Quote:
Originally Posted by Topnotchsy
Over the past few years, it seems like the real 'blue chip' players have seen a serious increase in price. I assume some are more localized factors. The movie 42 and the focus on the Negro Leagues likely helped reinforce Jackie Robinson's importance and the way his life transcended sports. (It is possible Jonathan Eig's book "King" added to that as well.) More broadly though, it seems like when money poured into the hobby during the pandemic, the baseball money disproprtionately went to the biggest names. Cobb blew up, but so did Jackie, Ruth, Gehrig etc.
From my perspective it seems like everything has softened in the last year or so (in some cases starting earlier, in others more recently). Coupled with inflation, the impact is reasonably substantial for those focused on a return, especially as other investments like the stock market have done well.
I have wondered (more generally) whether as time goes on, the biggest names will continue to be the stuff of legends, but more and more great players who are not in the tiny 1A group will become less interesting. In part I imagine this might have always been the case, but today it also seems like attention spans are so much shorter, and I wonder which fans are going to take the time to learn about the Al Simmons or Gabby Hartnett of Bill Dickey's of the world. Or learn about the Negro Leagues, or T205's or barnstorming or other areas that have enormous richness, but are not as 'front page.'
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Maybe. But I think more likely is that prices will go the other way. Five years ago a Cobb rookie might have cost twice a Ted Williams RC. Now it's 5x. Eventually people may start wondering why, and think that Cobb is over-priced. But who really knows?
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