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The Start of the Shopping Season
Posted by: | CommentsWe are approaching the time of year (my favorite time actually) where the baseball card releases slow down a bit, giving collectors a chance to catch up on getting organized. While there are still baseball products being released, this is typically the time of year where they are far and few between due to the winter sports taking over. I’m okay with that because I have piles upon piles to put away. It’s also the kickoff to the holiday shopping experience for those crazy enough to brave the malls the day after Thanksgiving.
I took some time to log in cards, put them into their player binders, and began to think about where to go from there. I have piles from recently opened blasters, cards from trades, cards from eBay, and just cards for cards sake lying around. I began thinking that there has to be an easier way to do things, so that I’ll know what is where. Some of you may remember from a previous post how crazy I am about how I organize and handle my cards; so it may come as no surprise, but I am looking for alternative ideas here.
We all determine which players are worthy of being sorted from the rest based on our own ideas, but what happens once we figure that out? Or when that player retires? Or if they turn out to be terrible? This is where I am at now: all players that are currently sorted into my binders are now in alphabetical order (excluding Pujols, Jeter, A-Rod, Lind, Tulo, Martin and Yankees). Now that they are all making new friends next to their alphabetical counterparts, some of them have since retired, or may retire this season.
Once a player retires would it be a good idea to start a binder of retired players (much like my retired Yankees binder)? Or should they go into a retired alphabetical box? I am leaning towards boxing retired players so that as rookies come up, or I acquire new cards of the guys in the binder, I will have more room.
Many of you are against binders altogether, because they tend to overfill. Cards can also bend against the rings of the binders, or the pages themselves can bend in storage. However, I have never had any of these problems, and rather enjoy being able to flip through my cards and enjoy the collection.
I would really love to hear everyone’s opinion on this because I am at a loss, and after this week I will have more free time than I can handle with no baseball on.
Shopping Season
This time of year also means Black Friday and Cyber Monday. For those of you who don’t know, Black Friday is the kickoff to holiday shopping starting the morning after Thanksgiving. I can see some of you rolling your eyes wondering, “What does shopping for hours on end starting at 3:00 AM have to do with sports cards?” It’s important, because Black Friday leads right into Cyber Monday.
Internet sites have started to implement their big sales the Monday after Thanksgiving, rather than trying to compete with the deals at brick and mortar stores. I am hoping to see some sweet deals from some of the wholesalers on hobby boxes, so that I can snow someone into buying me a cool present for my birthday or Christmas (or maybe even buy myself a little something nice). By “sweet deal”, I don’t mean places offering seven boxes of something for a ridiculous price once an hour. I am talking about some sort of percentage off for a 24 hour period. Something like taking 10%-15% off box prices and offering free shipping on orders over $100 will motivate customers to buy enough to get free shipping. That may have been more than they were setting out to spend, but the discount makes collectors happy to spend a little bit more.
I just got a flyer in the mail from one card wholesaler offering free shipping on larger orders, free packs and boxes depending on how much you spend, and a coupon code for another discount. Another wholesaler is definitely having a Black Friday promotion. As for me? I’ll be at the mall around 4:00 AM like a lunatic.
I know, way to turn into a woman and bring up Christmas shopping. We all have to start thinking about our holiday shopping. Despite all the craziness and occasional elbowing that goes on Black Friday, it’s addicting. At least to me, other people think I am off my rocker.
I wish you all a Happy Thanksgiving . . . and to those of you shopping the day after, may the sales be with you.
Marie co-writes the blog A Cardboard Problem in addition to being a season ticket holder for the Yankees and an all around baseball fan. Marie is an avid card collector and welcomes comments, questions, and e-mails.
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A Yankees Championship Dream Fulfilled
Posted by: | CommentsI had waited thirteen years to see a World Series game, not to mention a championship clinching win. Just so you can understand where I’m coming from, I’ll explain a bit of personal history; despite my intense fandom, I never had the opportunity to see the Fall Classic in person until this year.
In 1996, somehow my father came up with two tickets to Game 6 of the World Series. At the time I was 15, my brother was 10, and we all but did a jig in the living room to be able to go to the game. There was just one problem: there were only two tickets and we didn’t drive, which meant only one of us could go.
Only one of us could go? Now we were enemies. We paced the room sweating feverishly, wondering who was going to get to go and who would sit at home. As it turns out my father came up with an idea- he would drop both of us off at Yankee Stadium so we could both be there, and he would pick us up after. Sounds like it would be a splendid idea right? Apparently not if you are my mother. She saw it as a terrible idea for two kids to be left alone in the Bronx and needless to say we weren’t allowed to go: not even one of us.
For my mother it has been the longest thirteen years of me constantly reminding her what a terrible choice she made and how we had been scarred for life from the trauma of sitting home alone (we were apparently old enough to be alone in the house, just not in the Bronx) watching Charlie Hayes catch that last out in foul territory, screaming with joy jumping up and down. For thirteen years we had wondered what it must have been like to see your team win the World Series in person.
Fast forward to present day, and the wait was well worth it for me. I got to see every postseason home game, including a walk-off ALDS win where Teixeira hit a bullet of a home run to win the game in extra innings. The season ended Wednesday with a Game 6 win for the Yankees (clinching the World Series), and possible forgiveness for mom because my brother and I were there. Finally. As a season ticket holder I was given the option to buy my seats for all postseason home games, and you know I was not going to miss out on the opportunity.
This was a great season for the Yankees on so many levels, starting with the signing of Sabathia, Burnett, and Teixeira in the offseason. Then we got to see Mariano get his 500th save (even if it was on the road), and Jeter passed Gehrig for all-time hits leader as a Yankee (not to mention all the walk off wins this team put together). I definitely picked a great year to have season tickets, and see so much history happen. Much of it happened in the rain by the way, whether it was World Series wins or the delay before Jeter’s record breaking hit.
The postseason was my first as a season ticket holder where the Yankees made it to the World Series, making it both the most fun for me and also confirming that I am not a jinx. Most of the games were played in pretty intense cold with rain, while others were just frigid.
What does one wear to a baseball game in 40 degree rain you might wonder? The answer is simple: everything. I am oddly superstitious and I will tell you I have been washing and wearing the same clothes the entire postseason. My typical ensemble to the games has consisted of the following: Under Armor cold gear turtleneck and pants, heavy socks, a long sleeve t-shirt, Jeter or Rizzuto t-shirt (only those two), on-field fleece, 2009 postseason sweatshirt, Yankees coat, Under Amour head sock, and finally a Yankees hat. Phew. Oh, and hand and toe warmers, can’t forget those, they were clutch.
Despite the cold weather, the feeling of being there for all of these games (especially the World Series clincher) is completely indescribable and amazing. As a fan, watching from home or a bar is great but being there was on a level I had never even imagined. For most of the last three innings of Game 6 I was jumping up and down and shaking my brother, telling him we finally got to be here for this moment . . . of course, he kept telling me to shut up until it actually happened.
I was excited the entire day leading up to the game and the whole night after it. The group of people I sit with, a.k.a. the Bleacher Creatures, are the greatest group to sit with and watch a game. We all know each other, and we have all been there through the season, cheering and anxiously waiting for the postseason to finally arrive. It really is something to be there to begin with, but to sit with the same group of people, the friends that you have made over the seasons, is just awesome.
When Cano threw the ground out from Shane Victorino to Mark Teixeira to end the game, clinch the Championship and end the season, my brother and I jumped up and hugged each other. Everyone around us was doing the same, like we all had won the game, too. It was everything I thought it would be when I was 15, but even better.
Now that the celebration is over, is anyone wondering how all those bundled clothes worked out for me? Not too well considering I am sick and have been for a while now. Am I upset about it? Absolutely not! I am lying in bed telling you my story while wearing my World Championship t-shirt and Yankees Championship parade hoodie.
My friend Suzy and I got up and going very early to be at the parade down the Canyon of Heroes in New York City: that was the final event to cap off the season and my dealing with cold weather. I had never experienced the ticker tape parade before so I had to get there and enjoy it even if it meant getting up at the ungodly hour of 6am.
Despite the fact that most of us have not seen much of our beds, or families in the last week it was all worth it. The offseason is here and it may be as much of a welcoming feeling for the fans as it is for the players (or I could just be okay with it now since the Yankees won the World Series). In either case, pitchers and catchers report in roughly 90 days and I will be rested and ready to cheer for my team on Opening Day.
Marie co-writes the blog A Cardboard Problem in addition to being a season ticket holder for the Yankees and an all around baseball fan. Marie is an avid card collector and welcomes comments, questions, and e-mails.
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The ABC’s of Card Handling OCD
Posted by: | CommentsWhen I was growing up, all the adults in my family made it very clear to me that cards were not supposed to be “played with”. Cards were not “toys”, they did not get left lying around to get dinged corners or creases, they certainly did not go in my bicycle wheels, and I was not supposed to flip them. So you can imagine that over the years these lessons have stuck with me, and I am very, very meticulous about how I handle cards.
When I open packs, the cards immediately get put into numerical order unless it’s a player I collect (in which case he gets logged in, and put into his respective binder). Autographs and relic cards get scanned to show off, then go into penny sleeves and either a snap case or toploader depending on who it is. I was also told to be very careful when trading cards so that I didn’t end up getting hosed.
If you were to look at my binders, they may not necessarily be in chronological order (most are) but they are mint. When I see other people’s binders and they have cards in them with creases or white corners it drives me bananas. I don’t know why, it just does. I also don’t like handling my cards once they are put into the binder or cases as the case may be. Don’t get me wrong, I love looking through my cards but I just don’t need to touch them and potentially damage them. I don’t have an answer as to why I’m so crazy about my cards . . . I just have issues I guess.
I learned about trading cards with friends at a very young age. My mom’s friend had a son who was a year or two younger than me, so when we would go to their house I would always bring my binder so we could trade. We would run upstairs and carefully show off what we got since the last time we saw each other, and then we would make trades. It was the early to mid 90’s and all he wanted was Griffey Jr’s or Gary Sheffield, and I wanted Yankees: it did not matter who they were. Had I known that a heap of Kevin Maas and Matt Nokes would end up as kindling for a fire, I may have held onto some of my Griffey’s. But don’t worry, I never traded rookie cards of anyone, and I am still reluctant to do so. I always had to inspect our trades and make sure there were no creases or fingerprints (pet peeve) on any of them, then we traded and put our new acquisitions into our binders. My friend was also very careful with his cards, so this usually worked out well.
As a kid, Christmas always involved baseball cards. My brother and I always got a complete set for the year, and some Yankees in our stockings. The year Derek Jeter came up I got a whole bunch of his cards including one of my favorites, the Foundations card. By the way, the one Jeter card I really want to own eventually is the SP rookie. They are hard to find in good condition ungraded.
As I got older it seemed that less and less people were collecting cards, and I’m talking like 5th or 6th grade through high school. At that time I started selling cards I didn’t want so I could go to the hobby shop and buy Yankees and new packs. It seems as though I had the mind of a little entrepreneur as a kid and was always looking to turn unwanted cards into new stuff.
I know that many people out there have a warped perception of what types of people collect trading cards as adults, not to mention those who blog about it (like me). Trust me, they are almost always the complete opposite of the stereotype. But honestly, if it wasn’t for crazy people like me who had learned lessons as children about cards, there might not be many people buying them anymore. I have been blogging about cards for about two years now, and I have met so many people that I trade with and even talk to on a regular basis. I couldn’t even begin to tell you how much fun it is. I have acquired hundreds of Yankee Stadium Legacy cards for my collection either via trade, or people just send them my way because they don’t want them. My Pujols collection has also been boosted by fellow collectors’ trading cards, and buying singles online.
Any cards I don’t want now go up for trade on my personal blog, or I try and flip them on eBay in order to get new cards. Some things just don’t change: either you have a passion for collecting or you don’t. Collecting cards is one of the few things you can continue to do from childhood and is a great hobby.
I would love to hear if there are any other people out there that are super anal retentive about how they handle their cards and store them. If you are crazier than I am, I would love to hear that, too. I always find it interesting how people have quirks about handling and storage. I know I have my family very well trained when I show them a card or pack of cards: they handle them super gently and usually hold just the sides for fear of scratching them or putting (gasp!) a fingerprint on them.
Marie co-writes the blog A Cardboard Problem in addition to being a season ticket holder for the Yankees and an all around baseball fan. Marie is an avid card collector and welcomes comments, questions, and e-mails.
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Jeter’s Hit: Watching History Happen From the Yankee Stadium Bleachers
Posted by: | Comments“Now batting . . . number 2. Derek . . . Jeter. Number 2.”
Anyone who has ever been to a Yankee game can read that sentence and hear Bob Sheppard in their head. I know I would never hear that any other way. Jeter has stated that he will forever be announced by Bob Sheppard for as long as he is a Yankee (which should be his whole career).
As a baseball fan you either love Derek Jeter, or you love to hate him. There doesn’t seem to be a grey area in this debate. I’ve been having a bit of a back and forth with many people about this love/hate relationship to try and figure it out; it seems as though many people hate him simply due to the overexposure he gets from the media. Is that a good reason to hate him? I really don’t think Jeter is calling all these media outlets demanding all this attention; he’s not A-Rod.
But I will grant you this: the media does have an obsession with everything Jeter does. Clearly this is more far reaching than just New York, but I wouldn’t know that without talking to many of you out in the blogosphere. Derek Jeter has been quoted saying many times that he doesn’t watch baseball when he isn’t playing, and he doesn’t get the MLB Extra Innings package. Maybe that seems strange, but we can understand he doesn’t want his entire life consumed by baseball.
Personally, I will agree that the media jams him and the Yankees down your throat because they do it here. You all know I am a big Yankees fan, and I can say good things about Jeter until the cows come home . . . but really nothing needs to be said. You watch him on the field on a daily basis and you know what kind of player he is, you know the dedication and drive he has, and you know all about his place in Yankees history.
Some of you may have wondered what it would have been like to have been there to see Jeter break Gehrig’s record, and some of you may have changed the channel because you are sick of him. If you want to know what it was like, I can tell you firsthand. It was amazing, one of those moments that I would sit in the rain for six hours to see in person. There was an initial rain delay of 1:27 before the game even started, and I have never seen that many people wait through a rain delay in all my years of going to games. Most of the time if it’s raining people don’t even go, myself included. This was different; this was a matter of seeing 72 years of history being changed in a single moment. This was a night for one captain to steal the spotlight from another captain.
It was pouring for the first pitch and no one was in their seats. But between innings the seats filled in very quickly because Jeter was leading off in the bottom of the 1st. Jeter stuck out in his first at bat, and the fans ran for cover. I remained in my seat, as did most of the bleacher creatures. The crowd then returned for Jeter’s next at bat: he belted an opposite field single, in “Jeterian” fashion (as John Sterling would say). The whole stadium was standing even before he hit the ball. As soon as the ball reached the outfield I jumped up and screamed. The crowd erupted in typical Yankee Stadium fashion, and Jeter stood at first base with 2,722 hits.
The whole team came out from the dugout to congratulate Jeter, and the Orioles were very respectful of this and waited patiently (I even saw one clap on the replay). On behalf of Yankees fans, I’d like to thank the Orioles for showing Jeter respect and for understanding the moment was not meant to show you up.
The crowd stood for every Jeter at bat after that, cheering, and chanting his name. It was a great experience that I wouldn’t have missed for anything. There have been a few games where I have been lucky enough to get to see history, and this was definitely one of my favorites. It was probably what Jeter had in mind at the last night in the old stadium about ‘building new memories’ at the new Stadium.
And so far it has been a great first season in the new stadium: between walk off wins, come from behind victories, Jeter chasing the record for all time hits, and Mariano getting his 500th career save (even if it did happen on the road). To put a cap on it, Jeter finally became the Yankees all time hits leader.
I don’t know about any of you guys, but I have a great feeling about the Yankees’ chances in the postseason and making the World Series. We have a very good group of guys who seem to have that chemistry we haven’t seen since the 90’s championship teams. I just purchased my postseason ticket package, which entitles me to my seats for every home playoff game. Hopefully, we’ll create one more new memory at our stadium by taking home a championship.
Marie co-writes the blog A Cardboard Problem in addition to being a season ticket holder for the Yankees and an all around baseball fan. Marie is an avid card collector and welcomes comments, questions, and e-mails.
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Talking eBay at the Card Show
Posted by: | CommentsAs you may have already guessed, my favorite time of year starts at Spring Training . . . and with any luck ends with the Yankees in the World Series in October. I love baseball, so even if the Yankees don’t make it, the playoffs are still a great time of the year. My second favorite time is when the baseball card show comes to town. There are roughly three in my area (White Plains, NY) throughout the year, and with no local hobby shops this is like a three day slice of heaven.
Despite the card show opening on a Thursday night, I held off going until Friday morning, because I knew my rationale of all the good cards being gone on Thursday was a bit nutty. I arrived fairly early, with my checklists, my budget, and my mission (going to these things with a budget is really not worth bothering with because you never stick to it, at least it seems that I never do). Aside from picking up Pujols cards to fill in some gaps in my collection and supplies, I wanted to try and finish my 2009 O-Pee-Chee set, which at the time was missing 51 cards.
I started the show by visiting a dealer with just hobby boxes who remembered me (it was a trend all day it seemed), and we started talking Yankees, and about the new stadium. Since he was not in my budget I left empty handed. Now, I could tell you all about the deals I picked up while I was there, like seven cards for $5 bucks which got me all the Yankees 2009 Legendary Cuts (plus a Jay Bruce from the set).
But we are going to forgo the loot talk because I found a more consistent theme by talking to many dealers. It had less to do with them remembering I collect Pujols and asking where Suzy (my co-blogger/closest friend) is because they had a box of Jeter cards for her, and more to do with a growing dislike of selling on eBay.
When you talk about eBay with these vendors, you’re likely to hear some strong opinions. The gentleman who sold me the base cards at seven for $5 told me business with selling singles on eBay right now was poor, thanks to the fee structure change and less volume of customers. I really thought it was just our store because we haven’t had the money to buy new stock in a while, but this was coming from a guy with over 100,000 positive feedbacks, not counting duplicate user feedbacks. He told me that right now it really isn’t worth selling on eBay but he will continue to do so now just because he owns his own hobby store, and has a website (so for now it still can work for him).
Where hobby boxes are concerned, he now sells them only through his website, because he was putting up hobby boxes as “Buy-It-Now” or “Best Offer” listings and getting offers that were well under 60% of what they were listed for. Sadly, I was not surprised by this. I told him that many of us like the best offer option to maybe save $5 or $10 bucks, and that I usually try an offer around that discount just to feel like I saved something. He understood where I was coming from and wished that was the case with most people.
Another guy I frequently deal with on eBay only sells singles from case breaks, and I figured this was the guy who could help me pick up the last of the cards I needed for my 2009 O-Pee-Chee set. We had a little chit chat about cards while I rummaged through some boxes and I asked him if he had the OPC cards; he did not bring them. Not only did he not bring them, but he proceeded to tell me how hot they were in his eBay store and why. At this point, I was already steaming mad before I heard his reasoning (just in case you were wondering how I felt).
He told me he ordered X number of cases from his distributor, and only ended up with half. Now, he had promised team sets to many pre-orders and needed to fulfill those first, and then the remaining singles were being allocated to the eBay store. He said he sells more of those than anything right now, and didn’t really get it until he searched himself and found out there were not many (if any) other sellers of singles from this set. He also informed me that he would not charge $1 per base card, but that is the lowest you can list on eBay and they are selling. So how could I fault the guy for leaving them home and making money on them? Well, I can for one reason and one reason alone- eBay fees. He would probably end up with the same profit selling them at the card show.
The last vendor I spoke to ended up telling me basically the same things as the first two guys. I walked around to take care of a few last items (Albert Pujols Diamond Collection card, 2009 Legendary Cuts dual game-used jersey card of Robinson Cano & Ron Guidry) while mulling over all this eBay talk. I generally tend to talk more than look at these shows mostly because other than my blog and Suzy, it’s rare to find collectors this dedicated to the hobby.
When eBay first came around it seemed like it was the place to buy anything and everything at a great discount. In some cases that still holds true, but in the case of baseball cards I don’t know how much longer collectors can get a bargain buying here because of the fees eBay is now charging. Between the store fee (basic store starts at $15/month), listing fees, final value fees, and then PayPal fees because you can no longer accept checks or money orders, you are sometimes looking at making mere cents for selling a card. While I would love to continue my eBay business it is no longer practical or profitable, which is sad because I liked being able to flip unwanted cards for a couple of Albert Pujols or an occasional Robbie Cano autograph.
It seems to be a growing trend that dealers, sellers, and collectors are moving away from selling on eBay right now. If anyone else has a story to share about eBay, I would love to hear your comments or stories.
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