[ls7plus]

The new market seems dominated by speculative and transient demand (with the latter meaning that as long as a young player is hot, his card will stay that way, but when he's in his '30's and on the downside, its days as a hot commodity are done, as some new exciting phenoms will have come to rule the roost). But that's not so different from what we had in the '80's to early
'90's, and I can't be the only one who managed to gravitate from new cards then to older cards, with a little help along the way. The same can happen with these "collectors" now--given a genuine interest in baseball, all that's required is a change in focus, especially if there's no aversion to reading about the days of old, or watching some of MLB or Fox's old baseball classic programs.

I'm probably in the minority on this, but I also think that there may eventually be a strong market for something like a Joe Mauer Bowman Chrome Gold Refractor (one of 50), assuming he recovers physically and is able to resume a Cooperstown-bound career for a long enough period of time. The time to buy that card of course is not now, at $1500-$2000 or so, but when Mauer is in his downslide '30's, or shortly after his retirement, when he's out of the everday spotlight. I'm guessing a '68 Topps Bench rookie is about $900 in PSA 9, and that the pop count numbers should be similar to the Mauer. My conclusion would be that the Mauer Gold Refractor would be a reasonably good buy at $100-$200, when all of that speculative hype and transient interest has run its course, and the card has a chance to grow into its real value, apart from the hype. As a HOF collector, if Mauer does indeed persevere and stay on that path, I know I would want what I would consider his best, or one of his best cards--its just that right now, his course is cloudy, and there are a lot better vintage cards to spend that kind of money on than a gold refractor!

Thoughts, anyone?

Larry