End of the year card show meanderings

I've probably gone to more card show dates this past year compared to the last 2 years before the pandemic - however I've gotten self-conscious about showing up to where the scene is a little more unfamiliar perhaps.

I find myself feeling too much like a rando in a room of guys in the know who are simply interested in 'here and now' concepts I'm not vaguely aware of - big time wheeling and dealing involving higher end slabs, other sports [NBA, NFL], non-sports.

Maybe there has always been something bigger, something hyped that people who might be collecting and speculating are chasing after - but maybe I'm stuck in my reality, which has me less emotionally invested in the nuts and bolts of a card show, where it’s harder to cultivate any enthusiasm.

With sellers are more focused on other things besides bringing material catering more to my interests - it takes more effort to find things I can get into.

On the other hand, keying on tables with bulk cards for a dollar and less has me looking forward to that next rummage at shows - where as much as things are different, I can still find my roots at a random card show.

At my last card show trip, I was aimlessly wandering around and found myself digging through boxes at a table in the corner of the main room in a hotel - the table didn't register to me at first glance and now that I've planted myself, it doesn't look like there is any good 'ole baseball in these parts.

I started to find clusters of some old-school and / or vintage cards to go through [even if not seriously consider] - there was some vintage 1960 Fleer Greats, but I'm not sure what to make of them because they are a retro set rather than a set with active players [circa 1960].

There was a father / son manning the table but it seemed clear to me that the adult son [probably in his 30s] - wasn't really into the cards and may have been tagging along as more of chaperone, compared to his old man who was really running the table.

The prices were half off the stickered price - though I worried the prices on the cards might be marked up.

Finding a 1996 Upper Deck V.J. Lovero Ken Griffey Jr. #VJ 10 [$4] may have actually spurred me on to find more cards - though it wasn't going to be that big splash purchase, it might have been a random scratch the itch want.

I found and set aside 1989 Upper Deck Dale Murphy REV NEG #357 [$30] in a yellowed semi-rigid, which may have been interesting - the guy grabbed it for a moment and was telling his son it was some kind of error.

I occasionally see random cards that I might not flag outright but end up dwelling on after the fact - maybe the cards are not semi-definitive or definitive cards for a collection, where it's only a big deal in my head, but types of cards I shouldn't let get passed me.

There was doubt whether I should make the Murphy the centerpiece of what I might have found off these random boxes - the card was a bit more on the quirky side of the junk wax era, but I might be second-guessing myself for not grabbing this error outright.

Finally I found a 1990 Leaf Frank Thomas #300 [$10] and while it's been over 30 long years and I have a graded copy - the card was a status symbol of early 1990s collecting, so I wanted a loose copy, even if there is a tiny bit of worry about potential counterfeits that might be mixed in various collections and/or inventory.

My experiences with some junk boxes of doom - box 4.2

I think these are complete L.A.P.D. / DARE Los Angeles Dodgers sets from 1995 and 1996 - maybe at least a couple of cards from the perforated sheets have been damaged due to the natural conditions, but most cards are fairly clean and if I wanted to separate them, I don't need scissors to do so.

These oddballs are not worth anything but maybe after a certain number of years [25 years] - cards like this end up starting to be old-school curiosities, where it stirs up some sort of faux collecting nostalgia for cards I've never hand in-hand before.

More junk wax era singles in semi-rigids holders - I want say these cards wouldn't look out of place in card magazines from the era, even though the players pictured on the cards never had that lasting power in the hobby.

Maybe I'll set a number of these cards aside in a collecting time capsule of sorts - where I'm reminded that many of these cards were coveted as 'here and now' material from the years I really started collecting.

Finally there are these Topps stickers from 1986 - they are odd sized, flimsy and not something I'm familiar with at all.

I'll try and sort them out just to see if there is any more star power - but this might be it with Robin Yount, half and half combo of Goose Gossage / Jack Morris, half of Pete Rose, Wade Boggs and Jim Rice.

I don't know if I'll bother looking up who's who on these random stickers - like one showing a pair of longtime, shortstops who won Rookie of the Year awards [Alfredo Griffin and Ozzie Guillen] or another picturing Dan Gladden and Dwight Evans.

My experiences with some junk boxes of doom - box 4.1

This was the last of the 4 boxes I bought for $3 each off a bargain table at a card show.

This maybe dumpster diving at its finest - not everything is going to be salvageable, but I'll see what I can rummage through for the curiosity factor.

To this day I love digging through cards and sorting them out, though with these boxes - it was more about hoping I wouldn't have to toss certain cards that are too dingy to make keepers otherwise.

In this box, the oddball panels of cards are definitely what caught my eye - I'm not really an oddball collector, though perhaps I want to see if I can pick up types of overlooked, non-mainstream issues I still don't really see as 'real cards.'

Because I don't trust my hand cutting skills and may just give up trying to separate these cards individually - I'm probably going to leave these cards 'as is.'

Just a couple of the cards are damaged [too bad one is the Wally Joyner], but rather than cut things up where the suspect cards will mostly likely end up in the circular file - I'm keeping the panels together where the cards in their entirety are still presentable.

My experiences with some junk boxes of doom - box 3.1

These are mostly the highlights of my third junk box I picked up for $3 each - there was a good number of cards in the last two boxes that were in semi-rigid holders, which may or may not have reflected the 'better' cards, but may have been the most interesting to go through.

Literal junk wax to sort through and toss for the most part - in some twisted way, maybe I need to pick up these boxes when I see them once in a while, just to get back to my roots.

Not worth much, but I like the Steve Garvey and Mike Schmidt in particular - a pair of old school 1980s cards of longtime stars through that era.

Some 1989 Topps Jim Abbott rookies - to bring me back to my beginnings as a collector perhaps.

Two of the same Tony Gwynn insert cards and a small stash of Will clark cards - including a 1987 Donruss rookie that I'd probably pay a few bucks for outright, if I didn't have it already.

More Will Clarks - he was big league star for just about the entirety of his big league career, but may have been a considered a superstar for a 2-3 year period with the San Francisco Giants through the late 1980s.

A small stash of Bo Jacksons - one of the brightest stars of the junk wax era, even though a 'what if' in most fans' minds in both football and baseball.

Some 1987 Donruss Ruben Sierra rookies - how much were these going for at his late 1980s peak?

These cards brings me back to getting into collecting and through browsing actual hobby publications - reading about the crop of junk wax rookies that were going to be stars for years to come.

This stash of First Topps Cards could have been a penny stock investment for an adolescent collector - looking to see whether the value and gone up or down in his latest Beckett.