A Trip To The Co-Op

Everyone has written up something about their 2017 cards.  I am slowing down a bit this year, so I am doing a little more picking and choosing of sets to collect.  I set out recently to my local card, The Trading Card Co-Op to check out two different products.  In past years I have really enjoyed opening boxes of Heritage and Gypsy Queen, so they seemed like something good to work on.  I'd like to think of them as kind of staple products, or sets that are long running that I have been opening since whenever they started..... Beyond Gypsy Queen and Heritage, I also picked up a single card which fit nicely into my card collection.

New single card.

Love the black card with the gold signature and gold foil.  I am a little depressed about the Cardinals at the moment, so I am just going to leave this card here and move on to my Heritage box.  

The 1968 set is not my favorite, but it's not terrible.  I have always heard it described as the "burlap sack" set.  Good description, but I have always felt that was kind of a negative and I don't really see this set as one that I would run away from.  Besides, my box was pretty sweet.  The card above is a mini and the card below is a mini.

I think mini cards are supposed to be one per box, but mine had two.  Beating the odds is always good.  I also got a chrome Rizzo card.  Another good name to go along with the Posey and Machado.

I had one of cool parallel card which I did not scan because I did not find it until I started sorting out my cards into making my set.  One of those things you miss the first time around because it just doesn't stand out.  The other card was a grey back card which I believe are limited to just 10 copies.  All sounds good, but the card is the Rockies team card.  Not the best, but I am sure I can trade somewhere, or something like that.

On to the autograph.  I cannot complain about this one at all either.....

I actually spent the last few days watching the Cardinals play the Yankees, don't mention the outcomes, but Judge seems to be a really impressive player.  I am going to file this card away in a box and revisit it in the future.  Hopefully Aaron Judge has a nice career, if not I will look back and remember when I could have sold this card for more than $50, but now it's under $5 on COMC.....I like my chances of it staying pretty high.

Shall we Gypsy Queen?  I am going to do this one quickly.  My two autographs....

two pretty good young players.  The Severino is serial numbered to 150.  The Piscotty is not numbered, but it is always nice to pull an autograph that fits into my collection out of a box of cards.  A few other hits, not showing them all.  

My best non-autographed card, might be even better than my autographs, is a Manny Machado throwback variation.  The card is also missing the his position above his name, so this is a short print within a short print.  Way too over complicate things Topps.  Still a cool card.  

I pulled three other color variations out of the Gypsy Queen box.  The Car-Go card is a black and white variation and serial numbered out 50, Dozier and Judge are both purple and serial numbered out of 250.  

I also pulled a couple of cards with no name on the front and a few others with out the player's position above their name.  It seems like you get a couple of these per box based on what I have seen out of other people's pictures around Twitter and Instagram.  

Overall, I am happy to have finally picked up boxes of these two products.  I pulled some really cool cards out of the boxes and also am enjoying the new Matt Carpenter autograph.  Overall, a good day at the local card shop.  

2013 Topps Gypsy Queen Anthony Rizzo Autograph

This is an unprecedented second Cubs post of the week, but I picked up a card of Anthony Rizzo.  I have actually been looking for a little while, but he's definitely someone whom I had a price range in mind.  Basically meaning that if the value of his cards had stayed high I would have skipped him over completely and done without owning his autograph.  I've explained several times on several different posts my reluctance to pour too much money into high end rookie cards, but I get even more cautious when they player actually reaches the majors and does little to maintain the value of their cardboard.

Rizzo was originally a very well thought of Red Sox prospect which always tacks a few extra bucks onto the value of the card.  It's not a bad thing and I have to deal with this as a Cardinals fan at times on certain players.  Rizzo was then traded to the Padres in a high profile trade for Adrian Gonzalez.  Collectors still kept interest in Rizzo since he was now with a team that was going to play him.

Of course, Rizzo made his Major League debut with the Padres and bombed.  He posted a line of .141/.282/.242 in roughly 50 games with only 1 home run.  The Padres package up Rizzo to the Cubs and collectors ignore the ugly line posted in San Diego.  You know the excuses with the Padres: the park is too big, pitcher friendly, etc, etc, etc.  Throw in a good half a season playing on a terrible Cubs team with a line of .285/.342/.463 and you not only had collectors maintaining the prices of Rizzo autographs, but actually driving them higher.

First off, I still remember his terrible line for the Padres.  Two, most of his line and power numbers came from one and a half really good months.  Rizzo's June splits with the Cubs were .330/.375/.567 and September was similar.  July and August were ugly.  Add in the fact that two teams traded him and I am not sure I am totally trusting anything with Rizzo.  His line for this year is not what it was for the Padres, but it's not exactly setting the world on fire either.

Yet, there are many Rizzo pieces of cardboard floating around with price tags of $20 or more.  Scary and ridiculous.  I have seen a few really cool pieces floating around from Topps Museum and Gypsy Queen, but some of those are even higher than the $20 range.  Luckily, Rizzo played against the Cardinals last week and went 1 for 11 during the series with no power.  I was trading emails with a shop owner friend from my days in St. Louis when he dropped the Rizzo card on me.

2013 Topps Gypsy Queen Anthony Rizzo Autograph 

It seems that this card was blocking up his display case with a $20 price tag.  No takers and lots of low ball offers.  Luckily, I had been working on my reorganization project and managed to float him a lot of Cardinals singles for this cool looking on-card autograph of the Cubs first baseman.  I am not sure what dollar amount I can put on a box full of singles, there were a few nice Pujols cards in there, but I think I am pretty happy with my take away.