Companies that deal in collectibles and graded sports cards have to remain dispassionate. After all, this is a business. What might knock over the average collector has to be treated as an investment by a company. Handling a graded Honus Wagner T-206 card would make an ordinary collector tremble -- a friend got to hold one at last year's National, and he confessed that his … [Read more...]
Excerpt: The Card Removal Effect
Editor’s Note: What follows is a second (edited) excerpt from Jeff’s book, The Modern Baseball Card Investor. The first excerpt, The Four Basic Types of Ungraded Strategies, can be found here. The concept of card removal is exceptionally important to understand, as it is fundamental to multiple expansion in graded cards – that is, the spread in value between graded BGS 9.5 … [Read more...]
Graded Babe Ruth Cards You Can Own Without Going Broke
Early in 2014 one of the higher-end products from the Topps Company was released to the baseball hobby. 2014 Topps Museum Baseball was released for its third season, and it wanted the collecting public to know that it would continue to focus on high-end hits. Indeed, every pack promised either an autograph or a relic card with four-pack boxes promising an autographed relic, an … [Read more...]
Editor’s Blog: News & Notes in a Rapidly Vaporizing Year
2013 is winding down and tomorrow we will unveil the first-ever Mikey Awards. Compiled by our own erstwhile columnist Mike Fruitman of Mike’s Stadium Sports Cards, the Mikeys will sort out the good, the bad, the ugly and everything in between from the sports card product releases of the past 12 months (and, as usual, there were plenty to open). Mikeys will be handed out for … [Read more...]
8 Great Ways to Be a Smarter Collector
There are so many different ways to participate in the sports card and memorabilia hobby, sometimes it's easy for your brain to go on overload. From vintage cards and sets to game worn material, autographs, the latest parallels from card company sets, rookie cards, team issues. If you can name it, you can collect it. It's easy to go overboard or worse yet, have a collection … [Read more...]
Vintage Baseball Sets With the Most High Grade Cards
Not everyone chases high grade baseball card sets, but for those who do, some are easier to obtain than others. A recent look at the PSA Population Report for 1950s, 60s and 70s Topps cards reveals plenty of disparity in the percentage of straight NM/MT (8) cards compared to the total number of cards that have been encapsulated. We chose the '8' grade for the 1950s and 60s … [Read more...]