Trade with Fellow Blogger : Andrew of Everyday Holliday (2014 Topps Finest Lou Brock Base Autograph X-Fractor Parallel 142/149 BGS Graded Gem Mint 9.5 and 2009 Topps 206 Clayton Kershaw Mini Frame Autograph)

I recently finished up a trade with a new trading partner. It's always nice to start up new internet "relationships" and it looks like I "found" another trustworthy person.

Andrew of Everyday Holliday , who I became blogger and Instagram followers due to the fact that we have a mutual friend in the form of Frankie, posted this Lou Brock gem on his IG feed as he was looking to move it. This card actually was originally Frankie's but he traded it to Andrew sometime ago but since I have always wanted to add a Brock autograph to my collection I was interested in it again once Andrew put it up for "sale". He was looking for some funds to acquire another card and we had agreed on a price but at the last moment he decided to ask if I was interested in another card for the trade. More on that below.

I am more of a fan of the black parallels of Finest but I couldn't pass on finally getting a Lou copy for my collection. Has only been in hand for a week or so and Frankie is already inquiring about it so I might not have it for long. We shall see.

Quad 9.5's and a perfect 10 on auto.

One Forty Two

of

One Forty Nine

. . . so then Andrew asked if I was interested in a Kershaw autograph. Yeah, don't have to ask me twice as long as its at a reasonable price which it was. I actually have this card as this was one of my 1st autographs of Kershaw I was able to obtain back in 2013. To give you an idea how the market has changed I picked that copy up for a mere $13.75. Try to find one at that price now. You can read about that transaction HERE . To make that bargain even better I sent it in to BGS for grading and low and behold it came back as a 9.5 gem. Woo hoo. That recap can be seen HERE .

So do I "need" another one of these? No but I can't have enough Kershaw autographs even if they are duplicates. I ended up sending Andrew a Ozzie Smith autograph to help along the trade and added a little more to the money till. With this card in hand I think it has about a 50/50 chance of earning a gem mint grade from BGS but a mint 9 seems to be a lock. The centering is off a tad. We shall see when they are back in town.

Either way I am happy with the trade and I want to say thank you again to Andrew for making it happen. Hopefully we can do more in the future.

Thank you for reading and have a blessed day.

-Penguin

BGS Submission Update Eleven - 2009 Topps 206 : Clayton Kershaw Mini Frame Autograph Now Graded and Slabbed a Gem Mint 9.5

Original Submission Post
Beckett Book Value : $ 60

What do I know?
As seen in my original post I had this card at the bottom of the pile. Even though I expected all the cards to grade out to at least mint (they did not) I knew that all could not grade out to gem mint.

I believed this card to be a tad off centered but BGS did not agree with me and gave it a 10 and said it was perfect. I thought the corners were not sharp enough to garner anything more than a 9. Once again BGS disagreed and gave them a 9.5 as well. Well surely the edges couldn't be perfect right? They weren't but still they were worthy of a 9.5. To top it off the surfaces also received a 9.5 to go along with a perfect 10 autograph.

A card that I thought would have some trouble holding a mint grade instead comes out with nothing less than a gem mint on all the sub grades. I guessed right on most of the cards but I was totally off on this one and I couldn't be happier. This card's value definitely shot up with it's new gem mint status.

Card of the Day - 2009 Topps T206 : Scott Elbert Autograph

I am still not a fan of these T206's and the only reason I had one prior to this one is because it was of Clayton Kershaw and I will never pass on any Kershaw or Kemp autograph no matter what kind of card it is. That being said I saw this item up on eBay one day and even though Scott will not pitch for the Dodgers this year he is still part of the team and I think will be a very important one next year. Like a few other bloggers out there I really do prefer the on card autograph rather than the sticker autograph. Like to know they touched the card.

Wasn't going to spend much on this card and saw many auctions on the same card where the price in the end would be at least $5. Normally wouldn't blink at that amount but I had too many other auctions I wanted to win so didn't really worry about this one. One day a seller had this starting at .99 with minimal shipping. Now I was interested. With the auction winding down no one had bid on the card which is not surprising so with less than a minute on it I put in my bid at the minimum and won it at the minimum. With shipping the total damage was a tad over $2. Love the bottom of the barrel finds and you just can't argue with a $2 autograph card even if its displayed on a series you are not too fond of.

Card of the Day - 2009 Topps T206 : Clayton Kershaw Mini Framed Autograph

Another score for my Kershaw collection.

I've seen these T206 designed cards for years even when I wasn't in the hobby and they never held my interest. I like the modern sized cards with nice bold pictures and vibrant colors popping off. With that said I wasn't going to pass on another Kershaw autograph. I won this on a second chance offer and was more than pleased to add this to my collection. I lost the original auction with my price of $13.75 being bested by someone that was willing to pay over $16 for it. Didn't faze me but a day later the seller contacted me and stated that if I wanted to buy one at my high bid of $13.75 he was more than willing to sell me another copy he had at that price. I accepted the offer and within days had this nice Kershaw autograph in my hands. Can't get enough of Kershaw and Kemp autographs.