Hulk 181 Rookie Card sells for big money! 4 4

[onlyweaknesskryptonite]

 

45 minutes ago, Buzzetta said:

Is that sheet from 1940 or the 84 reissue?

I've always wanted those Superman 1940 cards.  Either way the uncut sheet is beautiful. 

I wish I could have gotten the 1940. Only ever seen one sheet come up for auction at a semi obtainable price and still just debated too long. It is the reissue. Which I got for a steal. At one point I have 3/4 of the 1940 Superman Gum , but finding some of those High #s is insane and even harder if you are not setting for pieces or paying big bucks per card, so I ended up selling those off . I got uncut sheets of almost every set I collected as well as the uncut inserts. Really considering letting go of most of the Marvels with these crazy prices. 

After completing most of my " master sets" of cards ( base cards, inserts, promos, sell sheets, info sheets , and some had binders) I started looking for uncut sheets. Which almost every set , I was able to acquire them. Here are just a few.

 BTW I have almost every DC Set ever made in my OCD version of a true Master Set. I had most of the Marvels , but started to run out of space and wanted to refocus on my comics. Now really will probably sell almost all of the marvel with these crazy numbers. More money for COMICS! 

Edited February 13, 2021 by onlyweaknesskryptonite
Sometimes my spelling is atrocious.

[Buzzetta]

I am still debating what to do with this... I had submitted it myself... but part of me feels it belongs in a PSA holder and part of me feels to leave it alone since i have no intention of selling it right now.  

[B2D327]

42 minutes ago, Buzzetta said:

 

How much is THIS worth given today's market?  

[Buzzetta]

I still cannot believe what the promo rookie is going for. 

I took these pics awhile ago and then had the cards locked back up.   When I get a chance I will go visit and get a better pic of the promo rookie. 

[comicwiz]

9 hours ago, Buzzetta said:

I checked that out this morning and just shook my head.  Apparently Boba Fett has a "Rookie Card".

I have news for the geeks.  Derek Jeter has a rookie card.  Tom Brady has a rookie card.  Boba Fett and Deadpool have a "Rookie Card"

I know - this is apparently Luke's "rookie" from the OPC set. It's also the first card in the set, and is one of the harder cards to complete, but I have one multiple. I see a few selling in the $100 and change range last month, and that was a big jump from the month prior, and now the BINS are in the $300 and up range.

[Funnybooks]

On 2/11/2021 at 8:56 AM, comicginger1789 said:

Exactly

I am just not sure who these buyers are and would love to talk to one. 

[serling1978]

I can't even begin to understand this. I wouldn't pay more than a couple bucks for a 1990s card with a picture of the cover of Hulk 181 on it. And since when did non sports figures have "rookie" cards?? Did I step into some kind of bizarro world? 

Maybe I should unload those Topps Rambo cards I have from the 1980s. One of them must be Rambo as a rookie right? Or better yet, I have a VHS tape of First Blood. I can see the sale on ebay now...

@WOW!!!LOOK!!! 1980 VHS tape!!!! FIRST appearance and origin of Rambo!!!! NEVER WATCHED!!!! Unrestored!!!! $10,000 Buy it Now!!!! 

[Buzzetta]

I wish we could tag department leads in certain threads.  This should be a real conversation with the card grading team. 

Once CGC starts grading some of these cards you know they are going to notate the labels.  If they say 'rookie card' or make any indication of 'first appearance' on a card, then CGC as a grading company is going to get laughed at by the rest of the card grading industry. 

 

Edited February 13, 2021 by Buzzetta

[an99]

I cannot even begin to understand what is happening to the collectables market right now. I've read different theories, but I still don't get it. Where is all this money coming from (and where can I get some?)

[comicwiz]

13 hours ago, Rip said:

Yes!
A box of Star Wars series 1 (5K+)
2-4 will get you around 1-1.5K+
Series 5 around $750
Empire Series 1 $750
Series 2 $400
Series 3 $250-300

Top card Luke Card 1 Blue Series 1
PSA 6 $625
PSA 7 $1.5K-2K
PSA 8 $4K
PSA 9 $6-9K

 

I posted the O-Pee-Chee (OPC) Luke 1 I've got, that's a multiple, I won't break my set and I'll give some others a go as I'm checking more prices. I also have a few anomalies - the first is an error card that was produced by OPC for the Star Wars trading card set. This was the first series (blue) trading card set from 1977 and the error is on card #57, which shows Mark Hamill as Luke Skywalker. The error is a misprinting on the reverse of the card, which should be showing one of the puzzle pieces, but instead shows the backing for what should be card #17. Out of all the sets I've built from an early age, this is the only error card I've ever run across:

And then I've got this Topps Star Wars 4th Series Wax Box with a transition "Cantina Scenes", 5th Series white sticker/label on the top and front panels. In the very early print runs, Topps used some of the left over 4th series boxes for its 5th series of Star Wars cards. This is the white sticker which is rarer than the yellow sticker that you see more often. So this one for some unknown reason was stickered with the 5th series white sticker, but contains 4th series wax packs.

I got these from a fellow who initially listed a Topps SW trading card wax box on a local classified site about 10 years ago. His dad had a general store in the US when he was growing-up. He recalled his Dad opening one of the cases and seeing these transition boxes, and opening them up to notice they had the 5th series packs. So he opened them and sold them as packs in his store. When he opened this one from the case, he noticed the packs were different and put it aside. Somehow, over time it went unnoticed until much later when he was clearing out his dad's old store after he had passed and noticed these lying around. He also found a proper 5th series wax box, which I ended-up with as well. He was initially very reluctant in selling me this because he thought it was "special."

The original listing he put up was for the proper 5th series wax box. I was on him for awhile, but admittedly I didn't think the deal was going to happen. Partly because he seemed so insistent on it being something he wanted to keep and I wanted to respect that if it was because of the memory attached to his Dad's store. Then out of the blue he calls and says he was helping his local church with fundraising for a mission, and was willing to sell. I actually met him at the church to buy it. I felt strange doing the deal inside the church, so I waited in the parking lot until after the service ended to meet him. I kept it for years not having really any interest in selling it because it represented my 4th series box because of what it contained, but over time I began learning about the different transition sticker labels used (yellow and white). There is also another wax box on feeBay with a white 5th series sticker on the exact same spots (covering the printed 4th series caption) but that one has the 5th series packs. My guess is that with any circumstance where Topps utilized previous series packaging in between printing the next series, there is a remote chance product passing through with the incorrect contents. I also think the guy wouldn't have made the story up and when I discovered this it made me wonder whether I should try to find a sealed box, but these transition white sticker boxes are so rare to begin with that you would have to find one, and still open it to determine if the packs are 4th series. Beyond the packaging transition characteristic and wax pack assortment variation error is that the 4th series packs are the one containing the notorious C-3P0 "golden rod" error card.

Even after the believability of this story, I tried to run this this through my mind. It's impossible to get in the minds of people making decisions in that era, but here's some thoughts on it anyway. You get a sealed case of wax boxes (16 count of wax boxes in a staple sealed case) and as you're getting the first, second, third box out of the case you are seeing either these green wax box with transition stickers, or the correct orange 5th series wax boxes intermixed with a few of these green boxes. Either way, you've sold in succession from those orange boxes, or green boxes that had the correct 5th series packs, then you pull this one out to replenish stock, it too has the 4th/5th series transition sticker, but when he opens it, he finds 4th series packs. This was at a time when remaindered stock was purposed in all sorts of ways, but as a shop owner, you've already climatized customers to the new 5th series packs, and seeing this in the box feels like Topps sticking you with old stock. Who knows what was running through the guys mind, but all I have is the word of a guy who says what he did, and Topps who found some reason to purpose old boxes in a manner that could have been confusing for shop owners, and given the population of these being so small, perhaps the very early cases shipped had a full case of these, but I'm willing to accept that they were intermixed with yellow and white sticker labels, and given the rarity of the white sticker, they had to have been one or two of's in a sealed case.

I would also add that returned unsold stock probably would have had a time limit based on series releases, and because they were using 4th series stock in this manner, that window closed quicker than normal. Who knows if him bringing this up when it was discovered, or if he brought it up at all, whether Topps put a time limit on the retailer to return 4th series packs. I know in comics, they had an affidavit return system where retailers had to first tear off the top portion of the comics, and later deface it with marker on the price box, and not be expected to incur any added cost to ship back to Marvel. I have seen 80's era Topps non-sportscard wax boxes with marker on them to indicate unsold stock, but have never seen a Topps SW era 1st through to 5th with any mark or defacing, so for this to have sat there without having a single pack sold indicates to me the shop owner may have had intentions of receiving a credit, but he either got pushback, Topps didn't honour it, and/or it just slipped his mind. Keeping in mind also that his son found a 5th series wax box as well with this 4th/5th transition box (also full). So it might have been one of those things where enough time had passed for Topps to have been willing to address the screw-up, or he may well have received a credit on that single box, and Topps told him he could keep it. Who knows. I know I asked if he still had the case, but unfortunately he didn't find anything other than these two wax boxes.

In the scenario however that Topps did give him a credit on his word, they may have told him not to sell the packs. It would need to matter that it was a person of integrity to have kept them unsold, but that probably makes the most sense, because if Topps told him to hit the road, he probably would have sold them to make up his cost on that box. I know in the affidavit return system with comics, it was heavily abused, to the point where there was an underground distribution that reached as far as big cities like Toronto. Jim Shooter talks about the other ways this was abused. Chuck of Mile High talks about how a lot of this stock was basically hoarded by the criminal underworld, and was pretty much what constituted the Mile High 2 find. But I also know retailers that didn't want to have their status with Marvel to be impacted in any way by disobeying their affidavit return (honour system) and even found a huge backstock myself years back where all the comics had been defaced by marker in the price box. Those were never even in the back issue bin, they were in the basements of these shops 20-30 years after those comics hit the newsstands. The profile of it being a small shop owner fits because they had less of a risk tolerance for being reported for or caught reselling "returned" stock.

Anyhow, thought I'd share, not sure if it makes sense to sell some of this stuff now or hang on to it.

Edited February 13, 2021 by comicwiz

[an99]

Hmm ... I wonder what my 1991 Desert Storm George Bush "rookie card" goes for ... 😆 

[FoggyNelson]

I think I have a stack of Marvel cards in one of my 800 count boxes buried away somewhere👍

[serling1978]

3 minutes ago, Buzzetta said:

I wish we could tag department leads in certain threads.  This should be a real conversation with the card grading team. 

Once CGC starts grading some of these cards you know they are going to notate the labels.  If they say 'rookie card' or make any indication of 'first appearance' on a card, then CGC as a grading company is going to get laughed at by the rest of the card grading industry. 

 

Agreed. The logic on these being rookie cards or first appearances is baffling. 

That image of the cover of Hulk 181 must have been printed on countless objects over time like t-shirts, stickers, those metal sign looking things people hang on walls, etc. Why would the picture being on a card VS any other random object have any sort of significance whatsoever?  

Sports trading cards are printed at the time the player is a rookie and that's the only true medium to collect the "first appearance" of a human beings sports career. The equivalent of the Hulk card would be if Fleer or whoever printed a card with a picture of Michael Jordan's rookie card on it 16 years after Jordan's actual rookie card came out. Would any person in their right mind pay money for that? 

[FoggyNelson]

It’s 1990 all over again😧😧🤮

[Funnybooks]

2 minutes ago, FoggyNelson said:

It’s 1990 all over again😧😧🤮

Time to break out my Gregg Jeffries rookies...finally

[THE_BEYONDER]

54 minutes ago, FoggyNelson said:

It’s 1990 all over again😧😧🤮

Much greater stakes

[Northwest]

Look at recent history in these markets. I think we all know how this will likely end...

Edited February 13, 2021 by Northwest

[Mercury Man]

So comic cards are now falling in line with sportscards and we are calling things 'rookie' cards?   I guess that is on part with sports athletes first appearances in comics (Mantle).  But that doesn't mean I agree with any of this 

 

https://www.ebay.com/itm/THRILLING-TRUE-STORIES-1951-YANKEES-CGC-9-4-MICKEY-MANTLE-ROOKIE-DIMAGGIO-BERRA/274677078470?hash=item3ff40799c6:g:HIoAAOSw2mhf4YBi

[an99]

10 minutes ago, Mercury Man said:

So comic cards are now falling in line with sportscards and we are calling things 'rookie' cards?   I guess that is on part with sports athletes first appearances in comics (Mantle).  But that doesn't mean I agree with any of this 

 

https://www.ebay.com/itm/THRILLING-TRUE-STORIES-1951-YANKEES-CGC-9-4-MICKEY-MANTLE-ROOKIE-DIMAGGIO-BERRA/274677078470?hash=item3ff40799c6:g:HIoAAOSw2mhf4YBi

Yea, and apparently Hulk Hogan's first appearance in comics is a thing too. 

Edited February 13, 2021 by an99
Spelling

[an99]

Does anybody have any insight into why this is happening? 🤔 Not just with comic cards, but the whole doggone collectables market?