What do I collect?

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Posted By: warshawlaw

It is really hard to come to terms with the fact that unless you have a six-figure disposable income, you just cannot hope to collect everything. The problem is especially acute for thise of us from the "I remember when" tribe who have been collecting for many years. I remember when Ty Cobb checks were $50, I was turning down Old Judge HOFers were $50, T-card HOFers could be had at auction for a couple of bucks, caramel cards were considered the red-headed stepchildren of vintage collecting, etc., etc., etc., and I turned them all down. Locating the cards was the hard part; affording them was nothing. The main advice I can give is to decide on your own personal comfort level and go with that. When it becomes less about the fun and more about the money the cards are worth, or where you find yourself grinding your teeth over how much a card costs, you need to refocus and collect cards that make you comfortable and happy. Fortunately, it is possible to do so, as I have found over the years.

First I prioritized the sports to collect only baseball and boxing, which are the only two I truly enjoy watching. I traded or sold off the rest, except for a small crop of cards that I had from when I was a kid and really enjoyed (primarily a couple of basketball sets with heavy ABA content and all the wild 70's graphics and the hair--Artis Gilmore, Dr. J, Darnell Hillman, Slick Watts, etc.).

When collecting anything baseball got too expensive, I decided to focus only on HOFers and stars except in a few limited contexts where I bought the cards out of packs as a kid and could afford to piece together sets at a price I could still enjoy. I found that I did not find set building to be satisfying for vintage cards because I did not like paying the high prices of "commons".

As prices further escalated, I have focused even further to collecting primarily Exhibit baseball cards, Zeenuts, T206 HOFer and popular players, Lefty O'Doul, Jewish players, error cards, though I still buy those HOFer and popular player cards from each other set that catch my eye aesthetically. Fortunately, I can still afford to collect all of the boxing cards I want, which is where I am comfortable trying to build sets. I've also stoked my interest in Western history by collecting historical cards of historical characters, and for fun have assembled some sets of very cheap (relatively speaking) entertainment cards of Star Trek, James Bond, Kung Fu and Batman movies and shows I loved as a kid.

I tried type card collecting but found type card collecting to be unsatisfying because I did not care to have a card from many sets nor did I care to have only a card from many sets.

I have also found myself being increasingly mercenary as the years go by and prices sky, i.e., I buy a lot of stuff I don't really want if the price is right. Last year's National was a good example. I came home with a foot-high stack of Exhibits, a bunch of Zeenuts, a few obscure O'Doul cards, and a bunch of miscellaneous HOFer and other vintage cards that I did not really want per se but found at very good prices.

One thing you might consider is going into tribute type sets from the postwar period to obtain a nice collection of HOFers who are otherwise unaffordable. There are quite a few really nice, challenging but relatively inexpensive sets issued in the 50s and 60s that allow you to collect vintage players. 1951 Topps ATG, 1950-56 Callahan HOF, 1960-61 Fleer, 1961 Golden Press, etc.