Hoops Hobby

I won an eBay auction within the last few weeks for a Tim Duncan parallel that caught my eye from the early 2000s, a collecting sweet spot as I’ve mentioned a few times here.

Within a few days after the auction’s end, I received a message from the seller saying that shipping would be delayed a few more days because of a personal issue. I had no reason to doubt the validity of the message, especially for a delay that in my mind wasn’t an issue at all.

Sure enough, after a few days, the seller added a tracking number in eBay and then a few days later, the package arrived in my mailbox. My initial reaction was that this was either packaged excessively well, or there was more or something different in my shipment than what I had purchased.

When I opened it, I found a stack of Tim Duncan cards, all of which were either numbered parallels or memorabilia cards, as well as a graded Tim Duncan Topps rookie. I was floored with this stack of cards, which did include the card I won at auction, so much so that I thought a mistake had been made, that someone else who wasn’t familiar with what was supposed to go where had sent me cards from multiple auctions.

Here’s the card I won, before I go any further. I enjoy picking up cards from sets that I call ‘One and Done’. It’s a 2002-03 Box Score First Edition parallel /100, and they just don’t pop up often. While this card looks like an insert, it’s actually a subset as part of the larger base set.

So I sent a message to the seller indicating that while I did receive the card I won at auction, it also included a good number of other Duncan cards that I expected made their way to me by mistake. The message I got back indicated that there was no mistake. These cards were sent on purpose because of the shipping delay and that the seller didn’t expect to be able to get much for them at auction anyway, the memorabilia cards in particular, and that I should enjoy them.

The first thing from the package was the heaviest, a graded Tim Duncan 1997-98 Topps rookie, by a grading company I didn’t recognize. It wasn’t a new card for my collection, but it does look like it’s in great shape inside of that slab.

A couple of memorabilia cards, including this 2003-04 Topps Jersey Edition card, were included. Glad to have a relic card from such a sharp looking set. Each pack of this product included 2 cards, all relics.

This dual jersey from 2003-04 Upper Deck Finite was the only duplicate for me in the group of cards, but it’s one I certainly don’t mind. Not every day you get a memorabilia card featuring two Hall of Famers.

I remember adding Bowman Signature cards of Pacers rookies back in the first half of the 2000s, guys like Fred and James Jones, and a few base cards of guys like Jermaine O’Neal, but this is the first parallel for me, numbered out of 249. You can tell by the gray border, where as the base cards have more of a brown/bronze color border.

Rather than a numerical card number, even the base cards and base parallels have a card number of SE, for Signature Edition, and the player initials.

Here’s a parallel I’m familiar with, since I recently picked up a Jeff Foster for my Pacers rookie year binder. It’s tough to tell from the scan, but the text on this one is green, and this is the Masterpiece Mania parallel from 1999-00 numbered out of 300. Another numbered Duncan card that I am happy to own.

This last card brings me the most joy out of any of the cards in the package. I have fond memories of opening 2002-03 Fleer Premium, and even though these aren’t the Star Rubies of the late 90s, this is quite a card, even more incredible as a throw-in.

And so a package that included much more than I expected provided a big boost to my Tim Duncan collection, plus a boost of motivation to do a couple of things. First, to look more vigilantly for opportunities to help others collectors. And second, to once again really focus on narrowing what I look for in my collection, because this group of cards really knocked it out of the park, and they all fit into my collection perfectly.

Anyone else been surprised by a fellow collector lately?