Time Crunch At The Card Show!

Apparently, the card collectibles hobby is thriving down here in the Shenandoah Valley. After attending my first card show since high school back in July, I had a chance to attend a second one last month. Unfortunately, I didn't have much time to spend there, only about an hour and a half or so. With over 80 tables, it was a race against the clock to find some cool card at good deals! How did I do? Well, I ended up making purchase at 5 tables.

 

Table #1

 

My primary goal was to hopefully find some cards to help me complete the 1977 Topps and 1971 Fleer World Series sets. Unfortunately I struck out on that end, but this one dealer had a lot of vintage cards, including a small box of 1956 Topps he had labeled 3 for $5. I went through and found three Red Sox I needed at least!

 

Table #2

 

This next table caught my eye not because of the cards, but because he had a bin of publications, with the one on top featuring the favorite team of  another blogger who I thought appreciate it. As for cards, he didn't have much but I did find a couple I could use.

 

 

He also had a few "team bags" including the Red Sox one. 

 

I already had the top card, but when I flipped it over I saw a card worthy of taking a shot:

 

The pack itself wasn't great, mostly 2024 base cards, but there were a few good cards I needed so no huge loss. I found it funny that after picking up the Ice Foilboard parallel of that J.D. Martinez card, the base was among the cards in the team pack.

 

  

Table #3

 

This table had what I am always looking for - cards 10/$1! Fortunately they were grouped by team too, making it easy to rummage through. Again, I found some cards for another blogger, but the rest were purely for me! Had I more time, I'm sure I would have spent half the day at this table.

 

 

 

Table #4 

 

My time was running short, so after a quick perimeter check I settled on this table. Ultimately, I'm very glad I did, but the dealer did leave a sour taste in my mouth. His setup was obviously geared to the high end guys, with most of his table space dedicated to graded cards. In a small section to my left, he had some boxes of ungraded cards, with a nice sign stating quite clearly that the penny-sleeved cards were 3/$1, while the ones in top loaders were $2. I concentrated on the penny-sleeved cards obviously, and found some cards from this year that otherwise bypassed my local retail store when they first came out.

 

I wasn't going to thumb through the $2 cards, as it looked like they were all parallels of modern sets that don't really move the needle for me, but there did seem to a small section of older cards hidden in the box. I flipped through those, and found a very beat up but otherwise glorious vintage Red ox card i just had to have. That's where the sour taste comes in. As I handed him the cards I wanted to purchase, he looked at this vintage card and asked for $5! After seeing the look on my face, he held the card up again, inspected it closer, acknowledged the creasing on it and said "How about $4?". That's when I called him out on his sign. Top loaded cards $2. This wasn't a case of a card getting misplaced in the wrong section of the table. Penny-sleeves, top loaders, graded cards - that's all he had. I didn't want to walk away from the card, so I met him a little and offered $3, which he took begrudgingly, mumbling about how he didn't have time to check his cards before the show. Dude's looking for people to buy his $100 graded cards and he's trying to squeeze $3 from me. it doesn't matter anymore, because I now this beauty:

 

 

This is my second card from this set, one of the few affordable playing-era ted Williams cards out there!

 

Table #5 

 

OK, I'm down to about 5 minutes left, and I still haven't done the one thing I have always done at card shows since I was in grade school - find some packs to rip! Fortunately, I found a guy with some cheap $1 junk wax era packs for sale.

 

 

That'll scratch the itch for awhile! I'll have to do something fun with these like another pack war or something.

 

I only spent about $25 there, which is fine by me. It would have been nice to be there longer and really hunt for deals, but I had to pick up something special for the family:

 

 

Meet Cannoli, the latest addition to the family!