Baseball Cards

Two more Sammy Sosa cards

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My goal is to get all of the 1990 Sammy Sosa cards and below in a graded format. However, some of the cards don’t seem to have any graded options for sale or they are way too expensive. This has forced me to buy raw cards for a few of them which is ok for now. I’d rather have the card ungraded than not have it at all! I can always send in the raw cards for grading down the road.

The first card is the 1990 Baseball Card Magazine #49 White Sox Rookie Stars with Sammy Sosa and Robin Ventura. I didn’t even know this card existed until a few weeks ago when looking at a few Sosa checklists. A quick look on eBay and I found one for $3.70 shipped so I went for it.

When I got it, it came along with 2 other Rookie Stars. At first I thought the seller gave me another person’s order but I confirmed that he sent the extras for me. Nice!

The Andy Benes / Steve Avery card has been spoken for. However the Todd Zeile / Alex Cole card is still available if anyone wants it. Contact me here or send me a message on Twitter (@cubsfanstan) if you’re interested.

The other card I recently picked up is the 1990 Coca Cola Sammy Sosa card. I noticed this card is slightly wider than normal baseball cards as it wouldn’t fit in any other sleeve I had except the one it came in.

This puts me at 226 unique Sammy Sosa cards. Wowsers!

Tyler Chatwood cards with autograph

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On December 7th, the Cubs signed former Rockies pitcher Tyler Chatwood to a 3-year, 38 million dollar contract. I knew nothing about this pitcher but if the Cubs were willing to spend that much money on him, I figured I’d better invest in him too. I hopped on eBay the next day and found a lot of his cards that had a best offer. It was priced at $19.99 but they sold to me for $12.99 + shipping.

Despite the auction claiming it to be a rookie lot, it technically was not. Beckett has his rookie cards limited to 2011 even though these cards say 1st Bowman or Bowman Chrome cards. Not a big deal as I just wanted some cards of his just in case he turns out to be a solid addition to the team. There are a couple refractors and a gold card along with an autograph. I don’t have many autographs in my collection so it’s always nice to add a new one.

Cards in this order:

(5) 2008 Bowman Chrome Draft Prospects #BDPP7 Tyler Chatwood Los Angeles Angels
(2) 2008 Bowman Chrome Draft Prospects Refractor #BDPP7 Tyler Chatwood Los Angeles Angels
(1) 2008 Bowman Draft Prospects #BDPP7 Tyler Chatwood Los Angeles Angels
(1) 2008 Bowman Draft Prospects Gold #BDPP7 Tyler Chatwood Los Angeles Angels
(1) 2010 Bowman Chrome Prospects #BCP188 Tyler Chatwood Autograph Los Angeles Angels

1980 Topps Chicago Cubs team set

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As I was browsing around eBay one day, I came across the 1980 Topps Chicago Cubs team set. I bid on it and won it for $2.80 plus $3.99 shipping! Not a bad price! I finally went through them today and compared them to the list of cards on Beckett.com as well as TradingCardDB.com. Beckett had an extra guy on there that is actually a White Sox player which I’ve emailed them about.

Both sites also listed a 1980 Topps #202 Home Run Leaders/Dave Kingman/Gorman Thomas card which was not in the eBay order. It wasn’t shown in the picture of the listing so I’m not going to complain about it. I’m guessing since the card has both a Cubs player and Brewers player on it, it wasn’t considered part of the set. I’d still like to find it so I can complete the set though.

According to Baseball-Reference.com, the Cubs went 64-98 in 1980 so not a very good season. I was a toddler at this period of time so I only recognize a few players like Sutter, Buckner and Kingman. No worries though as I still want to collect as many Cubs team sets regardless how they did in each year.

If anyone has 1980 Topps #202 Home Run Leaders with Dave Kingman and Gorman Thomas, please let me know! If I find it on my own, I will update this post. Thanks!

UPDATE: Thanks to a kind soul named Chris on Twitter (@addysdaddy181), the card is on its way to me! Thanks to all who replied to my request!

UPDATE #2: I’ve received the card from Chris and my 1980 Topps Cubs team set is complete! Hurray!

Cards in this order:

1980 Topps #17 Bruce Sutter
1980 Topps #54 Dennis Lamp
1980 Topps #103 Bill Caudill RC
1980 Topps #135 Bill Buckner
1980 Topps #153 Tim Blackwell
1980 Topps #175 Rick Reuschel
1980 Topps #240 Dave Kingman
1980 Topps #298 Ken Holtzman
1980 Topps #323 Mick Kelleher
1980 Topps #343 Mike Vail
1980 Topps #381 Team Checklist
1980 Topps #398 Barry Foote
1980 Topps #431 Mike Krukow
1980 Topps #452 Steve Dillard
1980 Topps #472 Willie Hernandez
1980 Topps #493 Jerry Martin
1980 Topps #514 Steve Ontiveros
1980 Topps #523 Ken Henderson
1980 Topps #541 Miguel Dilone
1980 Topps #574 Scot Thompson
1980 Topps #594 Dick Tidrow
1980 Topps #628 Doug Capilla
1980 Topps #639 Larry Biittner
1980 Topps #676 Dave Geisel / Steve Macko RC / Karl Pagel Future Stars
1980 Topps #691 Ivan DeJesus
1980 Topps #716 Lynn McGlothen