More Rescues From Among The Commons

As I've probably stated before in a number of ways, I'm not a rookie collector.

I can't wrap my head around the idea that a rookie card of a guy who only has a lot of potential is worth way more than (even the rookie sometimes) of a player who actually accomplished a HOF worthy career.  

But that's a whole other post...

One of the things that comes out of all the rookie hype is when you're building sets, you better hope you pulled the big rookie cards when you opened your boxes, or got them in trade before they took off.  Luckily, I had all the ones I was looking for.

On the flip side, since I don't pay so much attention to modern rookies, I will often leave them in the set boxes with all the rest of the base cards.  I will have finished the set, so they are in there somewhere, but as you saw with the Mike Trout post, I recently figured out it's probably better to pull them out and preserve on them at least a little bit.  

I intend to put them in the binder where all my major star cards are that aren't with their respective sets.  I have heard YouTubers say that binders and pages aren't good protection.  Aside from slabbing them, which will never happen, are top loaders or one-touches generally considered much better options than pages?  I don't have the storage space for many more top loaders.  Let me know in the comments...

So I went on COMC (This is generally how I figure out dollar values for stuff.)  and pulled up most of the current major stars (that I could think of - your comments helped a lot) and looked to see what their base Topps rookie cards were selling for, since those seem to be highly sought after lately.  I made a list of all the ones that were around $8 and over.  Nobody is close to Trout at four digits, but a few were more than I expected.  And since you can't really separate regular base cards in a COMC search for "topps base <player name>", I ran across a few others that I hunted down too, like A&G or Heritage high numbers.

Here is the group after I pulled them out:

I put them in top loaders for the time being, but like I said, they'll end up in a binder unless several of you leave screaming comments that I'm an idiot...Though I have put certain singles in top loaders and filed them back with the sets before too...

The down side of set building sometimes is that you amass the whole thing with most or all the inserts, sort it into a box, and then it goes on the shelf and sits for a very long time.  A few of these cards were in boxes that were way down on the bottom of stacks or deep in cabinets.

Like Altuve's 2011 Topps ($18) ~ that set was on the very bottom of the rack. 

Trout was in that bottom box too.  I just realized I forgot Goldschmidt ($35)...dangit!  Gotta pull that one back out again!

Had to think about where my 2013 Update set was.  I have a factory base set, and couldn't recall how I got the Update.  It was lurking in the cabinet.

 

...with the Opening Day set.

Yelich's Topps base is on the border of $7-8 like Posey's, so I haven't pulled it yet.  Arenado is $20+ and this Heritage High Number is selling for $68 right now.  Not sure if that's a fluke...

He was up on the cabinet shelf with the old school Update sets (lower right).  Mine isn't sorted, but he popped right up when I pulled out the first few cards.

2014 starts a run of Topps sets that fit into two row shoe boxes with Series 1, 2 & Update.  My run from 2014 to 2018 are all stored this way.  These guys are about $40-50 each for their regular rookies right now.  This is about when they started with the regular+rookie debut cards since just making one of a guy isn't nearly enough any more...

Lindor ($12) is the only one from 2015 or '16 that I pulled.  

Then we get to the guys that are still way up on the hot list.  Judge has one base ($41) and three Update cards ($8, $13, $20), plus I yanked his Bunt blue ($21) that I happened to pull and his '87 ($29) from my set.

And for Ohtani, almost nothing of his is registering below $10, so they all came out...even some Stadium Club inserts.  The one with Ichiro is only marked $4, so I might throw that one back...

If I was a good fan of the Nats, I should have a lot more Soto ($25) stuff, but he was in such high demand right from the jump that I never had any real opportunities to get anything exotic.

And I still need Tatis' RC from Stadium Club to finish that set....his are all about $10.

I did pull an Acuña auto from the previous Stadium Club and sold it on eBay.  Still have most of the others in that post.  His Update is going for around $20.

I was glad to pull the Vlad no-number at the time.  Of course, it's only like $17 now.  When those come out you think you might have hit a super rare short print, but the ones I find mellow out quickly.

So if you're a set builder, what do you do with the big name rookie cards?  (Guess it depends on how you store your sets too).  What is your value threshold to separate them from the set?  Or do you?  Bleep bloop it below, thanks!

Meanwhile, At Hivemind Headquarters...

Had to get away from another frustrating day of football watching, so here's what it looks like at Hivemind Headquarters when I'm pulling cards for trades from my baseball hoard of extra stuff from the 2000's.  I've shown most of this before, but stick around to the end for a special look.

On any given day, the card room is neater than this, but since I've got all the monster boxes laid out so I can jump around in them, it's solid cards all the way around right now.  

Here is the football half of the hoard as well...

And there's about that many (counting both batches) in the other room too, but I won't show those.  I like to take people in there first and they usually say, "Wow, you've got a lot!"  To which I reply, "That's just extra stuff, the actual collection is over here..."

Here are a few more that my friend Stuart brought in June...

Anyone trading older hockey?

Now I'll take you around the room and show the actual collection...

Starting from the doorway...

 You're greeted by Priest on the wall, and then the baseball binder shelf.

  

Which is next to the baseball (china) cabinet...

This one holds some of my storage supplies in the drawer. 

And the matching football & miscellaneous shelf on the other side into the corner...

Then turning around to the desk.  All kinds of stacks here - some are to be put away, some are future starter sets, some are just "I think xxx might need these", etc.

My Giants picture hangs in that corner.  Sometimes I think I should switch it with Priest so that baseball is with baseball and football is with football.  I'll get it right in my next house.

Then beyond the desk is the matching football and hockey cabinet...

Featuring the Theismann jersey,...

And Priest memorabilia...

Both cabinets have drawers for silverware that fit top loaders very nicely, though I keep filling them up and having to move things into boxes.

And finally, the rack at the other end of the couch gets you back to the door.

The top is all Washington football cards in the old vinyl lockers.  The rest are bulky sets.  The second shelf is sets in progress, and the rest are complete.

There are also complete sets in the bottom of each cabinet for their respective sports.  Here's the top and bottom of the baseball unit.

You've made it this far, so here's a full tour...

So if you need me, this is where I'll be.  Thanks for stopping by!

Might Be A Good Idea...

As you probably know, I'm not one to pay much attention to the hype on modern cards and their exorbitant prices.  The stars today don't quite have the mystique or reverance to me that vintage guys do.  Which is not to say that there aren't a few players that will be in the record books and lore for a long time to come.  

Every once in a while I have to acknowledge that as it manifests itself in cards.

So a couple months ago, I went into my collection...

It's down here somewhere...

Of course it's on the bottom...

Writing on the corner of a box is rather difficult.  My handwriting is better than this.  But anyway...

OK, pull that one out...

Series 1 on the left,... Series 2 next,...hmm don't have wrappers for Update.  Oh well...

Ah, bonus SP Ruth!  OK, should be about right here...

Pull that chunk out...

Right about here...

There he is!

That's a little better, considering...

Figured I shouldn't leave him in there with the set for much longer.  I could put him in one of those big lucite holders with the four screws like I have all my other big money cards.  (I know, no one uses those any more.)  

Anybody else I might be neglecting in my sets for the last decade or so who is now over $50?

My First COMC Swap

As of the first of September, I have sold 21 cards for a total of just over $72.  I still have 223 for sale in inventory.  (Let me know if you see something you like, but the price is not right.)

So far, this has accounted for a few more of the monster boxes I got in the initial "hoard".  I'll have to count up how many more I have to go.  My original plan was to sell off enough on COMC to equal what I paid for the whole 15 boxes.  I have sold a few chunks here and there that have contributed as well.  

When my sales total got over $50, I started shopping for myself on the site.  I picked out some player collection cards, some set and insert needs, and a few oddballs.  Here is what I basically traded for the cards I sold:

The first two are reprints from the 1987 Hygrade set - they are inserts that have multiple variatoins of the text on the back, namely the stated value of the real card.  Both were the last ones I was missing. 
The mini and the Tejada are from 2003 Topps 205.  Miguel is the blue background variation, and the mini is the "exclusive pose" flavored high number.
Next up, a woody feeling insert from 2003 Topps, and one back-number variation from 1994 Pacific, as well as two inserts from that set.  (Anyone need base cards from this?  I still have a ton.)
And on the bottom row, the last card for Topps Gallery HOF (also 2003).  Every card is one of a pair of subtle variations.  This is the red W one.  Piazza is the last of the scratch-off Predictor cards from 1997 Upper Deck, (now I can start on the prize cards that you got by sending these in) and the final Emperors Of The Zone from 2019 Stadium Club.

I buzzed through a bunch of my vintage baseball guys and landed a few cheap parallels of Lou Piniella as a manager,  one stadium giveaway Cubs Ivan DeJesus (I was at Wrigley for one series of those), a McDonalds Bruce Sutter that I might have already, and an innocent looking '86 Donruss DeCinces that's actually a well cut box bottom card.

Unfortunately, I didn't look close enough to one of the Piniellas and paid $.80 for a regular base card that was supposed to be a gold foil version.  They put a little barcoded slip in with each card like this.  (That's why all my scans have white in the background.)  Makes it easier to put away funky parallels when they're not easy to distinguish (when they're accurate anyway).

I really started to go nuts with Priest Holmes parallels, but stopped after 2000 or so.  I could have tripled my cartful with just his, but I'll wait for the next batch.  I skipped a bunch that I didn't have by putting a limit on what I spent on one card at about $5.  I won't list in detail all these, but I bet there are a few you haven't seen often.  There are no regular base cards except the first one in the middle row - it's a retail flavor of that Collector's Edge set.  The Cheifs card is 2017 or so.

I couldn't believe I found these on there for only a buck or two!  The three character cards from Star Trek: The Next Generation and Deep Space Nine are "Tryptichs" from the Skybox Master Series of 1994.  The hologram is the one exchange card from a set of nine that otherwise came from packs of the 1992 Impel Next Gen set.  Now I just have to wait for the other Triptychs (and four Master Series holograms that I just discovered) to show up later.

And to round things out, I snagged this 2008 UD Spectrum of Stars auto of Twisted Sister drummer A.J. Pero a while ago for about $12.  Sadly he passed away in 2015.  I think I'm only missing Vince Neil from these.  

So effectively these were basically free for several of the cards I shipped off to COMC in April.  

I also paid my first month's "storage fees" for card that have been there more than 90 days.  It was a whopping 60¢!  Of course, that's just for the ones that were posted from April.  There are a lot more that have only been up for a few weeks - from the same box I shipped!  But at least I don't fear the storage fees will be a big deal.  Anything priced under 75¢ is exempt.

Until next time...