Collectors of baseball cards striking out

[the blob]

I was always under the [mis?]impression that perhaps some of the topps higher #s were short printed, but looking at ebay results for a random sampling of PSA 9s it seems that prices attained are perhaps very card specific and not just about star power. Are there some cards that are just "harder" to find in PSA 9 (and a psa census to back it up?). For example, a 75 topps Nettles (#160) goes for $19.95 and then a horacio pina (139) goes for $148. I've never heard of Pina, Nettles was almost a HOFer. The numbering is pretty close. Is Pina (and jose cardenal (#15)..admitttedly a decent player -- $140, borgmann (127) - $255, Driessen (133) - $163) a notoriously short-printed card? (I'm guessing no on Pina given a PSA 8 commands about $5-$8, Cardenal is about $12, Borgman is $10, ) Just impossible to get in psa 9? If short-printed, does Becketts point that out or is it just something that has become apparent via PSA? Or the MVP duo cards...#208 Powell/Bench is $328, most of the others in the 190s/200s other than the Mantle/Newcombe are $20-$40 or so. Is the Powell card rarer?

 

Sorry if this sounds naive, I really do just buy these vintage cards for fun and for names I've heard of and almost never spend more than $1 each.

 

Not at all naive, haven't much time for a proper reply now, but will later! Basically your observation about a perfect card of an unknown major leaguer is dead on, its driven by set registry mentality, with people (some with deep pockets) in competition to collect certified "perfect" examples for a given set. Some cards will turn out to be pretty difficult to impossible to find without some sort of inherent flaw -- their certified population remains low -- and demand for the few perfect extant examples drives prices up.

 

Overall, mid 70s cards are extremely plentiful, with some exceptions, and basically starting with '71s and back, you'll see stronger prices for cards approaching perfection. To take an example, a '65 topps Carlton rookie in very collectible PSA 6 grade, is notably cheaper than it was a few years ago; but the same card in a PSA 9 would garner a very strong and growing price still.

 

Another example I can think of is a 1960 topps set -- a very nice one, with a typical range of cards in VG-EX to EX-MT and a few in NM, with the stars all at least decent, could try to find a price anywhere from $1800-$3000, depending on the balance of grades. A few years ago, some registry set owner sold his 1960 topps set, with nothing lower than PSA 8, about 30% of the set in PSA 9, and 3 perfect PSA 10s, including the only PSA 10 '60 Koufax, sold for better than $225,000. Grade makes quite a difference!

 

my local shop busts out pre-76 boxes every now and then...football and baseball...and makes them 50 cents. there will be stars mixed in there. i i get first crack at them they really do look pretty sharp...nice corners, etc. like they really haven't been messed with, straight out of a pack. i wonder why he doesn't send them in when they're this sharp looking? does psa do a 9 pre-screen? i could see how 7 and 8s would be money losers though.

[arexcrooke]

How about these 1954 Topps baseball cards then?

 

 

 

IMO all cards '50-'56 are sweet, with 54B bringing up the rear.

 

There are a lot of great sets out there, but my all-time favorite sports cards will always be the 55 All-American. Beautiful, I have loved them ever since I was a kid, staring at my dad's set. He had many, including early 60s Topps, etc, but these definitely stood out. Great design, love the school emblem and the black and white picture in the background.

 

 

 

 

All-americans rock! Love them, and '54 Topps too for that matter (very colorful) but I still like '56 Topps too! As Hepcat notes, something for everyone.

The 55 Topps AA are great cards! Ive got a couple of them, Charlie Choo-Choo Justice and Andy Bershak as they are both Tar Heels.

54 Topps are great but I like the 55 Topps more. Got a couple of decent rookies in there too by the name of Killebrew, Koufax, and Clemente!

[arexcrooke]

I was always under the [mis?]impression that perhaps some of the topps higher #s were short printed....

 

Topps baseball cards were printed in series of 88 cards in the fifties and through at least the mid-sixties. The last series was indeed short printed compared with the earlier ones, quite simply because most kids had lost interest by then so had stopped buying!

 

Worse yet, retailers would end up over ordering the first few series and would then end up stuck with a box of unsold packs. Until that box was sold, they wouldn't order any more cards, meaning the subsequent series. So in my neck of the woods, a kid couldn't even find any cards beyond the third series (#264) for several straight years from 1962 onward! Very frustrating!

 

If you check the pricing in the catalogue of a large dealer such as Kit Young Cards, the relative scarcity of the high numbers is reflected in higher asking prices.

 

The last year Topps produced series for were 1973. And that is exactly why some of the unknown commons from the higher series bring big money. They just arent there in quantity as the others. In comics it would be like an issue in a run being tougher than the ones around it for whatever reason. Say black border, brown border like Avengers 93, or for no damned good reason like Thor 168.

Im working on a 1966 Topps set and there are some cards in the 5th series that are very tough. Also, Aaron is a high number, McCovey, Gaylord perry, and a few others.

Lemme get my thoughts together and I will explain how some cards are short prints and others are regular or double prints.

[arexcrooke]

I was always under the [mis?]impression that perhaps some of the topps higher #s were short printed, but looking at ebay results for a random sampling of PSA 9s it seems that prices attained are perhaps very card specific and not just about star power. Are there some cards that are just "harder" to find in PSA 9 (and a psa census to back it up?). For example, a 75 topps Nettles (#160) goes for $19.95 and then a horacio pina (139) goes for $148. I've never heard of Pina, Nettles was almost a HOFer. The numbering is pretty close. Is Pina (and jose cardenal (#15)..admitttedly a decent player -- $140, borgmann (127) - $255, Driessen (133) - $163) a notoriously short-printed card? (I'm guessing no on Pina given a PSA 8 commands about $5-$8, Cardenal is about $12, Borgman is $10, ) Just impossible to get in psa 9? If short-printed, does Becketts point that out or is it just something that has become apparent via PSA? Or the MVP duo cards...#208 Powell/Bench is $328, most of the others in the 190s/200s other than the Mantle/Newcombe are $20-$40 or so. Is the Powell card rarer?

 

Sorry if this sounds naive, I really do just buy these vintage cards for fun and for names I've heard of and almost never spend more than $1 each.

 

Not at all naive, haven't much time for a proper reply now, but will later! Basically your observation about a perfect card of an unknown major leaguer is dead on, its driven by set registry mentality, with people (some with deep pockets) in competition to collect certified "perfect" examples for a given set. Some cards will turn out to be pretty difficult to impossible to find without some sort of inherent flaw -- their certified population remains low -- and demand for the few perfect extant examples drives prices up.

 

Overall, mid 70s cards are extremely plentiful, with some exceptions, and basically starting with '71s and back, you'll see stronger prices for cards approaching perfection. To take an example, a '65 topps Carlton rookie in very collectible PSA 6 grade, is notably cheaper than it was a few years ago; but the same card in a PSA 9 would garner a very strong and growing price still.

 

Another example I can think of is a 1960 topps set -- a very nice one, with a typical range of cards in VG-EX to EX-MT and a few in NM, with the stars all at least decent, could try to find a price anywhere from $1800-$3000, depending on the balance of grades. A few years ago, some registry set owner sold his 1960 topps set, with nothing lower than PSA 8, about 30% of the set in PSA 9, and 3 perfect PSA 10s, including the only PSA 10 '60 Koufax, sold for better than $225,000. Grade makes quite a difference!

 

my local shop busts out pre-76 boxes every now and then...football and baseball...and makes them 50 cents. there will be stars mixed in there. i i get first crack at them they really do look pretty sharp...nice corners, etc. like they really haven't been messed with, straight out of a pack. i wonder why he doesn't send them in when they're this sharp looking? does psa do a 9 pre-screen? i could see how 7 and 8s would be money losers though.

When he does ill take every Schmidt, Munson, and Catfish he has.

[hockey&comicsguy]

A lot of folks won't like these b/c of the very minimalist style, but that's exactly what I love about the 61 Parkhurst.

 

[Shootydog]

A lot of folks won't like these b/c of the very minimalist style, but that's exactly what I love about the 61 Parkhurst.

 

 

hmm..Now I'm craving Timbits.

[hockey&comicsguy]

 

That's what I hate about sport card collectors these days - the collecting of only the stars. When it came to collecting cards as a kid, I was a completist. I went after the whole set, and that's still the way I think it should be.

 

 

 

 

My five favourite Topps baseball sets are the 1954, 1959, 1960, 1963 and 1965, Different strokes for different folks i guess....

 

 

 

The 54's are wonderful cards too. Personally I just think the horizontally oriented cards look better. Just a personal preference really.

 

As for different collecting habits, I was never a completionist. I couldn't stand opening pack after pack to only get doubles and triples of Cory Snyder or Oil Can Boyd for pete's sake. I wanted Mattingly, Boggs, Schmidt, etc....

 

I remember when I was about 10 my mom bought me a hockey almanac and I was immediately drawn to photos of very old players like Maurice Richard, Terry Sawchuk, Boom Boom Geoffrion. I guess I just appreciated the older stuff. From that point on I would go to the card shop looking for older cards of star players. Since I also loved baseball of course I started looking into guys like Williams, Koufax, Musial, etc.....Long before my time but I just had a love for players of historic significance.

 

Completing sets was never a goal of mine. I just wanted players I liked.

[hockey&comicsguy]

hmm..Now I'm craving Timbits.

 

[Brian48]

Man. Looking at that '58-59 Hockey set is bringing teatrs to my eyes. I had the Hull rookie. It, along with alot of other vintage cards, was stolen when my house was burglarized back in '96. It would have graded a PSA 7 if not an 8 if I still had it today.

[arexcrooke]

A lot of folks won't like these b/c of the very minimalist style, but that's exactly what I love about the 61 Parkhurst.

 

Nice looking cards!

They remind me of the minimalism of the 1957 Topps.

[arexcrooke]

All-americans rock! Love them, and '54 Topps too for that matter (very colorful) but I still like '56 Topps too! As Hepcat notes, something for everyone.

 

If you back me into a corner, these are my three favourite sports card sets for a combination of aesthetic reasons and nostalgia:

 

1958-59 Topps Hockey

 

 

My own:

 

 

1959 Baseball

 

 

My own:

 

 

 

1959 CFL

 

My own:

 

 

 

 

 

[thirdgreenham]

You could have smiled.

[thirdgreenham]

Hey Arex,

 

Where's a good suggestion for selling some old ball cards. I've got a handful of 52 Topps cards that my friend's dad wants me to sell for him. If these go well, there's a good deal more.

 

Have you heard of Bill Goodwin's auction? I've used it before when I sold a near complete set of 1923 Maple Crispettes, but I get the feeling that they're mostly for higher end material. I haven't even thought about eBay, I suppose I should do a basic scan and see how they're selling there.

 

Andy

[arexcrooke]

Just sent you a PM Andy

[HOTFLIPS]

shoot ill buy them.

[arexcrooke]

There is always that option too.

Id love to know what he has as there are specific players I collect.

 

[HOTFLIPS]

 

That's what I hate about sport card collectors these days - the collecting of only the stars. When it came to collecting cards as a kid, I was a completist. I went after the whole set, and that's still the way I think it should be.

 

 

 

 

My five favourite Topps baseball sets are the 1954, 1959, 1960, 1963 and 1965, Different strokes for different folks i guess....

 

 

 

The 54's are wonderful cards too. Personally I just think the horizontally oriented cards look better. Just a personal preference really.

 

As for different collecting habits, I was never a completionist. I couldn't stand opening pack after pack to only get doubles and triples of Cory Snyder or Oil Can Boyd for pete's sake. I wanted Mattingly, Boggs, Schmidt, etc....

 

I remember when I was about 10 my mom bought me a hockey almanac and I was immediately drawn to photos of very old players like Maurice Richard, Terry Sawchuk, Boom Boom Geoffrion. I guess I just appreciated the older stuff. From that point on I would go to the card shop looking for older cards of star players. Since I also loved baseball of course I started looking into guys like Williams, Koufax, Musial, etc.....Long before my time but I just had a love for players of historic significance.

 

Completing sets was never a goal of mine. I just wanted players I liked.

 

So the era when you wer ten years old is what?? Like 1932??

[HOTFLIPS]

 

That's what I hate about sport card collectors these days - the collecting of only the stars. When it came to collecting cards as a kid, I was a completist. I went after the whole set, and that's still the way I think it should be.

 

 

 

 

My five favourite Topps baseball sets are the 1954, 1959, 1960, 1963 and 1965, Different strokes for different folks i guess....

 

 

 

The 54's are wonderful cards too. Personally I just think the horizontally oriented cards look better. Just a personal preference really.

 

As for different collecting habits, I was never a completionist. I couldn't stand opening pack after pack to only get doubles and triples of Cory Snyder or Oil Can Boyd for pete's sake. I wanted Mattingly, Boggs, Schmidt, etc....

 

I remember when I was about 10 my mom bought me a hockey almanac and I was immediately drawn to photos of very old players like Maurice Richard, Terry Sawchuk, Boom Boom Geoffrion. I guess I just appreciated the older stuff. From that point on I would go to the card shop looking for older cards of star players. Since I also loved baseball of course I started looking into guys like Williams, Koufax, Musial, etc.....Long before my time but I just had a love for players of historic significance.

 

Completing sets was never a goal of mine. I just wanted players I liked.

 

So the era when you wer ten years old is what?? Like 1932??

 

Oh, forgot the and the

[arexcrooke]

:hail:

how many of those UD sealed sets you got?

[HOTFLIPS]

I have to look. Havent been to my parents summer house in a while. Thats where i keep them. Have to go up there when i have a chance.