Baseball Card Show Report - Valley Forge

1974 Johnny Pro Phillies #24

I made good on one of my campaign promises from way back in February, and on Sunday Doug and I attended the baseball card show (the "Philly Show") held at the Valley Forge Resort and Casino.  It was Doug's first proper baseball card show and he was a little overwhelmed once he saw the size of the convention room floor and the number of dealers selling their wares.

Having my five-year-old son in tow was great for a few reasons.  First and foremost, I loved showing Doug the ropes of a proper baseball card show - from preparing my lists the night before, to making sure I had a good "crossing out" pen ready to go, to coming up with a navigation plan once we hit the convention floor.  A secondary benefit was that I had to be focused in my pursuit.  Doug is a patient kid, but he's not patient enough to stand by and watch me wade through an 800-count box of marked down Phillies cards for an hour.  My collecting goals for the show were to cross some cards off my 1971 Topps list and to track down some cool, old Phillies cards.

We immediately found a bargain bin of 1971 Topps high numbers, and he helped me find several cards from my list.  In total, I picked up nine stars and high numbers needed for my slowly progressing 1971 Topps set.  The cards are in decent shape, and I paid $20 for the lot.  I was very pleased with the price given that the Yaz card alone could have set me back that much.  Here's what I crossed off my list (with Doug's help):

#26 Bert Blyleven, #530 Carl Yastrzemski, #647 Juan Pizarro, #667 Pete Ward, #675 Dave Boswell, #679 Don O'Riley, #689 Frank Baker, #710 Sonny Siebert and #729 Dick Billings

After that, the goal was to look for "old" or "weird" Phillies cards and I think we did pretty well in our quest:

The Valley Forge Haul

1949 MP and Co. R302-2 #109 Del Ennis
1961 Topps Stamps Frank Herrera
1962 Topps Baseball Bucks Roy Sievers
1964 Topps Coins #113 and #144 Tony Taylor
1964 Topps Giants #36 Johnny Callison
1971 Topps Coins #31 Don Money, #55 Tony Taylor, #79 Deron Johnson and #107 Tim McCarver
1974 Johnny Pro Phillies #24 Bill Robinson
1983 Phillies Postcards Great Moments and Great Players - 28-card set and binder
1983 Star Mike Schmidt - 15-card set
2012 Phillies Fan Appreciation Day Postcards - 9-card set

I'll need to do an upcoming post on the Ennis card, as it's clearly not Ennis featured on the front of the card.  It's actually Giants great Carl Hubbell, and the set's manufacturers simply recycled photos from its 1943 set for its 1949 issue.  And I'm thrilled to finally have the complete Phillies Postcard sets from 1983 in my collection.  The binder was an added bonus.

Several dealers were very impressed with how patient Doug waited by my side as I thumbed through boxes of Phillies cards for sale.  He's truly a good kid, and I was very happy when I found a dealer selling Lego Star Wars mini-figures.  Doug came away with Jango Fett and Mace Windu figures.  He also scored a few packs of Star Wars cards for his fledgling collection.  And special thanks goes to the dealer who threw in the free Luke Skywalker card for Doug's collection from the original 1977 Topps Star Wars set.

After two hours, including a snack break, we decided the show was a success and we should head out for lunch.  (On the way out, we bumped into former Phillies and Pirates pitcher Grant Jackson on his way in for his signing session.)  Overall, it was a great show and a nice introduction for Doug into the wonderful world of collecting.  He's already asked if we can go to the next show scheduled for early December and I told him he wouldn't need to twist my arm.