Flea Market Finds #177: Stuff from the 70's, 80's, and 90's

It's official.  I'm finally caught up on writing flea market posts.  Perfect timing too, because in a few days I'll be heading out to the De Anza Flea Market in hopes of finding some hidden treasures.

In the meantime, here's what I picked up two Saturdays ago at the Branham Flea Market.

Purchase #1:  80's Baseball Sets  $100

Remember the guy with the Laughlin sets?  Well... he was back again.  Sadly he didn't have any 70's oddball issues this time around.  But he did bring a few 80's sets.  I picked out these four:

First up is a 1983 Donruss factory set:

1983 Donruss Factory Set

This was the first set I noticed (he had these sets spread out over a few tables).  Although they aren't rare by any means... it's not really something I come across at the flea market on a regular basis.

He also had a 1982 Donruss factory set: 

1982 Donruss Factory Set

Not sure if Donruss released the 1982 sets in cellophane packs (like the other 1983 set above), but this one didn't come with any.  The set was in order though, so it was easy to check for the Ripken:

1982 Donruss #405

The centering is terrible, but I'm happy to add this set to my collection of 80's sets.  Speaking of centering, the key rookie cards in the next set are really clean:

1983 Topps Set

This is one of my all-time favorite sets.  I love the design... and it contains the rookie card of my favorite player:

1983 Topps #83

1983 Topps #482

1983 Topps #498

And rounding out the trifecta of 1983 flagship sets is the Fleer set:

1983 Fleer Set

Unfortunately when I got home, I discovered this set was missing two cards.  Plus Joaquin Andujar (card #1) was sun damaged.  I already ordered all three cards on Sportlots, but it might take a few weeks for them to arrive.

In the meantime, check out the Big Three:

1983 Fleer #179

1983 Fleer #360

1983 Fleer #507

There was another guy who came along and showed an interest in these sets, but the vendor said he'd give me first dibs since I've bought a bunch of stuff from him this year.  He was looking to get $40 for the Topps set and $30 each for the others.  I asked him if he'd take $100 for the quartet and he accepted.

After I paid for these sets, I hung out at his booth.  We talked about him moving soon and him heading out to Arkansas.  We also talked about each of our hobby histories and why he was getting rid of his stuff.  I also found two more sets...

Purchase #2:  More Baseball Sets  $20

1986 Sportflics Decade Greats Factory Set

This is a set that I have been actively seeking for over a decade.  The box wasn't sealed and was in pretty rough shape, but I still wanted it.

I know Sportflics aren't super popular, but they hold a lot of nostalgic value for me.  I never owned this set, but I opened a lot of 1986 Sportflics packs and owned the Rookies factory set.

This set covers the best players from the 1940's to the 1980's.  Here's what the cards look like:

1986 Sportflics Decade Greats #28

These lenticular cards feature three images for the price of one:

It's the trademark characteristic of 80's Sportflics cards.  But the card backs were pretty cool too:

Check out how much information they packed onto the back of this card.  Plus it's so colorful!  They only downside is they sacrificed the athlete's career stats and focused on a specific decade (hence the name of the set).

In addition to the 75 player cards, they also included 51 trivia cards:

1986 Sportflics Decades Greats Trivia Card #32

Okay... enough Sportflics talk.  Here's the other set I grabbed:

1993 Gatorade Detroit Tigers Set

I've never seen this set before, but according to TCDB it sounds like these were handed out as a stadium giveaway.

I thought about opening this set up and pulling singles for my binders (player collections).  I'm going to keep it sealed for now though.

As for the purchase price, there wasn't any negotiation this time around.  Like I said... I really wanted this Sportflics set... and his twenty dollar asking price seemed fair.

Okay.  I've rambled on way too much and we're only through the first two purchases.  It's time to speed up the process...

Purchase #3:  Sega Genesis Game  $15

1993 EA Sports Tony LaRussa Baseball (Sega Genesis)

My streak of picking up new (in package) 90's media continues.  This time it comes in the form of a video game.

While most of my buddies were SNES fanboys in the early 90's... I was a Genesis guy.  Never owned this particular game, but figured it would look cool on my A's shelf.

Purchase #4:  Three for a Buck Singles  $4

Back in May, I bought some cards off of a guy with 3 for $1 boxes.  He was back.  Here's what I picked up: 

You know how much I enjoy Star Wars and shiny cards.  I also found a huge stack of Jackass cards, but only grabbed the Tony Hawk.

He also had two unopened packs of Sport Kings.  I'm still searching for the Richard Petty card for my set build.  How cool would it be to pull one from these packs?

Purchase #5:  80's Wax Pack  $2

1981 Topps Raiders of the Lost Ark

Found this pack sitting in a bin with a bunch of non-sport Junk Wax Era packs and figured I'd save it.

I'll have to see if I already have one for my unopened wax pack collection.  If I do, I'll crack it open on a rainy day when I need some blog fodder.

The guy who sold me this pack, also had some random 80's team sets...

Purchase #6:  Yankees Team Set  $5

1985 Topps & Topps Traded

There were a handful of singles I needed in my 80's base card binder, but the key to this purchase was this card:

1985 Topps Traded #49T

I needed this for my Topps flagship base card run of Rickey.  I was hoping to find this card in a dollar bin, but I got tired of waiting.

Purchase #7:  Vintage Football Stamps  $10

The last purchase of the day was off of the guy I usually start with.  However the past two times he's had a group of guys digging through his boxes.  Anyways... I ended the day by grabbing these two vintage packs of NFL stamps:

1972 Sunoco NFL Action Stamps

Each pack contains 9 stamps.  At the time, I figured this was a killer deal.  How often do you find unopened packs from 1972 for $5 each?  The answer is... anytime you want.  They're listed on eBay for this price or even cheaper.  Oh well... win some, lose some.

Hopefully I'll find some winners on Saturday at De Anza.  Either way... I'll show off my finds sometime next week.

Until then...

Happy Tuesday and sayonara!

Shifted Gears Quickly

The BBC 100 was an annual article published in Baseball Cards magazine from the mid 80's to probably the early 90's.  In the article, they'd analyze minor league statistics, predict MLB numbers, and rank their Top 100 rookies.

Last weekend, I picked up the April 1991 issue of Baseball Cards which contained that year's rankings.  Normally articles in these issues are short... which frees up more space for advertisements.  But this particular article spanned a whopping twenty-five pages.  In other words, I won't be scanning this article for you guys, but I will include their list and re-rank them to the best of my abilities.

I should preface this by stating that I will not be doing the level of research conducted by bloggers like Chris (The Collector) or Greg (Night Owl Cards).  It's 9:38am and I'm allowing myself two hours to hammer out this post... and I started writing this at least fifteen minutes ago.  In other words... I'm probably going to be historically inaccurate, so feel free to rank these guys yourself down below.

Let's start with their list:

Okay.  That took me twenty minutes to type out... and in the process I came to the realization that I only recognize about forty, maybe fifty names on this list.  Perhaps more importantly... I could only provide maybe one or two sentences worth of comments on a fifth of those guys.

So change of plans.  I'm not gonna rank them.  It would only make all of you diehard baseball fans shake your heads in disgust with my BS.  Instead... I'm gonna start digging through boxes and pull out some cards from guys on this list instead.  I'll leave the ranking to the experts.

Let's start with #1...

1992 Leaf Gold #304

Hmmm.  Right out of the gate, I discovered a problem.  It might be harder to find singles of these player than I thought.  I've shipped off most of my Tigers inserts and parallels over the years and it's not like I have a ton of 90's completed sets.  I definitely don't have random commons laying around.  Those were donated or sold over the years.

Luckily... I'm in the process of building the 1992 Leaf Gold set... and Fryman is sitting in the binder.

The #2 guy is also in the set, but I doubt you want to see this post turn into a 1992 Leaf recap.  So here's Ray Lankford from a different set:

1992 Fleer Rookie Sensations #17

This set was pretty popular back in 1992, but has cooled off over the years.  These days you can grab a complete set for $10 to $20 which is what I did.

I had to include Lankford in this post to honor The Snorting Bull who happens to be the blogosphere's Ray Lankford supercollector.

As soon as saw Mark Whiten's name at #4, I thought of this:

Not sure if the YouTube clip worked, but it highlights his four home run game against the Cincinnati Reds back in 1993.

1995 Topps Embossed Golden Idols #88

According to Baseball Almanac... eighteen guys have accomplished this feat in an MLB game... including six hall of famers.  But for some reason, the first two guys I think of are Bob Horner and Mark Whiten.

Topps mentioned this historic event on the back of Whiten's Topps Embossed card:

It's time to get the ball rolling.  The two hour mark has come and gone.  But I can't leave this post at three cards... so let's keep going.

The last player in the BBC Top 10 that I'll feature is #7 Carlos Baerga:

2016 Topps Archives Signature Series All-Star Buybacks

If you had asked me back in the 90's if Baerga was a future hall of famer, I probably would have said "yes".  He still finished with impressive career numbers, but an injury to his left knee towards the late 90's kept him from reaching Cooperstown.

Moving into the teens... here's a guy I was rooting for big time back in the early 90's:

1989 Star Minor League #170

The year this article was published, Baseball Cards ranked him at #14 and he went on to hit .331 with 11 home runs in 53 games.  This guy instantly became a hot rookie.  I have his 1991 Stadium Club rookie card laying around somewhere, but didn't have time to dig through a 5,000ct. box.  So here's a scan from some flea market pack breaks from back in 2019.

Seriously.  It's now approaching the three hour mark.  I realize that some of you might be getting annoyed by these "time" updates... but fellow bloggers might be able to have an appreciation of the time and effort that goes into these posts.

Let's jump ahead to #49:

1992 Kenner Starting Lineup #NNO

I just reorganized my Kenner Starting Lineup binder and remembered seeing this card of Scott Erickson.

His name stood out because he went to Homestead High School in Cupertino and later attended San Jose City College.  His fans probably remember him for his awesome sophomore season where he was second in AL Cy Young Award voting and walked away with a World Series ring.

Let's fast forward to Eric Karros...

1993 Fleer Ultra Award Winners #20

He's the Dodger that kicked off that insane run of NL Rookie of the Year Award winners for the Los Angeles Dodgers.

They won the award five years in a row from 1992 to 1996.  And I thought the A's winning it three years in a row back in the 80's was impressive.

By the way... the magazine ranked him at #73 and recommended holding off on buying his cards, because he wasn't coming up to the Dodgers anytime soon.  They were wrong.  He made his MLB debut on September 1st, 1991.

On the other hand, they were spot on with this guy:

1990 Best Minor League #162

Ozzie came in at #74 on the list... and they predicted that he'd never be as good as his twin brother. 

They also stated his cards were overpriced and not recommended purchases.  Win some, lose some.

Okay, let's wrap up this post with the star of one of my favorite World Series highlights of all-time:

2015 Topps Triple Threads Unity Autographed Jumbo

Relics Emerald #UAJR-LG (#'d 28/50)

Here's the actual highlight... assuming it works:

Seeing Luis Gonzalez (#95) take down the New York Yankees makes him my favorite player on this list.  Sorry Ozzie.

By the way... if you looked through the list and are wondering why I didn't include Oscar Azocar's iconic 1993 Stadium Club card... it's because I don't have one.  I sifted through my 5,000ct. box of San Diego Padres (something I wouldn't do for the above mentioned Plantier), but was left very disappointed.

Okay fellow collectors, it's your turn to chime in.

Who's the greatest player on Baseball Cards Top 100 list?  Favorite player?

By the way... a special thanks to John @ Johnny's Trading Spot.  His comment on my Flea Market Finds post where I showed off the magazine purchase was the inspiration for this post.  I'm sorry I didn't actually rank these guys, but that's something I'll leave for one of those award winning blog authors.

Happy Saturday and sayonara!

Extra Innings

Figured since I'm behind the keyboard, I might as well kill two birds with one post.  I was fortunate to win one of John's almost daily giveaways.  Here's a look at the 9-pocket page worth of cards he sent me earlier in the week:

The 1985 Topps card is a classic and a future wallet card candidate.  I'm a huge fan of that card, but until now... only had copies in my Gwynn collection and 1985 Topps set.  I've been using his 1986 Topps card since January 2017.  Has six years been long enough?  We'll see.  I'll need a little time to pull out some other candidates before I retire one wallet card and pick another.

The other card that stood out was this card:

1990 Sportflics #98

I needed this card for the Gwynn PC.  I've always felt that Sportflics were under-appreciated among collectors.  I've been a fan of them since I ripped open packs back in 1986.

The card back screams Score... which makes sense since they were the same company.  I always thought that Score purchased the Sportflics license, but according to Wikipedia, they are one and the same.

The other card that stood out is this Rollie Fingers:

1986 TCMA All-Time San Diego Padres #11-PAD

I'd really like to eventually track down the rest of the set.

And while I'm at it... here's one more 9-pocket page that John sent me (back in September of 2022):

I found this in a stack in my office a few weeks ago.  If you needed an example of how crazy and unorganized my life can be... this is it.  Sorry it took me five months to finally write about this.  Better late than never, right?

My favorite cards are usually centered around fantastic photography which this PWE certainly packed.  However this time the honor goes to a final tribute card:

1995 Upper Deck #450

Upper Deck honored several retired superstars in 1995 and Schmidt was one of them.  It was perfect timing as he was inducted into Cooperstown that year.

The best thing about this card resides in the full career statistics:

Thank you John for these two PWE's and all of the generosity you are spreading around the blogosphere.  There's actually one more really cool item I'd like to share from John.  But I'll have to share it another day as this post has officially surpassed the five hour mark and I haven't even revised and formatted it.  Yikes.

And for those who are interested... it's 3:04 and I'm going to hit publish right now.  With the exception of one bathroom break and two trips downstairs to get a drink, this was written in one sitting from start to finish.