Collectors of baseball cards striking out

[lemonman5]

Boy that card show looked depressing! Think NYCC or SDCC will ever look like that?

 

No way!

 

NYCC and C2E2 are getting bigger every year. On the Sunday of NYCC, I couldn't even walk the floor. There were too many people. I see no reason that it should ever reduce in size. Geeks aren't a dying breed, like card collectors.

[Designer Toast]

Sports cards do well here from what I've seen. The big fear of our hobby was that the kids would not be around. So not the case from I'm seeing locally and at the three or four shows I hit each year. A lot of younger readers/collectors asking for stuff like old school Hero for Hire, Justice League, horror books. The scenery looks good to me at this point

 

In spite of online gaming, cellphones, and the rest of it, I'm seeing a lot of younger readers at shows popping up with mom and dad in tow. I thinks comics will survive either which way.

[MasterChief]

There are some comparisons that come out of that, but for the most part it's still apples to oranges. I do see that happening over the longer term, but comics aren't nearly as abundant as cards and have more appeal than just nostalgia.

 

+1

 

The news piece was dead-on about the baseball card hobby. I was a huge collector back in the 70s and 80s, and then got back in during the early 2000s. I soon recognized that the hobby was not the same, for many of the same reasons identified in this broadcast.

 

I then got back into comics in 2003 and I'm still here. It really is apples and oranges, though there are some relevant comparisons.

I challenge all of you to pick up the book referred to in that news clip, Mint Condition, How Baseball Cards Became an American Obsession, by Dave Jamieson (2010).

 

Read that book and you'll formulate a completely different opinion. The historical events that have transpired between the two hobbies is strikingly in parallel...

[NewWorldOrder]

There are some comparisons that come out of that, but for the most part it's still apples to oranges. I do see that happening over the longer term, but comics aren't nearly as abundant as cards and have more appeal than just nostalgia.

 

+1

 

The news piece was dead-on about the baseball card hobby. I was a huge collector back in the 70s and 80s, and then got back in during the early 2000s. I soon recognized that the hobby was not the same, for many of the same reasons identified in this broadcast.

 

I then got back into comics in 2003 and I'm still here. It really is apples and oranges, though there are some relevant comparisons.

I challenge all of you to pick up the book referred to in that news clip, Mint Condition, How Baseball Cards Became an American Obsession, by Dave Jamieson (2010).

 

Read that book and you'll formulate a completely different opinion. The historical events that have transpired between the two hobbies is strikingly in parallel...

 

The only thing parallel about the two hobbies was the speculation in the 1990's and that is about it.

 

Photography vs art/story telling

 

Nothing close in comparison what so ever.

 

In the mid-90's I had to give up collecting one because I could only afford one hobby. I chose comic books for this main reason. I didn't have to worry about Spider-man batting .300.

 

To be honest I thought sports cards were pretty much dead 15 years ago.

 

I am glad in 1994 when I was 14 it occurred to me sports cards might be the most worthless thing to collect possible. I am still not sure to this day why I ever thought collecting a picture of some sports d-bag with their stats on the back of a card was somehow fun.

 

The with the progression of the internet you can now see countless up to date stats/pictures of your favorite sports figure rendering sports cards pointless. The internet has really hurt the collectability of sports cards while I feel the internet has only fueled the comic book back issue market upward.

 

Comic books in one form or another will be around well after I leave this earth while sports cards I thought were already dead by the year 1999.

 

Every comic show I see many kids under the age of 18 pointing out to their friends about seeing the AF 15, TOS 39, FF 1 on the wall.

 

Either by comic books, toys, anime, movies, or video games little kids will know who spider-man , batman , or the X-men are making the back issue market on the desirable issues are in demand.

 

Comparing comic books to sports cards is very much apples & oranges.

[shadroch]

The market for older cards is still red-hot. Shows like the one seen are obsolete. Why go to a show when anything you want is on the internet.

.Last year I sold an almost complete set of 1965 to 1969 Topps and got well above guide for it from a dealer. Had I broken it up and sold the sets by the year, I'd have gotten much more, but I needed to raise fast cash, and had bought it for a pittance just a few months earlier.

Post 1980 baseball cards are worth as much as 1990s comics, but 1940s thru the 1970s still sell. I have no idea if cards or comics will be worth anything in fifty years, but I'm fairly sure I won't be very active in the hobby by then anyway.

[chromium]

How's the market these days for the rarest cards ? The Honus Wagner, Mickey Mantle rookie card, the Shoeless Joe etc... Have those values tumbled as well, or are the very best cards still holding their own ?

[Whizzer]

As one thread on this subject peters out another begins.

 

Paging PulpGuide and Bedrock...

 

The funny thing about that video is that it almost made me want to start collecting Baseball cards, a sport I know nothing about and isn't even really played in my country

 

It's just the collector in me. Show me cool old stuff made of paper or card and the antennae just start twitching

[Chespirito]

I wish it would hurry upand die so I can start buying the comics I love for pennies in the dollar.

 

 

Good ol' boys will be drinkin' whiskey and rye

And all the Famous Funnies I will be able to buy

Buy buy

Swiss or 'Merican I will be able to buy

 

 

I said: Buy Buy, I'll be able to buy

 

 

[Chespirito]

How's the market these days for the rarest cards ? The Honus Wagner, Mickey Mantle rookie card, the Shoeless Joe etc... Have those values tumbled as well, or are the very best cards still holding their own ?

The 1932 rookie card of famed "one-tooth" McKenzy sold for 700$ on Cardauctions.com two weeks ago and the coveted 1933 Patrick "two-bit" Mahoney sold for 1200$ on the James Sheward 'Bid-Zone' on Saturday.

[mintcollector]

Can this happen to the comic book market

When all of this...

is commonly stored and enjoyed on one of these...

it's probably going to impact both hoarding and back issue markets.

 

Keep in mind that you can say this about the video game hobby as well. Thanks to the Wii Virtual Console, the Playstation Network, and Xbox Live; I can hold my entire vintage video game collection on one memory card.

 

I believe that the baseball card market is nothing like the comic book market. Comic books are a part of pop culture history; as many have said before. Sports cards are an acquired taste. Something we all tried while passing through a period of time we call youth. I do not like sports, but for a while I collected baseball cards. Luckily, I saw what was coming and sold at the height of the market. I never had an emotional attachment to those items.

 

Respectfully,

 

'mint'

[cbcnow]

I agree, that card show looked very depressing! However I do not think that NYCC or SDCC will every look like that.

 

What the card companies did in the 90`s and 2000`s to the card industry has caused a major impact on today`s card market. The card makers were competing against each other so much and getting more and more creative with their special insert packs that I believe it actually backfired.

 

A good majority of collectors lots of them kids began purchasing those packs for the special inserts in hopes of getting that special 1 of a 1000 or 1 of a 100 insert card. Some card makers were offering a 1 of 1 insert which had potential of being worth $10,000 or more. Those packs ended up being purchased more so as lottery tickets in hopes of getting that $1000 to $10,000 special insert card verses being purchased for hobby reasons, like getting that special player or for the fun of putting together a complete set.

 

Once those packs were purchased and opened and if they didn`t contain a special insert or any insert whatsoever a majority of the kids/collectors tossed the whole pack of cards in the garbage or gave them away because the pack did not contain an insert. Those packs cost anywhere from $3 to $20 per pack.

 

It is almost the same as when someone purchases a lottery ticket, if it is a no winner it gets tossed. In time I believe this diverted collectors from purchasing these packs due to how expensive each pack was and the fact that if the pack did not contain an insert card the rest of the cards really didn`t matter.

 

Within a short period of time most of those inserts that everyone was buying the packs for dropped in value quite drastically making the collectors and investors really feel like they got the short end of the stick. It turned out to be for the most part a lose lose situation.

 

Of course times have changed and technology has advanced allowing kids to do things that were non existent in the 90`s and even in the 2000`s which I`m sure has attributed to some of the changes in the card collecting hobby. However I do feel that a major factor in how today`s card market has changed is a reflection from the sales of the insert packs. The hobby for the most part was stripped away as more and more collectors purchased those packs in hopes of getting that special valuable insert card which led them to eventually forget or just stop caring about the hobby part of actually collecting cards for cards and not for the inserts. Saying all that I do enjoy cards very much and I wish the best for the card market.

 

As far as comics I believe they are here to stay. People may argue that kids of today are not into comics because of video games, texting, iphones etc.

But that does not mean that they will not be collectors or dealers of comics in their later years. A lot of us comic collectors enjoy, collect and sell older comics that we had no idea about as growing up. It could very easily be the same for today`s kids. Also for the most part comics over the years continue increase in value which gets and has gotten the interest of many people, and now with several different comics selling for over a million dollars the comic topic is hard to avoid.

 

The million dollar comic sales have already brought many speculators and investors into the comic market. These speculators and investors will continue to grow as more and more record breaking comic sales occur. In time some of those speculators and investors will gain a passion for comics as most of us have here on the boards.

 

I have been dealing with comics for almost 35 years and I have never once felt that the comic market was gonna come to an end or is slowly coming to an end! There is too much passion, history and money involved!

 

 

 

 

 

 

[ComicConnoisseur]

It was a pretty poor report by CBS. That baseball card show was a hole in the wall. That`s like me going to a local comic show with a camcorder around my area and showing just a bunch of dealers set up waiting for collectors to show up. The National drew 30,000 fans last year. Sure it`s not like the heydays of the 1990`s, but what is?The quality vintage baseball cards are still in demand and mass produced cards are undesirable. If you do a completed Ebay search you will find cards like Babe Ruth,Mickey Mantle and Ted Williams constantly sell in the thousands. For every one Walking Dead modern comic that sells in the thousands there are at least 5 to 10 hot modern chase sports cards going in the thousands. Baseball set attendance records last year.Everytime I went to sold-out Fenway Park I saw thousands of young people and women rooting the Red Sox on.The best way to sum up the CBS news report is how after they said baseball card collecting was dead that they ended their piece with the news that a T-206 Wagner sold for $2.8M.

[chrisco37]

Baseball is dead.

[Brian48]

I think its already happening, although the decline is not as pronounced as it is in the sports card hobby. i don't see an ounce of interest with any of my kids or their friends. My son would rather play Batman on his PC than read it in a comic.

 

When I think back, we didn't have the internet, video games, or cable TV as kids. Comics and Baseball cards (which I bought for the gum as well) were my escape from the monotony of chores and homework. Kids have more and better options today.

 

Plus, when was the last time you saw a spinner rack full of books at your local convenient store?

[ComicConnoisseur]

Baseball is dead.

Tell that to Yankee,Phillies and Red Sox fans.

[namisgr]

Baseball is dead.

 

Phils sold out 81 of 81 home games last season.

[vacliff]

Boy that card show looked depressing! Think NYCC or SDCC will ever look like that?

 

No way!

 

NYCC and C2E2 are getting bigger every year. On the Sunday of NYCC, I couldn't even walk the floor. There were too many people. I see no reason that it should ever reduce in size. Geeks aren't a dying breed, like card collectors.

 

Yes, but don't forget the growth has nothing to do with comics.

[the420kid]

Baseball is dead.

 

Phils sold out 81 of 81 home games last season.

 

 

+1

[chrisco37]

Baseball is dead.

tell that to Yankee,Phillies and Red Sox fans.

 

Everyone likes a winner.

 

It used to be the biggest sport in the country. Now it's #3 at best.

 

There are way too many games. It's boring to watch (it is fun to go to a game though). It's been so plagued with scandal and cheating.

 

 

[steveinthecity]

I prefer the scandal and corruption of the NCAA much more than the pro leagues.