Your 2010 National Sports Collectors Convention Travel Guide

Sports Collector's Daily has a great article for those traveling to Baltimore, MD for the 2010 National.

I'd also recommend the Babe Ruth Museum which is currently displaying the $500,000 Babe Ruth rookie card! If you're on Foursquare, there are some special History Channel badges to pick up in the Baltimore, MD area too.

Larry Csonka Headlines CSA Show This Weekend

The CSA Show this weekend in Chantilly, VA may be their biggest show ever - at least with the number of guests they are providing.

The Collector's Showcase America will have over 50 autograph guests running Friday through Sunday.

CSA doesn't just throw out random big names and keep introducing them at every show, they really gear the show for the collectors. This quarter's show has a 2nd Miami Dolphins reunion theme and several other NFL HOF players. I'm not going to this one, but I've been to several in the past. They are worth the trip.

The Top 10 ticket sales for their July show is:
1. Larry Csonka
2. Floyd Little
3. John Randle
4. Ray Lewis
5. Paul Warfield
6. Bill Stanfill
7. Nick Buoniconti
8. Marlin Briscoe
9. Larry Seiple
10. Dan Marino

Free Autograph David Wright Jerseys at Citi Field

Ten fans will win free autographed David Wright jerseys at tomorrow night's Mets game.

On Saturday, 10 fans at Citi Field can win a Jose Reyes autographed drawstring bag.

On Sunday, 10 Mets fans can win an autographed Jason Bay Bobble Head.

On Monday, anyone can take Ollie Perez as far away from this team as possible.

Thanks to the Amazin' Stories blog for the scoop.

If You Were the New Beckett Media President

Beckett Media has a new president and he's addressing their website performance issues and talking about future plans for the organization.

In an announcement on the company sites, Brian Gulledge, posted a message about the need to grow the site and his focus to improve their online presence. A new website will be launched in December, 2010. His message referenced that taking a long time, but considering the amount of data, that seems pretty aggressive to me.

In addition to the website, the new president will obviously tackle several other issues with the company.

The two biggest changes I'd like to see:

1. New Website: Clear difference between what is blog vs. what is front page content.
2. Mobile App for iPhone/iPad/Droid

If you were the new Beckett Media President, what would you do?

Twitter the 2010 National with #NSCC

The hashtag #NSCC is being used for tweets about The National Sports Collectors Convention or "the National."

If you're on Twitter and tweeting about "the National" use #NSCC in your tweet so others can join in the conversation. Sample tweet, "Topps just announced their promotion for the National. Check out the link to my latest blog post. #NSCC"

Hashtags allow both twitter users and non twitter users find conversations about different subjects.

Twitter and Non Twitter Users
To search for twitter conversations and information about the #NSCC:

• Go to www.twitter.com and type #NSCC.
• This will bring a list of tweets using the #NSCC hashtag. Another search is hashtags.org/tag/NSCC.

RSS #NSCC
Use any of the searches above and add it to your RSS reader. The hashtags.org URL to save the #NSCC feed is http://hashtags.org/feeds/tag/NSCC.

TweetDeck Users
What is Tweetdeck? Tweetdeck is a free and pretty cool application by Adobe AIR that you download for free to your desktop. There are other free Twitter applications for your PC, I personally like tweetdeck.

• Click the search icon in tweetdeck and type #NSCC.
• This open another column (if you have less than 10 columns) and continually refreshes as long as you keep it.

Twittering with a common hashtag, #NSCC, will also be helpful while you're at the The National. If you have mobile alerts. You can send and receive tweets about different booth contests or special autograph guests.

Here's another article I wrote about the benefits of using a hashtag at a card show.  Now if we can just get foursquare here!

Still Paying for Bobby Bonilla

Thanks Steve Phillips. Not only did you set the franchise back when you with the Mets, but you're still setting the Mets back years after you left.

According to the Wall Street Journal, a year from today, the Mets will begin paying Bobby Bonilla $1MM+ a year for the next 25 years! I've complained and mentioned my dislike for Bobby Bo here, here and here.

It's bad enough that Bonilla was terrible for the franchise 10+years ago, but now he'll be hurting the team for the next 25 years.


Thanks Steve.

Felix Jones Autograph Fail

Fans waited in line for an hour. They bought tickets for a minor league baseball game, Arkansas Travelers, and were promised a free autograph by Dallas Cowboys running back Felix Jones. But the fans went home without their autograph.

The Travelers promised fans a free, one hour, autograph signing by Felix Jones after he threw out the first pitch. According to the Dallas Morning News, Jones arrived, threw out the first pitch and then said he had an exclusive signing deal with a card manufacturer and couldn't sign autographs for fans.

Fill Your Satchel - Your National Sports Collectors Convention Checklist

It's not a purse, it's a satchel!

If you're going to the 2010 National in Baltimore, you need to bring some important items with you. Here's a list of items to throw in your purse, Eurpoean Carry All, backpack.
- Your list of hard to find cards. The National is the place to find them.
- Team card checklists.
- Cards you'd like to get signed if you see someone walking around. You never know who you'll find at the National.
- An extra Official MLB baseball
- eBay pricing (know the price of your wish list before you go)
- Mini helmet of your football team
- Bottle of water
- Meal/granola bars (Food is always terrible at the convention centers and I've chewed on bouillon cubes that taste better than some of the foods they serve at these.)
- Pens and sharpies
- Hand sanitizer (apply, apply, apply)
- Digital Camera
- Phone/Mobile Device to follow twitter updates
- Cards you'd like to trade