I picked up some 56s, and I'm hooked ... where do I go now?
 

So I went to the LCS today to try and add a few more cards to my ungraded 1962T baseball set. I didn't. But what I did get were a couple of 1956 Topps football cards. I'm now hooked on vintage football.


Here's the vintage football I picked up today
https://i.imgur.com/NJqJXxg.jpg?1


I've now got a handful of 1960 Topps and these 2 from 1956. My question is, where do I find more? I know about eBay. But I'm looking to potentially trade my baseball extras for football cards.


This place is crazy about baseball. Is there a place like this for football? A place where you can trade, buy and sell because there's not much of that here. I've even tried over at SCF without much success. As I said, I know about eBay, but I'm trying to trade off some of my baseball extras (or even modern football cards) for vintage football.


Either way, I'm hooked on football now. I love baseball and the history of that sport. But I've been watching old NFL Films footage this afternoon. Reminds me of the day I sat with Sammy Baugh with him wearing a spit stained shirt and watched some NFL Films footage, talked football and even went outside and played catch with him.

What is SCF?
Larry

I know the feeling! I have always been a baseball collector. However, about two years ago, I "discovered" vintage football cards. I have since completed 1965 Topps Tall Boy Football, 1966 Topps football, 1969 Topps football, and am now about 65 cards shy of completing 1965 Philadelphia. What you will find is a ton of great nostalgic and attainable sets which include multiple HOFers, especially in the late 1950s and into the 1960s. Unlike the monster sized baseball sets of the 1960s, the football sets are comparatively small. This forum is full of very committed, knowledgeable, and passionate football collectors from whom I have learned a lot. If I didn't like 1950s and 1960s baseball so much, I could almost just collect football. The thing I am having trouble with is balancing the two sports. As a set collector, I want it all and am having trouble balancing my wants. My football progress has been slim the last few months, but I did buy a few commons for my '65 Philly set last week. Have fun with it! It is a great side of the hobby!

SCF is SportsCardForum. Mostly traders, very few buyers. Mostly newer stuff.

I hear what you're saying. Baseball set collecting is just so tough. I'm a sprinter. In other words, I like to finish quickly I don't want it to take 2-3 years to finish a set.

It took me a little over a year to finish my 1958 Topps set, and I thought that was too much. I wound up selling it, which I regret to this day. But because I had traded for most of them, I only had $500 into it. I sold it for $1,500 to help fund a trip to Disney World for my wife and I (the very first trip for either of us).

Football sets seem like they'd be easier to put together simply for the fact they're about 1/5 of the cards of the average baseball set. But I can't find anywhere to trade.

You say there's football people here, but I don't see them. There's very few football threads and hardly no buy/sell/trade threads. You said you picked up a few for a Philly set. Was that on here? In a trade? Or did you have to buy them? See, I have tons of cards (newer and vintage), and I'd like to trade them. I just can't find any site that flows to football.

This site is full of baseball traders, SCF and Blowout have hardly any traders at all and Beckett is basically non existent. I know guys collect vintage, I just can't find guys to trade with. If I could find somewhere that caters to football cards, I'd probably give up my football collection and trade/work on all of the football sets through the 50s-60s.

It pains me to say you are correct. Too many football lurkers on this site (and other sites) for my taste but you can't force people to post LOL. Would love to see each dedicated football collector here commit to starting one new thread each week or two. If everybody did that, this forum would be awesome.

Agree there isn't much active trading going on here either. I think there are several reasons for this that have nothing to do with the site. 1) the football collecting community is very small compared to baseball which means a lot less people to trade with, 2) since football sets are small and less expensive it seems like many more collectors are hoarders ... i.e. only acquire and hardly ever sell/trade. A football collectors doesn't necessarily have to sell / trade one thing to get something else they want. In baseball, particularly for the very expensive items, collectors are constantly selling something to acquire something else. Of course this isn't universal but I know a lot of football collectors that just never feel the need to sell anything.

A couple of trade ideas for you. Check out OBC http://www.oldbaseball.com/. Collectors there trade and/or send to each other cards they need to complete sets. Note that the typical grade for cards traded / sent to each other is VG or less but there are some exceptions. Calling Larry, calling Larry ...

Check out https://www.facebook.com/groups/vintagefootball/ Lots more purchases than trades but a very active vintage football group that many use to purchase, sell, trade cards with others.

Hope this helps and you will stick around and help grow this forum!

jeff