{"id":5973,"date":"2018-08-06T09:00:11","date_gmt":"2018-08-06T09:00:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mojobro.com\/bigleaguecards\/2018\/08\/06\/inside-the-pack-2018-national-in-review\/"},"modified":"2018-08-06T09:00:11","modified_gmt":"2018-08-06T09:00:11","slug":"inside-the-pack-2018-national-in-review","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mojobro.com\/bigleaguecards\/inside-the-pack-2018-national-in-review\/","title":{"rendered":"Inside the Pack: 2018 National in Review"},"content":{"rendered":"

The 39th National Sports Collectors Convention is in the books, and boy, was it a week to remember! The truth is, I\u2019ve come to learn that any National is one to remember, but I think this one will go down in history for several reasons.<\/p>\n

Starting off on a personal note: as I noted in a previous entry, this was just my 2nd National. While the crowds seemed lighter to me and a few other dealers, the sales were still happening. I was set up with a few friends of mine who own a shop, Trading Card Co-Op, in Raleigh, NC. I haven\u2019t seen them in at least two years, so it was great to reconnect with them.<\/p>\n

In fact, reconnecting (or just connecting in the first place) was one of my favorite parts of this year\u2019s show. In addition to the Trading Card Co-Op folks, I caught up with a few other collectors, dealers, and customers who I don\u2019t get to see very often. I also met some new collectors who I forged connections with, particularly those in the OBC online community. OBC is dedicated to collectors who collect \u201cthe way it should be\u201d \u2014 putting together sets (many times oddball sets) in whatever condition possible. Over the years I have learned tons from OBC members, and have found them to be truly some of the nicest people in the hobby. I do what I can to cater to them as a dealer.<\/p>\n

Another cool personal experience was meeting a buyer I have been dealing with for about 4 years online. I met this buyer through an Ebay transaction, and since then we have been doing several deals a year through email, but we\u2019d never met in person. This year\u2019s National gave us the opportunity to meet and put a face to the name.<\/p>\n

Now onto the rest of the National itself. The big news was the 1955 Bowman wax pack that was opened at the breakers\u2019 pavilion. That pack yielded a Mickey Mantle which was later given a grade of 9 by PSA. The break was shown live on the convention center televisions and the screams from the breakers could be heard throughout the whole building. The pull was such a big deal that it made national news. Friends and family were sending me links to the article, as if I wasn\u2019t there in person when the card got pulled!<\/p>\n

The other big news was the sting operation that Cleveland police used to catch a dealer who was selling fake autographs. There was some buzz about it at the show among dealers and buyers, and there were a few news articles about this too. However, since the news articles don\u2019t name the dealer who was nabbed, I won\u2019t mention the name here either. In any event, it\u2019s good to see the authorities cracking down on guys who could bring down the industry.<\/p>\n

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This game used Jackie Robinson bat was one of my favorite items on the floor.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

In terms of \u201ceye candy,\u201d there\u2019s nowhere better than the National. I saw more Babe Ruth cards in one vendor\u2019s case than I had seen in my whole life up to that point. Heritage Auctions had some awesome Jackie Robinson items, including a game used bat. Some of the other eye candy highlights for me were a 1953 Topps Mickey Mantle PSA 10 (I was selling a PSA 1 at my booth…this one was much nicer!) and a 1969 Topps Johnny Bench PSA 10, which I had never seen. At the SGC booth, I got to see the company\u2019s new grading labels, along with an SGC 4 T206 Honus Wagner and an SGC 9 1952 Topps Mantle. I also had the privilege of attending the Beckett VIP Party, where I got to see (and hold!) the Bowman Chrome Shohei Ohtani superfractor autograph graded BGS 9.5. It\u2019s expected to fetch 6 figures at an upcoming auction.<\/p>\n

All in all, it was a fantastic week. I can\u2019t wait until my next time at the National!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The 39th National Sports Collectors Convention is in the books, and boy, was it a week to remember! The truth is, I\u2019ve come to learn that any National is one to remember, but I think this one will go down in history for several reasons. Starting off on a personal note: as I noted in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":5974,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[],"amp_validity":null,"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mojobro.com\/bigleaguecards\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5973"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mojobro.com\/bigleaguecards\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mojobro.com\/bigleaguecards\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mojobro.com\/bigleaguecards\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mojobro.com\/bigleaguecards\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5973"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mojobro.com\/bigleaguecards\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5973\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mojobro.com\/bigleaguecards\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5974"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mojobro.com\/bigleaguecards\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5973"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mojobro.com\/bigleaguecards\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5973"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mojobro.com\/bigleaguecards\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5973"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}