Recent slab pickups / grading

[2014BESTSERVICE]

So I still haven't found my missing slabs but located a bunch of other 2005 Absolutes that are not on any past inventory sheets. So before I move to 2004 stuff will post about what I located. A dupe item = along with 3 cards with interesting stories.

Card #1 - A dupe TOTT Triple #175 BGS 8.5 (I have a BGS 9)
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Card 2- the Blue Swatch Five #21 in the Authentic holder was an eBay item I won moons ago.
The shipper was an amateur who didn't realize UPS charges by weight, not package size.
It arrived crushed due to poor packaging. I advised the seller of the damage, gave them a few details on USPS they may not have known, and then told them I'd keep it since only 10 available. Who knows if I'll see another example so why toss. Seller offered a refund if I returned- turned down that request as who knows when the next one pops up. Still haven't seen a replacement ,but then again haven't looked in 5 years.
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Card # 3- The Red Prime Swatch Five #21- came from the same collector whose slabs I am missing
One of many low # items they had for years before selling to me. The brother to the above Five Swatch
Except this seller shipped in Lexan hard protectors
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Card # 4 - One item in particular I remember bidding back in 2012 was an Absolute I wanted at least 1 example of, and bid $200 thinking I'd easily win. It was the below Absolute 1/1 Auto/Triple Jsy Prime piece, and low and behold that nuclear snipe was not good enough as I bid--only to get outbid !!! Thought to myself " Some one else is this crazy ?!! "

Turned out to be our board member @Rollx8 ( haven't seen him since he sold in 2016 hope he's OK) , whom if anyone remembers had the McFarlane figurines and some crazy unique low # items that he paired with them in an awesome collector display. He wound up years later in 2016 having to break the McFarlane and card display set up, and I contacted him about the Clemens 1/1 Auto/Jsy item I had missed out on years earlier. He was kind enough to sell it to me. I'm indebted to collectors like him and Kevin (@Pinbreaker) and many others without whom you wouldn't see whats in front of you. In the end, we are all just temporary caretakers of stuff.

Also- whoever put the 1/1 piece together was not paying attention to detail-- the prime piece was put in the wrong window spot. Not the first DLP item to have that happen and a 1/1 of all things
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[Pinbreaker]

Cough Cough.. You need to send this one in..

 

[2014BESTSERVICE]

Today's quick post is about the 2004 Upper Deck set and in particular the 2004 UD Authentic Stars Jersey subset. Clemens did not have much stuff thankfully in 2004 Upper Deck so it was easy to put together the game used involved. I have no memory of when and where on these two , I just know I've had them slabbed for about a decade now. I'm sure tons of board members have similar cards of their player in the set . The next set after the below 2 is Ultimate which will take time to scan

Info on the set can be found here at 2004 UPPER DECK
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For those of you who missed the 2004 Ultra posting when I initially started this inventory, and for inventory girls satisfaction, here again is the 2004 Ultra set I posted about Dec 11th last year.
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This will be the last sub-set for today since I have run out of time have to sleep before work tonite. The 2004 Ultra Turn Back the Clock subsets were one of many awesome subsets in 2004 Ultra. I always bought Ultra as this was a Fleer flagship series I thought, and neat inserts were always inside. This years subset is no different with 4 total variations for Clemens in the TBTC . If you go to the 2004 Fleer Ultra you'll see those boxes are great breaks lots of interesting stuff. Might have a few in storage.

I have emailed the baseballcardpedia folks about the Patch series subset and they list them as # to 25 when the whole series is # to 29 for patches. As one of my go to sources of good info, I'd like to help them correct that overlooked issue and can send pics if needed of multiple players.

Info on the set is here at 2004 ULTRA

There are 4 Clemens jersey/patch pieces in this subset along with other base items I'll slab later

Copper Jsy # to 399
Silver Jsy # to 199
Gold Jsy # to 99
Platinum Patch # to 29

 

[2014BESTSERVICE]

Going to get a straggler card out of the way before starting in on the 2004 Ultimate
Forgot to include this 2004 Upper Deck R-Class jersey in the scans above

 

[2014BESTSERVICE]

OK another dynamite set is about to begin with 2004 Ultimate. It is a set I would be still groping around trying to locate stuff without other peoples help- and there were many folks who pitched in on this one. Back in 2004 I bought every box that came into the store IF I saw it. I wasn't the only one who wanted these boxes. At $100 a pop they were my favorite $100 box to crack. My favorite store back then, Cardsmiths, had both these and the SP Game Used tins series. I went for these every single time as ROI, even if I didn't pull my guy, was great. Lots of cool inserts and always a good master box to crack. I tried just cracking master boxes or master cases of this stuff. The height of credit card insanity- I don't even want to think about what I owed on my credit cards back then. I try not thinking about what this set cost me eventually- took years to get most of the cards and still need 4 -- and trust me I've tried to get them, only to see a nuclear snipe get crushed on all.


Info about the set can be found here 2004 Ultimate

First up is the Ultimate Achievement relic, cheapest of the entire run around $25-30 or so back then
One I was able to pick up on my own

Next up was a surprise gift from our very own @magicpapa . Showed up one day unexpectedly
Think I've have seen just 1 other on eBay in the 16 years since so not sure where he found it -but let's say I love it !!
Slabbed it almost immediately after it came in

Next up are the two Dual Game Patch versions. Can't remember which I got ,and which Kevin set aside, but he helped on one. These were a pain to get. Forget Ryan collectors ,the Johnson guys are just as bad, and bid just as high on some of this rare stuff. Back then everyone tried to get one to complete their sets. Some of this stuff I can pick up now half what it used to go for price wise

Finishing up today's Ultimate scans will be the two Dual materials versions of the above.
I have to go by my inventory / registry sheets sadly otherwise I'd have shown these first

 

[2014BESTSERVICE]

Todays quick post will show off the 2004 Ultimate Dual Materials Signature subset. The easiest to get was the Carlton followed by Maddux..Strange on the Carlton since it was an exchange card seems quite a few exist. Help from Kevin @Pinbreaker on the Johnson thankfully .
Ryan wasn't difficult just very expensive- the Johnson Dual on the other hand- see prior post just a nightmare to try and pick one up.
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[2014BESTSERVICE]

These next two cards have interesting backgrounds. The first is the 2004 Ultimate Game Patch. I originally purchased # 10/75 on eBay. Card came from the Niagara /Canadian border and disappeared. I filed a stolen items report ,ebay reimbursed us both, and I went out and brought this one. Its unusual to get these in great shape so I guess everything turned out okay although I'd have liked to get my purchased card
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After that patch is this next monster pickup that required just being patient. Always kept losing auctions on eBay for one of these. I had my limits on how much I'd spend and never exceeded my intended target range.But I did know a board member who may have been winning some. We both tended to tred water in the same ponds on eBay on the high end stuff as we had similar tastes, so I kept in touch constantly with him. When he decided to break up his 2004 Ultimate Super Patch set I contacted him about Clemens . I was able to make a deal and voila- into the PC it came !!

See the 2004 Ultimate Super Patch - courtesy of Eric @mrwhitesox30 , another person I haven't seen in a while ( hope he's OK as well)
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[2014BESTSERVICE]

These items below are all part of the individual team 2004 Ultimate Game Materials Auto/Jersey subset
The non auto was actually the hardest for me to win the other 3 came quite easily
Kevin @Pinbreaker plucked the Yankees auto/jsy version for me when I saw and held as usual until I handled
All 3 examples ( CL, CL1 and CL2 ) are below
One of these days will re-slab that torn up Astros slab
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[2014BESTSERVICE]

Couple more slabs before work from the 2004 Ultimate Stat patch series
Celebrates his 24 wins season on one and 7 CY Young awards on the other
Not sure how well your phone or PC shows the pics but the 7 Cy is # 02/07 and the other # 06/24
Kevin helped on the 7 CY while I chased other goals

 

[2014BESTSERVICE]

Going to finish up the 2004 Ultimate series. I've been entering grading orders now for 10 days straight, I need to make inventory girl happy again. Last up will be a bunch of dual and single autos. I picked up the exchange Ryan/Clemens first which is one I expected to be harder to find but wasn't. The Johnson dual- well the Randy Johnson collectors just love them some dual- took me 3 more years and Kevin helping to get that one

On the Gold #08/10 auto- I actually won it quite cheaply. Two years later tried getting the # to 25 version- lost that one = and it went for $50 more than I paid for the Gold # to 10 version. Go figure eBay out I haven't. Anyways here's the last 3 scans

I also need to see if I can locate a couple of misc cards ( a Gold # 50 base item and one other) to slab.
One day perhaps will pick up a Quad ( last went for $260) , Astros Six ( $565), or win the lottery and locate the Octo auto ($1250). Until then I just need to locate the base auto and finish up to a point I stay happy with

More to follow Weds when I get more time its in short supply right now as evidenced by the week layoff I had to take from inventory

 

[2014BESTSERVICE]

A couple of miscellaneous slabs below scanned for inventory girl before the 2004 Timeless Treasures series
Not gonna do a write up as time is limited suffice to say lots more from each series to slab

Sorry on original post had to redo wrong scans posted
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[2014BESTSERVICE]

So if anyone has slabbed with PSA or BGS in 2020 or 2021 your well aware how long bulks are taking with both of them
These went out in May 2020 and just got back today. A few surprises but overall no disappointments that were not expected

I've slabbed about 50-60 of the Upper Deck 40man its a tough series. Normal is an 8, the Mint 9 and above a wee bit harder to come by grade wise.If you've seen my posts over the last 2 years been mixing in the Mac HR History series down to just 2 cards left to complete. Self subbed all of them so its a personal goal I had. Will be a mix of all flavors this is stuff I've sat on slab wise for 10 years.

Figured I'd finally check on some series I've wanted slabbed for quite a while. I used last years Covid payment so freebies one and all.
Will be a slow slog handled some backlog deliveries that came in ( 4 boxes of slabs came in this week)
Scanning between resting up on shipments. Every time I get a slab with the PSA label on the left I do a slow burn
Is consistency too much to ask ? Apparently so

 

[2014BESTSERVICE]

Continuing on with scans a few Rolen and Bagwells slabbed as I ramp up several players slabs. Rolen Proof is a Pop 1
Could only get the Auth label on the Proof as its miscut and I figured as much when I mailed but still hoped.
The Premiere Date I have more examples so will try again; and the Holo Purple was nice made the grade I wanted.

I tried upgrading my 1997 Finest set with the Bagwell Promo- sadly stuck on Mint 9
I already own a Mint 9 so we all know where that's headed. All part of the freebie bulks from the Covid money subs last year
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[2014BESTSERVICE]

More show stuff and another Piazza back from slabbing.
The Chicago was an easy PSA 9 except for the fact of a print dot right in the middle of his forehead knocked down
And a little minor chipping up top
Whether it was a human or a machine- doesn't matter. Hence the unusual modern 8.5 mid-grade item
Harder to get this PSA mid-grade than you'd imagine on modern cards requires specific spec issues to get it
On a personal level, the 2002 Elite Career Best subseries -any type or player- is a personal favorite
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[2014BESTSERVICE]

Lebron is a Pop 9 with just 8 higher. Upper Deck QC causing major issues
The Jeter is a Pop 1 none higher. These cards come out dinged up all the time
The Brees Spectrum and Manning Black Metallized just loved the beauty of the cards
Had to use my phone scanner didn't do that surface justice
Part of a May 2020 bulk sub that just popped with some PC cards all freebies from Covid relief $$
(since I had just got my tax return that Covid $$ went to cards and medical bills)
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[2014BESTSERVICE]

Catching up on more scans. Between inventory and getting this other stuff done sleeping in snatches of 4-5 hours
Until my diabetes kicks my hind end then I sleep until I wake up !!
A mix of football, hoop, and baseball slabs. Griffey is an older slab I recently updated to the new QR slabs
The Duncan Rookie is to sell so I can get shipping funds to donate more cards to people ( thanks Tyler !!)

 

[Pinbreaker]

Lebron is a Pop 9 with just 8 higher. Upper Deck QC causing major issues
The Jeter is a Pop 1 none higher. These cards come out dinged up all the time
The Brees Spectrum and Manning Black Metallized just loved the beauty of the cards
Had to use my phone scanner didn't do that surface justice
Part of a May 2020 bulk sub that just popped with some PC cards all freebies from Covid relief $$
(since I had just got my tax return that Covid $$ went to cards and medical bills)
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Seeing the Jeter Statistical in a PSA makes me think I should send my Statistical Supers to get graded (or encapsulated)

 

[2014BESTSERVICE]

Yes Kevin they would look great in PSA holders !!

Another one of my favorite series is upon me- the 2004 Timeless Treasures !! I used to crack tins of this when I got bored at the shop or there wasn't anything else worth opening with good ROI. You don't crack Timeless expecting good ROI - trust me more duds than studs are inside these tins. When you do get a decent hit sometimes it rarely squeaked out half the tin cost which averaged $100 back then. I even sold the tins back then they make for good candy holders !!

Info on the set can be found here 2004 TIMELESS TREASURES

First up will be the Award Materials subset. Not sure why I blue labeled one of them.
Most times I remember that one's fuzzy for some reason did not stick with me.
Somewhere I have the base jsy # to 50 that I need to find and get slabbed which will complete 5 of the 6 required.
I need the Award Material Signature version serial # to 9 to complete the subset so almost done
Only able to scan one group today will try and do more tomorrow

 

[CAROLINA BOSOX]

AMAZING collection you have! Just incredible the cards you have acquired over the years and then having them all slabbed...WOW!!

 

[2014BESTSERVICE]

AMAZING collection you have! Just incredible the cards you have acquired over the years and then having them all slabbed...WOW!!

Thank you for the compliment . I've been able to get lots of help from many board members and Clemens collectors along the way its been a group effort. Luckily I collect cards and not reputations, so I've just chugged away on him since 1984.

Next up will be the visually pleasing Materials Ink subset- one of my favorites. If they want to do faux art -this is how I like it done ! Lucked out on a few as they came up during negative publicity times. Saved a lot of money holding off buying. They still were not cheap but cheaper than peak days.

There are 8 variations of them = all numbered to just 5 each. The fact I've been able to accumulate 3 different examples is a blessing