Talk to me about the Mcfarlane's SportsPicks
Hey I don't understand all the variant talk, I do understand that a variant is a pose they have already used with a different uni or something, if I am correct...

How do you tell if it is, and how do you know that a figure is a rookie or not...

I am thinking about getting into these, but need to know the scoop on these figures and what are good prices on these, I was in GameStop the other day and they had a 3 pack redwings, I think it was like 49.99 was that a good price, and they had some amare stoudemire figures for like 14.99, was that a good price as well...

I know this is chitchat BTW

I hear you Ryan... I've always been a fan of these sports figures but I've been scared away when the bottom fell out of starting line-ups.

If one were to start collecting McFarlane's, what is some advice that you can give?

I would also like some advice and information on these figures. I have visited there site and the figures look very nice, hopefully somebody can give us an inside scoop on them.

i have a mcfarlane its randy johnson

I am avoiding MacFarlane's precisely of what happened with starting lineup.

To find out if a MacFarlane figure is a RC, you need to get a price guide that lists all the figures...and of course, the first figure for the player made is his "RC"

I've noticed that in the Southern CA area, I have never seen Kobe or Shaq at

Toys R Us
Walmart
Kaybee Toy stores
K-mart
Target

etc.....

it seems like the employees at these stores are well aware of the MacFarlances and keep the Shaq/Kobes for themselves

I just buy them because they are the best looking sports figures I have ever seen. I always get mine at Wal-Mart for $10 bucks each. So far I have a Pudge(hehe), Ichiro, Pedro, Johnson, Walker, Schilling and maybe 1 or 2 more. I keep them in the boxes though for collectibility. If anyone is interested in collecting sports figures, these are the ones to get.

im just getting the ones i like. for instance bonds, colts, VC.

Originally posted by podstock
I am avoiding MacFarlane's precisely of what happened with starting lineup.

To find out if a MacFarlane figure is a RC, you need to get a price guide that lists all the figures...and of course, the first figure for the player made is his "RC"

I've noticed that in the Southern CA area, I have never seen Kobe or Shaq at

Toys R Us
Walmart
Kaybee Toy stores
K-mart
Target

etc.....

it seems like the employees at these stores are well aware of the MacFarlances and keep the Shaq/Kobes for themselves

Pod I was told this today at a store that there are people who come in like every other day and check for new stuff and they grab all the good ones, that is also what is probably what is happen in your area as well...

lol im the only person in my town that knows who MJ is, so i get all the good sports stuff first. lol

damn, every other day? I go about every week or every other week

Don't have time to do it every other day! damnnnnn!

At the Electronics Botique here, the 3-pack is 35 bucks.

These usually look awesome. They look even better signed. (although I only have a CuJo signed on the ice)

PM me any questions, I love these things and collect them hard corps

gioperation- Variants are figures with a different color jersey then the one pictured on the package. For instance, the Newest Bonds figure..the reg is in a white jersey, the variant is in a gray one. They are making repaints of players like Griffey, Clemens, A-Rod in teams they used to play for's jerseys. BTW, did ya send out the Fan Fest Set and can ya LMK about the card trade?

IggyWH- My best advice is collect who you like, unless you are trying to put whole sets together as a lot of us do that way you are still happy to have them in your collection in case the bottom falls out, wich I have a hard time seeing happening.

podstock- The employees are a hard thing to get by to get figures. The dealers from toy shops are just as hard to get ahead of because they camp outside a lot to get figures to sell before collectors can get any of them. I have a few Kobe figs to sell that I have extras of and I can get ya a Shaq at my Wal-Mart for $10+Shipping, LMK.

Some go every day and that makes it hard. $49.99 for a Red Wings 3-pack is insane. They are way cheaper most places by now.

If anyone has ANY questions about these, feel free to e-mail or PM me and I wil do what I can to help ya out.

Jim

rice80fan summed it up pretty well, my best advice is to buy the players who you like the most. I collect hockey figures, not because I think they'll be worth something someday but because I enjoy it. I've got 20 or 30 now, and there's still many more that I want. If you're looking to collect the really rare ones, there are erroneous figures that have two left arms, or the wrong paint job on one arm or something. I personally don't see any appeal to these figures, they just look stupid, but it depends why you're collecting.

i know this much, i started collecting just the players i liked last year and now i have complete sets of all the football and baseball.
it becomes obsessive and much more than the slu's i believe, mainly because of all the hype on the website and people hunting the variants. it gets ugly to right jim?
if you live in a large city it will be more difficult to find the variants or chase pieces because more people are on to the game.
to give you an idea about the bs that goes on about these , people have almost stooped to assaulting people for buying the variants or scalping. sad but true, spend a week on spawn.com and you will see what i mean

one more thing, since i have been on that website there has been well over 50 cases of
fraud complaints (internet, mail , etc) and a lot of people have resorted to the fbi. The secondary market for these generates more fraud than anything on the net right now besides autos i guarantee it. if you do get into
buying these be very careful who you deal with

these blow away slus, slus were toys these are sculptures they will in my honest opinion be around for a long time if they dont over produce the figures like i did see happening in series 3 and 4 of baseball. if you want to get into collecting these i would do it now before the prices of these figures goes up more, they seem to be going up more and more each month every time i look in my tuffstuff the price of the figures has gone up maybe with an expetion of the baseball figures. just my 2 cents oh yeah if do start collecting and are in it for the money or long run investment i would stick to buying variants over the reg figures , the variants are what bring in the money, some regular figures are worth less then what you buy them for in the stores.

Originally posted by flyersfanatic
these blow away slus, slus were toys these are sculptures they will in my honest opinion be around for a long time if they dont over produce the figures like i did see happening in series 3 and 4 of baseball. if you want to get into collecting these i would do it now before the prices of these figures goes up more, they seem to be going up more and more each month every time i look in my tuffstuff the price of the figures has gone up maybe with an expetion of the baseball figures. just my 2 cents oh yeah if do start collecting and are in it for the money or long run investment i would stick to buying variants over the reg figures , the variants are what bring in the money, some regular figures are worth less then what you buy them for in the stores.

Thanks man for the info...

Can you do me a favor and tell me where can I find cases of these for sale and another thing explain the variant/repaints thing to me...and do you have any cubs, bears, cots and bulls you would trade.

and where can I find checklists for these. and how do I know if a figure is a rookie or not...

aw yeah, do they have like the year made and series on the figure on them anywhere, and do you lose your resell value if you take it out of the package?

Originally posted by gioperation
Thanks man for the info...

Can you do me a favor and tell me where can I find cases of these for sale and another thing explain the variant/repaints thing to me...and do you have any cubs, bears, cots and bulls you would trade.

and where can I find checklists for these. and how do I know if a figure is a rookie or not...

aw yeah, do they have like the year made and series on the figure on them anywhere, and do you lose your resell value if you take it out of the package?

I am more then happy to help out :

here is a link that can tell you all the different players in each series that have been relesed. you will have to click on the specific series for ex: if you want mlb baseball 7 you have to click on the link mlb baseball 7 and it will take you to the page with the names and photos of the toys

http://www.spawn.com/toys/categorytype.aspx?categoryid=9
hope this helps you

if you really want to buy cases you can buy them on sereveral internet sites killertoys.com is just one of them there are a few others i dont know off hand. or you can go to walmart tru or target and ask if they have any sealed cases avaible to purchase i have done that and they will sell you the complete case usually its around $130 thats including the tax! but that equals what most online places sell them for , around $100 plus shipping

okay variant/repaint/chase

a variant is (remember this is just my opinion about what a variant is) a figure that is different from what is on the packaging! so for example lets take nba series 3 juwan howard his regular piece has him wearing his blue away uniform were his variant has him wearing his white uniform (understand now)

repaint is (remember this is just my opinion about what a repaint is) a figure that has already been produced but is now reproduced in the same pose as the first figure but now hows a different uniform on. lets take for example the latest to series of baseball that are being shipped as we speak. mlb 5 have actually 6 repaints 2 arent that rare derek jeter and jason giambi both repainted in the opposite uniforms then there earlier release, in mlb 2 jeter was in his pinstripes uniform and in mlb 3 jason giambi was in his grey uniform. so in mlb 5 giambi is now repainted in his grey uniform and jeter is repainted in his grey uniform (understand). okay here is another one mlb 5 barry bonds got a repaint, in his first and second figures he was in his giants uniform now in mlb 5( actually his second figure is in mlb 5 as a giant, but there is also a repaint too suprise) they have repainted the same pose from mlb 2 and now he is in his pirates uniform (pretty hard to find right now) (understanding alittle more) here are a few others that they did, mlb 5 the did a camoflague trevor hoffman( his regular fig has him in his sandiago uniform) a total white ichiro( regular fig has him in his blue away jersey and a greg maddux in his cubs uniform( regular had him in his atalant braves uniform). IN mlb 6 there is an arod repaint in his seattle uniform( first figure was in his texas uniform) a roger clemens in his blue jays uniform(first figure was in his yankees uinform) a jim thome in his indians uniform hope that helps on the difference between a variant and repaint :)

and a chase figure, this figure doesnt have to be a repaint or variant it could be a regular figure but just harder to find then a the other regular figures, they did this with nhl4 tommy salo in his 3rd jersey he was part of the regular set but was very hard to come by as well as nba3(series 3) they made paul gasol the same way very hard to come by

okay you know if the figure is a rookie by 2 ways one they sometimes will put on the front of the package that it is a rookie action figure or you can check tuff stuff which lists if it is a rookie or not

as for the resale value if you open them, if you are in it for the money or future profits then i would probably say yes because i do get both magizines tuff stuff and lees toy review and since these are toys i kinda lean toward lees toy review alot more and in the begining of there price guide they tell you how much % to take off the price for the different grade( mint, nrmt, and so on) a mint loose figure ( that means i comes with the inserts and all the assecories will probably be 10-20% less then the price of it still in package. hope this helps, you can find lees toy review at books-a-million or walden books not to sure about barns and nobles thoguh. oh and they do have the year and mcfarlane written on the back of the figure but not the series :)

Gio, I think I can still get ya a Kerry Wood figure for C+S.

PM me if interested.

Jim

And Brian, yeah man it does get ugly sometimes.
These are not for the casual collector or the faint of heart.

What ever happened to the Starting LineUps Sets? I read that the bottom fell out but was it because of lack of sales or what?

I doubt that McFarlane would do the same, since it has McFarlane's back, he's like a multibillion dollar man with Spawn, and all the crap that he's done...he bought the Sosa, McGwire and Bonds balls and wants to put it in the Hall of Fame or something...this guy is loaded...

lol yes theres no doubt hes loaded but not quite multi billion yet. slu's killed itsself by producing too many pieces and mcfarlanes will fade out one day to but not in the near future.
Its hard to compete with mcfarlanes because they are so detailed. I still collect slu's but mcfarlanes are hard not to buy when you see them , i have about 120 of them and 300 slu's. The cool thing about mcfarlanes is you dont know what to expect next i think thats what keeps people in the hobby. yes slus stopped selling pretty much for the most part.