Card Show Substitute

It's Saturday afternoon and as I'm writing this post... my favorite card show is taking place a little less than an hour away.  Over the years, I've made numerous purchases ranging from dime box bargains to complete vintage sets.  Plus even when I don't buy stuff... it's nice to hang out and talk shop with fellow collectors.

But today I woke up and decided I wasn't really feeling it.  This week in the classroom took its toll on me.  It had nothing to do with the students.  They were fine for the most part, but somehow a bunch of schedules were messed up and the school finally corrected them five weeks into the school year.

I was fortunate to only lose two students, however I was stressed out that they were going to take out a bunch more.  Plus anytime students are moved around, we need to go back into our grading program and reenter all of our grades for those students.  I had almost thirty students affected.

Plus... a few weeks ago... I picked up a card I had been looking for and essentially blew my monthly hobby budget on one purchase.

So I decided to stay home, catch up on some rest, and finally open up a care package that Julie over at A Cracked Bat sent me last week.  It was truly a nice substitute for attending a card show.

She hooked me up with a bunch of nice cards for my Oakland A's and Japanese baseball player collections that included everything from inserts to rookie cards to hits.

Here's just a sampling of what she sent:

I figured I'd wrap things up with my five favorites...

#5:  2001 Team Best Minor League Auto #NNO

Julie sent me twenty-three baseball cards featuring Japanese baseball players.  Twenty-one of them were new additions.  When you take into consideration that I have four binders dedicated to that collection, it's pretty amazing that only two cards were duplicates.  This card wasn't one of them.

In fact this was my very first autograph of Tomo Ohka and it's hard signed which is an awesome bonus.


#4:  2001 Bowman's Best Locker Room Collection Jersey #MM

A's fans don't have a lot to cheer for right now, so sometimes we dwell on the past.  Mulder, Hudson, and Zito provided a lot of fond memories back in the day.  Anytime I can add a new relic of any of these guys, it's a good day.

#3:  2002 Topps East Meets West #EW-MS

Masanori Murakami paved the way for guys like Hideo Nomo, Ichiro Suzuki, Yu Darvish, and of course... Mac Suzuki.  This card honors him.  I just wished Topps made more cards of him.

#2:  2014 Topps Red Hot Foil #104

When it comes to Topps baseball cards and Kurt Suzuki... 2014 was one of his finest years.  He had three different base cards and all of them are fantastic.  I absolutely love this card.


#1:  1999 Fleer Sports Illustrated Greats of the Game #52

This card captures one of the finest moments in Oakland A's World Series history.  Talk about perfect timing by both Rudi and the photographer.  It's even more special that this took place a little over a month after I was born.

Thank you so much Julie for this generous care package!  I've got some Tigers set aside for you and the Biggio you commented on.  I'll get around to shipping them out eventually.

Oh by the way... I should also thank you for putting me in touch with Gio over at When Topps Had Balls.

He had an extra set available, so I grabbed it.  I was really excited to add it to my collection.  It was worth every penny.

Okay... time for a nice nap.  Happy Saturday and sayonara!