Plainville Card Show report and finding cards at the car show

On Saturday, I went to the Plainville card show in Connecticut, which is run by the same guys who run the Enfield show, that I visited in February. I had a great time there, and not much of a spoiler alert: I had a great time here, too! (I can't imagine not having a good time at a card show)

I actually took one picture inside the show, of the NASCAR dealer I mentioned last time.

I didn't buy any of those cards, but I did buy a lot from him. We had actually been talking via email and he had two people I was missing from my project of getting one of everyone who ever got one, and he brought them to the show for me. Of course, those were not all I walked away from his table with...

Zane Smith and Chase Cabre were the two he brought for me- Jesse Little (Chad's son) is somebody I needed as well, but I forgot to put on the list I sent him, which was actually just a screencap of my chart here on Cardboard History.

Just a couple of days before the trip (I think, actually, the night before) I updated my list of Sets Missing from my collection, which was my main focus before I moved over to my Names project, and I discovered that there were only two NASCAR sets missing from my collection: 2017 National Treasures and 2018 Panini Prime. Well...

Solved that problem pretty quickly. The Stenhouse from 2017 Absolute Memorabilia is technically a duplicate, and I knew that when buying it. The one I pulled had solid blue material, this is three color, and appears to come from the right sleeve. I will occasionally add a "duplicate" if the material is a different color. The Allmendinger is numbered to 20 and I since I didn't care which card I got from the set, I told him to just tell me which one was the cheapest. I could have chosen between this card and a dual memorabilia, SN99, no autograph, of Joey Logano and Brad Keselowski, or this one. And you can see which one I chose.

After moving on from the NASCAR dealer (who has more than just NASCAR, but that's all I got from him this time) I hit some other dealers.

This dealer was at Enfield but I didn't buy from him there- I remember the large price tags he used. (I took them out of the toploaders for the image). That's my first card of Bates-Diop, and my first from this year's Select and Donruss Optic. All three cards are SN. Only my second card from last year's Chronicles, I liked the design, you all know how I am with numbered parallels, and rookie year numbered parallel of Jayson Tatum, marked at $5? Oh yeah, you know I'm not going to be able to pass that by.

 The next table down, I did something I say I will never do, but I did anyway. Current season cards. I make it a habit to not buy current year cards because I've done it and gotten burned by later getting duplicates. However, I know that I'm not really chasing current cards as much. I got one pack of Donruss and the only Donruss Optic I have of this year's set came from this show. I have not been hunting cards since January. Five of the above cards are my first of those players. All of the cards, including the numbered cards, cost me a quarter.

The same dealer had more expensive stuff, and these came out of a dollar box. I took a chance on the Elton, but it's a duplicate. However, my original copy is white and blue materials, so I'm on the fence about counting this one as new or not. (I probably will)

 The next dealer I visited was all hockey, and I bought another 2018-19 card. What am I doing? This is an oversize card, and I know I'm unlikely to buy one of the tins that UD does. As of right now this is the only card I have of 2018-19 UD Series 2. I'd like to do a hobby box of both series but I keep spending the money on other stuff...like card shows.

 Some older Whalers that I know I paid a slight premium for being in Connecticut, and a Jarome Iginla on the Bruins card, which is my first of him with that team, I think. First time I had seen any of the 1990-91 Score Traded in person, so I bought them.

 I almost didn't recognize Erik Karlsson without the trademark goatee.

This is tied as my most expensive purchase, costing me a cool $20. SN 9 of 10, it's my first card ever from The Cup brand.

The next dealer I visited, was mostly baseball, but as I was walking by I saw they had a box of the 1974-75 Fleer Cloth stickers NBA set, a rarity. The first time I've ever seen one in person, in fact, ever. It was a little more than I wanted to spend, but when I was looking at their display case I spotted a small stack of 1948-49 Bowman, the first NBA set, although it actually predates the NBA. These aren't particularly rare cards- some are- but they are expensive. You can't expect to get any cards from this set for under $20, and I didn't- paying exactly that for this card, of Bob Kinney, the only card he ever got.

Unfortunately, the top is not straight. I think it may have been trimmed, but for what I'm willing to pay, I can't be a stickler for condition. (It may have just been a miscut, but the fact that it was in my price range means it had to have something wrong with it, it's not like the dealer was trying to pull a fast one on anybody). It presents nicely enough for me, and I don't regret it.

The next to last dealer I visited had all baseball in the case, but did have some older packs for a dollar. It was a mixture of various sports and some non-sports, but everything he had I had either already completed, or wasn't interested in. These two, however, I could use.

The final dealer I visited was a great one- I think, when I get back to this show, he will be who I visit first. He had a wide variety of stuff, and great prices. Everything below cost me $45.

 A numbered Cam Neely insert, from a set I didn't previously have. A numbered Shipichyov from a set I didn't have, two numbered Mats Zuccarellos, one from a set I didn't previously have. A patch from a multi-sport set, my first Summer League patch, and a numbered relic from last year's Spectra, a set I didn't have.

 Another card towards completing 2015-16 UD Game Jersey Series 1 (I'm up to 8 of them now), a Gerald Wilkins autograph from the way-more-challenging-than-logical 2005-06 All-Time Fan Favorites Autographs from Topps 1952 style, my first card of Paul Zipser, a numbered jersey card of Zach Randolph, my second movie-worn relic ever, an autograph from last year's Goodwin Champions, a numbered triple relic featuring Kevin Garnett, David Lee and Udonis Haslem, and a card of an auto racer from 1910!

 Here's a better view of the relic from Spider-Man : Homecoming

 An auto of Frank Williams, an auto of Olympian Paige Selinski from 2016 Goodwin Champions, an astronaut relic, another card from the same 1910 set, a numbered auto of Jimmy Vesey, and my first card of Alexandar Georgiev, backup goalie for the Rangers. This is actually from last year's SP Authentic update.

The Vesey has a clear panel, which is cool. There are also parallels with relic and patch pieces, with lower numbering, as well.

In total, I ended up adding 90 cards to my collection, and that's not counting what is in those packs, as I have not even opened them yet. A great day!

We had stopped at the card show on the way to the RTS Expo, the first model show of the season. This show is the successor of the MassCar show, which was held in the same place, by the same people, but is "not the same show". I was the official photographer for MassCar from 2006-10, but for health reasons and lack of reliable vehicle, I had to stop going. Well, I went back this year, as I detailed in the last post. What surprised me about the show (Beyond the fact that I actually won something!) was that I found cards in the vendor area, from two different vendors!

 The first vendor I shopped from had the NASCAR cards, and the second vendor had everything else. What a find it was! The two Hot Rods cards are actually from the Milton Bradley game. the Fleer Krazy Kars stickers are from the 1975 second series, which I didn't even know existed...but the real highlight is those Indy car cards- from 1960 Parkhurst/Hawes Wax, this is one of the rarer Indy car releases, and I didn't have a single one. When the dealer told me the asking price, I didn't even look at them- I just said that I would take them all. None of them are in great shape, and there's even a duplicate- but I don't care. I'm thrilled to add these to my collection...at $2 each. There's 7 of them. There were also two from a different car set, which I can't identify yet,  but I think may be from Parkhurst of the same era. I overpaid for the Hot Rods and Krazy Kars, and vastly overpaid for a model from the same dealer, but based on the deal I got for the Indy cards, I'm still thrilled.

1994 Power is a set that I don't have a lot of and most of the ones I do are in poor shape. I hope that these have not become bricks after having been sealed since 1994. Time will tell, I have not opened it yet.

The same dealer I got the NASCAR cards from also had this Richard Petty set. I got one of these in 1993, but have lost most of it. I only knew where the hauler was. The two large cars, and the two trading cards? The last time I saw them was probably 1993. I had to get this for nostalgia reasons. I have opened it up to get the two cards out- and they were glued to the chrome backing. Ugh. I love Racing Champions, but not sure what they were thinking there. Now that I've bought a new one, I'll probably find my original in storage next time I go digging there.

I have three photo albums on my website in relation to this trip:
Driving through Connecticut and Massachusetts
RTS Expo Model Show
Stafford Springs, Connecticut
On the way home, my mom surprised me with a trip to Stafford Springs Motor Speedway. I also walked around the town.

Overall, I took more than 800 photos from the trip, and cleared 5000 taken in 2019...already. I also had 10 packages of cards waiting for me when I get home, which I will cover next post...thanks for reading!

PS. Sorry for the crappy pictures of the cards. The lighting in the hotel was not great. Will be scanning them soon, and posting them to a list on the Trading Card Database. I'll share the list in a future post.