What's up with these t206 sold auction prices ???

[53toppscollector]

I think pop reports are essential, because its really kind of impossible to collect, on a serious level, without knowing how many there are of a certain item. if you want to collect every Babe Ruth card ever made, you need to know 1.) what Babe Ruth cards exist and 2.) how many of each exist

If there are literally 3 surviving copies of a card known, and 25 people want to own that card, you can see why prices are what they are.

Now you can posit that there shouldn't be 25 people who want to own card X, but that is also kind of silly.

There are more people who want to own these cards than there is supply of the card. Which is why you have a common player like Devlin go for thousands in an extremely scarce back. People want those backs. And I think they always will.

[packs]

Analogies have always been an issue on this board. I am talking about collecting an Old Mill subset not Babe Ruth. I think it has been well established that there are a lot of pre-war collectors who don’t grade their cards. The pop count might be useful for cards that are overwhelming graded but I don’t think they’re a true representation of T206 commons that people have little incentive to grade unless they’re either high grade or have a back seen as generally rare like Lenox, etc.

Pop counts have their place in the hobby but will they go on to dominate pre-war? I don’t think so. Maybe good fodder for an auction description though.

[nineunder71]

“Little incentive to grade”. Again, your comment

So, how do explain 308 Piedmont 350 Malarkey cards currently being graded? When at the same time, you don’t think those submitters would submit their Cycle 350?? Your logic is off

If you don’t mind..... how old are u?

Originally Posted by packs

Analogies have always been an issue on this board. I am talking about collecting an Old Mill subset not Babe Ruth. I think it has been well established that there are a lot of pre-war collectors who don’t grade their cards. The pop count might be useful for cards that are overwhelming graded but I don’t think they’re a true representation of T206 commons that people have little incentive to grade unless they’re either high grade or have a back seen as generally rare like Lenox, etc.

Pop counts have their place in the hobby but will they go on to dominate pre-war? I don’t think so. Maybe good fodder for an auction description though.

[nineunder71]

I ask that last question in hopes of pointing out a big fundamental difference between how modern collectors and prior collectors look at the hobby

It’s just not the same anymore

[packs]

Your question cancels itself out and that’s my point. There aren’t only 300 copies of the card with a Piedmont back. There are only that many graded.

[nineunder71]

If you still can’t understand pop collecting after all that

So be it

I will end as I started, Best of Luck & Cheers to All

[packs]

I don’t think I’ve given the impression I don’t know what it is. My comments have revolved around its sustained presence and importance in the pre-war community.

[Tao_Moko]

If you don’t mind..... how old are u?[/QUOTE]

"u"? I have a twelve year old that does that.

I agree that pops hold value for estimating, but they are highly inaccurate. I have an 880 count box slammed full of slips and many very scarce ones at that. For cards that are plentiful, pops work. For true scarcities, not so much.

[G1911]

Originally Posted by Tao_Moko

I agree that pops hold value for estimating, but they are highly inaccurate. I have an 880 count box slammed full of slips and many very scarce ones at that. For cards that are plentiful, pops work. For true scarcities, not so much.

This. It's pretty good for estimating relative populations, especially in more available cards where the sample size lends itself to a better proportional accuracy, to say X is more difficult than Y. When people use POP to say "there are only 3 known!" of a card they have because there are 3 in the pop report, I find that ridiculous; it is almost never true. Competitive people are driven to grading, and more likely to talk about their scarcities in forums, there are usually many more 'in the active hobby' not represented here. The extant population is almost always much higher than the POP report, there are many collections with a significant amount of tough material that simply won't hit the POP's until their owners die, if then.

There are a number of cards that most of the graded population is actually sitting in one of my shoe boxes cracked out. Crack outs, regrades and crossovers heighten the inaccuracy.

[G1911]

Also, I have a poor Atz with a Tolstoi back with a total POP of 5, less than the OM Ames. If anyone would like to pay me half of the Ames price for it because of its POP, I'm a seller.

[nineunder71]

James,
Great work! I find it easy to make logical assumptions using the data in which you have extracted from the pop reports. This is exactly how I go about researching all 524, or any subset within. Nope, its not perfect, but very useful. Which leads me to

Luke,
U have amazing insight and I sure wish I could articulate my words as well as u do. Thanks for the efforts to always educate the masses with excellent tid bits like “card target” and “VCP”. Yes, many tools available to us

Ryan,
Thanks for starting the thread. Your inquisitive nature will help you greatly as you continue to have fun, learn and grow within this awesome hobby. As you can see, differing opinions abound. Best of Luck and feel free to reach out with any questions, anytime. I’ll send you a PM with a bit more insight to ponder

Y’all’s Truly,

Colton

[Pat R]

Originally Posted by G1911

Also, I have a poor Atz with a Tolstoi back with a total POP of 5, less than the OM Ames. If anyone would like to pay me half of the Ames price for it because of its POP, I'm a seller.

It's really hard to gauge some of the tougher combos when it comes to prices but it's more than just the PSA pops that affect the prices SGC pops and past sales are a big factor too. Personally I think past sales affect the price as much or more most times.

The Ames Old Mill portrait has 6 in the PSA pop report but 0 in SGC's pop report. The previous most recent recorded sale was a PSA 8 in September 2018 and before that one you have to go back to November 2011 so you only have two recorded sales of that combo in 10 years.

The Atz Tolstoi is a tough combo but in my opinion not as tough as the Ames Old Mill. The Tolstoi's are one of the backs I keep track of and Atz has a total pop of 9 which ranks him tied for #98-#108 out of 253 in scarcity.

Here's the Atz I have I don't thin I could get anywhere near 1/2 the price of the Ames for it but I wouldn't sell it for that right now if I could.

img850.jpg