Dime Box Digging From the Card Shop

About a week or so ago now, I mentioned I made a trip out to Maverick's in Dayton with my aunt. During my visit, I happened upon a rarity in card shops I visit, a dime box. Of course, I couldn't resist digging through it. 

I grabbed a bunch of these "Salute" inserts from 2018 Topps. Randy Johnson was the first one I came across and wasn't too enamored with it but then I came across more of them and nabbed the ones you see here. Plus, who can pass up cards like this for a dime!

Found two new Jim Thome cards to add to my Indians binder. 

A lot of the newer cards in the box were of the Bowman and Topps base card variety from 2018. That's not too say that those aren't nice cards but I'm not really a Bowman collector and I've already got a bunch of 2018 Topps. I was more on the lookout for cards like this. Random cards, like the Wil Myers Heritage Minors card or Jose Abreu in a throwback Sox uniform.

I also like finding cards like this from a time period that's pretty foreign to me at least in the world of card collecting. I always forget Zack Greinke started with the Royals and I think this might be my first Royals card of his. Barry Zito and Ben Sheets on a card together? Sure, ok. 

This may look like any standard Yoan Moncada card from 2018 Donruss on the front but there's something I didn't notice about it until I prepped these for scanning.

It's a blank back! I'm not sure what the odds were on the blank backs or even if these are classified as a parallel or short print, but regardless, it's cool.

I'm attracted to cool shiny cards like these when I find them in bargain bins. The Addison Russell card qualifies as a zero-year card since he never officially suited up for the A's before being swapped to the Cubs.

Late 80s Donruss Rated Rookies? Yes please.

Once I got past the mass of 2018 Topps and Bowman singles, there was really good stuff to be had. While I'm not actively building the set, I'll still grab some 1980 Topps singles just for the heck of it.

I'll also grab any random mid-80s cards that catch my eye. Honestly, how can you pass up any Mariners card with the old-school trident logo?

More random 80s. I might be able to use Julio Franco for my 1984 Topps set (which reminds me I really, really need to go through that and update what I need/have) otherwise, he'll find a home in the Indians binder.

And what's a dime box without oddballs? These pop-ups are from 1989 Donruss All-Stars. It's a 20-card set featuring the starters from each league and the two managers. I might need to find more of these.

Speaking of cards I need more of ... do you realize how long it's been since I've actually had one of these cards in my possession? Probably since these came out and I got rid of my original collection long, long ago. If you're not familiar, these cards are from Kraft and were found in packages of Kraft cheese slices. I know what you're thinking and no, they were not in the same wrapper as the cheese slice. These were found at the bottom of those multi-packs of cheese slices in the grocery store.

Here's what the backs look like. Honestly, it's easy to confuse the front and back sometimes but the card number helps. You'll notice the pull tab at the top as well. If you were to pull that, the player would pop out of the card and you'd get stats. I don't intend on pulling the tabs on any of these but I'm definitely going to try to find more of these.

All totaled, I dug out 35 cards from the dime box on just a quick rummage through it. That's 35 interesting cards I can now add to my collection. Just goes to show if you see a dime box, start digging ... you never know what you'll find.

Cleaning Up at the Card (and Video) Shops

I finally had a bit of down time this weekend. The family and I went to visit my mom and my aunt who was staying with her as she was in visiting from Tulsa. We went out and about yesterday, had lunch, took the kids out and got them toys and school supplies for my oldest. Then we dropped the kids off at my moms and then back out on another excursion, this time to two of my favorite places in Dayton, Mavericks Cards and Comics and then GameSwap Kettering.

I looked around Mavericks for a bit, saw a few interesting things but then I came across a dime box, which is a rarity for them. I dug through the box and it was mostly Topps and Bowman base cards from this year and last year but I did manage to find a number of good cards, 35 in fact, that I need to scan in. To save space here, I'll cover them in a future post.

 In addition to the dime box cards, I nabbed the last five packs of Gypsy Queen. You never know what'll be left in the box when there's just a few packs left. I'll take my chances on these and open them up soon.

After Maverick's, I headed a few doors down to GameSwap. I've mentioned it before but GameSwap is a super cool place with movies, VHS tapes, arcade games, and all kids of other miscellaneous stuff. Think of it as a tribute to a video store. I need to do a post on them someday. Anyway, I always like to check out their VHS section for old wrestling tapes and I found two good ones.

WCW tapes are extremely hard to come by and usually when I do find them, they've got a serious markup on them. This tape of WCW Uncensored from March of 1999 was only four bucks. 

They also had the pay-per-view event that followed it, Spring Stampede, for five bucks. This is a pretty notable show in that it featured DDP's first WCW world title win.

I also took a gander around the DVDs and Blu-Rays. They didn't have any of the movies on my want list but I did happen across this WWE Blu-ray from a few years ago. I picked it up from the local library when it came out and I really, really enjoyed it. For eight bucks, I couldn't pass this up either.

Finally, I noticed these at checkout. I was like "wait, you have Fright Flicks cards?!" I had to grab a two packs to put towards my set build. Plus these cards are just plain fun to open anyway.

As I mentioned, I'm working on scanning the dime box cards from Maverick's and I'll have a post up about those soon! I'll also share the contents of the Gypsy Queen packs and Fright Flicks packs in future posts as well. The Fright Flicks packs might wait until closer to Halloween and as I might go grab a few more between now and then, if they have any left.

Empty Arena Card Show

Last weekend I finally had a spare Saturday so I figured I would treat myself. I made the 45 trek up to the Nutter Center in Dayton to hit the monthly card show. Typically, the show is held in the adjoining gym but due to a last minute change in schedule (there was a robotics competition the same day) the show got moved into the main arena. 

Now, I've been to this arena numerous times for WWE shows and never in my wildest imagination did I think I'd be sorting through dime boxes on the same arena floor where Bret Hart made his triumphant return to WWE back in 2010. Also, going into the main arena and seeing the seats completely empty, was a bit bizarre. Anyway, let's take a look at my haul.

Behold ... all kinds of goodies and oddities. Let's look closer ...

There was one vendor selling these old retail sets for a buck each. There were lots of good sets to choose from honestly so narrowing it down to three was a chore. There was one Revco box set but it wasn't in that great a shape so I settled on these, a 1986 Topps Baseball Champion Superstars set and two sets from the old Hills department store. At a later date, I'm planning on giving each of these their own post.

I couldn't resist a Bronson Arroyo bobblehead for six bucks. When I unpacked it at work, I could see why it was six bucks. It was a little chipped and there was a very small piece broken off at the bottom of the base on the back but other than that it was fine.

Now on to the cards! First up, hockey! These all came from a dollar bin that was marked down to 50 cents each. So much good stuff especially with the Eric Lindros Maple Leafs card, Curtis Joseph as a member of the Coyotes, Brodeur, Patrick Roy, and others.

More from the 50 cent bin with Sergei Federov in a Columbus uniform, Mark Messier as a member of the Canucks, and some vintage! The Jean Pronovost card is from the 1975-76 Topps Hockey set. That season Pronovost played in 80 games, scored 104 points (split evenly between goals and assists). He also finished second in the voting for the Lady Byng Trophy that year.

Speaking of vintage hockey, one dealer had a 15-card stack of 1968-69 Topps hockey in his case. I asked to thumb through them and quickly noticed no price. I found two I liked and asked how much. Quickly, he turned to his Beckett as I shuddered inside. He sat the book down, shrugged his shoulders and said "eh, how about five for the pair." Ummm ... ok! So, let's reiterate ... I got a card of a Hall of Fame goalie (and a short-tem stop card nonetheless as the 1967-68 season was his only in L.A.) and a card of a guy who founded a very successful coffee chain for a measly five dollar bill.

I also added to my football collection. Everything you see here was from a nickel bin, except for the Terry Bradshaw which was out of a dollar box.

I swear I'll get to baseball cards here in a second. Before I get to that, I got this giant stack of WWE and UFC cards for ... brace yourself for this ... for free! As I was thumbing through them at the table, I asked the guy how much they were each. He said to take the whole stack as he didn't want them. I offered to pay for them but he insisted. 

Here are the only four I wanted from the stack. Clockwise from the top left is Michael Bisping, Terry Funk, Edge, and Frank Mir. The Edge card is a beautiful card as it's taken after his win at WrestleMania 27 in 2011 in what would turn out to be his final match.

Getting to baseball now, I managed to knock off two highly sought after cards from my wantlist. First, this 2018 Topps Update Matt Harvey. This is one of only two Reds cards that I know of that were issued of Matt Harvey as a Red. The other card is from the 2018 Kahn's set that was issued at the ballpark. (Yes, the Reds still make their own cards for the stadium giveaways).

Another card I was in search of was the Scooter Gennett Topps Now card commemorating his 4-homer game back on June 6, 2017. Not only was he just the 17th player in MLB history at the time to record a four homer game, he was the first Reds player ever to do it. The price tag on it was still $10 but I couldn't resist for a card I've been searching for ever since it was issued. 

Here's a pretty neat card, an Ozzie Smith manu-relic patch card numbered to 75. I got this from the same guy I got the Matt Harvey Reds card from. 

Another manu-relic card. I don't really hate on these as much as a I've seen a lot of people do. I personally think they're neat cards. The medallion here looks like a class ring but it's Randy Johnson as an Expo. I'll take that any day.

A few more bargain relics in players I collect.

I got these from a guy that said he was just cleaning out his garage so he had a bunch of random stuff like dime boxes, random loose vintage cards, and these. These are 1977 MSA discs that were issued in cartons of Pepsi and they cost me nothing at this show. Since I bought a nice stack of cards from him, he threw these in as a bonus.

Of course, I can't go to any card show and not pick up some vintage. I know the Billy Martin has some writing on the surface but it's a Topps card of Billy Martin with the Reds. I couldn't resist.

I nabbed this 1960 Wally Post as well from the guy who gave me all the wrestling and UFC cards. I like the card but there's something about it that seems a bit off. Maybe it's the border brightness or how sharp the corners are, I'm not sure. The back seems brighter that the 1960 Martin as well. Regardless, I only shelled out a few bucks for it.

Who can pass up vintage oddballs? I can't. These were a buck each.

Early 80s goodness for 50 cents each. 

Moving on now to where I did the most damage, the dime and nickel boxes. There were only a few vendors that had bargain bins so I made sure to make the most of them and I dug through each one thoroughly. The first was the regular vendor who has singles of all the new stuff. I nabbed a ton of new Gypsy Queen base cards for a dime each. These aren't all of them, just the highlights of the batch.

Some fabulous dime bin Reds from the 1980s. My favorite here may just be the Chris Sabo Toys R' Us rookie card.

90s oddballs? Sure, why not.

Some great 90s base cards including Jose Rijo working as a member of the Reds grounds crew. He always did fun stuff like that while he had a bad shoulder injury.

Some cool horizontal cards. Willie Greene was a decent third baseman for the Reds in the 90s and had a bit of pop in his bat too. His best year was 1997 where he played in 151 games and hit .253 with 26 homers and 91 RBIs.

Some great mid-2000s stuff to add to my collection.

And finally some newer Reds cards. Reds cards weren't the only thing I dug out of the bargain bins though ...

Here's some stars of the 80s, including a cool Graig Nettles that's not only a sunset card but also a short-term stops card as he wound up his career with the Expos in 1988.

These 1987 Donruss cards were a nickel each. Yes, a nickel each. I was so excited that I accidentally grabbed two of the Tim Raines card.

Can you guess what all these players have in common? If you guessed they are all former Reds, you'd be right. One of my guilty pleasures of collecting is getting cards of former Reds players in different or unfamiliar uniforms. Some of these I barely even remember like Tim Belcher with the Royals or Dave Parker with the Angels.

The bargain bins just kept on giving like these cards Hall of Famers. The most expensive here was the Griffey for a buck.

I hit some player collections as well ... some Dennis Eckersley Cardinals cards and Paul O'Neill who I enjoy finding cards of in bargain bins.

A bunch of random cards here. Just all kinds of cool stuff.

Buybacks! Yes!

Lots of inserts from some Hall of Famers. I love the Hank Aaron cards with the old school Braves jersey.

Diamond Kings are my favorite Panini product. I'll scoop these up from bargain bins all the time. The Orlando Cepeda card is just beautiful.

More random stuff. 

And finally, a bunch of really, really good stuff. I never really collected Justin Verlander cards when he was with the Tigers but for some reason, I'm drawn to cards of him with the Astros. I can't really explain it.

That wraps up my card show visit for the spring. I spent more than I thought I would (mainly due to the Ozzie Smith and Scooter Gennett cards) but I think I still came out on top though and even knocked two cards off my want list.