When Did RC Become Most Important?

[BobC]

Yup, like others are saying, early 80's and being pushed by Beckett and those other early price guides. Also, a huge reason IMO that Goudey Ruth cards are so damn expensive. Those Beckett price guides listed '33 Goudeys as Ruth's rookie cards, despite 1933 being the 19th year of career. That is just insane given all the cards Ruth had issued in the years before.

[MikeGarcia]

Originally Posted by BobC

Yup, like others are saying, early 80's and being pushed by Beckett and those other early price guides. Also, a huge reason IMO that Goudey Ruth cards are so damn expensive. Those Beckett price guides listed '33 Goudeys as Ruth's rookie cards, despite 1933 being the 19th year of career. That is just insane given all the cards Ruth had issued in the years before.

... Did you know , some say , I've heard , that you can classify a card as a rookie card , just by thinking about it ?

..

[Hankphenom]

Originally Posted by MikeGarcia

... Did you know , some say , I've heard , that you can classify a card as a rookie card , just by thinking about it ?..

Has Q issued his (her, it's?) list of RCs?

[Mark17]

Originally Posted by MikeGarcia

... Did you know , some say , I've heard , that you can classify a card as a rookie card , just by thinking about it ?

..

A lot of people call the 1952 T Mantle a RC, simply because they wish it to be so.

[Orioles1954]

My first rookie card memories were of Ron Kittle and Darryl Strawberry.

[Chris-Counts]

I can say with confidence that rookie cards were being hyped as early as the mid-1970s. Much of the buzz at the time centered around the '54 Aaron, because he had recently passed Babe Ruth on the home run list. I recall being at a show during that era and listening to a dealer explain to me that his 1963 Rose was a "rookie card," and hence, deserved a higher price. I was only about 14 or 15 years old at the time, but I laughed the logic — and still do.

[Dead-Ball-Hitter]

I'm not sure when The Sport Americana price guides first began to be published (late 70s to early 80s?), but I know they predated the Beckett guides, and James Beckett was a contributor, before branching out on his own.

I don't believe these guides indicated which cards were "RC" or rookies. But I do remember dealers using them in the 1980's and that Dr. J's 1972 Topps #195 (his rookie) was listed at .50 cents! I remember the dealer doubled the price to $1 and I was offended as a kid!

[mrreality68]

Originally Posted by BobC

Yup, like others are saying, early 80's and being pushed by Beckett and those other early price guides. Also, a huge reason IMO that Goudey Ruth cards are so damn expensive. Those Beckett price guides listed '33 Goudeys as Ruth's rookie cards, despite 1933 being the 19th year of career. That is just insane given all the cards Ruth had issued in the years before.

Is that when/how the 1933 Goudey Ruth cards became his rookie card? I truly do not understand that

[obcbobd]

I remember when Aaron was breaking the HR record that people started going crazy for his rookie card. I think the price was something like $5. I did not have $5 as I was only 12. :-(

[Jstottlemire1]

Great post.I love rcs but I think the cards from a players biggest season should be more coveted or be sought after as well and normalized however in collections along with the rookie. I.E. 21 or 27’ Ruth, 56 Mantle, huge individual years or long term career accolades/milestone breaking years. Just my humble opinion.

[todeen]

Originally Posted by Jstottlemire1

Great post.I love rcs but I think the cards from a players biggest season should be more coveted or be sought after as well and normalized however in collections along with the rookie. I.E. 21 or 27’ Ruth, 56 Mantle, huge individual years or long term career accolades/milestone breaking years. Just my humble opinion.

I agree! 1961 Mantle and Maris are top notch in my opinion.

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[D. Bergin]

I would say the introduction of Fleer and Donruss to the baseball card market in 1981 really started to escalate the RC phenomenon.

They also brought in the advent of the sought after "Error" card, though most of those have mostly been forgotten about or marginalized, except by the most hardcore variation collectors today (many of which reside on this very site. ).

It was a big deal that Fleer did NOT have a Tim Raines card, and that Donruss did NOT have a Fernando Valenzuela card.

Topps had them both on triple player cards, and then again by themselves in the Traded set...though at the time, the traded cards were in no way, shape or form, considered Rookie cards at the time.

I think the Joe Charboneau talk gets exaggerated a bit. Maybe his card got up to a buck briefly, but he was pretty much seen as a late bloomer, serious injury case, very early on. It was all about Raines and Valenzuela by the middle of 1981.

Then Ripken and a bunch of other prospects showed up in 1982 (Steve Sax, Mike Marshall, Kent Hrbek, Johnny Ray, etc. etc...), and it really started blowing up then, and collectors started to really go back in their collections and start pulling the Rookies of almost any promising player they could find.

I remember I had a particular fascination with Damaso Garcia of the Blue Jays, for a time. Thought I discovered an up and coming player that everybody else overlooked.

[steve B]

Originally Posted by D. Bergin

I think the Joe Charboneau talk gets exaggerated a bit. Maybe his card got up to a buck briefly, but he was pretty much seen as a late bloomer, serious injury case, very early on. It was all about Raines and Valenzuela by the middle of 1981.

T

It was, but considering what you could get for $1 in 1981 and what even some "bigger" cards went for that was a pretty crazy price for a card straight out of a pack.

[rats60]

Originally Posted by obcbobd

I remember when Aaron was breaking the HR record that people started going crazy for his rookie card. I think the price was something like $5. I did not have $5 as I was only 12. :-(

This was the first RC to take off in 1974 and it was 25.00 after he broke the record. The 1977 Fidrych was the first hot rookie in the new set followed by the 1979 Horner and 1980 Henderson. The late 70s RCs started taking off. If you look at the first Beckett annual, the RC was already the player's card to have.

[steve B]

Originally Posted by rats60

This was the first RC to take off in 1974 and it was 25.00 after he broke the record. The 1977 Fidrych was the first hot rookie in the new set followed by the 1979 Horner and 1980 Henderson. The late 70s RCs started taking off. If you look at the first Beckett annual, the RC was already the player's card to have.

Not to forget Joe Charboneau.... as that the first big rookie speculation bust?

[Snowman]

Originally Posted by mrreality68

Is that when/how the 1933 Goudey Ruth cards became his rookie card? I truly do not understand that

Unlike with the 1952 Topps Mantle, this has never actually been a thing. Nobody ever considered that to be Ruth's RC. There were just some random ignorant people who have said it over the years and collectors find it so funny that they repeat it in jest. But nobody who has spent more than a week in this hobby actually considers it his RC. Whereas with the 52 Mantle, there are some who like to think of it as his RC primarily because it's his first Topps issue (yes, stupid), and is "close enough" to his rookie season.

[G1911]

Originally Posted by Snowman

Unlike with the 1952 Topps Mantle, this has never actually been a thing. Nobody ever considered that to be Ruth's RC. There were just some random ignorant people who have said it over the years and collectors find it so funny that they repeat it in jest. But nobody who has spent more than a week in this hobby actually considers it his RC. Whereas with the 52 Mantle, there are some who like to think of it as his RC primarily because it's his first Topps issue (yes, stupid), and is "close enough" to his rookie season.

Beckett claimed, in writing, that the Goudey was a rookie for years. It’s not a jest.

[jchcollins]

Originally Posted by G1911

Beckett claimed, in writing, that the Goudey was a rookie for years. It’s not a jest.

The various forms of the Beckett organization - over their considerable history in the hobby at this point, has done more than a few questionable things here and there.

[G1911]

Originally Posted by jchcollins

The various forms of the Beckett organization - over their considerable history in the hobby at this point, has done more than a few questionable things here and there.

To put it mildly . But a jest is very different from a stupid proclamation. Beckett didn’t misprint one catalogue or have an April fools day jest. They kept it there for years, it was serious.

[jchcollins]

Originally Posted by G1911

To put it mildly . But a jest is very different from a stupid proclamation. Beckett didn’t misprint one catalogue or have an April fools day jest. They kept it there for years, it was serious.

Just being honest, I don't remember that. Not saying it wasn't there. I'm guessing this was in the yearly guides later in the 90's and not in BBCM - where indeed, they did not list values for prewar cards. I would agree it's a stupid proclamation.

[Leon]

Originally Posted by G1911

Beckett claimed, in writing, that the Goudey was a rookie for years. It’s not a jest.

+1. Not a good moment for them on that one. It made a lot of inexperienced collectors have the wrong information, and then tout it!
.

[jchcollins]

Originally Posted by Snowman

Unlike with the 1952 Topps Mantle, this has never actually been a thing. Nobody ever considered that to be Ruth's RC. There were just some random ignorant people who have said it over the years and collectors find it so funny that they repeat it in jest. But nobody who has spent more than a week in this hobby actually considers it his RC. Whereas with the 52 Mantle, there are some who like to think of it as his RC primarily because it's his first Topps issue (yes, stupid), and is "close enough" to his rookie season.

Agreed. It was begrudgingly granted that if a player did not have a card issued in his true rookie year, that one from the next year or sometime in the general timeframe was "the" rookie card. This is also likely at least initially how some people mistook the '52 Topps #311 for being something it was not. I'm not sure when some people started thinking that any mainstream "first" issue could be considered a RC, even if were years or decades after that player's first appearance in the majors. The '33 Goudey Ruths are clearly not considered rookie cards by anyone who collected rookies and understand how they were defined in the early to mid-1980's. Today - if people don't want to consider some of the rarer regional issues true rookie cards in cases like that - I'd rather just say the player doesn't have a rookie card.

[chadeast]

Originally Posted by BobC

Yup, like others are saying, early 80's and being pushed by Beckett and those other early price guides. Also, a huge reason IMO that Goudey Ruth cards are so damn expensive. Those Beckett price guides listed '33 Goudeys as Ruth's rookie cards, despite 1933 being the 19th year of career. That is just insane given all the cards Ruth had issued in the years before.

FYI, the Beckett guides list EVERY card in the 1933 Goudey set as a rookie card, so Babe just gets swept up in the madness. See photo below. It is pretty silly, they seem to have arbitrarily decided that the set would mark the beginning of RC eligibility. This 2010 Beckett guide also includes T205, T206, and CJ '14 & '15 set lists. None of the those sets have a single 'RC' in them. For example, Eddie Collins appears in all of these sets and has a card listed in the guide under each. Yet his '33 Goudey card is listed as his RC, years after he retired. The RC designation has no basis in reality for pre-war and should be ignored.

[rats60]

Originally Posted by chadeast

FYI, the Beckett guides list EVERY card in the 1933 Goudey set as a rookie card, so Babe just gets swept up in the madness. See photo below. It is pretty silly, they seem to have arbitrarily decided that the set would mark the beginning of RC eligibility. This 2010 Beckett guide also includes T205, T206, and CJ '14 & '15 set lists. None of the those sets have a single 'RC' in them. For example, Eddie Collins appears in all of these sets and has a card listed in the guide under each. Yet his '33 Goudey card is listed as his RC, years after he retired. The RC designation has no basis in reality for pre-war and should be ignored.

Speaker and Lajoie are not RCs, but Collins shouldn't be either. I agree that RC should be ignored for early cards, but I would apply it to 1933 guys at the beginning of their career such as Arky Vaughan and cards after that such as 1934 G Greenberg or , 1939 PB Williams.

[chadeast]

Originally Posted by rats60

Speaker and Lajoie are not RCs, but Collins shouldn't be either. I agree that RC should be ignored for early cards, but I would apply it to 1933 guys at the beginning of their career such as Arky Vaughan and cards after that such as 1934 G Greenberg or , 1939 PB Williams.

Sure, some of them are bound to actually be correct, in fact quite a few I'm sure, but my point was only that everyone who cares about such things should independently verify 'Rookie Card' status on their own and not rely on Beckett. This is, of course, news to almost no one here at net54, but I just wanted to let those who were wondering why these Ruth cards were falsely considered rookie cards by some how untrustworthy the source of that information is, not only for Ruth but for the entire set.

[BioCRN]

The RC designation has no basis in reality for pre-war and should be ignored.

One could draw so many lines here that it is true because people buy into different definitions/exclusions for their own collections.

Even though card sizes were not standardized, some people don't count post cards/exhibit/oversized cards as "real" cards or RCs.

Some people won't count regional-only issues.

Some people won't count small checklist issues regardless of distribution area because of the lack of representation of teams on whole.

Some people won't count cards that come from "WG" game sets...or mail-in redemption sets...etc.

Then we have the ambiguity of the actual years of some issues because it's believed to be a multi-year issue. A card may have been distributed in 1910-1911 even though it's considered part of a 1909 set.

There's gotta be even more than this. I consider most all of it valid given the lack of a cohesive hobby opinion and I don't really care if this opinion solidifies into a consensus.