What Are My Cards Worth: The Economics of Card Collecting

 When I was a young kid, I along with everyone I knew depended on two sources for how much a card was worth.  How much a dealer was selling a card for was one way, but the main way was to look up that card in Beckett.  Beckett listed out the notable cards in every set and set a value for them.  You'd grab every issue and see if the cards you owned had that coveted up arrow indicating that the card had gone up from the previous issue.  How much?  You'd have to do that research on your own.

I have been reliant to those numbers for years.  Almost more now, even though I know that the economics behind it is bunk.  The value of a card is not what a magazine says it is, but what you can get for it.  However, it does help out a guy who can't possible keep up with everything in the hobby just to have a baseline.

Back in 1996, I came across a stack of Steve McNair rookie cards.  Fifty, I think, and the dealer offered them to me for a quarter each.  At the time, Beckett had them listed for $2.50 a piece, I was practically stealing them.  Think of the profit!

Today I have nearly 50 Steve McNair Score RCs.  I have not score major profit, and they continue to taunt me.  I learned some valuable lessons.  First, I lived in Iowa and the Steve McNair community was not there.  Second, if a dealer sold that many to me for so little, I should have known that they would not be easy to flip.  Third, it takes a lot of work to find 50 people who would want McNair AND not have the Score rookie AND would rather give me money than some other options.  I have traded a few over the years, but I will never be without a bunch of McNair Score rookie cards.

Conversely, I once ran upon a Kirby Puckett 1993 Score Dream Team card at a show probably in 1993.  It was marked as $2 and I knew the Beckett value was only a dollar so I passed.  It took me 8 years before I saw another one again.  After the first year, it bugged me, and by the end it was an obsession.  I would have gladly paid the $2 then to have it. 

So what is value then?  Is it getting a $2.50 McNair for a quarter that I could care less about or spending $2.00 on a Puckett I want that is only worth $1?  What if I told you I got the Puckett for $0.50 when I did find it again.  What if I told you I only needed to get rid of 5 McNairs to make it worthwhile and the rest sit in a box that doesn't actually bother me all that much?  As with most things in life, its complicated.

When I go to a card show, I usually spend most of my time at the cheap boxes, and may buy a random card here and there.  I'll buy cards for myself and I'll buy cards I think I'll be able to trade later for more cards I want.  When I get home, my favorite card from the day will always come from that cheap box, usually a first card of someone for my collection, or a card that gets me closer to a Diamond King set or something like that.  Those cards are worth so much to me.

The other side is the stack of trade bait. Derek Jeter is always a solid trade bait player, and I really don't have an affinity towards him, so I have no trouble trading them.  I don't want them for my collection, but darn it I want full Beckett value in trade for those cards.  I couldn't tell you what T.J. Hockenson is worth, but I know what Jeter is worth.  I am the type of collector that feels his collection is priceless and his trade bait has monetary value.

I've been thinking about this lately.  The discourse within #TheHobby lately has been a verbal battle between two sets of collectors.  It's between collector's like me who define collections by set completions, player collections and full binders versus collector's who define their collections on singles, grades and flips.  So often these two worlds don't even run into each other, but each side is still bothered by the other.  We can't understand why their side doesn't value what I value.

So what are my cards worth?  Are they worth what Beckett says they are?  Are they worth what eBay can sell them for?  Are they worth the cardboard they are printed on?  Are they worth the world for the memories that take you back to a time where life was simple?  However you value your cards, I hope it brings you joy without taking it from someone else.