30 Day Baseball Card Challenge

Wednesday, January 16, 2013

Flea Market Finds #29: An Entire Collection

When:  SaturdayJanuary 5th
Where:  De Anza Flea Market
What:  A Collection
How Much?  $160

My favorite thing about all of our hobby blogs is the interaction we have among them.  While most of my friends are watching television, working out, updating their lives on Facebook, going shopping, or reading books in their free time... I enjoy reading everyone's blogs and leaving comments.

Unfortunately... lately I've had little to zero free time because of my latest purchase.  So I apologize in advance for my lack of activity in our blogworld.

So, what could possibly keep me away from your blogs?  Well... let's take a look:


What you see above is huge collection of football, basketball, hockey, and golf cards I stumbled upon while walking around the flea market and the final purchase in my cardboard spending spree.  

Actually... had I been there 30 minutes earlier, I could have added his baseball card collection too.

The seller had the typical story.  He collected in the mid 90's to late 2000's and was looking to dump his collection to make room for his family.

He was asking $7/box... some of which included stacks of memorabilia cards, graded cards, and autographed cards.  After inquiring, he offered to sell his entire football collection for $100 and the entire basketball collection for $50.

If I was willing to purchase both, he'd throw in a few hockey boxes and a box of golf cards.  At the time, it seemed like it was a no-brainer.  However... sifting through this collection is a project that's much more work than I imagined.

Plus, I just don't have the room to store these cards and my parents have already told me that I can't bring anymore boxes to their house.  One of my buddies let's me store stuff in his garage, but I don't want to push his generosity too much.

So, I'm in the process of sifting through these boxes and figuring out what I want to keep, what I want to sell, and what I want to donate.  I'm hoping to have things sorted out within the next week or so... but I'll keep you posted.

I also picked up a pair of boxes and five oversized cards from the same vendor for $10:


I absolutely love these oversized memorabilia swatches and from what I've seen on eBay... they're really affordable.  As soon as I get some downtime, I'm looking forward to busting these boxes too.  Maybe I'll find a Jeter rookie and a Honorary Captain Michael Jordan card.

Okay... it's time to get back to sifting and sorting.  Happy Hump Day and sayonara!

20 comments:

Unknown said...

You got a steal bro. Well done. Sifting through mems and autos is WAY better than sifting through junk wax. Well done.

The Diamond King said...

Holy cow, you are really making the scores lately!

Spiegel83 said...

Those boxes look like hours of fun. Great purchase.

Roy-Z said...

My girlfriend would be pissssed.

(...Joe) said...

I would love, just once, if I could find ANY cards at a flea market let alone an entire collection!

BASEBALL DAD said...

Great find. Too bad you missed the baseball though.

Alfredo Ortega said...

Great Buy!! Any Miami Heat cards in there?

cynicalbuddha said...

Yowza, that's pretty awesome. I miss really good flea markets. Nice pick up with the Ahman Green and Teixeira Sweet Swatchs. I remember picking up one of those Greens way back when he still was playing for the pack. Those are great cards. Looking forward to seeing what you find amongst your piles.

Fuji said...

What's up G... it's been awhile. Happy New Year Bro!

Couldn't agree more... junk wax base cards get boring pretty quick. But I actually found something I hate more... 90's base cards that stick together so much that when you pull them apart, they're damaged.

Fuji said...

It was fun while it lasted. At least I won't have to spend anymore money on cardboard for at least a few months.

Fuji said...

It's a double edged sword... some boxes are fun. Others are filled with base cards.

Fuji said...

I have a deadline... 30 days and I'm okay.

Fuji said...

The past year, I've noticed more and more cards appearing at my local flea markets. I think a lot of those collectors from the late 80's and early 90's are starting to dump their "investments".

Fuji said...

I know. I found about 30 baseball memorabilia cards and autographs. Plus 300 to 400 inserts/parallels. There were some nice cards in the lot, so I can only imagine what the other guy found.

Fuji said...

Thanks... there were tons of basketball cards, so my guess is that there are a lot of Heat cards included. However, there weren't any Lebron or Wade rookies or memorabilia cards.

Fuji said...

I love those over-sized swatches... can't believe they aren't more popular. My guess is that collectors have a hard time storing them.

Cubbieblue1984 said...

What are you doing with the hockey stuff?

Fuji said...

I pulled a few of the cards for my PC... the rest will either go into my tradebait, be listed on eBay, or will be given away to my students.

Yankeejetsfan said...

If your ever looking to unload that Teixeira, please let me know. I collect him and I have been looking to add that card.

Fuji said...

Hey Mike... unfortunately that card has already made its way down to my parents house in Vegas. But if and when I decide to get rid of it, I'll definitely keep you in mind.