i didn't get my hopes up

i've been able to retire a couple of saved ebay searches in the last few weeks. this came after years of futility with both searches. to have them hit within a couple weeks of each other is crazy. it had long been a ritual for me to check the searches, and if there was something to review, i would not get my hopes up that the card the triggered the "new item" alert was actually what i was looking for.

imagine my surprise one day when i saw a new item on my "2015 buyback baker" search and saw this card:

that is dusty baker's 1978 topps card in 2015 "originals" buyback form. as i mentioned in this post last fall, i had never seen one in the last nine years. adding baker to my collection brought me one card closer to having the full dodger team in buybacks from 2015, but i was still short a few.

well, a couple of weeks later, another saved search hit. once again, i did not have high hopes as i clicked on the search to see the new items, but lo and behold this card was looking back at me

i couldn't buy it now fast enough. like baker, i had never seen a 1978 topps tommy john card with the 2015 originals stamp before. with john in hand, i am down to needing just terry forster, tommy lasorda, and elias sosa. technically i would also need lance rautzhan, but i am pretty sure there were no 4-in-1 rookie cards issued as buybacks from the set in 2015.

my luck continued, sort of, when i went to the april card show and found a bunch of buybacks in a 10 for $8 box. one of the cards i came across was the dodger team card

i already had one of these for the team set pursuit, so i put this one in my steve garvey collection. the back was unmarked

but i figured i would mark it (digitally) to show my progress:

i also have a couple of cards in the team set that aren't on the checklist, including the team card itself and the nlcs card featuring davey lopes. i have one more dodger-adjacent card for the 2015 buyback team set, and it's this one

yes, that is clearly an indians card, but jeff torborg is also shown as a dodger so i will allow it. picking up this manager card rather easily gives me hope that someday a my "2015 lasorda buyback" search will get a hit and i will be pleasantly surprised when i open the link. i dare to dream!