three cards from three stars and more from the card shows

back in august, i visited some of the local card shops with great success. a few weeks ago, i made it to another lcs. this one, three stars sportscards, was one that i hadn't visited for years - and i had never been to their current location in bloomington. they have two locations - the other was closed for a bit but reopened in the same space in a northern twin cities suburb. this location, however, is their flagship.

the reason i have avoided this shop for so long is that you can't dig through boxes of cards. their loose inventory is on beckett marketplace and you have to find the card you want online. it doesn't enhance the lcs experience, that's for sure. however, i was in the immediate vicinity and i actually needed a few ultra pro sheets, so i popped in.  

i found one box of cards on a table with prices marked and dug through. i found a couple of cards that i figured were worth the price they were asking.  then i found bargain table with a bunch of random collectibles on it. included were oversized cards such as this one, which incidentally includes three stars as part of its design:

that's a 2022 topps series 2 box topper card of clayton kershaw. these oversized cards were $5 each or 3 for $10. i grabbed a couple of the other different box toppers and that was it for me.  a couple of the cards i pulled from the loose card box were a 2017 topps high tek cody bellinger rookie card

and a 2018 topps bellinger/yasiel puig black parallel

it's a checklist, of course

but numbered to 67. 

october was a busy month for card shows here in the twin cities and greater minnesota. there was the regular monthly show on the 8th, a mall show from the 14th to the 16th, and another semi-regular show on the 15th in the metro suburbs. plus, there was another show on the 15th not too far from the cities, another mall show from the 21st to the 23rd up in duluth, and one a week later if you dared cross in to wisconsin and get to eau claire. an embarrassment of riches, really.

i made it to the mall show on the 14th and found 169 cards from a combination of quarter, fifty cent, and dollar boxes. in all, i spent $55 on cards and $1 on another collectible. it was a good time digging through these boxes, and i found some decent stuff.

the first table i stopped at had a quarter box organized by teams, which is helpful to a team collector such as myself. lo and behold, i found some needs pretty quickly, like this blast from the past billy ashley insert from 1995 sportflics uc3

more modern cards included this 2017 topps fire kenta maeda flame parallel

and this 2021 topps chrome platinum anniversary clayton kershaw card

i knew that i did not need this card as i already owned it, but it was hard for me to leave it behind.

i got one step closer to finishing my 2021 topps fire team set with this keibert ruiz card

and this ruiz card from 2021 topps gypsy queen

actually did complete the team set.

i found a card for my vladdy pc - a 2021 panini donruss retro 87 card, to be exact

plus one for the names/numbers on the back collection from 2018 topps

it's a dumb card as far as the "who's on first?" question goes. where was this card back in 2008 when chin-lung hu was around? this effort reminds me of topps putting out a card in 2019 of max muncy and cody bellinger and calling it "sweet life". if only they knew that zach mckinstry was in the wings, they could have waited and at least got the names right.

just like with the kershaw above, i couldn't leave 2022 topps pristine cards behind. i picked up some brew crew legends and a couple of all-stars

i think the all-star uni cards are short printed, but am not 100% certain.

this guy also had some good stuff in his dollar boxes that wound up being slightly less than a dollar when all was said and done. here are some inserts and parallels, starting with one insert and one insert parallel from 2022 topps of jackie robinson

and moving on to 2022 topps fire parallels of inserts

i was excited to find an eddie murray dodger card that i needed, too!

more parallels from 2022 topps

and more inserts, too

i found a legends variation from 2022 topps as well

plus a decent looking 1975 topps card with the wrong city represented on roy campanella's cap

a nice find for sure. however, the card that made me do a cartoon double take was this next one:

um ok. for a buck! 1975 topps george brett rookie?! it has some issues but i could not leave it behind. just wow.

next up was a guy with a bunch of monster boxes, but only one that had baseball priced lower than a dollar each. i dug through and found some various inserts and parallels that piqued my interest, including this 1995 score summit tim salmon nth degree parallel

the back is interesting to me

with salmon making a catch under the halos' tribute to rod carew and his retired number while sporting the black armband worn in memory of jimmie reese.

did lightning strike twice?

no, it's just a 2010 topps cards your mom threw out insert

of yount's 1975 topps rookie card

the last guy said his lowest priced boxes were 2 for a dollar, but let me know that he was flexible. i wound up with a 3 for a dollar deal. here are some of my favorites i found from this seller.

2021 topps archives mini poster card of the boys of summer

in the words of mookie in a spike lee joint, "i got it, i'm gone".

here's a 2020 topps factory set photo variation of gavin lux's rookie card

and a blue parallel of that 2022 topps max scherzer insert of which i found the base earlier

finally, i like this instant walker buehler rainbow from 2019 panini prizm

this was the first time i had been inside a shopping mall for a couple of years, but it was well worth it. i may be back for the next one in december!

finally, towards the end of october, i made another stop at twin cities sports cards to peruse their nickel boxes. i was in the area killing some time and so took advantage. i put together a pretty good stack, but will only show a couple of cards from the haul.

i added a 2022 topps chrome buster posey card

to my final tribute mini-collection, and a 2018 panini donruss andrew benintendi photo variation card

to my name/number on the back mini-collection.

as for a couple of notable dodger additions, here's the aforementioned zach mckinstry!

i had not seen the target red parallels from this year's heritage before. it doesn't make me want to find more of them.

lastly, here's a gold parallel of  my favorite dodger card from 2006:

i was very happy to find a new nomar parallel for my collection.  i suppose i need to start thinking about my favorite cards from 2022...

there really are a lot of card buying opportunities around these parts at the moment. just another thing for a collector to be thankful for. speaking of being thankful tomorrow is thanksgiving, so here's a 2014 topps turkey red zack greinke card 

it's my first from that set which was only available online as i recall.

happy thanksgiving everyone!