Nolan Anderson’s Pull of a Lifetime
With MLB in midseason form and school about to be out for the year, Nolan Anderson got the itch to buy some baseball cards. The 12-year-old and his grandmother hit up a Target in Duluth, Minnesota, in June of last year, where Nolan nabbed a 2024 Bowman Baseball Blaster Box.
Nolan couldn’t wait to get to his family’s house in the nearby town of Esko before tearing open the packs. Halfway through the blaster, he pulled a sweet 1955 Anime of Cincinnati Reds phenom Elly De La Cruz.
“At first when I pulled it, I didn’t even know what it was,” Nolan said. “I knew it was a case hit. After a little while I realized, oh shoot, it’s a 1-of-1. I didn’t really see it in the bottom of the corner until a little bit later.”
Nolan had landed De La Cruz’s coveted Superfractor. He quickly called his mom, Alissa, and a few friends who collect. Of course, he had to call his dad, Jared, as well. When there was no answer, Nolan left a voicemail.
“It was unintelligible,” Jared said. “Nolan’s not a very excitable kid, but he was pretty pumped up.” Prior to his big pull, Nolan was a fan of De La Cruz; that player-collector bond is even stronger now. “I don’t know if there’s a card in that set that he would have rather pulled,” Jared said.
On Nolan’s 13th birthday, he wanted to celebrate by opening some more packs. His younger brother, Brock, bought him a 2024 Bowman Baseball Blaster. Nolan landed a 1955 Anime Shohei Ohtani numbered to 50.
The kid has pretty good luck with blasters.
“After that, all I could think was the only product I wanted to buy was the 2024 Bowman Blasters,” Nolan said, who is a seventh-grader at Esko Public Schools in northern Minnesota. “I opened a lot of them.”
Before his pull of a lifetime, Nolan never fathomed — nor did his parents — that an average collector could find a rare 1-of-1 out of an affordable Blaster Box from a retail store.
“It seemed like there was a growing sentiment online a little bit that the Hanger Packs, the Blaster Packs, the things your average Joe is going to get their hands on, won’t contain big cards,” Jared said. “Maybe there will be a few case hits floating around out there, but most of it is getting broken on videos on YouTube.” Seeing such an exciting card pulled in such ordinary circumstances reworked that idea a bit. “To see something like this happen sort of squashes that notion a little bit,” Jared said.
Collecting Together
When Jared was a kid in the 1980s, he loved collecting. He vividly remembers amassing plenty of the 1987 Topps wood-grain bordered cards.
“I like to look through his cards, the old ones, in the boxes that he has,” Nolan said. “He still has some sealed stuff, but I like to look through his Cal Ripken cards and stuff like that.”
Nolan’s parents encourage him to collect and to spend within his means. Jared and Alissa know their son could be involved in hobbies worse than collecting cards.
“There’s a lot of things you can do with the resources you have in this world, and collecting cards, things that could potentially have, hold, and gain value, is something that you’re into and it keeps you excited about The Hobby,” Jared said. “He enjoys not just collecting cards, he really loves playing the game, too. Anything that’s fostering that love of the sport for him, I’m OK with it.”
Jared enjoys the father-son bonding while doing an activity they have both loved.
“It’s fun to share in his excitement. I know I’m probably not as exuberant as he is until you see like, oh, that’s a 1-of-1.”
Nolan’s mother also enjoys the family aspect of The Hobby. “I kind of like the connection that he has, because his dad came into our marriage with many boxes of baseball cards that he had from when he was a kid,” she said. “I just think it’s a fun thing for Jared and Nolan to connect on.”
