Affectionately known in the collecting community as Mr. 264, Bob DePouw can be found on many hobby forums searching for sequentially numbered cards starting with 264/xxx. Otherwise known as road_runner_1964, his unique focus specifically targets the SPx Football product. Currently he owns 239 different SPx 264/xxx cards in his collection and another 267 cards with that serial number from other products. Why 264, you ask?  Really simple; it is short for his birthdate: February 26, 1964. His collection was even featured in the May 2008 edition of Beckett.

You can see his unique focus on his website: http://www.freewebs.com/road_runner_1964/index.htm

Why SPx? Here’s what he had to say:

I found myself chasing every 264/ in every product out there and quickly realized how expensive my pursuit had become. I really liked the SPx product in 2004 and chose to make it my primary focus. The product has always had a nice design and a mid-range price. I would spend hours searching all the secondary market websites, buying lots of SPx rookie cards in hopes of finding that elusive number. Lots quickly turned into boxes, boxes became cases and I quickly amassed a lot of the SPx product.

As any good collector would, I sorted and made trade lists of my “extra” product. (If it wasn’t numbered 264/, it became extra product to me.) But, I quickly realized that assembling the complete set for a particular year wasn’t that difficult. From 1996 through 2009, I have completed eight of the available 15 sets (which includes the 1998 SPx Finite). I stand at 93.7% completion rate from that time frame. As I continued, I found myself completing the SPx subsets. My wife pulled this card out of a box of 2003 SPx while driving home from the 2009 Nationals in Cleveland, Ohio. So, naturally, I had to complete this set too.

Not only my addiction to 264/, but more and more SPx as well. From 1996 this product has evolved overtime with the industry. In the beginning die-cuts, hologram technology and on-card autographs. Here is another great card from the beginning; this set is near completion too:

Then 1998 brought SPx Finite and serial number mania; 1999 engulfed rookie autographs in the set; and in 2000 we asked: “How did you get that jersey on the card and autographed too?”

The year 2001 introduced the blue and gold parallel versions. From ‘01 to 2003 the format remained the same with on-card autographs, but changed the shape of the jersey window. In 2004, the sticker autograph was introduced. There is a lot of debate over the pros and cons of that decision, but I continued on. The next few years focused on changing up the card design, inserting dual- and triple-jersey pieces, until 2008 a new parallel was born: the 1/1!

In 2009 it was the Shadow Box (pretty cool actually).

And this year, of course, introduces the collegiate version.

Mr. 264’s Mega 15-Year SPx Football Box Break

In honor of Upper Deck’s 15 years of evolution and innovation with the SPx football product, I am hosting a personal box break. I will be doing a live break of one box from every year from 1996 to 2010 and series 1 & 2 of 1998 SPx Finite. A total of 17 boxes. The breaks will occur Saturday, November 20, at 6 p.m. (EST), with broadcasting to start at 5 PM on BlogTV. My user name is: Mr264. Here is the link to the scheduled show: http://www.blogtv.com/sch/1473597

Come join the fun and see how many 264/s I can pull.

Yep, that's me: Mr. 264. All day long.