Tag Archives: Bryce Harper

Cashing in on Hot Rookies

Posted by on 17 November 2016 Comments Off on Cashing in on Hot Rookies

To sell or not to sell?

For those of us in the aging collector demographic, our childhoods were spent dreaming of the vast fortunes that awaited us in adulthood as our cards grew in value like those from generations past. The reality turned out to be quite the opposite though, as our massive cardboard reserves are now barely worth the paper they’re printed on. Ever since that harsh reality set in, collectors have struggled with the decision of what to do with hot cards they pull from packs. Sell for the quick cash? Wait and see for a little while and dump at the first sign of a downturn? Or hold on for the long haul and hope for a big return in the far future? My take is that you shouldn’t worry about it much, just keep what you like and sell off anything else that has value. Live in the now and let someone else take on the risk. But how has that worked out for me over the last 15+ years?

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Redemption Frustration

Posted by on 3 March 2014 Comments Off on Redemption Frustration

A Game of Cardboard Roulette

It’s what every collector hopes for. You open a pack and there’s a card that stands out from the rest. It isn’t like the others, so it must be something good. You pull it out and you’re hit with immediate disappointment when you see that the back looks like one of these:

You’ve hit a redemption card. Maybe it’s something good, maybe it’s junk. One thing’s for sure: you won’t be seeing the card for a while, if ever. Redemptions can help to get better cards into products, but they have become so prevalent in recent years that collectors have come to dread the prospect of dealing with yet another one. It seems like everyone has at least one outstanding redemption; some people have hundreds stuck in Pending limbo. If it’s a minor card you really want, it doesn’t hurt much to wait. But what do you do if you pull something like this?

Now you’re left with quite the conundrum. Do you redeem it and wait? Sell it now and let someone else deal with it? Will the price go down in the meantime or will the live card be worth more? Why do the card companies do this to us anyway? Let’s break down something we’ve been dealing with since the turn of the millennium but have yet to truly come to terms with.

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2012 Biggest Pulls

Posted by on 29 December 2012 Comments Off on 2012 Biggest Pulls

And the hits don’t really come all that often

2012 was my first year back in the hobby opening current-year product in ten years and I didn’t fool around, going with multiple boxes of ten different products.  For my trouble, I pulled two cards that sold for more than $100 and enough in total to earn me top rated seller status on eBay.  So what does the return on a big purchase look like?  Stop reading now if you want to keep the illusion that every box of cards holds untold riches just waiting to be set free.

Boxes of Chance

Here’s what I ended up buying this year:

4 Boxes of Bowman
6 Boxes of Topps Archives
3 Jumbo Boxes of Topps Series 2
3 Boxes of Topps Pro Debut
4 Boxes of Panini Triple Play
3 Boxes of Topps Chrome
2 Boxes of Topps Heritage Minor League Edition
3 Jumbo Boxes of Topps Update
4 Boxes of Bowman Chrome
3 Boxes of Panini Cooperstown

And a bunch of retail packs.  That’s a lot of cards, so surely something good must have come from all of that, right?

Harsh Reality

1. 2012 Topps Archives Bryce Harper Fan Favorites Autograph Redemption
$317

The big one came early this year with one of Bryce Harper’s first official “rookie card” autographs.  These started out at about $500, but the price fell quickly over the first few days.  In the end, this card made back half of what I spent on boxes of Archives, but the rest of the product was a bust.  Without this card, Archives would have been an epic disaster for me.

2. 2012 Topps Update Buster Posey All-Star Jumbo Patch ASJP-BP 6/6
$213.50

2012 Topps Update started out on a sour note when my first “Two relics and one autograph in every box!” box only had one relic and a Mark Hamburger autograph.  The second box followed up with yet another Mark Hamburger autograph and three relics, one of which was this beauty from the eventual NL MVP.  Cash is nice, but I would have rather pulled the R.A. Dickey version.

3.  2012 Bowman Chrome Rookie Davis Blue Wave Refractor Autograph BCP43 37/50
$48.58

2012 Bowman was the product that got me back in, but the return just wasn’t there at first.  The cards were nice, but too many of the autographs were lucky to sell for $1.  Luckily, the wrapper redemption Blue Wave Refractor packs came through with my biggest Bowman autograph pull of the year.

4.  2012 Bowman Chrome Jorge Soler Autograph BCA-JSO
$47.66

5.  2012 Bowman Chrome Billy Hamilton Autograph BCA-BH
$38.03

Bowman Chrome promised one autograph in every box and two in every 3rd box; I pulled six in four boxes (plus another from retail and one more through wrapper redemptions).  Interestingly, my pulls included the base autographs of all three players plastered all over the promotional material for this product: Jorge Soler, Billy Hamilton, and Shawon Dunston, Jr.  Selling prices ranged from $1.79 to $47.66, so not everything was a winner.

Best of the Rest

And that’s basically everything good that I got out of more than 30 boxes of cards.  Next on the list would be a  2012 Topps Pro Debut Nolan Arenado SP Photo Variation card at $27.99, which comes in ahead of two 1/1s and countless autographs, game-used cards, and manufactured material relics.  Several of the autographs wouldn’t even sell for $0.99, including both of the Mark Hamburger autographs from Topps Update (the third autograph from that product was a Tom Milone that sold for a whopping $0.99).  Of the cards that I didn’t sell, only a 2012 Topps Archives John Olerud Fan Favorites Autograph would be likely to be in the running here, probably toward the back of the pack.  Out of 31+ boxes with potential big hits in them, these are the 17 best cards I managed to pull.  I think I’m starting to remember why I stopped doing this…

Collect the Mets Fundraiser

Posted by on 25 May 2012 Comments Off on Collect the Mets Fundraiser

Six boxes of Topps Archives and all I got was this lousy Bryce Harper autograph

Here at Collect the Mets, we strive to bring you the best coverage of Mets baseball cards and collectibles past and present.  We never quite get there, but we try.  And by we I mean me.  And the army of spammers commenting on my posts.  I’m telling you, it’s like they never sleep.

Every card image you see on this site is scanned from an actual card that I have in-hand – no promotional images, stock photos, or pictures grabbed from eBay are ever used (unless I decide to change this, at which point anything I did not personally scan will be clearly noted).  This would probably be more impressive if I had posted a few more of the thousands of cards destined to appear on this site…

The main factor keeping this blog from achieving greatness is time, but money comes in real handy too.  I sunk a lot of cash into Topps Archives in the hopes of pulling a few of the 19 former Mets autographs in that product, but only got an Olerud out of it (in a Blue Jays uniform unfortunately; Topps seems to have ignored my suggestion to show him as a Met).  And while Bill Buckner should be considered an honorary Met for his Game 6 heroics in the 1986 World Series, I already have all I need of him on a dual auto card with Mookie Wilson.  That means 11 autos headed for eBay to bring in the cash to get the haul I was after.

Well, 11 autographs and this thing.

I mean look at it, they didn’t even bother to have a proper front printed, it’s just a crooked sticker.  Everyone hates redemption cards, right?  And Bryce Harper, he hasn’t even played a full season in the majors!  He’s no Jack Clark, that’s for sure.

All this and more can be yours, just put your bids in here and hope for the best.  All proceeds will go towards increasing my backlog of great Mets game-used and autograph cards to scan and post.  I think we can all agree that this is a worthy cause.