The Michael Jordan (Cards) Story

Back when I was in middle school, I was a big time basketball card collector. My collection sucked, mostly because I made terrible trades, and also because I liked to buy Topps or Collector's Choice. All of my friends had better, more valuable collections. (I actually went into a card store and asked if the guy had any Muggsy Bogues singles.)

So I decided to become a better collecter, AKA spend more money. Since I was a kid, I had no money. Any time my parents gave me some cash, I went straight to the card store. I recall stealing quarters from home and scrounging for every penny just to get my next pack. It was an addiction.

My friends & I would gamble for cards. Mostly playing horse at the courts, winner takes all. That is where I picked up most of my good cards.

After a while, my cards were much better. Instead of only having Muggsy Bogues, Larry Johnson, & Alonzo Mourning cards (i loved the Hornets), i actually had a small collection of Michael Jordan cards. My most "valuable" card was a $13 Antonio McDyess rookie card subset, which was had no value in trading with friends.

One day we were hanging at a friends, playing some pool, and some trouble happened. My one friend lost ALL of his cards at a game of pool. (Our bets got pretty heated up, hopefully we don't all go to Vegas) The guy was devastated. I felt terrible and I wasn't even involved. We had collected so long, and to lose ALL your cards.

So I made one of the worst deals in the history of the world.

• The guy who won the pool game returned the collection to the guy who lost.
• I gave all my Jordan's to the guy who won the pool game
• The guy who lost the pool game gave me his Laser Tag set

I traded all my Jordan's for Laser Tag. Keep in mind I was pretty old, almost in High School. But I remembered the commercials from childhood and always wanted to have Laser Tag.

Later: I played with the Laser tag ONCE after that day. It was pretty terrible. Not what I expected. Plus no one wanted to play with me. Sad face. That was the beginning of the end of my card collecting days.