The official Mickey Mantle Pickup Thread. All Mick, all the time!

[AustinMike]

Originally Posted by bswhiten

Nice ones Mike...

On the HI subject I just got back my nicest full matchbooks from Beckett.
A good way to protect them imo. They recognized variations too

Wow! That's great Ben. It's nice to know that you don't have to destroy matchbook covers to get them graded if you want them graded. It's also nice to know that they recognize the variations. Good for Beckett.

Edited to add: I do wish they would have slabbed them open so that you could see the inside.

[bswhiten]

Originally Posted by AustinMike

I do wish they would have slabbed them open so that you could see the inside.

Me too...I sent them as open books and they closed them. The matches inside these books are pristine as well Oh well.

[brian1961]

I was watching the spring, 2019 Huggins & Scott auction closely. They were offering a 1954 Stahl-Meyer Franks Mickey Mantle in PSA 1 POOR. In spite of its lowly grade, it has a lowlier PSA pop of 17 for the year. Though there were plenty of creases, a few stains, and the factory lot inventory number stamp (that landed in the exotic purple background beside Mick's cheek), the card presented very well, with the heart of the card---Mickey's face, hat, and neck virtually unmarred. With the required juice, the card sold for $6,519.

That's a very impressive price for a PSA 1 Mantle. To put it into perspective, earlier this year a 1954 Stahl-Meyer Willie Mays went for $1,320, or about 20% of what the Mantle auctioned for. While the '54 Stahlie of Mickey Mantle is considered his toughest Stahl-Meyer, the '54 Willie Mays Stahlie was the only year they issued Say Hey. Very interesting.

--- Brian Powell