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Two days ago, I went back to my old playground.

There was no swingset, though. No monkey bars, no sandbox, not even any grass.

That’s because my old playground is an unassuming baseball card shop in my hometown called Sportscard Outlet. I can’t remember the last time I was there. Had to be at least seven years, probably longer.

What I do remember is a guy named Vince, majestic stacks of baseball cards and five great years of my childhood.

If you ever collected cards, I’m sure you had your own Sportcard Outlet – the kind of place where you and your friends would go three or four times a week to blow the better part of your allowance, all the while hoping to pull that ’89 Upper Deck Ken Griffey Jr. or that ’90 Leaf Frank Thomas.

To be completely honest, this column started out as an RIP for the sports card industry. I had done some research online and found nothing but doom, gloom, and worst of all, greed in a pastime that had once seemed so innocent to me.

So when I decided to drop by Sportscard Outlet, I expected to see the same doom and gloom. Heck, I half expected there not to be a Sportscard Outlet anymore.

I didn’t even bring my tape recorder or notebook. I figured I already had the whole story: Oversaturation of the market and the 1994 strike had depressed both prices and kids’ interest, to the point that shops everywhere were closing down.

But sure enough, when I walked into the shop – six inches taller and hundreds of beers older – there was Vince, sorting cards. 

This is a story about one of the good guys. It’s one that they never teach you in economics class, because it’s about a guy who thinks about something besides the bottom line.

All those afternoons that my buddy Mike and I came into Vince’s shop, he always talked to us, always told us about new sets coming out, always looked through our collections for anything he might want to buy. I can’t imagine how annoying we were.

But you see, Vince is still in business precisely because he did all these things. And when I came into the shop, it only took him half a minute to remember me.

“Oh yeah, you and Michael,” he said. “You guys used to play field hockey in junior high, right?”

We caught up for a while, then I told him about this column. He started talking and talking about the industry with the same excitement one of his sixth-grade customers gets when opening a new pack of cards.

“It’s funny,” he says. “The guys who catered to the big spenders are no longer doing business. Let ‘em go. I tell people that if they want to make big money, go to your stock broker and good luck.”

Vince admits that he has been lucky to do business in a well-off area, where kids have money to spend on cards. But he’s still had to weather the stormy times.

“I don’t pretend like I’m not a businessman, but I also don’t try and sell pity,” he says.

He pauses, as Ed from Lloyd’s Plumbing comes into the shop to ask Vince what he’d like for lunch.

“See, I do have a core group of big money people, but they’re legit collectors. I have overcome through resourcefulness, and good relationships have gotten me through the hard times.”

Part of that resourcefulness has been the realization that he couldn’t get by with the shop alone. But instead of shutting down Sportscard Outlet, Vince has taken a day job and comes to the shop from 4 to 8 p.m., Mondays through Thursdays.

The other days, he’s open the full eight hours. But all seven days, he’s doing the same things he did for Mike and me seven years ago, with all new customers.

“It takes more work dealing with little kids, but the big spenders can get what they want online or at card shows,” he says. “They don’t need a hobby shop. I’m definitely an exception to the rule, but that should be a lesson.”

On my way out, for the first time in almost a decade, I got the itch. I bought a couple of packs and bid Vince goodbye.

They say you can’t relive your past, but as I started up my car and saw a couple of kids walk into Sportscard Outlet, I saw Mike and me going to our playground for the first time.