Topps Super Bowl Legends Giveaway summary

First, on a brief serious note:
I'd like to give a quick shout out to a post today by Jeff of My Sports Obsession.  His wife was diagnosed with MS and they'll be doing a fund-raising walk next month.  I got to meet Jeff's family a couple weeks ago, and they were great people, plus they're Michigan fans so they're actually OUTSTANDING people.  Jeff's asking for donations and I hope some of you will help out a fellow collector and blogger with something this important, so if you can, please head over to the site for donations!

Give it away, give it away, give it away, now:

After weeks of misinformation and stalling, Topps (wait, Topps was doing a shitty job of customer service and meeting deadlines?!) FINALLY got the Super Bowl Legends Giveaway up and running today.  I had 60 codes, and after realizing they weren't exactly selling like hotcakes, I decided to have some fun and redeem them.


First, here's a look at the prize process:

There are four types of items you unlock:  diecut cards, rings, coins and jerseys.  The cards can be shipped (eventually, this IS Topps we're talking about) but everything else is virtual.  To get to each of those prizes up top, you need to unlock a certain number of "unique" items of each type (not including cards).  As you can see, I had no problem getting to at least 10 of each type, so I got three free codes, three 10% off discounts for Schlocks.com and three free entries for an autographed Namath (the drawing will be at the end of January).  To get an automatic Namath auto you need all 45 of any one of those items.  Items can't be traded for different items (e.g. you can't trade rings for jerseys or even cards for anything but cards) and I'm sure some of these are rarer than others.


Here's a very brief summary of what I had immediately after I entered my codes:

• 5 cards: James Harrison (43), Howie Long (18), Jerry Rice (23), Jordy Nelson (45), Reggie Wayne (41)
• 23 rings: 17 unique, dupes of Colts, Packers, Ravens, Earl Campbell X2, Len Dawson
• 16 coins: 13 unique, dupes of Packers (31), Colts (5), Redskins (17)
• 19 jerseys: 14 unique, dupes of Cowboys (27), Raiders (15), 49ers (24), Packers (31), Chiefs (4)

So many doubles you'd think this was a physical box of Topps!  You can see how I'm doing working on the prizes in the screen shot above, and also here:

Right now, without more code cards (which I'm working on buying, but only at bargain basement prices--I'm not THAT obsessed) the Namath may be a pipe dream, but I'm still trading and seeing what I can do.  I'm also working on trades for the cards themselves, but here's what I started with:

I do have to say the cards look like they may be very nice (and maybe serial numbered?).  Frankly I'll be happy if I can end up with the Tom Bradys in the set and get those shipped, maybe along with the Rice if I can hold onto it.

My impression thus far is that this is another D+ Topps online giveaway effort--the codes proved to be almost worthless and they've barely improved the trading system.  Also, just because they know I love my "Topps is dumb" tag, here's what happens if you request to get a card shipped:

Well why AREN'T the cards "aviable," Topps?  Is "activiation" a new process you just invented or did you pull your entire customer service team from a pool of idiots who comment on YouTube videos and message boards?

Topps in one beautifully concise meme

It's not so much that I don't like having to wait until mid-October (right, we all know they'll meet THAT deadline) for my cards to ship--I just can't believe that after literally weeks of the site being overdue they didn't have someone with at least a third grade education proofread a site intended for the public.

Well, at least this didn't feel like the kick in the nuts that the baseball giveaway always offers.  Should any interesting developments with my progress on this ensue, I'll make sure to post something about it.  Until then, enjoy your usual overdue, overpriced, cookie-cutter shit from Topps! 


Edit, 9 pm:  Thanks to some wheeling and dealing, and especially to the generosity of Ted from Crinkly Wrappers, I now have the following:

• 24 unique rings
• 17 unique coins
• 19 unique jerseys

I managed to trade away all my doubles (including all three of my Earl Campbell rings accidentally, but no big deal) to end up with the numbers above.  On the third and final code Ted donated to me, I also hit this, my best so far:  

That's pretty cool, to be sure, so a big thanks again to Ted.  I now have six cards (all different) including the Montana to Rice combo.  Unless I can turn it and another card into both Bradys, this one's staying with me.

I haven't seen this many Calvins since the Reformation

I'll just cut to the chase:  this here card was in my mailbox today:

That's a 2008 Sweet Spot Red Stitch/Blue Ink auto of the Iron Man, which doubles my current total of Cal autographs.  No offense to the awesome one Beardy sold to me recently, but this one's my favorite of the two because I've always been a fan of the Sweet Spot Signatures that look like this, mainly because it's the next best thing to having an actual ball signed.
I got what I considered a very nice deal on this through Blowout (of course) in paying quite a bit less than what I was finding on eBay, so naturally I had to jump on it.  
For those of you who are interested (which I hope is a couple of you since at least I'm not posting a bunch of new Michigan PC stuff today) this goes along with four jerseys (including a dual with Gwynn), a manupatch, a bat/jersey and a bat.  All can be found as always in my Ripken favorites collection.  Hooray for sick PC autographs of your favorite player ever!

Final 2011 Topps football case break sales report

Well, it's been three weeks since I busted my 2011 Topps football jumbo case.  As a refresher, here are the results:

• Hits
• Base and Wolverines (plus design grades)
• Inserts and final grades

I made it clear from the get-go that this would be an experiment for me to experience busting a case and trying to sell the contents (anything that wasn't personal collection-worthy, of course).  So how did I do?  Entirely through Blowout's forums (because I don't trust screwBay and I didn't wanna pay even more fees) I sold the following (all prices are shipped and obviously don't account for eBay fees or what I actually paid for shipping:

• Aaron Hernandez, Matt Forte, Randall Cobb, Jordan Todman, Bilal Powell autos, Ryan Williams Rookie Patch:  $25
• Most of the Golds (29) and Minis (57):  $30
• Kyle Rudolph Rookie Red Zone auto, Santonio Holmes and Jason Witten autos, Kyle Rudolph Game Day jersey, Jordan Todman Rookie Patch:  $65
• Black Chad Greenway:  $8
• Cameron Heyward Printing Plate:  $25
• Greg Little, Marcell Dareus, Leonard Hankerson Rookie Patches:  $12

All told I pulled in a grand total of $165 (again, not including fees/shipping).  This was my return on paying a bit over $500 for the case.  So what did I learn?  More bullets!

• Busting cases is fun!  Well, I already knew that, but busting cases entirely for me is fun!
• It's not remotely easy making a profit.  That wasn't my ultimate goal--really I was hoping to get half my money back, which is still possible if I can finish up and sell a few of my sets.  Wanna buy a set?  If I can't get a good price for them now I'll hold onto them for a time when they're worth a bit more and then try to get something for them.  I also have a couple more decent hits that could bring me some cash eventually.
• It's not the easiest thing in the world making deals as a seller either.  However, I really didn't get lowballed all that much, at least not as much as I was expecting.  Because I know as a buyer I'm only happy with a low price, I worked with each person as much as I could, especially when they bought multiple items.
• I didn't get top dollar for my items by not using eBay, but I felt much more comfortable knowing I wouldn't get screwed as a seller by forgoing that option.
• Don't give buyers so much leeway.  Early on, I had a guy with a pretty good reputation on Blowout ask about a good number of my best hits.  We eventually worked out a decent price on the condition that we would also work on each others' set wantlists. Although several people made offers on some of those same cards, I held onto them for him despite a couple weeks of "I'll have your lists tonight."  I eventually found out he had a personal situation, but I ended his dibs on those cards right then because he should have been more up-front and said "I have a situation, but by this date I can deal again."  Fortunately, I found an excellent buyer who was willing to take most of that stuff, plus I got a bit more for almost everything else he wanted as well.
• These cases are really hit or miss.  About three of my boxes produced pretty nice stuff, but the others were relative duds, especially compared to what I've seen.  It still doesn't look extremely easy to come close to profitability on these cases, though I realize they're not exactly designed for that.
• Most importantly, I won't be getting into the business of busting cases to resell items for cash--I just don't have the time or skills to maximize my profit (or even make one apparently).  But I'm totally glad I tried this, and I hope it proved to be useful info for some of you too.

What's left?  Well, I have the following stuff remaining, which is still for sale, but now available for trade as promised:

All available except the Jenkins--headed to BA Benny

I'd really like to get cash for the Black Jones and may try to sell that individually, but wow me with an offer and it's yours.

I also have three base sets available right now (with hopefully one more up for grabs soon as well).  I'm asking $35 dlvd on those, but I'll work with you.  If you want to trade for one I might be willing as long as you pony up for shipping and give me fair trade value.

Thanks for following along with this crazy experiment--I hope you had some fun with it too, especially vicariously since I'm the one that took the shot to the wallet!  One thing I should stress though, is that, as I intended, any money I brought back in selling stuff was spent on more cards, as you've likely deduced from my recent (and future) Blowout acquisition posts.  Cards über alles!

A Blowout trade bait twofer

Not that Toofer

Another small lot makes for a good quick post on this fine Thursday, nine days before the start of Michigan's football season:

These 2011 Topps patches of McCutchen and Reyes were a ridiculous $5 delivered, so I jumped all over them knowing I could trade them to a couple people who'll be thrilled to have them:  McCutchen's heading to Dustin of No Relics Pulled and Reyes will be part of my trade to end all trades (until the next time we trade) with Mike of BA Benny's Yada Yada Yada (since it's one of like 80 teams that he collects).  I know not everybody likes manupatches (I'm not in that group unless they're very poorly done) but I think $2.50 a pop for these was a steal, especially when I know a couple collectors who'll want them.


Not much content today, so thanks to the Reyes patch I'll again post one of my favorite Simpsons moments:

"The Nye Mets are my favorite squad-ron"

More Blowout loot to come shortly, including an exciting new addition to my baseball PC!

Trade post Tuesday with Hiflew

Johnny/Hiflew (Cards From the Quarry) and I agreed to a trade at some point recently, that much I'm sure of, because I vaguely remember sending him stuff, and he reciprocated by sending stuff back that arrived to me today:

First up is this JJ Putz 2008 Topps Heritage Chrome parallel.  Compared to some of Michigan's recent baseball alumni, JJ's had a pretty nice career (plus he's still kicking ass for me on my fantasy team this year).  As far as non-hits go (I do collect those too!) this is a super addition to my Michigan baseball PC.  Topps Heritage is pretty reliably a beautiful set, and that plus Chrome equals awesome.  As usual, these are numbered (this one's a difficult-to-read 0962/1959).  I think this is part of what started this deal because I remember asking Johnny about it a while ago.

Next is this Chris Perry 2004 SAGE HIT Silver auto.  Perry was a beast of a running back and a Heisman finalist at Michigan, and here we have a great shot of him determined to pick up a big gain in a game or practice (or at the park, in his full uniform for some reason).    Welcome home, Chris Perry #13.

Finally, Johnny sent over a David Terrell 2001 SPx Winning Materials ball/jersey.  The older football versions of these often turned out more interesting than their baseball counterparts, and I think this is a great example.  In this football set we get a couple small swatches, but one's a non-white jersey, and the other is a ball, which I feel, without any facts to back it up, is rarer than a bat card when it comes to baseball relic stuff.  For comparison's sake, here's what I'm talking about in an example from the same year:

I love my Ripken relics, but the Terrell is hands down much better in my opinion.  (Did you notice how I both explained which one I preferred and detailed why, Chris Olds?)  Rounding out the card are a nice action shot of Terrell plus one of my favorites--serial numbering (105/750).  Just curious, do you people prefer serial numbering on the front or back?  It doesn't make a huge difference to me, but in general I like it on the back because I like the front to have enough going for it that it doesn't need numbering to improve it.  Anyway, that's David Terrell #26 for me.

Three quality Wolverines PC additions equal a great trade package for me, plus I'm pretty sure I dumped my unwanted Rockies on Johnny, so this deal was even better for me, but hopefully a win-win overall.  Thanks for an awesome third trade, Johnny!

It's like a virtual card show for about two-fiddy, plus WTF Chris Olds?

Mandatory Blowout purchase section:

Yadda, yadda, Blowout, right?  I realize I just did the mad libs thing, so I'll just keep this one simple:  six cards for $17 as they were $2.50 each out of the guy's Picasa Web Album (which he was still calling a Bucket for some reason).  I grabbed three for me and three that were trade bait, which explains the card show reference in the title--almost every time I go I get about 50% PC stuff and 50% trade bait, but never on purpose.


Trade bait:

• Brooks Foster 2009 Bowman Draft College Letter Patch Auto "R" (#039/173) (North Carolina)
• Aaron Brooks 2001 Topps Reserve auto
• Syndric Steptoe 2007 Leaf R&S patch/auto/RC (#093/299)

The Steptoe is destined to go to Tim, and if he doesn't take it, he'll be dead to me (people will say "Did you see Tim's latest post?" and I'll say "Yeah, it's a shame the way he went, though, at the fireworks factory--who would have thought he'd get run over by a clown car there?").

The other two are up for grabs for now.  The Brooks is a BA Benny-preferred card, but I'm certainly open to offers since I probably have more than enough to send his way.

Now for the stuff for me:

Adrian Arrington 2008 SP Rookie Threads Signing Day auto:  I'll start by saying I really like the design on these for some reason.  It might be the way the autograph section really pops, plus you can't really tell it's a sticker until you look up-close because it's clear.  It doesn't hurt that Arrington has an interesting autograph.  This is #18 of him in my collection and continues my streak of nothing but autographs of the former Michigan WR.

Charles Woodson 2006 Fleer Fabrics jersey:  W00t for doubling my Woodson hit collection.  Although he's pictured here as a Raider and the swatch might actually be from a black Oakland jersey (I really can't tell), I'm counting this as a Packers card because that's the listed team, that's who he just won the Super Bowl with, plus Oakland just outderped themselves and spent a THIRD-ROUND PICK in the supplemental draft on Terrell "Everybody murders" Pryor.

Jason Avant 2006 Prestige jersey RC:  A nice green rookie-year swatch of the sure-handed receiver.  I'm hoping for good things for Avant with Vick QBing now that he has a full year under his belt back from suspension.  This is Avant #17 for me, by the way.

Look for more, as usual, pretty soon, including another very exciting addition to one of my baseball PCs!

WTF, Chris Olds?:

I generally object to many of the things that Beckett's editor Chris Olds does--his box breaks annoy me to no end, and of course he's part of the "Hobby has never been better" up-your-ass smoke-blowing committee--but I picked today to ask "WTF?" about his latest piece of "journalism."  Here, Olds explains why Bull Durham is not his #1 baseball movie.  So far, so good--I'm not sure it's mine, either, and I have a hard time choosing one above the rest.  His main beef is that the teams Durham plays in the movie are geographically ridiculous and overall inaccurate.
While I disagree with this as a major reason to knock a movie down on your list, I don't dispute his right to use whatever criteria to order it.  What I'm most annoyed by   is that the article/editorial has zero purpose:  it's very short, its lazily-written, and most importantly, it doesn't even mention what his #1 baseball movie IS.  If you enjoy one-to-two sentence paragraphs explaining inaccuracies and literally nothing else, you're in for a treat.

It's crap like this that really makes me appreciate my fellow bloggers for the interesting and often insightful content they bring every day.  I won't pretend that as an English major I don't cringe at the usual array of spelling and grammatical errors that come with the territory (I'm only human!) but at worst I still get about 10 blogs worth of content a day from my subscriptions that trump the drivel Beckett's editor decided to crap out today.  Maybe Beckett needs to do a better job of incorporating user-generated content from, you know, the collectors that give its magazine a reason for existence (or, not really since its been a long time since the prices have been anything but obsolete).  That's my long way of saying, "WTF, Chris Olds?" and it may not be the last time I do.

More USPS incompetence plus another Dimwitted trade

USPS, where our motto is "You mail, we fail" or "You ship it we rip it" or "You send it we bend it" or "You pay us money to transfer it to another party and we damage it, lose it or poop on it and then damage or lose it, but hey, sometimes we deliver it!":
Some of you might remember that a couple months ago I made a brief mention of an eBay purchase I was awaiting in the mail.  You might also remember that it never arrived.  The seller was one of the better ones I've dealt with and despite the increasing frequency of scammers who pull this stunt after actually receiving the card, he refunded my money.  Good guy.


Flash forward to today, when this gem graced my mailbox:

Captain Picard, help me out here.

WTF indeed.  After being able to see a good-sized chunk of what's inside, I used my years of collecting experience to recognize what had to be the back of an '89 Donruss card.  "It couldn't be," I thought, "could it?"  It could be and it was:

These are the 2001 Donruss Rookie Reprint of Ken Griffey Jr. and its parallel version.  The scan of the parallel front doesn't really do a good job of portraying the "20th Anniversary" logo being as holographic as it is compared to the regular version, but that's the biggest difference aside from the serial numbering being exactly 1000 lower.

I bid on this auction because I'm pursing the Rookie Reprint set--there's a lot to like about it, especially the serial numbering out of the year the cards were produced, and most importantly, the fact that Donruss doesn't/didn't reprint its cards literally every single year for no rhyme or reason.  The fact that the parallel version was included was a nice bonus and it gives me another cool Griffey to add to my collection, but my main focus is on the regular set, and I hope to have it done soon because it would be awesome to show off.


I now need these:  3 5 10 11 14 17 18 20 21 23 25 28 29 32 37 40
so if you have any, please trade them to me, I'll give you something good.  And the good news is, if you mail them to me, I might even receive them!


Trade with Sam = Too Magglio Verlandersons:
Sam of the Daily Dimwit and I had kind of been working on a trade for a month or two recently before he moved, but now I'm glad to say we never finalized a deal until last week.  The reason the procrastination worked out in my favor can be found in this post.  Sam pulled a gorgeous Verlander autograph and gave me first crack at it, which was an awesome thing to do.  I'm sure he'll show off his end of the deal as soon as they arrive since I took so long to ship them while waiting to consolidate a bunch of shipments into one trip, but here's what I ended up with:

Curtis Granderson 2009 Allen & Ginter jersey:  This is my first Granderson relic, embarrassingly enough, but it's a great one.  I have no love for the baseball-phobic A&G base set or the craptastic results of their boxes, but I do like how Topps has done these framed mini relics the last few years.  A card without Granderson smiling is like Jim Leyland winning a division title--you're just not gonna see it in your lifetime.  A great start to the package and the making of a new trifecta.

Magglio Ordonez 2009 UD Piece of History Franchise History jersey:  Oddly enough this is my first Magglio relic too, but that's not as important because his name isn't part of the title of my blog.  I do have this 5x7 autograph of him but I haven't counted it as part of my Tigers hits because he's still with the White Sox there (I may relax that rule eventually).  This makes another trifecta for me since I have a ton of his RCs from 1998.


And the money card,

Justin Verlander 2007 UD Black Prodigious Autographs auto:  My second Verlander auto is this stunning number from UD black, pulled by the mojoriffic hands of the Dimwit himself.  I love that it's #d 50/50 (hurr eBay 1/1 durr!), I love that it's shiny and thick as hell, and most of all I love that it's another autograph of the AL's #1 pitcher this year.  Not only is he putting up ridiculous stats, he's the foundation of a castle that would otherwise sink into the swamp without him (several times).

So needless to say this has been one of my favorite trades this year.  Big thanks to Sam, and I hope you enjoy your haul just as much, whenever it gets to you (and may it arrive timely, unopened and unpooped-upon).

Wait, someone ELSE is obsesses with Wolverines

Time to pimp another contest, this time for a fellow Michigan collector:

Get in over here to enter Jeff of My Sports Obsession's 100th post contest.  The lucky four winners will get to pick from packs that look like-a so:

Not a bad selection at all.  Leave a comment, follow and pimp for your three easy entries.  Also, a big congrats to Jeff on post #100!

While I'm at it, Sam/Dimwit, Eric and Brian, your stuff went out tonight so you'll hopefully each see it in your respective mailboxes soon!

Blowout purchase mad libs

Hi everybody,


Last week I bought a bunch of stuff from Blowout and one of those packages arrived in my mailbox today.  This time I got a nice deal on a pair of Michigan autos of a couple of my favorite players:

Here we have a Braylon Edwards 2005 Topps Rookie Premiere auto.  I like this card a lot because Braylon is an awesome former Michigan star and I love autographs.  This is card number 29 of Bray-Bray and is a welcome addition to my collection.

Rounding out the small (but large as well, as you'll see in a moment) package was this 2008 Elite Jake Long 8x10 auto.  I was told that these were given out at the National (not sure which one, maybe 2008).  It's a shame that it's a bit scratched at the top (the yellow spot under the "O") but this is just a ridiculously awesome and unique card of one of the best tackles in Michigan history and it'll look great framed on my wall.  I now have 30 cards of Jake, which means he's tied with Chad Henne at the top of my PC, with Braylon behind by one card--very cool!


Considering how relatively rare these are, I feel like I did fairly well spending $30 for both.  I'm now up to 327 Michigan hits and counting, and you can bet I'll be right back to buying on Blowout as soon as I'm done with this post!


Ha, now that I have a template these posts will practically write themselves!

Mail Monday manupatches (but no chrome scratches)

A quick post on a gorgeous late summer Ann Arbor day which is better spent outside than sitting and waiting for Topps to flip the switch on the Super Bowl Legends Giveaway.  Today I feature two new (you guessed it) Wolverines hits that I grabbed from (right again) Blowout at a very nice price.

Braylon Edwards 2005 Zenith Prime Signature Cuts manupatch/auto/RC:  First of all, do not adjust your monitors--the signature just looks blurry due to the fabric/pen combination.  This is just a sweet looking card that also happens to be a Bray-Bray RC.  Although every card in the set looks this way, I can pretend that he signed a sideways "I" from "Michigan" a la the SP Threads Lettermen cards.  Serial numbering boosts the card's value to me as usual, and the mention of some historically great Michigan WRs puts it over the top.  The single best feature, though, may be Braylon's face, which is the kind of face I'd imagine I would make myself if the photographer said "Smile!  By the way, you'll be stuck in Ohio for the next few years!"

Chad Henne 2008 Prestige NFL Draft Patch auto:  Also an autographed manupatch numbered to roughly 100, this Henne looks great.  I'm generally cool with the way Panini does their various versions of these, as evidenced by my Mike Hart Colts version from Rookies & Stars of that year.  I'd definitely like to get one with a Michigan patch, like my EEE baseball Putnam and LaMarre editions, but I like this one a lot too because I'm such a fan of the 2008 draft class. As with the Braylon, there's a couple features that put this card over the top for me:  serial numbering and a Michigan uniform shot.


This pair of autographed manupatches of former teammates at a great price made for a pretty nice mail day.  Up next should be one last Blowout pickup, sometime this week, then within the next couple weeks you should see a few new blogger trade packages from some familiar faces!

Michigan garage sale and fan day, plus lots of trades!

Lots of stuff going on this weekend!  First up today, I headed down to the Michigan football garage sale with Dustin (who brought a couple cards you'll see below).  Intending to buy some football stuff, I actually only ended up with a 2007 Rose Bowl program for $5 (yeah, I know we lost, but it has a ton of great former Wolverines in it) in that sport.  However, I was luckier in terms of baseball stuff, as you'll see below.
We also met up with Jeff of My Sports Obsession, who drove up with his family for this event and the fan day event as well (which you'll also get to see below--starting to see a trend?) and he brought some stuff so we could do a little in-person trading.
About the only unrelated part of the weekend--but not really because trading was involved--was a great trade package I got from Ted of Crinkly Wrappers (see:  below).  Let's knock these out one at a time:


Garage sale and fan day:
I'll start with the more disappointing part of the afternoon:  fan day.  This was supposed to be a free autograph session where you could meet the various position groups and get free signatures (and maybe pictures), one per person.  Despite that limitation, and despite getting there almost two hours before the start of the event (AND despite Jeff and his family giving me cuts), I came away with nothing due to organizational incompetence.  From the sounds of things, this is the first year in a while things were this bad, and they seem to owe mostly to Denard Robinson's presence, plus construction-type stuff.  Still, it was pretty sad, and by the time I tried hitting up other lines or even just getting down onto the field, it was too late.  I at least took it like a man, though--you should have seen grown men bitching and using every excuse in the book while bemoaning missing out on FREE autographs.  I'm not happy with how things went, but you won't see me crying about it--there's always next year.
The upside (besides hanging out with Jeff's hilarious family for a few hours, including his daughter who wanted a sharpie to scribble out the Notre Dame players on her magazine) is that I got a few fun photos:

Here's the Denard line, which gives you an idea of why we never made it--people were about 8-10 across on the stairs and I think he was allowing photos, plus he left about 15 minutes early.

Here's the back of one of the scoreboards, both of which are getting upgraded

This is what the line looked like outside the gates (and stretching around into the parking lot) about an hour before the session started.

A view of a new scoreboard from the bleachers

And the other one, across the stadium

Fans enjoying themselves on the field.  Coach Hoke was signing in the lower right corner there, but there was no way in hell I'd be able to get him today

Another view of the field

...and one more, just because

So, yeah, disappointing, but at least earlier in the morning I had better luck at the garage sale.  I was planning on nabbing a practice/game-worn jersey, football or something else, but most of the good stuff was gone by the time we got there.  Not so in terms of the baseball stuff, though!  Dustin grabbed a jersey for himself, and I couldn't help but grab three different versions because they looked great (and at $20 were cheaper than store-bought stuff!).  Here they are before I wash them and try to get them in slightly better shape before I wear them

...and Dustin brought some cards:
Dustin and I see each other on campus often enough to trade quite a bit, so we're always flipping stuff back and forth.  Today he brought me a couple sweet additions to my PCs:

A very Sparkly J.J. Putz

Sweet!  A new Ripken, and it's a mini with a great shot of him in action at SS

 How could I say no to two awesome cards like that?


...then Jeff brought stuff today too:
I managed to track down Jeff at the garage sale and we arranged a bit of a swap.  Here's a look at some of the stuff I got from him:

A brand new Super Mario, this one hailing from 2008 Absolute Memorabilia.  This was the highlight of the deal for me, but I got other nice stuff as well.

Autographs of a couple erstwhile Tigers.  I may include these in my Tigers PC or I may flip them to another Detroit collector, we'll see

A few new Wolverines, a new Griffey, A 2011 Topps Gwynn reprint, a new Hill, a full-size Ripken to go along with the Mini Dustin gave me, and a couple George Sislers, including another Mini

This Gwynn is from an oddball set called Topps Heads UP! baseball stars.  It has a suction cup in the back so you can stick it wherever.  I may put it on my screen door on Halloween to scare the kiddies.  This is worth it for the 'stache/mullet-ish thing alone!

I'm sure Jeff and I will be trading again in the future, but as always it was great to meet a fellow blogger and trader in person, especially one who's such a big Michigan fan.  Bo bless you for spreading the Maize and Blue word in enemy land to the heathens of Notre Dame, good sir.

...and finally, cards from someone I didn't meet this weekend:

Ted and I had a trade on the backburner for a while, which worked out well for me because I had time to sort through everything and pull all my Blue Jays I no longer wanted.  I sent those his way, and this weekend I also got my stuff from him:

We'll start here with a bunch of great looking Verlanders and Grandersons.  I think the Turkey Red Granderson is my favorite of the group, it's just an outstanding looking card.

Next up were some Wolverines and set wantlist cards.  I highlighted these two because Richard is also a former Wolverine, and the Blue Jays are obviously Ted's team.  In all, he helped me with seven different sets.

Finally, more Tigers:  vintage Tigers, old Tigers on vintage-looking cards, current Tigers on vintage-looking cards, perfect Tigers, die-cut Tigers, gold Titers, former Tigers, rookie Tigers and brand-new Topps set Tigers.

Big thanks to Ted and I look forward to trading with him again.

I believe between this post and my card show recap yesterday I was able to cover everything that happened during this action-packed weekend.  Look for more Blowout buy content this week!