A Little Out, A Little In

While I was listing all of the cards from my Topps Chrome case on eBay, I took some time to list some other cards that I had been meaning to sell for a while now. Four of those cards were sketch cards from various non-sports boxes that I had opened over the past couple of years. In their place, I picked up a couple of cards on eBay:

I opened a box of CBLDF Liberty myself, but instead of the two autographs per box that were coming out of every other box, I only got one autograph and it was of Jimmy Palmiotti. That would have been huge back when Marvel Knights first launched and he was working with Kevin Smith on Daredevil, but I couldn’t tell you what comic he’s working on these days.

So, I took it upon myself to pick up a couple of the cards that I really wanted from this set. The fact that I was able to get them both form the same seller was even better. Combined shipping is always a good thing.

The Neil Gaiman is arguably one of the top cards to be pulled and I was surprised at how low it was selling. Then again, Gaiman’s autograph is not a tough one to obtain. He does a good number of appearances and you can buy autographed books online. I went to a reading Gaiman did when he was promoting Anansi Boys and was able to get a couple of things autographed afterwards. I still thought it would be cool to add an autographed trading card to my collection.

Erik Larsen has a smaller, but extremely dedicated following. Larsen first garnered attention when he followed Todd McFarlane on the adjectiveless Spider-Man comic. He would leave Marvel to become one of the founders of Image Comics and has been both writing and drawing Savage Dragon ever since. I’ve met Mr. Larsen is person as well. 6 years ago, my wife and I made a trip to the Baltimore ComicCon where I got a book autographed by Erik and was able to get a Savage Dragon sketch as well. Back when Image first started, I got an autograph from the Savage Dragon creator through the mail so I’ve got all kinds of Larsen items in my collection.

For those of you who enjoy non-sports releases, this set is a great deal even with just one auto per box. Many other non-sports boxes go for $60 and just have a single sketch card. These boxes have an autographed card and a sketch card and many boxes are producing two autographed cards. There’s some cool artwork on the cards, which tell the history of the CBLDF, and buying these cards helps to support a good cause.