6/6/25 card show report: June boon

So, yeah, I went the traditional route and you're getting my June show recap tonight. It's another short one but still filled with cool stuff so I hope you all enjoy it!

According to my spending tracker, that monthly Taylor Town show on June 6 was my only spending for the month, though I certainly made up for that in July! More to come on that.

Anyway, I dropped $110 on some quality stuff, and some of that included some choice 90s inserts. My usual guy had recently bought out a collection with a good number of those found therein, and he invited me to flip through a big box of those (mostly baseball, some football). They were all unpriced, so I was somewhat careful about what I chose, but in the end I was very pleased with the price he gave me after looking them up. You'll see a few of those below and possibly more in trade packages as they get dispersed.

No trade bait this month, so let's get to the goods!

Now this is my kind of scan! And yes, the "90s inserts rule!" tag is in full effect here. First up is a '96 Sportflix Double Take insert starring Ken Griffey Jr. and then-bigtime prospect Ruben Rivera. The two year run of Pinnacle's Sportflix product remains undefeated when it comes to inserts (and we'll get to another one in a minute) including this one that pairs up a couple stars on an extremely cool lenticular design. That particular Griffey card is paired with another one of my favorites from the era: '98 Studio's Freeze Frame. I think the J. Geils Band would approve of this photograph-themed chase card that's numbered /4500 on the back.

An Al Kaline Iconic Card Reprint from 2019 Topps is the lone exception to the 90s greatness in this scan (besides the two hits, of course), and it gives me yet another tribute to a RC I really need to track down one of these days.

Back to the 90s fun and the decade's other notable junior. Dress For Success is a '97 Leaf offering with a faux jersey feel and even slightly raised lettering that makes the card live up to its theme quite nicely. This one's numbered /3500 and yet another example of the kind of stuff we're denied in this era's creative doldrums. The second of three Cals is a '98 Leaf Rookies & Stars Pennant Edition MVP insert, which is also numbered (/5000), and this one picks a top player at each position on the back, with the Iron Man slotting in at 3B. Finally, we get our other look at '96 Sportflix and its Hit Parade insert. Sure, the scene in the background doesn't change per card, but the motion is still extremely cool and I continue to have a fondness for cards that look like this.

And then we have the pair of baseball hits, both of guys that spent at least some time behind the plate. The first is a 2016 Ginter jersey relic of Victor Martinez, who caught over 850 games, mostly with Cleveland and Boston. It was nice getting him on a card where he's pictured with Detroit, for whom he played the final seven years of his career. He's joined by HOF catcher Pudge Rodriguez on a 2004 Donruss Elite Career Best bat card (#d /200). The bat relic version of the card has a back with a COA statement instead of the base insert's explanation of the titular career best number, in this case his 1999 MVP season total of 113 RBI (he never did reach 100 again), plus becoming the first catcher in the 20/20 club (35 HR/25 steals, both also career bests). The bat chip may be relatively tiny but it's still a pretty cool card to me!

On the basketball side of things I did end up with a single new card: an autograph of Moussa Diabate. My second such card of the French C and former Wolverine (2021-22 only) is a rookie-year insert from 2022-23 Prizm called Sensational Signatures. While I don't think you can describe this one that positively, it's still a fun addition for me.

I scored a football hit as well, but first we'll look at the single 90s insert I purchased from that sport. Collector's Edge was certainly prolific during that decade, and that includes 1998, Charles Woodson's rookie year. What you see above is his second base card in the product, which is numbered /5000 like the rest, but is from the "Super Masters" subset which has a different design than the rest. Rookie year and numbered? Sounds like something I'd like to add!

And finally we have this evening's lone football hit. That ended up being auto #2 of UM and Dallas Cowboys TE Luke Schoonmaker. Found in 2023 Panini Contenders, this very reflective foil card is the Playoff Ticket parallel of his base auto, and it's numbered /149. Hopefully the third-year TE is more successful with the Cowboys than fellow ex-Wolverine/Cowboy at the position Sean McKeon.

That's it for June's show but stay tuned for July's recap which includes a fun cameo! Also I'll be back soon with one of the other posts I promised last time.

5/2/25 card show report: it's gonna be May

With another monthly show coming up in less than a week, tonight I'm recapping my Taylor Town trip from May.

Coming off a show where I'd spent a yearly low of just $55 I almost doubled my spending at a $100 even. Oddly enough I may have come home with fewer cards than April, but that was the result of an increase in quality at the expense of quantity. Hey, whatever works!

First up, I did snag a bit of trade bait to make available here, all of which is a bit higher end than normal:

The Lo Duca auto is numbered /227 while the patch is limited to 100 copies. I know I trade with a bunch of Dodgers collectors but decided I might prefer specific offers of items in trade for these as they're on the nicer side. Meanwhile, the jersey/auto of Stewart is /75, and the Sano manurelic isn't numbered.

Please claim any if you'd like to trade for them here or over on TCDb.

As for my keepers, I can also sum them up in a single scan:

#1 PC guy Cal gets yet another addition in the form of a '21 Topps 70 Years of Topps insert that imagines what he'd look like on the 1978 design. His fellow 2007 Hall of Fame inductee (I was there!) Tony Gwynn is the other baseball representative tonight in the form of a pair of early 2000s relics. The vertical card is from 2002 Topps 206 while its horizontal sibling hails from 2001 Upper Deck. The latter came out just four years after Gwynn was on the small checklist of the ballyhooed debut of UD's Game Jersey cards. It was certainly a different time back then! I now count 12 relics in my collection of Mr. Padre, and I'll happily spend in the $5-$10 range to continue growing that count.

As for football, the lone non-relic I picked up was a 2021 Absolute Blue Diamonds parallel of former UM RB Chris Evans. It's numbered /99 and the color was along the right lines so why not? Next to him we have my first two hits of 2023 National Champ QB J.J. McCarthy, both of which are Vikings jersey relics. On the left is a jersey from '24 Absolute's Rookie Force insert, and that's joined by the same year's Donruss Rookie Phenom Jerseys set. I hope he hits the ground running as Minnesota's QB this season after barely playing during last year's preseason due to injury. For now he becomes subject #265 in my football collection.

Last up is relic #5 (and 6th overall hit) of the electrifying Desmond Howard. He's pictured on the card above with the Lions but this one was actually made by Stadium Club in 2001 to celebrate his appearance earlier that year in the Pro Bowl as a KR for the NFC. That was his lone appearance in the NFL all-star game over his 11 seasons, and he was named to the team on the back of numbers like 457 punt return yards (including a career-high 95-yarder) and TD, plus 1401 kick return yards on 57 tries, including a season-high 70.

That's all for this time but I'll figure out what I'd like to show off next and try to get another post up soon. Until then, if anyone has any solutions for the reeling Tigers, please feel free to share them with the front office in Detroit!

4/4/25 card show report: April foolin' around

Tonight I'm posting what I think is my last recap for April which is that month's show, just a day before I head over to Taylor tomorrow for July's trip (and possibly a meetup with John!). This will be a very short one because I only spent $55 that day, and out of what I bought, only five cards stayed with me.

Here's a quick look at what I brought home:

You can see the best stuff right off the bat in the form of the baseball content. My 19th relic of Greg Maddux is a plain white Braves jersey swatch from Upper Deck's 2003 Finite product, a one-and-done offering that's somewhat forgettable. But hey, it's a nice new Maddux for me, and I think it was in the $5-$10 neighborhood so I'm happy!

As for a more recent pitcher I was glad to score a card of, you can see my second autograph of young Tigers starter Casey Mize, out of 2022 Panini Mosaic. It joins a 2021 card from the same product, and this parallel of the autograph set is apparently referred to as "Choice Fusion" for some reason. I was content to continue adding some cheap Mize autos to my collection before the season started, and then all he's done is get off to a great 8-2 start for the AL-best Tigers, so that makes this one even more exciting.

Switching over to basketball, Michigan Wagner bro Franz becomes that sport's 40th different subject in my hits collection thanks to a Hoops sweater card from 2021-22. I know people find these to be pretty goofy and I do myself sometimes, but it was a fun add for maybe $2 while I work on upgrading what I have of him.

Last up is a cheap football pair. On the left is a Red parallel of RB Hassan Haskins' RC from 2022 Panini Rookies & Stars, and Buckeye faces are probably still that color picturing him pouring on five TDs against them in 2021. Joining him is a 2020 Panini Playbook RC of former Pats LB Josh Uche. New England flipped him to the Chiefs last October but he barely played with them, and then signed with KC's Super Bowl opponents in Philly after the season ended. Out of the 14 Uche RCs I'm tracking, I'm now past 50% with eight out of 14.

So, yeah, not much this time, but that's ok because it made for less work in this post! After tomorrow's trip I'll get y'all another show recap once I'm caught up on May and June. Looking at my scanned stuff I think that'll amount to a pair of blogger trades, two more shows, eBay pickups for the first half of the year, a few TCDb deals before I disabled transactions for quite a while, and another fun Dave & Buster's sports-related prize.

I hope everyone has a safe and happy 4th as we get closer to the MLB All-Star break!

2/28/25 card show report: Marching into spring

I've been slacking again, or more accurately, focusing on other stuff that's grabbed my interest. That said, I haven't forgotten blogging, even if I'm terrible at keeping up with it!

Some of you may recall that I combined my first two 2025 shows into a single post because both dates were in January. Similarly, the "March" show's first date (since I usually go on Fridays) was the final day of February. Confused? Don't worry--the April and May shows took place during their corresponding months.

Once again it's been far too long for me to remember the details on this one, but I spent an almost-yearly high of $115 (January's was $120), largely thanks to one high-end card that I'm sure will get posted on another blog soon enough. There was also the usual nice stack of trade bait destined for some of my favorite folks, plus this unassigned stuff up for grabs:

The baseball stuff was mostly very cheap autos with a stray relic thrown in.

As for football, I went for a couple eye-popping patches and a patch/auto, plus a couple other cheapies I'm hoping someone will take off my hands. You know the drill: claim 'em if you want 'em!

And then there's my small pile of keepers:

Fleer's Lumber Company went through a number of different looks over its multiple iterations, and the '94 version isn't at the top for me, but it's still a very good one. I love me some numbered 90s inserts (they rule!) of my favorite stars from the era, so that Black Diamond Maddux (#d /1500 on the back) was a nice find for me. Cal's '83 Donruss second-year is a rare 80s base of him I didn't own, not to mention a reminder of the year I was born. Pacific's 2632 insert honoring his streak is one I don't recall seeing before so I was glad to snag it. And the Leaf Clean Up Crew insert offers a look at a very powerful infield trio for Baltimore that included two of the guys in the 500 HR/3000 hit club plus the SS with the most career bombs at his position.

On the basketball side of things I once again came home with a Caris LeVert insert out of what I'm sure was a dime or quarter box, plus a nice Bulls red jersey swatch of Fab Five guy Jalen Rose, my fifth relic and seventh total hit of the 13-year NBAer.

I now have a couple more shows to recap but first will be returning to trade packages with two from the month of March, then a few other incoming items.

1/3 and 1/31/25 Show Reports: Two-fer '25

Because I attended both January's and February's shows during the first month of this year (as you can see in the title, February's began on 1/31, and I like to go on Fridays), you get a two-fer post tonight!

#1 for the year was Friday, January 3, and my spending sheet says I threw down a year-high $120, which made for a strong start.

First, here's a scan of some pretty nice trade bait:

I've tried to swing back into getting baseball fodder since it seems that's what many folks prefer, but the football stuff just ends up being more plentiful much of the time, both in quantity and quality. The printing plate you see (scanned sideways, for some reason) stars Bears QB bust Mitchell Trubisky, and it hails from 2019 Panini Luminance (well, it was inserted into that year's Plates & Patches, but you know what I mean). I can't remember the exact price but I snagged it for less than $10.

As always, if you see anything you like, just ask and we'll see what we can work out!

As for my keepers,

It doesn't get much better than some "90s inserts rule" goodness! Junior Griffey features on the front of a '96 Pinnacle Team Pinnacle insert, Gwynn looks spiffy on a '97 Skybox E-X2000 base, Maddux is the face of a 2003 Fleer Tradition mini insert, and Pudge is the back half of the catching duo on Pinnacle's '97 Team Pinnacle version. Oh, and Ripken completes the quartet with a new relic card courtesy of '24 Ginter. Sweet!

The well-traveled Burke was a fun throw-in on the basketball side of things, and I'm always up for a cool Donruss numbered parallel, especially the Season Stat Line cards.

And it may not look it, but that '92 Pro Line football card was one of the most significant pickups for me this time. I'll explain why in a moment as we look at some backs.

The Reds' Sanders was a reasonable pick opposite Griffey to rep the NL OF in '95, his lone All-Star campaign. Maddux's Black & White mini card has a nice bonus of being numbered /1936 as a throwback to that year's Goudey design. I don't know why I included the back of Cal's Ginter relic here, but I did. Piazza was a natural counterpart to Rodriguez on the other Team Pinnacle insert.

And then we have my second example of a signature card from 1992 Pro Line Portraits' Autograph sets. OL Greg Skrepenak suited up for the Wolverines before being drafted by the Raiders, and he'd play 68 NFL games over five seasons between them and the Jaguars. His brief career combined with that era of the hobby means his certified auto selection is extremely limited, and this is one I was hot after since it's his only NFL version. I love adding signatures of new players to my collection and was happy for Skrepenak to join the club!

Four weeks later I headed back east down 94 for another Friday show. This time I spent a slightly odd (but even) $76, and I don't recall how I ended up at that number. Despite shelling out less cash, I brought home even MORE trade bait, if fewer PC additions:

Trade bait scan 1 of 2 is just the vertical cards, and most everything here was in the $1-$2 range, I believe.

And the other nine were of the horizontal variety. Lots more football, as you can see (and hopefully I'll get those sent out in TCDb deals at some point) with a pair of baseball relics. Want any? Please ask!

As for my keepers:

We'll start off this small assortment with another "90s inserts rule" reference. I don't know for sure if 1998 was my favorite year for Topps inserts, but after dragging their feet long enough to get way behind the likes of Pacific, Pinnacle, Fleer, and UD, Topps produced some bangers late in the decade. '98's Clout Nine, Focal Point, Mystery Finest, and Clemente Reprints were highlights, and to that group I'd add Hall Bound, a 15-card die-cut set honoring players who were practically shoo-ins for Cooperstown. Of that total, Clemens, McGwire, Bonds, and Juan Gonzalez were the only misses, for obvious reasons. Cal, of course, had no such problems. And here I added the Chrome version of his entry in that beautiful set!

Next I rewound the clock a decade while picking up the Whitaker/Trammell double-play combo in Starting Lineup card form. I've had (open) figure/card pairings of the two (plus Matt Nokes) since the year I turned six and was in retrospect lucky to find them at Meijer or Toys R Us, and now I have the inaugural iteration's cardboard issues. It was great finding them together and I think they were just a buck or two each. Cool!

Lastly, I think I paid about the same amount to add relic cards of a couple more Wolverines that are joining the hits collection tonight. QB Joe Milton III is the guy that transferred to Tennessee after the wacky 2020 "season," and then the hapless Patriots spent a pick on him. He was just flipped to Dallas where he'll try to be Dak's backup, I guess. Meanwhile, NCAA champ WR Roman Wilson joins him, and though his post-college year in football proved to be a bust due to injury, I'm hoping to see him making some plays for the Steelers in a few months.

The three football additions you saw tonight put me at 260 unique subjects in my football hits collection, and that's a number I've proudly increased quite a bit the past few years.

Posting these show pickups lets me put some more cards away and continue to chip at my backlog. Next I plan on showing off my lone February trade package, one that was plenty big enough to get its own month!

2024 August-December card show reports: binging through five shows

Here's a show recap post for my five trips to Taylor in August through December last year because if I do one post for each at this point it may take me until March.

8/2/24:

My purchase-tracking spreadsheet says I dropped $80 at this one, so it was a pretty average show for me price-wise.

First up, some trade bait:

I believe both the A-Rod and Hoffman up top are gone but I think I may have everything else still.

My keepers:

Hooray, a new Granderson! Newer Gwynns are nice but how about some "90s inserts rule!" action for Maddux? Griffey and Ripken complete the quartet. By the way, Bowman's Best's Mirror Image was one of my favorites back then despite the fact that the prospects they featured often didn't work out.

Holo Griffey! A numbered Gwynn! I included the back of the Mirror Image insert plus the numbered Elite Teams insert of the Braves, who definitely lived up to that description. Speaking of the Bowman's Best card, this one was quite good as obviously Maddux and Moose are HOFers, but Colon also had a very nice career, and Wright even managed to last for 19 seasons!

Basketball ended up being the story of the day with a couple of the biggest cards of the haul hailing from that sport: an autograph of Caleb Houstan (my second), the guy who plays for Ann Arbor South (Orlando), plus a nice Lakers swatch of his teammate Mo Wagner (hit #4).

Football didn't get shut out, though, as I came home with both a numbered rookie-year Griese from SPx plus a new Funchess jersey relic (hit #32 for him).

9/6/24:

For September's show it looks like I upped my total spending to an even $100, and a good chunk of that must have gone towards items for trade packages based on what I have scanned to show here. That works for me, though, as I love using these shows as a source of cards to send out to my favorite trading buds.

As for cards that weren't ticketed for specific folks, here's what I grabbed:

What can I say? I'm a sucker for autographed manupatches, and I think those signed metal cards are too cool. I probably only spent a couple bucks on each of these anyway, and hopefully they'll find a good home before long, but I don't think I've had any bites for them on TCDb just yet.

My keepers:

It's always great when I can add rarer cards like Artist's Proofs to my PCs, including Palmer's. Pudge shares his '93 Pinnacle Team Pinnacle insert with another excellent if not HOF backstop, Darren Daulton. And I'm sorry that Gwynn's the one to get covered by the peel's sticker on '95 Donruss Dominators insert you see above--a favorite of mine, by the way--but I got this one to pair with a copy that I do have peeled, so now I have one of each to enjoy.

I scored a few more basketball items this time, and THJ was the highlight as I found three new cards for his collection, including a Panini Prizm auto that represents my sixth signature and 13th overall hit of the ex-Wolverine and current Pistons standout.

The football side of things was very offensive, but only in terms of the positions represented, because I was quite happy with my little haul. The Threads jersey of Braylon gives him 95 total hits, keeping him in 4th behind Henne, Manningham, and Long, though the race to be the second to 100 is anybody's game. I also found my second auto of TE Nick Eubanks on a red parallel of his Contenders Draft issue, and believe it or not, the one I already own isn't from the same product, but an entirely different one!

10/4/24:

October was a bit of an outlier as I spent just $55, but in thinking back to that day and looking over what I have here, I'm pretty sure I recall that being a day where my favorite seller had lowered some of his prices even more so I got a lot of bang for my buck.

The available trade bait:

I'm pretty sure each of the autographs/jerseys was just a buck, plus the numbered inserts and other 90s stuff were just too cool to pass up and try to get into someone else's collection.

Not a ton for me either this time, but a few cool items:

The Maddux, Ripken, and Pudge cards were all fun additions, plus I nabbed my first card of IF prospect Trey Sweeney, one of the guys that came over in the Jack Flaherty deal with the Dodgers. If he can help force Javy Baez off the roster then he'll forever be a legend in my mind. Meanwhile, the Manning ended up being a decent chunk of my purchase price, and if I'm being honest, probably an overpay, but I thought it was a very cool piece with huge swatches, a signature, and numbering to just 10 copies. I don't know what his future is with the Tigers but this is the kind of card I see myself keeping even if he moves on.

RBs Chris Evans and Hassan Haskins stole the show on the gridiron for this month, though defenders Rashan Gary and Chris Wormley also get in on the action with cool numbered cards.

11/1/24:

I spent $105 on this one and didn't come home with any up-for-grabs trade bait, but I believe I did score some nice items for trade and Christmas card packages. But better yet, I had a very nice day bringing home some cool hits for myself, much of which I think was in the $2-$5 range:

A jersey produced by Fleer's Ultra brand becomes relic #18 (and hit #19) for Mad dog. I'm the most excited about the Arrington/Henne dual because it's getting harder to find reasonably priced copies of cards for either that I need, and Henne's one of my favorite PC guys. Arrington gets his 56th hit and Henne keeps a secure grip on the top spot in the sport with his 145th(!).

I landed pairs of autos of the rest of the players. Butt's are from Panini's Absolute and XR, and the Michigan TE who was anything BUT booty cheeks in college jumps up to 13 hits. DT Mo Hurst started his career with Oakland as seen on signature cards from Luminance and Prizm, but he's since moved on to San Fran and then Cleveland. I now own seven hits of his, all signed like these. And lastly, DPJ finally made his hits collection debut with a couple Panini Chronicles autos that were parallels done in the Obsidian design. I believe the Purple is limited to 30 copies and the Orange is /25. While they remind me a bit of many recent Leaf designs, I'm relieved that they weren't made by that execrable manufacturer, and instead I've got two quality college uni cards of one of the most talented wideouts to pass through Ann Arbor recently.

12/6/24:

With the holiday approaching quickly in December I planned on throwing down more cash towards Christmas cards fodder and was quite successful. The $115 I spent was second only to February's $130 cost, and I think the results speak for themselves as you look over the various posts and Tweets mentioning some of the cool stuff I sent out.

Once again, no unassigned trade bait, but some very cool keepers:

My favorite vintage guy was around and I think $15 of my total went to him for this trio of super cool Freehan items. Those include a '65 Topps Hot-Iron Transfers, '70 Topps Super, and '73 Topps Candy Lids. I'm always on the lookout for new Freehan stuff because anything I don't have is something I'll treasure. That made these an exciting purchase for sure!

I believe everything else I got for myself from my favorite seller was from the cheaper boxes, so everything here was probably $1 at most, and more likely $0.25 or $0.50. Once again, the "90s inserts rule!" tag is in full effect, and you have to know I was loving it. Fun insert designs starring three of my favorite 90s heroes always make my day. By the way, I think Freehan and a Pacific card featuring in the same post is very apt since they each remain criminally underappreciated these days.

Well, that's the rest of 2024 in show recaps for me. I believe what's left for me to cover for last year at this point is COMC, eBay, Facebook, and something else really fun that I don't think I've teased yet. Once I can catch up on those I can get to some cool trades I've received this month, January and February's shows (I'm sure I won't have those all done by this Friday), and maybe more timely TCDb trade recaps.

You might even say I still have a whole lot to...show you! (Sorry.)

7/5/24 card show report: Bought on the 5th of July

I was able to convince myself to spend a bit putting together a post this evening because I knew there wasn't a ton I had to show off. Tonight you get to see my pickups from July's monthly card show.

This was the usual one in Taylor and I headed over the day after the Fourth to celebrate my freedom the American way: buying stuff! My spending sheet says I threw down $70 at this show and that's as detailed as I'm going to be able to be here, but that's ok: I have a few scans for y'all to enjoy:

We'll start as usual with the trade bait portion. I'm pretty sure the Sowers jersey was a buck because I tend to ignore relics like that most of the time. Sabathia is a 2020 Topps Tribute Green triple jersey and numbered /99, and I'd bet that came out of the $5 (or 5/$20) box. If you're surprised to see a Raptors jersey up for grabs, know that it's because I accidentally bought two, but did make sure to send one across the border. As for the football items, the Shaq Evans auto (2014 Rookies & Stars) and Cadillac Williams jersey (2010 Elite, #d /299) were likely also in the $1-$2 range.

Please claim 'em if you want 'em! I might be a bit pickier in what I want for the Sabathia but we'll see.

And now on to my keepers:

First we have a couple Maddux cards: an insert from my favorite hobby decade, plus a Donruss base from last year. A Prizm of current Tigers hurler Mize is followed up by a franchise great in Morris, also from '23 Donruss, though pictured/listed with Minnesota. A shiny 2002 Donruss Fan Club insert of Ripken finishes off the baseball content.

Moving on to the court (and a team that currently has a brighter season outlook than the football team, unfortunately), THJ got a nice little bump to his collection with a trio of colorful Panini inserts. Houston, who plays in Orlando and not his namesake city, joins Hardaway as one of four Wolverine cagers to appear in this post.

LeVert and Poole--definitely keeping up the shiny/colorful theme, round out the basketball group.

Meanwhile, on the gridiron, transfer RB Charbonnet has been relatively quiet in his sophomore campaign for former Michigan DC Mike Macdonald's Seahawks, but he does have three rushing scores and a TD catch in six games this season as fellow transfer tailback Kenneth Walker III's understudy. Collins was on pace to improve on an impressive 2023 season when he got hurt, and the Texas will surely miss him for the multiple weeks he'll be out, as they did today.

The next two cards form a nice pair as QBs involved with Michigan's most recent national titles. I thought the shiny insert (numbered /500) of Griese, the 1997-98 field general, looked awesome, and Harbaugh, the former UM QB and coach of last season's champs, is also seen on a very cool 90s design with his image and some of the text raised on the insert above. Everything that could fall into place and go right did so in 2023-24 but has since fallen apart this year due to a majority of the coaching staff and a ton of talent leaving. Michigan fans look to be in for some down seasons as new HC Sherrone Moore and his not-ready-for-prime-time assistants try to figure it out, but I'm still basking in that championship and can put up with it.

We'll end things tonight with a pair of talented defenders. Ojabo is an enticing talent if he can stay healthy for a Ravens team known for producing excellent defenses. Here you see him on a Canvas parallel of his '22 Donruss RC. It's hard to tell but it has a bit of a canvas texture to it which is a fun feature. Meanwhile, 2023 Cowboys first-rounder Mazi Smith is in his second season and looking to make a claim for more playing time. I scored my first autograph (or hit of any kind) of the DT in the form of a 2023 Leaf Exotic parallel called "Prismatic Zebra." Leaf gonna Leaf, I guess. It's a Michigan uni-ish card (boo airbrushing) and numbered 9/13, so it's not a bad start to his collection. That makes him member #253 of the football hits collection.

That takes care of this show and I have nothing else from July to post other than one eBay purchase and possibly some TCDb deals, though I'll be grouping those into other posts when I'm caught up on everything else. That means the next time I post you'll probably be getting a look at one of four trade packages that were delivered to me in August, most of which were absolute doozies.

Until then, I hate the Yankees and Michigan State and hope to see both lose one or more upcoming games.

5/31/24 card show report: May the June be with you

Hi, friends! I've had a pretty busy September largely thanks to work (with the calendar indicating it's time for the new semester) and a bunch of non-blogging card stuff. The latter has mainly included my monthly show, yet another fun Facebook pickup, and some marathon packaging and shipping sessions that should result in some happy traders!

Speaking of shows, I did get out to Taylor for the June event, though the first day of three-day show was actually the 31st of May. Whatever, I'm still counting it as June for posting purposes.

Anyway, I spent $95, though it's been more than three months so I don't remember what the breakdown was. I didn't come home with any unassigned trade bait so let's just take a quick look at my keepers:

The baseball stuff begins with a six-pack of future HOFer Miggy, and technically he appears on one more card you'll see below. The first five cards being Marlins issues made me curious what the team breakdown is of my Cabrera collection. It looks like that works out to 62 Florida cards and 431 with Detroit. Not bad!

A stray Cobb then gives way to two many Grandersons! I still don't have nearly enough of him, just 276, which is less than half my Verlander count and not even in the top 10 of my MLB PCs.

Check out that oddball Griffey! Inge and AJax are a couple other Tigers favorites I was happy to see here. Jobe just got called up to AAA and could be in the mix for a rotation spot next year. I captured Maddux on three of his four MLB clubs (only the Dodgers are left out here) over four cards. Magglio's another guy I'm happy to snag cards of if I see them, even if they're White Sox issues.

Cal continues his PC dominance with three newbies up here and two more you'll see in the next scan, and I'm easily swayed by shininess. Leaf's Passing Through Time subset was a fun feature of mid-2000s Leaf (as in the REAL Leaf, not the sketchy imposter these days) and I have Pudge's 2003 and 2005 versions, the latter of which you see above. You could hardly call Skubal "Up & Coming" at this point as he's got a great shot at the AL Cy Young this season. And Torkelson's thankfully looked a bit better since returning from the minors.

Mickey Cochrane is yet another Tiger who's often seen wearing another team's uniform on cards, but that's never stopped me. Griffey, Maddux, and Ripken all make encore appearances, as does Miggy on a Topps Opening Day insert. And the first of the day's three big pickups is a cool bat card of Alan Trammell, which is my seventh relic (out of 12 hits) of the HOF SS. I own the full 10-card set of Fleer's 2006 Greats of the Game Tigers Greats insert, and now I have my third of the nine Memorabilia versions (Bill Freehan and Kirk Gibson are the others). Hopefully I can track down the rest at some point.

The basketball side of things is sparse as usual but I did track down a pair of numbered Jamal Crawfords to go with my second signature of ex-Wolverine/Piston Isaiah Livers. The shininess plus Rated Rookie logo made it a must-get combo for me, and I think I paid just $5 (likely less with my discount) for the autograph, which is numbered /99.

We'll close things out tonight with a perfect nine-card page of football. Funchess's Stained Glass Prizm insert looks quite cool, even if it doesn't live up to the acetate versions from previous decades. Haskins' green Prizm parallel reminds me that he got picked up by his former coach Jim Harbaugh's Chargers. I was surprised to find the three-spot of Ojabo cards you see above, two of which definitely have a Ravens purple theme going on, though my favorite is naturally the Legacy card of him with the Wolverines. By the way, he picked up a sack in week 1 against KC. A shiny pair of Schoonmakers reminds me that I read the TE might get some playing time this weekend against the Saints. GOAT CB Woodson can be seen on a poorly-scanned Silver parallel from 2023 Panini Mosaic that makes it hard to tell it's got the usual Refractor-ish finish.

And last up is my final big pickup of the show: a 2022 Score Signatures autograph of stud Texans WR Nico Collins. I'd say I landed my fifth auto (nine hits total) of the breakout receiver at a good time--a few months before the start of the season--because he could be on his way to an even better campaign after accumulating almost 1300 yards on 80 receptions with 8 TDs last season. Last week at Indy he went scoreless but did pop for six catches for a whopping 117 yards! Go figure his team ditched their dead weight at QB for the one competent ex-Buckeye QB in the league.

And that's it for this show. I'm thinking my next post will be a look at my big June Facebook purchase, though I'll have to decide how much I want to photograph/scan/write about since it was a LOT. Either way, I hope to have that up soon.

5/3 and 5/11/24 show reports: May the shows be with you

This past May was another two-show month for me--technically three if you count the first day of the June Taylor show being on Friday, the 31st of the year's fifth month.

First, as usual, I headed east to Taylor and dropped $80 mostly on some nice trade bait for packages that have since been sent out. I did snag a small handful to offer up here:

I'm pretty sure both jerseys were a buck and I'm relatively short on baseball trade bait compared to football, so I thought the jerseys repping the Texas teams were worth it. Claim 'em in the comments if you want 'em!

And now here are my May Taylor keepers, largely from the cheapo boxes like I like them:

Nothing crazy, just some of my usual favorites. Cronenworth is a natural when it comes to blue inserts. I was happy to find a high-end Larkin base for what I believe was either a quarter or a time. Three new Maddux cards? Not too shabby! A pair of fellow HOF pitcher Jack Morris was a nice find. And lastly there's one of two Ripkens I dug out this time.

That '96 Score Ripken you see above is specially numbered "2131" and had been on my wantlist for quite a while so I was happy to come up with it. A trio of Pudge closes out the baseball stuff.

When it comes to collecting basketball-playing Kobes, Bufkin's definitely my guy, and the lone basketball entrant here. But I did find a cool trio of non-UCLA cards of transfer RB Zach Charbonnet, including my first relic of him, making him member #252 of the football collection.

Here's some great looking football inserts including one of recent alum Ronnie Bell along with cool QB chase cards of Elvis Grbac and Jim Harbaugh. The former gets the Dufex treatment while the latter feels more like a Donruss insert to me than Pinnacle, though it looks great either way.

And here's the last of the football including dumbass LT Taylor Lewan and talented d-man Kwity Paye on parallels, a couple Absolute Retail RCs, and two more of GOAT DB Charles Woodson.

That was it for Taylor but I wasn't done for the month just yet!

Eight days later I made the 90-ish minute drive west to Kalamazoo so I could meet up with some great hobby friends. I knew Jeff and Kevin (Sluggo) would be at that big show selling, plus Jason from TCDb and John planned on attending as well. I got there in the early afternoon and met up with the Sluggo's guys, catching up with them first. Jason appeared a little later, and then John. As always it was great to catch up with everyone.

Here's a pic John got of the two of us, and clearly only one of us knows where to look when taking a picture. Anyway, I spent a total of $100 at this show between four or five sellers, I believe. Kevin gave me another outstanding deal and I snagged some quality stuff from a few others I may look for again the next time I head that way.

Once again most of my purchases were destined for mailers, but my combined haul looked like this:

Give me new Gwynns any day, horizontal or vertical. Haskins was let go by the Titans but just joined the Chargers and reunited with coach Jim Harbaugh. Higdon was another successful college back, just not in the NFL. Ruiz is one of a few recent talented centers the program has produced. And I found what ended up being my fifth auto of DB David Long Jr. (not to be confused with the LB from WVU) who was released by the Giants and doesn't appear to have joined their practice squad or another team just yet.

I also found this nice little six pack of Michigan Hockey guys in a dime box, of all things, which was a surprise given the star power here. Beniers just got paid big time by the Kraken and Fantilli, as I've mentioned a couple times, won the Hobey Baker after an outstanding '22-'23 campaign.

Many thanks again to Jeff and Kevin plus Jason and John for another quality show meet-up, and I hope we get to do it again soon, though not in September as that conflicts with Michigan Football's big matchup with Texas.

In the meantime I'll continue to play catchup as I now get to move on to June with still a TON of great pickups to cover.

4/5/2024 show report: Christmas in April

Tonight's post is one of two I know of that I need to finish out the month of April. This one's a quick summary of the monthly Taylor show I got to on 4/5.

I spent a yearly low there of $45 (with the exception of the second show I got to in January to buy from Sluggo's Sports Cards at the event in Kalamazoo) but still came home with some cool stuff.

First up is some trade bait:

I love me some 90s inserts! The Akili Smith is spoken for but everything else is still up for grabs. McNown's Gridiron Kings card is actually the Canvas version as it's one of the first 500 printed (#0090/5000).

As for my keepers,

As far as I can remember it was mostly a dime/quarter box kind of day. I added a trio of cards featuring a couple of Detroit's recent top prospects, double-"Js" Jackson Jobe and Jace Jung, largely thanks to a prospect-heavy Donruss product. Next is a pair of classic Tigers, Kaline and Pesky, though of course the latter is much more famous for his eight seasons (and namesake Fenway Park feature) than the three with the Tigers. A couple Ginter Ripkens bump his total up as he nears the 1300-card mark in my collection. And former UM pitcher (on a Wolverine-ish airbrushed photo card) Steve Hajjar is the source of this post's title with a 2022 Leaf Holidays-related product and its Happy Holidays autograph set. That's my third signature of the left who's in Cleveland's system.

I also found a couple scans' worth of football stuff between the dime/quarter and dollar boxes. Bell would look better in a Blue parallel, of course, but Red works for his current team, the Niners, plus at least the card has a great college action photo. Transfer RB Charbonnet is one of three guys in these two scans (K Jake Moody and TE Luke Schoonmaker are the others) to pop up thanks to the Retail versions of their Panini Absolute RCs (you can tell as they lack serial numbers on the front as opposed to the hobby cards). The two shiny Funchess parallels are numbered /70 and /75 so I didn't mind throwing down a buck each. QB Grbac features on a pretty cool early Bowman Chrome insert. I may be slowly (and unintentionally) working on Ty Law's Mosaic rainbow, we'll see. And Paye would also benefit from an upgrade of Red to Blue on a Press Proof version of his Donruss RC.

The previously-mentioned Schoonmaker gets almost an entire scan to himself thanks to a rookie-related quartet, one of which is a Prizm Draft card with a great shot of him in action for the Wolverines. And joining my non-sport/misc. Wolverines category is broadcaster Rich Eisen. The New York native is a fan of the Jets (for some reason) but has done a great job over his career of lauding the Wolverines and celebrating the school where he earned his undergrad degree while being a co-editor for the sports section of the Michigan Daily.

I'll try to be back soonish with my last April post and maybe even post a bit more frequently so I can get caught up a bit more.