What's new

Baseball Cards

A while back I got a box from my mom that had one of my extra Wild Life Treasury (those of you who grew up in the 80's know what I'm talking about) containers full of my old baseball card collection. There were hundreds of cards dated between 1987-1991 when I collected cards. I finally bought a Beckett price guide and went through them.

I had various players that were worth a little coin including Don Mattingly, Mike Schmidt, Randy Johnson, and Tony Guinn.

The best I found was Curt Schilling's Donruss '89 rookie card. It just so happened that I have two of them. They come in at a whooping $4 a piece. I guess I can sell one now and wait a hundred or so years for the other one to go up. :biggrin: :wink:

It was fun going through them again after so many years, especially because my fiance's son had such a great time learning how to price cards and learning about all of the old players...

Any baseball card collectors here at B&B?
 
I stopped buying baseball cards in 94.. Got various factory sealed sets from the mid-80s and early 90's that may be able to buy me a tank of gas in 20 years? Mom has a shoebox full of dad's cards from the 60's that may be worth a little bit more. She's asked me to look in to selling them, but I refuse.
 

ouch

Stjynnkii membörd dummpsjterd
I recall when I was around ten years old I discovered that I had an uncanny ability to "flip" cards. This was the preferred method of gambling at the time- one kid would flip any number of cards, and to win, the second kid had to exactly match the number of heards and tails to win the pot. I couldn't miss, and I can still impress my impossible to impress kid by flipping an entire deck of playing cards all heads.
I once found a single card (okay, I "found" it in the spokes of someone's bicycle) and turned it into a pile of over 600. Of course, mom threw them all out at the end of the year. :mad:
 
I've got about 8,000 back at home in Indy. I very clearly remember when you were serious hot $--t if you had Griffey Jr, Canseco, Bo Jackson rookies. I had (and still have) them all. I collected when I was about 8 thru 14 or so. It's kind of depressing to see how much they're worth now, although I never got them as an investment, it was always nice to look back in the price guide during those years and see what some of the then-20+ year old cards were worth. But this was back when there were still only 5 or so "sets" put out per year, one for each major brand, and that was it. It seems like lately the sports card companies have really saturated the market with dozens of different gimmicky sets. Also kind of disappointing.
 
There were hundreds of cards dated between 1987-1991 when I collected cards.

You and I collected at about the same time. I flipped through a Beckett at a hobby store a few months back -- enough to come to the conclusion that a college fund for any children I have in the future does not seem to exist in my old bedroom at the parents' house! To make matters worse, I stubbornly ignored such newcomers as Upper Deck to stick with the venerable but massively over-produced Topps sets. Still, I wouldn't give up the enjoyment the hobby afforded during my "formative years" for anything. I recall using paper route money to buy one full case of card packs per season, opening one pack per week. Heck, I thought I was rich!:smile:
 
Like everything else, I guess they saw how much money they could make off of just a couple of sets and decided to go over board with sets. The prices on the cards from the era I was looking at had almost no middle ground. The cards were either up to $5-$6, or $50.

I collected Score, Fleer, Upper Deck, and Topps.
 
Interesting article that spells out why cards aren't worth more than they are today. They go on to visit what cards are actually worth compared to their book value.

http://www.sportscardfun.com/baseball-cards-value.asp

Pretty much states what we've stated here ( but goes on to say that kids used to play with their cards instead of treating them as an investment like we started doing in the 80s and 90s.
 
The few I have left are from the '50s. '56 Pee Wee Reese, '54 Duke Snider, my favorite '59 White Sox, a Frank Robinson rookie card from '54 (I think).
 
I collected cards back in the late 80's. I still have them, but have no illusions of them being worth anything.

I had an uncle that gave me his entire collection when I was about 7. It was a box full of cards from the 50's and 60's. My mom used to threaten me that she was going to throw them out if I didn't keep them picked up. I didn't, she did. I won't repeat the names on the cards, because it would just make me cry.

My friend and I found his uncles collection in a closet of his mom's house growing up. There were some amazing cards in the boxes. Unfortunately, they were all bound with rubber bands that had managed to slowly eat away at the cards over the decades they'd been sitting there.

I have a friend that paid his way through college with his card collection, so it's possible to make money of the hobby.
 
I collected cards from about 87-90. To be honest, all I wanted was that hard pink stick of bubblegum that came in the topps packs. The stuff was gross and rock hard after about a minute, but dang! I loved that stuff.
 
I still have mine up stairs. I think the earliest thing I have is '84. I even have the TMNT cards from the first movies, the X-Men cards and Desert Storm Cards
 
Not baseball related but I have hundreds of basketball cards. Baseball cards are usually worth more but I have tons of Michael Jordan cards, including a few mint rookie cards.
 

Doc4

Stumpy in cold weather
Staff member
Sooo ... they made hockey cards but with baseball players on them?? :001_huh:









... just think of all the mothers who could be sued by their sons for tossing out thousands of dollars worth of hockey cards, comic books, star wars stuff, &c. ...
 
I got boxes of them from the mid-80's. I was a grown man but it sure was fun going through them. They are probably not worth much but at the time I got my money's worth of enjoyment out of them. I still had a few from the early 70's at home. Even have a Robin Yount rookie card in a box out in the garage somewhere. Some day I'll just put the whole pile up on e-bay maybe.
 
I received my shop.mlb.com opening day catalog in the mail today.

On page 24, they have a selection of baseball cards.

Item "Q" on this page is "2008 Upper Deck Premier Baseball Trading Cards" and is described thusly: "1 pack with 7 cards per pack. Two autographs including one rookie autograph card per pack on average."

The price?

$299.00

What went wrong with the baseball card industry? Ladies and gentlemen, Exhibit A. :bored:
 
I recently helped clean out my old room a bit...Saw my old cards/hot wheels....MEMORIES!!! didn't really look through them but I'll have to get a Beckette price guide just to see what I got.



Anybody ever have Pogs!? haha I found a binder of those also.....am I the only nerd here?
 
The price?

$299.00

What went wrong with the baseball card industry? Ladies and gentlemen, Exhibit A. :bored:

Exhibit B: The people that will throw down that kind of money for a pack of baseball cards. I was thinking that was a cool idea until I read the price.
 
Top Bottom