This past weekend I took a 17-hour round trip bus ride from New York City to Portland, ME to interview and obtain a few autographs of one of my boyhood heroes, Rangers and Bruins Hall of Famer Brad Park. The bus was my only affordable option, but I don’t recommend this mode of transportation for long trips. Every mile is a grind.
My grueling journey was well worth it because of the Northeast Sports Card Expo’s show at the Portland Expo Center. I love big regional shows as a collector, seller, and a writer. In recent years, I have repeatedly gone to the Philly Show and the Shriner’s Show in Boston. I religiously attend JP Sports’ White Plains and Tarrytown shows in New York City’s suburbs.
With 200 dealer tables occupied by vendors from US and Canada spread across 24,000 square feet of a basketball floor, the space was open and easier on the back and feet than the the unforgiving concrete floors at some shows.
The mix between modern and vintage was about 50/50, some of it high quality and the rest within reach. Most of the dealers were ones I hadn’t met before, so their material and stories were fresh.
Recalling the Last Maine Event
Over the years, Portland has hosted smaller 40-50 table shows. This was the biggest in 35 years, three dealers who attended the last one, told me. Don Hontz, a Portland dealer at the show and heavy hitter dealer at the National whom I’ve bought several cards from, was the co-promoter of that late 1980s event.
“The line was four abreast and at least 100 yards long,” he recalled. “People came from all over. There must have been at least 4,000-5,000 people in a big banquet room at a hotel a little smaller than this one. It was a complete madhouse. After a while, we let people come through the side doors for free so no one would get hurt. If the Fire Marshals had come, they would have shut us down.”
One of the main attractions was the primary autograph guest. Rogers Clemens, the superstar Red Sox pitcher, was coming off his Cy Young year and his 20-strikeout game. For some perspective, he cost the promoters $10,000, plus travel, and his autograph cost attendees $10. Hontz and his promoter sold far in excess of 1,000 autographs to make a healthy profit.
2023 Show Gets Off to a Sizzling Start
Portland has a population of only about 557,000 in the metro area— compared to New York, 24 million: Philadelphia, 6.2 million; and Boston, 4.9 million. However, about an hour after last weekend’s show opened, I was an eyewitness to the biggest sale I had ever seen at a local show. It started out with dead-centered SGC 6 1952 Topps Jackie Robinson. Then am SGC 7 1965 Topps Joe Namath rookie. An SGC 3 1961 Fleer rookie Wilt Chamberlain followed. A PSA 5 1949 Bowman rookie Richie Ashburn. A PSA 4 1959 Topps rookie Bob Gibson. A raw rookie 1954 Topps Ernie Banks in excellent condition. Higher grade 1955 Topps Knute Rockne and Red Grange cards.
The stacks of cards, raw and graded, grew higher and higher. Pretty soon, the dealer’s case was cleaned out.
By the time Mike Cance from Portsmouth, NH, was finished, he was forking over $31,350 in cold, hard cash. He handed the dealer three bricks of $100 bills and a stack of loose Benjamins. Cance told me he is one of eBay’s five top sellers (MC-Sports Cards). “I always like big buys of nice, clean vintage,” he said. “In a town like this there’s old money stuff that has been passed down.”
Cance was shrewd to make the hour-long drive to a big, new show in an underserved city which flushed out some prime material. The dealer told me he had been in the card business for 50 years, but never strayed far from home.
With so much cash changing hands for valuable material, it was reassuring to see strong security. I have seen big thefts firsthand at shows. Portland police were patrolling the aisles and eyeing the cases. They were wearing billy clubs and packing heat.
Meanwhile, another dealer filled five cases with mostly mouth-watering mid-grade and mid-and relatively lower priced cards from the early 1900s to the 1970s because a local show like this one in Portland attracts more modest buyers. For example, he was selling an SGC 3 T206 Ty Cobb ((bat on shoulder), an PSA 3 T205 Cobb, and PSA 3 T205 Christy Mathewson. From the deadfall area what also caught my eye were a PSA 1 Standard Caramel Honus Wagner. PSA 3 T206 Tris Speaker, and an SGC 3 T206 Cy Young. Among his pre-War were a PSA 2 1933 Goudey Babe Red (red version), a PSA 2 1933 Goudey Lou Gehrig, and a PSA 4 Diamond Star Hank Greenberg. Post War cards included a generous medley of Mickey Mantles such as a SGC 4.5 1956, a PSA 7 1965, and a PSA 5 1966. The dealer told me Aaron and Mays are hot, so he brought an SGC 4 1958 Topps Mays and PSA 5 Topps Hank Aaron.
On Sunday morning, a collector showed up at Don Hontz’s tables. He had come all the way from Indiana to attend the show and because he enjoys Maine. He bought a 1957 Topps Mays, Mantle/Berra, and a Sandy Koufax for $1100.
My favorite visitors to Hontz’s table who were oohing and aahing were seven-year-old Milo Davis and his friend eight-year old Abner Joyce. (Children under 12 were admitted for free.) Usually, it’s the dads dragging their kids around shows. In this case, the boys were the diehard collectors. Jeff, Milo’s 40 year-old father, said the last card he bought was a 1954 Topps Aaron rookie in mid-grade for $25 in 1993.
Diverse Demographic
I’m happy to report I saw hundreds of elementary and middle school age kids at the show. There were also teenagers carrying cases packed with modern cards and wielding wads of cash. There were women dealers and women collectors, too.
Dealers made a point of being kid-friendly. They let them break extra packs and take extra turns on a roulette wheel with various prizes for the same price.
I most enjoyed meeting entire families of dealers and families of collectors, some pushing baby strollers. Where else can families share such wholesome entertainment for so little and maybe make some money, as well? The youth and families at the Portland show would seem to bode well for the hobby’s future.
The New and the Old
The show had plenty of variety. The young who can wheel and deal tend to gravitate towards the modern.
Matt Sheehan had a big sale with a PSA 10 2021 Orange Disk Joe Burrow for $400. A lot consisting of a PSA 10 Rafael Devers auto and three shiny, new rookie cards went for $150.
Matt Bennett let me photograph him holding a card that was anything but child’s play. It was a PSA 10 2015-16 Upper Deck Young Guns Connor McDavid, the superstar Edmonton Oilers center, priced at $32,000— the highest priced card I saw on the floor.
“Everyone thinks he’s going to contest Wayne Gretzky for the greatest of all,” he added. “I mean he had 153 points (last season) and is only 26 years-old. And collectors chase these younger rookie cards. Auston Mathews is another great name in demand.” Matthews has scored 299 goals and 243 assists at age 26. Bennett is high on the Future Watch autos and Upper Deck’s The Cup hockey.
I made a small score at the booth of an old Brooklyn Dodgers fan, Bill Robinson, who was wearing the team’s cap. It was a New York Jets pin from their Super Bowl III victory at the Orange Bowl; their only title, of course. With the show catering to New England sports fans, I had no competition. So Robinson happily knocked it down from $100 to $75 for me. It pays to travel. I had similar luck with a vintage Willie Mays Mets signed photo at the Shriner’s Show near Boston and a game-used Howard Johnson glove at the Philly Show. I later had HoJo sign a photo of him holding it at another local show.
Signing with Smiles
The autograph room hummed both days with very reasonably priced guests. Celtics legends Cedric Maxwell and Hall of Famer Tom “Satch” Sanders made eye contact with every fan and smiled, a far cry from some of the modern stars I have observed. So did Bruins greats Rick Middleton and Mike Middlebury. The latter went into depth for me about the attributes that accounted for his teammate, Hall of Famer Brad Park, being named one of the 100 greatest players of all time.
The guests enjoyed answering questions and bantering with fans. After signing it, Park held up his Rangers game-used stick, which I recently won in a Lelands auction, and showed me how he used a blowtorch to create a curve for better puck control. He couldn’t have been more gracious to me, and he added inscriptions like “Best Wishes” and his uniform number without me asking.
“The attendees who met our guests seemed very happy and excited,” said Steve Pepdjonovic, one of the show’s promoters and co-partner of Northeast Sports Card Expo. “Brad did great. I saw children and adults of all ages getting his autograph.”
Others who appeared at the event included former Boston Bruins Ken Linseman, Rick Middleton and Mike Milbury, former Red Sox player Matt Stairs, pro boxing champion brothers Micky Ward and Dicky Eklund, former Boston Celtic Cedric Maxwell, wrestling WWE Hall of Famer Greg “The Hammer” Valentine, and former Boston Bruins & Stanley Cup champ Bobby Carpenter and his daughter 2X Olympic Silver medalist and Pro Women’s Hockey League player Alex Carpenter.
The show was such a big deal in Portland that a local TV news crew arrived on Saturday afternoon to interview Pepdjonovic after he reached out to them.
By the show’s close, thousands of people had walked through the hall. The director of the Portland Expo Building told Pepdjonvic that he had broken the venue’s record with the number of vendor tables. He plans to return, likely in mid-2024. “We love the people of Maine!” Pepdjonvic declared. Portland is back on the map.
“They do a great job,” said Robinson, another 50-year veteran of card shows. “They get people in the door. Whatever they spend on it, it’s worth it.”
Northeast Sports Card Expo’s next show will take place in another small city, Stamford, CT, on October 7 and 8. For more information check their website.
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