Friday haul at the ol’ card shop

Alright, I’ve got enough cards put away that I can honestly say I deserve to look at what I bought this week at my shop.  I’ll have a 1998 Collector’s Choice Series Two box break up in the next week or so, but for now all of the commons and uninteresting cards have been put away.

Before I get to the goods, I’ll show you what wasn’t in the Topps bag.

Yes, those are all cards from 2009 Allen & Ginter and no, I didn’t buy any.  While there were packs and boxes of the stuff everywhere, I passed right over it.  I’m not as crazy about this product as many others are.  It seems the entire baseball card blogosphere has gone mad over this set – and I don’t really see why.

Don’t get me wrong, I’ve picked up many hobby and retail packs of A&G in years past, but 2009’s checklist seems particularly absurd.  Between autographs of little kids who play guitar, relics from a mascot, and the base cards of guys who play with yo-yos, it seems that Topps has made the gimmick acceptable.  I’ve even seen cards of the Pi symbol in box breaks!  That’s silly.

Now, I’ll no doubt pick up some packs when they’re available in retail form because the randomly inserted cards of actual baseball players are phenomenal looking.  Maybe it’s just that I’m unable to wrap my head around the fact that Allen & Ginter isn’t necessarily a baseball card set so much as it’s a hodgepodge of random historical figures and places in addition to the occasional baseball player, but for now I’m gonna spend my money on other things.

(Quick side note: Thanks to Cardboard Junkie, Sharpe Since 92, and Cardboard Icons – I pulled these pictures from your sites.  I should’ve asked, but if you’d like me to take down your scans let me know and I’d be happy to oblige.)

I also didn’t begin my quest of hand collating a set of ‘09 Topps, but I verified that my shop sells both hobby and retail boxes of each series along with jumbo packs of both as well ($15 for series one HTA, $10 for series two).

By now the suspense must be killing you, so here’s what I picked up, starting with the cheap stuff…

2007 Goudey retail, $1 ea:

I’m sure I’ll eventually try to put together an entire set of this stuff, and these three packs will put me over the halfway point.  I saw an ‘07 Goudey retail box sitting on the shelf, so perhaps that’ll be my next “big” purchase.

And the big ticket item – relatively speaking – a hobby box of 2007 UD Masterpieces:

Fancy, huh?  I’m going to build this set before ‘09 Topps, which I’ll save for closer to when Joseph III is born.  I’ll spend many a late night diaper changing, pack busting, and collating.  For $57 I get three relics (which I still love like it’s 1999), an on-card autograph, and a good chunk of the complete set.  Sure, it may have cost $10 more than online retailers are offering, but after factoring in the seven dollars or so I would’ve spent on shipping and the “built in” tax it seemed like a fair deal.  They didn’t have retail boxes in stock, so that’ll have to be ordered to cheaply put together the entire set, but I’ll save that until this beauty has been busted.

Total spent: $58, and all on Upper Deck products put in to a Topps bag.

“Wait a second,” you’re saying.  ”Your total should’ve been $60!”  You’re correct, that’s what I should have spent, but the shop owner turned the packs of Goudey in to a three-for-one deal.  Little things like that will keep me coming back for many Fridays to come.

**UPDATE**

I mentioned that I’d borrowed a few images from other blogs without asking for permission.  Though I apologized and gave what I thought was a reasonable shout out, one of the site owners took note of what I’d done – Dayf, at Cardboard Junkie – and demanded that I post three more images from his site.  In an effort to escape possible further legal action, the following are three more cards I did NOT purchase at the card shop, courtesy of Dayf’s money, not mine:

Lesson learned.