December Pick ups

[MattyC]

Originally Posted by jchcollins

Nice card. Finding that one centered well is quite a chore, I've learned after nearly 30 years of collecting. I once had an example that was a solid NM or better, but centered L-R probably a tad worse than yours. Mainly because of that, I didn't hang on to it. Years later, I kind of wish I had because the color on it was really beautiful, and in my old age I'm trying to be a bit more tolerant with things like centering for my personal collection. (It's staggering this day in age when you can quickly look at many different examples of a single card for sale on eBay just how damn many of them are centered poorly - in some cases it's like 80% of the cards for sale outside of PSA 8's and above...and anymore those aren't always even centered that nicely unqualified for some issues). Anyhow - always thought the '57 Mick was one of the neater looking ones - but they are indeed a bear to find centered (and diamond cuts are pretty common too...) or without at least some type of moderate print damage.

Great analysis of the 57 Mick, and jives with my experience as well. As someone who's been collecting pretty much only Mantle basic cards for a year now, I'm continually amazed by how his cards across the board are so often poorly centered, or with specific print defects, making nice ones very hard to find-- in any grade.

For every ten examples I see of a given Mick...sometimes zero are centered. For the 57, few are focused with crisp print, for that 1960 card, whew, a slew of print issues alongside centering, the 67 has that red dot on almost every example above the 'S' in YANKEES, the 53B and 54B cards feel like they show up centered .00000001% of the time, LOL, we've discussed the 51B here, which is infamously hard, the others all have their similar issues-- it all makes assembling a nice run quite the challenge.

[Peter_Spaeth]

Matt is a perfectionist, but for me I can live with centering like this with the right color and print quality.

[jchcollins]

Originally Posted by Peter_Spaeth

Matt is a perfectionist, but for me I can live with centering like this with the right color and print quality.

Yep! The greenish blue hue of the stands behind Mantle is what I was talking about. The nice ones have blue in them, but all too often this card even in high grade has the green and then blackish-brown due to the difference in print variation. My '57 Mantle that I sold probably a decade ago looked like your PSA 7, Peter. Though centering considerations on mine may have rendered it only a 6, if graded.

[jason.1969]

Originally Posted by MattyC

...the others all have their similar issues-- it all makes assembling a nice run quite the challenge.

And here I thought the biggest challenge in assembling a nice Mantle run was how freaking expensive all his cards are!

[MattyC]

That specific PSA 7 of the '57 Mantle pictured up there is pretty much as good as it gets for that card, in my experience, in terms of the centering and print combo.

For comparison, there are a few PSA 8s and even a PSA 9 pictured on the PSA Registry Basic Mantle site, and in my opinion none of those higher graded examples with pictures are superior to that 7-- in terms of overall eye appeal.

It seems sharp corners carry that card to a high technical grade to the graders, but its centering and print woes remain-- for my money, corners take a back seat on that card in favor of print clarity, crisp focus, and centering. Great example, Peter!

[jason.1969]

Loving the Hodges, Mays, and Mantle recently posted. Learned over drinks that my boss loved Chris Chambliss as a kid. Picked him up this (hopefully real) autographed photo. Much appreciated if you can positively ID the other players shown...occasion is his huge HR in the 1976 ALCS. (Am assuming Munson and Carlos May, who was on deck, but let me know.)

Chambliss.jpg

[rjd1]

Originally Posted by jason.1969

Loving the Hodges, Mays, and Mantle recently posted. Learned over drinks that my boss loved Chris Chambliss as a kid. Picked him up this (hopefully real) autographed photo. Much appreciated if you can positively ID the other players shown...occasion is his huge HR in the 1976 ALCS. (Am assuming Munson and Carlos May, who was on deck, but let me know.)

Attachment 215537

Huge Chambliss fan...
Autograph looks good to me
It was Munson and I'm pretty sure Sandy Alomar on deck

[mintacular]

Nice clementes, you done well sir!

[jchcollins]

Originally Posted by MattyC

Great analysis of the 57 Mick, and jives with my experience as well. As someone who's been collecting pretty much only Mantle basic cards for a year now, I'm continually amazed by how his cards across the board are so often poorly centered...

Thanks. Equally good analysis of the run as a whole being difficult, with each set and card having its own particular quirks and idiosyncrasies. My centering score (though I didn't know it at the time; I didn't care about centering as a kid...) was the '56 Mantle gray back I picked-up and have had since I was about 14 years old (about 1990). It's only about a VG-ish card (corner wear, including some paper loss) - but besides being about 0.00002% diamond cut left to right if you look very closely - it is centered perfectly. It is a good example of a mid-grade card that retains a ton of eye appeal because even though it certainly has it's fair share of issues from the technical grading perspective - the color remains bright and that 50/50 centering all the way around just really sets it off. The one Mantle I have held onto since I was a kid because of what it means to me...