a brief tale of redemption

 Back on February 4th, I purchased a box of 2024-25 Credentials from my local hobby shop. Each box promised one autograph but mine was in the form of a redemption. I entered the number into the Upper Deck website and waited for the card to arrive. Yesterday, it did. 

This is only my second hockey redemption since I began collecting the sport actively in January 2017. This is my 9th card of Gauthier but first autograph. It is only my 2nd Anaheim Ducks autograph also. 

Since I mostly do lower-end cards it's pretty rare for me to pull a redemption or an autograph in hockey. Looking at my collection records, it appears that I hadn't pulled a hockey autograph since March 2024, almost two years. 

While I am a set collector at heart and a fan of parallels (which this one is, by the way) it's still a nice feeling to pull something special for your collection. 

Card Show Report: Fishkill, NY November 8th, 2025

 I had planned to go to a model car show in Long Island, NY on November 8th, but my chronic health problems decided to act up and I wasn't quite up for the 2+ hour ride. However, I was up for a card show in the much closer Fishkill, NY, and I'm very glad I went! It was a special Veterans Fundraiser card show, run by the same people that do the monthly show but in a larger location and with a $3 entry fee that went straight to the local VA Hospital. 

First, I took two photos at the show of a dealer display.

But now we get to the good part...what I brought home. I did exceptionally well! The show was roughly 50% baseball, with basketball and football making up the other 45%, and Pokemon 5%. There was almost no hockey and I believe there were only 7 NASCAR cards in the entire show...which I got all of. 

Everything you see in this photo cost me $130. When I say I did exceptionally well I wasn't exaggerating. Most of my purchases came from the one dealer with a dime box, which had a lot of modern NBA stuff. 

Almost everything here in this photo came from that one dealer. The only things that didn't were the baseball pack - which you got free when you paid the $3 entry fee, and the Haunted Hoops pack I shamed a dealer into giving me just by hemming and hawing when he quoted $15 and then changed his mind to $20 for a handful of cards, LOL. 

I generally do not buy brand new stuff as singles but it's well known that I love parallels. I actually bought these even knowing I had a Fanatics exclusive blaster on the way. Luckily no duplicates. The Bam Adebayo became my 101,000th unique NBA card. It's unfortunate it is my least favorite team but oh well, I have nothing against Bam himself. 

Both of these photos show alternate jerseys or in the case of the bottom left two and bottom right one, parallels. The top 4 right cards in photo #2 are people I was missing from my collection. Unfortunately the Markieff Morris (middle top row, name obscured) and Jordan Clarkson cards both turned out to be duplicates. When you have as many cards as I do, it's not always easy to remember. Oh well, someday I'll get finished scanning, sort my cards and try and trade the duplicates away. 

 My second biggest purchase of the day was this lot of Prizm parallels, mostly from 2023-24 Select but a few other sets as well. 

I had gone through the box and noted a base version of that Marcus Sasser card but passed by it as I'm not a huge fan of the base Prizm/Chrome cards. I was thinking about going back and getting it anyway because it shows a jersey I didn't have represented in my collection, but right at the end of the box I found this Prizm parallel. Problem solved! 

More alternate jerseys from the Prizm grouping, and in the case of the Jerome Robinson, that's actually my very first card from 2018-19 Certified. It's also a parallel, but I wasn't actually aware of that when I got it. I did know it was a set that was not represented in my collection. 

I don't normally buy unlicensed cards and I don't normally spend this much on a single card but this one spoke to me and I had to have it. It's the most I spent on any single card at the show. 

The Alvin Jones is a very rare card, in fact I'd never seen the design before. Musa is not a great person (got essentially kicked out of the NBA for choking his girlfriend) but a cheap, rare Nets card from a set I didn't have in my collection is a guaranteed buy every time. Believe it or not, that's actually a base card from the Panini Dominion set. 

My last purchase of the day was this batch of 1972-73 Topps. That is the least well represented 1970s set in my collection, and I don't even know the last time I was able to add 10 cards in a single day. Wait! I can check that since I have my collection fully on Excel. OK, it wasn't all that long ago, January 2018. I also did it in 2017. Before that however the last time was 2005. Of the 264 card set I have only 104 of them. I don't think I'll ever complete it as I'm not willing to spend the price required for a Dr. J. rookie card, but it's still good to add a bunch of them. I was able to get on to the Trading Card Database while at the show and access my wantlist on there. Luckily, I hadn't added any cards to this set since that day in 2018, so it was still accurate. I had stopped keeping track of my collection on there but I decided to go back to it, determining while I was checking these cards that it really is the easiest way to check what I have or don't have while I am away from home. So, I have roughly three years worth of additions, including the trips to the National and FanaticsFest in 2024, to add. That won't take that long as I've not been getting as many cards as I once did. 

The $5 bill in the top left was given to me in change by one of the dealers, and as he handed it back to me I saw it was a Star note- something I save when I come across them. My currency collection is VERY neglected, but finding an addition in the wild is fun. 

However, my favorite addition of the day wasn't a card at all. 

The show did door prizes every hour, and I was going through the dime box dealer's boxes when they were calling numbers. I had my tickets out but kept going through cards as they were calling them. I didn't pay that much attention since my number wasn't called although I did clap for the winners. However, they DID call my brother's number, and he won this signed puck! It wasn't a situation where you could pick, either, so the fact that they gave him a prize from one of my main sports is just a happy coincidence! Other prizes before that were baseball and football stuff, so we both lucked out. Needless to say, I was shocked and thrilled when he came over and showed me that he won! It is the first signed puck in my collection!  

Collecting by Opportunity

I consider myself a collector by opportunity. I have so many sets I'm working on, so many concepts I'm working on, that there is ALWAYS something to collect. So I like to sort by lowest price and pick off as many cards as I can before I run out of money.  

                                             

This card is from 1948-49 Bowman, and is the only card Howie Dallmar ever got. 

From 1953-54 Parkhurst, my 3rd oldest hockey card.

1994-95 Service Line, an NBA set I didn't know existed. The fact that it was only available in Europe is no excuse! 

A standalone inset from 1995 Upper Deck

I've always rooted for Bobby Dotter...mostly because he was car #08. So when I saw this autograph I had to get it.

One of the earliest relic cards ever made. This single card insert is from 1996 Pinnacle. 

Searching by SN -> lowest price is one of my favorite things to do so you will see a lot of them in this post, and they will appear in chronological order of release. 

Autographs are usually more expensive so I don't get as many of them but I still will when I can. 

This is a parallel of an insert, an Emerald Proof, with green foil. Each driver in the insert got three cards, and you could fit them together to make a larger image. 

I have no idea where this card came from.

The other side has a tire from Harvick.

I probably could have put the eTopps cards in the promo thread.

Red flag! 

My favorite autograph insert ever. I would really love to complete this set of any other, but I don't think it will ever happen. I lack some of the biggest names, like Jeff Gordon and Tony Stewart, still. I pulled the Dale Jr. from this set from a single pack purchase, still my favorite pull ever. 

I had no idea this was going to look so cool when I got it. The relic piece appeared black on COMC, but it's actually shiny chrome. 

A fairly generic insert card, which I got because it's one of only 2 Chicago Stags cards ever released. 

Raced used, SN and shows the car...doesn't get much better than that. 

When I was searching SN by lowest price, this card of Damir Markota came up, and since I knew he was somebody missing from my collection, it was an easy choice to add this one to my account. 

I really like how the background for the material is black, which shows off the holes in the jersey better. Believe it or not but this is a base card from this set.

I liked this card so much I bought two copies! 

Loved the Platinum parallels in Press Pass. 

It's hard to see but this card is numbered to 25 copies. Look on his left sleeve.

I really like the 2013-14 Contenders set.

I now have two of the many parallels of this card. I guess I'm building a rainbow. Being more than happy to collect cards of prospects that didn't "make it" opens up some nice cards. 

Green Flag prizm parallel, this is both race used and numbered. 

I wish Compendium was actually available to buy in packs.

Not the greatest photo, but a 29 cent addition to my set build.

I am working on this set slowly but surely. 

This is a Fast Break parallel. 

This is a Fast Break Parallel  of the Retro Series insert. It's kind of jarring to see this technology used on a Buffalo Braves card, but that's actually what drew me to it in the first place.

When I got this card, I thought it was my first of him, but I was mistaken. 

This card, besides being SN 01/25, holds a little more meaning than that. When I began collecting hockey officially, it was the end of the 2016-17 season. 2017-18 was my first full season, and the very first card I pulled out of the first pack of my first season was the base version of this card. 

I don't remember how much I paid for this but knowing me it wasn't much. Nice patch. 

Green parallel and SN5, and a car photo. Win all around!

Two big pieces of sheet metal here. 

My only card of him.

Erik Jones must not be too popular because his relics are not too expensive.

Never been a huge fan of Wally's but a great shot of the 1997 car there. 

Super sparkly, the scan doesn't do it justice.

My love of the UD Exclusives parallel is well known. I'll get any that I can afford.

Action Packed should be embossed...not just a photo with a filter run over it. 

I was inspired to add a card of her to my collection after hearing how she was helping to free a man wrongly convicted for murder.

My only hat headband relic

When I first got into the sport Rusty was a favorite of mine and I am glad to add this autograph to my collection.

and finally my first card of Cody Ware.