Well, collectors, I’ve got quite a quandary on my hands. I’m in the process of eliminating some of the extra baggage in my collection and can’t decide which Dan Haren autographed rookie stays in my collection, and which one goes on eBay. Usually I’d just keep both, but I do that too often. And right now, more than ever, I really need to figure out what is for my personal collection and what is expandable.

The two cards I’ve torn between is this 2003 Bowman’s Best autographed rookie, and the 2003 Donruss Team Heroes autographed rookie #’d/100.(picture below)

I’d been chasing the Bowman’s Best rookie for about three years now, and about a month ago I received this Haren in a lot I purchased for $40. I’ve since sold off the rest of the lot for $35, so in truth I’ve only got about $5 into this ‘Best Haren. But this card just irks me. Why? Because the signature is so weak. Maybe I’m pissing and moaning over small details, but compare the signatures on the two cards here. While Haren’s autograph is pretty ugly in the first place, the Bowman’s Best card features a really poor quality signature as compared the Team Heroes signature. The second factor is the lack of serial numbering. There are thousands of Best Haren rookies out there, and only 100 of the Team Heroes. Of course the one negative to the Team Heroes card is the fact that the signature is on a sticker.

If you were I, which would you keep?

This entry was posted on August 5, 2008 at 12:00 am and is filed under Card of the Day with tags Arizona Diamond Backs, autograph, Bowman's Best, Dan Haren, rookie card, signed baseball cards, Team Heroes. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.