Monday, January 7, 2019

Let 'Em Breathe!

I picked up two more All-Stars for the 1961 set build. I almost always go after raw cards but sometimes you find a graded card at a reasonable price. My normal procedure is to let them stew in their cases for a few days and then throw a 'freedom party' out on my workbench.

Ever since I damaged a '59 Killebrew rookie with an overzealous screwdriver I've been more careful doing this. I did ding my '62 Willie Mays but overall I've had success. What I normally do is stick the label (I've learned it's called a 'flip') into the binder on the back side of the card.

This morning I went from this...


...to this...



...and finally to this...



Now that I look at the scans I think I'm going to pull the flips out of the binder pockets. Viewing three of them on a page is kind of annoying. #retiredguyproblems :-)

Progress report: I'm at 538 of the 587 cards in the '61 set (92% give or take). 34 of the cards I lack are high numbers including three All-Stars (Aparicio, Banks, Mays). Of the 15 lower series cards a couple are stars/rookies including the Marichal rookie. I'd also like to upgrade one card... I have a Mantle World Series Game 2 (card #307) which is trimmed.

I made the hotel show this past Saturday but I've pretty much exhausted the supply of  '61s that my friend Darryl had available. I picked up both of Bill Mazeroski's cards from him.

Overall I think I've made pretty decent progress on this thing. From time to time (particularly when looking at high number cards of lesser-known players) wonder how I could have let myself get into the chase for this. But it's been fun. I have a goal (a soft goal!) of finishing it this calendar year. We'll see.

10 comments:

  1. Great job! Those cards look so much better in your binder pages as part of a set rather than being locked up in a plastic tomb. Agree you should pull the flips out of the binder so that you can see the full backs.

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    Replies
    1. I decided to put the flips in a tobacco card binder page in the back.

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  2. Beauty! I love the 61 All Star cards, and they look so much better in a binder page than in those awful slabs!

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  3. Man... that's gonna be one helluva 9-pocket page when it's complete. Just look at the names on it.

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    Replies
    1. Yup, that top right slot goes to Willie Mays. Not a bad top row.

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    2. Nice! No offense to any other players... but it doesn't get any better than that.

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  4. Replies
    1. It's grading company shorthand for 'mark', usually some sort of writing or ink spot. You can see that a kid put his initials on the back of Frank's card, just below the name box. It's the sort of thing that drives down the price for a vintage card but doesn't bother me a bit in that spot.

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    2. I live for vintage cards that had been "branded" in an innocuous spot. :-)

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