10 Bucks at an Estate Sale

I was browsing on FB Marketplace, and someone in the next town over was doing an "online estate sale" -- posting single items or lots they had for sale.  Scrolling through, I saw one of the pictures looked like this.

I was a little worried that it said "Pre-1990s" (since that includes the 1980s junk wax), but it had a 1972 Topps on the front and the backs I could see poking up looked old, too.   I was itching to open something -- I had nearly purchased a Fairfield Repack blaster at Target the night before, and talked myself out of it -- so I bought it!  I was expecting about 150 cards from that picture, so for half of the price of a blaster I was willing to gamble.  Let's see what was in there.

Total cards:  212

I'll go "oldest-to-newest" on these.

1968: 1 card // 1969: 2 cards

The Alley is in good condition.   The checklist, however, is all marked up. 

1970: 3 cards

Some nice cards to go in my trade boxes here.

1971: 56 cards

Here's where we start to get into the majority of the box.  There was a big stack of these.

Condition varied a lot.  The two on the top row were in fantastic shape!   The ones on the bottom - eek!  I'm not sure how you do that to the corners without tearing them off.

There were a couple highlights in here - Two Willie Stargells.  Pops!   One in pretty nice shape, and one a bit more worn.

Two of Pirate legend Bill Mazeroski, and a nice condition card of Dock Ellis.

1972: 99 cards.   

When it looked like there were a few '72s in the box....I definitely underestimated!   This was half of the box. 

Condition varied a lot on these.  Here's some bad guys.  Many of them looked like they had water damage on the top edge, which sullied some otherwise nice vintage cards.   The Maddox is a LITTLE miscut.  Someone took a red pen to Carlton/Seaver, and they have apparently made a lot of progress on their '72 checklist, too!

Showing the damage a little more...you can see it at the top of these HOFers.

However, there were quite a few "names" which were in outstanding condition!  Will keep a few of these and trade the rest.  Another Dock Ellis, too.

1973: 21 cards

Here's everything from that year.  Brooks suffered a little top damage, but the Blyleven looks nice.

Rockcards!  13 cards.  Someone opened a pack of these.  It had a few big stars I recognized.

The rest: 16 cards

 There was some other junk in there (including a little pile of bent 1994 Topps).  But these all caught my eye - George Bell "hole puncher" variation, an Elks membership card from Palm Desert, CA (I don't live there....), a Yamaha motorbike, and a nice 1994 Piazza.

I will enjoy putting these in my trade list on TCDB.  If you see anything you'd like, let me know!

In summary: 

Did I enjoy the variety in this box?  Yes!  

Did I get my money's worth?  Yes!  

Was this better than a repack blaster?  Yes!  

So I end this post as a happy camper.

Question:  Which card should I keep in my collection forever and ever?

Classic Cards - Garage Sale Finds

I LOVE Garage Sales.  Good garage sales, that is, not the junky ones with old furniture and paperbacks from the '70s.  Good garage sales have BASEBALL CARDS.  Luckily, my wife is always looking for a deal, so we hit our fair share of garage sales together.  Last Saturday the local high school sports teams were having a garage sale fundraiser so we drove down there.

At this sale LAST YEAR, I picked up a complete starter set of "MLB Showdown 2002" cards.  This alerted me to the "cards IN games" niche that is out there.  I was hoping to find something similar this year...and find it I did.

It was the 1991 Classic Trivia Board Game.  How much would you pay for such a thing?  $50??  $25??  $10??  No ladies and gentlemen, I was able to purchase this game for the low price of ONE dollar.  The school  was happy to have the money, I was happy to have the cards, and some mother was happy to have this out of her closet. 

But wait, there's more!  This game was apparently so special that it needed to be serial-numbered:

 004759/100000

I'm glad it wasn't some common thing that just anyone could buy....

Inside the box was a game-board, a bunch of pieces, some fake money (likely from a different game), and these two boxes of cards:

I cracked open those bad boys and found about 200 of the purple 1991 player cards.  The boxes were full, so I am assuming most of the set is there.  This set was nothing too special, but it did have a few interesting features.

Just like Johnny Cash sang "Ain't No Grave Can Hold My Body Down," Lenny Dykstra is singing, "Ain't No Frame Can Hold My Body Down."  He is busting out of the frame, spitting, and trampling upon his family name.  That just ain't right!!  And he's not the only one -- many players are doing such violent actions that they thrust themselves out of the frame.  Roger Clemens is having an on-mound chat with his catcher and coach while sticking his elbows out across the border.  What an action shot!

Classic did include one cheesy shot (awesome):

Because his NAME is Justice!  I get it now.  :-)

All in all, a great find for a buck.  Except for the Royals, all of these cards are FOR TRADE.  The checklist is here, so see what you want and send me an offer.  I'll probably take it, as long as it gets approved by our benevolent judge above...