TGI Mailday

Got cards in the mail from a few different sources today, helping it shape up into a pretty nice Friday afternoon. Let's whip up a quick post out of 'em.

As mentioned a couple weeks ago in the Tony Clark post, I'm working on a set of 1998 Bowman refractor reprints. Here we see a couple young sluggers from 1990 Bowman, secured from different ebay sellers coincidentally showing up at the same time.

On the topic of refractin' reprints, I've also been working on my ARMS.. Yep, my quest for an Archives Reverse Master Set is still slowly chugging away. I only have 109 cards left to go, which doesn't seem like such a huge number, but it's all autos and relics left, which leads to financial complexity, as I don't need to tell you readers. I'll likely not complete the football portion in my lifetime at current rate of acquisition, but maybe if I focus on the 2 baseball releases...?

TOP PRIORITY alert! 1972 Topps high numbers. I've been racing Crocodile to see who can finish our '72 Topps sets first. I'm down to 22 needs remaining, but I think he's gonna pass me. One of these was from a tcdb trade and the other was a Greg Morris ebay win (the only one of many '72s I bid on from that particular setbreak that I actually ended up with, grrr).

Here's the rest of the TCDb trade. I reached out to user ejholmes76 because I was after the '72 Traded Cardenal he had available, and our trade matching shook out nicely to a PWE swap of cards changing hands, to which he agreed, and that also netted me a '64 need (108 cards left, 81.66% complete on 1964 Topps). The '75s I already had in my set (surprisingly still down to only needing only a Reds team card [Sparky Anderson] but out of spite I haven't bought one yet, choosing to hold my breath until I get one by sheer luck), but I needed this pair of '75 dupes for PCs. (Thanks for the trade, Eric, if you're reading.)

And finally, here's the rest of the Greg Morris spoils: a double blast of Hoyt! I realized the other day that I should make a point of completing his Topps run. Well, the '52 Topps high number rookie card is unlikely to ever grace my collection in non-reprint form, but otherwise this goal is within reach, especially after landing this '62 Topps. Now really just need 1958 Topps and 1960 Topps (An extra '72 Topps for the PC would be nice, but it's a dang high number, so I might be content to "share" with the setbuild because who cares at the end of the day as long as I got one in the greater collectionscape.)

Oh, and the other card is my first 1953 Red Man. Looks good! I don't normally go after oversized pieces such as this, but ya gotta stretch outside your comfort zone for your top PC guys sometimes. And hey, does anyone have a running list of baseball cards where they put eyeliner on the player? You can put this one on it along with Dave Winfield's 1980 Topps plus several of the 3-player prospects at the end of 1979 Topps. Seriously, have you taken a close look at them? It's kinda weird, right? But yeah, whatever. Neat card and nice addition to the Wilhelm PC.

Enjoy the weekend, all!

Vintage pickups

I won another card from Greg Morris auctions the other day, and then set bids for a bunch more ending shortly and wound up winning a few to join in on the flat-rate shipping. Might as well get a post out of 'em, right?

A couple big boys from 1975 Topps to kick things off.

Nice pair of dueling All-Stars.

I ended up winning a couple Jim Rice rookies that ended around the same time, but I'd stop short of saying it was an accident; the cheaper creased card on the right can get thrown in the player collection.

Then I got Yaz from another eBay seller, and Vida Blue is also on the way, making the Reds team card with Sparky Anderson all that stands in my way of a complete 1975 Topps set. I'll have to grab one soon to wrap that up.

Back to the Greg Morris stuff, here's a pair of HOF Giants. I'm hoping to finally finish off 1964 Topps in the next year or two.

I'm not too picky with condition if it's a good deal, though I shy away from "Poor/Good" beaters when I can.

A couple more notable names and Bennie Daniels, notable for being the set's final card. Around this same time, I also knocked off more needs in my forthcoming COMC order that should push me over 80% complete when that shows up.

This Willie Montanez rocking the glorious ASR trophy was the initial win that prompted this round of pickups. Funny enough, I ended up losing all the proceeding 1972 Topps needs I bid on, but oh well, I got this one at least, and the few '75s and '64s to go with it. My '72 set currently sits at 95%, so I should be able to wrap up that one this year if I keep at it.

Planning on hitting a local card shop later this week for the first time in years with a blogger meetup scheduled for the local cardsphere crew and a visiting guest of honor from San Jose, so maybe I can score some needs then. Regardless, it'll be great to hang in person with some blogging buddies, assuming the inclement weather in the forecast doesn't spoil our plans.

A pack and a couple boxes

I still haven't bought any retail since covid, and while I like what I've seen of the 2024 Topps flagship design, I haven't been compelled to go out and buy any. But thankfully I still get the thrill of new-to-me cards with a little help from my blogger buds.

Actually CardBoredom was a new one for me, under my radar for these past few months. But it's a really well done site/blog. I've been going back to read David's old stuff and interested to see what's next from him.

I had read about David's attempts at replicating a wax pack, and was thrilled to receive one after he reached out about wanting to send me a few cards I'd probably like. The wrapper looks familiar and in fact it's a riff on the 1972 Topps wrapper.

Personalized and everything! Not pictured, but yep, there's even a stick of gum.

And here's what I pulled:

A pack of 1972 Topps high numbers for my setbuild! These are all from the toughest 6th series. I've never ripped a real pack of '72 Topps (several packs of '82 Topps from my LCS back in the early 90s is the closest I've come), so it's pretty incredible to get a simulation such as this. Big thanks, David!

Thanks to this pack, I'm up to 88.94% complete, with 88 cards left to check off.

(a band called The 88)

I think I'm rounding third with this set, not too far away from coming home. That high-number series is a bear, though. Pretty incredible to get this many at once, and from a #RAK mailing no less.

Thanks again to CardBoredom for the awesome surprise!

-  - ---o

The same day I received that pack of '72s in the mail, Padrographs Rod stopped by my house with a couple boxes of cards for me. It was a good day! Let's take a quick look at some highlights.

Smelling like goats over here, lol. Some of the biggest names you could hope to pull from Goodwin Champions.

Lovely ladies are always nice to see when thumbing through cards.

Looks like Juan Soto will go down as a great player who had a brief layover in San Diego during his HOF career, joining the likes of Rickey Henderson, Mike Piazza, Greg Maddux, and Willie McCovey. Oh well, glad he suited up for my favorite team, however fleeting. Still probably my favorite active player or at least high up on that theoretical list.

Here are some other dudes I like/collect who are currently still with the Padres. Hope those big contracts work out. (I could die happy with just one damn championship in my lifetime. I wouldn't say no to a dynasty, but really, just one is fine.)

Thank you, Rod! Always very much appreciated.

BTW, Rod, expect to see a new vehicle in the driveway next time to stop by. Everyone is fine, thankfully, but my wife had a collision on Presidents Day, and crumbled up the hood of our trusty old Mariner just barely to the point of it getting "totaled" by insurance. We're buying a new Subaru Crosstrek. I generally have a negative impression of Subarus, but that's just because I seemed to get cut off by Outbacks all the time back when I had a nasty daily commute. I haven't driven the new car yet as I write this, but I will have by the time you're reading.

-  - --o

Late addition to the post.

The last time I won a contest on Twitter, it was actually named Twitter still. I don't "RT" stuff much, and as such I don't enter many giveaways there. But Mashing Dingers ran one where all you had to do was like the tweet to win a random lot of sportscards, so I clicked the heart icon and next thing you know I won. Mashing Dingers seems like a good dude. We had even chatted a couple/few years back about him writing a guest post on Baseball Card Breakdown, but he got cold feet. (I suppose I have a blanket offer out there to any cool hobby folks who want to write a random interesting blog post but don't want to start their own blog just for one thing they want to talk about one time.. yeah, feel free to get in touch with me about writing a guest post. Lord knows I don't make blogging a top priority for myself these days, so I could use occasional help keeping the cobwebs away.)

Anyways, took a while to get the cards (giveaway was back in mid December), but they were fun to go through.

I'm not a big collector of basketball or soccer, but I don't mind sprinkling some diversity in my collection here and there, such as in a lot of random winnings like this. Cool to check out the crazy designs with various shine/sparkle stuff I haven't seen in-hand before.

Of course the highlights for me were the baseball cards included. I think it was seeing the powder blue Killebrew in the tweet that made me throw my name in the hat for the giveaway. A bunch of rookies and some shine here also. I think that's my first card of Jasson Dominguez.. I'll be curious to see how he performs after he heals up. Also hoping former Padres prospect CJ Abrams puts up some good numbers.

Alright, calling the post good here. Oh, yeah, the new car handles well, btw, though I kinda miss being higher up after so many years with the SUV.. moved up from San Diego in that car, so I guess I'm a little sentimental about it, but it was about time to move on from it anyways, so it's all good. Gotta go pick up the dog from daycare now. Thanks for reading.

Been at this for a decade now

Hey, here are some cards I got in trade from my buddy Dennis at TMV. He found some autographs he was interested in from my trade bait page, and we were able to hammer out a deal that resulted in big help to vintage setbuilds of mine. 

I've been after a second-year Garvey for a long time. Needed it for my set (129 cards left to go.. pretty much all high numbers or variations), plus he's a solid PC guy of mine thanks in no small part to his Padres tenure (growing up in San Diego in the '80s, as I did). Being a tough high-number, I'm unlikely to score a dupe for the PC anytime soon, so I'll be content with just the one.

And how about another Dodgers legend? Freshly-minted Hall of Famer Gil Hodges was probably the biggest name left on my '57 Topps needs. Just 80 more cards left to go, and none of those should run me much into double digits. I should probably hit that quest harder, hunting down deals on my remaining needs and finally sticking a fork in what's my longest-running setbuild. --Scratch that, my blog archives reminded me that 1964 Topps was in the works (and still is) when I officially declared I'd be trying to complete a set of 1957 Topps back in February 2017.

Typically when I get a player's '57 Topps card, that's my oldest card of the guy, with my collecting focus not often stretching back past the 60s, but I'm very happy to own a beat-up Bowman rookie of Gil Hodges. Cool to add another playing-days card of the man.

Anyways, those 2 cards would have been fine in exchange for the pair of autographs Dennis was interested in, but he kindly threw in another cardboard heavy-weight to take the return over the top...

Yes, the Klutts rookie second-year! This was the main hurdle in finishing my 1978 Topps build. Just 34 cards left there, nearly all commons.

And for good measure, a new Gavin and 12/25 card from the set containing the most Christmas Cards ever, 2008 Topps Moments & Milestones. Chase Utley, not too shabby.

Thanks again for the trade, Dennis! Always a pleasure.

- - -o

I had some other Gavins and Christmas Cards I've been meaning to post about, so I guess I'll do that here. The below were all eBay buys. I don't focus as much these days on either minicollection, though once in a blue moon I'll do a search and see if I can find anything cool cheap. But I also have a saved search for cards that are both Gavins and 12/25.. and are autographs. Like this pair..

Gavin Williams again on the left. He's likely to crack the majors this year with Cleveland. And a pitcher named Gavin Stone (whom I also have a 12/25 auto of) made his debut for the Dodgers earlier this year. Two new MLB Gavins in the same year?! What a time to be alive. As a kid growing up with it being an uncommon name, never thought I'd see that day.

A better look at the numbering. The other guy, Gavin Stedman, is still an amateur, so we'll see if he ends up doing anything notable in the sport. Remember back when I collected Gavin Lux as an amateur? Then he was a 1st round pick and did well in the minors and his cards were really hot there for a moment? (I didn't sell any of his cards then, not even my dupes *kicking myself*) And then he struggled and then got hurt, and now his cards aren't worth much? The cardboard lifecycle. Now that I've been back in the hobby for over a decade, I've seen it plenty of times, and it's probably why I don't mess with modern cards much anymore.

This trio of Christmas Cards are the result of some more bids that came out on top. I don't collect Nick Fortes, just taking a flyer on a cheap 12/25 RC. Dick Williams is a PC guy (Pads in the Hall), and I don't think I had a relic of his, so that helped me go after this ugly card featuring a b&w photo of Dick with his back turned pooping out a white swatch. I sure don't chase modern Pinnacle at all (honestly never that big on Pinnacle even in its prime), but it was the cheapest Juan Soto christmas card I could find, so I went for it.

- -o

Oh, it's my 10 Year Blogiversary today, June 15. Normally I'd make a bigger deal of it, but I'm more in a working-on-stuff mindset at the moment, with some creative projects in the works that I'm excited to share soon. I'll try to do a "celebrating 10 years of Baseball Card Breakdown" thing later this summer, perhaps with a contest/giveaway aspect. But can't get to that today.

Oh wow, it's not serious, but technically speaking I just now found out I have cancer while working on this post. It's just a little basal cell skin irritation on my back that needs a 15-minute procedure to burn off and isn't at all likely to spread anywhere, but still, yikes. (Finally went to the dermatologist for the first time as an adult earlier this week.)

Ok then. Thanks for reading! Got a COMC package due tomorrow, so you'll likely be hearing from me again soon!

February's incoming cards

I've got a big ol' lot of cards in transit from Bo at Baseball Cards Come to Life which will likely take some effort to sort and post about, so let's clear the backlog of cards from the cardsphere that've made their way through the winter weather to my mail slot this past month.

My trade bait page facilitated another easy swap with a friend of the blog. This time it was mr haverkamp who took a shot at the Mike Schmidt auto I had available, hooking me up with some great vintage needs in return.

Home Run King, Hank Aaron! Very happy to knock this big one off the '72 wantlist.

Plenty of familiar faces on these league leader cards.

Along with these other glorious additions, I've scratched my way up to 83% complete with 1972 Topps.

Also some good stuff for my 1970 Topps setbuild. Still barely over halfway through there, but slowly chipping away. It's not his pricey high-number base card, but that NL playoff highlight card features Nolan Ryan.. so that's neat.

I thought I had completed a basic set of 1974 Topps late last year, but as often happens, when I actually went through it, seems gremlins had run off with a few of the cards, including a consecutive run of postseason cards that I must've inadvertently missorted elsewhere. Plus there was a missing base card, #539 Lloyd Allen, which is now atop my reasonable desperate double dozen sidebar wantlist. But yeah, glad to re-acquire this above pair, including the final card from Willie Mays' playing career.

Thanks for the trade, Jim!

-    -   -  - o

A lucky comment left at Johnny's Trading Spot won me a PWE of Padres.

Some recent Topps Holiday cards. I appreciate John giving me a heads up that the Soto is a variation ("Santa belt"), as I probably would've missed it otherwise.

Vintage HOFers to balance out the PWE.

Thanks, John!

-   -  - - --o

Last up today is a surprise PWE from the illustrious Night Owl celebrating the return of baseball being played.

Another fun Holiday variation here, with Manny Machado's Santa cap being hard to miss. Fingers crossed he remains productive throughout that huge contract the team gave him.

Speaking of current happenings in the game, he's not included in this group, but a Dodger and a young player named Gavin makes me think of Gavin Lux. Poor guy just wrecked his knee in spring training and will miss all of 2023. Ouch! :( Such a bummer. Wishing the best to Mr. Lux on his recovery and Mr. Owl on a solid Dodgers season, though of course I'm rooting for San Diego, hoping the Padres can at least win it once in my lifetime. That's all I ask.. just once, damn it!

Everyone knows that Night Owl loves '75 Topps, so receiving any of those from him feels kinda special. The impressive trio above takes me to 86.82% complete-- or round that up to 87%-- with 87 cards left to track down, funny enough. (Everyone knows that Night Owl hates '87 Topps.)

Big thanks, Greg!

That'll do it for this post. Thanks for stopping by.

Trades and heads up on my new Trade Bait page

Time to catch up on some incoming cards. 

Let's kick off with my first trade with Hal, whom I became familiar with via Twitter a couple years ago. At the time, he lived pretty close to me, but by the time we finally got around to swapping cards, he had moved out of state.. bummer! Could have been nice to meet in person and save some postage. But better late than never, right?

These '72 Topps needs helped me reach the 80% complete milestone with the set. My goal from earlier in the year to finish it during its 50th anniversary is going to come up well short, but I'll keep on plugging away, and who knows, maybe this time next year I'll be wrapping it up..?

Thanks, Hal! Once I get more cards logged into TCDB you might need, I hope we can trade some more.

-  - -o

Speaking of TCDB, here's a little trade I was able to hammer out on there with a user who goes by DyeHardFan.

I was targeting that Dave Stieb ATFF refractor (if you have any ATFF refractors available for trade, I'm your guy), and got some cognac on the side.

Thanks, Ian!

-  - -o

Next up is a package from Bob at Best Bubble.

Wow, that's a big lot of 1992 Leaf black gold! I mentioned recently that I was shelving much of my "early 90s black gold" pursuits in favor of focusing on this parallel setbuild. Still love the look of these. I figured this was a blind bulk lot sure to have several dupes for me, but no, turned out to be all needs! Very nice of Bob to go through my wantlist for this set.

It wasn't all '92 Leaf, though, as Bob also sent along a black refractor and some ladies.

I'd been wanting one of these Batman Returns glowing stickers since I found out about them while putting together my big list of glowing trading cards, so I was thrilled to see Michelle Pfeiffer as Catwoman here.

I still haven't hit Bob back from his previous package, so I'm deeper in his debt now. I'll have to start planning a 2023 edition of the Bubble Gum Baseball custom set I did earlier this year.

Thanks, Bob!

-  - -o

Now on the topic of trading and not knowing what to send back...

Seeing as I haven't gone to a card show or ripped unopened product since pre-covid times, it has become harder and harder for me to find cards to make fitting returns for people who kindly send me stuff. Logging more of my available cards into TCDB is one thing I've been trying to do lately. And another is putting together a place on the blog to feature interesting trade bait. To that end... Presenting: 

The Baseball Card Breakdown Trade Bait Page

Lots of autograph cards up so far, and some customs and other stuff. I'm hoping to add more soon, though December is always crazy, so who knows. But yeah, check it out and maybe we can work out a trade. 

Not your average trade

Special trade to cover today. Dan, a guy I've dealt with over email a few times over the years-- originally sold him a Willie Mays auto for an offer too generous for me to decline-- recently reached out to chat and turns out he recently moved up to my neck of the woods. We hammered out a pretty big trade by my standards-- heck, I'd go as far as to classify it as a "supertrade"-- and conveniently were able to meet up for an in-person exchange the other weekend.

I've done a handful of real-world swaps in the past, but those were mostly brief interactions. Dan and I and our respective wives meet up at a brewpub around the midway point between our houses (just a 10 minute drive or so) and had lunch and a couple beers together. It was an enjoyable time all around and I loved chatting about card collecting topics, especially our similar niche focus that gives us a special cardboard kinship 

Negotiations took time, but when Dan tempted me with a 1972 Nolan Ryan, I knew we'd have a deal finalized pretty quick. Turns out he was dipping into his own PC (He's impressively got a career run of Ryans in PSA 7 or higher) and then would just go find himself another '72 Ryan to replace the one going to me. Now that's a trader who means business!

As a standard headshot, it's not one of Nolan's better looking cards (dig that short-lived Angels logo, though), but as an early card of his, and a semi-high number, it's a tough one. While I've still got a long way to go in my journey to collect all the psychedelic tombstones, feels like this acquisition has lightened my load considerably. My '72 setbuild generally isn't in great condition and so this NM slab might not exactly fit right in, but hey, now I can say I've got a PSA 7 Nolan Ryan in my 1972 Topps setbuild. Nuff said!

I had to give up a dandy of a 2003 Retired refractor auto (Marichal), but got back Paul Molitor in addition to the slabbed Ryan. I can live with that!

This marvelous Maz wasn't technically part of the trade, but rather a separate purchase from Dan. See, he's a big-time 2003 Topps Retired refractor collector, a kindred spirit to me, though my focus is 2004 of the same cards (also now dabbling in '03 and '05 since my '04 chase has stalled waiting for a Trammell to surface). As fellow Topps Retired aficionados, we had lots to chat about, such as the fabled 2003 Retired Kirby Puckett autograph that Dan and I are in agreement has never hit the market despite being listed on most checklists online.

But yeah, Dan is a big 2003 Retired collector, down to the last dozen or so needs (Note that the '03 auto set is 119 cards-- much larger than 2004's meger 76-- making his progress even more impressive.) He had a couple different Mazerfractors available, one that was graded Beckett 9.5 and another just 9 but was the "jersey number ebay 1/1". Since I generally don't worry much about grades, I eventually decided on the 9/25. There's a lot of number nine synergy going on, not just the serial numbering, but it's also graded 9 and the jersey 9 is visible in the front photo. So that's kinda cool. Nice to knock another HOFer Retired Refractor off my list (I don't expect to ever complete the '03 refractor set like Dan is working on, but I can't help snagging them if the price is right. I could possibly complete the auto set in my lifetime, but as a combination of base and refractors, currently 82/119 there).

Last card from the big lunchtime meetup with Dan was actually a separate one-for-one Tony Gwynn trade where I exchanged my 2004 Retired base auto for Dan's 2003 Retired base auto. It was a fitting swap because he had both 2003 base and refractor (but no 2004), and I had both 2004 base and refractor (but no 2003).

While Dan and I are collecting buds, we're also rivals when Retired refractors we both need pop up on eBay. Case in point, a few years back a seller listed the '03 Retired Gwynn 12/25 refractor, and also a similar Jim Bunning. The cards were each listed at a silly high buy-it-now asking price but with Best Offer option. I put in strong offers on both... my offer was accepted on the Bunning but I missed out on the Gwynn. I was kicking myself over this and in hindsight would have went higher on the Gwynn Christmas Card. Turns out it was Dan who bested my offer, that son of a gun! Oh well, all's fair in love and cardboard. At least he's cool and said we could work something out if he should ever end up with another Gwynn refractor (The 12/25 only graded out to an 8.5, so he wouldn't mind upgrading there anyways. Me, I vastly prefer my Retired autos in the original Topps "uncirculated" cases. In the past I've jailbroken slabbed Retired autos just to return to the regular casing, though am less gung-ho about that stuff these days.) But yeah, seeing as Tony is my top PC, very happy to score his 2003 Retired auto. Funny enough, the base version is just as scare as the refractor, both having a print run of just 25 copies (though the base isn't serial numbered).

Anyways, thanks a lot, Dan! Had a great time and came home with some great cards. Hope we get the chance to hang out again before too long. Best of luck in your quest to hunt down the last few cards you need. 

-   -  - o

That's probably plenty for one post, but I gotta clear out some backlog-- just received a COMC order!-- so here are a couple more quick trades for the post.

Traded with a reader named Sigler who helped me make solid progress with my 1977 Topps setbuild. We've already got a second swap in the works. Thanks, man!

-   -  - o

Last one is another new trading partner, Crocodile from a blog I just recently started following called Crocodile Sports Cards. He had posted about some glow-in-the-dark cards he wound up with that he didn't particularly care about. A thing about me is that I want all glowing cards, even if I already have them, but I needed most of these.

I never watched the 90s cartoon Skeleton Warriors, but now I've got the complete 5-card glow-in-the-dark insert set. I only had one of them before. Now I've got a set and several dupes (As I say, when it comes to glowing cards, I want dupes too.) These cards glow on the back, and I'm not convinced that wasn't the result of a printing mistake at the factory.

He asked if I wanted the acetate inserts too. Sure, why not. Neat stuff.

While I was excited to get the glowing cards, it's hard to beat a clean stack of needs and upgrades for my 1978 Topps setbuild. In the next couple years I should have a run of 70s Topps flagship filling out nicely.

On top of that, Crocodile was kind enough to hook me up with a stack of 1987 Topps for another of my hairbrained plans that might not ever really go anywhere. Even got an OPC Yount out of the deal!

But what's embarrassing for me is I had sent him a PWE with nothing all that impressive and he sent back a heavy box. Not a good first impression on my part with a new trading partner. In my defense I didn't realize those Skeleton Warriors cards were all in heavy plastic cases. I'll be sure to put some effort into balancing the scales once we get around to our second trade (assuming I haven't scared him off).

Thanks again, Croc!

Ok, that'll do it for today. Hope you're having a Happy Labor Day, everybody. My COMC order showing up today was a pleasant surprise, being a federal holiday and all. Some good stuff in there I'll plan to show off on the blog over the next few posts. Stay tuned.