Notes From Jacob's Childhood Collection

Plus some cards I'm selling on eBay!

Author

Mike Junk Wax Hero
March 31, 2025

On Friday I decided to take a risk and just read a viewer’s “attic find” story basically verbatim, and added photos for visuals over my voice. It was received extremely well, and more than 6,000 people have watched so far:

As promised here are some comments he sent me along with the photos:

“We get a little of everything in this picture. First, it looks like the August of '87 Beckett on the floor with Bo Jackson on the front. Second, we get to see the various weird containers that were of the norm for storing baseball cards. The odd one in this photo I remember vividly which you can see on the floor to the right. It was made to look like a baseball, and you could divide cards up into those sections. Then we have the fan favorite Nike shoebox that may hold more cards than any container in the world. Then to finish off the perfect pic, a binder, a pack of cigarettes and some matches, and one lazy brother.”

For the grand finale we have the undisputed champion, the crème de la crème, the most noble of perhaps any picture on the planet to represent everything it was to be a nerd kid in the mid to late ‘80s in small-town middle-class USA: me in my bedroom. Where to start when there's so much joy!? The posters we see left to right: a large Hulk Hogan, a small Bo Jackson followed by a larger Bo Jackson showing his two-sport prowess and then to finish it off a general great hitters of baseball where we catch Tony Gwynn in the bottom left-hand corner.

Let's not sleep on the full out Star Wars bedding along with a dial for a heated blanket. We scroll up to the human and see a shirt with two dope subjects, Bart Simpson representing the New Kids on the Block. Attached to this is one confirmed nerd who hated the glasses he recently got. (Though secretly loves them because how did nobody know he couldn't see anything before?!) And what's that in this fine young gentleman's hand? Well, that's what we used to call a phone. The thing coming out of the phone is a cord and that's where the term cordless phones eventually sprang from.

If we slide over to the shelves we will see a veritable hodge-podge of items from Wite-Out to a clown which I for some reason used to collect, a case for my sturdy glasses, a hot wheels type car, two electronic games which were the bomb (the top one is bowling), a pack of table tennis balls because even nerds want to be athletic, and finally what we're here for, random stacks of baseball cards.

A big thanks to Jacob for sharing his story!

PRESENTED BY THE PENNYSLEEVER

New Pennysleever vintage products are HERE!

They now carry sleeves specific to the following sets:

Things I’m Selling

1997 Pinnacle Inside Diamond Edition Javy Lopez #82 — this is a pretty darn rare card that came out of the Vermont Collection. I couldn’t find any sales, ever. There are 0 that have been graded by PSA. Of the baseball players in the set whose Diamond Edition cards have been graded, most have a pop of 1 or 2. Griffey leads with 12. Even raw commons sell on ebay for $20-40. I figured I might get $50 for this, but it’s already at $51 with 5 days to go. I’m auctioning it on eBay through COMC and anticipate doing a video about the experience.

I also have 12 slabbed cards I’m selling through PSA on eBay:

This Is Funny…

But probably true for a lot of people.

Go Watch This Video

With all due respect to Dick Perez, Graig Kreindler is the greatest baseball artist in history. Dan’s interview with Kreindler from Saturday is criminally-underwatched. Dan does such a great job prepping for these, showing visuals, and asking great questions.

Go watch:

The French Quarter Find SGC Reveal

Remember Lenny from The French Quarter Find a few weeks ago? Well he’s back with the SGC reveal(s) of those amazing pre-war cards:

And video 2:

🎬 Upcoming Videos

I continue chipping away at videos I committed to over the winter.

  • Attic Find Friday will continue

  • Peak nostalgia viewer responses

  • #29-25 of my ACE 100 list

  • A subscriber’s killer music card collection — I keep putting this one off because it’s big and intimidating

  • Amazing ticket collection

  • Subscriber collection rooms?

📩 Upcoming Newsletters

  • Missing Caitlin Clark card in Panini checklist?

  • 22-year TTM wait

🎬 Channel Highlights From the Past Week

What a fun week. Only 3 videos, but all of them did big numbers and got great responses.

First, this mail day video that got almost 4,000 views:

Interestingly, opinions were pretty evenly mixed. A lot of commenters felt that USPS’s recent issues took the heat off the seller, but the fact that the seller told me to wait until the day the shipment moved to ask for a refund was suspicious.

I don’t usually link my Sunday Clearing the Bases video in here, but I have a reason today:

Ryan Stuczynski, the founder of GemRate, left a comment explaining Beckett’s change:

🎁 My Pickup Of The Week

I’m also bidding on a big card (for me) but it doesn’t end for a couple weeks.

👻 Brief Horror Movie Review of the Week

No horror again. I’m slowing chipping away at The Righteous Gemstones, trying to get through the whole series.

I also watched the first two episodes of Seth Rogen’s new show The Studio. It feels to me like Curb Your Enthusiasm for a new generation. Cringe comedy at its finest, and I love it.

Lionel Messi trading card controversy: Who is signing his autographs? (might require subscription… someone sent me a free month)

This day in sports history: If you hate the MLB season starting in March, you can blame 1996. On March 31st, 1996, the White Sox and Mariners faced off in the season opener, the first time a season started in March.

Reply

or to participate.