Back to Buying Cards; Card Show Recap #11

It's official. After a month-long break from buying cards (aside from a gift card and change jar), I'm finally starting to buy cards again. This began with a trip to the baseball card show earlier today to ease back into things and catch up with vendors that I haven't bought from in a couple months.

Firstly, there were a couple of them who were very eager to hear about how The National was, including what we brought back. If I remember correctly, I recall myself saying "it's unlike anything I've ever seen before."

That's definitely true, but it's also nice to go back to the show that I've attended for a decade now. I know the vendors and buyers there, and it's overall a great show that never fails to disappoint me, and today was no exception. 

Since I'm trying to start off small, I stuck primarily to dime cards at today's show. So, after catching up with the vendors for a little while, I took a trip through the dime bins to see what I could find.

The best part of the baseball card show, for me anyway, is discovering new cards and sets that you never knew existed. Better yet, it's not typically just one card that you find from a newly-discovered set that you like. Take the 1996 Leaf Preferred set, for example. These metal cards are thicker and much heavier than the average baseball card, something I've seen before, but not from this set. As you can see, I didn't just find one of these cards.

I actually found 3 of them. Rickey Henderson on the Padres, Manny Ramirez on the Indians before signing the massive contract with the Red Sox, and Ryne Sandberg. The card backs are shown above and are relatively standard. However, I do like the Leaf Preferred logo in the back and the font used for the card number. For whatever reason, Leaf decided to make this a 77-card set, which is a pretty weird number all in all.

Within any dime box, you look through, you're pretty much guaranteed to find some oddball cards. While the oddball selection may not have been as strong when compared to other dime boxes, but there were still some strong choices. Take the Nolan Arenado Honus Bonus card, my very first from the Honus Bonus brand. I don't know all that much about the set so any information would be greatly appreciated. As for the others, we have a Joe Morgan insert card, a 90's Bowman's Best of Tom Glavine, and a 2017 Topps Holiday rookie card of Christian Arroyo, one of my newer player collections.

Next came a wide selection of shiny cards, because everyone likes shiny cards, especially for a dime each. While the majority of them are from the 2017 Topps Chrome set, we also have a 2016 Bowman's Best Mirror Image insert that will go to the Justin Verlander collection. The Hernandez prism refractor, Russell Future Stars, and Syndergaard 1987 will also all go to their respective player collections.

Speaking of Topps Chrome, I was incredibly shocked to already see 2018 Topps Chrome cards in the dime bins, nevermind insert cards. I knew I didn't need any of the base cards available, but I'm happy to say I was able to find a 1983 insert and a Future Stars card that I need in order to help me on my way towards completing the 2018 Topps Chrome set.

However, Topps Chrome was not the only 2018 product I brought back in this week's dime box purchase. The ever-popular Topps Stadium Club was another set that I was able to find in order to add to my player collections. Although I've already opened a fair amount of the set, I was still surprised to find so many cards that I still needed for player collections. This included a group of retired players...

along with a group of current players whose player collections I was able to add to thanks to the stack of Stadium Club cards in the bin. In terms of dime cards, Stadium Club usually beats out nearly any other set. Not only does it help me boost my player collections, but it also adds cards with stunning photos to these collections. Not many other sets are able to do that, let alone with incredible picture quality throughout the entire set.

At the current moment, I'm not a Blake Snell collector, but that is something that could definitely change due to how well he's been doing this year. On top of that, finding a variation card of his for only a dime may inspire me to begin collecting the guy who could possibly win the 2018 AL Cy Young award.

Last but not least, I was finally able to pick up what many are calling the card of the year, Ichiro's 2018 Topps Big League base card. I've seen this card before on other blogs, but I haven't been able to pull it myself despite opening 2 blasters of Big League. I didn't really think it would show up in the dime bins, but I was proven wrong today. After seeing and hearing so much about this card, it feels great to have it in-hand, and the fact that it only cost me a dime is even better.

I have to say, it's really great to be back at the baseball card show. I've definitely missed it.