Philly Baseball Card Show Report - Focus on 1965 Topps Set

Doug and I attended the Philly Show this past weekend, or the Philadelphia Sports Collectors Show, as it's officially known, held once again in the Valley Forge Casino Resort in King of Prussia.  Having been somewhat overwhelmed by the Saturday crowd when we attended the show in December, we decided to mix it up a little and go on a Sunday.  It was the right call.

After a smooth drive with no traffic, we arrived at the show right after the doors had opened at 9am and walked in with a few other families.  There were no lines and the crowd was fairly thin for the first few hours of the show, allowing us to actually browse tables and talk with some of the dealers.  I know the dealers obviously prefer a larger crowd, but I felt I probably spent more since I never felt rushed and I spent more time looking through binders and studying display cases than I usually would.  The autograph guests for the day were all Eagles players, and most of them weren't set to arrive until after lunch.  It seemed the general vibe of the show for those early Sunday hours was take your time, find stuff you like, purchase, repeat.

While Doug set out to acquire a few cool J.T. Realmuto cards (mission accomplished - see above) I had my focus on acquiring as many of the remaining 114 cards needed for our 1965 Topps set as possible.  After an unexpected detour where I added four cards to my slowly progressing 1934-36 Diamond Stars set, I started looking for dealers with 1965 Topps commons binders.  My search netted 102 cards from primarily three dealers - America's Pastime, Uncle Dick's (again) and Sports Cards Plus.  I'll continue to chronicle each card acquired for our set over on my 1965 Topps blog.

Funds depleted, dents made to our want lists, we left the show early and were home by lunch.  Doug's new Realmuto treasures along with a few other pick-ups are already proudly displayed in his room, while I have another huge stack of cards to checklist and sort and I'm thrilled to know a 1965 Topps complete set is well within reach.  Just need to track down reasonably priced Mantle and Koufax cards . . .

Memory Lane

Valley Forge 1 - September 2010 - Thinking of my Dad
Valley Forge 2 - October 2012 - Doug's first baseball card show
Valley Forge 3 - September 2014 - Meeting Darren Daulton
Oaks 1 - October 2015 - Meeting Pete Rose and Steve Carlton
Valley Forge 4 - September 2016 - Phillies acquisitions and 4 Phillies Legends
Valley Forge 5 - December 2016 - Meeting Don Money
Valley Forge 6 - September 2017 - Doug's big day
Valley Forge 7 - December 2017 - Ben's first baseball card show with Mike Schmidt and Rhys Hoskins!
Oaks 2 - December 2018 - Meeting Matt Stairs and Cole Hamels
Valley Forge 8 - March 2019 - 5 Phillies Autographs and Vintage Phillies Additions
Valley Forge 9 - September 2019 - Closing in on 1971 Topps set and Andrew McCutchen
Valley Forge 10 - December 2019 - Finishing 1971 Topps set, Starting 1965 Topps set, adding key autographs from Ryan Howard and Brad Lidge
Valley Forge 11 - February 2020 - More 1965 Topps cards, Jimmy Rollins, Mike Lieberthal and Jim Kaat

Valley Forge 12 - December 2021 - Huge haul of 1965 Topps, Jim Thome

Valley Forge 13 - March 2022 - Easy like Sunday morning, close to completing 1965 Topps