Young again

Well, I did it again.

I made yet another trek to my local flea market this past Sunday. Making the trip up there is becoming kind of an addiction for me.

Yes, I once again came home with an absolutely astounding haul, one that included a few deals you have to see to believe. And one specific buy that you really have to see to believe. (More on that in a later post.)

Since I'm just coming off a series of flea market posts around here, though, I'll probably hold off on writing about those for at least a few days. As much as I love reveling in my flea market finds, I don't want this to be a one-track blog.

Besides, I have another few post ideas that I want to knock out before then. But, since I (again) don't have the time to write about any of those right now, I thought I'd give a quick preview of my flea market finds, which included one of the better cards I've scored in 2013.

I decided to give the great Cy Young here his own post for a couple reasons. One, it didn't really fit in with any of my other scores on Sunday. But, more importantly, this is an awesome piece that deserves its own post.

Before Sunday, I'd only heard about the Sportcasters sets of the 1970's. I'd never owned nor seen one in person, which meant I had no idea of their oversized statures. You could probably fit four regular-sized cards into one of these. (In fact, here's a cool vintage commercial ad for the Sportscasters brand.)

At last week's flea market, I came across a guy who I'd never seen at any prior meetings. He had a bunch of random cards scattered amongst his table. While there were some nice pieces, an initial run-through didn't look too promising.

Half of his stuff didn't have prices on it, and the ones that did were overpriced. Still, just for kicks, I decided to take a look through the rubble. That's when I found "Cy" here.

I fell in love with this card at first sight. According to the back, this shot of the great hurler surveying some of the hardware he earned during his legendary career was taken in 1937, when Young was 70 years old.

Considering how overpriced the rest of this vendor's material was, though, I wasn't holding out much hope. I almost never ask about unpriced cards, but I decided to make an exception for this one. (That should tell you just how much I wanted it.)

As a bit of a hail mary, I offered the guy a buck for it. Honestly, I wasn't expecting him to accept.

But he did.

Shocked, I handed over my George Washington. And into my possession came Cy Young. Had this been my only find of the day, I would've walked away as one happy camper.

Still, in the case of last week's flea market, it was really only the beginning.

You'll see what I mean soon enough.