T206 Price Opinions.....Elite 12 Question...
 

Building an off-back T206 set (202/524).

Was happy to recently get this Old Mill Chesbro ($1k) and Lundgren, Chicago P350 ($1,225).
Were these Over-Pays? About Right? or Good Deals?

Perhaps something could be said to the toughness of finding Old Mill portrait HOFers, and Lundgren Piedmont 350 being part of the Elite 12, as these were my justifications for "getting out the check book"

Hoping to get the opinion of smarter t206ers than myself...

Thanks,
-Ryan

I would say a little high based on VCP.

A Lundgren fell through the cracks on a PWCC auction on Ebay back in March of this year and traded hands at $175 in a PSA 2. However, Heritage sold a PSA 2 in 2020 for $1500. Obviously, the value lies in between.

A Chesbro in a PSA 4 sold for $1250 in 2020 in a Heritage auction.

Obviously, they don't trade hands all that often so there is no true established value so if you really wanted them, you did OK.

The Lundgren that sold on PWCC back in March was the KC version, not Chicago, hence the big price difference.

Do aesthetics play into the pricing? I will pay double a vcp average for some cards (and have). That Chesbro above is really nice and has big borders. I would pay a premium for it . Personally, I am not too interested in avg vcp cards for my T206 HOF project...
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I am not sure there is such a thing as 'overpay' in such an illiquid market. if you are talking Red Cobbs, sure I can give my view, but a lot of other cards are +/- 20% at any auction. i had just posted 2 white hat mattys in the last heritage auction . 2 indistinguishable SGC 3s, one sold for 1650 and other 2400.

I’ll second this! Agreed!

Well, according to the picture posted on VCP for that auction, it was the Chicago version. I just looked at it again since I thought I had looked at the KC version based on your post.

Perhaps, VCP made a mistake but based on their info the card was the Chicago version.

I think I see the problem after looking on the PWCC website. They incorrectly listed it as the Chicago version, but the pic they posted of the card is the KC version. I think the $1500 on Heritage is more like market value for a 2 with that tough front/back combo.

Certainly, the "Looks" of the card make a lot of difference to some collectors. Hence, buy what you like and pay for it with no regrets.

VCP provides only a glimpse of graded card prices but is certainly an invaluable tool to most collectors when trying to determine an approximate value of a specific card.

As others have said, on cards with tough variations pricing is fluid.

I once saw a card sell for $29 on Ebay and the exact card sold for $1500 in a Heritage auction. It was the only Old Mill back graded by SGC at the time but it was a common card so no one was submitting it for grading. Obviously, it fell through the cracks on Ebay but not through Heritage.

Again, the picture VCP posted that linked to the PWCC auction is clearly the Chicago version. You can see the actual card on their site. Not sure how they could link the wrong card.

Prices seem fine to me. I considered Chesbro but didn't pull trigger because I have one and didn't think it was a bargain. Just about right. Not as sure about Lundgren, but I would guess you did just fine. TOugher backed Cubs are on fire lately and that one has a ton of demand.

I don't use VCP, so maybe we're talking about two different cards? This was the card I was looking at:

https://www.pwccmarketplace.com/items/2648068

and

https://www.psacard.com/cert/27252631

It's the only Lundgren "Chicago" that sold in a PWCC auction in March of this year for $175. It's obviously not the Chicago variation, but PWCC listed the card as such, and PSA also incorrectly labeled the card as the Chicago variation.

Where I run into difficulties is trying to figure a fair value for some of the more obscure back variations, like SC 460/42 overprint or SC 150/649 overprint. T206 Museum suggests 1.3 and 1.4 multipliers, respectively, but there isn't a lot of recent data that I can readily find to see whether these are too large, too small or just right. There are just enough cards in holders that do not list these variations to make the PSA price database unreliable.

You are correct. How silly of me to only look at the PSA flip which showed the Chicago notation and expect it to be correct. The card was indeed the Kansas City version when I actually looked at the card in the slab so your original conclusion was obviously correct.

Watching some of the T206 prices on REA. Wow!

Sold out of my T206 way, way too soon. :(

Yeah, at first I thought it was just PWCC's mistake, but it turns out PSA messed up the flip.

As far as value for that front/back combo, it's hard to say. They are quite rare and don't come up for sale very often.

Funny you should say that Nate...
Look what just went up on Ebay. Lol. Guess I'll get a good barometer in about 6days 20hrs.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/1909-T206-J...-127632-2357-0

I guess you guys were referencing the Lundgren...but still, pretty ironic to see the Chesbro just go up.

One Other ? About the Lundgren...
 

Thanks for the input so far gents. I'll definitely be following the end of the Chesbro currently listed.
As far as the Lundgren goes, does the Elite 12 still hold merit? I feel like that was researched a while ago, and at this point I'm wondering if current populations have caught up to more accurately show scarcity or, perhaps, non scarcity? An example being the pop reports for the Lundgren Chicago P350...it's all the way up to 18 (and that's just psa). I feel like some of the other Elite 12 numbers were a little higher than I would have expected as well. It's also interesting there are more Lundgren Chicago's graded than Kansas City...should the premium be the other way around?

There are a minimum of two that don't belong in the Chicago 350 pop report.

Attachment 491151

Attachment 491152

Not to mention the folks that crack and resubmit. Bottom line is there are FAR fewer of those than the 150.

Yeah, certainly the opportunity is there for these to be incorrectly slabbed. There are people hunting the elite 12 cards, which means a greater likelihood of getting slabbed by those that covet them. With the two mistakes, and probably more, that gets you down to a pop of 16.

With that said...

Chesbro Old Mill has a pop of 7
Lundgren Chicago P350 has a pop of 16

If I had to only choose one, I'd probably take the portrait of a HOFer with half the pop and a non-Piedmont back. I understand how you have to interpret the pop reports along with demand though.

The other thing to consider with pop reports for T206 and probably other sets is that more valuable/desirable cards are grade more often.

When I was really looking at a few groups pop reports what I saw was that for cards that should be equal, HOF players had about double the population of regular cards. That also worked to some extent for cards widely known for years to be tougher than the usual commons.

Lundgren Chicago is in that category. So I'd expect to see twice as many compared to the KC version. That the two are nearly equal makes me think that there are probably 2x as many KC as Chicago. That's complicated by the KC card being slightly tougher than regular commons.

For an extreme example, when I was doing that looking up I saw that there were more Magies graded than the Magee portrait. But it's obvious that doesn't come close to getting the comparable rarity correct.

Well, if you look back at the latest REA auction and you see that OM Waddell Portrait sold for $8K in similar condition with a combined pop report of 12, you got a great deal on the Chesbro. A lesser quality OM Dahlen Brooklyn just ended on EBay for a little over $1,000.00.

I think you can safely say it was a fair price to pay for the Chesbro. It's a beaut!

Bill

Do you think the big premiums being paid for Old Mill will sustain? For the right cards they seem to be a higher multiple than historically. Are the pops proving it to be more scarce than thought? Or really depends on the card? What about for Southern Leaguers? They seem to be more easily found in Old Mill, especially judging from my collection.

There was a good thread around this topic last August, with some links to some other great sites that talk about the group of scarce Old Mill subjects:

https://www.net54baseball.com/showth...ghlight=willis

Hope that links works.

Bill

Wish that I knew of the "Elites" back when I sold this beauty (lol) a few years ago. Don't even remember what I got for it. I do know, that when I originally bought it; back in the late 90's/early 2000's, I sprung for around $30. Phew!

https://www.net54baseball.com/pictur...ictureid=32273

https://www.net54baseball.com/pictur...ictureid=32272

Lundgren (Chicago)
 

Carl Lundgren (Chicago) is a unique T206 card. Besides Wagner, Lundgren is the only Major League (MLB) subject printed with just 3 backs.
My 4th card displayed here is a color printing error (missing the blue ink pass).

http://photos.imageevent.com/tedzan7...n4versions.jpg
.http://photos.imageevent.com/tedzan7...n4versions.jpg


I have been collecting T206's for 40+ years, and I can attest to the fact that this Lundgren's EPDG and PIEDMONT 350 cards are very tough to find.

Several years ago, at the Cleveland National, I sold a PIEDMONT 350 version (VgEx) for 1700. So, I am not surprised at the high value he is selling
for nowadays.
American Lithographic stopped printing the EPDG and PIEDMONT 350 versions circa late 1909 after Lundgren's MLB retirement on April 23, 1909.
His 8-year career was pretty good.....W - L = 91 - 55, with an ERA = 2.42.


TED Z

T206 Reference
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Lundgren is a good example of why you can't date the distribution by the teams the players are depicted on in the T206's.

Lundgren was long gone from Chicago when his Cubs T206's were distributed.

He Played in his last game with Chicago on April 23 1909 and shortly after that game manager Frank Chance and owner Charles Murphy were trying to get rid of Lundgren on waivers.

In April or May 1909 he was sold to Brooklyn but never played with them and in the end of May he was sent to Toronto who he also never played for in 1909. Then in June he went to Kansas City who again he didn't play for.

In July of 1910 he ended up back with Toronto and this time he did play in 10 games for them. He was then sent to Hartford in August who he also played in 10 games for.

So on his two T206's cards he's depicted on a team that he was no longer playing with on his Cubs cards and a team he never played with on his Kansas City cards.