Weirdness Or More?

Signa Cut cards are ugly they always have been but I still chase all the Virdons. In 2012 they put out a bunch of Bill Virdons.  

The were two Signa Cut sets in 2012: Regular and Bronx Edition.  Both were advertised as Gold/25, Green/10, Red/5, and Purple/1. That means there are eighty- two of them out there.  I completed the rainbow in the regular version long ago. 

The Bronx Edition has been totally different story.  I've never seen the Purple card numbered to 1,  which is totally understandable.  It probably got ripped by someone and it stayed in their collection.  Here's where the weirdness comes. 

That is the Bronx Edition numbered to 10. I've never seen the other 9 that are numbered to 10 and i search more than daily. I recently got the one numbered 4/5.

The 2012 Bronx Edition cards numbered to 25? I've never even seen one of them. It's crazy that a card numbered to 25 has never shown up when a /10 and /5 had shown up.  I call BS on there actually being ten of them numbered to 10 and he's why.  That cards numbered 4/5 i just got, it was my 5th one numbered to 5.

In thirteen years I was able to acquire every single one of the cards #/5 but not a single #/25 have shown up and only one of the #/10 has.  That seems like more than plain weirdness too me  I think maybe those 34 other cats may just plain old not exist. 

For 2013 I have /25, /10, /5, and I've never seen the #/1.

A Completed Team Set

When I got back into collecting cards in the early 2000s I bought a Red Sox Team set checklist on eBay. It consisted of all the Bowman and Topps team sets up through 2005. For each year there was an fill size checklist punched for a binder and there were mini checklists for a binder.  I pitched that whole binder of checklists years and years ago. The mini checklists I have mostly got rid of as I finished team sets.  There are a few of the minis that are still around though because they were in an empty slot of my binder. When I eliminated my binders a while back I got rid of the rest but for some reason not this one. 

I finally got that last 1953 Bowman Black and White. 

Jim Piersal eluded me for long enough and I finely got one to complete my team set. 

I'm going to post the whole team set but it's not a pretty of a picture as everyone else's would be because my team set is top loaded and bagged and I'm not taking them out just for a picture. 

I finished of the color set long ago. So long ago that I can't remember who the last card was. 

When I finished the color set I probably only had three of the black and white and it's taken years to track them all down. When I say years to track down that means years to track then down paying what I'm willing to pay for them.  I finally got the Piersal for $11.

And now:

Boxing Cards To Trade

I know most blogs are baseball and a little bit of football but hopefully someone will want these boxing cards. I thought about listing them for sale but I'd rather trade them if possible. I also have a complete set of 1996 Ringside and a bunch of other random 90s cards that are not pictured. If your interested just let me know. 

48-49 Leaf

1938 Churchman Cigarettes 

1951 Topps Ringside

Hanging

I've always hated hanging picture frames.  It doesn't make sense because it's not hard to do and doesn't take long but for some reason i absolutely hate it. I think maybe I'm a little too picky about the straightness and it bothers me enough I don't want to deal with it. But on an effort to make the new house more my own I hung some stuff today. 

This is a bunch of Virdon stuff.  The autographed bat is one Virdon used for fly ball practice at spring training.  It has hung in my office for almost ten years.  Inside the bat case is an autographed ball, an autographed spring training used batting glove, and a canceled per diem check from the yankees.  On top is a 1981 Stop and Go Virdon cup (because I can't figure out anywhere else to display it) and a Springfield Cardinals minor league Bill Virdon bobblehead.  The photo on the left also hung in my office and it's a picture of him after he was presented with his 1960 World Series ring. On the right is a painting I got from someone that purchased it from the Virdon Estate auction after he passed. (I promise the two pictures are straight, it's an optical illusion from taking the picture from an angle.)

Probably eight or so years ago I bought a shadowbox with the intension of making a collage of oddball Virdon items I have picked up over the years and don't really fit in a binder. I made several attempts and gave up each time because I don't feel like I'm very artistic and a never happy with how it looked. So it sat empty behind the credenza at my office all these years. I made another attempt at it and I'm pretty happy with it this time. 

Every other time I tried to display a whole bunch of Virdon items and it would always look too busy and haphazard. This time I went for simple.  Included is the nameplate from his his 1986 home jersey when he was part of the Pirates coaching staff. The number is just an autographed number I got off of ebay. He wore 9 when he played for the Cardinals his rookie year.  At the bottom is the sign off Virdon's locker while he managed the Astros. The name was hand drawn but the logos are stamped on there with and old school hand stamper.  I had his minor league all star belt buckle in there next to the number but I couldn't find something that was about the same size to balance it out for the other side. I almost went with a card but I didn't like the horizontal buckle on one side with a vertical card on the other side so I opted to just leave it out.  

Adding To My Least Favorite Vintage

I have never understood why people like 52 Topps so much.  I feel like I am chasing exorbitantly priced, not first year Topps cards even though that is how history incorrectly wrote it up.  I might understand it if those really were the first Topps baseball cards, but there was 48 Topps Magic and 51 Topps Baseball cards before 52 Topps.  however I am not opposed to picking up a 52 Topps Red Sox when they present themselves.

This is my latest vintage Red Sox pick up.  Luckily it didn't have the usual giant price tag that comes with 52 Topps.  For $4 I can ignore rounded corners and the pencil on Ellis's neck.  

Finding Some Organization In Chaos

 When I starting blogging again I didn't mean for the start and stop to happen.  I wasn't planning on a semi comeback I was shooting for at least twice a week posts.  Then things changed, but I guess that's life.  Back in February 2011 I wrote about a big change in my life, moving from MO to AZ.  Except for children being born I expected that to be the biggest change I was going to ever have to make.  Then this year hit.  In July I moved my daughter to TN so she could start college, then I came home and made a move myself.  I never thought I would have to start over a 50 but we don't always see what life is going to give us.  So new house (new address if your sending cards), new work, just about everything new.  There is a reason I collect old ballcards, I don't like new.  

There are some good things that come with new though.  I have kind of alluded to it before but I haven't had all the cards in my collection in one place in 10 years.  Probably 99% of the cards I acquire come from some kind of online transaction.  Since I spent all day at work on a computer I didn't spend any time on the computer at home.  So when I would purchase Virdon stuff I was doing it at work which caused a problem.  The Virdon stuff I don't have is mostly variations of things I already do have so I have to make comparisons before I do a purchase.  As an example I would find a Virdon postcard while I as at work but then I would have to wait until I got home to compare it to the postcard I already had.  That was bothersome so I moved all my Virdon stuff to my office.  That wasn't such a big deal Virdons at work Red Sox at home.  Only I used my work address for everything.  If you mailed me a card in the last 10 years, you mailed it to my office.  It started with a drawer in my desk.  I would get cards in the mail that needed added to my collection and I would throw them in that drawer to be brought home later.  No big deal it is just a few cards now and then but they started to pile up.  99% of them were in the vintage variety.  All my Vintage Red Sox fit in one 6" binder so I brought that to work too.  No big deal Virdon and Vintage at the office and the rest of my Red Sox at home.  Then I started buying the current sets each year.  I would order a binder and pages off Amazon which delivered to my office and then all the team sets would come to my office; once I filled that binder I just put it on my office bookshelf next to the Virdons and Vintage.  Then again a year later, and a year later, and it didn't seem like very long but all of the sudden I had 2017 to 2025 in my office.  Well no more office for me so now my cards are all under one roof again.  

Meet the new card shelf.  Those boxes on the top left are what used to be my vintage binder.  It is all top loaded up to 1980. The four boxes below those are partial team sets and inserts from 1980 to current.  None of them are labeled yet because I'm not totally happy with it.  Three row boxes fit on these shelves better than two row boxes so I am going to be swapping those out in the near future.  Below that is supplies and some autographed stuff I don't know how to display yet.  (That is an autographed crown, next to a boxing glove, ontop of a baseball glove, ontop of boxing shorts.)

The two boxes on the top right: one is autographs and relics, the other is a bunch of oddball stuff that doesn't fit in regular pages or binders. (the divider is taken out of one of those boxes.)  Below that is Red Sox doubles and all the cards from other teams. 

It isn't just a shelf, it is a whole closet.  Up top are all my binders.  The first one is boxing then it goes 1980 Red Sox to current.  That empty spot in the middle isn't there anymore, I filled up with my Virdon stuff.  I took the picture before I added the virdon binders in and reinstalled the the closet doors which I had to take off to get that shelf in there.  I like it better without the doors but I don't know what I would do with two giant mirrored doors so I put them back on.  

There are my Vidons in place half blocked by the door.  The first binder is Virdon cards.  There is going to be a change to this binder I just haven't decided what yet, future post I guess.  The second binder is my Virdon postcard to 8x11s.  I have posted about that binder before.  The third binder is magazine and program covers.  I don't know if I ever even mentioned that one on here before.  Magazines take up a lot more space than cards so I had to find somewhere to go with them.  The fourth binder is my unlabeled 2024 binder.  I is also stuck 2025 series one in there since I do not have a 2025 binder yet.  I still have lots of organizing to do still.  That black thing on the bottom left is my Virdon spring training fungo bat that needs hung.  That brown box on the right hold my Virdon 1982 Home Jersey.  

At least my cards are pretty organized even if everything else isn't!

Duped

I get excited when I see a Virdon item that I didn't know existed.  It doesn't happen often but when it does I try to jump right on it.  Recently there was a postcard that showed up on eBay that while familiar it was different.  

As soon as I say it I knew it looked exactly like a postcard I already have but the one I have doesn't have the name block at the top.  So for $10 I jumped in it.  (actually I set a snipe bid and paid for it last second)  Here is the new postcard scanned with the one I already had.

I actually like the name and position block.  I probably would have put it at the bottom and not thetop but it looks like it belongs, it looks like a totally new to me postcard; only it's not.  That "BILL VIRDON OUTFIELD" is a label that someone stuck on the postcard.  In other words someone duped me and now I have a postcard dupe.  

There is a small silver lining.  The backs are reversed.  

I am pretty anal about chasing down Virdon variations but even I would not have chased down a reversed back to a postcard.  If the wording on the back was missing all together or even if it was just slightly different wording I would have chased it. (there are some Expo postcards I chased down English and French back)