The (Base) Ball (card) Is In Our Court

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Posted By: bruce Dorskind

If you can’t get rid of the skeleton in your closet
you better teach it to dance

William Shakespeare from
The Tragedy of Richard II



Collecting, or more appropriately the buying an selling
of rare baseball cards, has long been a serious business.

The top 12 hobby auctioneers sell in excess of $100 million
dollars per year in sports memorabilia. Whilst it would
be time consuming to ascertain what percentage of those
sales are attributed to graded baseball cards, it is certainly
in access of 50%.

While there will always be debates and controversy when
something so subjective as grading plays such an important
role in determining price, we can, as a hobby, create a series
of standards that we would ask the major grading companies
and the top dealers and auctioneers to abide by.

Furthermore, we can establish a Standards Review Board
which includes a representative group of independent
collectors, and, perhaps, experts from outside the baseball
hobby to periodically review the efforts of the grading
services and dealers to adhere (enforce) the standards.

Although we do not have to go to the extremes of
Sarbanes-Oxley, it is imperative for the future of the
hobby that we establish rules and that said rules are enforced.

All dealers would need to be certified. All violations
would be reported. And we could even establish
a series of fines.. The Fines would be used to enhance
the quality standards.

There is clearly too much room for “dancing with skeletons”
If we don’t want to see ghosts in our own closets when
it comes time to sell, we, as a hobby need to act.

Our view is that the real power is not with the giant
auction houses or one or two grading services but with
the thousands of collectors who spend in excess of $250
million dollars buying and selling cards. Hopefully,
we can also gain cooperation from senior management
at E Bay as well as from the top auction houses and
grading services.

Your comments are welcomed

Best,


Bruce