Home » Misc » How much are my basketball card worth
How much are my basketball card worth
Basketball Card Price Guide - CardMavin
Use MAVIN to look up your basketball card values. Enter a description of your card into the search box and see the average price it sells for online.
You’ll need a few details:
Enter the year. Look at the back for the copyright date, or the last year of stats.
Enter the brand. For example: Topps, Upper Deck, Fleer, Hoops, etc.
Enter the player’s name.
Enter the card number. Found on the back of the card.
Search for:
Looking up a Basketball Card’s Value
The search results will show basketball card prices, based on recently sold cards… hopefully just like yours. The “worth” that initially shows is the average price (including shipping) of the results showing on the page.
Use the Checkboxes
If you get a lot of results that don’t match your basketball card, try adding more details to your search. You can also use the checkboxes to get an average price. Pick a few comparable items (“comps”). This gives you a much more accurate estimate of what your basketball card is worth.
Graded Cards
To look up graded basketball cards, enter the grading company and grade, for example PSA 9 or BGS 9.
What to do Next
Once you’ve gone through and searched for the value of your basketball cards using our price guide, you have several different options:
If they’re valuable: You can either hold onto the cards, perhaps get them graded if not already, and see if they appreciate in value over time. Alternatively, you sell it to a local card shop, but keep in mind dealers pay wholesale prices… they have to make a profit after all, and selling a large collection takes a considerable amount of time and resources… so don’t expect to get eBay prices for your basketball cards when you sell to a dealer. If you have the time and patience, you can sell it yourself on eBay and get a competitive price. Read our guide to selling on eBay.
If not: Basketball cards don’t have to be worth money to be considered valuable. Card collecting has been a beloved hobby that has been passed through generations. Each card has sentimental value to someone: where they found it, how they traded for it, who gave it to them. If your cards aren’t worth money, they could be worth some memories to a relative or a stranger. Put them on Craigslist, take them to a card shop, donate them, or hold onto them to give to the next generation.
Author Andrew FordPosted on Categories BasketballLeave a comment on Free Price Guide for Basketball Card Values
We monitor every eBay sale for Basketball Cards. Using our proprietary technology; We assign each sale to a Card, toss the junk, and record the grade of each sale.
Our Basketball Card pricing algorithm then determines the value for each Card for each grade. You can see historic prices for every Card so you know which Basketball Cards are increasing in price and which are dropping.
Using these prices and our collection tracker, you can keep track of how much your Basketball Card collection is worth.
Rules of the game of basketball - Internet portal Sportmaster Media
3 min.
Ball in the basket - victory is yours
Basketball
This is a material about the basic rules of playing basketball. We also have a text about the risks of injury in sports.
Basketball is a team game with a ball. The goal of each team is to attack the opponent's ring and score the most points during the match. We tell you how not to break the rules in a tough fight for the ball and become a winner.
Basketballs
New collection
7 199 ₽
Puma | Basketball ball PUMA Basketball Top Leather
Buy
-30%
New collection
2 449 RUB
3 499 RUB
Demix | Basketball ball Demix DB4000 Composite
Buy
-30%
New collection
2 449 RUB
3 499 RUB
Demix | Basketball ball Demix DB4000 Composite
Buy
1,199 ₽
Demix | Basketball ball Demix DSB Streetball
Buy
Demix | Basketball ball Demix Skywalk
Buy
Final price
Demix | Basketball ball Demix Hoops
Buy
1 399 ₽
Demix | Basketball ball Demix Triple Double 7
Buy
1 399 ₽
Demix | Basketball ball Demix Triple Double 5
Buy
Final price
Demix | Basketball ball Demix Buzzer 5
Buy
2 399 ₽
Demix | Basketball ball Demix Fast Break
Buy
Final price
Demix | Basketball ball Demix Buzzer 7
Buy
2 999 ₽
Demix | Basketball ball Demix DB3000 Microfiber
Buy Now
Each basketball team consists of 12 players who substitute for each other during the match. At the same time, five people from each team are on the site.
According to the rules of basketball, the whole team must have the same uniform and even socks of the same color. Jerseys of team members must be numbered.
For safety, remove jewelry and any accessories that could injure other players.
The game consists of four periods of 10 minutes. Breaks between the first and second quarters, as well as between the third and fourth, are 2 minutes. The longest break is 15 minutes, it is taken in the middle of the game, after the second quarter. At this moment, the teams change rings.
If the score is tied by the end of the match, the referee adds 5 minutes of overtime. Overtime is appointed as many times as necessary until the winner is revealed.
During the game, the team coach may take a time-out. This break lasts for a minute. Most often, a time-out is taken to adjust tactics.
Basketball accessories
Demix | Needle for inflating balls (3 pcs.) Demix
Buy
Demix | Whistle Demix
Buy
Demix | Demix Basketball Hoop Net
Buy
Demix | Demix ball inflation needle, 3 pcs.
Buy
Demix | Demix ball pump
Buy
Demix | Whistle Demix
Buy
Demix | Demix Double Action Pump
Buy
Demix | Demix Basketball Hoop Net
Buy
Demix | Demix Double Action Pump
Buy
Demix | Demix ball pump
Buy
Demix | Demix ball pump
Buy
Demix | Whistle Demix
Buy
Basketball court measures 28 meters long and 15 meters wide. Each site should have markings. It is applied around the perimeter and zones are designated: 9Restricted area It is suspended at a height of 3.05 m.
In basketball, the ball is played only with the hands, it can be hit on the floor, passed, thrown and hit. You can’t run without a lead or kick the ball with him.
With the ball in hand, you can take two steps, but only to stop, pass or throw into the ring.
Basketball shoes
New collection
7999 ₽
361° | Sneakers for men 361° Pull up 1.5
Buy
3 499 ₽
Demix | Sneakers for boys Demix Backyard Rld
Buy
14,999 ₽
Puma | Men's sneakers PUMA Fusion Nitro Black Fives
Buy
12 999 ₽
Puma | Men's sneakers PUMA Rs-Dreamer Super Mario 64
Buy
Puma | Sneakers for boys PUMA Court Rider I Jr
Buy
5 199 ₽
Demix | Sneakers for men Demix Argon 2
Buy
4 599 ₽
Demix | Sneakers for men Demix Beast 2
Buy
3 499 ₽
Demix | Sneakers for boys Demix Backyard Rld Mesh
Buy
3 289 ₽
4 699 ₽
Demix | Sneakers for boys Demix Backyard Rld Mesh
Buy
5 799 ₽
Demix | Sneakers for men Demix Joker
Buy
$29. 99
$59.99
Demix | Sneakers for men Demix Beast 2
Buy
1,899 RUB
3,799 RUB
Demix | Sneakers for boys Demix Buzzer
Buy
1 point - counts for the penalty throw
2 points - for a ball abandoned from the zone of biases
3 points - for the ball abandoned from the three -point hits
violations in the basketball, let's take basic.
A run is the movement of a player with the ball in his hands without dribbling. For this, the referee appoints a throw-in by the opposing team.
Three Second Rule - A player of the attacking team cannot stay in the highlighted area under the hoop for more than three seconds. For such a violation, the ball is transferred to the opponent.
Foul is a touch on the opponent that restricts his freedom of movement. In some cases, a free throw is awarded for a foul - this is decided by the referee. A throw from the penalty line is performed by a member of the opposing team, for a professional this is an almost guaranteed hit.
You can also get a foul without contact - technical. It is given for unsportsmanlike behavior, disrespect for the referee or other participants in the game. Two technical fouls are followed by disqualification.
Basketball matches are served by teams of referees. Usually 2-3 referees on the site and a secretary judge. Their task is to monitor compliance with the rules, keep track of time and impose a fine in case of violations.
Entering data into the protocol, resolving controversial game moments and keeping the game score - these duties are also performed by the referees.
During the match, the referees communicate with each other with gestures that help to quickly indicate the situation in the game.
To shoot 3-pointers in every game, you need quality equipment that will make you feel comfortable on the court. Look for clothes, shoes and accessories for basketball in a special section on the Sportmaster website.
Basketball
Baseball cards - a whole empire: Americans have been collecting them for 150 years, speculators trade them on the stock exchange - His foot - Blogs
Panini stickers, scarves, t-shirts, posters, programs and match tickets are a standard list of what a Russian fan usually collects. In the US, the main collectible fetish is cards. The scale of this cult is amazing: they have been collected for a century and a half, exhibited in museums, books written about them and sold for space money.
💵 Cards were invented by marketers. They are not related to sports in any way
Collections were collected in Europe as well. In England at one time they were more popular than in the USA
🎬 Madonna and Tom Hanks can be found on baseball cards
⚾️ The popularity of cards grew due to boomers - the first post-war generation (the same ones that were born after World War II)
At first, instead of athletes, there were leaders, birds, country flags on the cards
- I had a large collection of baseball cards. Everything was stolen.
– Did you take something else?
Yes, money. But let's focus on the essentials. I had a Topps card with Mickey Mantle, a unique piece. And others in good condition: 60/40 front and 90/10 on the back. All my cards were in packages, and if you take them out and take them, God forbid, with greasy fingers, they will instantly drop in price. I know the first 48 hours are the most important in this kind of investigation. The more time passes, the less likely it is to find them.
Dialogue from the first episode of the second season of Better Call Saul is a great illustration of how baseball cards are treated in the US. The unlucky collector went to the police because of the loss of an impressive and very expensive set, despite the fact that he himself was tied to the drug trade. But the disappointment of losing Mickey Mantle is much stronger than the fear of being caught. Many Americans would probably do the same, because a Mickey Mantle card in good condition can be worth $3 million.
Sports cards are a by-product of tobacco companies. In the 19th century, cigarettes were sold in soft paper packs: they were easy to crumple and damage the contents. The solution was found by the American company Allen & Ginter, which placed a cardboard stiffener in the package. Such protection had almost no effect on the cost of cigarettes, but it became a serious advantage for the buyer. Later, the innovation was adopted by other companies.
Cigarette liners about Russia
To stand out from the competition, Allen & Ginter began to add a bonus to cigarettes: instead of a boring gray cardboard, a smoker was expected to have a beautiful postcard that he could leave as a keepsake. Millions of firms use such a primitive marketing ploy today, but in the 1870s it was a revolution. Manufacturers "hooked" smokers not only on cigarettes, but also on the excitement of the collector.
At first, the most neutral images were placed in the packages: nature, animals, birds, flags of the countries of the world, leaders of states, Indian chiefs. Sports had not yet taken such an important place in the life of Americans, although baseball was becoming more and more popular. In the late 1850s, the first major organization of teams in and around New York City, the National Association, was founded. Ten years later, professional athletes appeared in baseball, and in 1876 a league was created that would become the basis for MLB at the beginning of the 20th century. Growing interest in the game prompted tobacco manufacturers to replace leaders with athletes.
Ball game in New Jersey in 1866. Note: Initially, "baseball" was spelled in two words. The company sold sports equipment and printed price cards to educate customers about the products. On the other side, a player was looking at a potential buyer. And although such cards are considered the first baseball cards, they have not yet received wide distribution. Not everyone was interested in sporting goods, but Americans of the late 19th century loved to smoke.
One of the first baseball cards was issued in 1869 on a Peck & Snyder booklet. This spurred interest in the cards
On the Internet, it is easy to find a picture of any athlete. But in the second half of the 19th century, when the first series of baseball cards appeared, this was more difficult. Allen & Ginter approached the clubs directly to send pictures of their best players. By that time, the first photo studios had already appeared in New York and other large American cities.
As a matter of fact, tobacconists placed cardboard boxes with pasted photographs in packs, and did not print them in a typographical way, so only a few copies of the first cards have survived to this day. The quality of photographic paper was then at a low level, and the Americans themselves did not yet realize the value of the collections. By the way, almost no one called inserts cards: then they bought and exchanged baseball or cigarette pictures.
Card set for the 1887 season
The most famous set of inserts of the time was produced in 1887. It was called World Champions, and today the original cards from that collection are selling on eBay for $2,000 each. Interest in photos of players in 1887 was fueled by the events of that season: Detroit became the first superclub in the United States after it was acquired by the owner of a pharmaceutical company, Frederick Stearns.
For the new project, Stearns bought out the entire Buffalo roster, including top Dan Brouters, Hardy Richardson and Jack Rowe, the stars on the World Champions cards. The businessman was not only interested in sports tasks, he wanted baseball to become a popular sport in Detroit. But he did not have enough money and time: after winning the 1887 World Series, Stearns announced the end of funding. Evidence of the rise and fall of America's first superclub was cigarette inserts.
Panini - the successor of cigarette cards in Europe
In the same 1887, the British firms W.D. took over the innovation. &H.O. Wills and Ogdens - they have gone through the same evolutionary path as Allen & Ginter. In England, one of the first series was called Guinea Golds, it was dedicated to famous people - writers, politicians and scientists. The people called the cards the worker's encyclopedia, as they were more accessible than books, and on the back there was a brief note on why the portrait of this man was placed in a pack of cigarettes.
The originals for Guinea Golds were taken from the National Portrait Gallery in London
In 1896, a new line appeared - sports, but not yet football: W. D. &H.O. Wills produced a "50 Cricketers" series which was in good demand. The tobacco company was doing so well in those years that from 1886 until the beginning of the 20th century it opened three large production facilities. And this despite the fact that at the end of the 19th century smoking was not yet a mass phenomenon in Great Britain: the bad habit took root already during the First World War. In addition, cigarettes were quite cheap: at 19The 00s pack (sold 10 pieces each) cost two pence - one and a half times cheaper than a pound of sugar and twice as expensive as a box of matches. Now a complete set of those very cards with cricket players is valued at five thousand pounds.
Football cards from Manchester Marcus & Company soon appeared. In response to a series of W.D. &H.O. released its own football line, which included 66 cards of the most famous football players of those years - George Clowley from Tottenham, Matt Kingsley from Newcastle, George Headley from Sheffield United, Jimmy Crabtree from Aston Villa and so on. Singleton & Cole enters consumer race with 19 series05 years. A hundred years later, it was reprinted specifically for retro fans.
At the beginning of the 20th century, almost every tobacco manufacturer issued such cards. But the companies tried to differ from each other: the liners of the cheaper cigarettes were black and white, the more expensive cigarettes were colored. Churchman produced them horizontally, and John Player & Sons used caricatures. Already in the 1920s, not just portraits of players, but illustrations of episodes of football matches began to be placed on the cards.
Birmingham defender Frank Womack on the 1914 card
The production of English inserts ceased during the Second World War, when Britain faced a shortage of paper. In the second half of the 20th century, cards were no longer considered a supplement to tobacco, they began to be sold separately. And then the idea was rethought by the Italian company Panini: in 1961, it released a series and an album for stickers dedicated to the national championship. Nine years later, the first set was released, timed to coincide with the World Cup.
Baseball card production may have disappeared due to robberies and monopolies
Allen & Ginter also had a following in the US. The system of licensing and sale of rights was then still in its infancy, so almost all market participants began to offer cigarettes with inserts to customers. At that point, the cards stopped having the desired effect, and many firms printed them only because others did.
From the 1890s, the American Tobacco Company dominated the US tobacco market, seeking to expand into foreign markets dominated by the British. The monopolist has taken over small businesses, and Allen & Ginter is no exception. At the same time, baseball cards were no longer added to cigarettes everywhere: there was essentially no one to fight for the consumer, and the idea itself, as it seemed to many then, had already exhausted itself.
At the beginning of the 20th century, the number of smokers was actively growing in the United States, but fewer inserts were produced. For example, in 1898, a large study by German scientists came out that linked bad habits and lung cancer. The cards were an incentive to buy tobacco, and the inserts were also popular with children. In the 1890s, each state had its own laws that related to the minimum age for buying cigarettes: from 14 to 24 years. And in 15 states, at different times, there was even a ban on the sale of tobacco.
It got to the point of absurdity: American newspapers wrote about teenagers who robbed stores, took cigarettes, took out all the cards, and left the rest at the crime scene. Such stories also pushed manufacturers to abandon the liners.
Sweets manufacturers cut cards in half for better sales
Sweets are not as strict as smoking, so Americans continued to be fueled with new cards. As soon as the tobacco companies began to print less of them, the Lancaster Caramel Company became more active. At the end of the 19th century, inserts with the image of baseball players appeared in packages of Hershey sweets. After the largest players in the market merged into the American Caramel Company, cards were already everywhere.
Just then, marketers came up with another move: the buyer received only half of the card, and he had to buy something else, in the hope that there would be a second part of the insert. It is difficult to calculate how much sales increased due to such tricks, but the American Caramel Company felt great until the First World War, when they had to stop making liners for several years. In 1927, the last series of baseball cards inside candy boxes came out from the American Caramel Company.
The appearance of inserts in sweets spurred children's interest in cards
In the interwar years, the culture of sports cards was again in decline. But it was no longer only about baseball, but also about other sports. In 1910, Imperial Tobacco Canada produced the first line of hockey cigarette inserts, but by the 1920s, their production was no longer so large-scale.
NHL inserts can trace not only the careers of players, but also major historical events. Canada entered World War II at 1939th, and the United States only two years later - therefore, wartime laws (for example, on saving paper) in Canada were adopted earlier. NHL player cards north of the border became smaller and black-and-white, and the United States issued the same inserts as before the war for two more years.
Canadian wartime card. They were produced by the O-Pee-Chee company until the takeover by Nestle in 1996.
American football was also gaining popularity, where manufacturers of cigarettes and sweets rushed. In 1884, Mayo Cut Plug Tobacco produced the first such set with 35 portraits of athletes. Later, images of football players appeared on packages of chewing gum, cereals and donuts.
As soon as statistics were placed on cards, it became easier for Americans to play with them
In the second half of the 20th century, Topps became the main card company. At first she was engaged in sweets, but later she completely focused on cards. An innovation introduced in the 1950s helped to become the market leader: they began to print player statistics on the back.
At first it was just a line about how the athlete spent the last season, but since 1957 they began to put statistics for all years there. Bowman (Topps' most famous competitor at the time) immediately copied the idea, and within a few years almost all sports cards contained statistics.
The best way to find out how a baseball player performed in the past is to look at the back of his card. Since the end of the 19th century, Americans have been building playing decks from inserts and inventing the rules themselves. The appearance of statistics on the back made it possible to unambiguously determine which card is older.
On the cards of 1974 there are players of a non-existent team
The Panini album cover for the 2018 World Cup featured Kokorin. The company simply did not have time to change the layout after Alexander tore the crosses. In 1974, Topps made a far more unforgivable blunder. She released a set of cards for a club that never existed.
The San Diego Padres baseball team was a total underdog, finishing last in the division time after time. Against this background, negotiations began to move from California to Washington. May 1973 years the club was sold for a then-record $12 million. The new team - "Washington" - was supposed to play in MLB as early as next season.
Uniforms were sewn and photographs of the players were held. Soon the pictures ended up in Topps, where they immediately set up the production of cards. Since only a handful of baseball players participated in the photo shoot, Topps also took old shots of the players still representing the San Diego Padres, but added the caption "Washington" to them.
Pitcher Dave Freisleben cards are the main curiosity of season 1974 years
At the last moment, the deal fell through, but the conveyor was already running. Topps had to urgently issue cards with old photos and old uniforms. At the same time, the Washington edition was already sold with might and main, and many collectors with special pride keep cards with the image of the players of the never-existing team. True, there were so many of them that the price of each copy rarely exceeds $ 10.
The baseball card bible comes from the museum
Cards from the late 19th and early 20th centuries are equated with works of art. This is the only way to explain why one of the largest collections is kept in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. It bears the name of Jefferson Burdick: all his life the American collected almost everything that caught his eye: posters, postcards, cigarette packages. And cards, and not only sports ones.
Rembrandt, Degas, Van Gogh and baseball cards are all masterpieces of one museum
Burdick donated the collection to the museum at the end of 1940s, but only after he prepared an extensive guide to all the collected cards - this was the requirement of the museum. The book "Catalogue of American Cards" among collectors has received a cult status. It is full of information about both sports inserts and other cards issued in the 19th and first half of the 20th century.
The catalog not only described their origin, but also systematized the search. Many cards have received an inventory number, which usually consists of a letter (denoting the manufacturer) and several numbers (indicating the series). The marking is still used today, and sometimes a number is enough for experienced collectors to understand what kind of rarity they are talking about.
Jefferson Burdick and his catalog
The last edition of the catalog was published during Burdick's lifetime, in 1960, and no new editions have been commercially available for the past half century. Since then, there have been regular conversations about the need to supplement the list with new cards. There are a number of inaccuracies in the book, and the numbering system is considered outdated. In addition, Burdick indicated in the catalog prices that, after half a century, have lost their relevance.
Today the value of a card is determined by a special company. It has already issued 80 million certificates of authenticity
In the post-war years sports cards became popular again, especially among children. They were treated like toys, and collecting was more like how schoolchildren in the 1990s collected caps: they look cool, you can show off in front of friends, but hardly anyone exaggerated their value.
The feeling of nostalgia changed everything. By the 1970s, the children of the post-war generation had grown up, dug up old boxes of cards, and formed a whole culture around inserts. If at 19In the 60s, a dollar could be offered for a rare copy, but a few decades later, a real industry arose, in which millions of Americans were involved.
In 1991, US residents spent more than two billion dollars on sports cards. They were now considered not only part of the collection, but also an investment. Price dynamics indicated this: the cost of some mid-20th-century Topps sets has increased in price by 10 percent annually since 1981. The Americans logically assumed that this would always continue and not only with old cards. The main thing is to ensure the safety of the artifact, for which they no longer buy albums, but cases, organizers, and the most valuable rarities are wrapped in strong plastic protection.
In 1992, for a promotional film about women's baseball, the film studio released a series of cards with Madonna and Tom Hanks. Its employees, like appraisers in a pawnshop, carefully examine the goods and set a price according to certain criteria. In 1998, PSA processed a million cards, and today on eBay, those lots are valued primarily where there is confirmation of authenticity from this company. More than 80 million such certificates have already been issued, however, some of them relate to other sports attributes, such as autographed balls.
The Baseball and Card Crisis
And yet, in the 1980s and 1990s, the industry was filled with people who were not particularly interested in sports, but who really wanted to make money. Collectors bought up fresh copies in the hope of selling them in a few decades and providing old age or college education for children.
Increased demand spurred companies to print hundreds of thousands of cards. Topps succeeded (or even overdid it) in this matter: in the 1990s, it flooded the market with a large number of cards, supplementing them with player autographs printed on the printing house and colorful design solutions. But the value of those collections is unlikely to ever be significant: that time was nicknamed the Great Bubble or the Age of Trash Cards. Now collectors are warned on the packaging: "Topps makes no guarantees as to whether the cards will rise in price in the future."
A full set of cards from last season of MLB (and there are 700 of them) costs about $50
The lockout in the 1995 season was an additional blow to the industry. Because of the athletes' strike, that MLB season ended in August instead of the fall. This affected card sales, and Topps, which owned the licensing rights, tried to refocus on other sports. Then came the NHL and NBA lockouts, causing the economic bubble to finally burst.
The boom in the baseball card market was followed by a disappointment in the sport itself. Playing with bats, bases and pitchers seems boring to the new generation against the backdrop of basketball, American football, hockey and even soccer. In MLB, events unfold slowly, there are many matches, and in terms of decibels in the stands, baseball hardly overtakes golf. It takes a lot of patience and endurance to watch the match from start to finish. At least that's what some young Americans think. And if they are not interested in baseball, then they are unlikely to enjoy collecting cards with portraits of players.
One of the rarest sets of the 1990s was released in connection with the Gulf War
The non-stop circulation of baseball cards has led to a paradoxical situation: collectors are willing to pay much more for a set that is at least somewhat different from the standard one. Thus, the Desert Shield, a special edition released in 1990 for US troops, is considered an extraordinary rarity.
The name of the set refers to the Gulf War. Desert Shield is a military operation inspired by Saddam Hussein's invasion of Kuwait. Tens of thousands of soldiers went to the Middle East, and some received a set released for the MLB 19 season with them on the road.91 years old.
On the left is a card for 20 dollars, on the right - for 14 thousand
It was issued by the same Topps company, which, however, on the occasion of the war, slightly supplemented the appearance of the cards: a small logo of the military operation was applied on top. They did not go to retail; a total of 7000 sets were produced, which is noticeably less than the standard circulation. Moreover, some of the cards were sent to the Middle East by plane, and, perhaps, not all sets reached the place of deployment of the American army.
The soldiers hardly realized that in the future the cards would be very valuable, so many threw them away without much regret. Perhaps somewhere in Iraq a fortune is buried in the sand: in 2018, a complete collection of 792 pieces was sold for $100,000. The regular cards of the 1991 MLB season are absolute trash.
The first attempt to trade cards as stocks on the stock exchange was unsuccessful
Topps started by selling gum with inserts. Now cards are her main business. In order not to go broke, in the early 2000s, the company came up with a new way to earn money: for 12 years in the United States there was an online card exchange, where each lot existed in electronic form.
The 1909 card is the most expensive card in baseball history. An image of Honus Wagner was sold for $3 million
Collectors were offered what looked like buying securities. An investor does not need to keep a share of the company in a safe, because it is accounted for in his brokerage account. eTopps, a platform for those who invest in sports cards, worked on the same model.
The actual cardboard copies were kept in the warehouse of the company, which was ready to send the purchase on demand, but it was assumed that the buyers only needed to know what they owned in order to later sell on the same exchange. The model did not work, and in 2012 the project was closed. All buyers were offered to order the delivery of cards and trade them on Ebay.
The cards have their own market index - just like the S&P500
The "major league" of baseball card collecting has formed around the PWCC. Under this mysterious abbreviation is a company that not only evaluates rare items, but also tracks their value. This is how the index of the most expensive cards was formed, which, by analogy with the S & P500 (the American stock index, it is compiled by the analytical agency Standard & Poor's) was called PWCC 100.
On the graph of the growth in the value of assets, the user of the service is hinted that baseball cards are more profitable than stocks of the five hundred best US companies. Since 2008, shares have risen in price by 100%, and the most expensive cards have become even more expensive by 250%.
Thanks to PWCC, there is a renewed interest in selling collectible sets in the USA. It just got harder to make money. Only the rarest specimens can generate income, but now it is much more substantial. Say, in 2017, $50 million worth of cards were sold through the PWCC platform.
Entrepreneur Brady Hill is one of those who made a fortune from this hobby. In his youth, he sold cards to buy a car and drive it to Louisiana to study at a local university. Years later, Hill decided to find out how much the cards he kept in the safe were worth, and he was pleasantly surprised. In the early 2010s, he invested 20% of his family's capital in rare pieces, hoping that this would be a good investment.
Brady Hill with million dollar cards (only in hand)
In 10 years, the 1952 card with Mickey Mantle (there are only 33 of these in the world) has risen in price seven times. Image of Hank Aaron 1953 - at nine. All of these cards are in the Brady Hill collection. In 1983, he watched the young and promising Darryl Strawberry of the New York Mets play. He failed the match, after which the 13-year-old Hill became disillusioned with Darryl. On his father's advice, he traded the Strawberry card for the now retired Mantle and Aaron. At the PWCC auction in May of this year, the Mantle card 19The 52nd was sold for $97,000.
However, it is very difficult to determine in advance when and how the price will rise. Many cards from the list of the most expensive over the same period have significantly fallen in price. “I have cards that cost between $600,000 and $700,000 in total,” Brady Hill said. “But besides them, there are a thousand other cards in my collection that cost noticeably less. In this case, supply must meet demand. There is no point in buying the rarest card if no one wants to buy it from you.
Bradley's passion is balancing between art collecting and trading. It's pretty hard to make money on this, although many Americans hope to one day go to eBay and see a card from their collection with a crazy price tag. Perhaps for this reason, clickbait headlines such as "The 10 Best Baseball Cards to Invest" or "If you have THIS card, you can become a millionaire" are regularly thrown to American fans on the Internet.