Has card collecting become an outlet for high stakes gambling?
 

While I know this kid is as close to a can't miss as they come these prices still surprise me when you can get all time great HOFer rookie cards for less than what this card is going for. This card still has SIX days left...

2018 Bowman Chrome Gold Kelenic- https://ebay.us/YGP8ht


Here are just a couple of all time great rookie cards that ended for less money than what this Kelenic is going for. These two players are widely considered inside*the top 20 best baseball players to ever play the game.

1954 Topps Hank Aaron- http://ebay.us/vIBVpr

1955 Sandy Koufax- https://ebay.us/LKGQYY

If it is about investment, the Aaron and Koufax are sound investments that will continue to increase year after year. Kelenic could potentially turn out to be JD Drew. If it's about collecting greats of the game....well they've already acieved that. So how do you make sense of what is going on?

None of the links worked . It’s not replacing gambling. It’s the same a the stock market currently. Has the stock market been gambling this entire time? I don’t think so some , making money comes with risk.

Your link didn't work for me but there is a 99.99% chance that card will be in a bargain bin in a few years.

Just my opinion, the "prospectors" have brought the game of "hot potato" to vintage.

No disrespect to Kelenic but there have been Kelenic's before. Jurickson Profar and Byron Buxton were can't miss once too.

Of course it is gambling.

It has ALWAYS been gambling. I buy a pack in 1980, sure hope I get Pete Rose or Nolan Ryan. Rip, shuffle, shuffle, Sixto Lezcano again? I've already got three of those. Shit. Throw the gum at a pigeon, watch it shatter on the pavement. Oh well, better luck next time.

https://photos.imageevent.com/exhibi...pps%20Ryan.jpg

Pulled from a pack in 1980...

A few years ago a guy who was just a Sixto collector kept contacting me wanting to buy my blank back and regular back Topps 1985 Mini Sixtos. I kept telling him they were part of a set and not for sale but he kept on offering more money and finally said I should name my price. Got mad when I would not sell. He would not appreciate you trashing his guy Adam :)

Got a kick out of "Mini Sixtos". How can you call it a set without a Mini Sixto?

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I can see the parallels to the stock market for sure. Some of these prices are just baffling to me.

With the prices wayyyy high now, can't justify spending for unproven youngsters. The big time oldies are the only way to go as I see it. However, others may want to gamble - some current rookie will one day make the HOF - good luck figuring out whom it is.

Can't believe I just plunked down $350. for a '66 Aaron in PSA 6 - yes 6, not a 7, just a lousy 6. Jeez. But hey, the centering was darn good.

I couldn't agree more! It was gambling in the 1990s buying pack after pack of 1989 Upper Deck trying to pull a Griffey RC. It was nice to get Randy Johnson, or some of the others, but honestly sometimes the content of the pack wasn't worth the buying price. And I had no gum to throw at a pigeon!

Just when I think I couldn't possibly be more stunned, I get double-triple-turbo-supercharged-stunned by a card's price, as happened today. A sharp, ungraded 1960's team card variation (which wasn't even mentioned in the listing) went for $225+. My first thought (after "What the high frickin' heck is going on here??!!!") was it's probably an example of shilling...but then I checked the bids and found two people 'battling' for it into the ionosphere. The similar ones I've gotten recently came to me for only about $15 each. Holy heck!!!

But just when you think it might be time to start selling to get a ton of money to buy other cards you want, you realize the exorbitant amount of money you will receive from a sale won't be enough to get anything else, because those cards, too, are going through the friggin' roof. :(

If the exorbitant prices are real and not just a cabal of shillers running up their cards in a pump and dump scheme...like a few years ago with the big RCs.

I disagree with this. In 1980 kids were able to buy a 25 card cello pack for 39 cents. a 15 card wax pack for 25 cents or a 42 card Rack Pack for 69 cents. Hardly high stakes gambling. No kids (or in my case 20 year old) were paying hundreds to thousands of dollars on single boxes of cards. Loading up their credit card hoping for a profit.

Kids and young adults didn't spend beyond their means. It was cash and carry.

With respect to modern cards, I think the answer to your question has to be an obvious yes. I mean, does anyone actually collect modern cards? Put another way, is there literally even one person who would buy that Kelenic for any reason other than hoping to resell it at a profit? I doubt it.

Maybe his mom?

When I was 11 I borrowed $45 from my father to buy a 1952 Topps Mays and a 1953 Topps Mays. If I'd had a credit card I've have used it. Seven years later I sold the pair for $500. I wish I still had them...