Is the shine off rookie card collecting?

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Posted By: Cat

Close to a year ago Leon started a thread about how rookie card collecting seemed to be out of trend. A board member took offense to the timing of the post and at that time the thread was deleted. It was unfortunate since I think the topic was one of interest to many (or at least some) of us and the rookie card collecting trend seems to have continued.

There seem to be very few of us relatively that collect rookie cards. I collect rookies and some Prookies but feel in the minority. So, I have a couple of questions:

1. To those of you who collect rookies, how close are you to having a "complete" collection?

2. Do you just collect HOFers? A subset of HOFers? Only players from certain teams?

3. Lastly, and the essence of my interest, Rookie card collecting seemed to be pretty hot as recently as 3 or 4 years ago, why did the trend slow and where do you think it is going?

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Posted By: jeffdrum

Cat,
I can only speak for myself but I tend to gravitate toward a specific issue or set based on the way that it looks as opposed to a rookie/prookie or such. Heck most people can't agree on exactly what a rookie is, what a card is, etc. I think one thing that makes the hobby so interesting is the variety of things that the variety of people collect. When I am buying cards though I do tend to collect HOFers exclusively and Philadelphia A's.

Edited for POOR spelling

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Posted By: barrysloate

There were two rookie card collectors who were competing to get the best example of each vintage rookie card. Both have sold their collections. That has created a huge void in the market.

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Posted By: James Feagin

Hello there,

I once had an idea to do a HOF collection. I then thought the idea was dumb, because I honestly have no interest in the careers of over half of the Hall of Famers out there. I decided just to do a "Class of 1936", because those were the folks who shaped pre-war baseball. I once had all five cards, but have since sold two. I am working my way back to all five.

James

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Posted By: Wesley

I try to find the earliest cards that I can find for players that I collect, but I don't feel the need to collect a full HOF rookie set. I prefer to focus on upper tier HOFers, rather than marginal HOFers that I am completely indifferent about. Of course the inargural HOF class that James mentioned above is a good start, but my search extends to cards of better Negro League and 19th Century players.

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Posted By: andy becker

what barry said is all too true.
it is a thin market and two of the bigger players (no offense to anyone else) have sold their collections recently.

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Posted By: steve

Not all of the time, but generally, steep prices for RC's tend to diminish for pre-WWII cards. The 1950-60's rookies seem to hold that RC premium of 3-4x the price of the second year card.

Note - the 1925? Gehrig Exhibit RC brings big bank
- the Balt.News or 1916 m card Ruth brings big bank
- the 1907? Dietsch Cobb RC is much cheaper than would expect
- the T206 Speaker RC is cheaper than would expect
- don't know about Matty or W.Johnson RC's

All said and done, I feel to spend extra big just to have the "fabled" RC is not for me. Looking over my list of 50 or so great vintage beauties, only my 1949 Satchell Paige would be considered a rookie card.

In my Aaron run, I still do need the 1954 RC, but cringe at the thought of having to fork out $4k.+ for a PSA 8. The second years Topps and Bowman have just as low of pop, but are only $1.k or less (the '55 Bowman is a steal of a deal in PSA 8 as it is the lowest pop Aaron).

steve

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Posted By: Wesley

When Sergio and Hal sold their collections, their cards did not exactly sell for bargain basement prices. Clearly collectors were still interested in purchasing rookie cards, and the hobby was able to absorb those two collections rather easily. That said, there is no prolific buyer to replace those two. Or if there is, then he is flying under the radar.

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Posted By: barrysloate

Wes- their cards did do well, although I can't say whether or not they got their money out of them.

But some areas of the market were clearly driven by the two, none more noticeably than E107 HOFers. Examples in SGC 10 were selling for around 10K when they were both fighting over them. Those days are long over.

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Posted By: Paul

I've always tried to collect the earliest card of Hall of Famers, whether the card is a major league card or minor league card. The minor league ones are actually my favorites. I have never expected to get a rookie card of every Hall of Famer. It's never really even been a goal. My goal has been getting ANY contemporaneous card of every Hall of Famer, which is enough of a challenge by itself. But I do particularly like the rookies, and I do collect them.

I think there are two basic factors contributing to the decline of interest in rookies. The first, which has already been mentioned, is some big rookie collectors selling off their collections. The second, in my opinion, was the election of a large class of Negro League players a few years ago, many with extremely rare cards from Cuba and Puerto Rico. It's only speculation, but I think a lot of people dropped out of the rookie HOF market when they realized how difficult it would be to get "rookie" cards of guys like Pete Hill, Biz Mackey, Cristobal Torriente, Willard Brown, and Andy Cooper.

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Posted By: Wesley

Barry, Many of Sergio's E107s were purchased in SCP/Sotheby in December 2006. Mastro auctioned Sergio's E107s in April 2007, and most of the E107s sold for prices significantly higher than the original SCP prices.

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Posted By: barrysloate

Wes- I'm remembering a point in time when a small group of E107 HOFers appeared on ebay and sold for crazy prices, and there was a thread on the board discussing it.

Does that ring a bell, or is my memory bad?

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Posted By: Cat

I have a few of Sergio's and Hal's former cards in my collection now and I don't think I paid less for them.

The dilemma as to what is certain players rookie card is an issue, but I feel my collection will never be perfect, so I don't really worry to much about the problem of "rookie definition." To me the true rookie is the card issued after his first major league appearance. "What's a card?" is also a problem. I don't like exhibits but I do have Gehrig's '25 exhibit. I like the W600s but don't consider them cards but I have Young's and Wagner's W600s (both are fairly rough).

I think the issues of "what's a card?" and "what's his rookie?" justs adds some flexibility. I use that flexibility to adjust my collection based on my taste. I like the looks of Gehrig's '25 exhibit so even though I generally don't like exhibits it is Gehrig's representation in my collection.

I have moved more to Prookies since I had many Goudeys as a player's card within my collection. I have replaced many with Zeenuts which I think are beautiful cards.

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Posted By: barrysloate

Cat- I still say Kid Nichols' rookie card is his N172, popular opinion notwithstanding. If I were collecting, that is the one I would go after.

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Posted By: Cat

Barry:

I don't even have a Kid Nichols card right now. It is at the very top of my want list. There were several in the Spring auctions but I ended up spending my money on other things.

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Posted By: barrysloate

Yes, I had one of them, and I thought it was one of the best cards in my auction.

Which leads to my theory that the N172 Nichols is so significant that the fact he is playing for Omaha does not stand in the way of calling it a rookie card. Just my opinion.

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Posted By: Wesley

I would also rather have the OJ Nichols than the Mayo.

The prices on the N172 HOfers in Barry's last auction were very strong. Not sure whether collectors are putting together OJ HOF runs or whether collectors are still chasing rookie cards.

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Posted By: nbrazil

speaking only for myself, i decided that a HOF rookie collection was way too difficult, frustrating and, most importantly, expensive to pursue. i started HOF rookie collecting 3 years ago. I found learning about HOF players I have never heard of very interesting. I found researching about first (or early) year player cards to be exciting. But, in the end, i felt it was a fruitless venture because there were several rookie cards i know i would never attain (ruth, e107's). Plus, some rookie cards were simply god awful ugly (foxx's rookie, for instance). And then there were wonderful sets I couldnt even have one card of because there were no HOF rookies in them (n28, for instance). So, with this in mind, I decided to drop my HOF rookie venture last year. I decided to instead keep collecting rookie cards of post war HOF'ers, but pursue the most aesthetically pleasing (in my view) cards of pre war HOF'ers, regardless if the card was issued his first season, in the minors or even posthumously (as i did with ruth and 48 leaf). I just picked up a dan brouthers scrapps card from Barry's recent auction...it's not his rookie card, but i'm very happy with it because it 1.) allows me to pick up a card from a set i would never have looked into and 2.) provides me a card that i find relatively inexpensive and aesthetically pleasing.

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Posted By: davidcycleback

Traditionally, rookie cards have been collected by collectors of Post War not Pre War-- 1950s, 1955 Topps Sandy Koufax, Cal Ripken, Dan Marino, etc. This would be an interesting topic to bring up on the CU and Beckett Boards. In particular, it would interesting to ask the young modern/insert collectors on Beckett board what they consider a rookie card-- ala do inserts, autograph cards count--, and what importance rookie cards have with the teenage crowd.

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Posted By: barrysloate

Wes- I think the better Hall of Fame cards from the Old Judge set are extremely desirable, such as Anson, Kelly, Delahanty, Nichols, Rusie, Wright. I think just about every serious collector wants to own them. I'm not even sure if their rookie status is the sole reason for their popularity.

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Posted By: Phil Garry

While I have patterned my collection after Hal & Sergio, I don't have the funds to go after the cards that they acquired in mid-high grade so I usually wind up with a lot of SGC 10's, 20's & 30's but as long as I fill another hole in my collection, I don't worry too much about the condition.

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Posted By: Bob

Yes

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Posted By: joe

Sorry, I just don't care about Rookie cards. I hope this does not upset the rookie card collectors.

Ty Cobb, Spikes flying!