Card Show Pickups - Miscellaneous Stuff

 In my last post I mentioned I bought a few cards at last weekends show just because they caught my fancy. And here they are.

I found this signed 1977 Willie Randolph in a $5 box.  The more I look at it, though, the more convinced I become that it is not authentic.   So, basically, a fiver down the drain.

Over the last few shows, I've picked up individual vintage football cards of HOF players. Nothing expensive, but mainly players who names I recognize and I may have watched as a youngster.  I really like the 1967 Topps Gino Cappelletti; enough that may try to build that set.  At the time, Topps only had the license for the AFL. NFL cards were issued by the Philadelphia Gum Company.  The dilemma I face is whether I should also collect the 1967 PGC cards also.  Generally, I like the design of the Philadelphia cards, which were issued between 1964 and 1967.  But, 1967 was ugly with a canary yellow border.  So, I may just stick with Topps. It isn't anything I am going to start soon, so who knows what will happen.

Another thing to note here is the back of the card, which is very similar to the back of 1968 baseball.  I am assuming Topps got a deal on that godawful yellow ink.  As they probably started the printing the baseball cards after finishing up the football set.

Capelletti is an interesting fellow. He was both a placekicker and a receiver. He passed away at the age of 88 earlier this year.

Believe it or not, this is the first 1951 Topps I have ever owned. I had to have at least one and this is probably where I will stop.  I am glad to have this card, but the set doesn't capture my imagination.

And, there it is.  My favorite pickup from the show. It was marked as $50, but the seller is my main in-person vintage guy, so he usually gives me a decent discount. So, I am guessing this cost me more around $40. Not a small sum, but well worth it to have an autograph of one of the greatest ballplayers ever.

So that is about it for the show.  Not sure what it next. Hopefully, I will start posting more.

What I am listening to: Lone Pine Hill by Justin Townes Earle

July Card Show Haul - Set Additions

I am back from the card show up in OKC today. I mainly wanted to pick up some cards towards my 1973 Topps and 1960 and 1961 Fleer sets. Measured against those goals, it wasn't a particularly productive show for me.  I did manage to find 7 base cards from 1973.

I also managed to find 5 of the unnumbered checklists.

I picked up seven more 1968 Topps Game Cards. This leaves me only five to go to complete the 33 card set.

This 1970 Topps Giant Super Hank Aaron was only $5, so I picked it up on a whim.

This 1977 Cloth Sticker is more appropriately labeled trade bait. I seem to recall that some card blogger was interested in collecting these. So I dropped the princely sum of $1 on it.  Of course, I cannot remember for the life of me who it was that was collecting them.   Any one out there collect these or remember who does?

Anyways, since these big shows come around once every other month, I tend to save up so I am not running short of funds if I find something cool.  Since there was really only one vintage seller today, I could have pocketed what I hadn't spent on the above cards and used it to work on my 1973 set at a second LCS next weekend.

But, as you might guess, I didn't.  Coming up tomorrow: MOJO!

What I am listening to:  Nashville Blues by The Nitty Gritty Dirt Band

Favorites from Rectangle Man

As I mentioned previously, I had traded with Cory over at Rectangle Men. I sent off my 1976 Topps duplicates and he sent back a large stack of cards from 2003 Topps All-Time Fan Favorites, a set that I have wanted to put together. Indeed, he sent me around 50 cards, a third of the set.  So, I am pretty far along with one bubble mailer.

I am not sure when I will get to working on the rest of the set.  I recently bought a 5 acre lot next to me and I have to do a large amount of work to make it safe to use a pasture. So, a fair amount of dinero will be going towards that for most of the rest of the year.  What little I have left for cards will probably go towards the vintage sets I have in process. Hopefully, this coming winter, I will loop back around and work on this.

In any case, I was trying to decide which cards to show (cuz that is what we do) and I decided to show those where I have the  actual vintage card it is based on and determine which I liked better.  But first there is something I want to get out of the way.

I understand that they don't want to issue an exact duplicate card. Thus, different pictures on the front.  But, I am not down with the way they chose to put career statistics on the back.  Specifically, I don't like that they chose to only show the players statistics with one team.  I would have preferred full career statistics.  Maybe it is just me, but I prefer to study the great players entire career.  But, that minor quibble aside, let's get to the cards!

In this case, I prefer the actual vintage card, the 1974 Hank Aaron Home Run King card, although it wasn't a fair comparison.  The 1974 version was probably the most valuable card I owned as a child collector and, thus, is still among my favorite cards of all time.  Sorry, modern Hank.

Two posed fake batting pictures.  Not a lot to diffferentiate them.  I guess I prefer the fake swing picture of the 2003 version to the fake waiting for a pitch picture of the 1977 version.

Toss up. Ole Bert is looking pretty creepy in both pictures, although the 2003 Bert is 1-2% less creepy.

I prefer the 2003 Mickey Rivers as he is wearing the home pinstripes and the photo os taken at Yankee Stadium rather than at Spring Training.

Have to give the nod to 1976 Fred Lynn since it is an action shot.

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2003 Craig Nettles wins versus 1976 although it was close.  The action shot is better than a posed shot in the home uniform.

Is it just me or does 1978 Jack Clark look a little bit like Tim Lincecum?  Anyways, 78 Clark gets the win here.  Posed batting pictures are kinda cliche, whereas posed fielding are somewhat novel.

So, I hope no one has been waiting a week in anticipation for this post.  It is pretty poor. Certainly, Cory's generosity deserves a better effort, but I am busier than a one armed paper hanger.  Work has been crazy and spring has finally arrived in force here and the yard work has multiplied exponentially since last weekend.  I am off to change the oil, filter, and blades on my lawnower.

Free Cards from Night Owl

A short time back, the Dean of Baseball Card Blogging, Night Owl, asked for help naming some card sets. My contribution was to suggest that the 1959 Topps set (seen below), should be called the Knothole set.



Obviously, the suggestion started with the circular photo inset on the card. I remember growing up that the Rochester Red Wings had a kid's club, called the Knothole Gang and that is what the card design reminded me of. Unrelated question: will Night Owl get out his red pen and mark my post up for ending that last sentence with a preposition? This Wikipedia article has some history of the Knothole Gang. Apparently, Night Owl (also an Upstate NY boy) liked my suggestion and so it came to pass. 1959 Topps is now, and forever more, The Knothole Set.

Now, the royalty checks would have been sufficient compensation for my stroke of brilliance. However, Mr. Owl was also nice enough to send along some cards. Not expected, but definitely appreciated.


My first 2012 Flagship card. Phil Hughes is bouncing off a horrendous 2011 and has looked sharp so far in Spring Training. It will be nice to have him back in form this year as the Yankees have really put together a stellar rotation.


My first 2012 Opening Day card. Robbie is a steady, quiet presence in the Yankees lineup. One of these days, he is going to get that MVP award.


My second 2012 Opening Day card, but I hate, hate, HATE this card because of what Topps did. Now I understand Photoshopping cards to put recently traded players into the uniform of their new team. I can also understand Photoshopping cards to remove advertising logos. But, this I don't get. Why, why, WHY did Topps have to Photoshop this card to make CC look fat? That is just unnecessarily cruel.



This is an odd little card. It has a landscape image associated with a portrait orientation. I love the card (what is not to love about Mo, other than having to bat against him), but it is a little jarring to look at.


The look on CC's face here seems to be saying "You ain't pulling that Shooping shit on me again. No more full body shots or I'll sit on you and squish you into jelly.

And finally, the stars of the cards he sent. Two 1977 Topps Yankees:




Now, I had previously completed the 1977 set last year but, by golly, these cards are actually upgrades over what I had before. The Oscar Gamble card was in better condition than the one I had and the Dock Ellis card was about the same quality, but had better centering. So, these two cards are now living happily in my 1977 binder.

Thanks, Night Owl!

R.I.P. Kid

Unexpected Bonus Cards

A couple few weeks ago, I won a lot of nearly 200 2001 Topps Heritage cards on EBay. It cost me $38.50, including shipping. When I got the cards, there was a 2001 Topps Heritage Chrome Randy Johnson card included. I didn't have much use for it, so I threw it up on EBay to see if I could recoup a little of my cost. Well, the card sold for $36. My Topps Heritage lot was essentially free. So, flush will all this cash, I decided to splurge over at COMC before I went into card hibernation during the holidays.

My shipment from COMC arrived today (Saturday), and I am quite pleased with my haul

Inspired by the cards from Chris at The Vintage Sportscard Blog, I finally broke down and got the last few cards I needed for my 1977 set. That set is now complete.







I also decided to work on my two player collections. For my Paul Blair PC, I got:


1991 Crown Cola All Time Orioles


1986 TCMA All Time Orioles


2001 Topps Archive


2001 Topps Archive Reserve

I also decided to add a few cards to my nascent Johnny Antonelli PC:


2010 National Ethnic Heritage Foundation Sons of Italy


1984 Mother's Cookies All Time Giants


1991 Topps Archive 1953 Reprint


2002 Topps Super Teams Retrofractor


1954 Bowman - This card is the gem of the shipment. It is hard to judge from a scan, but this card is absolutely stunning. Perfectly centered and I would rate it at Near Mint to Mint condition. I cannot adequately express how tickled I am with this card.

So, I ended up spending a little bit more than the $36 I started with. Even so, I am pretty happy with the haul.