15 months is a long time

It had been over 15 months since I had hit a card show, until today.  I had planned to go to the West Palm Beach card show for a couple of weeks now as the date is easy to remember, the 3rd Sunday of every month.  

It had been over 2 years since I was to this particular show, as the last couple that I had been to were kind of disappointing due to very low dealer turnout.  The show was still in the same location and I was kind of curious to see what it would be like when I arrived.

The parking lot was a lot more full than I remembered, which was a good sign.   I was actually greeted by the promoter when I walked into the hall, a very nice gentleman who was kind enough to let me know that entrance was "mask required".  Even though I've been fully vaccinated for over a month now, I had no problem putting a mask on after taking a quick peek inside and seeing everyone masked up.

I was shocked to see that the hall was full, tables front to back were all occupied by dealers.  I arrived at 10AM, an hour after the show started and there was a decent crowd inside.  (I actually heard one of the dealers say that this was the "slowest" show in a few months, which really surprised me)  I walked in and started wandering around, finding a table that had dime boxes (9 monster boxes crammed full).

I sat down, the first box was a bit slow for me as I only pulled out a few cards, then I started hitting some good stuff (well, at least for me).

A page worth of Ichiros, including the trio at the bottom that I hadn't seen previously.  10 cents apiece didn't hurt as well.

More player collection cards, definitely not what I intended when I left for the show this morning, but they didn't hurt.

Top row:  A pair of '08 UD heroes black parallels.  That particular set is almost 10% in.  The Anthony Rendon is serial #'d out of 99, a wonderful find for a dime!

Middle Row:  Mario Lemieux in the dime box will always end up in my pile.  The 2 stadium club cards are first day parallels.

Bottom Row:  Trade fodder, which was a nice portion of what I brought home today, with some household names.

I traded off a bunch of the Yankee Stadium Legacy cards a while ago on TCDB, this half dozen will prop up the trade pile for those.

Steven Jackson is another football player that I always enjoyed watching, love his nickname (the bull) and his running style.  10 cents and 10 cents.

I've been pretty hot with collecting the A&G run of sets the past few months and this was the key find for me, over 50 cards from the '13 A&G set, of which I have very few cards.  This set had taken such a back seat to a bunch of others that I hadn't even added a want list to the TCDB.  There are probably a few dupes in the group, but this batch will probably get me over the 20% mark and with a dozen SPs coming home today, it's probably time to update that list on the site.

Last up I grabbed a bunch of serial #'d Topps Moments and Milestones cards.  There was almost 2 dozen that I found with a nice price, so I grabbed them.  

My count was 245 dime cards and two hours of digging through boxes and chatting with other collectors.   The cost?

$20

For me, it was worth the 15 month wait.  I've already found out about another card show closer to home next weekend.  I'll be sure to check it out....

Enjoy the hobby!

Robert

Inbound and Down #4: Dime boxes pt. 1

You gotta love the emails that come your way saying "I haven't sent you anything in a while, so there's an envelope on your way."  When that email comes from Nick at the Dime Boxes blog, you know that some of the mega piles that he brings home from shows (how does he find all that swag anyhow??) is coming at you. 

Nick was the 2nd person (the Night Owl before him) who watched the video from a few weeks ago and decided the 2016 A&G wasn't going to be as big a task as I made it out to be.  Nick sent me 34 cards from the base set (almost 10%...damn) and a couple of the Numbers Game inserts as well.

Lot of guys holding bats on this scan, including former Blue Jay Edwin Encarnacion.  Hated to see him go to the Indians...

I like the pics in the upper right corner of cards that don't depict baseball players.  Sometimes it really does help me with who the person is.  I did know who Steve Kerr was without the help.

When I first looked at the Jen Welter card (upper left), I thought the picture in the corner was a gun.  Made me think she was an Olympian that participates in one of those rifle events.  Wrong

McBeth=Shakespeare, right?  Will always remember the Dee Gordon at bat in the first game after Jose Fernandez's passing last summer.   The two numbers game inserts are great, a couple of Hall of Fame pitchers to knock off the want list.

I'll likely move this want list over to the "well under way" page in the next couple of days, as these 34 cards from the base set will have me well past the 25% mark.  The Starting Points list will stay where it is, since I only have 8 of those. 

The other half of this post will feature a boat load of Blue Jays and a few cards from my early 70's want lists.

Thanks for reading, Robert

OK OK I'll do it

A fat envelope of cards arrived the other day courtesy of Nick of the Dime Box Heroes blog.  He dug deep for a lot of the cards that came out of this envelope for sure!  High number '15 Heritage on the bottom row featuring Pillar and Osuna.  Wal Mart Blue Steve Tolleson turning a double play.  There's even Jose Bautista and his upcoming $30 million a year contract in the middle row on the right.

I'm going to miss Jose in Toronto....

Love, love, love the Pastime's Pastimes A&G inserts.  It must be something about the 100 card inserts from A&G each year, because they seem to be the only inserts that I'll even consider putting together as a "set".  The Dave McKay buyback from the '79 Topps set was definitely an interesting add to the envelope. 

OK team set collectors, ? for you.  Write the Dave McKay in your spreadsheet as a 2016 or a 1979 card?  What would you do?

Chromey goodness is never lost on me, and the bottom row helped that even more.  I think the Martin is the first 2015 Topps Chrome Blue Jay I have.

A trio of '84 Topps Traded leaves that want list at just 1 card, not unlike a whole lot of other want lists on the Blue Jays page.  Speaking of #1, the Gold parallel of Scott Copeland is the first gold parallel from 2015 Topps that I own.  Man, am I behind...

Maybe that was a hint to make sure that my Blue Jays want list was up to date.  Get the 2016 team list on there, and decide what I'm going to chase after this year.

One Jays card that I don't have in my possession yet, and I'm going to need 2 of them, is the Jose Bautista bat flip.  Card #96 is going to be on two lists, hopefully I won't have to fork out a whole lot of $$ for them.  (NOTE: while writing this post, I found an auction for a lot of 5 of them for 3 bucks.  Problem solved)

So there you have it folks, a real lot of dime box cards from the master himself.

Thank you Nick, the cards were really appreciated!!

thanks for reading, Robert

Better off for knowing the Dime Box Man

Not that he's dead or anything, it was sad to see that Nick from the Dime Box Heroes blog bid the blogosphere a fond farewell recently.  I still remember running into him on the Bench website, right as he decided to start blogging, and was asking opinions on how his fledgling blog looked.  

I loved that blog right from the start.

All the dime box digging he did amused not only himself, but the blogosphere as a whole.   While we all may not admit it, we're a bunch of cheap bastards when it comes to cards, and Nick just made it a little cooler to be that way.

I went to a card show in West Palm Beach today, and for the first time in who knows how long, I got to sit in front of a boat load of dime boxes.   Yes, you guessed it, I thought of Nick while doing it.   As the pile started to grow I thought to myself how many times Nick has done it over the years, and brought home piles of cardboard (some of it for me).  

He showed us pictures like this....

OK, maybe that's more my speed...

Maybe there were pics like this...

Now the 59's and the '71 checklist were a quarter apiece, but the 1980 Murphy and Trammell cards were both a dime, which I thought was outstanding.

I managed to add a dozen Thome's to my collection.  $1.20 was all they cost.  Doesn't get much better than that.

I did also pick up a big stack of Blue Jays cards, which I'm saving for my next post because there's so many to scan. 

But the final card I wanted to show off today is something that Nick would enjoy just a much, even though it cost me 100 dimes.

Same dealer, at the other end of his run of tables had a bunch of discount vintage, and seeing this was the cherry on this apple pie of a table.  I hadn't bought a '62 in quite a while, so this was a good way of putting that set back into my head, even if it was for a brief time.

For $18, I had a blast for over 2 hours, and finally learned first hand a bit of what Nick preached all along. 

You don't have to spend a fortune to have a good time at this...

Thank you Nick.  You taught this old dog a pretty good trick

- Robert

Can't beat 10 cents a card

Little did I think I would encounter a box like this at the card show I went to today...

10c apiece  60s--70s--80s vintage.  

I had to rub my eyes and clean my glasses to make sure I wasn't seeing things.

OK, I look again and I'm not seeing things.  Then I think to myself that these cards are going to be "well loved", for lack of a better phrase.

About 20 minutes of digging, and I didn't fare too badly.

Some 1970 Topps cards made their way home.

Not bad for 60 cents.

There were even some decent '71s in the box

Another 60 cents well spent.

I even managed to dig out a '61 and a '69.

Yep, that's a tape stain on the top of the Juan Pizarro card, but for 10 cents, I figured why not?  I've always liked the color on the back of the '69s as well...

For me, this set has one of the easiest backs to read of any of the older sets.  Love the cartoon as well, the guy is knee deep in snow, and yet the football manages to stay right on top of it all, no problems. 

I managed to pull out about 50 cards from that dime box altogether.  Some '72s, '78s and '79s as well.
It's too bad I still wasn't building the '75 set, because there were a lot of those.

I'm sure that had he seen this box, Nick would have had a field day....

thanks for reading, Robert