Type Collecting vs. Collecting wo/Focus

[vintagebaseballcardguy]

+1000!! This really sums up a lot of what I have been thinking and feeling. At any point when I thought something like, "I HAVE to buy this card" or "I HAVE to finish this set" things started going downhill in a hurry. I mean hats off to collectors who can dig in and build those large 1960s Topps sets in nice condition because I am not the man for that job. One of my last efforts in postwar was building a 1965 Topps set. It is in my closet at about 62% complete. I couldn't possibly make myself buy one more card for that. No offense to collectors who are doing this and loving it, but I got soooo burned out.

I just feel free now. A few of you guys have essentially said buy what you like and can afford. That is precisely what I have started doing. Obaks, T205s, and D311s for starters. Perhaps some T210s and T216s down the road. Fun stuff!!

And these are some amazing signed cards, btw...wow!!

Originally Posted by T206Collector

I have found that if I hold myself to a specific plan that I get frustrated. If I just stuck with T206 cards -- even just signed T206 cards -- I wouldn't have picked up some of my favorite cards ever.

I am a T206 collector, but these are not T206s....

[ullmandds]

Originally Posted by vintagebaseballcardguy

+1000!! This really sums up a lot of what I have been thinking and feeling. At any point when I thought something like, "I HAVE to buy this card" or "I HAVE to finish this set" things started going downhill in a hurry. I mean hats off to collectors who can dig in and build those large 1960s Topps sets in nice condition because I am not the man for that job. One of my last efforts in postwar was building a 1965 Topps set. It is in my closet at about 62% complete. I couldn't possibly make myself buy one more card for that. No offense to collectors who are doing this and loving it, but I got soooo burned out.

I just feel free now. A few of you guys have essentially said buy what you like and can afford. That is precisely what I have started doing. Obaks, T205s, and D311s for starters. Perhaps some T210s and T216s down the road. Fun stuff!!

And these are some amazing signed cards, btw...wow!!

ooooooh that wagner!!!!

[vintagebaseballcardguy]

Originally Posted by ullmandds

ooooooh that wagner!!!!

Truth! The things I am privileged enough to see on this site!

Sent from my SM-G900V using Tapatalk

[Leon]

I used to be a type collector with a focus of getting one of every type card I didn't have before 1950. Now I am a type collector but only focused on cards I like not every single type I don't have. I have seen the title of this thread for a few days and been thinking the title pretty much sums up my collecting habits. Not much more needs to be said.

[nat]

I hope he's not planning to pitch from that distance.

[Fred]

Why not, the hitter aint gonna hit it... however if he does then it's going to hurt like a MFer if the pitcher gets hit..

[Seiklis]

I think the problem with type collecting is that it's also pretty much without focus. So long as you get a certain type, the players don't matter which kind of makes it a random set anyway.

I find type collecting with a focus, such as only doing a team, to work much better in both giving you a feeling that you're actually getting somewhere instead of a growing pile of stuff that to anyone outside the hobby looks completely random.

Now grant it I also include players out of uniform who played for Cleveland as well to fill in holes (such as T206 ABs....one of them doesn't have a Cleveland player) but it definitely helps keep the focus without getting too overwhelming

[T206Collector]

Originally Posted by ullmandds

ooooooh that wagner!!!!

Originally Posted by vintagebaseballcardguy

Truth! The things I am privileged enough to see on this site!

You guys are too nice, thanks for the kudos!

Having put together 520 T206 in 2007 & 516 T206 ten years later this year, I definitely go through long periods of T206 exhaustion. But, what happens is usually I go on a dalliance with a different set -- like 33 Goudey -- or period -- like 1950s Topps and Bowman, until the T206s start to call my name again. It's pretty weird, but I just try to follow my gut. Because if you're collecting cards because you "have to" or just to tic a box on a checklist, then you've lost the plot. Not to be overly philosophical about it -- I obsess over baseball cards, sorry -- but the collecting journey comes from within us. I only get close to satisfied when I listen to that voice inside me, not the voice of the half empty box of cards telling me I have work to do.

[vintagebaseballcardguy]

Originally Posted by T206Collector

You guys are too nice, thanks for the kudos!

Having put together 520 T206 in 2007 & 516 T206 ten years later this year, I definitely go through long periods of T206 exhaustion. But, what happens is usually I go on a dalliance with a different set -- like 33 Goudey -- or period -- like 1950s Topps and Bowman, until the T206s start to call my name again. It's pretty weird, but I just try to follow my gut. Because if you're collecting cards because you "have to" or just to tic a box on a checklist, then you've lost the plot. Not to be overly philosophical about it -- I obsess over baseball cards, sorry -- but the collecting journey comes from within us. I only get close to satisfied when I listen to that voice inside me, not the voice of the half empty box of cards telling me I have work to do.

Absolutely no apology necessary. I also get really philosophical when it comes to baseball cards and their history. They aren't just cardboard to me either, they are history and art among other things. For example, one set I have come to be drawn to is the 1910 Obak set. My maternal grandmother was born that year. It fascinates me to have a ball card that old. I think about all of the card's owners, where it has traveled over the years, etc. Living in Arkansas, I sometimes wonder if the Obaks that I buy from sellers on the west coast have ever traveled this far east in their 107 years of existence? With these cards, I find myself actually going back and looking at them even after I have had them for a while. That hasn't always been the case. I have been a checklist guy, but I will not again for these and the reasons you laid out.

You have a great collection. I want to work on T205s, Obaks, etc. the way you have on T206.

[Leon]

The stories behind the cards are often fascinating. When privileged to find an original/new to the hobby collection it is very exciting. Here is a Fatima-like postcard I am always on the hunt for more specimens of......

Originally Posted by vintagebaseballcardguy

Absolutely no apology necessary. I also get really philosophical when it comes to baseball cards and their history. They aren't just cardboard to me either, they are history and art among other things. For example, one set I have come to be drawn to is the 1910 Obak set. My maternal grandmother was born that year. It fascinates me to have a ball card that old. I think about all of the card's owners, where it has traveled over the years, etc. Living in Arkansas, I sometimes wonder if the Obaks that I buy from sellers on the west coast have ever traveled this far east in their 107 years of existence? With these cards, I find myself actually going back and looking at them even after I have had them for a while. That hasn't always been the case. I have been a checklist guy, but I will not again for these and the reasons you laid out.

You have a great collection. I want to work on T205s, Obaks, etc. the way you have on T206.

[darwinbulldog]

I prefer to think it's not so much that I don't have focus as that I don't have money, so I end up picking up things that I really like and then needing to sell them in order to get other things I really like.

If you asked me at any point in the past 15 years what I was working on I could have named a set or two, but I've always sold them off when something more special came along. I've made pretty good progress with N28, then T207, E95, R327, C46, T206 Polar Bears, and E126 -- but I didn't finish any of the sets or hold onto my partial sets for very long.

Sometimes I've made a little and sometimes I've lost a little when I sold them off, but it's generally been about a break-even proposition, so in practice whatever set I'm working on at any given time is likely to end up having served as a savings account toward a long-term addition to my collection (and it's the rare type cards that go into the long-term holdings). In the meantime, the set building gives me something to collect that shows up for sale more than once a year.