August Pickups
 

If one of these threads already exists, apologies, but let me get it started otherwise, with this amazing acquisition from yesterday!

Heck of a way to lead off August, Carl.
Very nice card.

Brooksie
 

Love the Brooksie card!

Nice B. Robinson pick up. I will eventually get me one but for now I am concentrating on my Johnny Bench set. Here is my latest additon.

Gibby's last stand
 

I've been looking for this for a while. For some reason, Bob Gibson's 1975 Topps card is hard to find centered with sharp corners. Happily, I was able to add one to my collection. It is ever so slightly off centered left to right. About 47/53 at center. But this should still be at least an 8 if I send it in to PSA.

http://imageshack.com/a/img538/502/z0PGzh.png

By the way, nice cards, guys.

jb, it looks like you're doing the same thing I'm working on with Robin Yount.

http://imageshack.com/a/img633/4192/kKJ7zQ.png

Are you doing only the Topps cards? Or are you going for his base master set, with the Donruss, Fleer and Upper Deck, too?

I'm planning on doing them all eventually, but the Topps will be first. I'm going to do the same with Clemente, just his base cards. That will take a while longer, though.

Nice Gibson Bill!

Bill,
I am doing the Bench basic set (which includes Fleer and Donruss) and will then probably move to the Topps set. No interest in the Master set for me even though I may pick up a few of the items. Nice looking Yount set you have going. Are you going for the master set of Yount?

Thank you, Steve. I was very happy to get that one.

Jb, I'm not sure yet, as that would include All Star cards, team checklists, highlights, etc. I think I'll do the basic sets, That's 20 Topps cards, of which I now have 5 graded in a PSA 9 (I added his 1976 Topps second year last night).

My goal is to get the basic Topps set for Yount and Clemente both done. I'm making progress, slowly but surely. :p

Good luck on the journey and beautiful cards! I have been working on my player set for 7 or 8 years now, so I can understand the slowly but surely thing.

Beauties and master sets
 

Thanks for the nice words on the Brooks card, everyone. I think I got a pretty good deal on it and it's just one of those cards I want to stare at all day. :)

And great pickups - awesome Gibson - tremendous color on those borders. ANd the Bench and Younts are fantastic. In fact, you guys are inspiring me to pursue graded Fisk cards.. suddenly my old cards that I collected since 1985 are starting to look a little weak...can't beat the sentimental value of those cards I tracked down one by one at shows and flea markets back in the day, but it sure would be cool to also have nice, pristine copies too! Hmmmm....

Chris,

Slowly but surely is fun, but I've been going at a crawl for a while, and I'm about to start hitting it. I've been working hard on build my savings back up for the last 4 months or so. I am almost at my target benchmark, then I'll just keep adding to it a little more each month.

I just added a PSA 9 '76 Yount beauty last night (perfectly centered), so I've got '76, '78, '79, '80 and '81. The later ones will be pretty easy. The '77 is tough to get as a 9. I'm looking at about $300 for that one, and probably a little more than that for the '75 mini. The standard '75 in an 8.5 will probably be about $500.

Clemente I've got two really nice ones, his '73 and '71. So I'm going to start working on him.

My most recent Bench pickup! Was not planning on getting this one so soon because it is not part of the Bench basic set but I justified it since I will be working on the Bench Topps set after I complete the basic. Never hard to find a good reason to purchase a card of your favorite player.

Here's the '76 Yount, just came in today. This thing is beautiful, and I love the new PSA cases.

http://imageshack.com/a/img673/3258/4P476y.pnghttp://imageshack.com/a/img538/6508/IQPAEh.png

Very nice Yount, Bill.
I have not focused on/looked at the '76 Topps set very much, but this card makes me want to jump in. Well done.

What a fantastic baseball card that 76 Yount is. The cloudy background takes it to another level.

Bill,
Outstanding 76 Yount both front and back.

Fresh from PA, probably a 1970's internal "team" item from Topps:

http://i130.photobucket.com/albums/p...ps124093c7.jpg

http://i130.photobucket.com/albums/p...ps38bbc75b.jpg

The 1976 is very under appreciated/rated. It's rare to find a 1st ballot HoFers 2nd year card so cheap.

Nice Yount, Bill! I don't see any flaws in that "9". It could be a 10 if the grader got lucky the night before!

So true Zach, I'd love to see a 10 next to that, there would be no visible difference. Nice pickup Bill.

That is a thing of beauty. Nice score!

Thank you, everybody.

I agree, Brent. I've been looking for this one in particular for a while, and when I saw it for $60 delivered, I had to jump on it. It's simply sublime.

I would agree with you both. I looked at it again tonight under my 10 x loupe, and to be honest, it really looks like it could be a 10. But it doesn't matter to me, really. My Yount cards will all be 9s except for the '75, which I might start off with an 8.5 on both the regular issue and the mini. There are too many other cards I want to own, and a half point isn't going to cost me sleep at night. :D

August Pickups
 

Another nicely centered '58 Topps all star received today.

Attachment 155761

Loving '75
 

After getting Mr. Gibson in the mail, I was reminded of just how colorful the '75 Topps set is. So, I've decided to start working on the set. I already have this nice '75 Topps Yount. Only the teeny tiny little surface scratch on the upper right hand corner kept this card from being a pretty high PSA grade. Otherwise, the edges and corners are pretty much immaculate. Without that, this is probably a PSA 8, and higher if it weren't for a slight top to bottom centering issue. Still, this is a nice card for the '75 Topps set. When I get my PSA graded card, that will just go in the safe deposit box.

http://imageshack.com/a/img742/2398/9y3Lxt.png

So now to a few new cards. I picked up my first group of '75 Topps, and they arrived today. I'd like to share them. They're exquisite. I'm going to try and build the set as close to near mint as possible. The Winfield and Yastrzemski were sold as EXMT+. I think the Yaz would grade a little higher, but think the grade for Mr. Winfield is spot on. There's a surface scratch on the upper right corner, and as far as I can tell, that's primarily the reason why this was graded the way it was. Once I've completed the set, I'll go back and look at the cards to see which ones need aesthetic upgrades, as the entire set will be displayed on my website. For now, it's a nice card, and gets me one step closer to 660. :D

http://imageshack.com/a/img912/33/GPUGZH.pnghttp://imageshack.com/a/img540/4514/1QqfwV.pnghttp://imageshack.com/a/img661/145/2laEtu.png
http://imageshack.com/a/img661/6383/fWwrDk.pnghttp://imageshack.com/a/img910/8444/9iEzN1.png

I think I have a pretty good idea what at least two of my next few '75 Topps cards will be. :cool:

Nice Bob Friend, Bob. :D

There are a couple National League pitchers from the 50s and 60s I've always felt were overlooked when it came to discussions of star pitchers. Bob Friend and Lew Burdette are on that short list. I bring them up together quite often, and people are surprised to learn that they combined for 400 wins. 197 for Friend, and 203 for Burdette. Two great pitchers from my favorite two teams of that era.

Dave,

Where did you find that? That's a cool piece. I'm guessing that was awarded to the employee who came up with the idea of the '75 Topps mini set. :D

Good start to the month, guys. Let's keep it hopping!

75s
 

Hi Bill, i'm a big fan of 75s too, check out this Brett I got as part of a set buy (sent it to psa for grading):

http://i434.photobucket.com/albums/q...ps40d0979f.jpg

Patrick, that is a very nice Brett card. Let us know how the grade turns out!

Hey guys, nice stuff this month! This is my first time posting to the post-war pick-ups. I've been concentrating on pre-war the past couple of years but have gotten bit by the post-war/vintage bug recently. I won these two Pirate issues that I didn't have last night in the Sterling auction. I also picked up a couple of "freaks". I'm normally not into them and am not sure if there's a market for them like there is with the T206's, but I just thought the matching pair was pretty neat and I couldn't resist for some reason:

Great stuff Guys:

Jason - Great looking Clemente Stand-up. That is a set on high on my next to complete list.

Patrick - awesome Brett, please share your grading results with us.

Bill - the '75 sets are a ton of fun to build, not hard to find any card and with the minis in particular, due to the dealer (his name escapes me now) who hoarded the cases in his basement for years, it's not too difficult to put a high quality set together. Centering was the biggest challenge with my high grade set (Claudell Washington) but still there are plenty. I've always loved the Dick Allen card from the set.

I wish I had a nice card to share, but it's been a slow month on the post war side for me.:(

Down to two!
 

At the national I finally got a Koufax rookie. I am down to just the Mays and Snider for set completion.

I also had SGC authenticate my 1961 Topps Koufax auto. It was a gift in high school, 1994, from my parents. It looks great holdered!

Here is the auto...

Evilbay....got lucky. I think Bad was good in this context LOL :D

Great item for me!
 

I have to bore most of you with background information so you can appreciate how excited I was about this. The Pittsburgh Post gazette has been holding annual dinners in Pittsburgh for I believe about 60+ years. Each year they honor a local sports personality (usually A baseball, hockey or football player). They issue a program which is distributed to the attendees and usually features an image of the honored player. As it is a regional dinner, the suspected quantities that have been printed in the past is very small. The number that survive even smaller.

I collect Roberto Clemente. Clemente was featured on 3 of the programs - 1962, 1967, 1972. The 1967 program has been the "easiest" of the 3 to find, followed by the '72. The 1962 program I have only ever seen twice in 25+ years of collecting. I bought a run of the programs a few years ago and included with a number of them were ticket stubs to the dinner! Really cool accompanying items. The '62 Clemente in the collection was one that had a stub - I was blown away as I had never before or since seen stubs from the dinner.

I happened to be browsing ebay the other night and found an item that was freshly listed with a bin of 14.99. I was extremely excited to be able to grab it. See photo below. Thanks for your patience with the background.

Here's the program it goes with
 

This was already in my collection

^^^^^ great find, Howard! Way cooler than a card or autograph, IMHO. :D

I really like both of those items especially for us mainly single player collectors. Thanks for sharing the pickup and the background story; love it!

Congrats on the find! Thanks for sharing.

The Clemente stand up is sweet as well as the ones above!

Really nice pieces Howard; that program is sweet (and poignant).

A couple for the Dodgers collection came in today.

Attachment 155892

Attachment 155893

Howard, stories like yours are not boring. Quite the opposite, actually. As much as I love a great baseball card, postcard, or ticket stub, the stories about them add that personalized touch that make them even more special. As a fellow Pirates fan, and Clemente nut...er super fan, I think it's great that you were able to add this ticket to your collection. I've had that really excited feeling a few times while checking out on EBay. It's a great boost of adrenaline, isn't it?

A couple more Exhibits and a nice Jenkins rc

Been having real fun seeking sneaky hidden jewels in the low to mid grade space lately. It's like a treasure hunt and the lower the grade I can find with eye appeal the more rare and special I feel the card is for its value.

Had always wanted a PB Joe with centering and focus, an Aaron where the side borders start out evenly sized on top, and a 59 Mick that wasn't washed out color wise. Should have a new batch in today for scanning...

http://www.collectorfocus.com/images...l-joe-dimaggio

http://www.collectorfocus.com/images...-hank-aaron-rc

http://www.collectorfocus.com/images...-mickey-mantle

http://www.collectorfocus.com/images...-mickey-mantle

Picked up this Aaron that I already had. I couldn't help myself. It's the one card I remember seeing in my dad's shoebox before he sold them for $50.
http://img.tapatalk.com/d/14/08/10/uveneqe4.jpg

Well done Matty C. Those cards are outstanding for the grade!

Love the reason behind that Aaron pickup; I think we all have a card or two that connects to a good memory or moment like that.

Thanks JB!

Knew I had to pick this up the second I saw it. Been doing an early Ryan run through 77 and was amazed at how tough the 73 is to find with eye appeal. Auction just ended seconds ago, so the scan from ebay here is a bit crooked; will take a scan with it sitting flush in holder upon arrival...

http://www.collectorfocus.com/images...pps-nolan-ryan

Well done MattyC....exactly how i found my Aaron Rc...I am currently working on something in a trade deal for some of my Mantles i am selling.

Thanks Chris for selling me this fine looking Home Run Derby card of Harmon Killebrew!

On that Home Run Derby Killer, you sure bought the card and not the number. What a killer of a Killer!!! Congratulations on getting that rare card. The eye appeal on that one makes it one of Harmon's top ten, easily. Again, way to go, collecting bro.;) --Brian Powell

Almost done with Mick run...

Never in my life saw a 52B like this one below. And ditto for the centering on the 69-- the 69 has amazed me with how brutally tilted and OC it usually is...

http://www.collectorfocus.com/images...-mickey-mantle

http://www.collectorfocus.com/images...-mickey-mantle

http://www.collectorfocus.com/images...-mickey-mantle

Sharp 69 WL
 

I would definitely take rounded corners and a crease just to have good centering any day!

Word up.

Just found this little ebay gem in the mailbox-- usually so OC, cannot go wrong for $50!

http://www.collectorfocus.com/images...-jim-palmer-rc

Let us know when you get it back, Patrick. That's a sweet Brett.

that deserves a 10!!!!!!!!! [Re: '76 Yount]

Nice pickup :)

Yeah that 76 Yount would look right at home if the sticker said 10, but we all know the dif btw the best 9s and any 10 is just the mood of a grader that day. Would much rather have the 9 as a collector.

You never see those Derby cards. The cool thing about that one is the photo captures a side of him that's cool and edgy, not just the smiling portrait so prevalent in that era.

That Brett would be a LOCK 9 or shot at 10 without that PD up top; regardless it is one of the nicer examples. No tilt. Left-right is just gorgeous.

Kept sifting through ebay like an old gold-miner last night came up on some more hidden gems... Bench will sit flat in holder when tapped and look sick; paying for an 8 or 9 would make me feel like a fool after seeing this 6 look the same for a mere fraction... Never saw a 75 Schmidt without PD... And have always loved every aspect of the 1980 Ryan-- colors, image, All Star banner...

http://www.collectorfocus.com/images...ohnny-bench-rc

http://www.collectorfocus.com/images...s-mike-schmidt

http://www.collectorfocus.com/images...pps-nolan-ryan

Great pickups MattyC. I love the Ryans and look forward to seeing the Mantle run when it is finished.

that's a really nice Schmidt!!

That '80 Nolan Ryan is one of my favorite cards from the set. I just love the whole 1980 set. That will be one of the next sets I build.

Yeah 80 Ryan is one of the more beautiful cards around to me-- just the perfect storm of photo, colors, card design.

Just grabbed these off some ebay BINs. Love it when cards are sitting crooked in the holder in ebay listings; when you get them in hand and sit them flush for a scan they will look money. The Manager's Dream card is so slept-on-- the talent in that photo, and peep the background, is amazing. And finding a Molitor/Trammell with no PD or black dot in the Molitor box is always a treat.

http://www.collectorfocus.com/images...ps-mantle-mays

http://www.collectorfocus.com/images...tortrammell-rc

http://www.collectorfocus.com/images...-cal-ripken-rc

http://www.collectorfocus.com/images...ps-roger-maris

Remember in "the Natural", how Gus had the Magic Eye that "sees all". It could see the money in Roy's pockets, well the paper money, anyway.

You've got the magic eye.

First of all, there has to be something I'm not seeing on that '62 Maris. Because there's no way I'm seeing a 4 when I look at it. It's got really nice edges, which isn't easy with that wood grain, and the centering is nice, too. The '62 Topps are not quite the '71s with the black, but that wood paneling really shows edge flaws. That's a steal for that card. And secondly, as soon as I saw the Molitor/Trammell, I was looking for the black ink. That card is absolutely clean. Beautiful pickup.

You just got a bunch of nice cards.

Thank you, Davino. :)

I couldn't wait to get it in my hands. I raced over, turned on my fluorescent lamp, whipped out the loupe, and spent a good five minutes straight looking at it. I couldn't believe how nice it was.

9..10..I'm just happy to own it. That one's never leaving my collection.

It's been a good month so far

Cool Mays MVP!

Stache-- appreciate the good vibes and Maris props.

Just snagged this Ted; after studying the card for a while, observed that the majority have serious image clarity/focus issues, and the usual bad centering. Was hoping a rare focused one without that strange background patina would surface, ideally an example with some honest corner wear, so as to keep the price down. Finally one hit the radar...

Some others for comparison (which are much more expensive) are shown below, which is why this little 6.5 was so eye catching...

http://www.collectorfocus.com/images...s-ted-williams

http://i741.photobucket.com/albums/x...ps460b2fe3.jpg

http://i741.photobucket.com/albums/x...s0f596888.jpeg

Nice Teddy Matt. You're pick ups are on fire! Keep them coming, and keep posting.
Drew

Matt - wow that '62 Maris is a NICE card, can't see where PSA sees the 4, but either way I'd take that for my '62 set in a heartbeat!

This '61 Face came to day, it's an upgrade to my current one.

Just got a couple '55's and a '63 Fleer

Anyone know who won this?
 

Wondering who the lucky winner was (unfortunately not me :().:

http://offer.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.d...&showauto=true

I'm working on doing some custom cards, so I needed to pick up a few cards for scans. I found a nice Don Money 1974 Topps that fit my needs nicely, and while looking for that, I found this nice Ernie Banks for $20.

http://imageshack.com/a/img674/1113/VWusx7.pnghttp://imageshack.com/a/img661/558/Bjb9Mt.png

My dad was a big Cubs fan, and loved Ernie Banks growing up. So, I thought I'd pick this up to pique his curiosity about the hobby. Here's hoping he'll get a little more interested. Regardless, I got a nice EXMT+ Banks. Until I add his rookie, and a few of his graded cards, this will tide me over. I like this card quite a lot. :) I happen to really like Ernie Banks, too. You'll be hard pressed to find anybody who loved the game more than he does.

"Let's play two!"

Indeed, Mr. Cub. Indeed!

Nice cards, Steve. I must say that I do like getting unslabbed cards.

Love the '68 Banks, your dad will love it! Next opportunity take him to a show, our older dad's who aren't into the hobby, like seeing the cards in person, he may get hooked seeing Mr. Cub smiling back at him!

Banks has some gorgeous cards. One day hope to add a nice low grade RC of his with solid centering.

Found this awesome centered Ted on ebay last night; hits the eye better than some 8s. The Mick is sitting crooked in holder but when tapped down will be perfectly centered, and a step closer to the complete Mick run...

http://www.collectorfocus.com/images...s-ted-williams

http://www.collectorfocus.com/images...-mickey-mantle

I am also putting the '75 set together. Beautiful set. Huge improvement from '74.

The start of my 1956 Topps set and a few others thanks to a fellow board member.

Great looking starter set. Please continue to post your progress on the 56. I think it will be the next set I start to tackle. Good job.
Drew

We know the two players facing the camera, who is in the background? I'm guessing ( left to right ) Elston Howard, John Roseboro, and Aaron. Nice card with lots of star power.

Hey bro.....FYI Hunts Auction has several lots that have 56 topps in them. Check them out.. Lots 892-952, yep over 50 lots, some with 20 cards in a group.

August Pickups
 

My small Dodgers sub back from SGC today. Two were cracked out of PSA 6 slabs, 2 were raw. The Sherry was an upgrade for my (8 of 12) set in progress. I'm having a hard time finding much wrong with the Podres...

Attachment 156646
Attachment 156647
Attachment 156648
Attachment 156649

Bob C