summer blockbuster card show

in addition to catching up with brian and receiving a nice grouping of cards from him, i spent some money at the june club card show. it was a pretty warm day, and the building that houses this show doesn't have air conditioning. there were some large fans set up throughout the space, and i was happy to see that it wasn't too crowded at the opening bell. 

i mentioned in that previous post that included my meet up with brian that i began my day with the same seller that i typically seek out first. he always has some fun stuff to go through and i am always willing to take a large number of cards off of his hands, even if they don't really fit into my collection. case in point: 

this time he had quarter and dollar boxes, but always discounts when you buy in bulk. from the quarter boxes, i grabbed the jaws card up top and some allen & ginter n43 box toppers, like these four from 2007 and 2008

and these movie poster cards from 2021 topps archives

plus my usual assortment of other inserts and parallels.

as for dodgers, i did ok with a 2025 topps clayton kershaw silver cracked foil parallel

a 2022 topps heritage joe kelly red border

and some 2024 topps heritage white border cards

among a host of other dodger cards.  i still think it's crazy that topps went and used yogi berra's actual 1951 card (they didn't do that in 1975) but for roy campanella, they just scanned the 1975 mvp card and didn't even bother to get rid of the black horizontal lines when fitting to the window. lazy.

the dollar boxes had some good stuff in them as well. i know there aren't many marlins card collectors, but i will take a 2025 topps team color border 

of any team for less than a buck.

those aren't serial numbered, but they seem to be relatively scarce. there were plenty of numbered cards in the boxes, however, including a 2023 topps update teoscar hernandez vintage stock parallel

and some 2025 gold foil parallels of different border treatments

numbered to 50 and other various types.

there was a lot to go through, and i wound up leaving one of the boxes unsearched. i did snag a healthy dose of dodger needs, including a 2025 topps heritage clayton kershaw through the years insert

a 2021 topps pedro martinez double header insert

that has his 2008 topps card on the back

and completely ignores his 2009 topps update card documenting his arrival in philadelphia.

here's a 2021 topps brusdar graterol significant statistics insert i needed

but thought was more of a quarter box sort of card. there were more, but the inserts were vastly outnumbered by the parallels. i was happy to find a 2016 topps update corey seager rainbow foil parallel

as well as a whole host of dodger variety

that 2025 topps heritage mookie betts parallel was especially nice to see in the dollar box. in the end, i think my cost per card from ed was about sixty cents per.

i did grab a couple of cards from my minicollections from the dollar boxes - a 2024 topps holiday carlos correa blue foil parallel

and a pair of manu-relics from 2018 topps update for the "42" collection

when they are shown wearing 42, i don't discriminate and will happily buy an astros card. it boggles my mind still that topps will produce jackie robinson day themed cards that don't show the number 42 in the photo used, and there were some of those cards mixed in with the two that i've shown above.

my next stop was at another regular's table because he always has dime boxes. i would up with 114 cards from him, including a 2017 panini donruss corey seager name variation 

a 2019 topps update hyun-jin ryu rainbow foil parallel

a 2022 topps gold label cody bellinger card

2024 topps tony gonsolin yellow parallel

2024 topps chrome cosmic mookie betts base card

2024 topps pristine freddie freeman (all-star) base

2024 topps stadium club tyler glasnow red foil parallel

and some more mini collection stuff in the way of a 2014 topps juickson profar red foil parallel

a 2017 panini donruss jose altuve name variation

and a 2022 topps chrome update owen miller purple refractor parallel

i also went off script and snagged some cards that appealed to me for no particular reason, including a 2009 upper deck 1975 o-pee-chee mini insert of mark teixeira

a trio of 2023 topps archives 1954 tarzan 3d inserts

a 2024 topps heritage high numbers reggie jackson perfectly programmed insert

and, my favorite dime box find of the day, a 2022 topps archives andrew mccutchen background swap variation

this is the guy who also has a dime box that he hosts for a friend. you have to keep the cards separate! so, i settled up with him on the cards from his box, and he rounded down to 11 bucks rather than fish for sixty cents of change.

after i waited for another person to clear out, i wound up pulling 35 cards from the other box including a 2017 topps chrome jason kipnis black refractor of jason kipnis

i wonder why topps didn't bother to number these that year. anyway, i told the guy i had 35 more cards and he said 3 bucks was fine, but i think he was a bit annoyed that i paid separately and cost him 90 cents that i am sure i would have been charged had i bundled them together. sorry not sorry.

next i pulled two bucks worth of 25-cent vintage from a seller who always makes me wish i were working on another vintage set. i couldn't let bill russell's 1971 topps card go unclaimed

and this 1974 topps dodgers team card

was pretty sharp for a quarter

i am still disappointed that 2023 topps heritage didn't give us an updated list of team records via team cards in that set.

the other vintage i grabbed were miscuts - a 1971 topps john cumberland

that is bottom-left justified, a 1972 topps vida blue in action

that has vida looking up instead of to the right where his space is being encroached upon, and a trio of 1973 topps cards

that are kind of all over the place. here are their backs

which makes things a bit easier to see.

the best miscut of the bunch was a 1976 topps traded dock ellis card

because he looks rightfully annoyed at the card creeping into his space.

it was at this point in my time at the show that it started to really smell like a card show and i knew it was time to get going. i made one more lap and found a seller with a $2 autos/relics box. i grabbed three cards

a 2000 ud spx auto numbered 1500/1500 isn't something you see every day, and i remembered someone was looking for one of the triple play relics, but couldn't recall who or which one. i later recalled it was madding, but he's looking for the pants and not the bat. 

i talked that seller down to $5 fpr the trio even though i had six bucks loose in my pocket, and he seemed annoyed with me. whatever. that allowed me to use the other dollar on a card from a seller who had a singular dollar box and everything else in cases. this 2024 topps update alex vesia red crackle foil

just happened to be in the front of one of the rows in that dollar box, so it was an easy grab.

there is usually not a club show in july, but in a couple of weeks, the show migrates to my town for some reason (although it will be smaller than normal). hopefully some of these sellers show up - at least there will be air conditioning!

right back where i started from

i took a detour while returning from texas in may and headed west to my hometown. while i was there, i stopped into the local card shop which is located on the same street but a couple miles south of the card and comic shop i frequented as a kid.

i'd been to this shop once before, and i went straight to their dollar boxes. one of the first things i found was a complete 1992 front row roy campanella all-time greats set

this was contained in a single sleeve, so it was a buck. same for this 1993 spectrum diamond club boston red sox set

yaz, doerr, dewey, freddie lynn, and luis tiant for a buck. this 1992 front row all-time greats set featuring buck leonard

was also a buck, and was still factory sealed.

as for singles, this purple parallel of vladimir guerrero's 2023 topps stadium club card

numbered to 75

was the card that convinced me to go through each of the boxes they had on the counter. i went on to find a few more decent cards, including a red parallel of aaron judge's virtuosos of velocity insert

from the same set, and this 2019 topps heritage high numbers juan soto candy lid insert

it's always nice to find a photo variation short print in the dollar box, even if it is from the 2021 topps set

and black border topps heritage parallels are great, too

even when they are a's.

i certainly didn't expect to find an elly de la cruz card in the dollar box, but there it was

it's a 2023 panini prizm insert, so not considered a true rookie card but still a good deal for a buck. and i will always pick up a numbered willie mays parallel for that price

especially when it's a (dodger) blue prizm parallel.

being in dodger country, i didn't expect to find many dodger cards in these boxes, but i did find a few. i was happy to find this 2023 panini prizm jim gilliam purple prizm parallel

which is also serial numbered, and a red foil parallel of will smith's 2023 topps stadium club card

i thought that maybe this 2022 topps gold label clayton kershaw card

was a parallel, but it's just the base class 2 design.

this 2010 donruss elite extra edition shawn tolleson status red die-cut signatures auto /50

is considered a dodger card because it says "los angeles" on the back. it's one of five autos i took from the boxes, and here's one of the others - a 1996 leaf signature series auto of two time dodger mike maddux

after i was through those boxes - i had pulled 45 cards - the owner of the shop brought out a consignment dollar box from which i took another five cards. one was this 2023 panini donruss pink fireworks jackson holliday insert parallel

holliday was back in the minors by this time, but i was still pretty surprised to see this for a dollar.

as i walked to the checkout, i felt the need to open a pack of something and 2024 bowman was really the only new release available at the time. i should have passed on the pack. the only card that was of any interest (and mild at that) was this justin crawford chrome prospects mini diamonds parallel

i was hoping for a paul skenes or even better, the pete rose short print, but came up empty. the shop owner gave me a bit of a discount, so i wound up getting the pack for almost free.

on my way out of town the next day, i stopped for gas and picked up a 2024 dodgers pocket schedule

i find it interesting that they went with neon this year. i guess it is the trendiest noble gas in 2024. it's always good to be on the west coast and i can't wait to get back there again!