LCS Pickup - Old and New

 This weekend my brother and I skipped a card show and hit up some local shops instead. While he was shopping for shiny new stuff I found a few needs for sets I'm trying to make progress on.  One of those is the 70th patch card insert set. I'm not sure why I'm smitten with these, but they are just pretty cool looking and its a fun little set to track down. 

In all, I managed to find 8 more cards including this Chipper Jones.  

I also added these two old timers.  The Stargell is only my third card from the update series.  So far I've acquired only 27 of the 70 cards in this set. Slowly making progress, but I'm also trying to be very careful not to over pay on this.  I'm averaging close to $2.50 for each card.

Of course there are parallels. Though not numbered. this blue Gibson was found in the same box which I gladly added to my set.  This joins a numbered Ernie Banks (/299) which occupies a space in the box.

I haven't posted much vintage on this blog despite my stated preference for old cardboard. That's probably because most of it has yet to be dug out from the depths of the closet. At least I can show off this weekend's acquisitions. So it's on to the old stuff!

First up is a 1965 Morgan rookie.  It is creased on the Morgan side, and off centered, but the price was right ($20), so I happily added this to my '65 set.  If I could track down a Carlton life would be good.

Then I added to my 1969 set build with this very nice (slightly off centered) McCovey. 

Finally to wrap things up is this very clean, well centered Bob Gibson. I've always thought the '69 set was a rather boring design, but I sure don't mind adding cards like this. The card backs for both the McCovey and Gibson are very clean too.  I passed on an Aaron as there was residue (likely from the gum or wax wrapper) smeared on the front of the card.  Which is too bad, because if the stain had been on the back I would have taken that home too.

In the past couple weeks, I've explored 3 new-to-me card shops around town.  It's nice to have a few choices to shop around which means the hobby is thriving.  The only down side I've noticed is the lack of vintage cards at most of these shops.  In one case I was told the shop had an arrangement with a buyer for all of their vintage cards, so they never hit the sales floor.  In another case I was told vintage doesn't sell as well, because parents bring their kids to the shop and they want the new product.

I guess that means more card shows are in my future, which I certainly don't mind.