A Collecting Funk But A Cool Card

I am kind of in a sports Blah! right now. The Mariners held on as long as they could but didn’t make the playoffs, now the longest playoff drought in all sports sitting at 17 years, and the Seahawks are 1-2. 

I just am kind of bummed over sports and my lack of current product purchases shows. I have not purchased any 2018 blasters, packs or boxes. I have purchased a total of six 2018 baseball cards and no 2018 football cards. I do have some that I watch but haven’t pulled the trigger, but I am not sure if it is because I am waiting for a better price or because I am uninterested. Probably a bit of both right now. 

When I saw the Murder’s Row cut signature card from 2018 Panini National Treasures it got my attention. It is kind of like a 1934 Ford pickup to me, I will never own the card but it sure if beautiful to look at.   

Print It!

 A nice little addition to my Allen Iverson PC, a cyan printing plate from the 2016-17 Flawless Basketball. I do not have many printing plates in my collection because of the prohibitive price but every so often a gem falls in to my hands.

La última de las tarjetas ByN de Edgar

I decided to order the other two BYN Edgar Martinez cards from the seller in Puerto Rico, these are from the 1989-90 Blanco Y Negro Update set.  They are cards #48 for his All-Star appearance and #56 league batting leader. He ended up the batting .424 in San Jose that season, batting 82 points higher than the #2 player in the league. That's Edgar just being Edgar.

Some how the printer was able to get a diamond cut along the top of the #48 card but square corners along the bottom of the card, that takes talent.

Monday Question Day- Large or Small PC?

Would you rather collect a top star with thousands of cards or a semi-star with hundreds or cards?

I am like many collectors and I have multiple PCs with both large catalog and small catalog.

Ken Griffey Jr's catalog is huge. According to TCDB, he has 18,042 cards. This isn't counting Broder cards and some of the other unlicensed cards, so probably closer to 18,500 cards.  While Jay Buhner is listed on TCDB as having 1,447 cards.

I like the idea of chasing both types of collections, sure I will probably get closer to completing Jay Buhner's entire list (not counting #1/1 type cards) then I ever will with Griffey's cards but that is part of the chase. I will always be on the watch for something new.

Oh Come On!!!

The auction ended for the fake Honus Wagner card that the seller with 0 feedback was selling and after 85 bids it ended at a winning bid of $3,000.02 by a buyer with 2844 feedback. I am dumbfounded at how many people would fall for this, but ignorance knows no bounds.

How do we follow this up? The same 0 feedback seller has posted 2 more “original” 1909-11 T206 Honus Wagner cards. One in a sealed pack, looking exactly like the one that just sold for $3,000 but not graded, and one from an opened pack that somehow still has the tax stamp still attached in tact. 

So somehow this guy has three mint Honus Wagner cards and instead of getting them graded by a reputable grading company and sell them through a reputable auction house where the seller could have made millions, they sell them ungraded (GAI is basically ungraded) and will make a couple of thousand and these bidders do not question a thing? 

At this point I no longer worry about the bidders, none want to do their research and are willing to get burned. This is on them right now, the seller is criminal, but victims are lining up to pay the fee to get ripped off. Even if I reported the cards I have no proof they are fake, so I wouldn’t expect eBay to do any investigation. This is money for them too, no reason for them to pull an item without proving it is as reprint being listed as real.

A follow up on the other counterfeit Honus Wagner graded by PRO that sold last week for $1,850, it has been relisted with an opening bid of $1,499.99 (no bids)

The Art Gallery 2.0 - 2014 Micheal Duron Commision The Walking Dead Zombie Girl

Welcome to The Art Gallery 2.0. I have so many sketch cards that I have 11 The Art Gallery posts in my Drafts listing and I still have sketch cards that I have scanned and waiting so for now, I figured why not share art twice a month?

This sketch cards is from the amazing artist Michael Duron, also known as Locoduck. It was a commission from 2014 but I picked it up on eBay last year. Duron is one artist that appears in nearly every major set and has a unique style that I really dig. I love this card because it depicts the first zombie, Teddy Bear Walker, that Rick sees in the pilot episode of The Walking Dead.

Are You F-ing Serious?

Today the Buffalo Bills’ Vontae Davis announced his retirement. Not following the teams 31-20 loss to the Chargers, during halftime of the game. He pulled himself out of the game in the 2^nd quarter with his team trailing 28-6 and quit. He literally walked out on his team when they needed him. He stated in his announcement that he does not feel like himself and questioned if it is still worth him sacrificing.  

I would like to point out that he decided to sign a one-year contract with the Bills during the offseason. He decided to show up for training camp. He decided to remain with the team while other players were being cut. He decided to play during week 1 and he decided to show up for today’s game. 

I know that players retire for a multitude of reasons, and every one of them are valid. My problem is that he quit during halftime. He could have easily finished the game, even if he didn’t play, he could have remained on the sideline with his team. He could have made the announcement to his teammates following the game but instead he walks out during the halftime show.

Someone Is Actually Going To Fall For This?

A bunch of questionable 1909-11 T206 Honus Wagner cards have been showing up on eBay and for some reason there are bids. One graded by PRO as original and graded a PRO 2, with the required blurry pictures (that way you know it is real) sold for $1,850 after 11 bids. I would expect the card to show back up for sale because the winner has a 1 feedback but looking at his bidding activity and the bidder has made 33 bids over the last 30 days and only 2 of them were with this seller. They were bid up by someone with a 61 feedback (35 bids in 30 days, 7 with this seller) and there was a $1,700 retracted bid by someone with 2997 feedback. Look at them beautifully rounded corners, pure perfection.

Now there is a Sweet Caporal pack with Honus Wagner on the back and graded by GAI as authentic and a GAI 8 by a seller with 0 feedback. There are 14 bids currently, all by bidders with positive feedback, and it is as $15.50. Again, blurry images. The stuff all over the holder is tobacco from inside, which I believe to be a real cigarette pack but fake Wagner. I would like to point out that Sweet Caporal had a solid wrapper and the cards were inserted facing inwards, but hey… if people want to spend money without doing any research at all that is on them.

For reference, here is a real sealed Sweet Caporal pack showing that you can not see what is inside.

 

They had wax paper around them originally, which the one that is currently for auction has around it. There is no way the Wagner card was inserted outside of the cigarette pack between the wax paper and the wrapper. This is a case of someone with bad intentions opening the wax, sliding in the Wager, sealing the wax back up and got the oblivious people at GAI to grade it authentic.

Congratulations Seattle Storm

Last night the Seattle Storm finished out their Cinderella season with a sweep of the Washington Mystics for their third WNBA title. Led by Sue Bird and WNBA MVP Breanna Stewart the team went 26-8, best record during the regular season, and then 7-2 during the playoffs to win the title. News worthy of a Pack War television news break interrupting the Babe at bat.

The Storm have been going through a rebuilding process since their last Championship in 2010 and before this season the last time they had a winning record was 2011 but the serious rebuilding began when Sue Bird decided to remain with the Storm instead of leaving in Free Agency following the 2014 season. Then with the #1 pick in the 2015 WNBA Draft they took Jewell Loyd, they again had the #1 pick in the 2016 WNBA Draft and took Breanna Stewart and from there the pieces just fell in to place.  

Sue Bird is one of my mini-PCs and earlier this summer I was able to complete the Sue Bird Trifecta when I picked up her 2002 Fleer Authentix RC. Her career would put every active NBA player to shame, and many NBA Hall of Famers too. She has 3 WNBA Titles, 10 WNBA All-Star appearances, 2 NCAA Titles (UCONN), 4 Olympic gold medals, 3 World Championship gold medals plus a bronze medal, 3 EuroLeague Championships, 2 Europe SuperCup Championships, WNBA all-time assist leader and Seattle Storm all-time points leader.

OK, one more Sue Bird factoid. A few weeks ago, NFL Hall of Famer (and former Seattle Seahawk) Walter Jones tweeted that Sue Bird is the best all around athlete that Seattle has ever seen. While I personally would say she is one of two (Griffey being the other) people got their panties all in a bunch and you would be surprised at how many claim to be fans of Seattle teams but not know who Walter Jones is, because there were a lot of people coming out with “What do you know about sports/athletes?” type of responses. It was quite funny.

Alright, alright… enough of me gushing over Sue Bird. Congratulations to the Seattle Storm on an amazing season and finishing with the title.

The Day We Will Never Forget

It has been 17 years and the world has changed greatly since 9/11/01 but one thing will never pass and that is the respectful memory of those who lost their lives that day and the families that have been affected.

Monday Question Day- Video Gamers?

Today I am going to ask a question that some may not have any input to because of the subject. Would you be interested in video game card sets? 

I am not talking about a TCG/CCG, a set connected to a comic book series or a set like a SEGA release that is part of a sports release (or sports in general), but a full-fledge video game release. In the early 90s when companies were looking to make money as quickly as possible there were various by Topps and Fleer but nothing was constant and I don’t think I would consider them a major release but more a money grab for a year or two.

I am a gamer going back to Pong, but I do not think that there is enough of a cross over of hobbies to garner enough interest from most collectors for a company to invest for a major release outside of possibly a Grand Theft Auto set. 

We will find out soon because it was announced at SDCC that Dynamite Entertainment is releasing a Fallout set some time next month. It is a base set with a couple of chase sets of holofoils and die-cuts and is pre-selling at $99, which is where I lost interest. 

The Art Gallery- 2014 Cult Stuff 1914: The War Illustrated British Soldier

This month’s Art Gallery display is from an unknown artist. The checklist that I was able to track down only had a couple of artists listed and this signature does not match any of them. The set is the 2014 Cult Stuff 1914: The War Illustrated, a set to memorialize the 100^th anniversary of WWI, the Great War.

I am a WWI history buff and I have been picking up cards from this set since its release, only a sketch card was outside of my price range, so I was very fortunate to find this one for under $10 shipped. The image is a great subject and depicts a British soldier in full gear going “Over the top”, a term that means the soldiers are literally climbing over the top of their trenches and charging across No Man’s Land in a frontal attack on the German trench lines. As expected, the charges rarely succeed and those that did often found that, so few soldiers made it to the defensive line they couldn’t capture the trench or they couldn’t hold it and ended up retreating. 

Initially Cult Stuff intended on releasing a set a year for the 100^th anniversary of each year of the war (1914-1918) but the 2015 Cult Stuff 1915: The War Illustrated set garnered minimum interest from collectors so they decided to cancel all the releases outside of a 1915 promo card, which really bummed me out.

Edgar Martinez's Tiempo con los Metros de San Juan

The last Blanco Y Negro card that I chased was the 1988-89 BYN Jay Buhner card and it took me over a year to find. This time, my search for Edgar Martinez’s 1989-90 BYN was much easier. It did take me a couple of months of constant searching, but I finally found a Metros de San Juan team set in August. There are two other Edgar Martinez cards from the 1989-90 BYN Update set that I will eventually like to add to my collection, but this base card was the priority.

Why Some Parallels? I Don't Know

There are some very cool cards in the 2018 Topps Fire baseball release, but then I come across a card like this gold Dee Gordon Speed Demons insert. This (coloring) reminds me of the wallpaper we had in the bathroom in my house in the 1970s. The card is cool and I love the base version but the gold parallel is horrid. 

These are the kinds of problems that the manufactures are running in to with multiple colored parallels. When the card is designed it is for the base card. Forcing colors in to the card to make a parallel is changing the appeal of the card. I feel the same way about the more recent use of the Reverse Negative parallels, trying to make a card look like the photo’s negative kind of ruins it for me.

Monday Question Day- Are We Ever Done Sorting?

Do you ever feel like you are done organizing and sorting?

I have cut my collection down significantly this year and then I began sorting and while I feel I am done, it is a feeling that I am not certain it is how I want to keep everything so I have this itch to begin again. Since I "finished" the organizing about a month ago I have already started to make changes by moving my Mariners PC (Buhner and Edgar Martinez) in to the 5,000-ct box with my Griffey PC. I am sure more changed will come along the next time I get a large COMC order.