The mall show, part 2

 

So as mentioned in the last post, it had been a year since Angus and I had gone to a card show together. We're both busy guys with super-hectic jobs and other issues that rudely won't get out of the way for leisurely pursuits.

 

He had been saving up some collectibles for me all the while. When we met at the Buffalo Wild Wings parking lot, he unloaded what I'm sure had been taking up too much space for too long.

 

There was a variety of stuff and all the card items were full of variety, too. Let's start with a legends set that I've always enjoyed.

 

This is a decent stack of 2001 Fleer Greats of the Game. I own all the Dodgers in this set already, but the purpose of this was to get me started on another set chase I believe.

 

I do like my legends -- and I now have more than half of the set. It'll go on the back-burner, but someday I may be up to pursuing it.

Here's another legends set -- 1994 Ted Williams. The base set is complete. But there are some nice inserts. Two more from the 500-club insert are mine.

Wooo! More old-timers! It's another Senior League set. The 1990 Pacific Senior League set is the one of the many Sr. League iterations that I have the fewest examples, so this will help. And I always enjoy going through and seeing those player names from when I was a kid.

 

I'll get to other kinds of cards soon, I promise, but how can you not love these? The 1992 Nabisco Canada set features notable Expos and Blue Jays from my yesteryear. Give them to me.

Someone finally carried out on their threat to send me some 1991-92 Pro Set hockey. This finally be enough for me to put up a want list -- I don't know if I'll ever look to buy the full set at once, we'll see, I guess. But first I need to sort some 1991-92 Pro Set! Lots of great names in there: Moog, MacInnis, Modano, Messier. That's just the Ms!

 

Since Angus was arriving from Canada, it was only natural that he would do damage to some of my O-Pee-Chee needs. Did he ever.

 

 1990 O-Pee-Chee Dodgers

 

1987 O-Pee-Chee Dodgers. One Scioscia card away from being complete!

This Pedro Guerrero wraps up the 1985 OPC team set! Yaaay

 

 

 

We're starting to get to the years where I've finished the Dodgers team set but the cards can be redirected to completing the main OPC set. In this case, the Super Veterans Sutton was the last card I needed for the '83 team set so the rest go to the big bad main set!

A mess of 1982 O-Pee-Chee Dodgers. Love that Lopes. Thanks to these, I'm a Burt Hooton away from completing this.

1980 and 1981 are done -- completed while Angus was spending the year accumulating these! Oh well, off to the main set completion bids!

Mostly Dodgers -- and some guy who I visited in his home to interview him. 1976 O-Pee-Chee doesn't clue you into its ways unless you turn the cards over ...

There we are!

This was super-appreciated, some early 1970s OPC Dodgers. I've fallen off from my quest of adding '70s OPC Dodgers, especially the first half of the '70s, maybe this will get me back on track.

I also received a few cards from Fleer's 1990 Canadian venture. I must have forgotten to photograph the fronts, but you've seen those too many times, take a gander down to the bottom of the card backs. PTD. IN CANADA!

 

Angus didn't just stick to Dodgers O-Pee-Chee. Here are three fine examples from the mid-1980s with the Jim Fanning and Warren Cromartie updates among the most classic in OPC history.

These are fine examples, of course, but I'm not a mere sampler with my collecting. I go all the way when it comes to cards and that means full set-collecting. Angus took note.

That's a super-healthy stack of 1978 O-Pee-Chee. I now somehow have all but 31 of the cards in the 242-card '78 OPC set!!!

Yes, this includes the Nolan Ryan. And many others! Angus mentioned that I'd have to find an Eddie Murray rookie but these are pursuits for another day. I'm going to roll around in these '78 OPCs for a good few months first.

Here is the best part of O-Pee-Chee, the variations from the Topps set. I've pursued a few of these recently (including the Matlack that just arrived in a COMC order that I haven't blogged about yet). So some lucky trade partners may get a couple of these some day.

WHAM!

1978 wasn't the only stack. There was an even larger stack of 1983 OPC!

1983 O-Pee-Chee is a larger set -- 396 cards. And I now have 325 of them!

I ran out of time trying to photograph them all but here just some of the variations. There are so many other great ones. The Tony Armas is super. Maybe I'll do a Cardboard Appreciation on that one someday.

Angus mentioned that I'd have to track down the Ryne Sandberg rookie, but added that the Wade Boggs didn't make the set. As for the Tony Gywnn:

There it is!

Obviously it's seen some sharper days but it's still very cool to own an OPC Gwynn rookie. I don't know if this came from Angus' original collection.

I do know that these did ...

Box bottoms!!!!

Oh, man. Angus said he's downsizing his box bottoms. He's sent me some of the OPC BBs prior and this is a mix of both OPC and Topps. This is going to lead to quite the project as I have some of this in original-card form and some in box-bottom form. What to keep? What to cut? What to send to others? I know what I'm doing for the next three months!

I'll just venture into nonsports for a minute before getting out of here.

I thought these were all from the 1977 Topps Charlie Angels set and then I saw the French along the bottom. Somehow having French versions of Charlie's Angels cards makes them much cooler.

 

Then The Fonz caught me ogling. (Angus positioned this card immediately after the Charlie's Angels cards in the box).

This Fonz card threw me because I've known the Happy Days cards as having blue borders. But apparently there was another set from the same year with red borders.

 

 

 Oh, and Angus provided a couple of binders, too. These are the neat flexible ones that he apparently got cheap. Thanks, man, but with all the cards you gave me I think I need a few more!

There were several other cards he gave me, but I'll wrap it up with this 1975 Topps Gary Carter rookie upgrade to the one in my '75 set. This is really appreciated. And so is all the other stuff.

After the mall show, we had time for a nice long food stop at Buffalo Wild Wings. I watched Angus agonize through Game 1 of the Mets-Phillies Division Series. The Mets won but that didn't stop him from sweating it out.

I know the feeling, I did the same through Game 1 of the Dodgers-Padres. It worked out, but Sunday was pretty lousy for both of us.

Just another reason why we need more card show time to take the edge off.

(RIP, El Tiante).