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08-31-2009, 04:55 AM #1
Thanks for the Memories - Contest Entry
Thanks for the Memories
by Jesse Reynoso
There is one person I have to thank for bringing me back into the hobby is my godfather. He’s also my uncle that took care of me when my parents were at work during the day. When I was 4 years old, my godparents moved to San Diego. I only saw him twice a year but he would call me every night before I went to bed. During the early 90s, my uncle came back to Los Angeles for a weekend. He surprised me with a ticket to the Anaheim National Convention. This was the first time I was exposed to the card hobby. There was a batting cage, where you were allowed to pick how fast the pitch would come out of the machine. I bet with my uncle that he couldn’t hit a 95mph fastball from Randy Johnson. After 5 swings, he foul tipped only 2 of them and I won the bet. I was allowed to pick any card that I wanted. My selection:
Ken Griffey Jr. was my favorite baseball player growing up. He was my hero and I wanted to be just like him when I got older. The Ken Griffey card isn’t worth much anymore but I will always cherish it because it was the first card I ever owned.
From that day on, that is when my collection began. My dad wanted me to do great in school so he promised me a trip to the card shop every time I brought home an A or B. The better the grade, the more packs I would be able to buy. There was a point where the owner of the shop remembered my brother and me. Every time we came in, he would had us some free cards or raffle tickets.
I would bring my binder full of sports cards to school every day and a few of my friends would bring theirs so we could trade. We did this for about 2 weeks and the teachers took notice of it. They made a rule the following week saying that we weren’t allowed to bring cards to school anymore. It was a shame that I wasn’t able to add new cards to my collection anymore.
When Pokemon and Yugioh cards came out, I stopped buying sports cards and focused on those instead. I was at the card shop every week buying packs and setting up decks to battle my neighbors. In 7th grade, I brought all of my yugioh cards to school and they were stolen by someone. He denied it the whole day and I lost my whole collection of Yugioh. I went back to just collecting sports cards again.
My birthday is in April and luckily for me there was a card show at Hollywood Park Casino every April. My dad would give me a $150 limit to spend on any cards that I wanted. I always bought a hobby box to rip open later that night. One of my favorite cards that I pulled was Alex Rodriguez.
I cherished it every day because he was a player I looked up to and the face of baseball during that time. He had the biggest contract in baseball history. Well now that he confessed to using steroids and he’s on my most hated team, it was time to let this card go for something I would value more.
Christmas was another favorite time of the year for me. “Santa” would always bring me a blaster from target. One year there was a 2001 Topps blaster and it yielded one of the best cards in my collection to this day. It was a Frank Robinson autograph and the odds to pull that card out of a blaster were just amazing.
This is one of my high end cards I still have in my collection until this day.
In 2003 Upper Deck came out with my favorite product. UD Superstars had multiple sports in their packs and my dad bought a hobby box for my brother and me. I let my brother pick half of the packs and I would get the other half. Well with my luck, I didn’t get any of the hits. My brother got all 3 hits from the box. There was a Allen Iverson/Donovan Mcnabb dual jersey, Adam Dunn patch from the Reds logo, and the best card from the box was a Shawn Green/Kobe Bryant/Wayne Gretzky Triple jersey numbered to 250.
Living in Los Angeles my entire life and rooting for those teams made the card that much special. My brother felt bad for me and let me have the triple jersey for my collection. I don’t think I will ever let this card go. This is easily my favorite card in my collection. Sadly this was the last time I went to the card shop. High school was beginning and there was no card shop within 30 minutes of where we lived.
None of my friends in high school brought up the fact that they collected cards. I never really tried to get back into the hobby because it wasn’t the thing to do in high school. I focused on baseball and friends. Once college began a year ago, I moved down to San Diego. I found out that I was going to a college that was 10 minutes away from my godparents. My second day in San Diego, I went to have dinner with my godparents and spent the entire day with them. After dinner my godfather took me upstairs and showed me his collection of Dodger and Rickey Henderson cards that he had. I was amazed with his collection and it brought back childhood memories. He was the one who started my collection when I was 4 years old and now he was the one who brought me back into the hobby just a year ago.
I went home that night a bought a couple of Lakers, Dodgers, and Falcons for my collection. I also found SCF a couple months later. We still talk on facebook every day about the cards we buy. It’s good to have someone there to talk cards with. My parents don’t really want me to spend my money on cards, but they said as long as I’m happy they won’t stop me.
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08-31-2009, 08:04 AM #2
Nice story. I envy anyone that had or has the opportunity to get into collecting cards the way you did. Here in South Africa, the only way to obtain sports trading cards would be online. There is an element to this hobby that I felt I missed as a kid. Would have been great to have gone into a hobby shop, pick the odd pack and open till my hearts content :-)
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09-01-2009, 03:03 PM #3
There is one person I have to thank for bringing me back into the hobby it’s my godfather. He’s also my uncle and took care of me when my parents were at work during the day. When I was 4 years old, my godparents moved to San Diego. I only saw him twice a year but he would call me every night before I went to bed. During the early 90s, my uncle came back to Los Angeles for a weekend. He surprised me with a ticket to the Anaheim National Convention. This was the first time I was exposed to the card hobby. There was a batting cage, where you were allowed to pick how fast the pitch would come out of the machine. I bet with my uncle that he couldn’t hit a 95mph fastball from Randy Johnson. After five swings, he foul tipped only two of them and I won the bet. I was allowed to pick any card that I wanted. My selection:
Ken Griffey Jr. was my favorite baseball player growing up. He was my hero and I wanted to be just like him when I got older. The Ken Griffey card isn’t worth much anymore but I will always cherish it because it was the first card I ever owned.
That day is when my collection began… My dad wanted me to do great in school so he promised me a trip to the card shop every time I brought home an A or B. The better the grade, the more packs I would be able to buy. There was a point where the owner of the shop remembered my brother and I. Every time we came in, he would add to our purchases some free cards or raffle tickets.
I would bring my binder full of sports cards to school every day and a few of my friends would bring theirs so we could trade. We did this for about two weeks and the teachers took notice of it. They made a rule the following week saying that we weren’t allowed to bring cards to school anymore. It was a shame that I wasn’t able to add new cards to my collection anymore.
When Pokemon and Yu-gi-oh cards came out, I stopped buying sports cards and focused on those instead. I was at the card shop every week buying packs and setting up decks to battle my neighbors. In 7th grade, I brought all of my Yu-gi-oh cards to school and someone stole them. He denied it the whole day and I lost my whole collection…I went back to just collecting sports cards again.
My birthday is in April and luckily for me there was a card show at Hollywood Park Casino every April. My dad would give me a $150 limit to spend on any cards that I wanted. I always bought a hobby box to rip open later that night. One of my favorite cards that I pulled was Alex Rodriguez.
I cherished it every day because he was a player I looked up to and the face of baseball during that time. He had the biggest contract in baseball history. Well, now that he confessed to using steroids and he’s on my most hated team, it was time to let this card go for something I would value more.
Christmas was another favorite time of the year for me. “Santa” would always bring me a blaster from Target. One year there was a 2001 Topps blaster and it yielded one of the best cards in my collection to this day. It was a Frank Robinson autograph and the odds to pull that card out of a blaster were very slim.
This is one of the high-end cards I still have in my collection until this day.
In 2003 Upper Deck came out with my favorite product: UD Superstars. The packs contained multiple sports and my dad bought a hobby box for my brother and I. I let my brother pick half of the packs and I would get the other half. Well with my luck, I didn’t get any of the hits. My brother got all 3 hits from the box. There was an Allen Iverson/Donovan McNabb dual jersey, Adam Dunn patch from the Reds logo, and the best card from the box was a Shawn Green/Kobe Bryant/Wayne Gretzky triple jersey numbered to 250.
Living in Los Angeles my entire life and rooting for those teams made the card that much more special. My brother felt bad for me and let me have the triple jersey for my collection. I don’t think I will ever let this card go. This is easily my favorite card. Sadly this was the last time I went to the card shop. High school was beginning and there was no card shop within 30 minutes of where we lived.
None of my friends in high school brought up the fact that they collected cards. I never really tried to get back into the hobby because it wasn’t the thing to do in high school. I focused on baseball and friends. Once college began a year ago, I moved down to San Diego. I found out that I was going to a college that was 10 minutes away from my godparents. My second day in San Diego, I went to have dinner with them and we spent the entire day together. After dinner my godfather took me upstairs and showed me his card collection of Dodgers and Rickey Henderson. I was amazed with it and it brought back childhood memories. He was the one who started my collection when I was 4 years old and now he was the one who brought me back into the hobby just a year ago.
I went home that night and bought a couple of Lakers, Dodgers, and Falcons for my collection. I also found SCF a couple months later. We still talk on Facebook every day about the cards we buy. It’s good to have someone there to talk cards with. My parents don’t really want me to spend my money on cards, but they said as long as I’m happy they won’t stop me.
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09-01-2009, 03:19 PM #4
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