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Posted By: warshawlaw

My kid, my nephews, all of the little ones, love baseball. We take them to the game all the time. I give them cards as gifts all the time. A few weeks ago, I pulled out a beautiful Cobb card and showed my lefty daughter why I split her grip on the bat (At 5 years old, she's driving the ball off live pitching with underspin and loft; I can't wait to show her Teddy Ballgame hitting. Scholarship, here we come!!!). She may not play it after grade school, but she will know it in her heart and if she wants it, she can have my collection when I die. THAT'S the feeder system for young collectors, US.

There are cheap new cards out there, not just $2 a box. The basic Topps 2004 product was 10 packs for ten bucks at Target; I got my nephew 2 boxes for his birthday. He had a blast. I see lots of kids at shows just having fun. The scholarship, the passion, that comes into play later on. I was a card nut from 8-15, totally out of it from 15-21, and back into it ever since.

The hobby isn't experiencing the growth it had earlier; it can't. No business can expand like that forever. Collecting has matured.

The investment element is here to stay, like it or not. Sure, there are market ups and downs with any commodity, but the classics keep going. Card collecting has been on an upward surge since the 1930's. It is unrealistic to think it will tank the way many collectibles of the day have crashed. Besides, I'd rather lose my shirt on Cobb cards than on Enron shares. The cards are so much prettier.