Around Christmas I ordered some packs of cards from an online retailer. There was a note that they were a return from a big store and the packs were not in a sealed box or anything. From past experience that usually means some of the cards will have dinged corners but they were cheap so not a big deal. I got them so I could open with my son. They were 16-17 NBA Hoops retail packs.
Of the 24 packs I opened 5 had been tampered with. Imagine my surprise as I was going through the cards with my kids and after opening a pack I see two early 80s Topps baseball cards. Basically, the inserts and rookies were removed and replaced with early 80 baseball commons. My kids had already opened the other four packs when this happened. Not sure which cards the tamperer was chasing but they had taken the time to do a very convincing job in repacking the cards. I couldn't see any visual signs of the pack having been opened previously. The only difference on the packs was a label from the closed card store they had been purchased from and where I imagine the tampering occurred.
The place I bought them from has been good to work with so far. I'm curious if they will send new ones since it would be difficult for me to prove what happened.
Anybody else ever have something like this happen?
I remember when I got back into the hobby buying a wax box of 88 Topps to open with my son. Due to the extreme bad luck in the box I question whether they were tampered with but with late 80s topps you never know. I remember getting as many as 6 of the same commons in the box and nothing worthwhile. Not that there were many amazing cards in the 88 Topps set.