One Last Item From the Vault...

I really enjoy collecting certified autographs and like to steer clear of in-person autographs unless I have extreme faith in the person or I am getting the autograph myself.  Those always make for good stories.  One of the biggest problems is that we are now down to a sparse few card companies who do not vary their autograph field greatly from product to product.

For example, I try to collect as many Cardinals and Rays autographs as possible.  The Cardinals are my favorite team to follow, but also enjoy watching the Rays since many of their players spent time playing for my hometown Durham Bulls.  I dabble in the Tigers and have a few other players I check in on, but the list of items going into my collection is not really all that wide.  You would think that would still leave me plenty of cards to chase down, but it seems like Topps excels at having the same few players for each team sign for each product.

So, I ask myself somedays: How the hell am I going to get a certified, or highly reliable Tony Cruz autograph?  I do not live in St. Louis anymore, he's not making an appearances in the Raleigh-Durham, or central North Carolina area, and I know Topps will not put him as a signer in a baseball product.  It's not that I am singling in specifically on Tony Cruz, I am not.  However, he's a useful role player on the Cardinals and has now been on the team for several seasons.  It would be a nice addition.

This is an area where the Topps Vault can come in handy.  Sure, Topps is not rushing out to make the first certified Tony Cruz autographed baseball card for a 2014 Topps product, I am sure the Cardinals will have Holliday, Lynn, Jay, and Craig, but since he has a card in their base set he has signed a card contract.  Topps actually puts their invalid, out of date baseball contracts, up for sale in their Topps Vault Ebay Store.

Just this past week I was making my weekly stop in to check out their new items and ran across a sweet  autograph of former Cardinals player, and current Cardinals employee, Kerry Robinson.  This was probably my one chance to snag a certified autograph of the Cardinals, and fellow SEMO (Southeast Missouri State) alumni, unless Topps is coming out with a front office employees of Major League Baseball set.  For $9.99 I picked it up.

I own a couple of these Topps contracts now, all really inexpensive.  Robinson is just the latest addition to my collection, of a Cardinals player, I have found in the Topps Vault.  For those not fimiliar with Kerry Robinson, he was originally drafted by the Cardinals and ended up on the expansion Rays (the 1998 Durham Bulls) and the Reds before returning to the Cardinals.  Robinson played three seasons for the Cardinals from 2001 through 2003.  He pinch hit for Mark McGwire in the last game of Big Mac's career and had this hit against the Cubs: 

The Topps Vault is a great way to pick up a certified autograph of some really cool players.  Now, I am filling in my Cardinals autograph collection and usually end up finding my autographs for less than $15.  Better players can fetch high dollars, but sometimes you'd be surprised and can walk away with a solid Major Leaguer for between $20-$30.  At the end of the day you will have a very unique collectable and a great item for your collection.  I have actually thought about having one or two of mine framed for my Cardinals room.  

More Goodness from the Topps Vault

Last night I shared a cool proof card of former Cardinals outfielder Ray Lankford which had been picked up originally from the Topps Vault.  If you are not familiar with the Topps Vault, it's basically an Ebay store that Topps uses to sell off its old pictures, proofs, and player contracts.  Some of the items are really fun to look at and every once in while I will pick up a card or something else from the store.

Most of my purchases from the Topps Vault would be best described as unique baseball cards I do shop the store for unique items too.  Mainly I am looking for cool items, which fit into my collection, and would look cool displayed in my man cave.

A few years back I picked up a set of photo proofs from the 2003 Topps Gallery Hall of Fame set from the Topps Vault:

2003 Topps Gallery Hall of Fame George Sisler Photo Proof 

2003 Topps Gallery Hall of Fame Jim Bottomley Photo Proof 

2003 Topps Gallery Hall of Fame Frankie Frisch Photo Proof 

 


There a pretty cool item that I decided to buy, for less than $10 each, after reading the descriptions of the photo proofs.  Each photo proof is roughly 4 x 5 and is a piece of transparency with a color picture printed on top of the clear material with a heavy piece of white cardboard dropped in behind.  I am not sure what the transparency paper is exactly, but as a teacher, it is stiffer than the transparencies you might have seen around a school back in the day.  The top of each plastic piece has a label which reads Kodak EPY which is a Tungsten based film used for slides.

Again, I am not sure what steps Topps takes in making their cards, so I am not sure where these cards fit into the process, but the cards do have labels underneath the pictures that are curious.  The labels identify the card year, player, team, and card number.  The last line is the curious part of these proofs which is the artist line.  Each artist line is dated, but the last two cards have a date listed in 2006, which is after production.  The Sisler card has a 2002 date.  I am not sure what to make of the dates on the last two cards, but it is certainly been a detail I have always found curious about those two proofs.

I have really enjoyed having these three items in my collection and have each of the proofs framed and hanging up in my man cave.  I put each in a nice black frame and have them hanging on a small wall right inside the door to the room.

Odd Ray Lankford

Sometimes I have a hard time figuring out some of the things that Topps puts for sale on the Topps Vault auctions.  It's fun to look at and obviously some of the stuff on there is cool to scout out.  I'd like to buy one of those Topps Player Contracts and hang it on the wall of my man cave, but there are also plenty of odds and ends too.  I am always amazed at the number of proof items they have up for auction.  Slides of players, sample photos, sample cards, blank back proofs, blank front proofs.  With all of those rough drafts and edits flying around you would think that Topps would make a few less errors.  

I actually already own a few cool proof cards, which might be worthy of a post at some point soon, and recently saw a proof which I could not pass up for less than $5 delivered.  

1999 Topps Gallery Ray Lankford Private Player Issue Proof 

The proof card is some sort of pre-production card used by Topps for something.  I am not exactly sure what their process for making a set of cards is these days, but this card is in there somewhere.  There are some slight differences between this card and the regular issue 1999 Topps Gallery Ray Lankford card.  First, this proof card is actually of the Players Private Issue card, not the base model of the card.  Notice the inscription in the top left-hand corner of the card showing it to be a Private Player Issue.  The Private Player Issue cards were a parallel to the base set which generally ran at one per box with a print run of 250 per card.  Here's a look at a copy of an Albert Belle Private Player Issue:

1999 Topps Gallery Albert Belle Private Players Issue 

The Lankford card and Belle card are nearly identical including the Private Player Issue script in the top left-hand corner of the card.  However, as mentioned before, there are two slight differences between the regular issue and proof issues of these cards.  

First up is the difference in size.  As you can tell, the Lankford card is both taller and wider than the Albert Belle card.  It looks like a huge difference in this picture, and is noticeable when handling the card, but for the sake of storage the proof card does fit inside a regular top loader.  My other proofs, I swear I will put them in a post this week, were big enough to frame and hang on the wall.  

The second difference is in the serial numbers on the back of the card.  The standard issue Belle Private Players Issue features the usual serial number written on the lefthand side of the card with the print run at 250 cards.  The Lankford card however is a proof which means that it is likely a one of a kind card and features.....

Absolutely no serial numbers.  The box for the serial number is on the card if you look carefully.  Very happy with my new Lankford addition.  Though a little bit of an oddball card a really cool and unique find from one of my favorite players.  More proofs and Topps Vault stuff later this week.  

The End of ARod

I think that my dislike of Alex Rodriguez started sometime around the end of the 2007 World Series.  I remember watching the fourth and final game of the 2007 series between the Rockies and Red Sox after catching Roctober sometime in late September and wanting to follow the Rockies until they were officially done.  Bizarrely, the end of the game focused on ARod opting out of the last years of his 10 year 252 million dollar contract originally signed with the Texas Rangers.

Rather than hearing about the Red Sox winning their second World Series in four years, the amazing run made by the Rockies, or the fabulous efforts of the Sox pitching staff the commentators on Fox spent the last two innings talking about ARod speculating whether he would resign with the Yankees or whether another large market team would swoop in and land the star third baseman.

As a baseball fan I felt that Alex Rodriguez picked the most inopportune time to venture out of his contract option.  It would have been like Dwight Howard announcing his refusal to sign with the Lakers while LeBron James was polishing off his second NBA championship.  However, even Dwight Howard has better sense than to make a major announcement about contracts and money during another team's championship moment.

I decided to go easy on ARod cards from that moment forward.  If I landed a good ARod from a box or pack of wax it was listed and posted on Ebay quickly or tried to trade it for as much as possible as quickly as possible.  I was not totally against ARod, but I was not taking on anything else.  I eventually whittled my ARod collection down to a single ARod autograph.

1999 Topps Alex Rodriguez Autograph 

I made sure that my remaining ARod signature was slightly uncommon, on-card, and featured a cool picture of ARod before the Rangers or Yankees.  Before steroids.  Maybe.  Who really knows anymore.  The other ARod card that I could not part with was a copy of his 1994 SP rookie card.

While I really do not enjoy ARod the person, nor the player, his rookie card is one of the iconic cards of my generation of collectors.  I also do not really like Mark Prior, but I picked up a copy of his 2001 Prospect Premiers autograph after they dropped below $10.  Great card, crappy player.  Much as a view Prior's iconic rookie card, ARod fits into the same card.  Villain on and off the field, but I am sure that someone somewhere will still value this card:

I actually still own the non-diecut version of this card too.  I remember when I could have sold this card for over $100.  The non-diecut version for more than $50 about ten years ago.  Since then the value of ARod cards has plummeted.  I do not even remember what I put into buy this card, I think in the late 90s, but I am sure it was significantly more than the $20-$30 the die cut versions now sell for on Ebay. Non-diecut?  Less than $15 and if you are patient less than $10.

So, as bleak as it looks for ARod on the field his cards have already taken a huge nose dive in value by collectors unwilling to pay a premium from a steroids era player.  I am sure that many collectors have learned their lessons from taking a bath on Clemens and McGwire cards that ARod will probably never draw a premium from his cards again.

While many collectors might resent ARod for ruining some part of their collection I am taking the swan dive in card values from ARod with a grain of salt.  I own three really good ARod cards that combined probably would have totaled more than $300 a decade ago and now they probably would not make half of that today.  However, there are a ton of really cool ARod cards out there that I never bought because they were really expensive and I did not want to buy them because I just did not want to pay the price.

In fact, I have been working on the 2000 Upper Deck Game Jersey Autograph set, the unnumbered cards which were in Series 2, for years, probably since 2001.  I own most of the set, but I have been missing the Arod and Jeter autographs for years.  When I started putting the set together I knew there would come a day where I would either have to give up the chase, or part with $400 to pick up both cards.  Now?  I actually picked one up this weekend in a trade.  Here's a picture my trade partner sent me of my new ARod:

2000 Upper Deck Game Jersey Alex Rodriguez Jersey/Autograph

I probably gave up $40-$50 worth of cards to acquire this card.  While it might fall more over the next year, I figure there is probably a limited quantity of this card and picking up the card at a quarter of its anticipated cost is great.  I completely understand the disappointment of ARod and how his actions have had a negative impact on the game and the collecting industry, but in the meantime, go find some cool cheap cards and add them to your collection just because....

2008 UD Premier Brian Roberts Premier Patches Autograph

I discovered Vine over the weekend and have had a lot of fun playing with the short video maker.  I was actually going to use it for work, but in the meantime, I guess I can also use it for baseball card blogging.  First up, my newest card for the day in Vine form.....

Yeah.  So, in non-Vine form that card actually look like this.....

2007 UD Premier Brian Roberts Premier Patches Autograph 

This is my second cool card I've picked up of the Orioles second baseman and Durham, North Carolina native.  While Roberts does not appear to be at his past level performance wise, it's pretty cool that the former American-League All-Star is actually healthy enough to contribute to the Orioles season.  Although, he was on paternity leave recently.  

This card is from the 2007 Premier set which has some really cool patch cards if you are looking for some fun relics cards to chase down.  I've added a few nice Ozzie Smith cards from the set during the past year and always take a peak in on what's floating around from that set on Ebay and COMC.  Most are low print runs and can be difficult to track down, but there are some very good buys to be found if you stay patient.  This card cost me a total of $8.50 shipped.  Very Nice.  

How fast did I post this.....

More Vines later....

2013 Bowman Carson Kelly

This is my first autograph of Cardinals third base prospect Carson Kelly in a Cardinals uniform.  I have two other autographs of Kelly, but both are in a USA Baseball uniform.  This card comes from the 2013 Bowman set and is one of the few Cardinals autographs that Topps put into this years set.  The card is a sticker autograph, but offers collectors a better quality autograph than Kelly used for his USA Baseball Autographs.  It looks like he's practiced a little bit.  The card is very affordable and can easily be found for less than $5.

2013 Bowman Carson Kelly Autograph

Carson Kelly is currently playing in the New York-Penn league for the Cardinals A ball team the State College Spikes.  He's currently posting a .281/.349/.373 line and has only 1 home run in about 150 ABs.  While he's off to a slow start this season, especially in the power department, many still think Carson Kelly is a prime prospect.  Baseball America ranks Carson Kelly as the ninth best prospect in the loaded Cardinals system.  However, Kelly faces competition at the position from Stanford product Stephen Piscotty who has recently been promoted out of A ball to the Cardinals AA team in Springfield, Mo. 

2013 Topps Chasing History Matt Holliday Jersey

I picked up the Carson Kelly card in a trade and also managed to score a Matt Holliday jersey card to even out the trade a bit.  This is my second copy of this card, but it's always good to have a few extra Holliday cards hanging around.  

The Dull Trading Deadline Made Worse By The Royal Baby

The past week leading up to the trade deadline offered the usually assortment of smoke, but there was not any fire when the trade line actually came and went this afternoon.  There was the Jake Peavy trade which saw the White Sox pitcher land with the Red Sox, Avisail Garcia with the White Sox, and Jose Iglesias land with the Tigers.  Bud Norris landed with the Orioles for L.J. Hoes.  Really not much to see.

The slow trade deadline will eventually be felt this fall when Topps releases the third installment of its base set.  While the majority of traded players are featured on airbrushed cards its still always cool to pick up cards of old players on new teams.  I will have to get a Bud Norris on the Orioles, but that might be the crowning glory of the Update set...maybe.  This year I guess that will be even less exciting.

Topps is figuring that a dull trade line might result in a dull Update set too, so how do they solve this problem?  Gimmicks of course.  To boast the sets release later this fall Topps announced an additional card to the Update set to attract a little bit more attention and help generate more sales.  I am slightly disturbed.

Topps has put all kinds of gimmicky cards in their sets of the past years.  Some of the cards, such as the Skip Schumaker rally squirrel card, end up making a pretty good splash.  Others, like the Ryan Dempster/Abe Lincoln card, just turn out lame.  I guess this all started with the Jeter/Mantle/G.W. Bush card in the 2007 Topps set, but the announcement of the Royal Baby card is not sitting well with me.  Is that RC circle in the corner a rookie card stamp?  Lame.  

All excitement has been dampened to the point that I might simply quietly buy the complete set off of Ebay, flip through the box, and then put it away into my card closet.  The royal family does not excite me, nor interest me in the least.  However, I know that there are people who are gaga over anything to do with them, so I am imagining that the update set could have a few crazy moments when it first hits the secondary market.  

You remember when the Skip Schumaker Rally Squirrel card was selling on Ebay for the first two days at $400?  Now the card is $40-50.  I see something crazy like that happening with the royal baby card.  If I land a copy it's going on Ebay immediately.  Cashing out.