Flea Market Finds #98: Expensive Vintage and Totally Awesome Wax

Winter has officially arrived to the Bay Area.  Or at least it felt like it on Saturday morning, because it was super cold.  The kind of cold where you want to lay in bed, turn on the electric blanket, and go back to sleep kind of cold.

However... the De Anza Flea Market only comes around once a month, so I threw on a hoodie, picked up some Starbucks, and made my way out there.  There were a lot of vendors set up.  Probably the most I've seen in awhile, although it seemed like half of them were selling holiday decorations or stocking stuffers.  Thankfully there were a handful of vendors with sports cards sprinkled in here and there.

Purchase #1:  1956 Topps Baseball $5

One of them was a friend who had a small stack of vintage in his display case.  Five dollars seemed a little steep, but he's taken care of me in the past and it was my turn to return the favor.  At least they're two guys I've actually heard of and are in decent condition for being nearly six decades old.


Purchase #2:  Blubber by Judy Blume $1

Last month was National Bullying Prevention Month and one of the YouTubers I follow is participating in an anti-bullying read-a-thon.  I figured I'd join in and read one of my childhood favorites.


Purchase #3:  More Baseball Cards $2

I'm always on the lookout for the random first-time vendors with boxes of cards hidden among all of their other items...

This box was filled with 90's inserts, parallels, and the occasional autograph.  Most of the cards had card shop price tags from back in the day, which wasn't a good sign.  I was relieved to hear that the sets were only five bucks and singles were one to two dollars each.

A few months ago... I would have spent $20 to $30 with this guy.  But I decided to save my money and only pick up cards that really stood out to me.

1992 Classic Best Minor League Auto #BRTA

If you collected baseball cards in the early 90's... then you remember Mr. Taylor.  He was the first pick in the 1991 MLB Draft and Baseball America's top prospect before the 1992 season.  I'm sure this card was on plenty of peoples' Hot List.  These days he's considered one of the biggest busts in MLB history.

2000 Pacific Prisms Dial-A-Stats #9

On the other hand, Griffey was one of the best players in baseball during the 90's and this particular card is both unique and hard to find.

Dial-A-Griffey!

It features a dial that spins around and shows off the number of home runs Griffey hit during different seasons.  Fifteen years ago, Pacific inserted these in their Prism packs at a rate of one per 193 packs.  That's a little more than eight boxes!


Purchase #4:  Super Awesome! Wax Packs 25¢

That's not a misprint.  Three packs for a quarter.  I have no idea what these are... but they're trading cards at 1970's wax pack prices.  Stay tuned.  I'll be busting these sooner than later.

Purchase #5:  Inside Out Blu-ray/DVD $14

And wrapping up my day at the flea market was the most expensive purchase of the day.  I don't usually purchase new movies... but this is one of my favorite movies of 2015.  The sad thing is...

This single purchase exceeded all of my other purchases combined... and that includes the $2.50 churro.

Happy Tuesday and sayonara!

Extra Innings

If you're interested in winning a cool sports print of one of your favorite athletes... head over to Sport Card Collectors.  Click Here

Hard Work and Deception

Size matters not.  Well... at least according to Yoda and Daniel "Rudy" Ruettiger.

2007 Press Pass Legends Saturday Signatures

Each year, I teach a unit on goal setting and perseverance to my students and use the movie Rudy.  For those who are unfamiliar with the story, Mr. Ruettiger was a twenty-seven year old, 5'6" guy who wanted to play for the Fighting Irish.  He worked really hard and overcame many obstacles to achieve this goal.

My students' assignment is to identify the main goal he sets for himself in addition to the steps he takes to achieve this goal.  They also break down his roadblocks and personal support system.

During the process of digging up facts for my fact vs. fiction post movie discussion, I discovered that today is the 40th anniversary of Ruettiger's big game.  On November 8th, 1975... in his only college football game appearance against Georgia Tech, he played a total of three plays... one of which ended in him sacking the quarterback.

In other sports news...

Bucky Harris is a member of the National Baseball Hall of Fame.  He played for the Washington Senators and Detroit Tigers in the first half of the 20th Century, but was better known for his managerial skills.

In 1924, while playing for the Senators, he also managed them to a World Series Championship.  There's a great story about he tried to outwit legendary manager John McGraw during the 7th game of the series.  You can read it here.  Harris won another title while managing the 1947 New York Yankees.

2003 Topps Gallery HOF #38

Anyways... there's a specific reason I'm featuring him in today's post.  Today is both his birthday and the anniversary of his passing.  I guess technically we all have a .27% chance of passing away on our birthday, but I thought it was interesting.

Happy Sunday and sayonara!

Flea Market Finds #97: Moses and the 4 Star General

The flea market has been placed on the back burner... and now that we're headed into winter... I probably will only go once (maybe twice) a month if I'm lucky.  With that in mind... I forced myself to get out of bed and head on down to the Capitol Flea Market this past Sunday.  Rolling back the clocks an hour was additional motivation and left me with no excuses.

Unfortunately... I didn't find any affordable sports cards.  Oh there were several dealers out there with them.  One of them even had some decent vintage.  But their prices were way too high for my liking and my latest approach to cardboard, so I passed.

On the other hand, I did manage to purchase a few non-sports related items...

Purchase #1:  Autographed 8x10's  $20

A few weeks ago, one of my friends picked up a binder of autographs.  The previous owner was an autograph collector who was selling off his duplicates.  He had a bunch of personalized autographs of entertainers and athletes.  Unfortunately, my name isn't Timothy.  There were about thirty that weren't personalized and these were the two that stood out.

I'm planning on having both of these authenticated by PSA at the Tristar show and hopefully flip these for a profit.  My buddy told me he'll give me a refund if they don't pass, so I really have nothing to lose.

Purchase #2:  Presidential Newspapers $2

I'm a sucker for nostalgia.  A vendor had a bunch of old newspapers... mainly with political headlines... so I grabbed these two.  I was hoping to find one with John F. Kennedy, but he didn't have any.

It's hard to tell by the photographs, but these are in excellent condition for being 45+ years old.  Newspapers tend to yellow (or brown) over time, but these look like they came straight out of the newspaper machine.

As soon as I have some free time, I'm going to open them up.  I'm really looking forward to seeing if any cool sporting events took place the day before.  I'm also excited to see what movies were in the theaters back then.

Well that's all for now.  Happy Wednesday and sayonara!

Cardboard Collecting Crossroads

Procrastination is like a credit card:

it's a lot fun until you get the bill.

-Christopher Parker

People purchase sports cards for different reasons.  One of my friends buys cards to flip to his flea market customers.  My other friend only buys cards to support his favorite team.  I buy cards for a bunch of reasons.

I'm a team collector.

Set collector.

Player collector.

Rookie card collector.

Autographed card collector.

Vintage card collector.

And an insert card collector.

Collecting so many things can get a little overwhelming at times.  I'm constantly thinking about which direction I want to go in terms of this hobby, because I can see the collecting crossroads quickly approaching.  And when I finally reach it, I'll need to make some decisions on what I want to do.

Who and what will I continue to collect?  What do I sell or trade off?  When will this all occur?

As of right now, I don't have definite answers to any of those questions, but it's just another thing that currently sitting in the back of my mind.  And honestly... it's kind of been something I've been avoiding for a few months now.

Kinda like these packages I owe many of you...

The good news is I've packaged these up and should have them shipped out by Wednesday or Thursday.

Unfortunately... I don't really have any plans on restocking my trade bait anytime soon.  I literally have hundreds of autographs and memorabilia cards that need to be organized... but I have absolutely zero motivation to do it.

Two years ago... I looked forward to receiving and sending out care packages.  But between a crazy work schedule and major procrastination on my part, it led to a huge list of people I owed.

And if you're one of those people... I owe you a huge apology.  Most of the cards I'm shipping out were purchased over the summer and could have been sent in early September.  But I was lazy.  And the more time that passed... the more I felt guilty... and the more I avoided going into my office to build everyone's packages.

Finally... I got off of my fat butt and took care of business.  Well... I took the first step at least.  The next step is taking the packages to the post office, which I promise you I will do.  After that... I have some decisions to make.

This hobby is very important to me and I have no plans on leaving it.  With that being said... something is going to change.  But at this moment in time... I'm not exactly sure what I'll do.

Once again guys... I hope each of you whom I owe packages to... will accept my sincere apology.  Happy Monday and sayonara!