@daltex said:
Why is a Cal Ripken 2nd Year Card one of the "Big Four"?
First regular issue stand alone card of Ripken, MVP season, World Championship season. 4th most valuable card in the set, in general. Ryan and Henderson are nice pulls from 83, as well, but I have no problem recognizing Ripken as part of the "Big 4".
17 is a huge number from vending. fwiw, the Moffitt, Ivie and Rivers are all pretty tough/low pop.
"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 love the 87 Fleer and Donruss cards. They were so hard to find when I was a kid just getting serious about collecting. The big pulls still resonate with me. I keep a few cards on my desk in my office at work. One of which is a McGwire 87D RR. That was a huge card as a kid. Thanks again for sharing.
John
Conundrum - Loving my unopened baseball card collection....but really like ripping too
Partly because of this thread, I was in the mood to thumb through some freshly opened 88 Topps this afternoon. I opened up 2 vending boxes and a wax box today, and after handling 10s of thousands of 88s over the years, I pulled my very first 2 (as far as I'm aware) McGwire record breaker variations with the white triangle by his foot. They both came from the vending, and both vending boxes also included the correct blue letter Comstock and correct Al Leiter photo. I then also pulled the McGwire without the white triangle from the wax box, but Comstock and Leiter did not make appearances in the wax box.
Does anyone know the ins and outs of this McGwire variation? Clearly, this was a later print run, as some errors had already been corrected. I've pack pulled a couple of white letter Comstock cards back in the day, and seem to still hit about 50-50 on the 2 different Leiter cards whenever I rip random wax, yet I've never gotten the McGwire variation before today, or at least overlooked it if I have. Was there only a small window during a mid-printing run that the white triangle appeared? I'm guessing they fired up the presses 5 or 6 different times with all of the errors and variations and corrections that occurred in 88, and maybe the white triangle made an appearance only for a bit at that time, until they noticed it and fixed it. Just curious. I know it's not particularly rare, but regardless, I'm geeked out over finally finding some myself. Haha! None of the 3 are gem, although the corrected one is petty sweet on the centering and color. Upper left corner is a bit soft and there is a small stain in the red, mid left side. Just thought I'd share a pic.
Does anyone know the ins and outs of this McGwire variation?
I am no expert on the McGwire error, but I believe it did not surface until a middle/late print run. The reason I believe this is that I opened boxes right as they came out in late November of 1987 and they had a mix of White/Blue Comstock, all Leiter errors and no McGwire errors. The vending case I am ripping now has the corrected Comstock and Leiter, but like yours has the McGwire white triangle. This makes me think it was a later print run variation. I will certainly defer to any experts here though as this was just my breaking experience.
Wanted to share this preview of coming attractions. Time to throw these beauties into the rip mix rotation. As if the black borders on the 1987 Donruss were not enough to drive me mad, I will soon crack the seal on this factory sealed case of 1985 Donruss to hunt for GEM MINT cards along with the RCs of Clemens, Puckett, Davis, Gooden and Hershiser...
How long have you had a lot of the stuff you are opening? Were the prices you paid when you bought the stuff in line with what you would pay today if you bought these items? Thanks for your time...
@Kep13 said:
How long have you had a lot of the stuff you are opening? Were the prices you paid when you bought the stuff in line with what you would pay today if you bought these items? Thanks for your time...
I started salting away unopened boxes and cases back in 1994, so most of these items I have had for 15-20+ years. In fact on many of these I have multiple cases. I just decided that after years of staring at unopened cases/boxes, that I wanted to rip a portion of them to relive my childhood. Plus the hunt for perfect examples is a tough challenge and keeps this hobby fun for me. None of these are so rare that they cannot be replaced, so I decided to enjoy a portion of them. Hopefully others are enjoying the ride.
1985 Donruss is an underrated 80s issue IMO. Great design and card lineup. The Eric Davis card is one of my favorite of all time. I pulled it in the only 85D pack I opened as a kid. Back in 87, I was on cloud 9.
John
Conundrum - Loving my unopened baseball card collection....but really like ripping too
@NJ80sBBC said:
Believe me, we are enjoying the ride!
1985 Donruss is an underrated 80s issue IMO. Great design and card lineup. The Eric Davis card is one of my favorite of all time. I pulled it in the only 85D pack I opened as a kid. Back in 87, I was on cloud 9.
John
Eric Davis was "The Man" in the hobby back in early 87. For a short period of time, people wanted his card more than any other. Then Davis got injured and McGwire started crushing homer after homer as a rookie, so everyone moved on to chasing McGwire's Olympic card and 87 Rated Rookie, and eventually I think people forgot just how spectacular of a player Davis had really been for that short stretch of time. I've posted this mlb.com link in other threads before, but it's one of my favorite Joe Posnanski pieces. If you haven't read it, enjoy.
Ok...if you were a collector in the 1980s, how sick are these pictures!?!?!
It seemed like every single Beckett had up arrows next to Clemens, Puckett, Gooden and Davis. This set has some of my most coveted cards as a kid. You know what this means...time to go hunting!!
Dear lord...as expected, these are going to be crazy tough to find in GEM MINT. I am pretty confident the majority of the ones already in PSA 10 holders are from factory sets. The way to tell is that they will have slightly rounded corners and the stats on the back line up with the left side of the card front. Pack pulled will have razor corners and the stats line up with the right side of the card front.
At any rate, here are my observations after the first wax box:
Centering on this issue is a total mess and there are lots of tilt cut too
Like the 1986 and 1987 Donruss, micro chipping on the edges is the norm
The cards are gorgeous when you find an actual flawless example
Distribution in a box is really poor and littered with duplicates (which can be bad or good)
Here were the stars and rookies...
Similar to the 1986 and 1987 Donruss, there were only 5 contenders for PSA 10 in this box (0.9%)...
These 3 RCs made an appreance and if not for the micro chips on the Eric Davis top edge he might have been a contender...
I have never saved a box bottom until now, but this often forgotten Gooden RC is freakin’ cool!!
Oh, and the Rated Rookies this year were a complete miss from Donruss. Aside from Dunston, Tartabull and Hatcher, I would be hard pressed to remember a single one of these guys...
The Lee Tunnell one is a 2-part card...there are a handful of 2-part cards, that when you put the cards next to each other, they form one photo...so the other card will only have a left border
Yeah, it was a 2-part card, with the other player being Al Holland. Put the cards side by side, and it was a play on their last names, "Holland Tunnel".
Ah, thanks guys. I googled some “tunnell fleer 1985” images and saw the Holland card with the missing right border and thought “wow, it’s funny that google seems to recognize ‘Holland Tunnel’ like this” but never put 2 and 2 together!
@jordangretzkyfan said:
Dear lord...as expected, these are going to be crazy tough to find in GEM MINT. I am pretty confident the majority of the ones already in PSA 10 holders are from factory sets. The way to tell is that they will have slightly rounded corners and the stats on the back line up with the left side of the card front. Pack pulled will have razor corners and the stats line up with the right side of the card front.
At any rate, here are my observations after the first wax box:
Centering on this issue is a total mess and there are lots of tilt cut too
Like the 1986 and 1987 Donruss, micro chipping on the edges is the norm
The cards are gorgeous when you find an actual flawless example
Distribution in a box is really poor and littered with duplicates (which can be bad or good)
Here were the stars and rookies...
Similar to the 1986 and 1987 Donruss, there were only 5 contenders for PSA 10 in this box (0.9%)...
These 3 RCs made an appreance and if not for the micro chips on the Eric Davis top edge he might have been a contender...
I have never saved a box bottom until now, but this often forgotten Gooden RC is freakin’ cool!!
Oh, and the Rated Rookies this year were a complete miss from Donruss. Aside from Dunston, Tartabull and Hatcher, I would be hard pressed to remember a single one of these guys...
I'm just sitting here going through this thread and watching the world series and just gotta say "Damn this is fun!" I do have to ask if you have any sort of contraption to help with your review or is all eyeball and experience?
@JustMark said:
I'm just sitting here going through this thread and watching the world series and just gotta say "Damn this is fun!" I do have to ask if you have any sort of contraption to help with your review or is all eyeball and experience?
Mark
Hi Mark,
Thanks for the post and glad you are enjoying the thread along with an action packed World Series. No contraption on my end, just good old stubborn pickiness and close attention to details. I have submitted many cards over the years to PSA and BGS, just never on the magnitude of this project. I start by ensuring the card is dead centered or 55/45 at the very worst depending the year of issue. Then on to the corners making sure each one comes to a perfect point with zero touch or fray. Then look at the edges for any hint of chipping. If all that is clean, then on to the surface to make sure there are no micro creases, print defects or surface bubbles. This is why my hit ratio of PSA 10 contenders is hovering around 0.5% for Donruss, 1% for Topps and 1.5% for Fleer. Finding cards from the 1980s is easy, but finding perfect examples has been quite the challenge...but a fun one! I am waiting until I either complete the full set or get pretty close before submitting since this will be a massive bulk sub. I am hoping to have each full set graded with consecutive serial numbers. I’m sure they won’t all come back as PSA 10, but I am being insanely picky since any that come back a PSA 9 will be a money losing endeavor and the occasional PSA 8 will be a disaster since I will throw those out and look for better example. Thanks for commenting along the way!
Wow...much like Babe Ruth, LarkinCollector called his shot. There were only 3 candidates for PSA 10 in the first box and sure enough, Mr. Larkin was one of them!
The odds of calling that shot are less than 1 in 220 based on the ratio of PSA 10 candidates per box out of a 660 card set. Nicely done! Should the spirit move you, please feel free to call out any other predictions of success from other years and I will rip the box 🙂
Would have loved for a call out to Maddux or McGwire since both were really nice, but not dead centered...
@jordangretzkyfan said:
The odds of calling that shot are less than 1 in 220 based on the ratio of PSA 10 candidates per box out of a 660 card set. Nicely done! Should the spirit move you, please feel free to call out any other predictions of success from other years and I will rip the box 🙂
I think it only works on 87s for me We shall see, I also called poppage this week on a sub I'm piggybacked on, if that hits too then I'm truly prescient.
ETA: That Davis in Gem is a monster hit for a Reds fan of that era too!
All the usual stars and RCs made an appearance. My piles of these pack fresh cards continue to grow. A number of you have asked if I am willing to sell the cards I am not planning to submit. Yes, just drop me a PM and I am sure we can work something out.
There were tons of RCs in this second box, but none that made my pass for GEM MINT.
At first glance, here were the only 2 contenders. Not sure the Winfield will make the final cut...
1986 Fleer is a really tough year to find perfect examples. None were gradeworthy in these 12 wax packs. All was not lost though...here were the stars and RCs. Always fun to pull a Canseco RC!
Love this thread!! Inspired me to go grab a box of 1986 Donruss. Nightmare centering, but found a couple really nice examples. An OC Canseco but overall very happy with it. Lots of great memories.
@Huskies11 said:
Love this thread!! Inspired me to go grab a box of 1986 Donruss. Nightmare centering, but found a couple really nice examples. An OC Canseco but overall very happy with it. Lots of great memories.
Next stop: 87 Donruss
Always fun to pull the iconic Canseco RC...congrats. Looks like some of those stars have nice centering. Thanks for sharing the pics of your rip. Good luck on the 1987 Donruss. Hopefully a perfect Maddux RC is in your future!
When I pull up all threads with "New Posts" in them, and this particular thread is among them, without fail I go straight for it. There is no better thread on this board at the moment: so fun, so so so much fun. Keep this going as long as you can. It's soul food. Simply, thank you, Chris.
@ahopkins said:
When I pull up all threads with "New Posts" in them, and this particular thread is among them, without fail I go straight for it. There is no better thread on this board at the moment: so fun, so so so much fun. Keep this going as long as you can. It's soul food. Simply, thank you, Chris.
Andy
Thanks for the kind words Andy! I am still having a blast and have tons more unopened to break...so let the fun continue.
Comments
Still enjoying this!
I'm ripping Heritage high number right now.
Thanks Mike. Looking forward to hearing how your Heritage break goes.
Such an underrated player. I agree Tom, that is one good looking Parker.
Time for another 1983 Topps vending box...
The condition in this box was outstanding! Here were the ungradeable stars and rookies...
All of the big 4 made an appearance. The Gwynn was really nice, but the top two corners are not perfect...
The miracle was that I found 17 candidates for GEM MINT with some nice star power mixed in...
Why is a Cal Ripken 2nd Year Card one of the "Big Four"?
First regular issue stand alone card of Ripken, MVP season, World Championship season. 4th most valuable card in the set, in general. Ryan and Henderson are nice pulls from 83, as well, but I have no problem recognizing Ripken as part of the "Big 4".
17 is a huge number from vending. fwiw, the Moffitt, Ivie and Rivers are all pretty tough/low pop.
I can once again begin my day. Thank you sir!
Thanks for the heads up on the low pop pulls. I hadn’t even been checking those yet as I break all these boxes. Super helpful.
I love the 87 Fleer and Donruss cards. They were so hard to find when I was a kid just getting serious about collecting. The big pulls still resonate with me. I keep a few cards on my desk in my office at work. One of which is a McGwire 87D RR. That was a huge card as a kid. Thanks again for sharing.
John
Partly because of this thread, I was in the mood to thumb through some freshly opened 88 Topps this afternoon. I opened up 2 vending boxes and a wax box today, and after handling 10s of thousands of 88s over the years, I pulled my very first 2 (as far as I'm aware) McGwire record breaker variations with the white triangle by his foot. They both came from the vending, and both vending boxes also included the correct blue letter Comstock and correct Al Leiter photo. I then also pulled the McGwire without the white triangle from the wax box, but Comstock and Leiter did not make appearances in the wax box.
Does anyone know the ins and outs of this McGwire variation? Clearly, this was a later print run, as some errors had already been corrected. I've pack pulled a couple of white letter Comstock cards back in the day, and seem to still hit about 50-50 on the 2 different Leiter cards whenever I rip random wax, yet I've never gotten the McGwire variation before today, or at least overlooked it if I have. Was there only a small window during a mid-printing run that the white triangle appeared? I'm guessing they fired up the presses 5 or 6 different times with all of the errors and variations and corrections that occurred in 88, and maybe the white triangle made an appearance only for a bit at that time, until they noticed it and fixed it. Just curious. I know it's not particularly rare, but regardless, I'm geeked out over finally finding some myself. Haha! None of the 3 are gem, although the corrected one is petty sweet on the centering and color. Upper left corner is a bit soft and there is a small stain in the red, mid left side. Just thought I'd share a pic.
Had to bring up an interesting feature of McGwire's swing after "bulking up."
For those who played some ball - mine only HS.
Notice - in order to get good leverage - McGwire's left leg is "locked" for added force in the '87 RB card.
Notice how he relied more on "upper body strength" in the 90s (after "bulking up") - his left leg is "bent."
You can see the same thing with Bonds, IMO.
>
I am no expert on the McGwire error, but I believe it did not surface until a middle/late print run. The reason I believe this is that I opened boxes right as they came out in late November of 1987 and they had a mix of White/Blue Comstock, all Leiter errors and no McGwire errors. The vending case I am ripping now has the corrected Comstock and Leiter, but like yours has the McGwire white triangle. This makes me think it was a later print run variation. I will certainly defer to any experts here though as this was just my breaking experience.
Interesting observation Mike. With either swing, the fact remains that chicks still dig the long ball 😉
Wanted to share this preview of coming attractions. Time to throw these beauties into the rip mix rotation. As if the black borders on the 1987 Donruss were not enough to drive me mad, I will soon crack the seal on this factory sealed case of 1985 Donruss to hunt for GEM MINT cards along with the RCs of Clemens, Puckett, Davis, Gooden and Hershiser...
How long have you had a lot of the stuff you are opening? Were the prices you paid when you bought the stuff in line with what you would pay today if you bought these items? Thanks for your time...
I started salting away unopened boxes and cases back in 1994, so most of these items I have had for 15-20+ years. In fact on many of these I have multiple cases. I just decided that after years of staring at unopened cases/boxes, that I wanted to rip a portion of them to relive my childhood. Plus the hunt for perfect examples is a tough challenge and keeps this hobby fun for me. None of these are so rare that they cannot be replaced, so I decided to enjoy a portion of them. Hopefully others are enjoying the ride.
Believe me, we are enjoying the ride!
1985 Donruss is an underrated 80s issue IMO. Great design and card lineup. The Eric Davis card is one of my favorite of all time. I pulled it in the only 85D pack I opened as a kid. Back in 87, I was on cloud 9.
John
Eric Davis was "The Man" in the hobby back in early 87. For a short period of time, people wanted his card more than any other. Then Davis got injured and McGwire started crushing homer after homer as a rookie, so everyone moved on to chasing McGwire's Olympic card and 87 Rated Rookie, and eventually I think people forgot just how spectacular of a player Davis had really been for that short stretch of time. I've posted this mlb.com link in other threads before, but it's one of my favorite Joe Posnanski pieces. If you haven't read it, enjoy.
https://www.mlb.com/reds/news/eric-davis-put-up-video-game-stats-for-reds/c-279109048
Early 90s is when I purchased a lot of stuff.
The '94 strike pretty much annoyed the crap out of me and I stopped for some time.
Prices were pretty good back then - have to say.
A 79T vending case was around 2800 bucks back then.
I love this thread.
Ok...if you were a collector in the 1980s, how sick are these pictures!?!?!
It seemed like every single Beckett had up arrows next to Clemens, Puckett, Gooden and Davis. This set has some of my most coveted cards as a kid. You know what this means...time to go hunting!!
Dear lord...as expected, these are going to be crazy tough to find in GEM MINT. I am pretty confident the majority of the ones already in PSA 10 holders are from factory sets. The way to tell is that they will have slightly rounded corners and the stats on the back line up with the left side of the card front. Pack pulled will have razor corners and the stats line up with the right side of the card front.
At any rate, here are my observations after the first wax box:
Here were the stars and rookies...
Similar to the 1986 and 1987 Donruss, there were only 5 contenders for PSA 10 in this box (0.9%)...
These 3 RCs made an appreance and if not for the micro chips on the Eric Davis top edge he might have been a contender...
I have never saved a box bottom until now, but this often forgotten Gooden RC is freakin’ cool!!
Oh, and the Rated Rookies this year were a complete miss from Donruss. Aside from Dunston, Tartabull and Hatcher, I would be hard pressed to remember a single one of these guys...
Hmmm...cannot decide what I feel like next, so guess I will stick with 1985...
Only made it part way through the box, so more to come later. Here are the stars and rookies that continue to pile up...
Landed these two rookies so far. I’m about half way through the box...
At first glance, there are a whopping 9 contenders for GEM MINT so far...
Any idea why Lee Tunnell doesn’t have a left border? All of the other Super Star Specials seem to have all 4 borders. Just curious...
Jim
The Lee Tunnell one is a 2-part card...there are a handful of 2-part cards, that when you put the cards next to each other, they form one photo...so the other card will only have a left border
Yeah, it was a 2-part card, with the other player being Al Holland. Put the cards side by side, and it was a play on their last names, "Holland Tunnel".
Ah, thanks guys. I googled some “tunnell fleer 1985” images and saw the Holland card with the missing right border and thought “wow, it’s funny that google seems to recognize ‘Holland Tunnel’ like this” but never put 2 and 2 together!
Jim
Jeff Reed is from my hometown!
I'm just sitting here going through this thread and watching the world series and just gotta say "Damn this is fun!" I do have to ask if you have any sort of contraption to help with your review or is all eyeball and experience?
Mark
Hi Mark,
Thanks for the post and glad you are enjoying the thread along with an action packed World Series. No contraption on my end, just good old stubborn pickiness and close attention to details. I have submitted many cards over the years to PSA and BGS, just never on the magnitude of this project. I start by ensuring the card is dead centered or 55/45 at the very worst depending the year of issue. Then on to the corners making sure each one comes to a perfect point with zero touch or fray. Then look at the edges for any hint of chipping. If all that is clean, then on to the surface to make sure there are no micro creases, print defects or surface bubbles. This is why my hit ratio of PSA 10 contenders is hovering around 0.5% for Donruss, 1% for Topps and 1.5% for Fleer. Finding cards from the 1980s is easy, but finding perfect examples has been quite the challenge...but a fun one! I am waiting until I either complete the full set or get pretty close before submitting since this will be a massive bulk sub. I am hoping to have each full set graded with consecutive serial numbers. I’m sure they won’t all come back as PSA 10, but I am being insanely picky since any that come back a PSA 9 will be a money losing endeavor and the occasional PSA 8 will be a disaster since I will throw those out and look for better example. Thanks for commenting along the way!
Well that’s pretty cool Tom...sorry I sold Jeff short in his hobby prowess 😉
Time to finish out this box of 1985 Fleer...
The remainder of the box didn’t have a single card that was dead centered, so no contenders to add. Here were the stars and rookies...
I still get crazy psyched pulling these RCs...such iconic cards from my childhood!!
And now on to my second cup of coffee after looking at this thread.
Up first tonight...because the best things in life come in pairs...
May the Larkin be with you.
Wow...much like Babe Ruth, LarkinCollector called his shot. There were only 3 candidates for PSA 10 in the first box and sure enough, Mr. Larkin was one of them!
The odds of calling that shot are less than 1 in 220 based on the ratio of PSA 10 candidates per box out of a 660 card set. Nicely done! Should the spirit move you, please feel free to call out any other predictions of success from other years and I will rip the box 🙂
Would have loved for a call out to Maddux or McGwire since both were really nice, but not dead centered...
On to box #2...
I think it only works on 87s for me
We shall see, I also called poppage this week on a sub I'm piggybacked on, if that hits too then I'm truly prescient.
ETA: That Davis in Gem is a monster hit for a Reds fan of that era too!
All the usual stars and RCs made an appearance. My piles of these pack fresh cards continue to grow. A number of you have asked if I am willing to sell the cards I am not planning to submit. Yes, just drop me a PM and I am sure we can work something out.
There were tons of RCs in this second box, but none that made my pass for GEM MINT.
At first glance, here were the only 2 contenders. Not sure the Winfield will make the final cut...
Going to hunt for the tough blue bordered 1986 Fleer next...
1986 Fleer is a really tough year to find perfect examples. None were gradeworthy in these 12 wax packs. All was not lost though...here were the stars and RCs. Always fun to pull a Canseco RC!
Awesome!
Love this thread!! Inspired me to go grab a box of 1986 Donruss. Nightmare centering, but found a couple really nice examples. An OC Canseco but overall very happy with it. Lots of great memories.
Next stop: 87 Donruss
Currently Collecting:
Flickr: https://flickr.com/gp/184724292@N07/686763
Always fun to pull the iconic Canseco RC...congrats. Looks like some of those stars have nice centering. Thanks for sharing the pics of your rip. Good luck on the 1987 Donruss. Hopefully a perfect Maddux RC is in your future!
When I pull up all threads with "New Posts" in them, and this particular thread is among them, without fail I go straight for it. There is no better thread on this board at the moment: so fun, so so so much fun. Keep this going as long as you can. It's soul food. Simply, thank you, Chris.
Andy
Andy
Thanks for the kind words Andy! I am still having a blast and have tons more unopened to break...so let the fun continue.
Up next...1983 Topps vending box...
Always love looking at the design from this year. Here were the stars and RCs...
No Gwynn or Boggs in this box, but here was a nice Ryno RC. Not GEM MINT, but still a nice looking raw card...
At first glance, these 7 look like possible GEM MINT contenders...