Vintage card you need that, apparently, doesn't exist centered
 

1972 Topps Vida Blue, In Action.

It laughs at me. Openly. Then gets the attention of 1971 Boog Powell and they just have a grand time.

Yours?

71 Murcer
72 Aaron in Action

73 Clemente. I normally don't care much if my cards are nicely centered but a guy at a show pointed out how off-center the Clemente I was buying was and I've been a bit obsessed with finding a nice one since.

This thread hits too close to home. My life is one great miscut....

1954 Red Heart Mantle. I'm a patient man. Too patient now that everything is expensive. But I might wait forever.

1961 Pirates Team card
 

1971 O Pee Chee Clemente

1976 Brett. #19. Always a killer for me.

Also 1967 Mike Shannon #605, tough for me to find centered.

I'll add, virtually every All Star card from 1969 and '70.

68 Mays, Hunter and Bill Freehan

I try not to get too hung up on individual cards, because there are so many different ones out there to collect. But one that I have been chasing for years is the 57T Mantle. That is one I am not sure exists centered (at least naturally). If anyone has a good one I would love to see it.

I am not a Clemente collector and I don't generally collect 70s cards, so I don't know why I have this one.

Ha ha, there is such an inherent problem with this thread. By posting the card you are seeking (and never finding), you are alerting everyone else to its scarcity, and as such, adding a whole new crop of people who will now be chasing after it and grabbing any one that eventually pops up before you can get your 'bidding paddle' ready...leaving you very, very sad, indeed. Been there too many times, so I shall remain mum about which ones I'm heavily pursuing. :rolleyes:

As a near psychopath regarding trying to find certain centered 1972 cards, here are two mentioned in this thread that I submitted through one of Bobby's group subs. (And like everyone else assessing their own cards) I thought Hank should've gotten a higher mark...

Attachment 446849

There are a number of 53 Bowman color singles that are very difficult to find centered on a consistent basis, or won't require a small fortune to purchase:

#48 Sauer
#68 Reynolds
#73 Pierce
#104 Easter
#119 Mitchell
#128 Lockman
#129 Meyer
#155 Clark

There are others, feel free to add to this list or disagree if your experience has been different.

Phil aka Tere1071

Here is my copy of a '57 Mantle. I watched Ebay for MONTHS, and various other places until I found one with the eye appeal I was looking for.

Its not super high grade, but it offers a LOT that similar graded cards in that price range just don't.

https://i.imgur.com/BtbXQnWl.jpg?1

Also, it was a "PSA 5" when I nabbed it. I thought it might be worthy of a review, and sure enough I sent it off months later, and it got a .5 bump. :D

I think I paid about $400-$450 for it 3 years or so back. No way in Hell I can replace it for that now.........that ship has sailed. :(

Excuse the poor cell phone pics, but you get the idea.

Is there such a thing as a right border on a 71T Reggie?

This card...lol...


I honestly don't care for a little OC as long as you see border and corners are sharp. But for my two master 69 Topps sets there were two cards I WAY overpaid and searched for to get decent centering -

1969 Topps Willie McCovey
1969 Topps Willie Stargell


I'm sitting on two 67 Mike Shannons right now...one that is centered and has creases...and one that is OC and fairly VGEX (one soft corner) Ugh. Feel like I need to keep buying them...haha

Darren...I honestly think that is the FIRST TIME I have seen a 72 IA Aaron that is centered! I have a few, all OC and didn't think a centered version was ever printed! I got imagine your getting PM's for that card...lol

It's the same with the 1972 Harmon Killebrew, Willie Mays, Willie Stargell, etc., 'in action' cards. Everyone on the planet can reach out from where they are sitting right now and grab a bunch of these cards. They are that ridiculously abundant. But finding one of those guys NOT falling off the left side of the card? It's safer to bet that humanity will achieve cold fusion before finding those cards centered.

This may not be as true today, but back before the internet, I walked all over one of the Nationals looking for a clean, nicely centered copy of the 1973 Topps All-Time HR Kings card. I never did find a good copy at that show. Sometimes it was the corners, most of the time it was the centering that was bad.

71
 

71 Munson comes to mind. More later as I think this one out.....Basically every 72 BB :D

I’ve basically stopped looking for a Bob Gibson RC. It’s been well over a year now.

Or, more often than not, when you do find the card well centered, the corners have been chewed off.

Here is my copy of a '57 Mantle. I watched Ebay for MONTHS, and various other places until I found one with the eye appeal I was looking for.

Nice!

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1951 Bowman Willie Mays
 

I've been looking for a centered 1951 Bowman Willie Mays for years. In fact, even the high grade cards that I've seen aren't centered 50/50. Am I looking for an unicorn?

Had to check my set...I do have graded Killebrew that is centered and high end in my SGC Killer collection, but these are the 4 I pulled from my set. Aaron is the better of a couple, same with Mays...and decent...but that's the only Stargell I have and wow, I got to do better than that...lol. This thread is motivation to upgrade...several IA cards! I couldn't even in good conscience pull my Vida Blue, it's that embarrassing.

https://i.ibb.co/Ytw6F3T/72-IA-Cards.jpg

Any 1967 Topps card...[emoji849]


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No, you're right. Super tough.
I looked for over 18 months several years ago. Finally got one, and then found a blazing raw one that was just as well-centered in a card shop weeks later! Couldn't pass it up.
The raw one now resides in this PSA 6 holder.

Just moved my spare with great reluctance two weeks ago to a fellow Board Member.
Went to a good cause, though -- helped to fund an E92 Wagner.

The '57 Brooks Robinson is extremely hard to find centered.

The '79 Ozzie RC is all but impossible to find perfectly centered. I don't know that I have ever seen one that doesn't have at least some diamond tilt the left, even the "gem mint" ones.

Here's my Gibson RC. It got a 7.5 subgrade for centering...

https://i.imgur.com/TvWdWKD.jpg

Is this the Unicorn you speak of?
-

My God! THAT is one card I remember vividly having as a kid. We didn't have a big league team in Memphis. After Russwood Park burned in 1960, we didn't even have a minor league team until the Blues started up in 1969. Every one of my pals and me loved the Cardinals; they were only 300 miles away, and we had their games on TV on Sunday, and KMOX on the radio came in loud and clear at night until WMPS started carrying Cardinals games. So we obsessed over Memphis' own Tim McCarver, not Mickey Mantle, and all the other Cardinals players. For whatever reason, Mike Shannon was one of my favorites. Maybe because he had played for the Memphis Chicks at Russwood before moving up. And I vividly remember him calling games when he retired. This 1967 Topps card of his really stands out. Just like the one I had years ago, the copy I have all these years later is also way OC!!!

Call it a minor miracle, but I was finally able to find another pretty-nicely-centered 1972 #170 Vida Blue IA card, and snatched it up immediately. Woo hoo...

Attachment 455562


208. Cardboard Cryptid
A card that is virtually impossible to find perfectly centered.

I think beyond the Shannon card, other 67 highs that come to mind that are tough centered for me anyway, are/were 580 colavito and 605 stanley. I'd also mention that finding the Shellback card without print defects was tough for me as well.

A man would have to do a little digging, but I wonder if there is a common thread between the placement on an uncut sheet and the cards that have been mentioned. Are they usually cards at the end of the rows? At the top or bottom row, in the middle of the sheet? If the same cards always seem to come up crooked, there must be an underlying reason; it is not just random. And are they low numbers or high numbers? I can imagine a cutting machine getting slightly out of alignment over time, before someone would notice and step in and realign it.

Made me look. :)

https://caimages.collectors.com/psai...A_original.jpg

Bob-

[emoji1626][emoji1626][emoji1626]

Gold medals for you.

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Here is mine. I remember BBCE listed it (several years ago) and I must have been one of the first to see it. I did not hesitate to pull the trigger on this one.

https://www.collectorfocus.com/image...b-gibson-psa-6

That has got to be the best looking I.A. Vida Blue on the planet. Wow!

And somehow the PSA Wizard hath decreed it only an "8."

What silliness.

On the back someone wrote "My gawd, this card is nicely centered!!" That may have kept it from being graded higher. :rolleyes:

Ha, well played.

Wow, those 52B Mays cards are outstanding. Color me envious!

These cards fly completely under the radar for almost everyone on the planet, but if you're attempting to complete a centered 1972 Topps set, well slap me on the ass and call me Marvelous Margie Maple!!! Fred Kendall and 'The Major' are always 'floor scrapers,' with the images basically falling off of the bottom borders with nothing but a hair sliver of white space visible there...but NOT today!! I lucked out!!!

Attachment 457090

If you have a couple of minutes to waste, do a search on ebay for either card. Aside from the one Kendall graded PSA 9 with a huge BIN price, neither card can be found even close to being accurately centered while in nice shape.

These were the ones for me, that when I found these copies I jumped for joy.

https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/...f18101f7_z.jpg

https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/...e0823581_z.jpg

https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/...01b68695_z.jpg

Agree with whoever said the ‘71 Topps Munson. I’m not a centering freak, but I don’t like miscut cards. My LCS owner 2-3 years ago had like 4 different copies of that card and every damn one of them was miscut on one border or another. Eventually I got a decently centered PSA 5 off eBay.


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I think that is the best-centered 69T Mantle I've seen. And your 57T is right up there with Phil's. I am definitely jealous.

This one appeared in the B/S/T last year, and I jumped on it quicker than a meth addict could blink...

Attachment 457449


The white 'damage' above the second 'E' is nothing more than a reflection of the crinkling of the plastic sleeve.

Made me look again. :)

https://caimages.collectors.com/psai...s005Munson.jpg

Me too! This one came from Battersbox a couple of years ago. I couldn't have hit the BIN any faster.

My current nemesis is 67T #3 Duke Sims.

Agree on all these. The 76 Brett is a killer. 69 topps always seem diamond cuts.