You never know what treasure you will find in small-town Mississippi. For David Aven, a goldmine was discovered on the shelves of a GameStop outlet in Grenada.
Aven laid claim to the highly-coveted redemption for Paul Skenes’ Gold MLB Logoman Patch in late 2025. The card earned the Batesville resident a payday of $58,800 after being auctioned off last week. But the backstory of how Aven came about getting the card highlights the beauty of having hobbies and the importance of family.
“I’ve never sold a baseball card. This will be the first I’ve ever sold,” Aven told SuperTalk Mississippi News.
While stoking the flames of a once set aside passion, Aven was shopping for baseball cards at the Grenada Walmart when he discovered that the mega store had none in stock. A lightbulb of sorts lit up, and Aven thought to visit the nearby GameStop store in pursuit of cards. That decision did not disappoint.
When in the retail gaming store, Aven stumbled upon five 2025 Topps Chrome packs. Chrome packs contain premium, high-gloss trading cards printed on reflective “chromium” stock. Aven bought four of the five packs, and fortunately, did not leave the box with a hidden gem tucked inside on the store’s shelf.
As he perused the cards he had acquired, Aven discovered that he had landed the Skenes card. For those of you who may not be the most in-tune with the professional baseball scene, Skenes is the Pittsburgh Pirates’ decorated pitcher, who earned Rookie of the Year honors and Cy Young Award recognition in just two seasons. His cards have proven to be quite valuable, as his major league debut patch was bought for $1.1 million.
“I was in Grenada doing something, and Walmart didn’t have any baseball cards. I knew GameStop sold them, so I went over to GameStop. They had five boxes. I bought four of them,” Aven said. “Thank goodness I didn’t leave the one that had the Skenes card in it.”
With redemption cards, the owner exchanges the card with the manufacturer and usually receives an autographed version at a later date. In Aven’s case, however, another baseball fan will possess the card while the Mississippian has cashed in. 31 bids is what it took to drive the price near the $60,000 range when the card was in auction.
No stranger to purchasing cards, Aven was an avid collector in the 1980s and up until the 1990s. That habit died down when he got married, with his hard-earned money supporting the family he was starting instead of a side passion. But around seven years ago, he satiated his card-collecting palate again, but only on certain occasions, and a friend convinced him to buy newly-released ones, which made possessing the Skenes card a reality.
“If I saw somebody on Facebook selling their old collection, I would buy it,” Aven said. “I have a buddy who’s been collecting cards. He talked me into buying cards that have come out in the last three years. I was kind of hesitant to buy them because of the price, but I started buying them anyway.”
A family man through and through, Aven said he mainly plans to use his earnings on his daughter’s student loans. Aven’s daughter graduated from Ole Miss with a master’s in music education and is currently a band instructor in Pocahontas, Ark.
Aven is an avid Ole Miss sports supporter and has referred to former Rebel head coach turned LSU frontman Lane Kiffin as a “snake” on social media. No fan of LSU, Aven said he is making a fandom exception for Skenes, the former Tiger national championship-winning hurler.
Now that he’s claimed his reward for another fan’s treasured artifact, Aven said he is on a mission to own a rookie card from his Mount Rushmore of baseball giants — Nolan Ryan, Pete Rose, and Johnny Bench. As for those getting into collecting, Aven emphasized that it’s important to be versed in what one is buying because any given card could have monetary or sentimental value attached to it.
“It can be found anywhere. If you can pull it in Mississippi, you can pull it anywhere,” Aven said. “Look at what you have and research what you have. I wouldn’t have known what I had if that had been my first box in 10 years. I never would have known what that was.”
Coincidentally, Aven is not the only person connected to Mississippi, or even Ole Miss, to land a rare card. Former Rebel quarterback Jaxson Dart, who now starts for the New York Giants, recently claimed a one-of-one R2-D2 Star Wars card.