Flea Market Finds #192: Nothing Too Crazy

Sorry for the lack of flea market related posts.  It's not for a lack of trips or even purchases.  The big change is the amount of time I dedicate to writing posts... which has significantly declined.  Over the summer, I was focusing on itemizing and organizing my collection.  And the start of a new school year is always hectic.  The good news is things begin to stabilize in October.

The bad news is card related deals are drying up faster than ever.  That's why I've started targeting other items while walking around the flea market.  Two of these items are featured in today's post and were purchased this past Saturday at the De Anza Flea Market.

Here's what I purchased...

Purchase #1:  Pair of Sets  $1

I'm officially at the point in the hobby where I get excited to find cheap overproduced retail box sets from the 80's.  I have purchased stuff from this vendor a few times over the years, but like other card vendors... his prices are becoming unreasonable.

1988 Topps Woolworth Baseball Highlights Sets (x2)

However he had a plethora of these 33ct. box sets... and was asking a buck each or $20 for a case of 24.  He didn't hide the fact that he wanted to dump them, so I offered him a dollar for two and he accepted.  One of them will go into my boxed set collection.  The other will be opened up, possibly featured in a future post, and the singles will either go into player collections or added to care packages.

Purchase #2:  Cassette Tapes  $8

Outside of trading cards, LP's and cassette tapes are my favorite things to look for at flea markets.  Unfortunately, the competition is stiff in this area as well.  Luckily I found a guy with some tapes I was interested in and he had reasonable prices.  $3 each or two for $5.

I found three...

U2 Live Under A Blood Red Sky

I went through a U2 phase back in the 80's where they were one of my favorite bands.  Never actually owned this album, CD, or cassette... but I recognize most of these songs.  I was very happy to add this to the collection.

Steve Miller Band Greatest Hits 1974-78

My brothers are over a decade older than me, so we weren't exactly close when I was a kid.  In fact, they were more like uncles than siblings.  But they were definitely the cool kind who exposed me to classic rock of the 70's.  I've had this CD in my collection for decades.  My brother gave me his LP a few years ago.  I'm pretty sure I owned the cassette tape back in the 80's.  If not... I own a copy now.

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Coming Out Of Their Shells

Never knew this cassette tape existed, but as soon as I saw it... I wanted it.  Based on a YouTube video, it looks like you could purchase a these at Pizza Hut for $3.99 back in 1990.  I'll never actually listen to it, but if I ever build a TMNT display in my office... I'll add this to it.

Purchase #3:  Charlie Hustle Autograph  $5

Yeah.  Yeah.  Yeah.  There's no guarantee that this signature is real.  And even if it is... his autographs are far from rare.  I don't care.  I wasn't going to pass this up for five bucks.

1984 Gateway First Day Cover

This first day cover silk cachet commemorates Pete's 4,000th hit on April 13th, 1984.

The vendor who had this had an entire table filled with old magazines, programs, and photos.  While flipping through the stacks, I came across a sleeve containing a few different commemorative covers.  Only two were signed.  The other featured Len Barker's signature.  Rose was worth the risk, but not Barker.

Purchase #4:  Dollar Cards  $2

After digging through the programs and purchasing the Rose, I started digging through the guy's dollar box.  This was one of those boxes where cards are literally tossed into it... half of which were completely unprotected.

Sitting on top was a small stack of 70's Hostess cards... which caught my eye.  Unfortunately there were poorly cut and the biggest name I saw was Davey Lopes.  But I did find this 90's parallel:

1993-94 Stadium Club First Day Issue #186

Karl Malone wasn't a good father and if you ask Magic or Kobe... he wasn't a good teammate.  But he was one heck of a power forward.  Not gonna lie.  When I saw this card in a heavily worn penny sleeve, my eyes lit up.  Anyone else miss the days when parallels weren't pulled from every pack?

I'm glad I continued to dig, because I found an even cooler card:  

1976 Kellogg's #19

Unfortunately this card was floating around in the box without a penny sleeve.  However somehow the cardboard gods spared it from any cracks.  The back is pretty stained though:

I'm not going to complain.  I'll buy uncracked 70's Kellogg's cards of any familiar name for a dollar all day long.

Purchase #5:  Box of Old Postcards  $20

Another side collection I have been building are vintage postcards... especially one depicting places I've been to.  I haven't counted, but I'd estimate you're staring at two to three hundred postcards.  I flipped through a couple of stacks, compared them to some purchases I have made online, and figured it was well worth the price.

If you'd like to see some in a future post, comment down below.  If not I'll eventually sort and file these away.

Purchase #6:  A Wood Box  $5

Last month, I saw this gentleman with a bunch of affordable handmade boxes.  I stopped at his booth to see if he'd be willing to make some custom boxes for my card collection.  Unfortunately he was busy with several customers, so I never got a chance to ask.

I was happy to see him again this month. but he doesn't do custom builds.  I pulled out a top loader and discovered that it fit perfectly sideways in this particular design.  I purchased one.  Haven't figured out how I'll use it.  But if I do within the next month... maybe I'll grab a few more.

Well that wraps up my most recent trip to the flea market.  Nothing too crazy, but I found some baseball cards to purchase.  That always counts as a win.

Positive or negative... I'd love to hear your thoughts on my finds.

Until next time...

Happy Tuesday and sayonara!

A Few Goodbyes and a Pair of Set Completions

I'm an A's and Padres fan.  You know that.  And there are times when the San Francisco Giants are my least favorite franchise in baseball.  This isn't one of those times, but they're definitely in the bottom five.

That being said... I wanted to kick off this post by honoring Mike Krukow with a proper sayonara salute as he officially retires from the Giants broadcasting booth after dedicating over four decades to the franchise.  

1983 Mother's Cookies Giants #12

1983 Mother's Cookies Giants #11

He's a Bay Area legend who will be remembered for being half of the Kruk & Kuip duo.  This week... Duane Kuiper announced to his fans that he has been diagnosed with throat cancer and started treatment.  Not sure what the future holds for him, but he assured fans that he would be there to support his close friend on his special day.

2013 Panini Hometown Heroes Signatures #HSMK

Enjoy retirement Mr. Krukow!  And here's to a speedy and full recovery Mr. Kuiper.

Now let's check out a pair of PWE's from John (@ Johnny's Trading Spot) and Bo (@ Baseball Cards Come to Life!).

I'll start with three cards for two set/project builds...

1984 Topps Glossy All-Stars #5

1986 Topps Glossy All-Stars #5

2023 Topps #330

John sent me the Robin Yount which gets me one step closer to completing the 1984 Topps Glossy All-Stars set.  The Ripken and Rodriguez cards were from Bo and complete both of those sets.

Here are a few bonus cards from John:

I'm guessing I won another Maddux Monday giveaway.  I'll have to see how many of these I need for my collection.

Bo included these:

I needed the Matsui in the middle!

Thank you John and Bo for helping me with my set builds!

Hope all of you are enjoying your final weekend of baseball.  I'm feeling much better today and should be back in the classroom tomorrow.

Happy Sunday and sayonara!

Extra Innings

Here are a pair of bonus sayonara salutes...

2014 Topps Chrome Refractor #140

I'm sure everyone watched Verlander being greeted by his daughter yesterday as he stepped off the mound for the final time in his MLB career.  What a touching moment.  Congratulations on your retirement Mr. Verlander!  See you in Cooperstown in a few years.

The sports world also lost a legend earlier in the week:

1994-95 Action Packed Basketball HOF Autographs #27

Bob Pettit played before my time, but I knew he was one of the NBA legends from the 50's and 60's.  However... Bulldog (@ Nothing If Not Random) wrote a nice tribute that truly opened my eyes to his greatness.

Rest in peace Mr. Pettit.

A Whale of a Sort

Summer break is over.  Technically I don't need to report until Thursday, but I've been working in my classroom since early last week.  It takes me a few days to set up my classroom and prep the first three weeks of lessons.

Not teaching summer school forced me to dip into my savings.  Outside of that... it was pretty amazing.  I'll have a recap post posted by the time students arrive on the 17th.

Today's post is a continuation of the Sunday Sort.  Last weekend I opened up three packages from Rod over at Padrographs and sorted everything into categories.  Phase two (which is the focus of today's post) is to sort and integrate the Tony Gwynn cards he sent.

But before we get into that, here's a Gwynn I recently purchased on eBay:

1992 Fleer Ultra Commemorative Promo #NNO

I have been trying to add this card to my 1992 Fleer Ultra master set for years.  It was handed out at the 1992 Fleer stockholders meeting and features Fleer's CEO back in the day.

The back talks about Gwynn and how he signed over 2,000 cards which were inserted into packs of 1992 Fleer Ultra.

I thought this card completed my run of 1992 Fleer Ultra Gwynn cards:

Unfortunately... while looking up this Mullan/Gwynn promo, I discovered that Gwynn also has a 1992 pre-production sample as well.  There are actually nine other sample cards I need to find, but I'm up for the challenge.

Okay.  Let's get to the Gwynns from Rod's care packages.  He sent over 200 Gwynns.  Obviously I don't have the time to scan them all.  In honor of Mr. Padre's jersey number, here are 19 cards that were added to my Gwynn PC...

1984 Fleer #301

Technically, I already have a copy of this second year base card.  But completed sets get priority over player or team collections. 

1992 Padres Police #NNO

1992 Padres Police #NNO

1993 Stadium Club Members Only #538

1994 Donruss Commemorative Anniversary #10

While originally sorting through all of the Gwynns, I thought this was his 1984 base card.  But upon closer inspection, it's from an insert set celebrating their ten year anniversary.

1995 Leaf 300 Club #13

1995 SP Championship Die-Cut #90

1996 Bowman's Best Mirror Image #7

One of these guys is not like the others, but there was a time when I thought Ben Grieve would end up being a superstar.

1996 Leaf Statistical Standouts #2 (#'d 1939/2500)

1996 Pinnacle Aficionado Slick Picks #15

1996 Topps Master of the Game #MG12

1996 Topps Gallery #147

1999 Fleer Tradition Diamond Magic #5DM

1999 Pacific Invincible Sandlot Heroes #17

2000 Fleer Focus Pocus #2FP

2000 Topps #240a & #240d

Much like the commemorative promo card above, I have been trying to complete the five card subset of 2000 Topps Gwynns for a few years.  Split between the two series, Topps highlighted the careers of ten players with a Magic Moments subset.  Each player received five cards that were short printed, which is why set builders may or may not consider their set complete with one of these singles.

2001 Fleer Tradition Grass Roots #13

2003 Topps Record Breakers #RB-TGW

If you've ever wondered how long it takes me to integrate and scan a large stack of cards into my personal collection, this Gwynn sort will help paint a picture.

1994 Donruss Commemorative Anniversary #10

Obviously sorting a few hundred cards usually doesn't take too much time, but thanks to the 90's... I had a lot of trouble figuring out which year some of these Gwynns were produced.  A card might say 1993 in the copyright area, but actually be listed as a 1994 card.  This also forced me to move some cards around in my collection.

Another delay I encountered were late 80's Topps and Donruss variations.  Holy cow.  Why did I ever decide to collect these?  Anyways... looking for missing periods, apostrophes, or asterisks with a magnifying glass took longer than expected.

Toss in a few breaks here and there... and this Sunday Sort took close to five hours.  This is by no means a complaint.  It's just an observation.  There are still seventeen stacks of Gwynns that I still need to integrate into the collection, but I needed to wrap things up and write this post.

Unfortunately... I couldn't stay awake last night and ended up falling asleep before I could finish, so this edition of the Sunday Sort gets to be published on a Monday morning.

Thank you Rod for these awesome additions to the Gwynn collection.

Happy Monday and sayonara!