Baseball cards

[Mik 0]

Al, if you think this isn't sports related enough and want to move it to general chat, please do.

 

Anyone still collect baseball cards? I gave it up in the mid 90s, but this summer I wasn't planning on working, but found myself short of cash. My cousin works for Topps trading cards, and she got me a job in the autograph department. It was pretty amazing seeing autographed cards of all the greatest players on a daily basis, including some dandies like the 2000 Bowman Chrome Pujols Rookie that is booking for $1000.

 

So, based on that I'm back into it. I've had some great cards pass through my hands since I got back into it. I mostly collect baseball, but the one basketball box I bought had a LeBron James gold parallel rookie /25 that I sold on eBay for $480. That was pretty sweet.

 

I, as you can imagine, only mostly collect Marlins cards, and have accumulated about 12 Miguel Cabrera autographs, most notably his 00 Traded Auto rookie that is currently worth $350. I think it will end up around $1000 or more though, just like the Pujols.

 

So anyone still collect? It's a way different hobby now, and most good boxes cost over $100. More expensive, but you're more likely to get great cards. I'd be interested to hear from some people who still do.

[Guest Staravenger]

Yes and No. I collect baseball cards (and basketball cards) as a hobby, but I'm not obsessed with getting expensive cards.

 

Every now and then I'll buy a box set or two of Topps and Upperdeck, check through them, put them away for years. I've been collecting since as far back as I could remember, and I have sets going back to 1988, but didn't start collecting until I got into baseball (around 91-92).

 

I gave them up in 96-98 because I was interested more in basketball, but then started doing both. I probably have a bunch of good cards packed away (my collection is only 8,000 cards though) but since I buy complete set boxes, most of them are average players with no worth.

 

Last I checked over my collection, it's dominated with a shit load of New York Yankees and Los Angeles Dodgers (probably just random luck).

[the max 0]

I have a box of probably over 1,000 of them, but I'd have to sort through it to find anything of value.

 

My valuable cards are in a folder in my closet.

[razazteca 0]

I have a collection of cards primary of 90s basketball, 80s football and baseball.

[Slingshot Suplex 0]

I have a ton of hockey cards. Haven't done a lot of collecting in the last year...primarily cause it's hard to find decent hockey in southern Missouri. But I'm hoping to do a set or two over the winter.

[EVIL~! alkeiper 0]

Al, if you think this isn't sports related enough and want to move it to general chat, please do.

 

I think this is an acceptable topic for the Sports forum.

 

I stopped collecting several years ago. The card industry has become too money-driven, and there's no fun in it anymore. When I was young they had cello packs you could buy and get about 40 cards for $1.50. Nowadays its $2-4 (or more) or eight or ten cards. I still have the cards I had as a kid though.

 

I did, however, find an Ozzie Smith rookie card a few weeks ago on Ebay for just $12. Easily the greatest card purchase I have ever made.

[Guest Brian]

I've mostly given up, but I still surf E-Bay. Three weeks ago, I picked up a Yaz graded rookie card for fifteen dollars.

[Guest Staravenger]

When I was young they had cello packs you could buy and get about 40 cards for $1.50.  Nowadays its $2-4 (or more) or eight or ten cards.  I still have the cards I had as a kid though.

Those were the days. A 15 or so pack of Topps in 1991 was like $0.90. Now an 8 pack is $1.99. Thats why I mainly buy the boxed ones and not individual packs unless they are super cheap.

[razazteca 0]

I remember the good ol days when a pack of Donruss card cost 40 cents and the day when Upper Deck became the 1st "premium" card selling for the expensive $1 a pack.

[Guest Staravenger]

I remember getting yelled at for spending $2.50 on a pack of Topps Stadium Clubs in 92 or 93. I think that was the first time I bought an "expensive" pack of baseball cards.

[Mik 0]

For comparison purposes, 03/04 Upper Deck Exquisite Basketball was selling for upwards of $800 a pack earlier this year.

 

Of course, this same set yielded a LeBron/Kobe dual NBA logo card 1/1 that sold on eBay for $65,000. And no, that is not a typo.

[kkktookmybabyaway 0]

I have a shitload of baseball, football, basketball and hockey cards from when I used to collect them. I quit collecting in the early 1990s when the hobby stopped being fun for me. I'm going to re-catalog them in the near future...

[Youth N Asia 0]

Slingshot Suplex has some sick hockey cards.

 

I used to buy a lot of packs and collect and whatnot. I don't think I've bought a pack of cards in a couple of years now. It was fun for a while, but they've priced me out of it.

 

The best cards I ever had

 

Basketball:

 

From a pack of SP Authentics I pulled a redemption card for a signed Penny Hardaway Jersey (worth like $500 at the time). Also got a Duncan rookie from the same pack.

 

Hockey:

 

I bought an old box (like 98-99) of some Pacific brand and for a $200 Heading for the Hall Gretzky...although last I looked Beckett didn't even list the set anymore. My favorite card was a completly mint OPC Yzerman rookie, I had cards worth more, but I liked that one the best.

 

Baseball:

 

I have sets up Topps 85-91 complete. My dad put them together and gave them to me years ago. And the 86, 87, and 89 include the traded sets. I bought packs but don't think I ever pulled any great baseball cards.

 

Football:

 

I had a friggin 76 Topps Payton rookie...and sold it a week before he died. It went from $160 to $225 in no time. Best card I ever pulled was a numbered to 50 Payton Manning card, worth a couple hundred.

[kkktookmybabyaway 0]

I guess my most valuable cards regarding $ are a rookie Lawrence Taylor/Jerry Rice (topps) and Barry Sanders (score) cards, however, I don't care what they're "worth" because I'm never selling my cards -- they're my little piece of history...

[Cuban Linx 0]

I still have a ton of basketball cards laying around from the early to mid-90's, the most notable of which was some uber-fancy Michael Jordan card that was worth $500 or so back then (though that's in Australian money, so probably a fair bit less in $US). Other than that i never seemed to get many valuable cards, though i probably have cards of every no-name NBA jobber from that period that maybe 5 people remember.

[Slingshot Suplex 0]

Slingshot Suplex has some sick hockey cards.

 

Hockey:

 

I bought an old box (like 98-99) of some Pacific brand and for a $200 Heading for the Hall Gretzky...although last I looked Beckett didn't even list the set anymore. My favorite card was a completly mint OPC Yzerman rookie, I had cards worth more, but I liked that one the best.

That Gretzky , if it's the one I'm thinking of, books at $80 now. It's in the Beckett Hockey Card Plus magazine.

[Guest Olympic Slam]

I quit collecting hockey and baseball when I was like 12. The whole hobby scene got outrageous in terms of price.

 

My dad used to have no problem buying me packs upon packs of Topps cards in 90' and 91' for like a buck each. But when Upper Deck came along and the Stadium Club crap started up, that was the beginning of the end for me. It was just too much for too little. And all the chase cards really cheapened the experience of just collecting regular team sets and players. My last attempt at collecting baseball cards was in 93' or 94' when I went to every store in my town and bought ALL of their Mike Piazza rookie cards before everyone figured out how good he was. That was a lot of fun.

 

Oh and did anyone collect those E-motion hockey cards from the mid 90's? I have a near full set and those things were FUCKING expensive. It was like 5 bucks a pack for 8 cards. But the cards were really thick and sweet to look at. Heh, they're prolly worthless now.

[kkktookmybabyaway 0]

That's exactly why I stopped collecting.

 

Back in my day it was 50 cents for a pack of 15-20. I was on the edge of when they put that crappy gum in each pack, and I didn't miss it.

 

I could deal with paying $1-1.50 for many of those packs in the early '90s, but when they started jewing (omg anti-Semite) me out of cards per pack that's when I decided there were better things to waste my money on...

[Guest Staravenger]

When a pack of 5 cards costs more than an issue of Sports Illustrated, something is wrong.

[Mik 0]

To defend, there is one great thing about collecting baseball cards now. The chance to get an autographed card or a relic card (game used bat/jersey/shoe/batting glove/hat/jacket or any combination of the above) in a pack is way increased.

 

It's fun to open a pack of cards and pull out an autograph, no matter who it is. I still get excited to pull an auto.

 

And 2004 Upper Deck SP Authentic has a price retail of 5.99 per pack and 2 guaranteed autos in a box. So there are still some cheaper options to get some great cards.

[Guest Staravenger]

I was kinda happy the last time I bought a box of MLB's. I got a card with a piece of a game worn John Olerud jersey. Of course, he's not really a GREAT player, but I still was glad about it.

[yankovic fan 0]

Thread bumping is a bit of a pet peeve of mine, but this post is relevant to the thread. With that stated, I have a very pressing series of questions.

 

How does everyone organize their cards? When I was younger, I kept them by sets but as my set grew and I never really collected a specific set, my collection got VERY disorganized. Then around high school, the girl I was seeing took all my stuff home with her, and organized it all by teams for me.

 

So thats pretty much been my method. The only thing is every now and then I run into trouble. Like what do I do with Houston Oilers? Do I put them in their own binder or do I put them with the Titans? Or maybe the Texans?

Same with the Montreal Expos/Washington Nationals.

 

And what about REALLY old teams like say the New York Senators (baseball)?

 

And then what about undrafted rookie cards that never made teams? I currently just have a generic binder for rookie cards that I don't know the team that drafted them (if they got drafted). What about cards with different players on them? Checklists?

 

Heck the pharmacy has grab bag cards with a superstar on the front and back sandwiching a bunch of crap like "The greatest football players from the University of Washington!" What do I do with all of that? (aside from the obvious stop buying cards from Walgreens - I learned my lesson)

 

And what do you do with your really valuable cards? I mostly keep anything above 4 bucks in a top loader seperate from my general collection of binders. But some jersey cards and the like are too thick for a top loader. What should I do then?

 

HELP!!!!

[CanadianGuitarist 0]

I sold mine all a couple years ago, save my Gretzkys. Number nine on my 'bucket list' is to collect them all before I die, or at least what's listed in Beckett. I've got I think 81 right now. There's probably about 250 or 300, which I think is possible thanks to Ebay. Before Ebay, part of me knew (and at least still thinks somewhat), that I'm gonna wind up selling them someday. I probably will, but I'll make a run at it.

 

I don't have any order to them per se, just chronological. I don't think they're arranged by year in anyway.

[KingPK 0]

I don't have too much and I really haven't touched them in a while, but I just sort them by sport and series if I have a lot of cards from the same one. I don't think I've bought a pack or individual cards in 10 years or so. I might bite the bullet and pay for Beckett's online guide to see if I have anything good (I doubt it).

[TheDevilAndGodAreRagingInsideMe 0]

I was at Camden Yards on September 11, 2004.

 

And I stopped collected baseball cards around 5th grade, but still have all of them in stashed boxes and binders in my room.

[kkktookmybabyaway 0]

I'm going to re-catalog them in the near future...

 

Still haven't done so.

 

My cards are still in a green bin in my closet.

 

 

If memory serves, I think I had them divided by sport and had them sorted by year. After that, each year's set would be sorted by card number. Many sets had players grouped by teams anyway, so getting players in the proper "order" wasn't hard to do.

[JHawk 0]

I've still got most of my cards, but I stopped collecting in the early 90s. It got to be over a dollar a pack and just wasn't worth it to me anymore.

[Vampiro69 0]

I had my cards organized by brand and by year. Football cards were kept in a seperate box, same as my basketball and baseball cards. That was done with my common cards though. For players that I like, I kept them in binders.

 

I still can't believe that I have a collection of over 350 Thurman Thomas and 100 Aeneas Williams cards.

 

[LivingLegendGaryColeman 0]

I had gotten back into collecting basketball cards again in recent years but have not really picked any up in a while. In the past year, I picked up one box of this year's Topps just to snag some of the rookies and happened to get a 1:3,000 packs Adam Morrison autograph in the box.

[Smartly Pretty 0]

Before Lebron James played his first game, I bought his McFarlane's Sports action figure for 12.99. Last time I checked it's worth 80 dollars now. Hopefully that continues to rise.