I Want My Spiegel!!

I used to work in a bookstore, and we sold a German newspaper called "Der Spiegel."  This was before the internet, and so imported papers like this were in demand with a small segment of customers.   We would receive this paper on a limited basis from our newspaper supplier for various reasons.  The point is, we wouldn't always receive Der Spiegel with our weekly shipments.  This was not a big deal to 99.99% of our customers.  There was one exception.  We had one customer that was very put out when he didn't get his Der Spiegel.  I never actually saw this guy, but for some reason, I seemed to always be the poor bastard that answered the phone when he called to complain.  I won't bore you with the whole rant, but every time he called he gave the same speech about us letting him down and not understanding the laws of supply and demand.  What I distinctly remember is that he would always end is phone call by yelling "I want my Der Spiegel!" and slamming the phone down.
I always think about this when I see anything from the blog "Nomo's Sushi Platter" by a dude named Spiegel.
I also think about cool trades.  I recently completed my second trade with Spiegel, and received my end of the trade yesterday.  I sent about 20 cards to him, and he sent a lot more than that to me, with a note saying he hoped what he sent was enough.  I wonder what he thought I was sending?  Speigel, it was more than enough, and I will send you some cards to make up the difference.  Here is what my man Spiegel sent:

 Lots of great Rangers cards!  Love the Andrus Gypsy Queen, and the Cruz Topps Chrome is really cool!

 I don't know why my scanner sometimes chooses to auto crop, and some times not.  But this Ichiro Wall Climber card is really sweet!

 D-Mac!  All time great Razorback!

Speigel also sent a very nice assortment of stars I collect, including some cool cards of the newest 3,000 hit club member, Derek Jeter.

Check out Spiegel's blog if you haven't already.  He's a different kind of cat, and I am amused with his take on things.

Thanks Spiegel, I will catch up with you on the trade soon!

2004 Sweet Spot Classic Patch

At the recent auction at Cleve’s, I mentioned one of my best wins was a box of screw down/magnet card holders.  I always need these in general, but I had a specific purpose in mind for buying these.  I have a handful of very lovely Sweet Spot Patch cards from 2004 that are too thick for pages. 

I understand manufactured patches aren’t universally loved.  I know one exception.  Make it two, because I really, really like these cards.  There are about 90 in the set, but I have no business trying to build it.  But I do periodically look for one to slip through cheaply on eBay, and there are a few players that I definitely still want to get.   Here is what I have now:

Here are two of my favorites, front and back.  The scratch on the Robinson is the case, not the card.

Exquisite

UD had a high end set in called Exquisite.  With a name like that, the cards have to be good. At some point names that denote a luxury product will be hard to come up with.  We've had Finest, Sterling, Exquisite, Pristine, Platinum, etc.   I wish one of the card companies would name a higher end set, “Delicious.”   Or “Fabulous.”  Topps Fabulous.  It would bring in a whole new customer segment to the hobby.   

You may recall when I began my “12 Days of Brycemas” posts, the first card I wrote about was a 2007 Exquisite Michael Young.  I am totally enamored with this card.  I’ve got other thick cards, but this thing feels like a brick.   I chanced upon a lot of 12 of these on eBay the other day, and couldn’t help myself.  They came in the other day:

Now, these are fabulous. 

Speaking of the 12 Days of Brycemas string, no, I have not forgotten about it.  Unbelievably I am STILL waiting on a very large order of cards from a certain seller on sportsbuy.com.   I can’t do Day 4 and a few other days until this order comes in.  I finally got confirmation that it shipped, but will not be here until the 11^th.  Well over a month after I ordered it.  I am very tempted to blast this seller on my blog, but one of my tenets for this blog (and life for that matter) is to avoid negativity and causing ill toward others.    The seller apparently added some free cards for the hassle, so that’s something.  Long story short, it will be a few days before I resume the 12 Days of Brycemas posts.

Trade at the Plate

I’ve been a fan of the blog Play at the Plate for a while now.  Brian, who runs the blog, has an entertaining blog, and is a fellow Rangers fan to boot!  We never had traded before, but I recently was fortunate enough to get (2) Michael Young autos from a fun UD Ovation case break from the Daily Dimwit.    That was the seed of our trade.  I sent the Young auto and another low numbered Michael Young card to Brian.  He was going to send back several Gypsy Queen inserts that I needed.  I received his shipment today, and found the Gypsy Queens, plus a whole lot more:

I like the Gypsy Queen set okay, but I LOVE the inserts.  This nice group really put a dent in my Gypsy Queen checklist.

The Sticky Fingers set is my favorite from GQ, so I was happy to get this card.  Brian also sent some cards of my favorite players.  The Hunter Chrome card is #d to 599.

Finally, he included some very nice Barry Bonds cards.  The 02 Diamond King is really sweet, with the paper border.

Thank you so much Brian, I owe you! 

Cleve's Auction Night: Part Two- "Are You Serious, Napkin?"

I am serious.  And don’t call me Shirley.  Airplane.

I mentioned in yesterday’s post that instead of goody boxes, I got goody binders.  These were $2-$3 each, so even though I admittedly didn’t know what they had, I bought them anyway.    I also got 3 Topps Traded sets for $2.  Two 1990, with nobody significant, and one 1989.  The 89 set has a Griffey Rookie, so that covered my cost.  I looked in the boxes and these cards are pristine.  I’m pretty sure I didn’t have either of these sets, and for about 65 cents a pop, I thought, “Why not?”  We’ll say I paid a buck for the 1989 and $.50 each for the 1990s.  That doesn’t seem so bad.

Here was the gist of binder #1:

1993 Stadium Club

 Nolan Ryan Pacific

I guess Stadium Club did team sets in 93.  I’ve never seen these before, but complete team sets are great for trading.  Teams included in this binder are : Cubs, Rangers, Rockies, White Sox, Marlins.  Each set is 30 cards.  There was also a whole bunch of Nolan Ryan cards that I’ve seen before but don’t know much about.  This binder was $3, which equates to about $.50 per team set/Ryan lot.  Eh, not great.  However,  I can box these and make better use of the pages and binders.   Hell, the pages and binder would have cost around $5 alone.

Binder #2:

Again, this was $3, and again, the real value is the 50 pages in this binder and the binder itself.  The pages consisted of 1990 Sportflics, and base 86-88 Topps.  Nothing special.  But I like Sportflics, so I’m ok with these junk cards.  And there were some decent stars inside that can go in my star player binders and boxes. 

Binder #3:

This was also $3 and the best of the 3 binders.  There are about 20 pages of various Bowman chrome, and some good players (Ripken, Gwynn, Piazza and former Razorback David Walling for my Hogs album).  I love the Bowman Heritage Chrome TV cards, but these shown were the only 2 in the binder.

The best part was this complete SP set from 2000.  90 cards, with no cards missing.  I love complete sets as you may know.

Grades:

Traded Sets:  B+  Super cheap, and I needed both years. 

Binder 1:  B-  : Team sets will be good to trade, and Nolan Ryan is Nolan Ryan.

Binder 2:  B- :   I can’t give myself a grade below B when the cost was only 3 bucks, and at a minimum I can use the pages and binder.  But these cards are totally unnecessary to my collection.  I basically bought the pages. 

Binder 3:  A :  Shiny cards and a complete SP set make this the best binder of the 3.  

I’ll give myself some bonus credit for the 90 blank pages that will come of this after I take all the cards out.  That would be about $15 in a store.  And they are the nice pages, too. 

Everything but the traded sets are up for trade for anyone interested.  Sadly, this will be my last auction for a few weeks.  I will be on business trips each of the next two weeks.  I could probably go into Cleve’s and do some write in bids for anything that looks good, but I should probably knock it off for a while.   I’m sure the lovely wife would agree with this.  However, she should know that Allen and Ginter is coming soon.  And Topps Marquee has my attention.  And truly, if Topps Lineage is as cool as I think it is going to be, there may be some trouble in the Doon Household.

Cleve's Auction Night- "Are you serious Napkin?"

Yes, the lovely wife was in for yet another shock tonight on my return from the weekly sports card auction at Cleve's Sports Cards.  I came home with quite a haul, for a small time collector.   Instead of goody boxes, this time I brought home goody binders.  Let's see how I did:

Let's start with one of the main reasons I went tonight.  I had my eye on this box of screw down cases, and hoped to get it under $10.  I did.  $7 got me this box of 34 holders, and I was very happy to see that 6 of them were the magnet types.  Full disclosure-  I spent $38 total tonight.  This particular purchase paid for the evening for me in my estimation.
Purchase grade: A+  I'll take $.18 per screw down/magnet holder any day of the week.  And they are in great shape.   I'm just ticked that I didn't jump on the box of 50 brand new 9 pocket pages that went for $3.

On to the cards:

I didn't scout this card out before hand, and didn't need it at all, but when no one else was biting for $2, I grabbed it.
Purchase Grade:  B  It is a Topps Certified auto, but I just didn't need it.  Although, if I can get something good in trade for it, I will give myself a better grade.

1956 Sandy Amoros and a 1969 Micky Mantle Checklist Card.  These were separate purchases, but in the interest in keeping the post a reasonable length, I combined these cards.  I always try to pick up some vintage of players I don't have at these auctions, thus the Amoros.  I'll take any Brooklyn Dodger I can find, and this beauty was only $3.  The Mantle was $3 as well, and it's now the only vintage Mantle I have.  Purchase Grade:  A- For the Amoros.   I'll take Brooklyn Dodgers for $3 in great condition every time.
C For the Mantle.  I didn't get a good look at this card.  It has been checkmarked.  I also would like an earlier Mantle than 1969.  I was too impulsive on this one.

1958 Roberto Clemente- $5.  This is actually the second 1958 Clemente I've got from one of Cleve's auctions.  Again, I did not scout this one out ahead of time and didn't see the big creases in it from my perch in the back of the store.  Still, I think I would have bought it for $5 anyway had I known.  It's Roberto Clemete for crying out loud.
Purchase Grade B-  It's creased, but it's Clemente and it was $5.  Hint:  I can definately see this as a potential prize should I decide to do another Big Fun Game in the near future...

1960 Ernie Banks- $7.  This was my card of the night.  I do not have a vintage Banks, and this one was in fantastic shape!  There is a little ink on the bottom of the card and some dings along the edges, but I'm very happy with it. Purchase Grade- A+  I would have had to pay twice this amount for a card in this condition online.  It was a HOF player that I wanted but didn't have yet.  Best buy of the night IMO. 

Tomorrow, I'll cover the goody binders that my wife rolled her eyes at.   She's lucky I didn't really go crazy.  I held off on a lot.  There were several pages of (9) 1956 Commons that I could have had for $3 each.  I'm starting to kick myself over that miss.  There was a Gayle Sayers autographed football that went for $17.    There was a cool ticket from a Yankee game at Yankee Stadium from the 50s that went for $10.  There were several unopened wax boxes from the junk wax years that went for $3 each.  See baby, it could have been worse.  Much worse. 

But, so far, what do you think?  Can you please explain to the lovely wife what a great job I did?  And yes, most all of this (and what I show tomorrow) is up for trade, except the Banks.

Happy 4th!!! Reminder...

Today at 12 pm est is the annual Nathan's Hot Dog Eating Contest.

This is one of the greatest spectacles in all of sport, and if you have not seen this yet, and have a strong stomach, you should definately watch.  I laugh hysterically the whole way through.  The lovely wife can't stomach it. 

Joey Chestnut- American Hero

Goodwill Finds

I really wanted to name this post Goodwill Hunting, but even I think that is a little hacky. 

About a month ago, my sister called from the Goodwill store in her city.  Before I could ask her what the hell she was doing in a Goodwill store, she told me she found a bunch of bobbleheads for $2 each.  Long story short, I told her to get one of everything, and get every Piazza, Ichiro and Ripken they had.  I picked them up from her recenty:

I do not know why Blogger rotates this picture.  I don't have time to mess with it, so just turn your head to view.

I guess this was a short lived program from UD.  Obviously I didn't help keep the series going in 2001, since this was the first I ever saw of them.  That's too bad, because these are pretty nice. I actually have a pretty sizeable Startting Lineup/McFarlane collection, so these go quite nicely with them.

Early Fireworks in the Mailbox

Ryan at the outstanding blog "This Card is Cool...My Life in Baseball Cards"  just made my day!   I recently was one of the winners in his surprise package contest.  I had only a vague idea of what I might be getting, but didn't know for sure until today.  What I got blew me away!

First, Ryan sent these 3 non-sport autographs:

Very nice indeed!  He also sent a bunch of entertaining non-sport cards:

My wife is a big fan of the Tudors, so she gets the Tudors card.  I'll keep the Betty Paige for myself.  The Topps Tribute card of the Tortoise and the Hare is really nice!  There were several of the UD Political cards which I think will be really fun to look back on over the years.  The "art card" at the top is a card of original artwork by wretler Jeff Hardy.  And of course, Ginter minis are always cool!

But the best part was the heap of 2011 Bowman inserts he sent!   Here is just a sampling:

There was about 40 insert cards in this package, which really made a huge dent in my Super Duper Checklist needs!

What a great way to start a long weekend, and thank you so much for the generosity to Ryan!

Card Shop Auction Night Part 2:

When I got out to my car after the auction and got a chance to see what all I got, this was the first card I pulled out of the first box:

I had no idea there was a card of Bob Saget out there.  Not that I was looking for it, but I was really puzzled to see this.   Of course I was initially familiar with him from Full House with the Olsen twin lizards.   But, a few years ago I was flipping around the tube and paused when I saw him doing a standup comedy routine.  It was one of the foulest things I’ve ever heard.  It was really hard to reconcile that against the character he played on TV.    Not that I watched Full House, but I know enough to know it was a family show.  Once I got over my confusion with his filthy act, I will admit he was really funny.  He’s also been on Entourage quite a bit, and his plays a complete perv very convincingly.

I need to do something fun with this card, but I don’t know what yet. 

I took a second look through the boxes tonight and I am more and more pleased with my purchase.  There weren't any monster cards, but enough decent material for my own collection as well as trades to make it worth the effort.  I mentioned yesterday that I got some basketball cards in my goody boxes from the auction:

There was large chunk of this SP set.  About 80 cards with some dupes, but not many big names.  If anyone is working on this set, I might be able to help you out.

There was a handful of Chris Paul and Vince Carter cards as too.  These will work nicely in my little side basketball collection, unless anyone out there is interested in them. I didn't scan them, but there were several other mid-range stars (Jamal Mashburn, Shawn Kemp, Glenn Robinson, Eddie Jones, and Tracy McGrady) included.

Yesterday, I showed the Mike Piazza and Frank Thomas cards that came in the boxes.  There also were nice lots of Jeff Bagwell and Alfonso Soriano.

I think my best hits were these low numbered Playoff contender cards.  I didn’t even notice them until my 2^nd look through the box.  Again, there aren’t any big names here, but I’m always happy to have some low numbered cards fall into my lap, although the coloring on the corners on some of these looks a little jacked up.

I included a card from 2006 Bowman Chrome in the scan too.  The box had about 40 of the first 55 cards of this set.  I thought maybe the set only went to around 60 based on this, but apparently it’s a pretty big set.  So I won’t be chasing it. 

There were countless other little single nuggets in the boxes, but I’m going to pass on spending too much time on them.  I’m sure I’ll go through the boxes yet again tomorrow and if there is something that looks interesting, I’ll make a note of it.  Again, if anyone is interested in these, let me know!

Finally, there was a box of old Beckett’s that was about to go up for bid, but Cleve decided to just give them away to anyone who wanted them so I snagged a few.  For me, the price index is useless, but I am interested in the articles.  Just like Playboy.

Card Shop Auction Night: "Oh Great, More Crap"

Those tender words of support came from the lovely wife Tuesday evening as I came floating in from the LCS auction with two 1,600 count boxes full of joy under my arms and a big dopey grin on my face.

Wait, have I not shared with you the awesomeness that is the weekly sports card auction I often attend?  No?  Well, let me fill you in.  Every Tuesday night there is an auction at Cleve's Sports Cards in Springdale, AR.  I discovered it a few months ago when I went to his shop for the first time.  The shop has been around for a long time, but I am rarely in Springdale and didn't know about it.  The owner, Cleve, told me about the auction and showed me the cards that would be up that week.   It was a pretty darn impressive selection.   For a small shop in Northwest Arkansas, the auction is pretty legit.  In fact, about once every 6 weeks he'll hold a "big" auction and sell some REALLY nice stuff.    There usually is anywhere from 15 to 30 people at these auctions and it usually lasts about 30 minutes to an hour.  Short and sweet.

I've gone to several auctions now, and always come home with something.   My best win was a 1958 Roberto Clemente for $15.    I rarely spend more than $30 total.   For the past two months, my boy's T-Ball games have taken priority (rightfully so) over the auctions and I've been absent.  But his season just ended and I was excited to go back last night for the first time in a while.

Here are my most recent Tuesday night treasures:

Vintage cards are the main draw at his auctions, and I was happy to get all of the above for about $8.  The Bench card is in great shape other than the centering, and I got my first vintage Aparicio. 

I have a weakness for goody boxes like these above.    I didn't have time to search them, but I saw a lot of penny sleeves and thought I might be able to fill some sets or at least come up with some trade bait.  What was in the boxes?  Thank you for asking:

Whoever sold this box collected Frank Thomas.  There were about 80 Frank Thomas cards inside.  There were about that many Raul Mondesi cards too.

There was also a handful of Mike Piazzas that will beef up my Piazza pages.

Any Nomar collectors out there?  My guess is that whoever put this up for auction used to be a dealer, or at least tried to sell these at a card show or something.  Notice the prices on all the Nomar cards.  If anyone wants to pay me $2 or $3  (or $9) for any of these, you have a deal.   I remember Ted Williams saying that he thought Nomar had a chance to hit .400.   These cards used to be hot! 
There were also football and basketball cards in these boxes:

 These 2003 Topps All American Foil cards are really nice, and probably my favorite finds in the boxes.  No big stars, but nice cards nonetheless.  And looking at sportlots.com, not common or cheap!

The boxes also had about a half a complete set of this nice 2009 Playoff Contenders set.  Looking at sportlots.com, very common, and very cheap.  It's still a nice looking set, and the cards I got had some good names.


Wow, there actually was a lot of good stuff in these boxes for the puny amount ($4 per box) I paid.  I will need to extend this into two posts to cover everything.   Tomorrow I'll show more football and the basketball portion.

And, this is all up for trade if anyone is interested. 

Checklist Chipaway: 1996 SPX

Received another batch of cards in the mail today.  This time, I was able to clip off a dozen cards from the 1996 SPX set on the Super Duper Checklist.  I am sure these things were super expensive when they came out in 96.  I got all of these cheap off sportlots.com and moved this cool 60 card set to almost 50% complete.   I'll probably grind out getting the next 15-20 cards over the next year or so, but once I get to around 80% complete, I'll feel the momentum and knock it out.   As with most cards like this, the scans don't do them justice although they came out better than I expected:

On the off chance anyone has some of these that they are willing to trade, here are the cards I am lacking:

1	Maddux, Greg
2	Jones, Chipper
3	McGriff, Fred
5	Ripken Jr., Cal
8	Canseco, Jose
11	Edmonds, Jim
12	Salmon, Tim
14	Sandberg, Ryne
15	Grace, Mark
16	Thomas, Frank
22	Bichette, Dante
23	Walker, Larry
26	Fielder, Cecil
29	Bagwell, Jeff
33	Piazza, Mike
34	Mondesi, Raul
35	Nomo, Hideo
37	Molitor, Paul
38	Cordova, Marty
39	White, Rondell
40	Isringhausen, Jason
41	Wilson, Paul
43	Jeter, Derek
44	Boggs, Wade
48	Smith, Ozzie
50	Caminiti, Ken
51	Bonds, Barry
53	Fernandez, Osvaldo
54	Buhner, Jay
55	Griffey Jr., Ken
57	Rodriguez, Alex
59	Carter, Joe