Epix Success~!

I've written about the 1998 Pinnacle Epix cards a couple times before.  They rank very highly in my favorite sets of all time list.  For YEARS I've been trying to finish off my Griffey set.  Which is why when I recently did one of my regular "Griffey Epix" searches on eBay I almost fell out of my chair when I finally saw a Griffey Emerald Game card pop up. The Emerald Game is the last** card I needed to finish the set, and it was only $11 to boot - BUY BUY BUY BUY~!

A few days later I got one of those familiar brown envelopes in the mail.  I excitedly tore into it and saw.....

A card that was clearly NOT an Emerald.

I contacted the seller immediately and told him he sent the wrong card.  Evidently he LISTED the wrong card, as he didn't have an Emerald Game to send me.  He refunded my money right away and let me keep the card too, but still, I was crushed.  Who knew when another Emerald Game listing would show up?

As it turns out, the answer to that question was "the very next day."

Unbelievably, another listing popped up on eBay for a Griffey Emerald Game Epix.  This one wasn't buy it now, and I got in a bit of a bidding war so I had to pay $24 this time around, but this time when I opened the mail I saw this:

And it's MINT too!

FINALLY, I have the full set of nine~!**

Check one off my collection bucket list!


**The asterisks are because technically there is more to this set.  As I talked about in one of my old posts, there was supposed to be a fourth subset, Epix Season, that was to be included in 1998 Pinnacle Certified.  The company went bankrupt so the set was never released.  However, some of the Epix Season cards made it out onto the market somehow.  I've actually got the Griffey Epix Season Orange too!

I saw a Griffey Epix Season Emerald on eBay once years ago (for $100), so I know that at least one copy of that card exists.  I've never seen a Griffey Epix Season Purple though.

A Possible Steal from eBay

The latest addition to the Griffey Collection was the result of a random impulse bid on eBay:



1998 Pinnacle Platinum Gold Promo #53


I bid on this card on a whim when I was looking to see if any of the Pinnacle Bankruptcy Griffeys were out there, having just become aware of their existence when I stumbled onto this website: http://thejuniorcollection.com/RareFinds.php (I was looking for the Pinnacle Select Griffeys.  If anyone ever sees these out there in the marketplace, let me know please!!)

I was paying so little attention when I bid on the card that I didn't even notice that it was a promo card and not the regular version (yes, I somehow missed the giant "SAMPLE" in the picture.  I blame the small screen on my cell phone).  I decided to look and see if there were any other versions of this promo on eBay and what they are selling for, and much to my surprise I found three others selling for buy it now prices of $48, $60, and $120!  Now this doesn't necessarily reflect the true price, since we all know people will sometimes list cards for super high prices hoping some sucker will buy it, but still it made me feel awful good that I got mine for a grand total of $7.69~!