Early 80's Basketball + eBay = One Happy Collector

[sanjosefuji]

A couple of weekends ago, I picked up a bunch of vintage baseball, basketball, and football cards. It was one of my coolest purchases... and it led me to search for more older cards.


I headed over to eBay and found a set of 1981/82 Topps basketball. I've been a fan of this set since the early 90's, because it's older yet affordable.


How affordable you ask? Well I picked a complete 198 card set for $13.15 (+ $7.95 shipping). Yep... that's the complete 66 card base set, along with the East, West, and MidWest sets.


If you're not sure what I'm talking about. Topps released this product regionally (East, West, & MidWest). Cards numbered 1 through 66 were inserted into packs of all three regions. In addition to those 66 cards, Topps produced 44 additional cards for each region. In other words... 132 extra cards.

The most expensive card in the set is the Kevin McHale rookie card which was only available in the East packs. It currently books in Beckett for $20. The set includes early 80's cards of other superstars like: Larry Bird, Magic Johnson, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, and Julius Erving. And if you're a Detroit Pistons fan... it also contains rookie cards of Rick Mahorn, Vinnie Johnson & Bill Laimbeer.


But I've left out the best part... I won the auction for $21.10 (including shipping), but that's not what I paid. I had $10.02 in eBay Bucks to spend... so my final price for this sweet early 80's basketball set was $11.08.


I know that people have their share of eBay horror stories... but right now I have nothing but positive things to share.


Today's question of the day:

What's are some of your favorite older (say early 80's or earlier), yet affordable sports card sets?

If you're looking for a baseball set and love the 70's, I encourage you to hunt down a 1976 SSPC set. It has 2nd year cards of Robin Yount and George Brett, along with a bunch of HOFers. You can check out the review I did a few months back here.

You can pick up complete sets of this 35 year old product for under $50 on eBay. It may not have the flashiest design, but if you appreciate old school photos of baseball players from a different generation... this is a sweet set at a great price.


I look forward to hearing what older sets you think are great bargains. Happy Tuesday everyone... Sayonara!




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[key2win]

Congrats. That is one nice vintage basketball set to have.

[Sports Card Radio]

I have to agree, any vintage set without Michael Jordan tends to not be collected as much .... as 86/87 Fleer Magic Johnson's tend to sell for more than some of his Topps cards. I think as collectors who remember these players as kids get back into collecting later in life ... you will see the prices start going up.

At an upcoming show, I hope to find some more vintage basketball cards. I'd like to find raw copies that look really nice & send them into BGS or PSA to be graded. It would be fun getting a MINT 9 on a single you can find for a couple of dollars.

I'm really interested at getting most of Kareem Abdul-Jabbar's cards (except RC & Bucks cards) graded 8 or better. The STAR Company cards are interesting too, but I'd only purchase pre-graded versions, as there are too many fakes around. The 80's topps sets you mention are high on my list - as the Magic Johnson & other Lakers sell for very little money. I got a PSA 9 Kareem for around $12 and I hope to get both Magic Johnson's in the set in PSA 9 too.

The eBay Bucks is a really cool system, I only get $3 - $5 each time, but it does get you a 'free' card each quarter.

[sanjosefuji]

Sports Card Radio - I hope you're able to find some stuff @ Tristar... are you guys going on Saturday? If so... It'd be cool to finally meet the brothers.