Completing The 1975 Topps Set; National Recap Part #6

After spending the majority of last week recapping my trip to The National, I only have 2 more recap posts, including this one, to show off what I brought back with me. As you can tell by the post title, I was able to complete the 1975 Topps set at the show despite needing around 80 cards going into the first day of the show nearly 2 weeks ago.

As I recall, one of my goals for The National was to make lots of progress with 1975 Topps, though not necessarily complete it. I didn't really know what cards I needed for the set, but I figured acquiring 80 cards from a vintage set at an enormous show was not going to be easy.

Well, I was absolutely wrong about that.

For the most part, the cards I needed ended up costing me 50 cents each. That was the standard price for the '75 commons that I bought, most from the same dealer. They had binders full of 1975 Topps cards which I recall going to on my very first day at the show. Like I said, most of the cards (Moret, Melton, and Cardenal) were only 50 cents apiece, but more valuable cards like the Thurmon Munson ended up costing more. In this case, the Munson card was $2, still a very good deal.

The main reason why I ended up completing 1975 Topps rather than taking it slow and adding onto it was that the selection of cards available was vast, and the prices were extremely fair. In fact, even though this show is gigantic, the selection of cards they had was so impressive that I only needed to go elsewhere to find 3 cards of the 80 I needed. All others, like the Bob Gibson ($1) and the Willie Stargell ($1.50) were available and well within a reasonable price range.

One of the more distinctive parts of the 1975 Topps set, Topps celebrated 25 years of Topps baseball cards by paying homage to the past MVPs from both leagues, beginning in, I believe, 1951. I already had the majority of these cards, but there were some higher-priced ones like 1956 and 1962 that I still needed, likely because both of them have Mickey Mantle on the card. The other 2 were the standard price of 50 cents despite each having a Hall of Famer on the card.

I have to say, the only part of 1975 Topps that failed to impress me was the league leaders cards. For such an exciting and eye-catching set, the league leaders cards have very little color and do little to differ from the standard base card. In nearly every single other card sets, the league leaders cards' design looks different from the base set. I suppose I'm not a big fan of the 1975 Topps league leaders cards for the reason that they don't do much to stand out. 

However, the acquiring of the Pete Rose base card at another booth (one of only 3 cards I needed to do that for) officially sealed it for me. This $6, slightly expensive, but completely worth it Pete Rose card did it for me. It completed the 1975 Topps set barely a month after completing the 1972 set. Not only does this put another vintage set in the books for me, but it allows me to focus on the 1976 Topps set which I made tons of progress with at the show.

What a year it's been so far. I've celebrated my 200th post a couple months ago, completing 1972 Topps, my 1-year anniversary yesterday, completing 1975 Topps, and my 300th post is set to come in about a week. It's truly been an incredible year so far for Cardboard Greats with many months still yet to come.