Hooray For Brooklyn!

Today was the day that I cashed in on my free pass that I won from the blog, Vin Scully is my Homeboy.  The free pass was admission to the SoCal Baseball Expo in Anaheim.  The show was going to have some baseball card vendors so, I put my game face on and made the journey to Orange County.

This was a pretty far drive for me and the trip took me a little over an hour to arrive at the Anaheim Marriot. I was in search of some baseball card card finds and was in a positive mood about this show.  It helped that I won a free ticket.  Otherwise, I may have not attended at all and missed out on some vintage finds.

The few card shows that I have been to in SoCal, have had an abundance of vintage dealers.  A card show in Glendale that I have been to a couple of times had mostly vintage tables.  The show I regularly attend in City of Industry may be split among newer product and vintage cards.

This show in Anaheim, was mainly vintage tables.  Some newer stuff that skewed towards the high end, which is not my cup of tea.  I was happy to see some vintage cards for sale, I just wish this show had more variety.  Maybe some more newer singles in a dime box or low end hits in a $2 dollar bin.

I saw some quarter boxes which were nice.  The dollar boxes were nice to dig through.  I would have spent an extra hour at this show if I found one dime box.

The SoCal Baseball Expo had around 25 vendors selling baseball cards, memorabilia, and autographs.  I saw one of the vintage dealers that I was familiar with from the Glendale shows was at this Anaheim show as well.

I spotted his table and knew it was time to work on one of my goals for this show.  My top two goals were to boast my vintage Dodger collection as well as add to my Hall of Fame collection.

I finally pulled the trigger on this card.  The colors on this 1955 Topps Johnny Podres is eye catching.  I have been wanting this card for awhile.  It is now in my collection!

1955 was a huge year for Dodger fans.  The Brooklyn Dodgers finally beat the Yanks to win there first World Series in 1955.  Podres was the series MVP and pitched a shut out in Game 7 to clinch the victory for Brooklyn.

Beating the Yankees in a Game 7 is always sweet, it was even tougher for Podres because it was at the old Yankee Stadium.  Over 60,000 Yankee fans were in attendance and the crowd was probably pretty loud and obnoxious.  These were the days when Yankee fans actually showed up to playoff games.

Podres shut the Yanks down and Brooklyn became the champions.  Finally they over came, the Yankees dominance and claim 1955 as the Dodger's year.

This card will always have a special place in my collection.

I have been searching for a Bowman card of a Brooklyn Dodger, for a fair price for sometime now.  The Carl Furillo card spoke to me at the card show.  This card had to be mine.

The painted look of vintage Bowman cards are spectacular.  The color holds up on this 1952 card and the corners are decent.  I wasn't expecting to buy anything this nice and I am glad that I found this lurking within a mass of vintage boxes to pick through.  I chose the right box to search because I heard Furillo's voice.

I enjoyed my time at this show.  I was really able to focus and spend my money only on singles.  I was able to pick up some cards for the bloggers that won my little contest.  I also purchased more vintage that i will show in another post.

Roberto from Vin Scully is my Homeboy was at the show and got a sweet Hubie Brooks signature.  I was glad to see a familiar face and someone to chat with for a bit.  It was also nice to thank him in person,for running the contest that got me in the show.

Luck and fate were at play.  The Podres and Furllio were meant for my collection.

If any SoCal bloggers are attending this show on Saturday or Sunday and have any questions please comment or email me.  I was able to scope the place out and do some laps around the tables.