Topps 1968 Milton Bradley set

[ALR-bishop]

I finished this set with the 2nd CL card with the help of Carlton Miller. For anyone else interested in this set here is a great article on it by Carlton in the current issue of SCD. Anyone interested in the Topps regular 1968 set and it's variations should also read it

http://www.sportscollectorsdigest.co...on-bradley-set

[savedfrommyspokes]

Nice to finally be able to pat Carlton on the back publicly for this fabulous and informative article as he was generous enough to share a preview a few months back with me. Thank you again Carlton! Over the years I have sent a bunch of these 68 MB BB to Carlton before I decided to start on this set myself(thanks to Carlton for motivating me)....so far I am about 40% complete.

[horzverti]

Thanks for posting. Great info. Let's see some 68 MBs!

[ALR-bishop]

MB LC Variations...both are MB cards



I have one pair of these with my MB set and one with my 1968 Topps set since they are listed as variations to it in most guides



Koosman




Aaron MB back and regular 68

[JollyElm]

I thought the only CL's in the MB set of 77 cards were the two different Marichal variations. The Robinson CL was part of the game, too?

[Mark70Z]

Someone show the Brooksie please!

[ALR-bishop]

Sorry---good catch Darren. The Robinson variants are from the regular set. I pulled up the wrong scan

[JollyElm]

Originally Posted by ALR-bishop

Sorry---good catch Darren. The Robinson variants are from the regular set. I pulled up the wrong scan.

You had me scrambling to update my need lists!!

[kickstand19]

Just wanted to chime in to acknowledge the great job Carlton did on putting this article together. He's been an immense help over this past year as I've hunted these cards aggressively. Everything he has said about these cards are true. A few collectors will be all it takes to start drying the inventory up. The MB story is a great one which I think will resonate with collectors. It's also very reasonable to believe these cards eventually end up in a Super Set. Great opportunity to find these cards now... Putting this set together has been an absolute blast!

BTW.... Just the Marichal checklists are in the MB set

[4reals]

I was fortunate enough to have Carlton ask me to help on his project. He emailed me the scans of each card and gave me the coordinates on where it would have appeared on a sheet and I simply pieced it together. Here is a larger version of the picture of the sheet since the one on the article isn't very big.

[JollyElm]

I have a pretty nice Stottlemyre…

[kickstand19]

That's a real nice Stottlemyre.... I've had trouble coming across that one

[savedfrommyspokes]

Originally Posted by kickstand19

A few collectors will be all it takes to start drying the inventory up.

I have had great luck finding these MB cards (both BB and FB) embedded in random lots....over the past few years, I have probably come across 100+ of these MB cards (if I had kept them all, my BB/FB set likely would have been complete) out the 12-15K cards from these issues I have bought and gone through before reselling. Before Carlton turned me onto these cards several years back, I had no idea they existed, so in the years before, there is no telling how many I missed. Based on my experience with finding these cards embedded in lots(even from experienced dealers), there are a lot of these MB cards still out there lurking in dealer stock, collector sets and accumulations, unknown to their current owners.

I think it will be a while before these are dried up because they are so dispersed and embedded.

[savedfrommyspokes]

Originally Posted by kickstand19

A few collectors will be all it takes to start drying the inventory up.

dup

[savedfrommyspokes]

Originally Posted by kickstand19

A few collectors will be all it takes to start drying the inventory up.

Duplicate

[ALR-bishop]

Thanks for posting that Joe.

Saved makes the point that some sellers may be unaware of this set and mix them with regular Topps 1968 cards in their inventory. When I was putting my set together I came across a few sellers offering cards from the later 1968 Toppps series as MB cards because of the similar backs. If collecting this set it is important to be familiar with the checklist.

Anyone here have the complete game with cards ? I know Carlton has a few. I am just a baseball guy so it is not on my list. Anyone collect the football set ? The hot rods ?

[savedfrommyspokes]

dup

[savedfrommyspokes]

Originally Posted by ALR-bishop

Thanks for posting that Joe

Yes, very nice Joe

[kickstand19]

I do agree that there are still quite a few of these yet uncovered. However, they will be spread out thinly through many different collections. Hardly anyone will have a lot of these. I've contacted a ton over people over the past year (probably over a thousand or so) with regard to these cards; many big dealers included. Your going to find that a lot of the big dealers have been cleaned out and have very few. After they've been cleaned out, its going to take a long time for them to restock. I've also inquired with many sellers about MB's in their collections, and have scored quite a few of these this way (I have approx 800 total) I do expect to see a minor glut of these cards as people start to figure out what they have and attempt to make a few bucks. I just think a few collectors could put a serious dent in what's available. I guess time will tell.

[ALR-bishop]

Mark---here is the Robinson

[Mark70Z]

Al,

Thanks so much for taking the time to post the Brooksie MB. Your example looks to be in very nice condition as well.

Mark

[goheels]

Mark,
Here's a picture of a Brooks MB with a top border (lower part of the Ron Mix card). For whatever reason, there aren't many Brooks cards cut with the border. I have about 30 Robinson MBs and only a few with this border.

[goheels]

Here is one of my two PSA 8 Robinsons. Came from my "Game 7" purchased for a minimal sum over 20 years ago from an antique/toy dealer in the midwest. I have a couple raw cards that may equal or surpass this one but I did think this one was undergraded. To date this game has yielded 8 PSA 9 cards, still have some more to be graded. I thought the centering was perfect on this one.

[goheels]

For my MB auto collection I tried to get cards with borders. Brooks signed this for me years ago. Very gracious.

[kickstand19]

scan0001.jpg

scan0002.jpg

Here are a couple 2014 Topps 75th Anniversary Buybacks I located when Series 1 broke a few months back. Good illustration of how mainstream these cards are. I thought they were pretty cool...

[Mark70Z]

Originally Posted by goheels

Mark,
Here's a picture of a Brooks MB with a top border (lower part of the Ron Mix card). For whatever reason, there aren't many Brooks cards cut with the border. I have about 30 Robinson MBs and only a few with this border.

You really shouldn't have more Brooksie MB's than a Brooks collection... So if you ever make a reduction to the 30, please let me know.

Thanks so much for posting the Brooks MB cards; I really enjoyed the view...

[goheels]

You can barely see the white border at the left, almost perfect centering.
Second card is nice too. Both came straight from games and went to storage years ago. Fortunately, both of these cards came from the middle of a stack that had a relatively loose rubber band. Smaller rubber bands have taken great looking cards down to a PSA 6 from the indentations on the side.

[horzverti]

The card in the middle is a reg Topps card and the cards on the left and right are Milton Bradley versions.

You can see that the Milton Bradley issues have yellow backs and the regular Topps has the orangish back.

The Milton Bradley version often has a more orangish red color and the reg Topps version will have a deeper true red color printing of 1968 Rookie Stars.

These MBs are by no means plentiful and should demand a higher premium. Sure they can be found on eBay, but I don't think their current prices reflect accurately on their scarcity. It is no secret that MBs exist, but I think we should expect their demand to increase as they become more regarded as necessary in the 1968 Master Set.

I feel that the 1968 Milton Bradley cards are an absolute gem of an issue. Thanks for the great thread.

[horzverti]

Heels, those are gorgeous MB Ryans!

[Bestdj777]

Anyone know what the deal is with the 68 Mantle? My understanding is that there was no MB version, and it is not on the checklists I've seen, but I have seen pictures of what was represented as a MB version.

Thanks,

Chris

[goheels]

I have seen the picture and website you are referring to. There aren't any MB Mantles, never were. All the cards were taken from the 1st and 2nd series. I have opened up 8 games to date in my lifetime--about 800 cards in total. That should average 6 cards each (800/132=6.06). In that grouping I have a few cards with only 3, maximum 9, about what you would expect statistically. No Micks.

[Bestdj777]

Originally Posted by goheels

I have seen the picture and website you are referring to. There aren't any MB Mantles, never were. All the cards were taken from the 1st and 2nd series. I have opened up 8 games to date in my lifetime--about 800 cards in total. That should average 6 cards each (800/132=6.06). In that grouping I have a few cards with only 3, maximum 9, about what you would expect statistically. No Micks.

Thanks for confirming. I really appreciate it. Not sure where those pictures from--photoshop?--but they had me searching for a bit for a Mantle. I'm very glad I won't have to shell out the money for one though.

[goheels]

Vorzverti,

You bring up a great question about the possible difference in the front of the cards. Your two Ryan MBs sure look different.

If you look at my two, one is orange looking and the other is red. I looked at my Ryans and I don't see a pattern.

A better test was the 155/156 World Series cards. I had exactly 6 regular WS 5 and 6 cards each to compare with 28 and 25 MB cards respectively. I think that's a good sample size. I don't see a difference in the cards. Some look like red and some like orange.

I did a decent look at cards 7,8,10 (leader cards with red/orange tops) and the lettering for the Indians Rookies/Tigers Rookies, both Marichal check list cards, and Dodgers/Yankees cards which have red circles. Didn't see a difference. It would be nice if picking out MBs were that easy.

Al Richter has a great picture of the 68 Billingham rookie card regular Topps issue which has the orange and red variations. There are a few rookie cards like that in the regular 68 set, and amongst variation guys I think there is a bit of divided opinion. It really is hard to distinguish. I feel the same about the 1964 Topps Leaders Cards, red vs orange "variations".

The only difference I have seen on the MB vs regular fronts so far (other than cards with borders) is that the cards with bluer backgrounds like Jim Merritt, Don Wilson, and Ron Willis are more intense and darker hues than the regular cards. I have 46 Merritt MB cards and 14 regular Merritts. In general the MBs are bluer but at the end of the spectrum some of the lighter blue background MBs are lighter toned than the darker regular cards. It does get to the backs of the cards with this issue. I quit trying to guess on the fronts after wasting quite a few dollars on ebay buying what I thought was an MB and I finally figured out I just couldn't tell. I wouldn't gamble on a Ryan with those prices, to be sure.

But then my eyes are quite middle aged.

[goheels]

The WS Game 6 card is badly miscut. It resides in the 7th row, 7th column, and the white border is a Pete Beathard. The Hudson (3rd row, 10th column) is worse and you can see the AL 10 card on the obverse.

The corners are perfect, these cards came straight from a sealed game. I don't know if the resolution shows it but there is an indent at the top of the WS GM 6 card and a small one at the bottom. Whenever the rubber bands were placed vertically and not horizontally there was more of an indent. This card was 3rd down in a stack of 26 cards. The Hudson likewise came from the same game, different stack. There were six terribly miscut cards in this one game, none in my other games. The Hudson has a small ridge at the upper right border, from years of pressure in the box. That indent usually knocks a PSA grade down to a 5 to 6.5. The cards before and after these two were perfectly centered, rare for MBs. Go figure.

These scans were high res 600 DPI. You can't see the flaws on the scans but they are there. PSA misses them sometimes but not often. It certainly adds to the challenge of getting decent grades. These cards with the high gloss and brighter than average colors look sharper than regular 68 vending cards, but the dings of the box and rubber bands make it a crap shoot.

[horzverti]

Thanks for the analysis Heels. I need to find myself a red lettered MB Ryan now.

[Mark70Z]

Ok... Any good looking Belanger's to share?!?

[goheels]

1 of 2 graded 8s, none higher.

[kickstand19]

Nice Belanger Heels... I haven't had much luck finding him in high grade. Very tough card... EX is the best I have

[Mark70Z]

That's a great looking card; thanks so much for posting Carlton. I've always like the pose of Belanger in this shot, with the away Baltimore uniform...classic!

Has there ever been any information discovered as to who selected the baseball players in the set? Just seems like an interesting selection. I'm just glad there are two awesome O's in there, Brooks (greatest 3rd baseman of all time), and Belanger (greatest defensive shortstop of all time). No debate; I'm correct on this one.

[goheels]

I don't think we will ever know why those seven rows of cards were selected out of the 10 possible 1st series rows and 8 possible 2nd series rows.

I never spoke with James Shea, Sr. He retired in late 1967, stayed in the Springfield area until his death around 1984.

I did speak with his son briefly, James Shea, Jr. He ran the company from 1968 until the merger with Hasbro in 1984. He moved to California, and died there in 2013 at the age of 87.

The last contact I had with anyone at Milton Bradley who had anything to do with this set has no memory left, severe dementia.

Mr. Shea Sr. was a lifetime Red Sox fan. I have always wondered why he wouldn't have picked some of the Yaz League Leader Cards--he was the triple crown winner in 1967. He might have also picked Tony Conigliaro #140. Willie Mays #50 was still one of the most popular players in those two first series. I believe the selection was random, as the atmosphere in that company in early 1968 was very hectic. I don't think Mr. Shea picked them. Checklists and rookie cards were not popular with kids back then.

[Mark70Z]

Carlton,

Thanks again so much for the information on the MB and the generosity you've shown.

Regards,

Mark

[goheels]

Here are two extreme miscut regular cards. The distance between the bottom of the red surname letters and the white border in the MB cards is 2 mm; it is 4 mm in the regular miscuts. On the back, the regular 68 Wills miscut is so extreme at the bottom that it becomes white stock. You can see white stock all the way around any 1968 regular BB sheet.

[Mark70Z]

Ok Carlton. Post your FAVORITE MB card; please...

[ALR-bishop]

Koosman rookie ?

[goheels]

Bought this Blue Eddie at a card shop years ago in New Jersey.
Definitely an MB--look at the lower border, and the yellow back.
It is next to a "missing link" card of Brinkman and Winston Hill.
A regular 68 Brinkman is depicted for comparison.
I have found at least one other MB Blue card and a few other strange ones.
It is totally missing yellow:
Yellow letters minus yellow=white letters (or blank letters)
Green circle minus yellow=blue circle

I need the printing experts to help with this one!!

[goheels]

Same card shop in New Jersey. I couldn't believe it when I saw these two. Paid 50 cents each for them.
There were 11 other MBs in the shop, none of them unusual.
You can see that the Blue Cox also has the same attributes:
Yellow letters minus yellow=white or pale letters
Green circle minus yellow=blue circle
If you look closely at the burlap, it is bleached looking, missing yellow.
It is definitely an MB by the back, which is diagnostic.
Regular Cox 68 for comparison.

[goheels]

This graded Carew MB is graded as a regular card, long before PSA recognized MBs.
It looks different from my other Carews. It looks bleached out a little bit.
You can see the white border on the bottom which is the top of the Turbo-Sonic hot rod card.
The trophy is not nearly as yellow.

[brightair]

I'm getting the impression that there are 2 versions of regular Topps Brinkman and Cox, white team and yellow team, and just the yellow team versions of Milton Bradley cards. Is that correct?

Second, I'm trying to get a sense of value for MB cards, but can find little to go on. Can anyone give me some idea of average prices for commons, and also average prices for the Brinkman and Cox MBs? Perhaps in EX shape?

Thanks in advance.

If it looks like I am trying to acquire some of these, you are right. Have also cards to trade if anyone is interested...

https://sites.google.com/site/richar...trade-material

brightair
Richard D

[goheels]

Here is the "blue" Carew next to my PSA 9. The 9 is the only one graded as mint. There is an absence of some yellow. The tone of the grass is different as is the burlap border.

[goheels]

Welcome to the discussion, Richard. I use your variation list every time I go to a show and I deeply appreciate the work you have done in listing variations.

The Cox YT was listed first as a "variation" in 1983 Sport Americana Price Guide #5, and the Brinkman YT in 1987 (volume 9). Denny Eckes first noted the Brinkman and I bought my first MB Brinkman from him in 1986.

All Milton Bradley 68 cards are yellow backs and vice versa. This includes the Cox/Brinkman. They were only produced in the game but have become widely dispersed as many of the MB collectors on this board will attest.

To be consistent, PSA should list all 77 MB baseball cards as variations or none. There is nothing different about the Cox and Brinkman except they were obvious from the team letter CORRECTIONS, hence their inclusion in the guidebooks, still 15 plus years after they came out.

The MBs do belong in some kind of master set. It is possible that PSA may recognize a third category down the road--the regular set; the master set with the checklist variations, and cards #10 and 400; and a super set that would include the latter plus the 77 MBs.

This would be consistent with how they dealt with the 1962 green tint cards. PSA lists the regular set, the master set with variations, and a super set with all the green tints.

The very strange cards I listed tonight are bizarre. I didn't mean to confuse anybody.

As to the value, it is based on supply and demand. The prices on these cards are going up. A PSA 10 Brinkman sold for almost 4000 recently, a PSA Ryan 7.5 for 3200+, and a PSA 9 Gaylord Perry for 500 last week with spirited bidding.

Not enough sales information yet for a price guide.

I lost a bid for a PSA 9 Ted Savage a few months ago to a fellow MB collector. It went for over 200, with several individuals bidding over 150. A PSA Savage is a common that usually sells for 20-25.