Sports Cards Mania

Fishercat

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Cool!! And yea too bad about the Meyer and Blaze. I am still looking for my first Meyer anything, but like usual I get so put off by the prices. I don't have any issuss blowing all my cash on David Ortiz (and boys, I have) but when it comes to prospects I struggle with all that.

Need to see that Bello once you get it!
The Mayer relic turned out to be a sticker so while it was a bummer it was alright as I have a pretty good Blaze already. I'll keep an eye on eBay for a decent deal as the only Mayer auto I picked up was like, an off-off brand Onyx card which was just a nice price at the right time kind of deal. I ended up with a nice Sal Frelick who is a BC / Boston guy in that break who I'm very excited to hopefully see rake in Milwaukee. Like I’d still rather have Marcelo but it’s a good get regardless. I'll post the hits when they come in - given I probably spent about 75% of the cost of a box for the breaks, three autos (and two really good ones) and some Sox base is ahead to me.

In general news, someone on Reddit crunched Series 1 numbers - decent print run jump even from 2022 S1

2023 Topps Series 1 base print run: ~1,148,000. : baseballcards (reddit.com)

Given you can still find discounted S1 for 2022 we might have 2023 retail for a while.

I picked up some nice goodies recently, waiting for a couple cards to come in to put some slides together but I feel like the folks here are of the right age to get a Monday nostalgia rush. I had a couple Chrome Goldschmidts to trade in before the March 31st deadline and my GF and I were out at a toy and record show in NH, so we were close to a small LCS I like. I stopped in intending to just put those towards a box or some packs or some supplies and then saw this card and felt like if I'm trading in shiny cards, I may as well get one back. For a card to 10k this felt impossible to hit, which I guess makes sense given the ridiculously huge early 90s print runs.

View: https://imgur.com/gallery/KDlowcN
 
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JoePoulson

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Guys, I did a thing:

61947

I haven't see the black bordered auto hit eBay yet (or anywhere, actually...are we sure it exists!?!?), so if anyone sees it let me know. I'm on eBay way, way too much but I still miss things somehow. Anyway, I hadn't purchased any 2023 Topps Series 1 until that 1/1 Papi, then I figured I'd get the other four for the set and then see what happens. Life is too short, buy all the baseball cards!!

(edited to change the picture a bit, no biggie)
 
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NJ_Sox_Fan

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The Mayer relic turned out to be a sticker so while it was a bummer it was alright as I have a pretty good Blaze already. I'll keep an eye on eBay for a decent deal as the only Mayer auto I picked up was like, an off-off brand Onyx card which was just a nice price at the right time kind of deal. I ended up with a nice Sal Frelick who is a BC / Boston guy in that break who I'm very excited to hopefully see rake in Milwaukee. Like I’d still rather have Marcelo but it’s a good get regardless. I'll post the hits when they come in - given I probably spent about 75% of the cost of a box for the breaks, three autos (and two really good ones) and some Sox base is ahead to me.

In general news, someone on Reddit crunched Series 1 numbers - decent print run jump even from 2022 S1

2023 Topps Series 1 base print run: ~1,148,000. : baseballcards (reddit.com)

Given you can still find discounted S1 for 2022 we might have 2023 retail for a while.

I picked up some nice goodies recently, waiting for a couple cards to come in to put some slides together but I feel like the folks here are of the right age to get a Monday nostalgia rush. I had a couple Chrome Goldschmidts to trade in before the March 31st deadline and my GF and I were out at a toy and record show in NH, so we were close to a small LCS I like. I stopped in intending to just put those towards a box or some packs or some supplies and then saw this card and felt like if I'm trading in shiny cards, I may as well get one back. For a card to 10k this felt impossible to hit, which I guess makes sense given the ridiculously huge early 90s print runs.

View: https://imgur.com/gallery/KDlowcN
I have that exact Gwynn, as well as a few others from that Elite series. Awesome cards.
 

NJ_Sox_Fan

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Guys, I did a thing:


I haven't see the black bordered auto hit eBay yet (or anywhere, actually...are we sure it exists!?!?), so if anyone sees it let me know. I'm on eBay way, way too much but I still miss things somehow. Anyway, I hadn't purchased any 2023 Topps Series 1 until that 1/1 Papi, then I figured I'd get the other four for the set and then see what happens. Life is too short, buy all the baseball cards!!
This is insane. Also, the red Papi is my favorite.
 

NJ_Sox_Fan

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It is. But it was 100% driven by the buying singles vs boxes math. I have bought one box in the last like 12 years if you don't count breaks. Singles4Lyfe.

The red is absolutely the best one!
Always the wise choice, but I just can’t stop myself from buying boxes every now and again.
 

JoePoulson

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Those are all awesome! But thankfully I'm not a fan of A&G. It's a super-fun product and I love the shit out of their non-baseball cards each year (would love to have the Guy Fieri and Anthony Bourdain autos from years ago)...but it's just not my thing. I think it's the art vs pictures more than anything, but never really grabbed me like other lines.
 

JoePoulson

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WOW that is a beaut! I don't know if I've ever seen one like that. Wise choice my friend, display that one loud and proud! What else you got from that line??

Speaking of displays, I'm hoping tonight to get my two baseball card display cases mounted in the office. Gonna look great plus allow me to properly display the greatest hits. I have a total of like eight items to arrange and hang, so I've been playing some wall Tetris and asking the wife's advice, trying to figure it all out. Regardless pics coming soon cause I'm sroked to share plus I have a memorabilia question for you all.
 

Fishercat

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May 18, 2007
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WOW that is a beaut! I don't know if I've ever seen one like that. Wise choice my friend, display that one loud and proud! What else you got from that line??

Speaking of displays, I'm hoping tonight to get my two baseball card display cases mounted in the office. Gonna look great plus allow me to properly display the greatest hits. I have a total of like eight items to arrange and hang, so I've been playing some wall Tetris and asking the wife's advice, trying to figure it all out. Regardless pics coming soon cause I'm sroked to share plus I have a memorabilia question for you all.
That one will be on the desk for a while. Until I get a proper display the stuff I'm most interested in just hands out about the desk, that Fisk might be a long term placement.

Below is a gallery of the handful of autos from the set I have. There's a subset of framed autos with their HoF Plaque as opposed to their picture, I dunno, I really don't care for how they look. Papi, Boggs, and Pedro are also in the framed auto set, it'll probably depend if I find the right deal for those ones.

The base auto style (Realmuto is a parallel but it only really affects the border for autos, the base non-auto parallels are more striking) is an example is probably the best Topps Chrome design of the year and nice looking in person, X, JDM, and Duran have autos in that.

I think I mentioned it before - way beyond reasonable to rip at this point (the 1/1 Pedro redemption sold for about half of what a box sells for now - only way you come out ahead is an auto of one of the huge rookies) - but top flight singles stuff.

View: https://imgur.com/gallery/GH7xRNk
 

Fishercat

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I didn't end up buying a box when it went on Topps site and by the time people like me got a whiff of what it ultimately was, pricing went from "semi-reasonable for two on card autos and a high-quality presentation" (I think a tick over $300) to "no way that's nuts" (it's in the high 600s now)

2022 Topps Gilded Collection Baseball Checklist, Details, Reviews (cardboardconnection.com)

So I just bought singles. Those four cards combined probably cost about half of what the retail cost of the box was originally. You could easily do something like a David Ortiz or Wade Boggs Framed Auto, Xander Bogaerts Gilded Auto, and non autos of Devers, Ted Williams, Yaz, Bogey, and Pedro all numbered to /99 or less for less than the cost of a box when it came out - if you spent up to re-sale you could buy some truly exceptional stuff. With that said, the right auto out of that set (Julio, Ohtani, etc.) is a four figure card so yeah gamblers gonna gamble.
 

saintnick912

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Wow that's a lot of Sox autos, can't wait to see some of them pop up.

I snagged this the other day, I had to. It makes me irrationally happy and he now watches over us at work and inspires us. It's actually a super-cool card that reflects all kinds of neat colors in the light:

Picked up a "fractal" variant of this which is less rare but also a cool looking pattern. Happy to have it in my collection. I once saw him win four matches in one day to take King of the Ring in Providence.
 

JoePoulson

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Post a pic! I'd love to see it. And that's so awesome you got to see him live. I've only been to one wrestling event and that i. 2001 or so, here in Orlando. Was incredibly fun, saw the Rock, Goldberg, Stone Cold, etc.
 

JoePoulson

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I finally got around to ordering some stuff from Superior Fit Sleeves, and holy shit they rule so hard. Like I know Cardboard Gold makes perfect fit sleeves for graded cards, and they rule of course, but Superior makes them as well (without the PSA markings if that matters), plus they make them for one touches and just about everything else. Most of you probably already know this, but for those who don't...definitely think about this company and their products!

(I'm not a shill! I just got two orders of their stuff delivered over the last couple days and I'm super-impressed with the whole deal...price, shipping, quality, etc.)
 

Tim Salmon

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Oct 24, 2005
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I've been trying to finish the 2022 Topps Archives 1953 Fan Favorites set. If you're not seeking any of these for yourself, please ping me if you see them out in the wild:

53FF-CR Cal Ripken Jr. /50
53FF-DJ Derek Jeter /35
53FF-I Ichiro /35
53FF-JS John Smoltz /50
53FF-MT Mike Trout /?
53FF-RJN Randy Johnson /45
53FF-RS Ryne Sandberg /30
53FF-VGO Vladimir Guerrero Sr. /50
53FF-WF Wander Franco /50



Just down to the Clemens to complete the set.
 

JoePoulson

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Absolutely incredible set! Definitely one of my faves to come out in recent years.

Edited - I'm sure you know, but there's been a Clemens on eBay for a while now for $150. May as well finish it off!!!
 

Tim Salmon

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Absolutely incredible set! Definitely one of my faves to come out in recent years.

Edited - I'm sure you know, but there's been a Clemens on eBay for a while now for $150. May as well finish it off!!!
Unfortunately, the one on eBay has pretty significant corner damage. I’ve seen the whole card — not just the eBay pictures — and it’s worse in person. The seller shouldn’t be advertising it as near-mint/mint.
 

JoePoulson

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Unfortunately, the one on eBay has pretty significant corner damage. I’ve seen the whole card — not just the eBay pictures — and it’s worse in person. The seller shouldn’t be advertising it as near-mint/mint.
Ah man that's too bad! Thanks for sharing that info though, it's good to know stuff like that.
 

JoePoulson

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Finally got the time to hang those card frames, I think they look amazing!

62131

62134

62135

I would love more, honestly! But for now this is perfect and will help focus the collection a bit over the next few weeks/months.
 

JoePoulson

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Closer look at the Arkansas side:

62136

Corliss Williamson across the top and row two; row two has some Sidney Moncrief as well; row three has a Benintendi booklet / Bobby Portis / Moses Moody; row four is Darren McFadden (need that "O"!) and a Treylon Burks. Always adding any new Corliss I see, and whatever fun Hogs that are reasonably priced.

Closer look at the Sidney and Sid / Corliss combo:

62137
 

Green (Tongued) Monster

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Closer look at the Arkansas side:


Corliss Williamson across the top and row two; row two has some Sidney Moncrief as well; row three has a Benintendi booklet / Bobby Portis / Moses Moody; row four is Darren McFadden (need that "O"!) and a Treylon Burks. Always adding any new Corliss I see, and whatever fun Hogs that are reasonably priced.

Closer look at the Sidney and Sid / Corliss combo:

Looks great. What product are the letter cards?
 

JoePoulson

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I just went for it this weekend and hung everything that needed it! Finally got these up as well:

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The one on the right was a lucky find back in late 2010. The day before I had received a job offer, so I was in an amazing mood while out checking some antique stores in a small town famous for them called Mt. Dora. Inside one of the bigger, nicer ones, I saw this INCREDIBLE collection of baseball books. I'm talking first editions of everything, many signed, going back like 80 years. I asked somebody working what was all of this, and they said someone had passed recently, who was obviously a baseball mega-fan and they had been given this collection to sell. Unfortunate for that dude, but lucky for those who were there at the time. I wanted them all of course, but did what I could to just take the Red Sox books. After I grabbed all the Sox books that I could find, I turned around and saw that framed Ted and knew immediately it was also from that dude's collection. I snagged it as well and returned home happier than I'd been in a while. Later I got to thinking about just how special the rest of those books were and that I'd left behind, so the next day I went back to get a few more. To my surprise they were ALL GONE! The people there said someone came in not long after me and bought the rest of the collection. Said I couldn't blame them and wished I'd grabbed a couple more BUT I can't be greedy! I love that Ted and I still have those books! What's cool about the Ted is that it's been signed by the artist Robert Riger:

62176

I also had it re-framed recently as the original was not great and this piece desperately needed the upgrade!
 

Fishercat

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Now for something a little bit different, though it's not unprecedented for this thread. I generally dislike Panini products. For the most part I find their card designs very same-same even between product lines, their redemption history is hugely questionable, CS is crap, their product is severely overpriced (IMO) for what you get, etc.

With all of that said...they do a great job with their WWE Products, especially their high-end ones and the singles market is fairly reasonable outside of the hottest female wrestlers and the S-tier legends. I've always thought Topps wasn't really great with their wrestling products, given the theater of pro wrestling and the potential for amazing staged shots it was all very staid and boring. I did pick up the New Day Triple Auto from Finest because, well, I love the New Day and until this year's Immaculate I don't think they had a Panini Triple Auto (and that's both a three figure card and a redemption right now). Now is a box of Immaculate worth $450? Nah. But some of the best looking cards I've seen this year have come out of those boxes. The Shawn Michaels autos in particular are amazingly done, just out of my price range. And frankly it's still a better deal than the NFL Version is this year.

A. WWE Impeccable Katana Chance (Kacy Catanzaro) Auto /99
B. WWE Impeccable Drew McIntyre Stainless Stars (Steel) Auto /99
C. WWE Immaculate Diamond Dallas Page Immaculate Celebrations Auto /75
D. Topps Finest Kofi Kingston / Big E / Xavier Woods Triple Auto Unnumbered

View: https://imgur.com/a/EzD4mA9
 

Bergs

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I finally got around to ordering some stuff from Superior Fit Sleeves, and holy shit they rule so hard. Like I know Cardboard Gold makes perfect fit sleeves for graded cards, and they rule of course, but Superior makes them as well (without the PSA markings if that matters), plus they make them for one touches and just about everything else. Most of you probably already know this, but for those who don't...definitely think about this company and their products!

(I'm not a shill! I just got two orders of their stuff delivered over the last couple days and I'm super-impressed with the whole deal...price, shipping, quality, etc.)
I was very badly wanting good looking sleeves for 1-touches. Ordered some. Don't let me down, @JoePoulson!!!
 

JoePoulson

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It's like the upgrade from VHS to DVD. 4K sleeves! Or when you finally find that perfectly fitted condom as an inexperienced young male. My one touches are all nice, snug, and tightly protected in their new sleevedoms!
 

NJ_Sox_Fan

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These look great, and I love those two cards despite the fact that those players helped make 11 year old me cry.
 

JoePoulson

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I am partly responsible for my coworker owning both cards. He's a huge Mets fan obviously, from NY. I figured it was finally time to come to grips with the fact the Sox lost in '86, and helping my buddy find those cards was therapeutic. So I completely understand as I was 12, watching that insanity.
 

LogansDad

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Ordered a 2023 Series 1 retail box, should be delivered today. $77 on Walmart, a ton of cards, no guaranteed hits but usually some decent parallels. I got my Bello auto out of a Bowman retail box.
 

Fishercat

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So I still haven't received this redemption from back in November (4 months now). Checking the Topps site, my redemption now says "Request sub" under status. Does that mean I have to request a substitute (and they'll probably send me Gleyber Torres or something), or if I'm patient I'll still get the Trout?
My understanding is you can wait it out or play the sub game
 

Deathofthebambino

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Apr 12, 2005
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So I still haven't received this redemption from back in November (4 months now). Checking the Topps site, my redemption now says "Request sub" under status. Does that mean I have to request a substitute (and they'll probably send me Gleyber Torres or something), or if I'm patient I'll still get the Trout?
It's been a while for me since I had a Topps redemption, but IIRC, after a certain period of time, if they haven't filled a redemption, they offer you a substitute that's on hand that they can send out quickly, because they don't know when Trout may sign again, etc.

Panini's substitutions are fucking bullshit. Like I said, I'm sitting on a dozen redemptions that were submitted from 2015-2017. They've filled all of the ones that lost value over 4-6 years, and the ones that have retained value (Logomans, Jaylen Brown RPA's, etc.), they just don't send. It's infuriating. I don't remember if I ever went with a substitute for a Topps redemption or not, but given how much better and faster they are at filling them, I'd be less concerned than I would be it if were Panini.
 

Fishercat

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Never had to do it myself, but some of the anecdotal Reddit evidence is...poor. It seems they'll base it off of current eBay value based on this thread about how an Amador prospect redemption turned into a Trevor Story non-auto parallel - though some in the comment thread are calling BS. Others say not to substitute as value isn't equal -.

I have a couple outstanding redemptions with Topps. I feel like you only sub if you really don't care for the card you're getting. Hold for Trout for sure. He'll probably sign and it's worth playing the odds. IMO.
 

Deathofthebambino

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Never had to do it myself, but some of the anecdotal Reddit evidence is...poor. It seems they'll base it off of current eBay value based on this thread about how an Amador prospect redemption turned into a Trevor Story non-auto parallel - though some in the comment thread are calling BS. Others say not to substitute as value isn't equal -.

I have a couple outstanding redemptions with Topps. I feel like you only sub if you really don't care for the card you're getting. Hold for Trout for sure. He'll probably sign and it's worth playing the odds. IMO.
I don't know the first thing about Reddit, and every time I go there, I get completely confused on where threads start, end, continue, etc., but if you see any information on Panini redemptions and secrets to getting them filled, please post if you can. Thanks.
 

Fishercat

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I don't know the first thing about Reddit, and every time I go there, I get completely confused on where threads start, end, continue, etc., but if you see any information on Panini redemptions and secrets to getting them filled, please post if you can. Thanks.
Feels like water from a stone. Reddit is full of people commiserating on that front. That's another thing about the WWE Cards I posted earlier, no matter how nice they look, it's an absolute backbreaker that so many of the highest end cards are redemptions. I think in Immaculate that Undertaker, Randy Orton, Hulk Hogan, Ronda Rousey, John Cena etc. are all redemptions and you see cards going for four figures you know are just the most expensive scratch ticket. Even in the lower price ranges you have collectible guys like Big E (for justifiable reasons for him in particular), Kevin Owens, The Dudleys, Cody Rhodes, Ciampa and it just kills so much value in there.
 

Oil Can Dan

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I think I am going to try to put together a 1956 set. Been thinking about that one for a long time and I just love the overall look. The fronts are awesome with the background picture and the backs are awesome too with the little factoids and cartoons. The only expensive rookie card is Luis Aparicio but there's a ton of HOFers, including Mantle and Campanella who had a few years away from Topps due to contractual obligations with Bowman. Not including variations there are 342 cards. Not ready to fully dive in but I think I'm about to put my toe in the water...