A few 1965 Topps caged beauties

I'm at the point where I'm gonna have to spend some decent money if I want to keep moving with my 1965 Topps setbuild. The cards I'm featuring today get me past the 90% complete mark, with most of what's left being big-name guys and high numbers. Since I have a soft goal of finishing the set by the end of the year, expect to see more 65s on the blog over these next 4+ months as I try to focus my card budget on picking off needs.

Four big pickups to show off today. Hobby purists be warned: they're all slabbed. I'm usually not big on graded cards, but if I'm going to shell out for vintage stars, I'll often pony up a little extra for graded copies just so I can be reasonably confident they're not counterfeit, plus it's nice to have added protection against damage. But I don't concern myself with the assigned grade as long as the card looks nice enough to my eye.

The great Bob Gibson. Gotta love this card. Between League Leader cards and World Series Highlights, he's in this set a few times.

And here's Gibson's teammate and fellow Hall of Famer, the speedy Lou Brock. It's his first Topps card as a Cardinal after coming over from the Cubs. This is a short print, from back in the days when those really came out of the printing process, not planned and artificially created.

I figured now would be a good time to go after some set-need Pete Rose cards, seeing as how he's been in the news for alleged nefarious activities (that don't have anything to do with gambling/money, for a change).

Not sure how much of an effect it's had on the value of his cards, but I think I got a good deal on this, just his 3rd Topps card. It's only graded a 2, but looks pretty damn good, unless you angle it in the light to reveal some minor creasing. (That's another reason for buying graded vintage: less chance of being surprised by flaws that might not show up in pictures.)

Last one for today, big Willie Mac! Such a nice looking card.

Got a few more (non-graded) '65 eBay wins on the way that I'll probably post about next week. Factoring those in, I'm down to 53 cards left.

1965 Topps Needs (as of 8/10/17):
3 AL 1964 Home Run Leaders - Harmon Killebrew / Boog Powell / Mantle
55 Tony Conigliaro - Boston Red Sox
120 Frank Robinson - Cincinnati Reds
130 Al Kaline - Detroit Tigers
134 World Series Game 3 - Mantle's Clutch HR
206 Willie Horton - Detroit Tigers
220 Billy Williams - Chicago Cubs
236 Denny McLain - Detroit Tigers RC
260 Don Drysdale - Los Angeles Dodgers
282 Giants Rookies - Dick Estelle / Masanori Murakami RC
308 Mets Rookies - Cleon Jones / Tom Parsons RC
310 Johnny Callison - Philadelphia Phillies
321 Rusty Staub - Houston Astros
329 Hawk Taylor - New York Mets RC
340 Tony Oliva - Minnesota Twins
349 Larry Miller - New York Mets RC
352 Alex Johnson - Philadelphia Phillies RC
353 Jerry Lumpe - Detroit Tigers
360 Orlando Cepeda - San Francisco Giants
369 Phil Linz - New York Yankees
378 Chuck Estrada - Baltimore Orioles
381 Al Jackson - New York Mets
384 Johnny Klippstein - Minnesota Twins
385 Carl Yastrzemski - Boston Red Sox
386 Cubs Rookies - Paul Jaeckel / Fred Norman RC
405 John Roseboro - Los Angeles Dodgers
440 Tom Tresh - New York Yankees
445 Don Lock - Washington Senators
455 Norm Siebern - Baltimore Orioles
462 Lew Krausse - Kansas City Athletics
470 Yogi Berra - New York Mets
474 Cookie Rojas - Philadelphia Phillies
475 Clete Boyer - New York Yankees
477 Cardinals Rookies - Fritz Ackley / Steve Carlton RC
487 Woody Woodward - Milwaukee Braves
495 Joe Christopher - New York Mets
500 Eddie Mathews - Milwaukee Braves
513 New York Yankees Team
519 Bob Uecker - St. Louis Cardinals
521 Phillies Rookies - Dave Bennett / Morrie Steevens RC
532 Hector Lopez - New York Yankees
533 Mets Rookies - Napoleon / Ron Swoboda / Bethke / Tug McGraw RC SP
545 Jesus Alou - San Francisco Giants SP
550 Mel Stottlemyre - New York Yankees RC SP
554 Chico Ruiz - Cincinnati Reds SP
566 Yankees Rookies - Gil Blanco / Art Lopez / Moschitto RC
572 Baltimore Orioles Team SP
573 Red Sox Rookies - Lonborg / Moses / Mike Ryan / Schlesinger RC SP
579 Dick Smith - Los Angeles Dodgers SP
582 Bob Schmidt - New York Yankees SP
592 Frank Bork - Pittsburgh Pirates RC SP
593 Tigers Rookies - Jackie Moore / John Sullivan RC SP
597 Twins Rookies - Joe Nossek / Dick Reese / John Sevcik RC

If you've got any of these available to maybe work out a trade, please let me know and I'll do my best to make you a solid return offer for consideration.

Thanks for reading!