My obsession of graded cards has reared its head once again as BGS was back in town (sort of) and my stack of cards I wanted to get graded has continued to grow since my last submission back in March.
The stack had a total of 29 cards (and I have more coming in) but that was too much ($$) to do all at once but half of that was doable and after a few sales on eBay I had the necessary funds to cover the transaction. First I had to pare down the stack and I came up with these 18 as the most desirable ones. While Tarzana is not in my neighborhood it was close enough to take a day trip to hopefully get 18 great results back from Beckett. I decided to go with the 10 day turn around instead of my typical 20 as I wanted these bad boys back in hand sooner rather than later. When this post goes live I will be one week out from knowing the results. Here are the 18 and my thoughts on each one and what kind of grade I expect from each.
2013 Bowman Inception Blue Seager
If this batch had to be named it would be the Seager/Urias batch as 9 of the 18 are of them. First up is this Bowman Inception blue parallel. Inception has notorious condition issues with the corners being the worst offenders. I was lucky on the Urias card from a few batches ago but I think since there are two corners here with issues I will not luck out on a gem mint of Seager here. I don't think the corners are bad enough though to knock it down to a NM result so I am looking at a nice minty 9 here.
2013 Bowman Inception Gold Seager
Same card, same player but different color. As with the blue one this gold one is subject to the same conditioning concerns especially the corners. The reason this one is higher on the list compared to the blue one is that while it also has issues on two corners one of them you can only really see while under a magnifying glass. Again, can it earn a gem mint grade? Sure but I am being more realistic in my thinking and it will probably come back as a mint 9 just like its blue brother. Still a nice card no matter the grade.
And let's make it three of the same card and player but yet another different color. Of the three colors this orange one appears to be in the best shape. As with the other two there is a corner issues but thankfully it is only on one and it is minimal at that. Hard to see with the naked eye so that works in my favor as if Beckett has to see only if its under a magnifier there is a good chance it will receive a 9 sub grade and hopefully the other 3 sub grades get a 9.5. At worst though I expect this will be at least a mint 9.
2015 Topps Museum Blue Archival Autograph Kershaw
A submission batch wouldn't be complete without a Kershaw autograph in it would it? Of course not and here is the one and only I included of him this time. I love the look of this card and as long time readers know I want a gem mint autograph of Kershaw from every year that there is an autograph released by Topps of him. So far this is my only 2015 of his and I hope it can earn a gem mint grade but since it is way down here on the list (15 of 18) I have reservations about it. Everything looks good but the lower right hand corner has some chipping. I am praying that is earns a 9 and the other sub grades bump it up but I am being realistic and know there is a better chance than not it will grade out to an 8.5 sub and 9 overall.
2015 Heritage Black Refractor Kershaw
I'm done with autographs of Kershaw for the batch but not of his cards in general and here is the first. This is a great looking black bordered card that at first glance looks to be in tip top shape but I can see it's off centered which will probably cause that sub grade to drop to a 9. For some reason I have a bad feeling that it will earn an overall 9 even though my research says it should still be gem mint. Hopefully its just me and not the card. We shall see. Fingers crossed.
2011 Bowman Seager
And now, yet another Corey Seager autograph and the one I
really want to grade out to gem mint 9.5. The other 3 (Inception) are nice and all but this 2011/2014 (2011 Bowman but released in 2014 Bowman) is the one that has major upside in the future and I would love to pare it with my gem mint Bowman Chromes of Seager. What holds me back is the centering. I can tell its not perfect but I hope it still earns a 9 as I think the other 3 sub grades will get a 9.5. I have seen these in graded form and they are going for top dollar and will only go up in the near future. My hope is that I can own one as well.
2014 Bowman Chrome Purple Refractor Urias
We are to the point now in the batch where I think everything should be gem mint but there are a couple borderline ones and this purple Urias is the 1st. Top to bottom this cards looks to be centered perfectly but from side to side you can tell its not 50/50, Couple that with the back having the "same" issue we shall see what grade this one earns but I am still more confident than not that it will be gem mint rather than plain old mint.
2014 Bowman Chrome Prospects Green Refractor Urias
There are 3 cards that I feel are borderline and this is the second of the 3 and the second Urias overall. Just like the purple parallel this green one "suffers" from a slight centering problem. I do not believe it is enough to knock it down to a mint 9 but at the same time since I'm thinking it might I have to be ready that it might earn that "dreaded" 9. Come on Beckett, give it a gold as green looks good pared with it.
2015 Topps Tribute Autograph Printing Plate Pederson
Halfway through the batch and we have arrived at the card I
REALLY want/need to get at least a 9.5. This is a 1 of 1 autographed printing plate from the 2015 Tribute release which was recalled by Topps due to quality problems. This card was pulled and put on eBay the 2nd day of the set's release and I was lucky enough to grab it. Printing plates have a notorious history of not so minty grades. When this card made it into my hands I could see no flaws. Everything looks great including the autograph. To be quite honest if this, or should I say when, grades out to a 9.5 I will probably flip it on eBay. Sell high, buy low. Joc's autograph cards have skyrocketed and if I was to have a gem mint 1 of 1 from a product that is basically not on the market anymore it should sell for a pretty penny. Fingers crossing and here's to hoping for that gold banner.
2014 Bowman Chrome Prospects Red Wave Refractor Urias
Alright, I am officially more than half way through the batch now and all I expected to see are gold banners on the rest of the cards from the batch starting off with yet another Urias parallel. This is a limited (#/25) red wave parallel that looks to me to be perfect all the way around but I don't want to be too confident so I'll say that centering is not perfect and cross my fingers. = )
2014 Topps Chrome Black Refractor Trout
It's a non Dodger appearance. Whaaa...? Other than Dodgers everyone knows I love me some Trout cards and once I finally picked this black beauty up I knew it was going to BGS for hopefully a gem mint grade, Card looks to be in great condition with no obvious issues other than one small blemish on the surface. We shall see what Beckett thinks but I will be disappointed if this anything less than a 9.5.
2006 Allen and Ginter Wooden
It's a very tense time when I submit an autograph of a person that will probably be my only one for my collection so its basically my only shot at a gem mint grade and once again this all hold true here. I would have put this great looking Wooden card near that top of the list as I see no issues whatsoever but with my history of totally hitting it or totally missing it I will leave it here. Seems like I get gem mints or near mints returns and totally bypassing the mint bench marker. With only a handful of these out there I really hope this card earns the former and not the former. I am confident just not too much.
2013 Bowman Chrome Yellow Refractor Seager
I did my research when acquiring this card and I hope that I don't disappoint myself as this would be a real big feather in my Seager hat. This is the last Seager of the batch and the one that I am most confident of at least earning a gem mint grade. Corners crisp, surface clean, edges nice and centering looks to be spot on. At one point I even thought that it should be a pristine card but I don't want to be greedy. I'll be happy with a plain old 9.5 here and would be really bummed if it didn't come back that way.
2014 Bowman Oversized Purple Ice Urias
You can't tell by the picture here but this is one big a$$ card. I picked this up on a trade with Frankie as it was my big get from that trade and when it arrived I knew it would be heading to BGS to hopefully earning a gold banner which would sit nicely next to my other gem mint Urias autographs. For a big card it surprisingly looks void of any problems. With only 25 in existence I sure would love to be one of only a couple to have a 9.5.
2015 Topps Silver Framed Pederson
Now to the top 4 and the next 3 are all the same per se with the exception of the player so it basically is just preference on my part to the order. Pederson is on his way to a ROY award the way he is swinging the bat and his play in the outfield and I picked up another limited parallel of his in the form of this silver frame. I still stand by the fact that unless the the actual picture is messed up I can't see these metal framed cards earning anything less than a gem mint grade. Corners, edge and centering are obviously perfect in my eyes with only surface being in question. Expect a gem mint but as always we shall see.
2015 Topps Framed Kershaw
As with the Pederson framed card the only difference between that one and this one is that this is Kershaw and Clayton will always trump Joc in my collection. I already have the "highlights" Kershaw framed parallel and I was lucky enough to have that one earn a gem mint grade and I would love to pare his "twin" here with the same grade.
2015 Topps Framed Trout
And the final one of the 3 framed parallels and this one features the reigning AL MVP, Mike Trout. Most times I would place Kershaw above Trout in my lists if I believe they are the same condition quality but this time Trout gets the nod as this card books for twice as much as Kershaw's. One other reason this time around is that Trout's photo looks better than Kershaw's as I do love me some horizontal cards. 3 framed cards and looking for 3 gem mints.
2014 Topps Strata Griffey
We have arrived to the final card of the batch. Number 18 of 18 and the only one I know will grade out to gem mint as it already has via Beckett's raw card review. Long time readers might recognize this card from my previous batch back in March. I received this back from BGS with the gem mint grade BUT they attached a note stating that it was too thick to slab. Wth? They slabbed my Pee Wee Reese strata but said no to this one? I thought I would hold onto this till Beckett came back in town and I could go and get a second opinion. Well from March till now I found another Griffey Strata exactly like this one that had been graded AND slabbed by Beckett and was being sold on eBay. I downloaded a picture of said card and when I dropped this off with all the other cards I included a picture of that other card stating if you can do that one you can do this one. So now we shall see if they do indeed slab my copy. Hopefully they do as this big plastic holder is an eyesore in my room.
Well that's it everyone. 18 cards and I get anything less than 12/13 gem mints with all perfect autographs I will be disappointed but as always these submissions are a crap shoot. Crossing my fingers and by next week I will know all the results. And with that I am already working on my next batch when BGS comes out in October.
Thank you for reading and have a blessed day.
-Penguin
