Caitlin Clark Instant Collection

I mentioned a couple of posts ago that I was accumulating a stack of Caitlin Clark cards for a small player collection. So far everything I've picked up comes from Topps' Bowman U Now line of cards, a print-to-demand set that focuses on the exploits of college stars.

I've bought a few direct from Topps during the ordering windows, and a few from eBay resellers who buy in bulk hoping for parallels and offload the base cards at a slight discount.

My current boss grew up in Iowa, and says that the whole state is pretty caught up in Clark's career to date. I reckon that with the print runs on these being what they are I won't be making any money on my collection, but profit has never really been my driving force when it comes to collecting. A card that enters my collection rarely leaves it. My collection really is a story about my life, but unfortunately it's a story my family won't appreciate when I'm dead and gone, because they won't be able to read it. Hopefully my blog will be there still for them to read and put some of the pieces together if they want to. I'm not planning on going away anytime soon, but I sometimes contemplate what will happen to the stacks of 5000-count boxes in the shed when the time comes. It's a valuable collection and a record of my life and interests, but it won't likely be worth the labor of sorting through it all and disposing of it for money.

That took a dark turn for a second there. I imagine it's something many collectors think about from time to time, as our collections grow larger and we get a little older. Another thing I've been contemplating recently is what my next hobby project should be. I have been feeling a little directionless lately. A lot of the projects I used to work on each year have run out of my price range, and I don't want to work on projects that just require me to throw money at them. I'd maybe like to build a set the old-fashioned way, through busting packs and collating the cards myself. The problem is picking a set that is compelling enough for me to chase it, and cheap enough to be worth the hassle. I haven't come up with a solution yet. I had some fun sorting some Donruss Racing cards today. That would be an option, but I'd want to wait for boxes to go on sale at one of the big online retailers before I committed to that. Another option might be to wait for Topps Heritage this year and try to put that one together. Something to think about, I guess.