The other 5%

Any player collector can relate to this.

Recently, I purchased a lot of 212 Tino Martinez cards, knowing full well I had nearly every single one. However, this was a calculated purchase, as:

1. All 212 were Yankee cards, so I wasn’t getting extra Mariners or Cardinal cards.
2. Some of the cards were pictured in the eBay listing, and I knew I needed them.
3. The price was just $.49, but had a shipping price tag of $5.95. I was the only bid.

All in all, I needed 11 cards (just over 5% of the lot), which I don’t think is a particularly bad percentage.

Could I have gotten the cards I needed for less than $6? Maybe. But probably not all together in one place. So it was basically a COMC order, with about 200 Tino dupes thrown in. Who knows, maybe I’ll bundle them in a lot together and make that money back, as I don’t really need 15 1997 Zenith cards.

Some of the dupes were cool too, and ones I don’t come across frequently. I think I only had one of this 1998 Topps Stars N Steel in my collection, so that’s a productive dupe.

As is this Leaf State Representatives insert.

Overall, a fun and useful Tino purchase. I’m not sure I would have pulled the trigger had I not seen the images from the listing, but I think it worked out well.

And if anyone needs some Tino’s, let me know. I have a lot of dupes.

And I already found a use for four of the dupes – coasters!