Mid-Year Report

REA has passed. June is knocking on the door. Another year is half over. Sunrise. Sunset.

How is everyone doing on their collecting goals for the year? I'm not doing so good it seems. I have a hard time staying true to my goals, and each catalogue (and spam mail) brings me something new and exciting to chase after.

I remember the Ken Burns documentary where it was said that when a fire engine went by the ballpark, Rube Waddell would have to be restrained from chasing after it. In a sense, I consider myself the 'Rube' of collecting with the way things have gone.

My goals, much unchanged from 2010, were to get an E95 Wagner or '15 CJ Wagner, a T206 Young and a condition upgrade to my T206 Lajoie, an E121 Heilmann and NY Gians HOFers, an assortment of '33-'34 Goudeys including Terry, Dean, Grove, and P. Waner, and a '48 Leaf Musial.

This reminds me of 2010 where the only card on my want list I achieved was a '33 Goudey Gehrig. Thusfar, I've only been able to cross the E121 Heilmann and the E121 Youngs off my want list. I guess I should be happy that I managed to actually get two cards on my list so far this year.

In terms of 'shiny distractions' I upgraded my T206 Mathewson, got what now looks like a great price on an M110 Cobb, and entered the nineteenth century with an N300 Delahanty. Great cards that I love, but certainly not what I wrote down as 'wanting' at the start of the year.

How is everyone else doing?

Chris...I seem to be doing similarly as you! My goals of trying to add the following cards to my collection have gone unheeded:

-e94 murray(violet)
--e97 s nichols phil var
-e98 jennings red/orange
-t206 uzit, drum back
-accumulate t213-I
t213-3 byrne

Instead I've acquired:

-beater red hindu back t206
-a bunch of e94's which I think I'm going to try for the set...any colors!
-t215-1 type
-loudy red cross back(kind of an impulse buy!)
-babe ruth champions exhibit...probably my favorite acquisition
-a bunch of randomness...gilliam squires stamped obak, some tougher backed t206's

I'm enjoying myself...which I believe is all that matters!

The started the year with goals of adding more to my Delong set, acquiring more t205 Sovereigns and getting a Red Cross card from the GeorgeD collection.

So far, the only things I've acquired is t215 type lot from the GeorgeD collection. I haven't gotten anything else because I've been saving for this one purchase. Now I can focus on the stuff. I'd really like to complete the Delong set this year. I sold off all the cards in the lot but one so I know have that cash to finish the set.

Kind of a different year for me. Sold off my Goudey HOFers and am considering selling more of my collection. I figured it would be a bit of a slow year collecting-wise and it is turning out to be exactly that. We'll see what the second half of the year brings, but I'm envisioning more selling than buying.

Last year was a lot more fun.

looks like my frist kid is on the way!!!! (sometime in october) so the monster is 2 shy and will stay but e92 i will be trying to sell in white plains tomarrow god I need money...... so thats that later BOB

Hey Chris,

You are excited, huh...4.5 months in and you are calling it mid-year... .

Well, I'm pleased with my pickups, and decently happy with my focus this year so far. I make better progress when I am able to deny myself cards that aren't at the top of my list...but somehow I feel compelled to pick up cool items on the periphery.

Key 2011 Red Sox snags include:

M131 Speaker
'15 CJ Hooper and Wood
E94 Cicotte (olive)
Helmar Stamps Speaker

2011 Dockmans:

Matty
Magee

2011 items I got distracted by:

Croft's Cocoa Bender
Champs Cigarettes Hockey, including Clint Benedict

Understandably a very quiet year for me collecting-wise. Since moving to the DR, most of my action comes in the summer months when I'm visiting home. I manage to find other ways to engage in the hobby though, via this board and a little card buying group that I've been a part of for the past few years.

My goal this year (and it has been for a while) is to acquire a 1912 Boston Garter card....any player/condition...as long as the card is intact. I had lofty dreams of selling my whole collection and putting the $ into the BG Matty SGC 10 that was in the recent Paragon auction, but that went MUCH higher than I had expected. I'm starting to think that acquiring a common card from the 1912 BG set might just be an impossibility. I'll keep looking and hoping though.

My only goals this year were to add a few nice Benders and try to pick up some of his teamates he played with and also pick up Mickey Cochrane cards as I started a small collection of him since my in-laws live across from Mickey Cochrane park in Bridgewater where he grew up and it also gives me nice type cards from the 30's and the best part is they are not outrageously priced ! My biggest pick ups this year would be-

T213-1 Coupon Bender
D304 Weber Bender
Ju-ju Bender
E103 Bender ( just submitted to SGC yesterday )
and of course the T215 Red Cross which should arrive Monday !!!!!!!

So after the White Plains show yesterday it's looking like I might be done buying anything until the fall or next year ! Anything big anyways lol but cant complain as this year added some of the biggest cards to my collection yet !

Wow, those are some very tough Bender types that you crossed off the list this year. Well done. The E107 will be a bear though. Good luck and continued success!

I have been pursuing another hobby the last couple years and haven't been real active on the card front. While the passion may wane at times, it never goes away.

That said, This year (so far) I have added a few T3's, N172's and T206 hofers
My want list is modest , maybe a couple big T206 hofers.
Johnson and Young portraits would be nice or a T205 Joss,
Who knows, only the shadow knows.

TheBig6 wrote:
Who knows, only the shadow knows.

jerry you're dating yourself with this quote

had my boy last year, so cutting back on cards and other hobbies. instead of a e94 hof'er, now it's a warren spahn topps heritage autograph. the passion and enthusiasm are still there no matter what i do atm. still having alot of fun and still enjoy talking cards to other collectors and sharing whatever info i could.

In about 6 years, you'll be chasing the new stuff hardcore when you drag the kid into the hobby kicking and screaming

fisherboy7 wrote:Wow, those are some very tough Bender types that you crossed off the list this year. Well done. The E107 will be a bear though. Good luck and continued success!

Thanks ! When an E107 finally shows up maybe I can make a deal with Brian and buy his W600 and promise not to bid on it !!

Before this year, I had never collected anything older than '34 World Wide Gum's. Those can be pricy, but they don't come up much, and neither do the short-printed '48 Leaf's, so I was never forced to budget or 'plan,' per se. When you're buying mostly raw stuff from the 50's and 60's and you're averaging maybe $5 a card, who needs a plan?

However, now that I've wandered into the deep and pricy waters of The Monster, an annual collecting plan is probably exactly what I need. I've already been considering selling off my finished sets (or most of them, anyway), but now it's probably time to get serious about it in order to create a collecting fund with which to continue tackling the T206's. Plus, I don't wanna give up on those 34WWG's. I've never seen a whole set of those available. I'd like to pull that off.

Or, I could just slow down on the buying. That would solve the problem. But heck, what fun would that be?

ChiefBenderForever wrote:

fisherboy7 wrote:Wow, those are some very tough Bender types that you crossed off the list this year. Well done. The E107 will be a bear though. Good luck and continued success!

Thanks ! When an E107 finally shows up maybe I can make a deal with Brian and buy his W600 and promise not to bid on it !!

I like the way you think!

ChiefBenderForever wrote:

fisherboy7 wrote:Wow, those are some very tough Bender types that you crossed off the list this year. Well done. The E107 will be a bear though. Good luck and continued success!

Thanks ! When an E107 finally shows up maybe I can make a deal with Brian and buy his W600 and promise not to bid on it !!

This might sound hard to believe, but in 2002ish, I passed on a low grade E107 Bender for $550. It had a purplish stain on it which caused me to shy away. Oh my...

Was that the magical day when several showed up on eBay for ridiculously low BIN amounts? Oh to have had that opportunity...

I remember the $400 Plank and didn't pull the trigger

terjung wrote:Was that the magical day when several showed up on eBay for ridiculously low BIN amounts? Oh to have had that opportunity...

That was the day, one I'll never forget. Levi listed 5-6 E107's with BIN's, all HOFers. Beyond the Bender, I recall there being a McGinnity, Flick, and a Lajoie. Can't remember if there were others. The Lajoie was in the nicest shape of the group, solid VG, with a $1500 BIN. The others were pr/fr with BIN's in the $5-600 range.

McGraw was another one of them, I'm told. Needless to say, I have more than $500-$600 into mine. I think George Davis might have been another one... but I am going from heresay since I didn't see it myself.

Amazing who the seller was at those prices - Levi doesn't exactly have his cards priced to move!

Amazingly, it was Levi Bleam who listed the E107 HOFers. A rare occasion where he listed his stuff at a fraction of its actual value (even for 2002 prices).

Don't recall Mcgraw and Davis in the group, but it's certainly possible. McGraw is a tough card in the set, Brian you are lucky to own it! I came close to acquiring that exact card in trade, but I'm glad it has a good home in your collection now.

Times sure have changed wow. I was busy plugging away on my 1958 Topps and 59 Fleer Ted Williams sets which are worth about half what they were then, I sold the 58 Topps a few years ago so didn't do to bad, still have the 59 Fleer TW but did sell Ted Signs, I love the set reads like a comic book. Can only imagine the BIN he would put on the E107 today.......