1984 Topps Mattingly etc @ 5-10 cents each

[insidethewrapper]

In 1984 the Topps Wax in Michigan contained the following "Baseball Card Offer". One per pack. You could get 10 cards for $ 1.00 or 20 cards for $ 1.00 + 10 wrappers. That year I opened several cases. For each case ( 36 packs X 20 boxes = 720 Mattingly's and Strawberry's + 8 to 18 other stars etc. for either 5 or 10 cents each. What a deal ! See scan for front and back of offer.

[deweyinthehall]

So to be clear - regular Topps wax packs sold in Michigan each contained one of these offer cards? I had never seen one of these before.

[steve B]

And to handle the demand for star cards, Topps printed special sheets with just stars in multiples. I've seen one of the sheets and have a piece of it I got when the dealer that had it cut it into panels.

[BobC]

Interesting! Was unaware and had never heard that before either.

[steve B]

I was in Mass, and I don't recall where the offer was. Maybe a wrapper? I don't recall the insert offer card.

[Bigdaddy]

I can def say that offer was not in Virginia. We opened a lot of those boxes and probably would have ordered cards as fast as we could lick the stamps.

Just as a thought exercise, which 10 cards would you have ordered at the time? I'd have gone with, in order:

1. Mattingly
2. Strawberry
3. Nolan
4. Tom Terrific
5. Ripken
6. Boggs
7. Gwynn
8. Schmidt
9. Brett
10. Rose

And then just sit back and waited on the flow of cash to come rolling in.

[insidethewrapper]

That's what I did and the cards you listed were the ones I ordered, over and over again. I had to write a lot of checks and had several check booklets made.

[lowpopper]

Originally Posted by steve B

And to handle the demand for star cards, Topps printed special sheets with just stars in multiples. I've seen one of the sheets and have a piece of it I got when the dealer that had it cut it into panels.

please provide a reference to these sheets. very interesting

[bnorth]

Originally Posted by steve B

And to handle the demand for star cards, Topps printed special sheets with just stars in multiples. I've seen one of the sheets and have a piece of it I got when the dealer that had it cut it into panels.

Very cool, I figured they just pulled them off the line and shorted the packs of star players. I know that is what Score done when selling large star player lots.

Yesterday I opened a wax box of 1990 Topps I bought from the original owner and it contained nothing but commons with the exception of a Frank Thomas rookie. My first thought was I got a box from when they pulled the stars to sell in large lots.

[JustinD]

As a kid that saved everything down to wrappers and all my contest cards that any normal kid would have tossed, and also grew up in Michigan, I can confirm these cards 100%.

I never knew these were regional until this thread though, the small print on the front limited it to Michigan, Ohio, and Indiana. Looking at these I must have just put them right in a box as I wish my Mattingly's were this pristine, lol.

[steve B]

Originally Posted by lowpopper

please provide a reference to these sheets. very interesting

Tried finding the panel I have, and no luck in the two most likely places. My assortment of "miscellaneous baseball junk" is apparently way more assorted than I'd thought.

I saw the sheet, held it, tried to buy it. But they wanted what they thought was the breakup value for selling it as panels.
Standard 132 card sheet, no commons, every card was either a superstar, rookie or locally popular player for some team.
The most wanted were in panels of 3 side by side, not vertically like the double prints had been.

If you have old hobby publications, Halls Nostalgia advertised at least a few panels at the time. (85-90 ish the year I don't recall). I got mine from one of their auctions.

Mine will turn up at some point. But probably not soon.

[deweyinthehall]

Interesting that Michigan was also the location of the cello-wrapped "wax" packs in 1983.

If anyone in possession of one of these inserts wishes to consider selling on, please PM me.

[insidethewrapper]

Also opened , not sure what product type from Topps, in Michigan in 1982 and got "Blackless" cards. Topps liked Michigan.

[JustinD]

Originally Posted by deweyinthehall

Interesting that Michigan was also the location of the cello-wrapped "wax" packs in 1983.

If anyone in possession of one of these inserts wishes to consider selling on, please PM me.

I honestly didn’t know that 1983 Topps came in traditional wax packs until the advent of the internet. These wrappers below were in the same box of random stuff.

Honestly Dewey, if you are a completest let me know and we can get one of these to you. Al must have one already because I was waiting for the ultra completest to chime in.