1970 Topps - What should I expect?

[Vintagevault13]

Originally Posted by SOX75

Longtime lurker...finally registered when I saw this thread, so thanks for drawing me out.

I've been working on the 1970 set for the last few months. Most all cards are readily available in all grades. Centering is a real issue with this set.

How are you going to start the set? Buy one, build it, upgrade one?

Here's how I did it FWIW: over the summer I bought a complete VG-EX set from Heritage for $500. Most of the star cards were in pretty good shape (Clemente & Mays) but others were VG (Bench, Ryan). In retrospect I should have probably sold the set for a profit and bought something a little nicer, as I prefer to have my cards in EX-Mint condition. What I did do was go through the set and individually buy cards to upgrade to the condition I wanted. So far I've put over $800 more into the set and I still have to upgrade the Bench and Ryan cards. I've spent more than I wanted but I've built a set I'm pretty proud of with over 90% of the cards having 4 sharp corners.

One thing to take into consideration is the 6th and 7th Series cards (high numbers). They are much more expensive to find in EX grades (min. $4-5 each). If you are trying to assemble the set by hand your cost is going to skyrocket from those cards as well as the Bench, Ryan, Mays & Clemente cards. The Munson Rookie is not too expensive, but some of the league leader, All Star (Rose & Bench) and World Series (Ryan) cards are.

I primarily bought my single cards from Greg Morris on eBay. He is very conservative with his grading; I've never been disappointed. You can bundle a lot of cards and pay one price for shipping as long as you win them within 7 days. He runs 1-2 auctions a week. I've found another seller on ebay who sells high grade, low number cards for only $1. The key is being patient. It might take months to acquire the right card at the right price. I can't tell you how many times I've seen bidders pay $10-15 for a Hoyt Wilhelm or Frank Howard card when they could just pay $2 for the same card from another seller. Being patient has allowed me to pick up some of the high number cards for $2 or less.

My advice would be to try to buy a complete set and pay special attention to the high number cards and Ryan and Bench (both are high numbers). If those cards are good then you'll come out ahead. I've found that prices in private auction houses (Heritage) are more reasonable than eBay (but mind the 20% buyer's premium).

It's a fantastic set, well worth the time and money to collect. Have fun with it.

Great advice. Thanks for sharing your experience. Sounds like you have put together a beautiful set. Just curious, do you keep the set in a binder?

BTW, welcome aboard. Glad I was able to draw you out of the shadows. 😊