Rare Larry Bird PSA 10 Sportscaster sold
sushihotwings
Posts: 452 ✭✭✭
I was hoping I might get lucky and grab this Larry Bird Sportscaster for $1500ish but a power snipe grabbed it at the close. The card was produced before his Topps Rookie and only 9 ever graded GEM MINT. I thought I would share the link since these don't come up for sale often in this grade and card is pretty unique.
https://www.ebay.com/itm/132456687778?_trksid=p2471758.m4704
On the hunt high grade Star Basketball.
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Comments
Bummer you missed out. That would have been a great addition.
Wow. Crazy to me that what is essentially a college basketball card sells for more than his NBA rookie card.
Arthur
Really nice card. Would have been a great item to have in your collection for sure!
I see the same seller has another one of these currently up on ebay. It's the cert number right after the other one that sold, so the seller apparently had two great examples. Didn't see any others around that same cert number.
https://www.ebay.com/itm/1977-79-Sportscaster-Larry-Bird-rookie-74-18-PSA-10-GEM-MINT/132471173386?_trkparms=aid=777003&algo=DISCL.MBE&ao=2&asc=47300&meid=f7eca75010374804a8a0e265c44b1e43&pid=100012&rk=3&rkt=9&sd=132456687778&_trksid=p2047675.c100012.m1985
seems to be some weak left to right centering to be in a 10 holder...
Thanks for posting. I am definitely interested. Centering is off a tad, but still looks to meet the 10 specs.
It's not even clear how to measure the centering on this card. It doesn't really seem cut off center because the left side is slightly wider looking at both the front and the back.
Interesting- I didn't think the sportscasters cards were that rare. I only know of the issue because Gretzky was included in the set, so my casual knowledge obviously needs further information.
Above deck 56(?) or somewhere around there, they get a good bit more difficult to find due to a postal rate increase IIRC. The "high numbers" are thought to only have a few hundred copies produced. Thankfully for Bird collectors there aren't any foreign issues to chase that I'm aware of. I've got up to 9 different versions of some of the golfers I collect (including print run variations).
Would you mind giving us ignorant folk a nickel explanation on how the Sportscasters set worked?
Arthur
No prob, I'll even give you the quarter. As I understand it, you signed up for a subscription, and they send you a cello wrapped deck of 24 cards every couple weeks like a book/wine of the month kinda thing. #s in the lower right on the back indicate country of issue (03-005 for US), deck # (74 in the case of this Bird), and card number within that deck (18 for the Bird). For some of the foreign decks, they didn't renumber to 1 on each deck and just counted up sequentially. You'll occasionally see unopened US decks on the bay.
The first 7 decks of the US issue can be found with 'Printed in' either Italy or Japan (not to be confused with the Italian language issued decks). On many of the decks, there were multiple print runs. If there's no bolded letter on the bottom of the back, it's a first print run, 'A' is second print run, 'B' third, etc. I've seen up to 'D' on a few.
Hard to find them without touched corners and wrinkles.
Have like 9 of the Rocky card but gave up buying them as it felt like a lost cause.
I've recently re-found thousands of these (I think I have two full sets of the Finnish -version, and some bonus cards apparently as I found 5 Björn Borg's...) that I got as a teen from a family members collection, stored away in my parent's house - so all of the forum posts on these Sportscaster -cards are super interesting as I'm trying to find a way to sell the best ones off. But maybe I need to get them graded first by PSA, would you recommend that?
Many of the ones I have are in pristine condition, prob. because I don't think they've been touch since gotten in the mail and having put in a folder at the time of their release in 1977-1980. Most certainly look like they would've come from a pack yesterday. But it's difficult to find what's worth to collectors and what's not, for example eBay has cards on Bruce Jenner listed for $39k, but then in auction I've seen them for 23 dollars. So... I do feel a bit lost in my search of what's valuable and what's not.
I do have 2 Larry Birds, and 2 Gretzky's, both mentioned here. One of the Larry Bird's looks like it was printed yesterday, it's in such good condition. So maybe I should have that graded?
(older members: old thread notice)
@milkafilm
welcome to the forum and nice find! sportscasters are getting more popular by the day. i would definitely have the major stars of sport graded. however, please be aware that even if they were put up in ft knox way back in 1979, that still doesnt mean they’d grade a 9 or 10. seems to be a standard misconception and just dont want you to be heartbroken or spend an insane amount of money unnecessarily
i dont know much about the grading of sportscasters but post some pics here. a broad array of collectors here that can help out with centuries of combined collecting knowledge at your disposal.
That.
Exactly that. 😉
Curious about the rare, mysterious and beautiful 1951 Wheaties Premium Photos?
https://forums.collectors.com/discussion/987963/1951-wheaties-premium-photos-set-registry#latest
Thank you! I felt bad for resurrecting such an old thread, that I made a brand new one with a photo
But yeah, since the grading is quite expensive, I'd maybe go for that only on the top cards, maybe with 2-3. But great to see that there's help to be found!
Here's the pic I posted on the other thread I created:
prolly best if you post individually, front and back. and a darker background is better for the eyes. 😉
eta & fyi: the gretzkys are prolly just as, if not more valuable than the birds.
I've seen the same with Comic Books especially recently - just because a book was "never read" and "put in a bag immediately after purchase" does not make it a CGC 9.8.9.6.9.4.9.2 ,9.0 or even an 8.5
There are hobbies like artwork when dealing with one-of-kind items that condition really not a consideration. That's where I've devoted 95% of my collecting allocated funds for over 2 decades. It means a tiny defect not seen by me in 1999 won't cost me any potential value today.
It's the singer not the song - Peter Townshend (1972)
Yeah, this is good information to have that I shouldn't expect them to be graded high, but if they are, it's just a nice surprise. The whole grading aspect is new to me so thanks for all of this.
This comment is purely from a resale perspective, independent of your own interest in keeping them in your personal collection.
I have subbed tons of Sportscasters for grading over the years. Pay attention to the pop reports on them, as the registry participants collect these in graded form but they don't have a huge amount of popularity outside of that, with the exception of a small number of players in the sets. The cost of grading has increased a whole heck of a lot on supersize holder items, so you will not have sales prices that exceed the grading costs anymore except for a small list of players. Also, the Finnish set is one of the most common produced/available sets relative to the other nation versions out there. The ones in the Finnish set worth grading are as follows:
Grade these regardless of which nation issue (Finland vs. North American; these ones not available from the other countries versions) :
Gretzky
Magic
Bird
Maradona
Exclusive to the Finnish version, so worth grading (but they wouldn't be if there were other lower print run nations versions out there) :
Kurri
Pelle Lindbergh
Tretjak
Possibly worth the grading fees but a gamble since only if you land a high grade:
Orr
Pele
K. Dryden
Formerly worth subbing, but will no longer beat the grading fees unless you get a 10 or maybe even a 9:
Ali
Howe
There are a lot of other stars in the Finnish set that would have been great to sub back when you could get them in at a per card fee of approx $20 or so, but those days are long gone. Almost every one of the graded ones now will sell for under $100 even on the top end stars. The player set registry participants pretty much all have the ones they need by now since the Finnish versions are so incredibly plentiful compared to other foreign options, so you'd have to be pretty lucky to land a 10 on something not on my list above and then find a participant interested in upgrading his set.
Thank you A LOT for this miwlvrn! Super helpful!
Like said earlier, give us pics of one card at a time, of the Birds and Gretzkys. With enough detail, you will get some ideas of what they may grade. But like mentioned earlier, many people new to grading overgrade their stuff big time. Recently someone posted a card that they said would likely be a 10. Once they posted pics it was obvious it would probably great between 3 and 6, 7 at the very best. Also, it's helpful to view your cards using a 10x loupe to find defects. A PSA 10 will look nearly perfect under 10x loupe. A PSA 9 will look perfect with the naked eye.
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I took some photos of the Larry Bird that was in better condition, as the other one is not like this. The Gretzky's are not as well-preserved as this. But... what are your thoughts on this?
G
Those lower corners on your Birds will put them most likely in the 4.5 to 5.5 range, though a 6 is not outside of the realm of possibility. Note that one corner is uneven such that it looks trimmed or handcut. That is not the case though. A lot of Finnish ones are known for having that odd corner shape on one corner straight from the manufacturer. I've subbed some Gretzky and Magic ones with that issue and they were graded, not deemed trimmed.
OK, thanks for this, this is good to know.
Great pictures. Those will definitely give some good responses. The thought of the Bird being between 4.5 and 6 will give you a standard for the rest of your cards.
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Successful transactions on the BST boards with rtimmer, coincoins, gerard, tincup, tjm965, MMR, mission16, dirtygoldman, AUandAG, deadmunny, thedutymon, leadoff4, Kid4HOF03, BRI2327, colebear, mcholke, rpcolettrane, rockdjrw, publius, quik, kalinefan, Allen, JackWESQ, CON40, Griffeyfan2430, blue227, Tiggs2012, ndleo, CDsNuts, ve3rules, doh, MurphDawg, tennessebanker, and gene1978.
Do you have any thoughts on the potential grading of this Kareem Abdul-Jabbar? This is an odd one, as the company is misprinted on this one. The copyright is for Edition Rencontre, but... in other Sportscaster-cards the text is Editions Rencontre. This is missing the letter S. An odd typo.
That horizontal press line across the front is pretty killer. I'm voting no higher than 5.