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I collected a LOT of baseball cards back in the 90s when I was in Jr High and High school. Funny thing was, I thought they would eventually be worth something. They were all in boxes or binders. I lugged those damn things around for 15 years before I finally gave them away. We are talking tens of thousands of cards that weren't worth the cardboard they were printed on.
The funny thing is, during this time, I also played a card game called Magic The Gathering. When I played, I thought it would just be a fad and eventually everyone would get bored and stop playing. Well, the game is stronger than ever and all those cards I had from the early 90s are worth a small fortune. No exaggeration, but if I still had the collection that I sold in the late 90s, it would be about 30 grand. I sold them in the late 90s for a few hundred bucks and at that time, I thought I was ripping the guy off.
Good point about magic cards. I was in a Barnes and Noble in the Denver area a couple months ago, went to the hobbies section, and browsed through the Magic cards price guide. Yes, lots of those cards are 50 dollars and up. A good friend of mine done real well with magic cards for a long time until he sold his business.
One of the things that really hurt the baseball card industry was the 1994 MLB strike. The Denver area didn't quite see the impact of store closings than other parts of the country where cities had card stores in, but there still were a few stores that shut down. I think the fact that the Colorado Rockies was just starting out kind of helped there.
The one thing that saved some of those stores was that those stores also carried a ton of other product; ball caps, flags, pennants, t-shirts, jerseys, and other baseball related items. PLUS they had sizable football card inventory, particularly vintage cards. If those stores didn't, well.....
Good point about magic cards. I was in a Barnes and Noble in the Denver area a couple months ago, went to the hobbies section, and browsed through the Magic cards price guide. Yes, lots of those cards are 50 dollars and up. A good friend of mine done real well with magic cards for a long time until he sold his business.
One of the things that really hurt the baseball card industry was the 1994 MLB strike. The Denver area didn't quite see the impact of store closings than other parts of the country where cities had card stores in, but there still were a few stores that shut down. I think the fact that the Colorado Rockies was just starting out kind of helped there.
The one thing that saved some of those stores was that those stores also carried a ton of other product; ball caps, flags, pennants, t-shirts, jerseys, and other baseball related items. PLUS they had sizable football card inventory, particularly vintage cards. If those stores didn't, well.....
I forgot all about Magic cards. All my cards were from the Beta series because that's when I played. I gave my cards away about 10-15 years ago but I don't remember who I gave them to. Seems like they are now worth $10-100 EACH and a few are in the THOUSANDS like my Ancestral Recall, Tundra and Mox cards? That's my kids college tuition right there I hate you for bringing this realization on me.
I've still got a lot of sports cards and Magic cards from when I collected in the 90s. I've been trying to cut down on my sports cards, but will occasionally get some more. I've been meaning to start getting rid of some of the Magic cards, so I'm happy to hear their values have done well.
Nice to see posts about cards. I have been collecting since 1977, and never once collected for their worth. I have thousands now, completely organized by teams in their respective binders. It is quite relaxing to me to look through them, and regularly attend shows. I'm also fortunate to have a wife who honors, encourages, and supports my hobby.
It's funny, when I started collecting, you either bought a pack of Topps, or you didn't buy baseball cards. Now there's so many subsets within. It's enough to drive a player-collector nuts.
A funny memory. Back in the summer of 1989, I was in a card shop in Knoxville, Tennessee...looking at a complete set of Fleer or the all-new Upper Deck. My sixteen year old brain says no way am I plunking down the extra four dollars for the Upper Deck. The upside is, I traded the Fleer set to a friend for his air conditioner-sized box full of cards. Good recovery.
Nice to see posts about cards. I have been collecting since 1977, and never once collected for their worth. I have thousands now, completely organized by teams in their respective binders. It is quite relaxing to me to look through them, and regularly attend shows. I'm also fortunate to have a wife who honors, encourages, and supports my hobby.
It's funny, when I started collecting, you either bought a pack of Topps, or you didn't buy baseball cards. Now there's so many subsets within. It's enough to drive a player-collector nuts.
A funny memory. Back in the summer of 1989, I was in a card shop in Knoxville, Tennessee...looking at a complete set of Fleer or the all-new Upper Deck. My sixteen year old brain says no way am I plunking down the extra four dollars for the Upper Deck. The upside is, I traded the Fleer set to a friend for his air conditioner-sized box full of cards. Good recovery.
All the subsets is what got me to stop collecting sports cards (as well as comics, but that's a different story). I was a 16 year old kid working at McDonalds for minimum wage. No way could I afford to buy all these different types of packs of cards. I eventually stopped buying packs and only bought singles.
Funny thing is, I still have the singles from my favorite player back in the 90s. I have close to 200 different cards of him. It is Rickey Henderson and his rookie year was 1980. From 1980-95, they produced so many different cards of him, I couldn't keep up. It was simple in the 80s. Generally, there was Fleer, Topps, Donruss, Upper Deck in 89 and a few not as popular brands. This made for each player to only have 5 or so cards a year. Then the early 90s came out along with random inserts. Then sub sets came out like Fleer Ultra and Topps Finest. Then there were sub sets of the sub sets like Topps Finest Chrome. Anyways, you get the point. From a 16 year old perspective, it drove me nuts so I stopped collecting, but lugged all that crap with me.
I don't know much about baseball cards, but I collected basketball cards and Pokemon, yes, Pokemon cards (with my son when they first came out)
Recently I was selling the basketball cards, (on E Bay) I grouped them by player. Unless they are graded, I had best luck grouping them by player and selling them that way.
Now, the Pokemon cards on the other hand, they sell quickly and I got much better money for them then the basketball cards. I sold several single cards for 50.00, one for more. Many sales for 5 to 20 dollar cards. I still have a bunch of basketball cards, Shaq O Neal, Vince Carter, Jordan, Johnson, .. many more.
Hi HeadingtoDenver......I like Rickey, too.....in my opinion, he made for some of the coolest cards. The '83 Fleer is classic, and while I like him in a Yankee uniform, the old school colors of Oakland are the best. I do recall collecting the baseball sticker albums in school...and being driven nuts trying to get all six stickers to complete his head first slide picture lol. Dollar for the album, and a quarter for a pack...
I buy mainly singles, too....and the best, is the card show....I go regularly here in Connecticut...and there is always a ten cent box...with current stuff. Let them try and get the big money for all the short print and game used stuff...I prefer the classic approach.
Just another old card collector's opinion: the best way to understand the difference in book value vs. real value is to take a look at your local Craigslist collectibles by owner. In most cases, you'll see a lot of people unloading boxes of cards, nearly all after 1980 and often after 1990, the era of official glut. Keep watching; you'll see that no one buys them, and they appear again and again. My own inquiry is simple: how much you got before 1980? I can always heat my house with the post-1990 stuff, I reckon. Of course, most people selling the boxes assume there is Big Money Value in that box, and that they are giving up a fortune for a song. And it never occurs to them that if that were true, someone would have paid them by now what they asked.
Just another old card collector's opinion: the best way to understand the difference in book value vs. real value is to take a look at your local Craigslist collectibles by owner. In most cases, you'll see a lot of people unloading boxes of cards, nearly all after 1980 and often after 1990, the era of official glut. Keep watching; you'll see that no one buys them, and they appear again and again. My own inquiry is simple: how much you got before 1980? I can always heat my house with the post-1990 stuff, I reckon. Of course, most people selling the boxes assume there is Big Money Value in that box, and that they are giving up a fortune for a song. And it never occurs to them that if that were true, someone would have paid them by now what they asked.
This is very true. My wife and I were in an antique store a few weekends ago and I noticed an unopened box of 91 Upper Deck baseball packs. They wanted 10 bucks for the box and it was obvious that the box had been sitting there for a while because there was a layer of dust on it. I see the sealed complete sets all the time for the late 80s to the mid 90s and they generally go for 10-15 dollars a set. This is for a factory sealed set.
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I forgot all about Magic cards. All my cards were from the Beta series because that's when I played. I gave my cards away about 10-15 years ago but I don't remember who I gave them to. Seems like they are now worth $10-100 EACH and a few are in the THOUSANDS like my Ancestral Recall, Tundra and Mox cards? That's my kids college tuition right there 
I hate you for bringing this realization on me.
The upside is, I traded the Fleer set to a friend for his air conditioner-sized box full of cards. Good recovery.
