voodoo or something. Check out his eyes. Rico's crazier than a peach orchard sow." -- Whitey Herzog, Spring Training 1973
A couple of questions. Once you have a "10" of a card , do you keep subbing
others? What happens to the cards that are up-graded? Do you sell or trade them?
This so reminds me of my 1978 Topps quest I started 15 years ago. It’s so awesome still seeing this type of passion for a single more modern complete set!
Tibor, if I hit a PSA 10 on a card, I stop submitting unless: it's a HOFer, it's a low pop (single digits), or it's a card I received in a trade and therefore didn't submit myself. As for the cards that are upgraded, I think I have some hoarding tendencies as I've kept all of them.
"I think the guy must be practicing voodoo or something. Check out his eyes. Rico's crazier than a peach orchard sow." -- Whitey Herzog, Spring Training 1973
Poppage! The fine gentleman I piggybacked with said we finally popped on business day 114. 6+ months I believe. Very pleased with the results, so I can't complain.
I'm going to add some more info to the results. I've been listing the source I pulled the card from and I'm adding the year I pulled the card as well as my grading history with the card. Note that when I list one PSA 9 or two PSA 9's, these are not crackouts of the same card. They're all totally different cards. Hopefully not too confusing.
7 1 42121590 GEM MINT 10 1983 Topps 375 Pete Vuckovich Card (eBay mega-lot, 2017, one PSA 9)
8 1 42121591 GEM MINT 10 1983 Topps 699 Lee Smith Card (vending, 2016, 1st graded)
9 1 42121592 MINT 9 1983 Topps 161 Dave Kingman Card (rack, 2017, 1st graded)
10 1 42121593 MINT 9 1983 Topps 461 Steve Trout Card (cello, 2015, 1st graded)
11 1 42121594 GEM MINT 10 1983 Topps 539 Roger Erickson Card (eBay mega-lot, 2017, 1st graded)
12 1 42121595 GEM MINT 10 1983 Topps 760 Dale Murphy Card (Mich. wax, 2012, one PSA 9)
13 1 42121596 GEM MINT 10 1983 Topps 21 Orioles Batting & Pitching Leaders Card (rack, 2015, two PSA 9's)
14 1 42121597 MINT 9 1983 Topps 38 Tim Flannery Card (eBay partial set, 2016, 1st graded)
15 1 42121598 NEAR MINT-MINT+ 8.5 1983 Topps 758 Aurelio Rodriguez Card (rack, 2015, one PSA 8, one PSA 9)
16 1 42121599 GEM MINT 10 1983 Topps 370 Gary Carter Card (rack, 2015, one PSA 8)
17 1 42121600 GEM MINT 10 1983 Topps 39 Terry Puhl Card (cello, 2014, 1st graded)
18 1 42121601 MINT 9 1983 Topps 549 Charlie Puleo Card (eBay partial set, 2016, one PSA 9)
19 1 42121602 GEM MINT 10 1983 Topps 442 Brian Downing Card (rack, 2014, one PSA 8.5)
20 1 42121603 GEM MINT 10 1983 Topps 582 Marshall Edwards Card (unknown source, two PSA 9's)
21 1 42121604 MINT 9 1983 Topps 120 Len Barker Card (ebay partial set, 2016, one PSA 8)
22 1 42121605 GEM MINT 10 1983 Topps 774 Alan Ashby Card (Mich. wax, 2014, one PSA 9)
23 1 42121606 GEM MINT 10 1983 Topps 530 Eddie Murray Card (rack, 2015, one PSA 9)
24 1 42121607 GEM MINT 10 1983 Topps 748 Derrel Thomas Card (rack, 2016, 1st graded)
25 1 42121608 GEM MINT 10 1983 Topps 705 Victory Leaders L.Hoyt/S.Carlton Card (rack, 2017, two PSA 9's)
26 1 42121609 MINT 9 1983 Topps 750 Ben Oglivie Card (rack, 2015, three PSA 9's)
27 1 42121610 GEM MINT 10 1983 Topps 440 Ron Guidry Card (rack, 2014, one PSA 8.5)
28 1 42121611 MINT 9 1983 Topps 637 Pat Corrales Card (rack, 2015, 1st graded)
14 out of 22 PSA 10's. I made 3 piggyback subs in 2018 and I went 41 out of 72 PSA 10's. MY GPA continues to rise. If I didn't know any better, I'd think that PSA's grading has gotten easier.
Nothing low pop to speak of, but it's always nice to hit PSA 10 HOFer's like L. Smith, Carter and Murray. I'll post scans when I have cards in hand.
"I think the guy must be practicing voodoo or something. Check out his eyes. Rico's crazier than a peach orchard sow." -- Whitey Herzog, Spring Training 1973
You have really developed an exceptional eye for ths set, Brett! Congrats on these results!
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.
@ahopkins said:
Brett, what's the PSA 10 count for your set? I love this quest. Keep it going, man.
Thanks guys.
An initial count without the cards in hand has me at an even 300 PSA 10's and 322 PSA 9's.
"I think the guy must be practicing voodoo or something. Check out his eyes. Rico's crazier than a peach orchard sow." -- Whitey Herzog, Spring Training 1973
I was off on my count a couple posts above. I'm actually at 300 PSA 10's and 316 PSA 9's. That's about 78% of the set in graded form.
"I think the guy must be practicing voodoo or something. Check out his eyes. Rico's crazier than a peach orchard sow." -- Whitey Herzog, Spring Training 1973
@ldferg said:
Great looking cards and scans. What scanner do you use? 😀
Like many on the board, I've got an Epson V37. I haven't tinkered with it at all. Still using the factory settings.
Also, thanks to all for the kind words.
"I think the guy must be practicing voodoo or something. Check out his eyes. Rico's crazier than a peach orchard sow." -- Whitey Herzog, Spring Training 1973
Great job so far. This was my favorite set design for 80s baseball sets, and seeing them in PSA 10 cases makes me appreciate them even more. Keep it up.
Gorgeous cards from the best set of the 80s. Always love seeing an update to this top thread. Thanks for sharing Brett. BTW, do the non rookie HOFERS command any money in a 10?
John
Conundrum - Loving my unopened baseball card collection....but really like ripping too
John, I don't follow pricing too much, but in general I'd say most non-rookie HOFers can be had for $25 bucks or so in PSA 10. I'm sure there are exceptions. Ripken probably goes for more than that. Ryan maybe? Someone correct me if I'm wrong.
"I think the guy must be practicing voodoo or something. Check out his eyes. Rico's crazier than a peach orchard sow." -- Whitey Herzog, Spring Training 1973
It was a tough year for unopened. I could see it coming, so it was not a big shock, but at this point I think I'm priced out of the 1983 unopened. With prices the way they are, it's not as easy to shrug off a disaster box. I guess everybody reaches their breaking point and I've hit mine. I was able to pick up a couple of vending boxes and two 3 rack pack lots.
I've not abandoned my journey however. It will just take a little bit of creativity. One such opportunity arose in late August. Offered on eBay was a 6 box lot of vending. The only catch was it was opened and all of the Gwynns, Boggs' and Sandbergs had been pulled. That's 3000 commons including all of the non-Big 3 stars. Box fresh. I won the lot for the opening bid of $99.
This thing was heavy. Like 6 bricks packed in a medium priority box.
When I first opened the box, here's what I was greeted with.
At first I thought he had jammed 3000 cards in to a medium priority box and shipped them off. Luckily, he just used a top layer of about 100 cards as packing material. I considered it a good omen that I pulled 3 cards from the packing materials to be graded.
The Tanner and Mariners Team Leaders cards are actually pretty tough too.
The first box yielded the following 27 cards.
The highlight here was the Weaver card that features Earl as a surly drunk. It's a pop 7.
It should be fun to rip into the rest of these vending boxes.
"I think the guy must be practicing voodoo or something. Check out his eyes. Rico's crazier than a peach orchard sow." -- Whitey Herzog, Spring Training 1973
I, too, have bid on and won similar lots of vending boxes where only a few specific cards have been pulled. I think the idea that they've been "searched" scares others away, but they've turned out to actually be amongst some of the best purchases that I've made. Good luck on pulling some more gems from the remaining boxes!
It’s awesome to see this journey still alive! It sure does get tough once purchasing unopened to rip passes the threshold of of financial viability. I can attest to that for sure.
that is a lot of 83 topps cards. if you want to part with a box or two of those cards I would like to buy them from you. I am trying to upgrade my raw set. thank you.
@lwehlers said:
how much of the set do you have in psa 10 grade. I have been reading this post since you started it has been great looking a the 83 set.
I have an even 300 graded PSA 10 with 316 PSA 9's that I'm trying and hoping to upgrade.
"I think the guy must be practicing voodoo or something. Check out his eyes. Rico's crazier than a peach orchard sow." -- Whitey Herzog, Spring Training 1973
@coinspacks said:
Do you sell off the lesser cards in bulk lots on ebay? Sell complete sets? Sell nothing?
I'm a hoarder by nature. I think I've sold one or two complete sets and a rack pack with Sandberg on top. Also made a handful of trades. Otherwise, I've kept everything else. Three or four years ago I did break down and throw away a lot of my empty boxes. Here's a picture before I made a trip to the dumpster.
"I think the guy must be practicing voodoo or something. Check out his eyes. Rico's crazier than a peach orchard sow." -- Whitey Herzog, Spring Training 1973
@lwehlers said:
how much of the set do you have in psa 10 grade. I have been reading this post since you started it has been great looking a the 83 set.
I have an even 300 graded PSA 10 with 316 PSA 9's that I'm trying and hoping to upgrade.
impressive. I still thank you for the nines that you sold me about two years ago.
One of my favorite threads of all time! Love the 83 set and this multiyear journey you have shared with all of us. I would have to imagine that this 6 box lot at that price could be the best bang for the buck you have had yet. Good luck on pulling those dimes!
John
Conundrum - Loving my unopened baseball card collection....but really like ripping too
I opened the 2nd of the six box lot of searched vending. I noticed that two of the boxes were not closing properly. Two of the boxes have these snaptite cases containing stars in them.
I ended up pulling 24 cards from the box.
The Reggie, Ozzie, Eck and Fisk All Star were from the snaptite case. Also pulled Perez, Torre, Gossage Super Vet and Sutter on the Leading Firemen card in addition to near HOFer Dewey Evans, that were not in the case.
If you've followed this thread, the toughness of the Horner has been discussed. That was a nice hit. But the biggest hit may be the aforementioned Gossage Super Veteran card. That card is in the top right corner of the E sheet and is low pop like all corner sheet cards.
Despite the absence of the Big 3, this is looking like a strong lot.
"I think the guy must be practicing voodoo or something. Check out his eyes. Rico's crazier than a peach orchard sow." -- Whitey Herzog, Spring Training 1973
I have an even 300 graded PSA 10 with 316 PSA 9's that I'm trying and hoping to upgrade.
Great thread, came across this and got hooked on your journey. I have dozens of boxes of 83’s and 84’s and you motivated me to go through them again. Im two weeks in and I have even more respect for your patience and passion in your quest!
Are there any cards in 9 or 10 that have remained elusive for you? I know some are notorious for centering issues. By now you must be close to a full set. Keep it up! Thanks for posting!!!
When I'm done ripping for the year, I'd like to go through all my subs and my pile of cards to be subbed and figure out just how many cards in the set I've never found a single copy of that was gradeworthy. I really have no idea how many that'd be. 100?
Throughout the thread, I try to mention cards I've found particularly tough. A couple that come to mind right now would be the Bob Lillis and Doug Flynn cards.
"I think the guy must be practicing voodoo or something. Check out his eyes. Rico's crazier than a peach orchard sow." -- Whitey Herzog, Spring Training 1973
Opened the third box of the vending lot. This was the 2nd box that had the snaptite case with stars inside. Overall a very good box. In the snaptite case, I found the following cards to be gradable.
I won't even say anything about Garvey not being a HOFer. That card is a beast to find centered and I'm very happy to land it.
In addition to the cards pictured below, there were 10 or 12 cards I already had in PSA 10 that I didn't include.
Similar to the Garvey, there were several cards I pulled that are very tough to find with good centering including the Tekulve Super Vet, the Gorman Thomas and the Phil Niekro which has been mentioned previously in this thread.
This continues to be a very nice lot.
"I think the guy must be practicing voodoo or something. Check out his eyes. Rico's crazier than a peach orchard sow." -- Whitey Herzog, Spring Training 1973
Comments
Don't have a Horner and my Niekro is a PSA 9.
Thanks for this. Spent some time last night downloading pictures of all 6 uncut sheets from the set. Not sure why I never did this before. Great reference source. My initial take: any card placed in the corner of a sheet is very tough and any card placed on the top or bottom row and the far left and far right columns are at least decently tough. I know that's hardly a hot take, but it's just nice to see a card along the edge and say to yourself "Yep. No wonder the centering is so bad on like every copy of that card".
Brett, do you have a list of PSA 10s you're still in need of?
Andy
Andy
The easiest way to check would be on the set registry. My set is called Mr. Peanut's 1983 Topps Set or something along those lines. I know this is 2019, but someone more tech savvy than I would have to post a link.
Makes sense. Thanks, Brett. Good luck with your quest. A most marvelous quest it is, sir.
Andy
Andy
https://psacard.com/psasetregistry/baseball/company-sets/1983-topps/publishedset/60531
A link to your set. Good luck with it and thanks for posting along the way!
Nathanael
Thank you for the link.
Next up is a Michigan wax box. I purchased the box off of eBay in September for $265.
I think I've had some pretty good luck this year, but this was a horrible box. In each pack when the sequence broke, the bottom half of the pack had an atrocious tilt cut.
The other half of the pack was no better with mainly poorly centered cards. I did pull a Sandberg and a Boggs.
Only two candidates for the grading pile, and I pulled the Rose out of the very first pack. I think the eye tends to get poisoned somewhat when the tilts are so bad and maybe you start to see everything with a tilt, so I may take a fresh look at some of these later on.
The final box of the year will be another vending box. The box is from the same source as the one I had such good luck with so I'm hoping for good things.
I ripped this vending box a couple of weeks ago, but just getting around to posting the results. As I mentioned in my last post, this box was from the same source as the nice vending box I opened earlier this year. The box was purchased off of eBay for about $120 back in July.
A Gwynn and a Boggs were pulled, but not gradable.
I pulled 29 cards for the grading pile. Not as good as the other box, but still very good results.
Nothing too exciting. There's a Rickey and a Schmidt, and the Krenchicki is pretty tough.
That concludes another year of ripping. I've already secured a vending box, so I will be back next Winter for another round.
I've also got a sub that is due to pop imminently, so I'll be sure to post results and scans when it pops.
Great stuff as always Brett!
I’m horribly still sloooowly chipping away at my set.
This is a fine, fine hunt. Very much enjoy your enthusiasm and resiliency. One of these days I'll be doing this for 1984 Topps. Keep it up, Brett.
Andy
A couple of questions. Once you have a "10" of a card , do you keep subbing
others? What happens to the cards that are up-graded? Do you sell or trade them?
This so reminds me of my 1978 Topps quest I started 15 years ago. It’s so awesome still seeing this type of passion for a single more modern complete set!
ISO 1978 Topps Baseball in NM-MT High Grade Raw 3, 100, 103, 302, 347, 376, 416, 466, 481, 487, 509, 534, 540, 554, 579, 580, 622, 642, 673, 724__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ISO 1978 O-Pee-Chee in NM-MT High Grade Raw12, 21, 29, 38, 49, 65, 69, 73, 74, 81, 95, 100, 104, 110, 115, 122, 132, 133, 135, 140, 142, 151, 153, 155, 160, 161, 167, 168, 172, 179, 181, 196, 200, 204, 210, 224, 231, 240
I appreciate the positive words guys.
Tibor, if I hit a PSA 10 on a card, I stop submitting unless: it's a HOFer, it's a low pop (single digits), or it's a card I received in a trade and therefore didn't submit myself. As for the cards that are upgraded, I think I have some hoarding tendencies as I've kept all of them.
@mrpeanut39 Thanks for the reply. You must have an abandoned box
store where you keep everything!
Poppage! The fine gentleman I piggybacked with said we finally popped on business day 114. 6+ months I believe. Very pleased with the results, so I can't complain.
I'm going to add some more info to the results. I've been listing the source I pulled the card from and I'm adding the year I pulled the card as well as my grading history with the card. Note that when I list one PSA 9 or two PSA 9's, these are not crackouts of the same card. They're all totally different cards. Hopefully not too confusing.
7 1 42121590 GEM MINT 10 1983 Topps 375 Pete Vuckovich Card (eBay mega-lot, 2017, one PSA 9)
8 1 42121591 GEM MINT 10 1983 Topps 699 Lee Smith Card (vending, 2016, 1st graded)
9 1 42121592 MINT 9 1983 Topps 161 Dave Kingman Card (rack, 2017, 1st graded)
10 1 42121593 MINT 9 1983 Topps 461 Steve Trout Card (cello, 2015, 1st graded)
11 1 42121594 GEM MINT 10 1983 Topps 539 Roger Erickson Card (eBay mega-lot, 2017, 1st graded)
12 1 42121595 GEM MINT 10 1983 Topps 760 Dale Murphy Card (Mich. wax, 2012, one PSA 9)
13 1 42121596 GEM MINT 10 1983 Topps 21 Orioles Batting & Pitching Leaders Card (rack, 2015, two PSA 9's)
14 1 42121597 MINT 9 1983 Topps 38 Tim Flannery Card (eBay partial set, 2016, 1st graded)
15 1 42121598 NEAR MINT-MINT+ 8.5 1983 Topps 758 Aurelio Rodriguez Card (rack, 2015, one PSA 8, one PSA 9)
16 1 42121599 GEM MINT 10 1983 Topps 370 Gary Carter Card (rack, 2015, one PSA 8)
17 1 42121600 GEM MINT 10 1983 Topps 39 Terry Puhl Card (cello, 2014, 1st graded)
18 1 42121601 MINT 9 1983 Topps 549 Charlie Puleo Card (eBay partial set, 2016, one PSA 9)
19 1 42121602 GEM MINT 10 1983 Topps 442 Brian Downing Card (rack, 2014, one PSA 8.5)
20 1 42121603 GEM MINT 10 1983 Topps 582 Marshall Edwards Card (unknown source, two PSA 9's)
21 1 42121604 MINT 9 1983 Topps 120 Len Barker Card (ebay partial set, 2016, one PSA 8)
22 1 42121605 GEM MINT 10 1983 Topps 774 Alan Ashby Card (Mich. wax, 2014, one PSA 9)
23 1 42121606 GEM MINT 10 1983 Topps 530 Eddie Murray Card (rack, 2015, one PSA 9)
24 1 42121607 GEM MINT 10 1983 Topps 748 Derrel Thomas Card (rack, 2016, 1st graded)
25 1 42121608 GEM MINT 10 1983 Topps 705 Victory Leaders L.Hoyt/S.Carlton Card (rack, 2017, two PSA 9's)
26 1 42121609 MINT 9 1983 Topps 750 Ben Oglivie Card (rack, 2015, three PSA 9's)
27 1 42121610 GEM MINT 10 1983 Topps 440 Ron Guidry Card (rack, 2014, one PSA 8.5)
28 1 42121611 MINT 9 1983 Topps 637 Pat Corrales Card (rack, 2015, 1st graded)
14 out of 22 PSA 10's. I made 3 piggyback subs in 2018 and I went 41 out of 72 PSA 10's. MY GPA continues to rise. If I didn't know any better, I'd think that PSA's grading has gotten easier.
Nothing low pop to speak of, but it's always nice to hit PSA 10 HOFer's like L. Smith, Carter and Murray. I'll post scans when I have cards in hand.
Great job Brett !!!
Awesome results, congrats on the poppage. One of my favorite threads ever on the CU Forum.
John
Brett, what's the PSA 10 count for your set? I love this quest. Keep it going, man.
Andy
You have really developed an exceptional eye for ths set, Brett! Congrats on these results!
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.
Great eyes on these. Really like how you're tracking this. Kudo's on your quest.
Thanks,
David (LD_Ferg)
1985 Topps Football (starting in psa 8) - #9 - started 05/21/06
Great results. You really do have a great eye. can't wait for
the next update.
Thanks guys.
An initial count without the cards in hand has me at an even 300 PSA 10's and 322 PSA 9's.
I love your patience
Here's a couple of scans from the latest sub.
I was off on my count a couple posts above. I'm actually at 300 PSA 10's and 316 PSA 9's. That's about 78% of the set in graded form.
Brett , great looking cards .
Just keeps getting better. You've got a great eye for quality!!
Gorgeous cards...thanks for sharing the clear scans. Those are stunning!
Great looking cards and scans. What scanner do you use? 😀
Thanks,
David (LD_Ferg)
1985 Topps Football (starting in psa 8) - #9 - started 05/21/06
Like many on the board, I've got an Epson V37. I haven't tinkered with it at all. Still using the factory settings.
Also, thanks to all for the kind words.
Great job so far. This was my favorite set design for 80s baseball sets, and seeing them in PSA 10 cases makes me appreciate them even more. Keep it up.
Gorgeous cards from the best set of the 80s. Always love seeing an update to this top thread. Thanks for sharing Brett. BTW, do the non rookie HOFERS command any money in a 10?
John
John, I don't follow pricing too much, but in general I'd say most non-rookie HOFers can be had for $25 bucks or so in PSA 10. I'm sure there are exceptions. Ripken probably goes for more than that. Ryan maybe? Someone correct me if I'm wrong.
It was a tough year for unopened. I could see it coming, so it was not a big shock, but at this point I think I'm priced out of the 1983 unopened. With prices the way they are, it's not as easy to shrug off a disaster box. I guess everybody reaches their breaking point and I've hit mine. I was able to pick up a couple of vending boxes and two 3 rack pack lots.
I've not abandoned my journey however. It will just take a little bit of creativity. One such opportunity arose in late August. Offered on eBay was a 6 box lot of vending. The only catch was it was opened and all of the Gwynns, Boggs' and Sandbergs had been pulled. That's 3000 commons including all of the non-Big 3 stars. Box fresh. I won the lot for the opening bid of $99.
This thing was heavy. Like 6 bricks packed in a medium priority box.
When I first opened the box, here's what I was greeted with.
At first I thought he had jammed 3000 cards in to a medium priority box and shipped them off. Luckily, he just used a top layer of about 100 cards as packing material. I considered it a good omen that I pulled 3 cards from the packing materials to be graded.
The Tanner and Mariners Team Leaders cards are actually pretty tough too.
The first box yielded the following 27 cards.
The highlight here was the Weaver card that features Earl as a surly drunk. It's a pop 7.
It should be fun to rip into the rest of these vending boxes.
I, too, have bid on and won similar lots of vending boxes where only a few specific cards have been pulled. I think the idea that they've been "searched" scares others away, but they've turned out to actually be amongst some of the best purchases that I've made. Good luck on pulling some more gems from the remaining boxes!
Brett, great score on those vending boxes. And great news that your quest continues. I'm looking forward to more posts. Good luck!
Andy
Good luck and seems like the cherry picked vending boxes might be the way to go.
It’s awesome to see this journey still alive! It sure does get tough once purchasing unopened to rip passes the threshold of of financial viability. I can attest to that for sure.
Good luck!
ISO 1978 Topps Baseball in NM-MT High Grade Raw 3, 100, 103, 302, 347, 376, 416, 466, 481, 487, 509, 534, 540, 554, 579, 580, 622, 642, 673, 724__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ISO 1978 O-Pee-Chee in NM-MT High Grade Raw12, 21, 29, 38, 49, 65, 69, 73, 74, 81, 95, 100, 104, 110, 115, 122, 132, 133, 135, 140, 142, 151, 153, 155, 160, 161, 167, 168, 172, 179, 181, 196, 200, 204, 210, 224, 231, 240
that is a lot of 83 topps cards. if you want to part with a box or two of those cards I would like to buy them from you. I am trying to upgrade my raw set. thank you.
how much of the set do you have in psa 10 grade. I have been reading this post since you started it has been great looking a the 83 set.
Love. This. Thread.
Do you sell off the lesser cards in bulk lots on ebay? Sell complete sets? Sell nothing?
I have an even 300 graded PSA 10 with 316 PSA 9's that I'm trying and hoping to upgrade.
I'm a hoarder by nature. I think I've sold one or two complete sets and a rack pack with Sandberg on top. Also made a handful of trades. Otherwise, I've kept everything else. Three or four years ago I did break down and throw away a lot of my empty boxes. Here's a picture before I made a trip to the dumpster.
impressive. I still thank you for the nines that you sold me about two years ago.
One of my favorite threads of all time! Love the 83 set and this multiyear journey you have shared with all of us. I would have to imagine that this 6 box lot at that price could be the best bang for the buck you have had yet. Good luck on pulling those dimes!
John
I opened the 2nd of the six box lot of searched vending. I noticed that two of the boxes were not closing properly. Two of the boxes have these snaptite cases containing stars in them.
I ended up pulling 24 cards from the box.
The Reggie, Ozzie, Eck and Fisk All Star were from the snaptite case. Also pulled Perez, Torre, Gossage Super Vet and Sutter on the Leading Firemen card in addition to near HOFer Dewey Evans, that were not in the case.
If you've followed this thread, the toughness of the Horner has been discussed. That was a nice hit. But the biggest hit may be the aforementioned Gossage Super Veteran card. That card is in the top right corner of the E sheet and is low pop like all corner sheet cards.
Despite the absence of the Big 3, this is looking like a strong lot.
Great thread, came across this and got hooked on your journey. I have dozens of boxes of 83’s and 84’s and you motivated me to go through them again. Im two weeks in and I have even more respect for your patience and passion in your quest!
Are there any cards in 9 or 10 that have remained elusive for you? I know some are notorious for centering issues. By now you must be close to a full set. Keep it up! Thanks for posting!!!
~Justin
Thanks.
When I'm done ripping for the year, I'd like to go through all my subs and my pile of cards to be subbed and figure out just how many cards in the set I've never found a single copy of that was gradeworthy. I really have no idea how many that'd be. 100?
Throughout the thread, I try to mention cards I've found particularly tough. A couple that come to mind right now would be the Bob Lillis and Doug Flynn cards.
Opened the third box of the vending lot. This was the 2nd box that had the snaptite case with stars inside. Overall a very good box. In the snaptite case, I found the following cards to be gradable.
I won't even say anything about Garvey not being a HOFer. That card is a beast to find centered and I'm very happy to land it.
In addition to the cards pictured below, there were 10 or 12 cards I already had in PSA 10 that I didn't include.
Similar to the Garvey, there were several cards I pulled that are very tough to find with good centering including the Tekulve Super Vet, the Gorman Thomas and the Phil Niekro which has been mentioned previously in this thread.
This continues to be a very nice lot.