Here's what a nickle will get you!

I was able to make it to a card show yesterday and I picked up a few things. I spent some time digging through a 20/$1 box and walked away with 20 cards.

I picked up some food issued cards, but the majority were duplicates. There were six Marketside (Wal-Mart) cards that were all dups and two Post cards that I ended up already having. That's what I get for not have checklists.

Here are the food issue cards that I needed.

I'm working on the two Post sets, the Wonder Bread card makes it into my binder as the lone card I have from that set.

Next up are a few David Wright and Joe Mauer cards. Lots of similarities between these two guys. Both were selected in the 1st round of the 2001 draft. Mauer went number 1 and Wright was selected number 38. Both started their major league careers in 2004 and both retired after the 2018 season. Both spent their entire career with the same team.

Both had great careers, but both dealt with injuries throughout their career.

I don't think anyone thinks David Wright will end up in the Hall of Fame, but I've seen some talk about whether Mauer is Hall worthy. What do you think? He has a career .306 batting average and is a  3x batting champion and the 2009 A.L. MVP. His career totals for hits (2,123), home runs (143) and RBI (923) are a little light though and I don't think he'll make the Hall of Fame.

Let's finish it off with two sure fire Hall of Fame players. One, Griffey, is already in and the other, Mike Trout, will be in 5 years after he retires.

I hope I need the Griffey. It didn't look familiar and I'm not going to pass on a Trout for a nickle.

So there are my 20/$1 finds. Nothing crazy, but a few nice cards. I wish I had lists with me so I didn't end up with dups, but maybe I'll send those out with the prize packages for my contest.

Be sure to enter my contest by creating a post using one of the topics I listed. Here are a couple more that you can choose from.

11) Tell me about your weirdest interaction with a dealer at a card show or a card shop owner.

12) Write a fiction piece about how you'd beg, borrow, or deal (anyone remember that show) your way to the National this summer in Chicago.

More Post Ideas for my CONTEST!

Here are a few more post ideas for my contest.

6) Work baseball cards, as a major part, into an episode of The Office or LOST.

7) Post a video of you sharing your collection with someone that didn't know previously that you collect sports cards.

8) Put together an entire inning of a baseball game, just using baseball cards.

9) Come up with at least 5 events for a Baseball Card Olympics.

10) Come up with a Minute-To-Win-It game involving baseball cards.

Good luck!

10 Years and a CONTEST!

10 years is a long time. To celebrate my 10th Blogoversary, I'm going to be holding a contest the likes of which the Blog-o-sphere has never seen before! Okay, that might be a little dramatic, but I'm going to give away some cool prizes.

If you remember from a post or two earlier this year I mentioned getting some duplicate vintage that I would be giving away. Well the time has come.

To enter the contest you'll need to pick a topic of my choosing and write a blog post about said topic. I'll post a couple of topics today and a few more over the next 10 days for you to choose from.Be sure and comment with a link to your post so I am aware of your post. If you don't have a blog you can email me your entry.

Alright here are a few topics to choose from to get started.

1) The best baseball card in ever made and why.

2) The worst baseball card ever made and why.

3) A short story involving baseball cards and time travel.

4) Your most embarrassing moment involving sports cards.

5)  Write a post as if you were a past or present famous person who collected cards. So for example, write as if you were George Washington and he had an awesome Nationals collection back in 1776.

I will be judging the posts and select winners based on content, originality, humor, and if you made me cry. This isn't a you participate and you go into a randomizer. I want to reward those that put some time and effort into it.

You'll have the entire month of July to post. Enter as many times as you would like. More than one person can select the same topic.

I will post more topics to choose from over the next 10 days. Have fun!

Here are some of the prizes.

Live Auctions Over eBay Any Day!

I'm still chipping away at my goal of collecting every Topps Hank Aaron card from his playing career.

I went to an auction at my LCS this past Saturday and I picked up this 1962 Topps All-Star card.

Anyone else have live auctions at their LCS?

The card isn't in great condition, but it's in a lot better shape than many of the Aaron cards in my collection. I actually though the card might be trimmed, probably because of all the talk about trimming going on in the hobby right now, but after comparing it to other cards, I don't think it is.

What are your thoughts on all of the controversy right now surrounding "trimmed slabs"?

I think there are a few bad apples in the baseball card industry that are ruining it for a lot of collectors, in a big way. I don't think this is new, it's just in a new format.