Card Show in San Francisco Part III

This is the third part about my trip to San Francisco for the TriStar Sportscard show.  At the card show, after looking at thousands of dime cards, it was good to get a break and look at what other dealers had for sale.  Although finding a great dime card is pretty cool, there were a lot more cards at a show to look at and buy.

At this show, I began a search for cards that cost up to a dollar.  There seemed to a number of cards to choose from and I had planned to set aside time to look at and to buy dollar cards.

Sometimes I get really lucky and find vintage cards for a buck and in my next post I will share some of the one dollar vintage cards that I got this past weekend.  But with this post I want to show some of the more recent issued cards, mainly from the 80s and 90s, that I brought home with me.

1983 Donruss    

 

The 1983 Donruss set is one of their earliest issues and these cards are similar to the cards from the 1981 and 1982 sets.   There are some nice cards in the set and I was able to find a Julio Franco and an early Cal Ripken Jr. card.  The Franco card is his rookie card and shows him as a Phillie.  Is Franco still playing?

 

 Cal Ripken, Jr.  #279 & Julio Franco #525

  

1994 Upper Deck SP Previews

 

Here are a couple 1994 SP Preview cards, from the second year that Upper Deck issued a SP set.  I don't think I have any of these preview cards and reading in my Beckett Almanac I found out that they were distributed as inserts in the Upper Deck regular set 2nd series product. 

  Barry Bonds WR1 & Ken Griffey Jr. WR3

 

Topps Museum Collection

 

The Topps Museum Collection card is a nice card and I have a few of them.  I am not sure what a pack of Museum cards sell for as I don't remember seeing any of these in the local card shop.  The thick card stock give these cards a good feel.

 

 2012 Topps Museum Collection Joe DiMaggio #81 & 2013 Robert Clemente 2013 Museum Collection Canvas Collection CC-14

 

A Couple Superstar Card

 

Here are a couple of cards of superstars that I got.  You can't call everyone a superstar, but these two guys would definitely be superstars.  I am always interested in any Michael Jordan baseball card and this 1994 Upper Deck Electric Diamond card is sweet card.  The Derek Jeter card comes from the 1996 Metal Universe Platinum set and is an early Jeter issue.

 

 1994 Upper Deck Electric Diamond Michael Jordan #19 and 1996 Metal Universe Platinum Derek Jeter #87

 

Yankees Greats

 

Here are a Babe Ruth and Don Mattingly card.  The Babe Ruth card comes from the Conlon Collection.  The Conlon Collection offers some great photographs from an era gone by.  This Babe Ruth photo is from the 1933 All-Star game, as he is nearing the end of his great career.

 1992 Conlon The Sporting News 13th National Collection Sports Collection Babe Ruth #663 & 2005 Zenith Artist's Proofs Silver Don Mattingly #242

 

Pinnacle Museum Collection Cards

 

Here are a couple of 1990s Pinnacle Museum Collection cards of Hall of Famers.

 1994 Pinnacle Museum Collection Ryne Sandberg #6 & 1995 Pinnacle Museum Collection Pedro Martinez #235 

 

1996 Ultra Inserts

 

1990s Ultra product had numerous insert sets.  If I remember correctly Ultra said that you would get one insert in each pack of cards.  Although at the beginning of the 90s, other card companies had insert sets, but it wasn't until when Ultra started the practice of having many inserts, that by the end of the decade, Upper Deck and Topps began issuing many of their own insert sets. 

 

 1996 Ultra Call to the Hall Barry Bonds #1 & 1996 Ultra Rawhide Cal Ripken Jr.  #9

 

Greg Maddux Rookie Cards

 

Here are two Greg Maddux cards from 1987 update sets during his first tenure with the Cubs.  When these were issued who would have thought that he would become one of the greatest of all time.
 

 1987 Fleer Update Greg Maddux U-68 & 1987 Topps Traded 70T

 

Some Shiny Cal Ripken Jr. Card

 

It was during the 90s when card companies started to issue, what the owner of the local card shop here in my hometown call "Shiny Cards".  It still continues today with Topps products, like Chrome and Finest cards.  Here are a couple of "Shiny" Cal Ripken Jr. cards issued in the 90s. 

 

 1994 Pacific Silver Prism Cal Ripken Jr. #15 & 1997 Pinnacle Shades Cal Ripken Jr. #5

 

A Relic Card

 

I don't normally collect relic and signature cards.  The last signature card I acquired was last year when I got a 2011 Bowman Sterling Sonny Gray card and I did get some relic cards earlier this year in the 2015 Heritage product.  At the show the only relic card I got was a Chipper Jones Game-Used Bat Card for my best friend. 

 2000 Upper Deck SP Game Bat Edition Piece of the Game Chipper Jones #CJ 

 

 

    

Card Show in San Francisco

This past weekend I attended the TriStar Sportscard Show in San Francisco.  I have attended this show for the past five years.  Being from a small town in Northern California, there are never any cards shows here (please bring back the glory days of the early 90s when even in my hometown there were shows monthly).  Usually the only show I attend each year is this show in San Francisco, normally held at the Cow Palace.  For me it is about a five hour drive to San Francisco, but it is worth the time and expense as I get a chance to look at and buy baseball cards outside of my local card shop. 

I was excited about attending the show, as I was planning to go to the show on Friday afternoon/evening (I had never done that before) and Saturday.  I was a little confused on Friday when I first arrived as there was a long line of a couple of hundred people waiting to get into the show.  However, the reason that there was such a long line was cleared up minutes later when I found out that this year the venue at the Cow Palace was moved to the north side of the building, because there was a HempCon show also scheduled (link: Hempcon Show San Francisco) that was using the room that the card show normally occupied.  A couple of times when I went to my car to stash some of my purchases, I detected the wafting of smoke from a joint or pipe floating across the parking lot.    

The main reason I attend the show is to buy baseball cards.  Prior to the show I curtailed my purchases at the local card shop and on the internet so I would have more dollars to spend.  A couple of other reasons I like the show are: 

1. I get a chance to talk with dealers.  I like to talk with them about cards and ask how they are doing at the show.  This year, the dealers that I talked with said they were having a good show.  To me there seems to be more people at the show than in previous years.  I don’t go to the show to sell cards, but a couple of times I was asked if I had any cards for sell.  I also noticed many dealers were willing to purchase cards.  From what I could tell, a majority of those deals were for relic and signature cards or one-of-one issues.
2. I also like to talk with the children at the show.  Yes, a majority of the attendees were old farts like me, but if I get the chance, I like to talk with youngsters about their card collecting.  I was eight years old when I started to collect, and it is a hobby that I’ve enjoyed since then, and I know the future of the hobby is to have children interested in and enjoying the hobby.  On Friday night the few children I saw seemed to just be tagging along with their dad and/or mom.  On Saturday, I got the chance to talk with a few children, and those that I did talk with were excited about the cards they had, as they seemed most trilled about the relic or signature cards they were holding.  There was one young man, who couldn’t have been any older than twelve, who was working a table with his parents.  He seemed very knowledgable about cards and was having a good time, except when his older brother pissed him off after he stole his nachos.   He was a good salesman and looking back, I should have bought some of the cards he offered me.    

So when I entered the show, I had my lists in hand and started looking for dime boxes and $1 vintage cards.   I found dime boxes first. I was able to find two dealers who were selling cards for a dime.  One of the dealers had over 100,000 cards and the other dealer had about six or seven full 5000 card boxes.  It seems that I was elbowing for space with other card bargain hunters, as I wasn't the only one looking for dime card deals.  Yes, other collectors were polite and courteous and apologized as we kept bumping into each other in search of the best dime card.

In my next few posts I want to share some of the cards I bought at the show.  I am happy about the cards I got, maybe spent too much, but it was worth the travel time and spending a couple of days combatting the traffic of the city.    Later I will do posts on some of the non-vintage cards that cost more than a dime and about vintage cards that I bought for a dollar.

Dime Card Deals

One of the best things about going to a card show is looking through boxes of dime cards.  It is fun to look for a good deal, but I also enjoy looking at the cards, many that I’ve never seen.   Normally I will come home with anywhere between 500 to 1000 dime cards.  This show was no different, and now that I’m back home, I am wondering what I am going to do with all of these cards.  I’ve started to sort them and I am trying to figure out what I've got and now that I write this blog, I can share some of my purchases on my blog.  Here are some of the cards that I brought home with me.

 

 

1969 American League Co-Winners of Cy Young Award

 

I was able to find vintage cards of the Co-Winners of 1969 American League Cy Young award.  These cards are not perfect.  The Cuellar card is a Topps 1966 short print issue and the McLain card is from the Topps 1972 set, one of Topps first traded cards.

 

Mike Cuellar Topps 1966 #566 and Denny McLain Topps 1972 #753

 Negro League Stars 

I always interested in learning about the history of the game.  Baseball cards offered the chance to educate me about players from yesteryear.  Each of these Negro League star cards was issued in 2001. What could have been if these players would have had the opportunity to have a playing career in the major leagues?

 

Josh Gibson Topps 2001 What Could Have Been #WCB1, Andrew “Rube” Foster Fleer Tradition 2001 Stitches In Time #20, Satchel Paige, & 2001 Upper Deck Legends, The Foirentino Collection #F2.

 

 

The 1952 World Series Reprints 

The 1952 World Series was before my time but was a rematch of the 1949 Series between the Dodgers and the Yankees.  In 2002, Topps issued reprints of cards from their 1952 set that portrayed players from the 1952 World Series, which the Yankees won four games to three.  I was able to get five from the 2002 Topps regular set and two issued in the chrome set.

 

 

Topps 2002 regular set 1952 World Series Reprints 

 

Duke Snider #2, Bill Martin #6, & Gene Woodling #15,

 

 

Johnny Sain card #16 & Hank Bauer #19.  

Topps 2002 chrome set 1952 World Series Reprints

“Preacher” Roe #11 & Ralph Houk #17

 

 

 Topps 1998 Minted in Cooperstown set 

 

 

I don’t have many cards from the Topps 1998 Minted in Cooperstown set.  Beckett says the cards were seeded in one of every eight packs.  I didn’t buy a lot of packs in 1998, so the Minted in Cooperstown cards I have I purchased on the secondary market.  I was able to find a stack of about 40 common Minted in Cooperstown cards and I went ahead and snagged all of them.

Here are a few of those cards.

 

Carlos Delgado #384 & Bobby Bonilla #356

 

 

Jim Eisenreich #67 & Chili Davis #40

 

Ozzie Guillen #164 & Walt Weiss #96

 

 

David Wells #83 & Trevor Hoffman #57

 

 

Food Issues

I was able to find some nice odd ball food issue cards.

 

1987 M & M Star Lineup Mike Schmidt #3, and 1989 Hillshire Farms or Kahn’s Cooperstown Collection Brooks Robinson #9

 1994 King B Greg Maddux, Jr. #18 & 1994 Tombstone Pizza Cal Ripken, Jr. #26,

 

2001 Upper Deck Oreo/Ritz Ken Griffey, Jr, no # listed on card & 2006 Upper Deck Sunkist Alex Rodriguez #6

 

 

Minor League Issues 

It seems that in the early 1990s there were many minor league issues.  I was able to find some nice minor league cards.

 

1990 Star Ivan Rodriguez #26 & 1990 CMC Dave Justice #285,

 

1991 Line Drive Pre-Rookie Double AA Jim Thome #96 & 1991 Classic Best Pedro Martinez #355

 

1992-93 Fleer Excel Manny Ramirez #164 & 1996 Classic Sport Nomar Garciaparra #121

Some Rookies

 

 

I was able to get some early 90s rookie cards plus some rookie cards for current players.

Here are a 1990 Donruss Rated Rookie Juan Gonzalez, which is a reverse negative (note the 19 on Gonzalez's jersey is backwards and that he is batted left handed), and a 1990 Leaf of John Olerud.

 

1990 Donruss Rated Rookie Juan Gonzalez #33 & 1990 Leaf John Olerud #237

I found 2004 Topps Cracker Jack Yadier Molina rookie with the sticker issuance of the same card.

 

2004 Topps Cracker Jack Yadier Molina #204 and the same card as sticker

Here are a couple of current Red All-Stars, Joey Votto and Todd Frazier.  I am not sure if the Votto is his rookie card.  He made his major league debut in September 2007.

2007 Bowman Draft Future’s Game Prospect #BDPP98 Joey Votto and Topps Update 2011 Update Todd Frazier #US270  

 

Some Inserts

I found inserts from sets going back into the 80s.  Here are a few of them.

 1987 Fleer All-Stars Roger Clemens #11 and 1993 Upper Deck Then and Know George Brett TN2

 

1999 Upper Deck Wonder Years Mark McGwire #WY19 & 1999 Fleer Sports Illustrated Diamond Dominators Nomar Garciaparra #8

 

2001 Topps Gallery Alex Rodriguez #GH9 and 2001 Upper Deck Superstar Summit Deter Jeter #SS1

Watch for other of my blogs with more tales about the San Francisco card show.