Flea Market Finds #155: Oddball and Outer Space Items

Woke up on Saturday and headed over to Branham High School for my first flea market trip of 2023... and the first one since the start of the school year.  As soon as I walked out the door, I kind of regretted it.  It was in the high 30's and knew there was a good chance the cold would scare away vendors.  I was right.

There were only thirty to forty vendors set up, but the good news is four of them had sports cards.  I was tempted to make a reasonably sized Junk Wax Era purchase that included a 1987 Fleer Update tin set and several hundred 1987 Fleer Star Stickers, but the guy wouldn't budge on his prices.

I did find a few things to buy from two of the other guys.  None of them were great bargains... but each were purchases I could live with...

Purchase #1:  Pete Rose Record Record  $3

There was a vendor I hadn't seen before with tubs of stuff ranging from old magazines to sports books.  He also had a display case filled with cards including a graded Tom Brady rookie card and some vintage hall of famers.  I tested out his prices by asking about his 1990 Score B&W Bo Jackson, but his $3 price tag was a little too high.

I moved on to his bin of books that also contained a cereal box.  There was a pretty cool Los Angeles Lakers Wheaties box from the 80's, but it was banged up.  I continued to dig through the bin, when I stumbled across this: 

1979 CMC Talking Baseball Cards #4

It looks like a CD cover or something, but it's actually a record.  If you were around in the 70's or early 80's, you might remember companies printing records inside of magazines.  They're much flimsier than a normal LP as they were printed on very thin paper/vinyl.  Anyways... this card kind of reminds me of one of those magazine records.

Based on what's printed on the back of the record, I'm assuming it talks about Pete's 44 game hitting streak back in 1978:

This record is still in its original packaging.  However it's missing the upper flap.  This is the kind of oddball stuff I enjoy adding to my collection.  The vendor said I could have it for $3... which I thought was reasonable and there you have my first flea market purchase of the year.

Purchase #2:  90's Baseball Cards Magazines  $5

I continued digging through the vendor's bin and I came across a stack of Baseball Cards magazines from the early 90's.  He also had issues of Beckett Baseball, Sports Illustrated, and Ring, but I focused in on these because they still had the uncut strips of baseball cards.

Did I mention I like oddball stuff?  Anyways... here are the three issues I purchased along with the cards (that I've already removed from the magazines):

Baseball Cards February 1990

BC7 - BC9

BC10 - BC12

This issue's cards featured the best National League players from the West.  Obviously, I would have rather seen Gwynn replace Alomar or one of the Astros.  At least they gave the Padres a card.  The Dodgers were shutout.

As always... I'll eventually sit down and read this issue from cover to cover.  Maybe I'll find something interesting.  If I do, maybe I'll write a post about it.

Baseball Cards June 1990

The next issue featured the hot rookie of 1990: Ben McDonald, so it's not too much of a surprise that this issue's cards focused around the top rookies:

#31 - #33

Like the Rickey Henderson issue, this one once again utilizes the 1969 Topps design.  They Cardinals and Expos cards are error cards... with the incorrect teams printed on the backs.

#34 - 36

I remember hoarding Todd Zeile and Marquis Grissom cards back in the early 90's.  I wish I would have focused on Larry Walker a little more.  He's the only guy featured that went on to have a hall of fame career.

Baseball Cards April 1991

I'm pretty excited to read the Bo Jackson interview as well as see which cards won the Stale Bubble Gum Awards.  It'll also be interesting to see how many of their 100 top rookies panned out.

This issue is from 1991, so they switched up designs and used the 1966 Topps baseball card design.

#19 - #21

Todd Zeile makes his second appearance.  I'm sure back in 1991, I would have been stoked to add that card to my collection.  The San Francisco Giants Rookie Stars card stands out the most thirty-two years later.  I actually remember watching Decker and Leonard play in San Jose in the late 80's.

#22 - #24

The Santiago is pretty cool.  He was an all-star for the Padres for several years.  But the Eddie Murray is definitely the coolest card in this issue.  The back of his card mentions he hit .330 in 1990.  I knew he could hit home runs, but didn't realize he competed for batting titles too.

Okay... I've spent way too much time talking about these magazines.  Let's move along to my third and final purchase...


Purchase #3:  Poster w/Postal Cachet  $3

1969 #C76 10¢ Moon Landing First Day Cover

After spending almost thirty minutes looking through the collection that contained the 80's Fleer cards and walking away empty handed... I started walking back to my car.  One of the regular vendors with cards was on my way out.  I had looked at his stuff earlier and didn't see anything worth purchasing.  But this time around, I saw this cool postal cachet commemorating the 1969 Apollo 11 mission where Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin, and Michael Collins landed on the Moon.

I wasn't born yet, but since I was little... I've been interested in things related to NASA.  This poster was originally housed in a wooden frame, but it was coming apart.  I picked up a new one for a little over $20 on Amazon, so technically I'm into this poster for more than $3.  When it arrives, I'd love to hang it up in my office... but it'll probably end up in my classroom.

Well that wraps up my first trip to the flea market in 2023.  I only walked around for about an hour... which is way longer than I originally anticipated.  I would have been in and out in 15 minutes if it weren't for the guy with the bins and the guy with the 1987 Fleer Update tin set.

I actually have one more post related to this past Saturday... but I'll have to share it another day.

Happy Tuesday and sayonara!

It's A Celebration

How hectic are the last few days leading up to the end of the semester?  Well... I started writing this post on Monday.... and the plan was to publish it on Wednesday.  Unfortunately I didn't finish writing it until Thursday evening and wrapped up the editing, revising, and formatting today.  Better late than never.

Midweek posts on this blog have become rarer than affordable crack-free Kellogg's cards from the 70's.  But today I wanted to share a congratulatory post to my former student who designed this card for me two years ago:

Sarah was part of a very special class.  I taught 5th and 6th grade for ten years before making the transition to middle school.  She happened to be in that last elementary school class... and as she graduated and headed off to middle school... I followed her and her classmates.

There were ten to fifteen kids who ended up having me three years in a row.  She was one of them.  You'd think she would have gotten sick of me, but she actually ended up TA'ing for me in summer school when she was in high school.  And even when she went off to college, we kept in touch.

Over the weekend, her mom announced on Facebook that the San Jose Sharks would wear special Lunar New Year jerseys designed by Sarah on January 18th during warm ups.  That night her artwork was featured around SAP including the new video scoreboard:

Based on what I've heard, the color red symbolizes "good fortune" and "joy" which is what the Sharks and their fans experienced Wednesday evening in Sarah's presence.  It was the first game I followed live all season and it was fantastic.

The Sharks faced off against the Dallas Stars and fell behind 3-0 before scoring five unanswered goals to win the game.

2022-23 Upper Deck Canvas #C66

Erik Karlsson broke the tie halfway through the 3rd Period and Logan Couture added insurance with empty net goal.

2022-23 Upper Deck Dazzlers #DZ-27

Both of these cards were donated to my San Jose Sharks PC by Reader X who sent me another care package last week.

I haven't bought a box of hockey cards in years, so Xavier is my primary source of Sharks cards.  Here's a thick card with a scratch-off on the back of Couture:

2021-22 Upper Deck Artifacts Bounty #A-17

I looked it up and discovered this is part of an interactive challenge where collectors complete challenges by redeeming certain bounties.  Since this is the only "Bounty" card I own, I won't be participating... which means it'll go into the collection unscratched.

2022-23 Upper Deck Canvas #C65

2022-23 Upper Deck Centre of Attention

Teenage Mutant Ninja Hertl didn't score any goals on Wednesday, but he did assist on the game-tying power play goal in the 2nd period.

Here are a few other cool Sharks cards that Xavier hooked me up with:

2021-22 Upper Deck Artifacts Threads of Time #TT-JT

Look at Jumbo's beard!  The San Jose Sharks will be hosting a legends game the night before they retire Patrick Marleau's jersey number.  Marleau will be playing in the game.  Hopefully Joe will too.

Here's another great hockey beard:

2022-23 Upper Deck Defense Mechanism #DM-22

The past few seasons, Burns was my favorite Shark.  It was a bummer to hear that he was shipped off to Carolina during the off-season.  At least he's with a Stanley Cup contender now.

I wanted to show off two cards of Jonathan Dahlen...

2022-23 Upper Deck Debut Dates #DD-10

2022-23 Upper Deck Rookie Retrospective #RR-2

This guy is no longer with the Sharks, but he's half of the answer to an interesting Sharks trivia question.  His father played for the Sharks too back in the mid 90's and they make up the first father-son duo in franchise history.

That wraps up the Sharks portion of this post.  Figured since I started things off with Sarah's custom of Gwynn's Topps rookie card, I end it with two new additions to my Tony Gwynn PC:

2022 Topps Archives #22

2022 Topps Archives #376

Thank you Xavier for the new additions to the Sharks and Gwynn PC's!  Happy Lunar New Year (it's actually tomorrow) to any of my readers who celebrate the holiday!  And a huge shout out to Sarah for honoring her heritage, doing something positive for the community, and enjoying life to the fullest.

Happy Saturday and sayonara!

Enjoyable and Meaningful

I've been itching to write lately, but free time is a luxury these days and anyone who blogs knows that it's not just about sitting down and typing something out.  Well... I guess I could sit here, write a few sentences and hit "publish", but that really isn't my style.  If I'm going to blog, I'm going to at the very least put some thought into the post, add a scan or photo, and do the routine formatting.  The goal is to make each one "enjoyable" and "meaningful".

Unfortunately... that means we're talking about thirty minutes to an hour minimum per post. 

Well today I just happened to have an entire day to myself... and the only thing on the agenda was following the Seattle Seahawks game which I'll get to in a minute.

Earlier in the day, I caught up on reading some blog posts from earlier in the week.  One of them inspired this quick "under an hour" post (actually when all was said and done... it was more like two hours).

On Wednesday, Matt over at Diamond Jesters centered his Repack Haiku post around Harold Baines who some believe isn't Cooperstown worthy.  So he challenged his readers to fill in the blank...

"If Harold Baines is in, then _______________ should be in!"

The one condition is the person you nominated had to meet or exceed Baines' six All-Star Game selections and one Silver Slugger Award.

The first person who popped into my head was Barry Bonds.  Yup.  I'm on that side of the line.  If you wanna read my reasoning, click here.  And that's whose name I left in Matt's comment section.

Later in the day, his challenge popped into my head again and I started wondering about MLB pitchers who meet his requirements.  A quick trip over to Baseball Reference revealed that there were four:  Zack Greinke, Tom Glavine, John Smoltz, and Fernando Valenzuela.

Obviously Glavine and Smoltz are already in.  Greinke is still playing.  Which leaves us with El Toro:

1983 Donruss Action All-Star #53

Fernando wasn't only a 6x MLB All-Star who won a Silver Slugger Award.

In 1981... he won the NL Rookie of the Year Award, Major League Player of the Year Award, and NL Cy Young Award.  He also won a Gold Glove Award in 1986 and has a career WAR higher than Catfish Hunter.

Plus he's arguably the greatest MLB player born in Mexico and when you factor in how many people became fans of the game because of Fernandomania, I think his name should at least be considered.

Before I give you my personal verdict on him, I wanted to quickly share something a fellow collector sent me earlier in the week:

On Thursday, I received another care package from Reader X and thought it was interesting that he tossed in this package of tissues.  I guess he knew I'd need it after watching the San Francisco 49ers end the Seattle Seahawks season.

He actually used the tissues as padding (pretty ingenious) inside the box he sent... which included hundreds of cards.  I'll write about plenty of them in the future.  In fact, I have an entire box sitting on my desk filled with cards I want to write about eventually and at least 50 of them were included in care packages from him.  I just need to find a little free time and figure out a way to make the post enjoyable and meaningful.

Speaking of enjoyable and meaningful... Fernando Valenzuela was both.  That being said, I'm a Small Hall kind of guy... so he's more of a Hall of Very Good guy to me.

Feel free to argue or agree down in the comment section below.

Thank you Matt for being the inspiration for this post... and Reader X for the care package and tissues.

Happy Saturday and sayonara!

Extra Innings

By the way... I was hoping to see who won the battle when Baines faced Valenzuela at the plate.  Unfortunately, Baines never played in the National League where Fernando pitched most of his career.  In 1991, Fernando played for the Angels, but only pitched in two games.  Neither were against Baines' A's.

1994 Topps Gold #175

And in 1993 they were teammates in Baltimore.

I could do a little more research to see if they faced each other in the playoffs, but I've already spent way too long writing this post.