Josh is the man

Sluggo and I went out to Warsaw to check out a card show yesterday. It wasn't the greatest but we still found some stuff to grab. Him to sell, me for my collections. The show seemed to be more guys selling their cards than dealers set up, if that makes sense. Which was fine, like I said, I found plenty for myself and Sluggo found some stuff he wanted.

Afterwards, we went around the corner to a LCS there, it was really small (they're getting ready to move to a bigger location) and after being at a show for a couple of hours, I really wasn't in the mood to search a bunch of boxes for cards. I did grab one out of his showcase and again, Sluggo picked up a few as well. 

We left there and headed home but before we got there, we thought we'd hit our LCS and I ended up finding more stuff. He had just bought a collection that had a ton of high end White Sox stuff which was cool to see but was way too rich for my wallet. He did have a bunch more my price range that I did pick up. It was a nice day of shopping for cards and I've spent most of today logging and scanning all the cards from last weekend as well as yesterday.

I just recently looked at how much I've spent this year compared to the last few and I've already spent more than last year, and last year was my highest to date. I guess it's paying off for my collections to work the shows because I generally spend the money I make working for Sluggo towards more cards so it's really easy on the budget. It's also gotten me to spend more money per card instead of always buying cheaply. I've added quite a few cards that I would never had purchased before. To be exact, I've already spent over $600 more than last year and I've picked up a little less than 5000 cards less than last year so that shows you, I've been buying nicer cards.

Today's post, however, is a nod to the old me (from last year). At the Plymouth show last weekend, I was talking to Josh (the promoter) who I had bought a bunch of vintage stuff (you'll see that later) and I was talking about my vintage collection. He handed me a stack of 1975 Topps (39 cards) and asked if I wanted them all for a buck. Hell yeah!

Out of the 39, I needed 33 of them. They are in stacks of teams (you can't tell by the colors so I figured I'd tell you) then the last photo (other than the 2 Rangers) are all the cards I only had 1 player from that team. It boosted my 1975 Topps set to 142 cards. Nothing really flashy but all needs and 1975 cards for $.02 each. I'd call that a bargain, but wait, there's more. 

He also said he had a box of 1982 Topps I could have for $5 but it was at home. He sets up at the Shipshewana show which was a couple of days after his so I told him to bring the box and I'd find him. At the Shipshewana show, I found him and he took me out to his car. I figured he had a 300 count or maybe an 800 count box until he stood up with this.

Those are all 1982 Topps card. I though for sure I'd get to at least only needing the really good players with that many cards. First I sorted them into teams, because they were already somewhat sorted that way.

Yes, those are in alphabetical order by teams. I've sorted baseball cards most of my life and can pretty much name them in alphabetical if I think about it hard enough. Especially 80's, the expansion teams since then throw me off a bit but back to the story. As I was sorting them by teams, I noticed they were almost all standard player cards. Only a couple all-star cards and team leaders cards. No in action, no future stars, no highlights. Alright, that's cool. Than as I started to go through the team stacks, I noticed there were only so many players and a bunch of each. For example, that Athletics stack which seems to be the highest, I only added 13 cards and am still 9 short of the team set. I'm certainly not complaining because I boosted my set quite a bit, almost doubled what I had. Just telling it like it is. Let's look at what I did keep.

I ended up adding 232 cards to the set so I ended up paying just over $.02 a card for the ones I kept and now I have a huge box to get rid of. By the way, the photo of the box was after I took out the 232 cards, that's how packed it was. If you're in need of any 1982 Topps, please let me know. You can have them at no cost, well, maybe shipping cost depending on how many you want.

Let's see how well that boost my 1982 Topps set.

Before

After

61% definitely looks better than under 32%. 

Thanks Josh and quit bringing so much good stuff to the shows, you're taking all my money!