Card show by the river

This card was one of my purchases at the card show on Saturday. In fact, I acquired two cards of Rickey Henderson in a Dodger uniform this weekend, which also happens to be the weekend that Henderson was inducted into the Hall of Fame. To quote The A-Team's Hannibal: "I love it when a plan comes together."

The rest my time at the show didn't exactly go as planned, and to explain why, a little background on the show.

I get to only four card shows a year. That's all there is where I live. Three of them are all at the same place. But the fourth, always held on a weekend late in July, is in a small tourist town by the river. The show is actually billed as a "coin, stamp and postcard show." And when you enter the building, that's mostly what you see. There are postcards everywhere. I never knew how fanatical postcard collectors were until I went to one of these shows. People camp out in chairs and go through rows and rows of postcards for what seems like hours.

Most of the people who attend this show are older, kind of upscale, folks. People who own a cottage on a river, a summer home, a boat, retired folks up from the south for the summer, etc. I feel rather out of place.

I also have to search a little before I find the sports card dealers. There never were that many, maybe 5 or 6 tables. But each year it's dwindled to fewer and fewer. Last year, there was just a single sports card dealer. Fortunately, it was a guy I knew who I've dealt with several times. He's fair and a huge baseball fan and has tons of cards. Last year, I bought a couple of '57 Dodgers from him and some '72s.

And that's traditionally how it's gone at this show. I drive the 30 minutes or so to the river, take in the scenery, visit the show for about an hour and find a handful of vintage cards. Sometimes the family goes. It's pleasant. More like a day out than a card feast.

But something interesting happened this time. Everything was the same until I entered the building. I immediately noticed more sports card dealers. I saw at least six tables and there might've been more. I don't know. I ran out of money.

The other thing that changed was I didn't buy a single vintage card. And that is a first, regardless of where I am. I think there are a couple of reasons for that. First, I appreciate the modern card a little more than I once did. Secondly, you can get a bunch of modern cards cheap. After making a purchase at one table, I headed right for one dealer's bargain bin. It was filled with inserts and special sets from between 2000-08. I grabbed a bunch.

So I left there and headed home through the sunny river hills rather pleasantly surprised, first that the show that once seemed to be dying out in terms of offering sports cards was on an upswing, and second, that I could go to a show and not buy a single vintage card.

However, you'll notice that most of the cards I got feature vintage subjects. And here is some of what I brought home:

You don't get more vintage than Gabby Hartnett from the Cubs teams of the 1930s. I basically got this because I like his pose and the camera angle.

These are key, because they are two cards from the 2004 Topps Fan Favorites set that I am collecting. Plus, I didn't realize this until today, but I watched these pitchers face each other at Fenway Park on Aug. 14, 1982. It's true. Look it up. One of the best games I've ever witnessed in person.

OK, the rest are Dodgers (with one exception). This card is pretty ridiculous and I'd like to think it's the reason Donruss lost their MLB license. Can I even consider this a Shawn Green card? He's barely two inches high. The card is numbered to 2,000, too. Whoopee.

A pair of Adrian Beltre cards for my ever expanding Beltre collection. I've noticed that you end up with way more of certain players on your favorite team than others, just because they played during the era when there were 8 billion sets.

Here is the exception that I mentioned. I'm only showing this card because it was free! It was stuck to the back of the Beltre Bowman Chrome card. I didn't even notice. I thought the Beltre card was just super thick. The dealer didn't notice either.

Four random Dodger cards from the past decade. I think I like the Baker one the best. I prefer to remember him as a player, not as a manager for teams I don't like. And definitely not as a studio commentator.

Now we get into some golden age players, starting with Johnny Podres. The card on the left is an insert set from 2004 Topps Heritage. I can't figure out the background at all.

A pair of Don Drysdale cards. I do like the 2007 Legendary Cuts set quite a bit. It works better than some of their other efforts. The Fleer Greats card at the right is a numbered insert.

The next pair are of Gil Hodges. Not a great use of space on either of these two cards. I know they were making room for the relic on the top card, but really not great thought behind the whole thing.

Two more '07 Legendary Cards of one guy in the Hall of Fame and one that I hope is in the Hall some day. Wills wins a place in my heart for beating out Willie Mays for the NL MVP in 1962.

I added five more Duke Snider cards to my collection. This is from the Topps Archive set. I have no idea what year. 2001 or 2002, I think. It will always confuse me.

Probably my favorite of the five. A 2006 Turkey Red card.

These 2004 Fleer Greats cards were cool, too.

Another space-waster from Donruss. Couldn't they have put another image on the card if there was no relic with the card?

A cool card from the 2004 Topps Heritage insert set. I didn't know they were that innovative with camera angles in 1955.

I'll end it with two relic card purchases. The first is my first relic card of Eric Gagne from 2005 Fleer Authentix. I got this card because I like the look of this set a lot. And even though Gagne's a Mitchell Report guy, I still admire what he did from 2002-04 (you can't say it was all steroids), and he was a pleasant guy to interview.

So, he may be a cheater. But he's my cheater.

Had to pick up this Hideo Nomo relic. It's a fancy thick card. I'm not crazy about that color. It reminds me of the color they once used to paint hospital walls. But it's a well-designed card. And it's numbered 24/25. And it's Nomo-rific!

So, that's the story of how I went to the card show by the river expecting to buy some early '70s cards and came back with relics and modernized stuff. How about that. The old dog. He learned a new trick.