My first vintage purchase

Awhile back I mentioned in a post about how my dad went to high school with former pitching phenom Don Gullett. Gullett was drafted out of high school by the Reds, made the majors at 19 and later pitched for the Yankees before having his career ended by injuries. During his short nine year career he had a very strong 109-50 record with a 3.11 ERA finishing with double digit wins in six of his nine seasons. Gullett is also one of the very few players to win the World Series four years in a row.

Well one evening recently I stumbled across an eBay seller that had some vintage 70's cards for $1 each. They included the following, which I bought.

1971

1972

1975

1977

1978

So, I am now looking for Don Gullett's Topps cards from 1973, 1974, 1976, 1979 and 1980. If anyone has these cards and is willing to trade them I am interested. 

On a side note, I showed these cards to my dad and he said he always though Don looked like he was lost staring off in the distance, ie, all of the cards above save for 1978.

More Braves from eBay

I love going cheap BIN hunting for Braves hits.

The next two cards came as a lot. I was more interested in the auto RC of the Braves future franchise catcher since I already acquired a similar relic. But I'm not complaining! Especially for the $6 shipped price.

When retail is better than hobby

Over the last couple weeks I've purchased five hanger boxes of 2014 Topps Update because there's been nothing else even slightly interesting. From these five boxes I have accumulated what I'm guessing is close to a complete set as well as plenty of inserts, Walmart blue parallels, five gold parallels and the following cards.

A sparkle variation and an image variation. Topps really went nuts with the variations in Update series. Way over the top. I mean..really, come on Topps. A pitcher who hasn't had a good season since 2007 and a guy whose prime ended when I was in high school and who hasn't played more than half a season since 2008. I guess maybe this is better than forty-seven different parallels ala Bowman Chrome.

#31/99

#03/50

#87/99

BOOM.

So let's analyze this. For about $50 plus tax I got a near full set, two variations, two color parallels numbered under 100 and a numbered relic of the newly crowned National League Cy Young and MVP award winner. Hobby boxes have just this week dropped below $50 online and I would imagine are still in the $60-70 range at your typical overpriced LCS (like mine). Actually knowing my LCS they're probably still $85 there like they were on release day and will stay at $85 until they turn to dust. But I feel like the chances of pulling these cards from one hobby box are near zero. Most boxes would likely yield one sub-100 color parallel, an unnumbered All-Star stitches relic and MAYBE one variation if you're lucky.

So I think I'm starting to figure out that during the period of peak to mid-range prices for current year Topps flagship buying retail is a better bet than buying hobby. Ignoring the existence of jumbo boxes of course. While I think hobby is far superior to retail in other Topps sets like Ginter, Topps Chrome and Bowman Platinum, in this case it looks to me like retail wins.

The Odds

Back in June I pulled a Levon Washington orange retail auto #164/250 from 2014 Bowman. The post can be seen HERE.

Well America's Largest Employer put out a couple rack packs that they had somehow missed I guess. I bought one because Bowman was a fun rip this year. And what would I pull...but...this:

Another Levon Washington orange retail auto. This time #043/250.

Now these were seeded 1:255 packs. I did not open even half that many packs of Bowman this year between retail and hobby, much less retail alone. So the chances that I would pull two orange autos was not good, much less the same freakin guy from a checklist of 22 players. I'm no math whiz but I expect that the odds were astronomical. Maybe I should start buying lottery tickets...

eBay acquisitions

I actually got these cards about a month ago but I'm super behind on scanning an posting.

My first Maddux relic

And my first relic of the Braves future star catcher

I picked this one up simply because the swatch is awesome. It obviously comes from the White Sox navy with white pinstripes alternate throwback jersey. I love non-white/gray jerseys. So when I can get a relic of one I love it.