10K for a Young portrait in a 5

[Sean]

Originally Posted by Rhotchkiss

Last night a number of T206's again went for crazy numbers - the Matty Portrait, a few Cobbs, the HR Baker and the Waddell Portrait, etc.

The fact that these cards -- week after week, auction after auction -- keep going for crazy prices, and its not just limited to Cobb, Young, Wajo, Matty, leads me to conclude that these prices are becoming the new normal for good looking T206s. In my opinion, what is happening is too wide/broad for it to be a few people manipulating a few cards. It seems that T206 has caught fire and people are willing to pay whatever it takes to get the cards they want.

I do not understand who/why someone would pay 2-3 times what a relatively-common example previously sold for publicly, but people are doing it. They are spending that money with PWCC, Heritage, REA, and yes, Memory Lane, who I thought had a great auction last night and obtained some pretty crazy prices.

I went after a Southern Leaguer, Helm, in PSA 6. The highest VCP sale was $880, last year. The card went for $2,100.

[benjulmag]

Back in the good old days (the 1960's), before the present insanity of paying exponentially more for a card that more neatly fits within a grading company's subjective opinion of desirability, T206's could be purchased for $1 from the Card Collector's Company. And the price was independent of player. I remember requesting that I be sent a card with no creases, and if I received such a card that by today's standards grade vg-ex, I would feel I hit the jackpot. THOSE ARE NICE LOOKING CARDS FOR THE ISSUE!

So the question to me is not why someone would pay $10k for an aesthetically pleasing T206 Young graded a 5, but why one would pay multiples of that for the card in an 8. And that doesn't even go into the question of what was done to the card to make it an 8.