I found this on eBay and while I am skeptical, the price was too hard to ignore. I purchased two packs, and I don't know, I think this is legit, but maybe a trained eye can tell me if it wasn't / isn't. I recorded a cell phone video of opening the pack, but I can't get it to upload to blogger, which is why this is post #702 instead of #700 - the technical difficulties with it forced me to punt the post down a couple slots.
Update - video is now available, embedded at the bottom of this post
If I do get the video up (I might have to upload to YouTube then link it), you'll hear that I noticed Yogi Berra sitting in the center right away, but I missed Willie Mays on the bottom right. I'm guessing this team photo wasn't taken in 1975.
Supporting the theory that this is not a truly sealed unsearched pack -- Vic Correll was on the wax side, but has no discernable wax stains on the surface. Ron Schueler was next to the gum, and similarly, the back of the card touching the gum seems like it survived without any staining.
Here's the back of the Schueler card, which has a delightful cartoon about young Robin Yount being born after teammate Hank Aaron's MLB debut.
It was a Brewers' Hot Pack! In favor of this being a legit pack, the cards are all in excellent condition, the most wear was on the Scheuler card with a rough edge, and what little imperfections there were seemed to be on one same corner for all of the cards. It's possible it was searched and replaced with the same cards?
There was one Hall of Famer as well. I think this also is a point for a real pack. It's not his rookie card, but I suspect that this card would have been replaced if the pack had been tampered with. There were a total of 10 cards, typical for 1976 Topps. 1976 Topps packs came in 7-card dime packs and 10-card 15 cent packs.
There's the back of the Goose.
I don't know!
The Pros - The seal seemed tight on the pack, the cards were all in essentially the same condition, there was a Hall of Fame player in the pack.
The Cons - it was a lot cheaper than I thought it should be (based on what I've paid for '78 and '79 packs in the past), the top and bottom cards weren't damaged by wax or gum, the gum was broken (though it did make a full piece).
Here's the video -
What do you think? If you opened 1976 packs before, does it seem reasonable to get 4 Brewers in one pack? Possibly too good to be true.
'83 is the oldest pack I've ever opened and that was from a wax box I bought in '83. How cool to rip something from '76 regardless.
ReplyDeleteFun whether it had been searched or not. Thanks for sharing!
ReplyDeleteThis has at least a decade on the oldest pack I've ever opened (probably '86 or '87, now that I think of it). Very cool!
ReplyDeleteI opened packs in 1976: getting 4 cards from the same team is pretty close to a red flag. I don't ever remember that happening in a single wax pack.
ReplyDeleteNice catch on Mays. I'll have to examine that card now.
Cool pack break. One day a while back, I watched six or seven videos on YouTube of people busting vintage packs. Very entertaining.
ReplyDeleteI'm pretty sure 1977 Topps Star Wars were my first packs. I guess I could have opened a pack of 1976 baseball at some point, but if I did, I don't remember it.
Now that I can comment here, I'll be self-promoting and say that if anyone's curious about the Mets team card I wrote about it here:
ReplyDeletehttps://shlabotnikreport.wordpress.com/2018/07/10/a-thwarted-comment-and-i-didnt-want-to-waste-the-time-spent-researching-the-1976-topps-mets-team-card/
I also opened packs in 1976, and four Brewers seems a bit strange but honestly... my memory isn't great so anything I say regarding this wouldn't hold up under cross-examination in court.