Card Show Pickups: Graded Junk and A Pair Of Relics

It's been a while since I've been to a local card show.  They usually aren't that good.  But I took shot on the wild side and ventured out this morning to see if I could find anything I had to have.

Turns out, it was a really decent show today.  There were a few vendors I'd never seen before, and a couple were blowing out there stuff because they were exiting the hobby.  Unfortunately, my little boy got sick early into the show and I didn't get too far around the tables.  Fortunately, I hit a few good things while I was there. 

First, I came across a table that had a big pile of graded cards, priced a $1 each, or 6 for $5.  I found 6 that I thought were worth it:

I like the looks of Beckett Graded cards, and I'm always happy to add a nice Gwynn to my collection.  Yes, it's graded 8 and it's 1987 Donruss (which I happen to love), but it was under a buck.

I love this Mike Piazza card.  I have a pretty good sized Piazza collection and had never seen this card. 

 This Bagwell card is really cool in hand.  the foil moves in the light and hypnotizes me.

So this is not only a Graded 1989 Donruss Craig Biggio, it's the SECOND graded 1989 Donruss Craig Biggio I've purchased at a local card show.   Actually, once I took a second to look over the card, I realized it's a REPRINT of a 1989 Donruss Craig Biggio.  And it's graded.  7.5.  Don't judge me, I paid $.83 for it.  And Craig Biggio is a bad ass.

This was the last one I got.  I got it for reasons I can't explain.

I was pretty satisfied with this purchase.  I was also very satisfied with the $2 worth of cards I picked up from a dime box.  I've already sorted them and forgot to take a picture.  But I got several good cards for my sampler album.  You'll just have to trust me on that one.

Finally, I found a couple of cool relics for $2 each:

 It looks like someone mixed in some red with the whites on laundry day.

Baxendale is a former Razorback, so this was a great find for me.

Card Show Loot- Two of My Favorite Players

I had planned to dedicate a full week's worth of posts about the card show I attended last Saturday, but those plans went to crap.  But better late than never, so here we go:

First up, I picked up several nifty Tony Gwynn cards I didn't have.  My Gwynn collecting has slowed somewhat, but I'm still happy to add cool cards of him when I see them.  And when they're cheap.  All of these came from dime boxes:

 

While we're at it, I'll knock off the Adrian Beltre's I found.  All of these came out of the dime boxes too.  I wish there had been some cards of him in a Rangers uniform, but whatever.

Notice that I was too lazy to scan these individually. 

Card Show Pickups

I found a few items for my Sampler Album this weekend at the monthly mall card show.  I’d pretty much started ignoring the monthly show, since it’s usually comprised of only a couple of dealers.  They’re almost always the same guys, and their stuff is almost always the same.  However, with my new wonderful Sampler Album project,  I had reason to re-look through their offerings with a fresh perspective and new shopping needs.  Sure enough I found some stuff I could use.  I picked all of these out of a ½ off box, and spent a total of $8:

 
I’m really happy with the Jay Johnstone rookie card.   I read his book “Over The Edge,” in high school.  From what I recall, it was a pretty light, fun book about all the pranks he pulled in his career.  I honestly don’t remember a lot of details, since I read it over 20 years ago, but I do remember enjoying it.  Plus, Johnstone had a bit part in Naked Gun!  That alone makes this card a great add to my Sampler Album.

 The 1968 Mazeroski was a nice pick up too.  My 1968 page is really weak, and this helps. 

My other favorite from this haul is the Billy Martin card, from his days of managing the Rangers.  I love the crappy airbrush job on his hat!  A nice add to the 1974 page.

I suppose a good blogger would have scanned these individually and commented on each card.  After all, there are several HOFers in this group, and the more I look at it, the more pleased I am that this all only cost $8.  But I'm a lazy blogger.  I probably won't even try to come up with a nice and neat way to conclude this post.


 

 

Card Show Recap Part 2: The Expensivies

Something I haven't done at a card show in a long time is purchase a "nice" card.  I usually only end up with dime box material, which is fun- don't get me wrong, but I usually only get my nicer cards online or at Cleve's auctions. 

As I said yesterday, we had a pretty nice card show this weekend and I came across a few things I'm pretty proud of:

I've been trying to get a good deal on a Mike Moustakas auto card for a while now.  Moustakas absolutely tore it up during his AA stop here in NW Arkansas (NW Arkansas Naturals), which is where my interest stems.  I got what I thought was a good deal on this Bowman Sterling auto'd rookie.

Speaking of former Naturals, I also picked up this Aaron Crow relic and Wil Myers Bowman Chrome rookie at great prices.

I didn't neglect my Rangers either. 

Last but not least, I picked up this Fergie Jenkins Triple Threads relic for only $5.  Jenkins is one of those guys that I think I may start collecting.  He's a HOFer, a former Ranger, his cards aren't too expensive and from what I've seen in interviews, he seems like a really decent guy.

Card Show Recap Part 1: The Cheapies

We actually had a really nice card show here this weekend, much larger in scope than the typical 3 dealer monthly shows in this area.  I only went because the show was in a location that was different than the usual haunts, and didn't go in with much in the way of expectations.

Turned out to be a good show for me, and I walked away with a nice variety of high-end-ish cards, and a budget friendly purchases.

Today I'll show the cheap cards.  I found a dealer from Tulsa that I'd never bought from before, and had a blast going through his 5,000 count boxes.  At 8 for $1 they weren't technically dime box cards, but close enough:

These were all purchased for my ever growing sampler album.  I started the sampler album this year when I realized I'd never complete every set Topps made.  However, I thought it would be cool to have an album with one page dedicated to each year.  Once a page is full, I'll swap out blah cards for mediocre cards, then mediocre cards for good cards, then good cards for great cards until I have a page of 9 awesome cards from each flagship set from 1952 to the present. 

I'm not collecting Topps Tribute, but these cards are really pretty and I had to have them for $.125 cents each.

These cards are pretty too, in an over the top holographic way.

Finally, some assorted cards of other players I like, or cards that I couldn't pass up at 8 for $1.

These cards, plus some others that I didn't bother to scan only set me back $5.  Tomorrow I'll show the more expensive cards, at least, compared to these.

Card Show Finds Part 2

Yesterday, I covered the cheap vintage stuff I picked up at the local card show this past weekend.  Today I'll quickly cover the modern stuff.

 I got this Larry Walker card for $.50.  It has a little patch of "netting" in it that I thought was pretty cool.  It reminded me of an incredible Tony Gwynn card I got in a trade from "This Card Is Cool.." a while back.

 As great as dime boxes are, nickel boxes are fun too, especially when you find cool cards like these from the Fleer "Greats of the Game" set.  I got about 12, but I should have just grabbed them all (there were about 30) at $.05 each.

These tri-fold T205 cards were $.05 each as well, so I grabbed what I could.  This is about the time my daughter spotted the car rides and started getting jittery.

I managed to shuffle through the boxes a little longer and found a few misc things I didn't need but liked:

The 3D slugger and Eddie Mathews Chrome card were $.25 each and the tiny Cracker Jack and Reggie Jackson mini were dime box finds.

Card Show Finds Part 1

I've mentioned the puny card show that is held in NW Arkansas monthly before.  Sometimes I find some good stuff, most times I don't.  The show is either Fayetteville or Rogers (about 30 miles apart) and the shows in Fayetteville are usually better, but the show in Rogers is closer to my home.  The show this weekend was in Rogers.  Here is the show in all of its glory:

This poor little mall is not exactly a happening place. You can't see it but I took this picture standing in a little kids area with 4 of those $.50 car rides that go up and down for about 2 minutes.  I had my two year old daughter with me.  Guess where we spent most of our time that Saturday morning?

To be fair, she was pretty patient while I looked over some of the tables.  The lovely wife was smart enough to send some fruit snacks with me and that kept her content while a browsed.  And, I'm happy to say that I found a few goodies.

First, some cheap vintage for my sampler album:

 All of these came out of $.10, $.20 and $.50 boxes.  Actually, only the 1975 Killebrew and Madlock were $.50 the rest were $.10 and $.20, so I was pretty pleased with this haul.

Here are a few other dime box finds I was proud of:

 That's not a mistake.  The Gil Hodges 1967 Card was in a dime box.  There is a little smudge on the top corner, but otherwise the card is in great shape.  I think I might be able to scrape off the smudge too.

And finally, I found this in a dollar box, but the seller gave me half off without asking and I got this 1959 Larry Doby for $.50:

Overall, I spent about $7 total, which ain't too shabby.  I spent almost that much on my daughter's kiddie rides.   I'll show the modern cards I got tomorrow.

Piddly Card Show Post

Almost once a month there is a "card show" in Northwest Arkansas, either in Fayetteville or Rogers.  It's almost always pretty weak, with 3-5 dealers at the most.   One dealer sells mostly DVDs so I shouldn't count him.  These shows are usually so uninteresting, I skip going altogether much less posting about them.   Today's show was nothing less than ho-hum, but I did find a few things from one dealer.  He had a chunk of Gypsy Queen base cards in a dime box.  I went to the show unprepared with my checklist so I wasn't sure what I needed.  Since they were only a dime each, I just bought them all and hopefully will be able to make some headway on my Gypsy Queen set.  There were also a few Gypsy Queen minis that I thought I should grab at $.10 each:

 
 The same seller had a $.25 box for vintage stuff, and I found a few things that I liked:

These will either go to my sampler album, or hopefully to Cardboard Catastrophes.  I know he is collecting the 1976 set, so maybe I can help out now.

I also got a couple of 1975 Topps Minis and  a Kelloggs all star card of Larry Bowa.  Again, the minis will be part of the sampler album unless the Night Owl can use them.  The reason I picked up the Bowa escapes me at the moment.  Surely I had a reason....

Card Show Loot Part 2

I still can't figure out why I bought this:

1989 Donruss.  PSA 8.  For crying out loud Napkin! The worst part was, after I bought it, the dealer really started working me.  I'm sure he couldn't believe the luck of having a total sucker right in front of him.  Perhaps if I had said, "Sir, perhaps you do not know who you are dealing with.  It is I, Napkin Doon, in the flesh." Well, he would have realized he was overmatched and quit while he was ahead with the Biggio card.

Dammit, I can't believe I bought that card!  Maybe it's like when you decide to get a dog, you go to the shelter with intentions of coming home with a beautiful pure bred.  But you get there, and it's the sad little mutt that steals your heart and you can't resist him.  I've never owned a dog, but I assume that happens to some people.  So, looking back, perhaps that is what I... dammit I just can't believe I bought that card.  And I announced it to the world (or a handful of readers anyway) on my blog like a total jack leg.  Maybe I should put an scan of it on the sidebar of my blog and let it brand me like a scarlet letter so the blogging world knows my shame.


Moving on...  I was pleased with these $1 GU cards:

I normally wouldn't have bought the Prior card, but the little 59 on the jersey swatch caught my attention. I have no idea what it is, but it made the card pretty interesting.  I'm open to trading these by the way.

Perhaps my favorite part of card shows is scrounging through the dime/quarter boxes for bargains.  Here are my nabs:

A little addition to my side project of building a small collection of basketball cards.  I don't know anything about the Jordan UD card, but there were 10 of them and I got them all.  At a dime a peice, I figured what the heck. 

I also added some cool Piazzas for my PC.  I only got the Canseco "Bowman's Best Selections" because it was die cut and I thought it looked cool and wanted to use it as reminder to look for other cards in the set.   Turns out, it is part of a 15 card insert set from 2000 Bowman's Best.  And after a quick look at sportlots.com and COMC,  I see these cards are relatively expensive!  So score one for the dime boxes!

Card Show Loot Part 1

There is a monthly card show in Fayetteville that I try to attend when possible.  I wish I had a picture of it.  It's pretty pitiful.  However, I can usually find something I want,  so I keep showing up each month.  The dealers and selection don't really change that much from show to show.  I'd love to go to a big show sometime, but it's probably better for our bank account and my standing with the lovely wife that I don't.  Here was the best card I got today:

Not a game changer, but a graded Gwynn rookie is a nice addition for me.  At the same table I for some reason purchased this:

I have recently been awakened to how good Craig Biggio really was, which is why the card caught my attention. However, this is a 1989 Donruss card.  Graded 8.  I didn't spend much on it, so I don't have buyers remorse.  I think I was just confused when I saw it.  Someone sent this card in to get graded, and from what I understand, that is not a cheap thing to do.  I don't understand why this was sent in for grading, and I don't understand why I bought it.

So I've shown the best card I bought, the most confusing card I bought.  Here is my favorite card I bought:

Nick Schmidt was one the best Razorback pitchers of all time.  He is currently in the minors dealing with injuries, and has not yet got on track as a pro.  He was drafted by the Padres in the first round in 2007, but I'm not sure if he is still with them.  Regardless, I loved watching him pitch, and this card is really nice.  It's very shiny and numbered to 500 and has a swatch of a Razorback jersey.

Tomorrow I'll subject you to my dime box prizes.


 

Trash or Treasure?

At a recent card show in Fayetteville, I was rummaging through a dime box and finding all sorts of crap I didn’t need, yet didn’t pass because they were a dime.  There was a whole bunch of product called “Action Packed” from 1993 which I was not at all familiar with.  The cards had raised images on thick, strange cardboard, and there were tons of HOFs and Legends.   I was certain it was more overproduced 90s offerings, and turns out I was right.

However, these are actually not bad little cards.  The images are raised on the card, although you can’t tell in the scan.  And the backs are pretty informative.  I picked up about 25 of players I was interested in.  I also thought the Abbot and Costello card was neat.   I wish the older player cards had been printed in this same color theme rather than the sepia. 

So even though I know these are worthless, I’m glad to add them to my collection.  My call:  Treasure!