Ted Taylor has completed his book, "Philadelphia Athletics . . . By the Numbers"
  It's a treasure trove of tidbits on all of the A's players and, of course, includes their uniform numbers.
To order, visit www.Xlibris.com/bookstore or check out www.amazon.com or www.barnesandnoble.com.

July 1, 2009

This is our 34th Year of hobby columns

Ted Taylor’s Collector’s Corner

After two decades of hobby magazine inclusions…

Coach’s Corner Sports & Celebrity Auction House

to publish own catalog

            After publishing their every-four-weeks (13-a-year) auctions in Sports Collectors Digest for over two decades Coach’s Corner Sports & Celebrity Auctions of Souderton, PA has decided to publish and mail their own catalogs going forward it was recently announced by Scott Malack, president of the auction house.

            “We have over 25,000 registered bidders, already publish each auction on our website (www.myccsa.com), and we realized that we were no longer reaching the large audience we once did in SCD,” he said. “It was just the right time to do this.”

            The new July auction, with over 5,000 items, has just been posted to the internet and a new catalog will be available shortly they tell me..

            Coach’s Corner’s just completed June auction offered 5,483 items and in addition to SCD advertising he published a 26-page catalog that will be the basis of future catalogs.  Three Babe Ruth balls sold in that auction for an average price of $2,400 as well as baseballs signed by Hall of Famers Ty Cobb, Honus Wagner, Lou Gehrig, Mickey Mantle-Roger Maris all going for over $1,000 each. A baseball signed by the Beatles brought $1,500 and a large lot of signed baseball cards sold for $1,100.

            Given the large volume of items handled in each auction Coach’s Corner offers winning bidders the option of returning an item within 21 days of the auction’s completion. And even with this option the auction house recently reported that it has a less than a one per cent return rate.

            Over the two decades since Coach’s Corner was founded by Souderton’s Nick Malack, the auction house has sold thousands of items – everything from Mickey Mantle’s boat to artwork by Pablo Picasso.  “The secret to our success is that there is no item too large or too small to be included,” Malack said.

            Malack has also found that a growing number of his new consignors are people that are fed up with eBay and their multiple layers of fees (insertions, pictures, credit cards, etc.). “We are always looking for consignments and welcome people who have one item or one thousand, we can handle any amount and can even come pick it up if that would be more convenient,” he added.

            Auctions are always on the internet but catalogs will be mailed to anyone who requests one – and at the current time there will be no charge for them.

            For more information or to be included in the catalog mailing list call Coach’s Corner at 215-721-9162 or find them on the web at www.myccsa.com  .

 

McCracken suggests new HOF Voting Idea

Julian McCracken, a member of the Reading Phillies Hall of Fame (he was once their General Manager) and a guy I actually hired and worked with for several years at Fleer (he was manager of our ProCards minor league cards division at the time) says that he thinks the balloting for the Hall of Fame needs an overhaul.  I agree.

“For much too long, the sportswriters have had a stranglehold on this cherished franchise and it is time to incorporate others who have seen our wonderful game of baseball… those who have witnessed baseball and its performers from a different perspective than simply a seat in the press box, McCracken said.

 “If I had my way, this is how it would be done,” he said and then suggested that they divide the vote into five, different but equal, factions (20% for each group).

(1) Sportswriters and Broadcasters (with at least 15 years of MLB experience)

(2) Current Hall of Famers

(3) Current & Retired MLB Executives (with at least 15 years at the Major League level)

(4) Scouts (with at least 20 years on the job)

(5) Current & Retired Umpires (with at least 20 years of MLB experience).

Good idea Jules, it makes sense hence it is likely doomed to failure and we’ll keep on electing the marginal guys and keep out players like Bing Miller, Doc Cramer and Indian Bob Johnson that belong in there.

As an aside, once McCracken left Fleer in the early part of this decade I was amazed that some ball club didn’t quickly pick him up. The man is an astute observer of baseball talent and, at the very least, would make a terrific scout for some big league club.

HOBBY TICKER…Another one bites the dust…

    BC Collectibles, a West Chester PA-based sports memorabilia chain, has ceased operations. Originally formed as Brandywine Collectibles many years ago (and once owned by Electronics Boutique), the chain once positioned stores in malls mostly along the east coast. The chain originally filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy last September and closed 15 of its 49 stores; now they are all closed. The company lists debts of $10 million.  Rumors I hear suggest that BC might reorganize and open a few stores in selected venues when the dust clears. In the meantime there is no news or information on their website.

    Bad info alert. Some guy on one of the internet blogs has uncovered, he thinks, a big secret and reported that I am really the owner of Coach’s Corner Sports & Celebrity Auctions.  Why he suggests that I don’t know? I am not, never have been. I have done PR for them off and on for two decades (the Malacks are my friends, I was head of a PR company) and my current company, STAT Authentic LLC, does authentications for some of their consignors. I believe STAT does less than 1% of the items in each of their 5,000-plus lot auctions.  If I owned the auction we’d be doing them all!

NEW HOBBY PRODUCTS…

    Bowman Sterling Football is in a high end Class of Its Own…The collector-popular Football product returns in 2009 featuring all the top rookies and super veterans for the upcoming NFL Season.   With every card being sequentially numbered and featured on chromium technology, the Bowman Sterling brand is known for its high-end autographed and memorabilia cards…

   Every Pack guarantees: 1 Autographed Card, 2 Relic Cards and 2 Rookie CardsEvery Box guarantees:  2 Autographed Relic Cards (image attached)Every Case guarantees:  1 Dual Autographed Gold Refractor Card

   All autographed cards feature 5 parallels including Refractor (#’d to 75), Black (#’d to 25), Gold (#’d to 10), White (#’d to 5) and Red (1 of 1). And all relics feature the same parallels…Refractor (#’d to 199), Black (#’d to 50), Gold (#’d to 25), White (#’d to 5) and Red (1 of 1). 2009 Bowman Sterling Football Ships late August and carries a $50 SRP per pack. Wow!

   Neat stuff…I picked up a Dover baseball card reprint book I had never seen before last weekend at a North Wildwood yard sale.  In it were 1953 Bowman color cards – but it was missing one page (the one with Smokey Burgess and Robin Roberts, of course).  The other cards, including the Mickey Mantle, look like the originals except the backs are black (instead of red) and they say “Dover Reprint” on them.  I’d love to find a “whole” one now, I have all their other ones.

What’s on your mind ????

Don’t’ be bashful.  Drop us a line (ted@tedtaylor.com) and let us know what you think. Thanks for reading the column.  Your feedback is important.

“Happy July 4 Everyone!”