Perhaps the most unethical thing I've seen in our hobby. Topps should be ashamed

[the 'stache]

http://www.sportscollectorsdaily.com...ate-questions/

This is not a story dealing with pre-war cards directly, but I thought some of you would get a kick out of reading about how unethical Topps, who pretty much has a monopoly on baseball cards right now, has become. And we might see some new members here, as modern collectors, tired of these games, look for collecting alternatives.

Each year, one of Topps' biggest products is the Bowman Chrome line. The cards that make up the completed set are broken up into three different releases-Bowman, Bowman Chrome, and Bowman Draft Picks & Prospects. Bowman Baseball comes in the spring, and each pack contains 2 Bowman Chrome cards. The first cards of the year. The Chrome line comes out in September, and Draft Picks & Prospects in late November. Each product includes what is typically an up and coming minor league star's first autographed baseball cards. When I came back to the hobby a few years ago, I started out by collecting modern cards, and Bowman Chrome prospect autos are what I collected. I've always loved baseball, but minor league baseball seems to have a lot of the things the big leagues used to have. Sure, a lot of the players you see will probably end up in the Major Leagues, but you can still talk to the players here without security guards beating you into a pulp. And taking your family to a minor league game won't break you financially.

Anyhow, it's fun watching players come out of high school, or college, being drafted. Following players as they work their way through the minor leagues, and finally realizing their dreams, is like nothing else. In the NFL, and the NBA, when a team picks a player, they're on the big league team. They may not start right away, but they go through training camp, and the top picks are virtually assured of playing. Not so in baseball. It's a lot of work. A lot of traveling. And many of these guys aren't making a lot of money. But they are chasing their dream. And as an added benefit, if you're a collector, and you are paying attention, you can buy cards like this one for $95 when it comes out:


Mike Trout's 2009 Bowman Chrome prospect auto.

So, for the last year or so, one of the Chicago Cubs prospects, Kris Bryant, has been absolutely destroying the baseball, first at AA, then at AAA. In 492 at bats this year, Bryant hit .325 with 43 home runs and 110 RBI. He ended the season with a 1.098 OPS. He's an exciting player, and long suffering Cubs fans finally have something to look forward to. The Cubs have several of the top 20 prospects in the game, and Bryant is leading the charge. And Chrome prospect collectors were told that his first Chrome auto would be released as part of 2014 Bowman Chrome. And, as advertised, the cards came out right on schedule. Hobby boxes and cases flew off the shelves as fast as suppliers could get them in. And the Kris Bryant cards were going nuts on eBay. I mean, the prices were ridiculous. I think they were going for over $1,000 at one point. This for a guy that had never played a game in the Major Leagues. Mike Trout's 2009 Bowman Chrome, which I posted a picture of above (that's mine), has been humming along at about $1,200-1,400 for a graded Beckett 9.5. Mine, ungraded, would fetch about $850 to $900 last time I checked, if not a little more. Centering carries a premium, and that one is centered perfectly. But the Bryant prices were something I'd never seen before.

Topps continued to pump out the cards. The smart collectors waited for the product to come out, and instead of buying cases of the stuff, they just bought the cards they wanted. That's how I've built my collection. But after a while, box and case sales slowed. Topps did very well. Very well. Collectors prepared for upcoming releases.

And then, a funny thing happened. Whether or not it was announced before it happened, I do not remember. But in other Topps products (Bowman Platinum 2014, if I recall correctly), suddenly, Kris Bryant Bowman Chrome 2013 prospect cards started showing up. First of all, Topps had never put Chrome cards in other products. Only Bowman, Chrome, and DP&P.

But as I mentioned, these were not 2014 cards. These were 2013 cards. Those 2014 Bowman Chrome cards, which had the label "1st Bowman Chrome card", were now no longer the first card of Bryant's, technically speaking. And the autographed 2014 cards, the card that drove demand, and saw prices jump over $1,000 a pop...for just the base (unnumbered) cards....when the 2013 cards hit the market, the 2014 cards were no longer as valuable. In fact, their values plummeted. And these 2013 Bowman Chrome cards skyrocketed in value. I don't know how high they got, but you can imagine what happened.

Call it unethical. Call it dirty business. Call it whatever you want. It's flat wrong. And these 2013 cards weren't short printed. There weren't just 100 of these. It looks like Topps did a normal print run. Now, the Platinum line, which is considered a lesser product compared to the Chrome, is selling like hot cakes, as people are looking for the 2013 cards.


Kris Bryant's 2013 Bowman Chrome auto (left) was released after his 2014 Bowman Chrome auto (right). Makes sense, right?
Oh, and what a lovely signature he has. Do you get "Kris Bryant" from that?

I don't want to get into a discussion about the absurdity of the card prices. We all know when Bryant reaches the Majors, his cards will plummet in value, and then they'll go back up depending on how he does. Some people just have to be the first ones to have the card, I guess. I would rather take $1,000, and buy a T205 Christy Mathewson. But Topps, who essentially has a monopoly on baseball cards because they have exclusive licensing with MLB Properties until 2020, basically runs unchallenged. Panini and Upper Deck release cards every year with generic looking uniforms. They sell, but Topps is the king of the modern hobby. We're back in the 1970s again, only there are a hundred products every year, and 95% of them suck. Topps does a T206 set, a T3 Turkey Red set, Allen & Ginter, etc. It's sickening. They don't care. They make money, and I'd wager that most people have no idea where those sets originated.

How does this affect us? I would not be at all surprised to see some people get sick of these games Topps has been playing. Inevitably, some of them are going to make their way here.

How do you like this, guys? Just what our hobby needs, right?