Observations from the Card Show Front Lines - UPDATED!!!

[drmondobueno]

I was wondering, while I was reading this, if I am an anomaly, a statistical brain fart, or just a figment of my own imagination. My last card show was in 1987. Or so.

In order to finish my ex’s job of throwing me out of the house… err, divorcing me, I sold my childhood collection to a card shop in Temple City, CA and cashed my attorney out of my life. A true two for one. I managed to keep one card worth anything - a T206 Jack Bastian - with a Piedmont back. Nice shape too. Graded by SGC about 25 years later a 4.5.

When my present spouse and I bailed on SoCal to the Eastern Sierras, I got the bug and started collecting again -using post-1988 technology, the Internet, Ebay, Auction House and Net54. Quick and somewhat painless purchases, for the most part. Did y’all know there were guys selling trimmed cards on Ebay? On (Gasp!) Net54? Everywhere? Guys were altering cards, and sold one for a huge amount, founding PSA (allegedly)? Jim Rome sez if you aren’t cheating, then you aren’t trying. I’m glad Jim Everett shook his world back in the day. In the meantime, not a card show in site where California meets the Great Basin.

Sure sounds like the card world today is full of shady car dealers selling to uneducated buyers - kids who have seen the BOOM cycle and are more than likely the KABOOM cycle. Card Breakers are moving from card types to different sports and back in their attempt to capture dollar opportunity. Financial hacks are speculating on card values, buying and selling in a churning feeding frenzy. I’d rather shoot craps. Seriously.

The piranha are loose in the carnival. Soccer moms are accompanying their brood spending their allowance on cards. They are worth money! And Fanatics is raking in the cash, selling boxes of cards for $400 to 500 bucks and more. For who? For what? Anybody think that this is the true junk card era for modern cards?

A new web site is out there to try and make sense of all this. Whatsmycardworth.com. Has value information for every sports card in the history of personkind. And so the idea of walking in aisles with thousands of individuals looking to buy the same six or so quarterback one of ones, the under-graded Local Koufax or Ted Williams card that should be a seven, at least a six…sound familiar? And who owns all the Crackerjack, Old Judge, T206, and who were all these guys? Never heard of ‘em, and besides the cards look boring and for old people and I can get a mini or three in my box of Gypsy Queen….don’t they know people follow basketball and that’s where all the cool cards and money is…not baseball. Just ask the guy on ESPN!!!


My back and knees hurt. Driving 200 miles to a card show sounds like fun, but this ain’t 1980. Not sure I could handle one these days. Or that I would spend the money when The Net makes buying a bit simpler…for us old people…just my opinion.


But one of these days, maybe the National…just to see the fantastic history of the game in one place, the people, the places where the game was and is played… so many reasons to attend besides buying and selling…a celebration of the game, barkers and hustlers be damned.

I love baseball. Always have, always will.