2021 eBay purchase: Pacifically Legends

Pacific Legends: for three years this better-than-expected low-end product from the manufacturer that would eventually be able to produce cards of current Major Leaguers (in English, even!) offered collectors another way of collecting some of the legends and past fan favorites of the game.

The sets came up on my radar last Summer when I was able to grab a couple boxes of the '88 version among a bunch of other stuff (generally smaller boxed sets) on Facebook. Fuji bought one and I busted the other, coming one card shy of a pair of complete sets.

In talking to Fuji about his interest in these sets, I later found out that he decided to keep the box he got from me unopened, and then grabbed the full 220-card '88/'89 set on eBay to go with a complete 1990 set out of a box he did open. This was relevant to me since he generously sent me a near complete '90 set earlier this year.

Thanks to Cardbarrel and Spotlots I was able to finish up my second '88 set and knock out the remaining 90s I needed, leaving me shy just the '89 version. I thought I'd purchased just that from eBay a couple months ago, but it ended up just being something like 20% of it, so I returned it.

Then, in Mid-April what did I come across on eBay but the very same '88/'89 set that Fuji had purchased for himself, also at under $10 shipped.

I pulled the trigger and happily received this package not long after.

As a reminder, the 1988 and '89 products comprised one continuous set, with the former numbered 1-110 and the latter picking right up again at 111 through 220. By the way, a nice bonus of this boxed version was the pair of checklists, which weren't packed out as far as I can tell. I can't claim to have removed the sets completely undamaged from this unorthodox packaging, but I'm fine with how the cards look.

Since I did a long-ass video of my 1988 box break and that allows you to take a good long gander at those cards, I won't show any off here, but I did think it was worth doing some highlights from '89 since I had very few of these in my collection before this purchase:

The Tigers included HOFers Cobb, Cochrane, Greenberg, and announcer Ernie Harwell, whom you would be unlikely to see in a set made by someone else.

I grabbed a back so you could compare it to the '88s. The fronts and backs are pretty much the same between '88 and '89 with the power blue background color on the latter being the only difference; the '88s are yellow. I also thought the back of this Reggie would be fun to scan because "Reggie's Hall of Fame election appears certain." definitely made me laugh.

Here's a selection of some of the legends from the '89 set, all well known names. As you've probably noticed, art work was used for most of the pre-WWII players, possibly to avoid having black & white images mixed in, I'm not sure.

I thought it would be fun to show a few of the fun/interesting appearances as well, from fan favorites to an ump and another broadcaster. A Mad Hungarian, former Tiger, catcher/manager of the Seattle Pilots, and mutton-chopped dude who slugged 50 HR (not to mention an umpire nicknamed "Shag") definitely keep you on your toes!

Since I'm showing those off this evening I though it would be worth doing the same with the completed '90 set since I never formally did that previously, with just a few examples when Fuji sent me the main stack and then some of the ones I bought to complete it.

The Tigers this time included HOFers Bunning and Gehringer (the one UM guy I believe you'd find in all three series), fan favorite Horton, and also HOFer Kell, whom I'm including with this group because he was with the White Sox for all of three seasons, as opposed to seven with Detroit.

If you compare the fronts of the cards in the group above to the '88 and '89 versions you can notice a couple subtle differences in the top corners and "banners" on the bottom, but they're still pretty close. The backs give you more clues that you're looking at a different product, though, especially with the 110-card set starting things back at #1. Color-wise it's like an inverted 1988 card, plus you lose the kind of scroll design for the writeup/stats area. I think I prefer this one a bit more, but there's nothing wrong with the prior versions. Also, how amazing is it that Appling was still alive when this card was made? He passed early in 1991, a few months shy of 84 years old.

There were lots of great choices for legends to show off, like these guys. If you remember some of the membership of the '88 set then you might notice some repeat cameos here, like Aaron (#1 in both), Banks, and Berra, but it's kind of understandable since it doesn't seem like it was meant to be a third series, but its own thing.

There were lots of fun choices among the other fan favorites, though, and I figured at least a few of you would see one or more guys you remember fondly here.

So now I can happily call myself the owner of all three two three (yeah, we'll go with three) Pacific Legends sets from 1988-1990. I got to bust a box, do some old-fashioned set-building, and even sort cards from a previously unopened set, all for under $30. Money and time well spent for sure, once again with a very appreciated assist from Fuji.

On a related note I have two completed '88 sets (#s 1-110) available for trade should anyone ever be interested in dealing for one or both, so hit me up!

I had another eBay pickup arrive just today so that'll probably get its own post soon, plus I'll be trying to get back to the huge Sportlots haul, so keep an eye out for plenty of new cardboard soon. As for me, I'll be enjoying the satisfaction of filing these away in a box in my card closet.

2021 Sportlots purchases part 1: quick summary and set wants

It's been a few days since I got my COVID vaccine, and after about 24 hours worth of side effects I'm feeling great again, not to mention happy that this likely means I'll be able to return to my favorite monthly card show in a few weeks. It's been 13 months since I could go to a show, but fortunately I've been able to keep things going thanks to some of my favorite online sellers. Back in January I gave Baseballcardstore.ca a trial run and declared it a success. Then in early March I gave Cardbarrel another shot for the first time since they'd rebranded from JustCommons, and that went well too.

Shortly after that, having crosschecked prices and availability with Cardbarrel, I put together my latest Sportlots order. This one was another doozy at 650+ cards spread out over 14 sellers. A small percentage of those were set aside for three trade packages, leaving me with more than 600 new cards for my various collections.

I grabbed some set wants but mostly focused on player collections, especially guys that I've been focusing on more recently: Dean Palmer, Tony Phillips, Ted Simmons, and Mickey Tettleton. But I still managed to put together nice stacks of guys like Barry Larkin and other Michigan Baseball PCs (Dick Mountain represent!) along with Al Kaline and some of my Tigers favorites.

There's a lot of stuff to cover and I'll figure out how I'll be posting it as I go, but you can look forward to a bunch of different players, sets, and designs, and even a mix of sizes and formats. I grabbed a ton of stickers plus minis, oversized items, some coins, and other weird stuff. When you PC as many guys as I do you're gonna benefit from lots of variety.

You won't see a ton of variety in this post as I'll be briefly recapping the numbers on this purchase and then beginning the series with cards from my set wants, but no worries, there'll be plenty to gawk at soon! (And if numbers bore you, please feel free to skip down to the cards immediately--I won't judge you!)

Quick summary:

This time my purchase consisted of:

• Approximately 660 cards (estimated due to some the sellers were missing)
• 14 sellers
• $14.21 in seller shipping costs (where the sellers send the cards to Sportlots to be shipped to me when I'm ready)
• $9.46 in Box shipping, for a savings of over $50 compared to direct shipping
• One direct shipment from a seller who offered free premium shipping
• Four missing cards from shipped packages (all successfully refunded) and four more that couldn't be found before shipment (also refunded)
• Roughly $149 total spent in cards and shipping

Today's cards:

Today we'll be looking at the cards I received for sets I'm working on. While I have very few I'm still chasing, I had five I was able to attack here, four or which I finished up:

We'll open things up today with the only card I didn't get more than one of from my 1988 Pacific Legends box break last year. Late Ball Four author and former Yankees pitcher Jim Bouton finishes up a second complete set of this fun low-end fan favorites-type product, and I'll happily make it available in trade to anyone who's interested! I'll also credit this card as the biggest reason I started this latest Sportlots purchase.

Nine years later Score released what I believe were hobby-only premium versions of its Series I and II base sets. Series I's version was called Premium Stock and fronts were gray instead of white while Series II was called Hobby Reserve and went back to the white fronts. Both series' cards were thicker than the regular base and had gold foil stamps up front with the "Premium Stock" or "Hobby Reserve" name. I bought some boxes of both and eventually completed each series...or so I thought.

As I was scanning in a bunch of my Hobby Reserve cards on TCDB I realized that a number of mine were of a variation that had different card numbering than most of the set, which is numbered "HR###" (as seen on the back of Swfit's card). Not one to let that stand, I sought out the "correct" versions I needed, which were helpfully labeled on Sportlots, and I landed the five you see above, all at fairly reasonable prices. Hopefully I'll track down the final five I need so I can re-cross that off my list!

Last up in this scan is a pair of cards from roughly the same point in time. My brother and I collected some basketball for a bit in our younger days so I have a few complete and in-progress sets from the sport. It's been long enough that I can't recall if we bought a box or just some packs of 1997-98 Upper Deck UD3, one of the manufacturer's short-lived but cooler products. Either way, I was apparently only two cards short, with both guys actually being former Pistons. If you weren't aware of UD3, especially its debut version in multiple sports, I highly recommend you check it out!

The other two sets needed enough cards to try to squeeze each pile into its own scan. First is the 1990 version of the Pacific Legends product you just saw. This is a set I've mentioned a few times since Fuji so generously gifted me an excellent starter lot back in January. I found three of the cards I needed for better prices at Cardbarrel and snagged the rest on Sportlots, meaning I only had to pay a couple bucks to sew up another very cool set. It's another who's-who of fan favorites and icons, and I may just have to show the whole thing off in its own post soon!

Last up is 1993 Pinnacle Series I. A huge chunk of this set was part of one of my bigger Facebook Marketplace purchases last year around this time, and it seemed like a reasonable task to try to complete it. One or two TCDB trades got me closer, and between the four cards I grabbed from Cardbarrel and this bunch here I can now call it complete. You can see this is a pretty good group of stars but I got all of them for the minimum $0.18 except for the Griffey, which I had to re-order (still free using a refund/loot!) as the first seller I bought it from couldn't find it. It was fun adding new cards of both Juniors to their PCs as well as to a set I was completing. While I vastly prefer Pinnacle's design from 1994 on, this is a cool early/mid-90s set to have in the old collection.

That's it for today but after I happily get all of these set cards put away I'll work on figuring out what you'll get to see next. Stay tuned for lots of different players on multiple designs, oddball stuff, stickers, and more!

2020 Facebook purchase: boxing day (with recap from last night's break!)

So I ended up doing things a bit out of order by breaking the '88 Pacific Legends box last night before posting this, but then again it's my blog and

Here's a quick breakdown on how this purchase came about, plus a bit of a look at everything I ended up with.

Last Monday I was perusing Facebook Marketplace again and noticed a guy not too far from me had posted a bunch of listings for a few things that caught my eye, starting with boxes of Topps commons from the 70s (and 1980) at very good prices. I was hoping to grab those for Jeff since he's working on a number of those sets, and he was definitely interested in these.

Besides those I was after a nice pile of 80s and 90s boxed sets, plus a couple of boxes of the aforementioned Pacific Legends cards, one of which I offered to Fuji.

Happily everything worked out and after about a 45 minute trip both ways and $80 cash I was back home with quite the bounty. I've already sent Jeff and Fuji their cards, which they can share at their convenience if they feel like it, and now I can cover everything else here.

  

First up: the results of my Pacific Legends box. I had a blast ripping packs, sorting cards, and talking to Fuji, Andy, Chris, and Chris last night, not that the video is a great indicator since I was spending a lot of time off-screen sorting. I don't really do boxes anymore so this was a fun treat for me, even if it came from the junk wax era. The $10 price was perfectly acceptable to me as I chased a complete set, and maybe a second?

While set #2 wasn't quite meant to be--I pulled only one of card #20, Jim Bouton--this was a fun rip of 36 packs of 10 cards each while attacking the 110-card run. Considering how bad collation could be back then, though, one set plus practically a second was a steal at that price! The player selection is awesome--Bill Freehan and Mark Fidrych join the likes of Kell and Kaline, not to mention Teddy Ballgame, Hank Aaron, and more--and the hits kept coming.

I did a quick breakdown and ended up with 367 cards, even when removing the six Tigers I already had in-hand, broken down into:

• Set 1: 110/110, 100%
• Set 2: 109/110, 99%
• Set 3: 60/110, 54%
• 53 quadruples
• 31 quintuples
• 4 sextuples

I'm working on tracking down one more Bouton so I can finish my second set, plus I have some dupes to help others, possibly even Fuji when he breaks his box!

With that covered, the rest of this post will show off everything else I grabbed, which was in the form of 80s and 90s boxed sets that set me back $1, $2, or $5:

Most of them can be seen here, and I'll go into a bit more detail below. The majority of these were a buck with some of the ones on the bottom making up the $2/$5 group.

And my favorite find of this haul was a 1992 Stadium Club Dome package for just $5. It's not that these are rare, but I don't think I'd ever seen one in-person, so having all the pieces is extra cool!

I opened anything that was sealed and got all the cards put in order, because that's always fun, then tried to get a quick look at fronts, backs, and any extras from each box. In this scan you can see (top to bottom, left then right):

• 1986 Donruss Highlights (56 cards): pretty obvious by the name. Includes a mini Hank Aaron puzzle.
• 1986 Fleer Limited Edition (44): a bunch of stars (like Gibby and Sweet Lou, whose card I didn't flip over to show off the back, d'oh!) plus free stickers.
• 1986 Kay-Bee (33): a collaboration with Topps that shows off young Superstars, like Tony Gwynn at the time!
• 1987 Fleer Award Winners (44): another obvious one. Also comes with stickers, which is a common theme among these.
• 1987 Fleer Baseball All-Stars (44): yep, 44 cards and stickers, plus wot it says on the tin.
• 1987 Fleer Limited Edition (44): you can see where I'm going with this. Look up a couple rows in the photo to compare the two designs.
• 1987 Fleer Record Setters (44): why not 45? I dunno! Cool stickers again.
• 1987 Kay-Bee (33): same set size as the year before, but the word "young" is left out and this is all "superstars" chosen quite well--few if any duds.
• 1988 Fleer Baseball MVPs (44): Fleer didn't have any problem coming up with excuses to print boxed sets, and that's fine by me!
• 1989 Donruss Traded (56): I've always been a sucker for trade & rookies-type sets. The real ones, that is, not the monster that Topps Update has become. Nolan Ryan on the Rangers seemed like a good sample card, and this one also came with a mini Musial puzzle.
• 1988 Score Young Superstars I (40): yeah, this should have been above the Donruss cards chronologically. Oh well. This is Series I of the super glossy young star cards Score produced in their debut season, and they also came with the mini lenticular trivia cards the brand would be known for for a few years.
• 1987 Fleer Mini (120): ok, these are here on purpose, at least, since I thought I'd put them last due to their oddball size. That's a little Eric Davis base you see, plus a rad version of the Tigers' best logo in sticker form.

I believe all of these were $2 apiece except for the UD hologram set on the bottom, though one or more might have been a buck more:

• 1989 Score Rookie/Traded (110): that's a good size for one of these sets. I think this one was $3 which seemed reasonable enough when you consider the Griffey seen here is a RC, one I didn't have! Also, more mini holograms.
• 1990 Topps Debut '89 (154): this one kept the standard '90 flagship design but added a banner up top mentioning the player's debut from the previous season. I couldn't help but show off card #84 of Yankees pitcher Kevin Mmahat--what a last name!
• 1990 Score Rising Stars (100): welp, I did it again, probably because I keep thinking Debut '89 is from '89, though it isn't. Anyway, here's another super glossy set filled with up-and-comers (and holograms). A huge stack of these was part of an earlier Facebook purchase of mine but pretty much all of them were damaged, so this was a nice replacement.
• 1990 Score Rookie/Traded (110): very similar to that year's colorful (as usual for the time) base set, except with orange borders. No huge stars to chase here, but some fun stuff, like cards of hockey dude Eric Lindros and football player D.J. Dozier, as highlighted in this Baseball Card Backs tweet yesterday.
• 1992 Upper Deck Team MVP Holograms (54): I already had a few of my PC guys' cards from these, but I just couldn't ignore the awesome packaging and presentation here. The shrink-wrapped packaging has a cardboard sleeve touting how limited this thing is, and that protects a sweet branded hinged plastic case. The super premium holograms were banded together with a COA starring Junior Griffey, too! Each team at the time got repped by their best pitcher and hitter, plus there's a couple checklists, giving you 54 cards.

Last up is the super cool 1992 Stadium Club Dome set, so called because it came packaged in a little replica of Toronto's SkyDome, host of the '91 All-Star Game. If you thought the presentation above was great, try this: the 200-card set goes into a fairly typical box, inside a molded plastic stadium that opens (and looks like R2-D2 at the bottom), and into another cardboard box!

This one includes 100 draft picks, 25 Team USA cards, 56 cards highlighting the '91 All-Star Game, and 19 more covering the playoffs and World Series. I grabbed fronts and backs from all four subsets, with my favorites being the mulleted draft pick and a back starring one of my favorite names in the game, Basil Shabazz. I'm definitely geeked to have such a nice looking Stadium Club set in my collection, and the original packaging is a very nice bonus.

Now that I have these covered I'll be back soon with another eBay buy and at least one more trade package, so watch for those as I figure out how to make room to store all of this!

1988 Pacific Legends box break LIVE link

Watch the break here or head on over to YouTube!

Rainy Sunday post: who's up for a live box break?

It's been a rainy kind of Sunday here in southeastern Michigan and that makes it seem like the perfect afternoon for spending time with some cards I recently purchased. I'll have a good summary up later, but long story short, one of the items I picked up in another fun Facebook Marketplace buy was a box of 1988 Pacific Legends.

  

That's 36 packs of 10 (fairly thin) cards for a reasonable $10. The set is just 110 cards so I'm hoping '80s junk wax collation doesn't prevail and that maybe I can get a couple complete sets out of this!

Is anyone up for watching me bust this low-end but classic box live? I'm posting this here and on Twitter so if I can get a few of you interested for this afternoon/evening, I'll throw up another post with a Youtube link. Just drop a comment here or on Twitter if you're in!