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One dollar gets you two dozen

"Two dozen what?" you're asking.

Ah, sit tight for the story, dear readers.

While I was at work last night, my wife went out shopping. During her search for party favors for my daughter's long-delayed birthday party/sleepover, she stopped at that dollar store with the dollar bags of '80s baseball cards. And because she is an angel, she grabbed a bag for me and left it by the computer when I came home from work.

Now my wife knows very little about baseball, but she knows I like these particular bags, and she understands a bargain when she sees one. Forty or fifty cards for a dollar? What's not to understand?

She actually did quite well with the first card, which was showing on the top of the stack.

It was a 1986 Topps Rod Carew card. My wife doesn't know who Rod Carew is or that I have this card already. But really, for blindly grabbing at the first card you see, you can't do better than Rod Carew.

Sadly, after Carew, the bag went south. Way, way, way, south. Deep south. Born on the Bayou south. The bags are set up so there is a key card displayed on the front and a key card displayed on the back. The middle cards are usually not as good. You could get basketball cards, football cards, a few duplicates, '88 Donruss. In other words, something unpleasant.

I've learned to peek a little closer at the bags to determine what is between the two display cards, and it's worked pretty well. My wife, of course, didn't peek. So I ended up with this:

That is a picture of exactly two dozen 1989 Donruss Todd Burns cards. I couldn't believe it. I was going, "what is this?" after about the sixth Burns card, and then I ended up with 24 of them. I have never pulled so many of a single card in my life. Heck, I've never owned this many of a single card in my life.

What am I going to do with 24 Todd Burns cards? (Well, 23, anyway. I need one of them).

And that has me wondering: what is the most of any one card you owned? I'm not talking about intentionally acquiring multiple copies of one card. I'm talking about unintentionally stumbling into duplicate hell. The closest I ever got before this was pulling eight 1991 Upper Deck Scott Lusaders. Come to think of it, I think I bought that package at a dollar store, too.

Anyway, that's about it for now. I have to go. I think I hear the Todd Burns cards plotting against me. They know they have me outnumbered.

In the meantime, take a look at the two scans found for me by Jeff of Card Junkie and by Max/jacob mrley. Both cards seem to display the damaged right thumb of Carlos May unlike the other cards of him. Nice detective work, folks.

Comments

Ben said…
1987 Topps Tippy Martinez.

I started collecting in 1988, so the only 1987 cards I would have bought were from the bargain bins. I don't think I bought all the much 87 Topps back in the day because when I started to seriously put the set together last summer, I only had about 125 cards. BUT six of those were Tippy Martinez.

Two boxes of '87 Topps gave me another five Tippys (Tippies?). So I've got 10 extras.

But back in the mid 90's I played Magic the Gathering. I was cursed at getting Craw Wurms out of 4th edition. Just from buying starter decks and packs I had about 10 of them, then I got seven more out of two boxes I bought in 1995. I was sixteen cards short of the set, and I probably would have made it if it weren't for those damn craw wurms.
Anonymous said…
There aren't any baseball cards that really stand out, but when I was getting Star Trek Collectible Card Game cards, I seemed to be cursed by Fleet Admiral Shanthi. Even though it was technically an uncommon card, I must have ended up with at least half a dozen of the boring things.
Motherscratcher said…
2008 Chipper Jones SP Legendary Cuts.

A few months ago I bought a lot of about 50 Chipper Jones cards off Ebay. This lot included 14 of the SPs. I thought it was kind of funny. I remember thinking "hey, it could be worse. It could be 24 Todd Burns's". OK, I didn't really think that, but I do now.
madding said…
I think the most I have of any one card is probably some of the late '80s/early '90s Donruss MVP cards. I think I probably have dozens of Tony Gwynn 1989 Donruss MVP cards at the very least.
Bo said…
One time I bought a big box of commons from the flea market I wrote about it for the most recent blog bat-a-round. In the box were about thirty of the same amateur promo card made for Hideki Irabu's Yankee debut. My record for a regular card is 20 copies of Kelly Mann's 1990 Donruss card.
Mad Guru said…
I don't even know how many Topps Doug Dascenzo rookie cards I have (I stockpiled them as an "investment" when I was in high school) but my boss celebrated her 50th birthday last year and everybody gave her 50 of something as a gag gift. I gave her 50 of the Dascenzo cards and I still have a stack a couple inches thick.
jacobmrley said…
I found a 100-card brick of 1988 Topps Kevin Seitzer recently. While I love all-star rookie cards, this is a little much for even me to take...
Fuji said…
I have 500 copies of card number 545 from the 1990 Upper Deck baseball set. Who's card #545? Yep, you guessed it... I'm the proud owner of 500 Todd Zeile 2nd year cards. I picked them up last year in a baseball card package off of Craigslist. I've thought about using them in a lesson with my students, but no great ideas have popped into my head. Any ideas?