A View of Two Million Baseball Cards – Video

Happy Birthday, America. The 4th of July falling on a Wednesday gives me an extra day of sorting. This morning I’m working on finishing up a couple team trades (Rockies and Red Sox).

Yesterday, Cards From The Attic tweeted a question to his followers asking how many cards were in their collections. I responded with “about 2 million,” and showed a few pictures.

The pictures are a bit outdated because it seems as though I’m adding thousands of cards by the week. So, I said I would show a video of the card room, card closet, and “overflow” room.

My monster collection is only about three years in the making. I’ve collected cards since the late 1980’s, and sold off most of them at various times.

When I moved to Madison four years ago the collecting bug caught on and stuck. New town, no friends, and for the first time in my adult life I had a job that allowed nights and weekends. So, I regained my hobby love. It started by weekly trips to Target to buy blasters, and a couple months later I bought my first Craigslist lot.

Still, my collection numbered about 100,000 at that time.

Over the next couple years I found more and more Craigslist lots. Our last house had a large unfinished basement. It was an okay area to pile all of my cards. But, it was dark and not appealing to spend time down there. It also had a concrete floor so sorting had to be done on a table.

Then my wife and I began building a house. We had builders (I struggle putting together a book shelf). I had to move all those cards. At the time it was probably 500,000 or 600,000.

And in our new house I had a finished basement complete with my own card room. My dream!

Initially my collection fit nice and neat in th card room.

But then I added more and more and more cards. In the past two years I’ve added over a million and I would estimate my collection is very close to two million, maybe more.

What does two million cards look like? Well, they certainly don’t fit nice and neat in my card room. Nor do they fit nice and neatly in the neighboring walk-in closet. And they have started to overflow in another unfinished storage area. Here’s what it looks like.

Meeting P-Town Tom From Waiting 'Til Next Year Blog

Not only have I met awesome traders online, I’ve completed a few deals in person with collectors I’ve met online. Chalk up another in person trade this past Saturday.

A fellow Cubs collector (and Dan Vogelbach super collector), P-Town Tom, and I met this weekend for a swap. A few months ago I found Tom’s blog, Waiting ’til Next Year. I believe it was a post from last summer when he visited the Baseball Card Shoppe in Madison, Wisconsin. The Baseball Card Shoppe is just 10 minutes from me and I consider it my local card shop (LCS). Tom and I have exchanged a few emails over the past months, and recently he mentioned he had some extra Cubs and was looking to purge.

Tom was going to be in town (Madison) for a wedding and wanted to arrange a time to drop off his extra Cubs. He said he didn’t want anything in return. I wasn’t going to meet empty handed.

He had mentioned he was in need of some non-Topps series one and two Cubs cards. I have plenty of extra Bowman and Topps Heritage, so I put together a small lot of Cubs for him. But that wasn’t enough. He was bringing me 1,000 Cubs plus two empty monster boxes.

Wisconsin is among the top states in terms of craft breweries. A few weeks ago I drove down to Sterling, Illinois and gifted Shannon with some New Glarus beer for 25 monster boxes of cards. That’s it! A beer for cards trade, part two.

Not knowing exactly what Tom prefers (though I have read previous blog entries that he does enjoy craft beer) I put together a random 6-pack mix of Wisconsin craft beers. You can read more about the beers on his blog.

Let’s get to the cards! It was a great mix of cards from the 1970’s to 2018. Plenty of Ryne Sandberg inside. A total of 53 Ryno’s!

Another favorite: 1989 Topps Ty Griffin. Three more for my Griffin collection.

In my last post I mentioned the early 1990’s Classic cards. There was a 1988 Classic Rick Sutcliffe here.

Allen & Ginter is one of my favorite sets each year. I’m still debating if I should indulge this year or not. The cards are simple, yet the design is very attractive. Here’s a 2010 Tyler Colvin rookie.

Panini aren’t my favorite cards due to not having a licensing agreement. However, I love it when non-superstars from the 1970’s and 1980’s get the current set treatment. Enter Bill Buckner and Jody Davis.

1978 Topps is one of my favorite Topps sets of all time, and Dennis Lamp gets a nod on a Rookie Pitchers card.

At this point in my quest it’s not often I receive cards not already in my collection. This box had two newbies. First, a 1990 Classic Draft Picks Lance Dickson (Although technically I do have this card as part of the unopened set – but it’s not part of my Cubs collection).

Second is a 1991 Post Andre Dawson. It’s not just a Post…it’s a Canadian version. There are eight of these here!

Willson Contreras is quickly becoming my second favorite Cub behind Javier Baez. Seven more 2017 Bowman for the Willy collection.

Finally, have you ever flipped through cards you’ve seen a thousand times…but stop and appreciate the photography and design of the card? I did that with the 1991 Stadium Club Jerome Walton. Walton was a favorite of mine when he soared to Rookie of the Year in 1989. I’ve never really stopped to appreciate the Stadium Club photography, so I had to stop and look at the 1992 version as well. These Stadium Club cards from 1991 and 1992 really pop.

It was great to acquire another 1,000 Cubs for the collection, as well as a couple storage boxes, but even better to complete another in person trade. Hopefully Tom and I can meet up again for a trade.

One Million Cubs Flat Rate Giveaway

Over the past six months I have met, conversed, and traded with dozens upon dozens of fellow collectors. There has been great conversation and even more generosity. It’s time to pay it forward.

Over the next week, I will be offering up one flat rate box filled with baseball collectibles. The box will be randomly given away next Sunday July 8.

How do you enter? Simply follow my Twitter account (@onemillioncubs) and retweet my pinned tweet (see below). On July 8, I will compile on followers of the @onemillioncubs twitter account that retweeted the pinned tweet (note: there will be multiple tweets throughout the week – only retweets of the initial tweet that will be pinned qualify).

What’s in the box? Great question. It’s filled with random collectibles that do not fit into my collection, so it’s a great way to pay it forward. First up is a Baseball Cards magazine from December 1987 featuring Kirby Puckett on the cover.

The “free cards” are still intact.

Another magazine in the box will be a Baseball Today from 1988. This issue features Kirk Gibson and Juan Samuel on the cover.

A Mark McGwire Oakland Athletics starting lineup (still in the package) is also in the giveaway box.

Starting lineups were cool in the late 1980’s and early 1980’s. Today, it’s all about the bobblehead. My giveaway box has you covered. It’s a Corey Hart Milwaukee Brewers bobblehead from 2013.

An unopened (okay, it’s been opened and later shrink wrapped – but the packs haven’t been opened) box of 1990 Topps Yearbook stickers.

And some unopened packs. There are 10 packs total including five packs of oddball Sunoco Dream Team cards. The other packs are: 1988 Donruss, 1989 Topps, 1989 Score, 1991 Donruss, and 1991 Ultra.

Complete sets? Covered that, too. How about a 2015 Bowman Draft paper base set. This set is loaded with cards from Aaron Judge, Andrew Benintendi, Ian Happ, Walker Buehler, Alex Reyes, Rafael Devers, Scott Kingery, Amed Rosario, and Albert Almora.

We need to give away some singles. Both old and new. First, a 1986 Topps Traded Barry Bonds XRC.

A 2018 Bowman paper base Miguel Andujar rookie card.

OHTANI. He’s here, too. A 2018 Bowman paper Shohei Ohtani rookie card.

And the future: a 2018 Bowman Chrome Vladimir Guerrero Jr.

Finally, supplies. Two packs (100 count) of brand new penny sleeves.

Hopefully I’ve put together a package that will fit the needs of a winning collector out there. Remember, to enter you just need to be a follower of the @onemillioncubs Twitter account and retweet the pinned tweet. That’s it. Next Sunday will randomly select the winner. Good luck!

Bulk Trade Nets 3,025 Cubs Cards and a Glut of Griffin's

Last week I acquired 3,025 more Chicago Cubs cards in a bulk trade with Merle from Highland Park, Illinois. The trade was six weeks in the Making after discussing the trade on Facebook.

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Merle is a set collector with many needs from 1997-2018. Unfortunately, a bulk of my near two million cards are not sorted by set (most not really sorted at all). So, it took some time to gather up 3,000 cards and it came during an extremely busy time for me.

The trade was finally completed on my end and I gained quite a few new Cubs items, not just cards, for my collection.

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One of the trade chips I was most excited about was a stack of ticket stubs. I’m not a ticket stub collector, but if I can pick up a few here or there in a trade I’m game (Cubs stubs of course).

Thirty-five Cubs stubs came in my box ranging from 1987 into the 2000’s. I haven’t looked to see if any milestones occurred on these dates. One of the 35 was my birthday! And yes, I did look at the Wrigley Field prices from 1987, and it makes me a bit depressed.

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Some other oddball game day giveaways were included, such as bookmarks of Kevin Tapani, Ron Coomer, Joe Girardi, and Eric Young.

Postcards too!

And some commemorative milestone cards of Greg Maddux (300th win) and Sammy Sosa (500th home run).

And a really cool baseball card Oddball item. Reprints of Cubs cards that were given away in 2002 sponsored by CLTV. There are 11 cards in the set. I have 10 Lee Smith and one Dave Kingman.

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Now I’ll have to search for the other nine cards in the set. They produced 20,000 of each card and they are numbered.

Now to the cards. Most of the 3,000 cards are 1988, 1989, and 1990 Topps. But, these 1999 Upper Deck Victory bring back good memories. I was buying these up in the quarter box at my local card shop.

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This marked my second foray into Cubs team collecting that began in 1998. My first was 1989-1991. There were several other stints until now, but this is certainly my biggest Cubs collecting adventure yet.

Speaking of 1989-1991, a couple Oddball items. Mark Grace unlicensed card from 1989.

And a couple Derrick May 1991 Classic issues. He was a hot rookie and did stick with the Cubs for a few years unlike many other hot Cubs rookies of the 90’s.

Finally, the holy grail. Ty Griffin! I think all collectors have two favorite cards in their collections. One may be the white whale they searched and searched and searched to obtain. Or maybe a rare card. The other favorite is due to personal ties. Maybe it’s the first card they owned. Or the first “hit” pulled out of a pack as a kid. My latter favorite card is the 1989 Topps Ty Griffin #1 Draft Pick. I’ve discussed many times in this blog why. So, behold, a stack of 174 Ty Griffin 1989 Topps cards.

Great trade made with Merle that added some Oddball items to the Cubs collection, a few new cards, and a lot more Griffin!

Of Beer and Baseball Cards

Another day…another empty mailbox. Sort of. I did receive some cards in the mail today, but I’m not ready to blog about it. Hopefully in a couple weeks I’ll be ready to share a minor project that grew organically recently.

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Until then, I’ve got little to blog about. However, I did receive a couple packages in the mail this week that I will get to this weekend.

Tonight, though, I blog of beer. It’s no secret on my twitter feed I love beer. I live in Wisconsin, which is among the Kings of craft beer. Last week I tweeted that I found my new favorite beer. It’s called Sweet Sunglasses. It’s a blonde ale made by a brewery that is less than two miles from my house.

What first caught my eye was the description at my local liquor store. It described it as a “day drinking, lawn mowing beer.” I grew up in rural Illinois and a “day drinking lawn mowing beer,” is exactly what I grew up on.

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After enjoying a beer, or three, I looked into Hop Haus and what it was all about. Ironically, last Sunday when I drove into Illinois to pick up the monster boxes of cards I drive right by Hop Haus, which is located in downtown Verona, Wisconsin.

My wife isn’t a drinker, but I we have friends that just moved into our neighborhood that would enjoy this spot, so we visited Hop Haus this evening.

Hop Haus seems to be a place that is still finding its own. It has a great atmosphere, and serves bar food along with its beer.

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The only problem is that you order all food and beer from the bar, despite most of the seating being tables. Hopefully they hire a waiter/waitress to fix this.

We decided to just do a couple drinks due to the seating/menu situation. The first drink I had was the Sweet Sunglasses, on tap.

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My second drink was the Dairy Aire hefewizen. Perfect name for a craft beer in Wisconsin and is paired well with a basket of cheese curds.

Hop Haus also offers flights, and my friend and I both decided it was a perfect spot for a future guys night. The area is also great (Verona is a small town – population 10,000 that borders Madison) and they had a taco food truck in the parking lot and live music in the park across the street. A very cool spot for a weekend drink.

I Blame The Cleaners For This Lunch Break

Today, my lunch break has two different meanings. First, the logical break from work for lunch. Second, a break of a couple 2018 Topps series 2 blasters on said lunch break.

I blame the cleaning ladies. Yes, a lame excuse that wouldn’t pass the wife test.

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We have cleaners come every two weeks. Good and bad, for selfish reasons. Good because that’s less of the house that I have to clean. Bad, because I usually have to scramble the night before they come to pick up the basement floor of baseball cards. Because it usually looks like this…

So, today I grabbed a Milio’s Caprese sandwich for lunch. Milio’s is a sub chain similar to Jimmy John’s. It’s next door to my office, so it’s typical my go-to spot on cleaning day.

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The caprese sandwich is really good. It’s a limited time special sandwich, that I hope sticks to the menu.

When I have the Milio’s lunch I typically retreat to a neighboring parking lot. Today. I decided I’d take a drive around the area and ended up dining in the Target parking lot. I know, convenient right?

As I finished lunch I thought I may as well check out the card section. Unfortunately, Stadium Club was not stocked, but I dabbled with a couple Series 2 blasters because there was time to kill.

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The first box was quite a dud, with the biggest hit a black Border 1983 All Star Hideki Matsui, along with the one guaranteed MLB The Show 18 code. The second box unveiled a Sonny Gray Variation, AJ Minter 1983 Rookie blue Border and the 1983 rookie Shohei Ohtani.

And of course the best hits! The Cubs cards. Of the two blasters I pulled 13 Cubs cards. Unfortunately, they are already part of my collection.

When I did arrive home after work there was a large box on my doorstep. It’s from a big bulk trade that I’ve been working on for about six weeks. Stay tuned!

Medium Flat Rate Box Monday Blowout Sale

Since my mailbox was empty on Monday it’s time for a blowout sale. I’m looking to blowout some bulk medium flat rate boxes as I’m running out of room.

At this time I have three different deals. In the near future I’ll likely add some other bulk sales.

Deal #1 – Hockey

I have several monster boxes of hockey cards that I have not sorted. I know absolutely nothing about hockey cards, and really couldn’t tell you what I have other than the cards stretch back to the early to mid 1980’s and extend to the last few years. I honestly can’t give you an idea of which players are in here, but there is likely Superstars as this same bulk purchase was filled with baseball, football, and basketball superstars.

One medium flat rate box of hockey cards (approximately 1,500 to 2,000 cards) – $24 shipped.

Deal #2 – Texas Longhorns

A flat rate box of 2011 Upper Deck Texas Longhorns football cards. There will be between 1,500 and 2,000 cards with a lot of duplicates.

One medium flat rate box of Longhorns football cards – $24 shipped.

Deal #3 – Oklahoma Sooners

A flat rate box of 2011 Upper Deck Oklahoma Sooners football cards. There will be between 1,500 and 2,000 cards with many duplicates.

One medium flat rate box of Sooners football cards – $24 shipped.

If interested, tweet me or email me.

Take Advantage of Free Money With eBay Bucks

If you are buying on eBay you are earning free money. Well, it’s not exactly “free” money because you have spent money to buy an item. But…if you did not realize eBay Bucks existed, then it is free money.

I assumed everyone shopping on eBay was familiar with eBay Bucks. I was wrong, hence this post. As I was texting a friend this afternoon, he had no idea what eBay Bucks were. And he’s no casual eBayer. He spent more than $1,000 in the last two DAYS. Can you imagine the amount of eBay Bucks he has let go to waste!

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So, what are eBay Bucks? eBay gives you a percentage of cash back for every transaction you make. Typically, it is 1%. So that $1,000 assuming it’s the base 1% would be $10.

eBay Bucks accumulate each quarter, and cannot be redeemed until released. Currently, we are in quarter two. All transactions from April 1 through June 30 will accumulate and eBay will release those Bucks around July 1 or July 2. They can only be redeemed the month of July. Any past eBay Bucks cannot be redeemed. It’s use it (the month they are released) or lose it.

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Now, it’s not just a simple 1% on each transaction. There is strategy. Often throughout the quarter, eBay will send out a flash notice offering 6% or 8% or even 10% in eBay Bucks. This is actually very common throughout the three month period, but it only lasts 24-48 hours. If you have items you are watching, wait until you receive an eBay Bucks notice. Sometimes the notices are sent to your eBay mailbox. Most of the time it is just linked to your home page on the eBay app (or website).

How do you know how many eBay bucks you have? Go to your My eBay summary and under the “buy” tab, there should be an eBay Bucks link. It will show you how many bucks you have accumulated and will also have an itemized breakdown on how much you earned on each transaction for the quarter.

The good part. How can you spend those eBay bucks? You should receive an email from eBay a day or two into the new quarter announcing your eBay bucks have been released. All you have to do to redeem them is purchase the item you want, and in the PayPal checkout under coupons, codes, eBay bucks, click eBay bucks. It will automatically know how many eBay bucks you have and will subtract them from your transaction. If you have eBay bucks left over you can buy more stuff (within the monthly redemption period).

Quarter two ends in a week, which also means there should be some eBay Bucks deals coming in then next few days to promote spending.

An Economical Way To Shipping a Large Volume of Cards

One struggle in the past I’ve had is selling junk era complete sets. A five dollar set, of say 1989 Topps, will set you back about $12 to ship. That’s not economical. So, you bundle.

The issue there is that those large Topps sets will not fit inside a medium flat rate box, nor will they fit in a typical large flat rate box.

Here’s a solution! A large flat rate gaming box will fit roughly 4,000 cards. If you use a PayPal label it’s just $17.65 to ship that amount of cards. That’s a huge savings considering a lot of about 300 cards gets bumped up to priority for just under $10 at the post office.

There’s one problem. You can’t just walk into most post offices and grab these particular flat rate boxes. However, you can order them for free off the USPS website. Here’s what to look for.

Three 800-count boxes will fit inside long ways, and two 550-count boxes fit on top. It’s a perfect fit and minimal padding (tissue, newspaper, bubble wrap) is needed inside the box.

This is a great and economical way to trade large volume cards or move those junk era sets without breaking the bank.

A Story of Baseball Cards and Gas Station Pizza

For those of you that saw my tweets earlier tonight you may or may not be aware of the dinner I enjoyed. A dinner of pizza that is made inside a gas station. And for those outside the Midwest, it may have looked a bit odd, and based on your preferences possibly a bit disgusting.

It’s a taco pizza from Casey’s General Store. Casey’s is a chain of Midwest gas station/convenience stores. They look like this.

Someone I follow on twitter last week posted something about starving before eating gas station pizza, and it immediately gave me cravings for Casey’s pizza. Their taco pizza is my favorite, followed by their barbecue pizza.

I opted for the taco pizza tonight. Included on this pie: refried beans, cheddar and mozzarella cheese, lettuce, tomatoes, and Doritos. It had been at least ten years since eating a Casey’s pizza. As I drove to pick it up I considered the likelihood it would not taste like I remembered. I was wrong. It was just as good, if not better.

It took me back to my childhood. I grew up in a rural Illinois town that did not have a stoplight, let alone a pizza place, and kids drove tractors to school. There was a Casey’s in the next town over (about 5 miles), so it was a bit quicker than the nearest Pizza Hut 15 miles away.

Friday nights were usually pizza night at my house. It was either a Casey’s pizza, or an actual visit to Pizza Hut using my Book-It coupon.

If it was a night in I would sort my baseball cards and watch the TGIF lineup. Full House was my favorite, along with Perfect Strangers. Just the Ten of Us was another early favorite, while Step by Step and Boy Meets World were my jams in the later TGIF years. So of course tonight as I’m eating Casey’s pizza I was sorting baseball cards (well, I ate first and then washed my hands – taco pizza is messy).

I’m just beginning to sort through the 25 monster boxes I picked up last Sunday. There has already been some nice additions for the Cubs collection. There was a partial set of 1980 Baseball Immortals. A few are new to my collection. The King Kelly card shows him in a Boston uniform, but lists it as Chicago Cubs on the back.

A couple of 1999 SP Prospect including a pair of Todd Noel Rockford Cubbies cards.

And how about this. Eight Alex Arias rookie cards. Or as most people in the hobby consider it: Chipper Jones rookies.

I’m still looking for trades this weekend. Would prefer team trades, but will consider other trades as well. Tweet me or email me.