The following results of this sale are from MastroNet's webiste:

MastroNet, an sale house in Watchung, N.J., completed an 833-item auction on Saturday, and the results were much like any of its other auctions. But the items were unlike many others. There were game-used items, sports cards and autographs from as far back as the 1880s, rare advertising displays, Super Bowl championship rings, bobblehead dolls from the 1960s and much, much more. The big names dominating the baseball-laden auction were obvious: Honus Wagner, Babe Ruth, Willie Mays, Mark McGwire, Ty Cobb, Hank Aaron, Roberto Clemente, Joe DiMaggio, Mickey Mantle, Christy Mathewson, Barry Bonds and so on.

The most expensive starting bid was $30,000 for a Christy Mathewson T202 Triple Folder advertising poster. One of only three known to exist, the poster has a painting of “the world’s greatest pitcher” framed between a pair of baseball bats and was produced to promote the 1912 Hassan T202 Triple Folder set. The item received only five bids and sold for $43,923. Fairfield native Willie Mays had several items in the auction, but few items drew more attention than his rookie card. His 1951 Bowman card professionally graded as a PSA 9 (mint) drew much more than its $3,000 listing in the price guide. Because it is one of only two cards to receive such a high grade, the Mays card sold - after 27 bids - for a whopping $95,338.

A rare copy of the world’s most expensive baseball card, the 1909 T206 Honus Wagner, also was up for sale. The card originally was available in cigarette packs, but when Wagner learned about the card he requested that it be pulled from circulation because he didn’t want children buying cigarettes to find his card. While fewer than 75 copies of the card are known to exist today, this copy has the super-rare “Piedmont” back. (The tobacco company’s name is on the back and would show through the cigarette pack’s wrapper.) Only one other Wagner card (which is in mint condition) is known to be a Piedmont, and it sold for $1.265 million in a July 2000 MastroNet auction. This Wagner card is definitely not in great shape, yet it had a starting bid of $25,000. After receiving 16 bids, it sold for $75,417. While rare items like the Wagner card are obvious auction items, my personal favorite in the auction is something that, by all rights, shouldn’t even exist today but was produced in large quantities 50 years ago.

An unopened 1952 Topps wax pack, which cost 5 cents when it was produced, is a simple folded piece of wax paper with a few cards inside - something that should have been ripped open years ago by a child at a Woolworth’s store.

Instead, it sold for $8,080. Why? Because the presumably perfect cards inside can fetch a minimum of $50 each, and a perfect Mickey Mantle or Willie Mays card could be inside. Mantle’s card is worth $18,000, while Mays’ sells for $2,500. Since these cards should be close to perfect, professionally graded versions of the cards inside - even the least-famous players - could fetch much more than the bidder’s amount for the entire pack. (Like the 1951 Mays card.)

Of course, the pack should have been bought and opened for a nickel years ago. Surely that 5/8-ounce stick of bubble gum is still hard as a rock (just like it was then). Another very rare and valuable card that got a lot of attention during the auction was the 1915 M101-5 Sporting News Babe Ruth rookie card. The rare copy of the card - one lacking the advertising for The Sporting News on the back - was professionally graded as a PSA 8 (near mint) sold for a mere $52,556. One obscure item in the auction is one of the few non-card items with Alabama ties. For a mere $1,209, one bidder bought a 10-karat white gold ring made for winning the 1974 World Bowl. The championship ring was given to a shareholder of the Birmingham Americans of the old World Football League. It was the only WFL ring given out because there was only one champion in the 22-month history of the league. The Birmingham Americans were renamed the Vulcans the following season and the league quickly was gone. Yet the memorabilia, like this ring, remains.

Two other very popular football items offered by MastroNet were unused tickets for the first two Super Bowls - games in which Alabama graduate Bart Starr was named the MVP. The tickets had starting bids totaling $2,000 but were snapped up for a total of $17,598.

Barry Bonds items were in good supply during the auction - four game-used bats sold with an accompanying pair of batting gloves for each. These sold for $1,755, $1,450, $3,384 and $1,735. A Barry Bonds game-used glove sold for $3,894, while a glove used by Yankees shortstop Derek Jeter sold for $4,189.

But while Bonds items are selling well and are readily available, Mark McGwire items - because he simply does not sign many autographs or allow many game-used items out onto the market - demanded top dollar. Two signed baseballs sold for $1,183 and $1,685, while a large signed photo sold for $578.

Another of my favorites in the auction not only is a unique collection of cards, but also shows a bit of the sometimes-controversial history of the card industry. The lot, which sold for $5,191, was a complete 67-card set of 1963 Fleer cards along with an unopened pack of the cards, a complete wax pack wrapper, an empty wax box and the most interesting thing of all - a 38-year-old cookie. At the time Fleer created the set, Topps had an exclusive contract that allowed it to sign players to card deals. The contracts specified that cards would be issued with gum, so Fleer tried the next-best thing to circumvent the deal. “Lastly, and perhaps most important, included is an original 1963 Fleer cookie in unbroken Excellent condition,” reads the auction catalog. “There was considerable debate in MastroNet’s offices about whether to actually include this cookie with the lot, but after much consideration we felt it our duty to offer this 1963 Fleer collection exactly as it was presented to us, including cookie.” Fleer’s cookie quickly crumbled. It lost its legal battle and wouldn’t produce baseball cards again until 1981. Having that cookie makes all of the difference.