The 1998 Topps Tek Thread

rinkrat38 · Aug 5, 2013

rinkrat38 said:
Purchased six 1998 Tek patterns on Beckett from the same dealer to replace six that are less than M/NM in my collection of 8100. They came Saturday. To my surprise, two of those $1.00 Teks were diffractors, a Kenny Lofton and a Robbie Alomar. Both are tough cards to get. Looked at the dealer's web site. They don't specialize in baseball cards. So I bought the rest of the guy's 98 Tek inventory listed on Beckett, about 130 cards for about $160.00 (and free shipping). That included some Bonds, Griffey, Ripken, and McGwire cards and a good mix of other stars. Bit of a gamble, but I think less of a gamble than these group box breaks. I'm sure I won't get one out of three diffractors from that lot, but I figure these are the remains of a couple of boxes that the dealer or a customer broke. Maybe a few more diffractors, and maybe some tough ones. Maybe he had one of those "hot boxes". I'll pass along the results when I get the cards.

Got my shipment of 98 Teks in from Chicago Cards. Definitely looked like the 80% remains of two 98 Tek box breaks. One or two cards of just about every player in the series except of the Cubbies. Guess that's their walk-in traffic. No Jeters, but one or two of all the other big stars. No Albert Belle's though. Pristine looking cards; no spotting, shadowing, oval peeling, etc. Got a total of seven diffractors from them -- six were new for me (all listed as base cards) out of 130 cards. The big bonus was a new Juan Gonzalez diffractor. Next best was a Scott Rolen diffractor, to go along with the Robbie Alomar and Kenny Lofton diffractors received earlier. Those four diffractors made this experiment worthwhile, but probably little more than a break even deal.

MansGame · Aug 6, 2013

rinkrat38 said:
Got my shipment of 98 Teks in from Chicago Cards. Definitely looked like the 80% remains of two 98 Tek box breaks. One or two cards of just about every player in the series except of the Cubbies. Guess that's their walk-in traffic. No Jeters, but one or two of all the other big stars. No Albert Belle's though. Pristine looking cards; no spotting, shadowing, oval peeling, etc. Got a total of seven diffractors from them -- six were new for me (all listed as base cards) out of 130 cards. The big bonus was a new Juan Gonzalez diffractor. Next best was a Scott Rolen diffractor, to go along with the Robbie Alomar and Kenny Lofton diffractors received earlier. Those four diffractors made this experiment worthwhile, but probably little more than a break even deal.

MansGame · Aug 15, 2013

Ryan's group break of 6 boxes if anyone is interested in getting in: http://www.freedomcardboard.com/for...n-6-box-1998-tek-break-aic-rstadlerasu22.html

I'm looking for anyone that wants to go in on LOT 5

George_Calfas · Aug 15, 2013

MansGame said:
Ryan's group break of 6 boxes if anyone is interested in getting in: http://www.freedomcardboard.com/for...n-6-box-1998-tek-break-aic-rstadlerasu22.html

I'm looking for anyone that wants to go in on LOT 5

RustyGreerFan · Aug 15, 2013

George_Calfas said:

George - I'm interested in splitting Lot 9 with you. Maybe we can make it a 3-way with a Thome collector. Pimp that.

RStadlerASU22 · Aug 15, 2013

Mac, thanks I was gonna make a note in here but I appreciate the assist

Ryan

MansGame · Aug 15, 2013

RStadlerASU22 said:
Mac, thanks I was gonna make a note in here but I appreciate the assist
Ryan

Any time boss

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Looking for Albert Belle cards! PM me!

rinkrat38 · Aug 17, 2013

Caveat emptor. There were five new "diffractors" listed yesterday on COMC priced under $10. Two of them are now gone. The scans of all five were very clear, and clearly NOT diffractors. Several similar listings on eBay in the last week or so. Guess this is the counterbalance to surprise diffractors in lots of base cards.

Rich

SINFULONE · Aug 30, 2013

Nice to be back on this thread again.Anyone here score this?

Greg Maddux Braves 1998 Topps Tek Card 50 Pattern 5 Diffractor | eBay

MansGame · Aug 30, 2013

SINFULONE said:
Nice to be back on this thread again.Anyone here score this?

Greg Maddux Braves 1998 Topps Tek Card 50 Pattern 5 Diffractor | eBay

Wow, great deal.

SINFULONE · Aug 30, 2013

MansGame said:
Wow, great deal.

Score any more Belle's?

RustyGreerFan · Aug 30, 2013

SINFULONE said:
Nice to be back on this thread again.Anyone here score this?

Greg Maddux Braves 1998 Topps Tek Card 50 Pattern 5 Diffractor | eBay

Yep, I got it. Pretty unusual that a seller knows exactly what they have and still completely whiff at the market value. I'm trading it to rinkrat for a different Maddux Diffractor.

MansGame · Aug 30, 2013

SINFULONE said:
Score any more Belle's?

No, not yet. I was in the '98 break of six boxes and only like 6 base Belle's hit but I'm not sure any I need (of the 7 I needs still)

SINFULONE · Aug 31, 2013

RustyGreerFan said:
Yep, I got it. Pretty unusual that a seller knows exactly what they have and still completely whiff at the market value. I'm trading it to rinkrat for a different Maddux Diffractor.

Yeah, I was surprised he way undersold it too.Did you see the Ripkin Diffractor that sold for $130?

SINFULONE · Aug 31, 2013

MansGame said:
No, not yet. I was in the '98 break of six boxes and only like 6 base Belle's hit but I'm not sure any I need (of the 7 I needs still)

Bummer.Hit anything else good?Where did someone find boxes to break?

RustyGreerFan · Aug 31, 2013

SINFULONE said:
Bummer.Hit anything else good?Where did someone find boxes to break?

Yeah, saw the Ripken go for high. It's so weird how prices can be all over the place. Also, just the frequency in which they hit ebay. I think it's been a year now since I've seen a Buhner Diffractor on ebay.

No big hits in the Tek break unless you include A-Roid. My break was eerily similar with the only big hit being a Jeter. Ryan got them from the same seller I did a few months back when I did my group break. I think that now two known "hot boxes" have come from that seller's stash. My break got one and I think maybe rinkrat did too (?)

rinkrat38 · Sep 1, 2013

RustyGreerFan said:
Yeah, saw the Ripken go for high. It's so weird how prices can be all over the place. Also, just the frequency in which they hit ebay. I think it's been a year now since I've seen a Buhner Diffractor on ebay.

No big hits in the Tek break unless you include A-Roid. My break was eerily similar with the only big hit being a Jeter. Ryan got them from the same seller I did a few months back when I did my group break. I think that now two known "hot boxes" have come from that seller's stash. My break got one and I think maybe rinkrat did too (?)

Yup, I got three boxes from the same source and cracked them in June. 14 diffractors in the first box I opened. 3 and 4 in the other two. It was that first "hot box" and one "hot box" of the six that RustyGreerFan cracked in the group break that pushed me to go in heavy on Ryan's group break. No "hot box" in that break, but I did get 13 of the 18 diffractors that surfaced (9 of 13 new for me)--and still lost out money wise. I had 42% of the slots and got 72% of the diffractors, but nothing big like my 3-box break in June that included McGwire and Juan Gone diffractors and a bunch of other pretty good ones.

Three box rinkrat '98 Tek break June 2013

Box 1-- 14 diffractors, Box 2--4 diffractors, Box 3--3 diffractors. Box 1--Frank p. 16, * McGwire p. 28, A. Jones p. 68, Ventura p. 3, * O'Neill p. 53, * Delgado p. 30, * Kendall p. 80, Molitor p. 24, Juan Gone p. 44, R. Alomar p. 34, * Edgar Martinez p. 81, * Grace p. 44, Mussina p. 22, McCracken p. 69. Box 2--Justice p. 3, Palmeiro p. 33, Glaus p. 44, * Manny p. 36. Box 3--(all dupes to me) * B. Williams p. 79, * Kotsay p. 45, * Mo Vaughn p. 1. The diffractors preceded by an asterisk * are duplicates to me that are available for trade. 11 of the 21 diffractors in the 3 boxes were new to me.

MansGame · Sep 1, 2013

Id like to know what patterns I got in the break. It was only 6 cards or so, not sure why I can't be told lol

---
Looking for Albert Belle cards! PM me!

SINFULONE · Sep 1, 2013

RustyGreerFan said:
Yeah, saw the Ripken go for high. It's so weird how prices can be all over the place. Also, just the frequency in which they hit ebay. I think it's been a year now since I've seen a Buhner Diffractor on ebay.

No big hits in the Tek break unless you include A-Roid. My break was eerily similar with the only big hit being a Jeter. Ryan got them from the same seller I did a few months back when I did my group break. I think that now two known "hot boxes" have come from that seller's stash. My break got one and I think maybe rinkrat did too (?)

Yeah, sadly, the Rodriguez rookies I've been holding onto for awhile are forever worthless I guess.At least I didn't spend that much on them.I would hate to be sitting on a bunch of his UD SP rookies.Are you going to be having another group break?

rinkrat38 · Sep 4, 2013

SINFULONE said:
Yeah, sadly, the Rodriguez rookies I've been holding onto for awhile are forever worthless I guess.At least I didn't spend that much on them.I would hate to be sitting on a bunch of his UD SP rookies.Are you going to be having another group break?

Don't give away or throw away your A-Rod cards just yet. There are currently over 14,500 eBay listings for Pete Rose cards. I know, a saint compared to A-Rod, but 10 or 20 years from now I have a feeling A-Rod's name won't be forgotten.

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