Quote:
Originally Posted by Bliggity
Bingo. And I found the info I had been looking for before.
In June 2020, Lelands auctioned a near-complete set of 96/100. All of the main stars were included and were graded PSA A; the rest of the set was raw. This was the first time I'd seen any in PSA holders, so PSA must have just started grading them not too long before that. The set sold for $12,998.40. The buyer immediately split the set and put each of the supplements for sale individually on eBay, with BIN prices on the graded ones about 3x or more of comparable raw versions (and the raw ones were also priced about 2.5x other raw comps). I thought they would sit forever in the eBay museum, but one collector immediately bought the Jackson and Cobb/Wagner and posted them here and on other sites. He noted with pride that the Cobb/Wagner was a "POP 1" and was the first and only copy that PSA had graded. I was floored.
Since then, PSA A and 1 copies have continued to do unreasonably well. Meanwhile, around the same time I bought an absolutely beautiful Eddie Collins in BVG 4.5 for $160. BVG cards in grades 2-3ish continued to stay around $125-250 for mid-tier HOFers, while PSA 1s were sometimes pulling $300 when there were better raw or BVG copies available. And now we have a PSA 1 Jackson alone going for $12,700, which was basically the price of the entire 96/100 set that sold 13 months ago.
Unlike most other prewar cards where the highest-quality examples are already in TPG holders, 99% of the highest-quality examples of M101-2s are in raw collections, along with tons of examples that would probably grade in the 2-4 range. Whoever is buying these either has no knowledge or understanding of the series, or is a registry addict, or both. As BobC mentioned, if the people holding the 99% of the nice raw M101-2s start grading them, the people who are paying $12K for a PSA 1 Jackson and $10K for a PSA 1 Wagner are going to be hurting.
But who knows, we'll probably look at this thread in 3 years and think they got the deal of the century.
 |
Dan, Thanks for that info, was not aware of that sale last year. Based on the timing and everything else going on, yours and my thinking sounds like it may be on the money then to possibly explain how those ML auction prices got so high, people basing their purchases on the PSA registry somehow. If that is the case though, I can't believe the extremely low number of PSA graded M101-2s wouldn't make someone stop and wonder why there are so few graded on their pop report. They could do an Ebay search and easily find supplements for sale, especially Beckett graded ones in much nicer shape as you pointed out. I totally agree with you that there are likely a lot of much nicer supplements out there in private collections, but the apparent timing of PSA starting to grade them only recently, coupled with the pandemic and the PSA grading backlogs and delays, have possibly worked to keep the pop report numbers for these so low, at least for now. With those prices realized in the ML auction I've got to believe it was noticed by others as well, and it will be interesting to see if the number of PSA graded M101-2s starts to jump in the coming months.
The big question then, as you alluded to, is if others do start getting many more of these supplements graded by PSA, what is the impact on future prices. I feel these ML auction prices are ridiculousy high for the grades, and conventional wisdom would make one think that if they bring more M101-2s out for grading that are in much nicer condition that will have a negative impact on the pricing/value of these PSA1 graded supplements. But as we've seen over the past year or so, conventional wisdom on pricing has gone out the window, and it is possible that the new collectors/money that appear to be the main culprits behind the price surges during this pandemic may view these ML auction prices this past week as a new starting point for M101-2 prices going forward. In which case, if higher graded PSA examples of these supplements start hitting the market, we may see prices going even higher. I guess only time will tell.
By the way Dan, love how you have your M101-2 collection raw and in the binders. Have mine the same way with one of those rigid comic/magazine backing pieces in each page to support the supplements so they don't accidently get bent or creased. What do you do for the the double page team supplements then, just leave them folded over in the binder page then?
One thing did strike me as odd though. This Newman collection had so many high graded examples of unbelievable cards, I couldn't believe he would have been satisfied collecting only PSA1 condition M101-2s, and can't believe he couldn't have found nicer examples. Newman clearly had an eye for condition and quality so you would expect he would know those M101-2s wouldn't have graded well had he originally bought them raw. Maybe that is another factor that played into the amazing prices those sold for. If bidders saw how high-end the rest of his collection was, they may have assumed that those M101-2s he had were also among the best examples in the hobby as well, and bid accordingly, despite them all being only PSA1s.
Will be interesting to see how this plays out going forward. Now if PSA would just start grading S74 silks as well...........