New and Shiny - Market Manipulation

[Exhibitman]

Other than as gambling, modern has never made much sense to me. is there market manipulation? Of course there is. Hyping Keston Hiura cards is the essence of manipulation. Generational talents like Jeter and Trout are generational talents.

If you want to gamble on modern, the only thing that makes any sense at all is to put away unopened and wait to see what happens.

[JustinD]

Originally Posted by Exhibitman

If you want to gamble on modern, the only thing that makes any sense at all is to put away unopened and wait to see what happens.

This is not bad advice at all, there's a ton of people that should live by this that throw away money by the boatload.

[Section103]

As far as distribution goes, I will relay a story I know of first hand and experienced with my own eyes and people I know in real life.

I forget the year exactly, but I was working the National card show in Chicago around 2008-2010. You are all familiar with the timing of that show. The person I was working with managed to have 6 out of a limited football rookie card numbered to 10. In August. Before this future Hall of Fame player had played a single down.

This certainly doesnt indicate all companies do this in all cases. But I can tell you with no uncertainty that is not always perfectly random.

[packs]

Are you saying you think specific cards from a product were pulled from packs and sent to one specific person prior to release? That would be pretty difficult for a large scale producer like Topps or Panini to make happen.

What type of place in the hobby would this person occupy that would make a huge company alter production to get a few specific cards to them? And why would they be interested in doing that?

[bnorth]

Originally Posted by packs

Are you saying you think specific cards from a product were pulled from packs and sent to one specific person prior to release? That would be pretty difficult for a large scale producer like Topps or Panini to make happen.

What type of place in the hobby would this person occupy that would make a huge company alter production to get a few specific cards to them? And why would they be interested in doing that?

Large dealers get special treatment just like in pretty much every business. I have no personal experience with Topps or Panini but I can guarantee Score done it. It is also no big secret Topps has done it for decades, I just have no personal experience with it.

In my experience it was not done before release and it takes very little effort. They just have one person stand there and pull certain cards.

[packs]

Pull them from what? The conveyer? Some kind of pre-release pile? From what I understand the autographed cards are mailed to each individual athlete who then signs and returns them. For this to be done those cards would have to be intercepted when they arrive back to the company and everyone in between would keep it to themself.

That seems like a lot of moving parts to accomplish what in the end? The chase cards sell the product and live breaking would make it obvious the chase cards aren’t in the product, at least in todays world.

[bnorth]

Originally Posted by packs

Pull them from what? The conveyer? Some kind of pre-release pile? From what I understand the autographed cards are mailed to each individual athlete who then signs and returns them. For this to be done those cards would have to be intercepted when they arrive back to the company and everyone in between would keep it to themself.

That seems like a lot of moving parts to accomplish what in the end? The chase cards sell the product and live breaking would make it obvious the chase cards aren’t in the product, at least in todays world.

You are trying to make a very simple thing seem difficult when it really isn't.