eBay Buys or "Not What I Had Hoped to Be Opening Today"

As I had mentioned (with excitement) a few times prior to today, I had ordered a case of 2011 Topps Series 1 cards.  Up until a few days ago, I was even more stoked because I got my case for a much lower price than what they are commanding now that the redemption program has been announced.  Anyhow, to make a long story short, I bought (paid for) the case on January 3, 2011 from an online seller with a rating of over 1600.

On January 14, I received the following email (which made it seem like everything was ok, I was happy to receive it quite honestly though at this point I had no reason to doubt the seller):

Hi fan_of_reds,

Thank you for your purchase of 2011 Topps Series 1 Baseball.  Talked

to Topps today and so far everything seems to be running on time with an

estimated release date of 2-16-11.  I will also be listing 5 cases of 2011

Topps Regular Hobby Cases with a buy it now option.  I only have 5 left so

if you are interested you may want to view the auction.  Thanks again for

your purchase, and I hope everyone had a wonderful Holiday season while still

getting prepared for spring training.

  Sincerely, Nancy (fivestarky)

And then, beginning January 17 or so, the seller disappeared from eBay.  No more auctions, no more bidding, nothing.  Obviously, I became a bit concerned so I sent the seller an email asking if the case would be shipped early (by this point Topps had announced a change in the release date).  No response.

Commence minor panic mode...

So now, without having many other options (cases were much too expensive for me to try and buy a new one at this point), I decided to do a quick online search for the seller (fivestarky) and see what information I could find out.  My search brought me to this post on BlowoutCards.com.  At this point, I knew that not only were other people having the same problems I was but that there was an almost 100% chance that we had all been ripped off.

After finding the BlowoutCards post (there were actually four or five posts with similar comments/problems about the seller), I fired off one more email to the seller asking for an update via eBay's messaging system.  Obviously there was no response, but at that point I wasn't expecting one...I just wanted to make sure I was covering my own bases.

Finally, today I filed for the buyer protection via eBay.  They have opened a case - though based on the most recent feedback for fivestarky, I can't imagine that it will take them long to figure out what has happened:

Yikes.

And so, I now wait - hoping for money back...and now unable to buy any boxes because the prices have gone through the roof.  I'm guessing I won't be able to buy any of Series 1 for awhile (can't until eBay gives me my money back)...and my local Wal*Mart doesn't seem to have any cards anymore.

And so, today's eBay post is NOT about me opening my case and all the good stuff that I found - but is instead about a tiny yellow envelope containing nine 2010 Allen & Ginter "World's Biggest" mini cards - only three of which I needed.  And yes, it's nice to knock three more cards off my want list - but honestly, I'm still too bummed/pissed about the scammer that I can't get too excited about cards.

Here's what I got that I needed:
2010 Allen & Ginter:
World's Biggest:
WB17.  African Elephant

WB18.  Eastern Lowland Gorilla

WB23.  Sedan Crater

and then a bunch of minis from the set that I don't need (and thus, are available for trade):

WB1.  Blue Whale
WB2.  Burj Khalifa
WB2.  Burj Khalifa
WB4.  General Sherman (Sequoia)
WB4.  General Sherman (Sequoia)
WB5.  Mount Everest

Should you want or need any of those - or any of the other 2010 Allen & Ginter cards I have available for trade, check out my want list and then shoot me an email and we'll work something out.