Man those pins are out there...and so is the 9 g's. Great post! Those would be in the exotic category....and when you add baseball + exotic you get in the high rent district. You have to wonder who the two bidders were that got into it, and who got it. I speculate had you not posted this, we may not have ever seen them in the hobby and that some dealer, and I have one in mind, won them and will flip them for $15,000.00 - $20,000.00 to a collector we may or may not even know of. I've heard a legend of very high profile celebrity collector. Are they worth that kind of money? In relation to how rare they are and they are baseball and relate to world champions....$15,000.00 - $20,000.00 could just be a fraction of what they are worth. A bargain is a state of mind, but there are likely collectors who aren't after bargains. They're just so happy to find something like these pins they'll pay what ever, and be very glad to. Exotic baseball is just so tough to find. It always has been, but there's even less of it today to be had than 20-30 years ago because the little there is, is off the market locked up in collections. Look how sparse the auctions have gotten for great display pieces over the last few years, never mind exotic The amount of exotic baseball that exists can not increase. Sure there can be finds of something unearthed never before seen, sort of like these pins, but these kinds of "unearthed finds" don't happen as often as they did 20 years ago. But the amount of collectors can and does increase by the decade....and that can only result in increased prices. I think that's particularly true for exotic material. Very rarely do we see exotic pieces in the hobby, I think the really great stuff get's taken into custody before it hits the market. Although occasionally something gets loose. That 1871 Eagles Base Ball Club broadside in Hunt's last year...which ended up at the 09' National...now there is a good example of exotic baseball that miraculously got thru. Whenever I think of exotic baseball I think of a 48" wide c1890 baseball box office sign I saw in a book...a perfect example of what you never see come up in the hobby.
