30 Day Challenge 7: A card I bought in person and the story behind it

Before I get into today's post, a thanks to Chris aka The Collector. Got the package today! I'll have a proper post up as soon as I can, but likely in a few days. Luckily, I have all 30 of these Challenge posts written and ready to go so I just had to add this message to the front of one.

================================================================================

This is a tough one. Most of my card collection I bought in person- the majority of my collection was purchased between 1996-2006, before I even had an Ebay account, so most of my cards were purchased in person. And the story is pretty much the same for all of them- I didn't have it, so I fixed that problem. That's pretty much the story of roughly half my collection, LOL. The other half being cards I received as gifts or in trade.

Choosing one that has some sort of meaning other than "I saw it, didn't have it, wanted it, could afford it" is a challenge, but again I will dip into my NBA pool and show a card I have shown before. The majority of my collection is NBA, so these posts have been trending more to the NBA, and this is a card that does have some added meaning to my NBA collection Wait, let me correct that. This is a card that has added meaning to my collection, but it's not an NBA card. Instead, I will show my first ABA card!

The last time I posted this card, back in 2015, I remembered it was important to me but I didn't remember why. Now I do...because, thankfully, I thought to write down why it was important in my paper listings. This was, in fact, my first ABA card! Interesting that it came from 1972-73 Topps, the 70s set I have the least of. Back when we used to have almost weekly shows and multiple shops, and I was building up my collection, I always gravitated towards 70s cards. I primarily learned the history of the sport by collecting vintage cards, from before I began collecting or in the case of the 70s cards, before I was born. But the 1972-73 set was always the toughest to find. To put it in perspective, I've completed the 1971-72 set, and also the 1975-76 through 1979-80 and 1981-82. I can't afford to complete 1980-81, and I'm working on- slowly- 1973-74 and 74-75. I have hopes that I can complete them some day. I can't afford to complete 1972-73 thanks to Dr. J.'s rookie card, but I'm not even close...it's a 264 card set, I have only 94 of them. In 21 years of collecting! And while it's true I was away from the NBA from 2006-12, since I came back I've added over 100 cards to my collection from 1974-75 and 1973-74 each in that time (granted most of the 1974-75 were a gift from Mark Hoyle, but I did find a dealer with a stash of them a year or two later)

I don't remember when I got this card...but I remember where. The Baseball Card Shoppe in Fishkill, NY, which is where I sourced my first 1970s cards from. It closed in either December 1996 or January 1997. But I must have gotten it earlier in the year because 1996 was a peak time for card shows, so for this to be my first it had to have been in either February or March- April at the latest. I began collecting the NBA in February, and the card show season started in March, which is how I'm figuring this. Unfortunately, I didn't begin to keep track of when I got any cards until right around Christmas 1998, so the exact date is lost. The fact that we went to the store every week eliminates any chance at guessing.

Who would have guessed this would be the longest post in the series so far?

Hot off the Scanner Tray Week 4- a rare non-weekend weekly roundup

For some reason I have not been keeping up with creating this post as I go along, and leaving it in draft like I usually do; I am starting it from scratch now and will post it when I am done. Now, normally I post it on the weekend but I am going to do something different this week. Saturday is out because it's my scale model club's annual show, which will take up most of my day. Even when the show is over my time will be spent processing the photos- I'm the official show photographer, a position I volunteered for. Our Show  I might have time to do a post afterword but I don't want to take the chance of missing a week. Sunday is out because that is my birthday, and I will have new cards to post about...as well as a major milestone for my collection- I'm going to hit 80,000 different NBA cards. I know I will, as all I told my mom and brother I want are cards (and a few comics I missed throughout the year) but even if they don't get me as many cards as I need, I have a stash waiting to be opened that will get me there for sure.  I'm at 79,968 as of right now.

I have been very busy this week scanning, and a lot of it was vintage. I have also been working on checklists and team cards- two topics I love- and I am the only collector I know who has ever listed a checklist as their #1 most wanted card. (1996-97 Topps #111, it was my most wanted from 1996 through 2005, when I finally hunted one down and, I believe, traded an autograph for it!)

2005-06 Topps Total #425. The two years of Total were the only mainstream sets ever to include mascots.

1972-73 Topps #216. This card almost led to it's very own post. For some reason this card evokes some faded memories for me, but I can't remember WHY this card was so important to me. It may have been my first card from this set, my first ABA card, or both. I simply don't remember and in the end decided to just post it here.

1974-75 Topps #83. I love team cards and wish they still did them.

1977-78 Topps #123. I did most of these in my collection in a one day span. More below. E. C. looks like he's dancing, to me.

1977-78 Topps #132, Darryl Dawkins' rookie card, and last card in the set. As is usual for cards of this era, the back of my card is not in great shape.

1990-91 Hoops #130. Father of defending NBA Rookie of the Year Andrew Wiggins.

1993 Action Packed Hall of Fame #35. One of my biggest regrets surrounds this set. When I was not collecting NBA I went into a card shop that had a bunch of these cards for sale. I didn't get any. The shop has since closed. I probably could have completed my set there in one day. I will always regret not getting those cards and some others the shop had.

1995 (1994) Action Packed Hall of Fame #9. (The set is referred to as 1995-even by itself- but is copy written 1994 and has features on the 1994 inductees into the HOF. Action Packed's second and final basketball release, this set has always been one of my favorites. Some have not aged well, as the foil Action Packed used sometimes turned nasty. When I was going through my collection to pull these for scanning, I missed one card, argh. This is one of the very, very few cards to show the Chicago Packers, a team that was in operation under that name for one year, 1961-62. They are currently the Washington Wizards.

1995-96 Metal Maximum Metal #3. Somehow this card got put into the box with the other cards already on the Database that I was putting off to do later, when I went through those two boxes to pull out the 1977-78 Topps cards I found this one in there. It's die cut.

1997-98 Finest Embossed #164. The embossing is hard to see, but this is also a die cut card. They were not easy to find. Scanned REALLY good for a Finest!

2001-02 Topps Heritage #92. This was my 30,000th Card, and the first Milestone card I ever wrote down, back in 2002. Lamar Odom has been in the news lately for ODing on various drugs, they aren't sure if he will survive.

I went through the aforementioned box of cards to be scanned later because the Database broke out the listing for the two versions of 1977-78 Topps. There is a version with gray backs and white backs. It was the only year Topps produced the cards like that, and the gray backs seem to be slightly more common.

The #103 of Billy Paultz is the only card I have both versions of. 

The Database reckons collections differently than I do. For me, if a card has more than one person featured, the Database keys it to however many people appear, I keep track of how many cards I have that depict more than one subject, (not always person, it can include teams, kinds of cars, whatever, where applicable.) Well, I found the box of the multi-subject cards and started working on them. This one features Elton Brand, in only his second year. 

2000-01 Topps #290. This purple border is not my favorite, and not easy to make the scan accurately match it, either! Karl Malone makes it into this post twice, look in the background on the Wiggins card.

 And, finally...one of the greatest names in professional basketball. 

1989-90 Hoops #104. Blab, from Germany, was one of the earliest European players to come to the NBA. As far as I know, he only got two cards, the other being in 1990-91 Skybox.

It's all basketball this week, as that is all I've worked on.