November 1, 2025 • 42 mins
Scarcity in cards is a difficult thing to decipher. Is organic scarcity better than manufactured scarcity? Is manufactured scarcity real? What is the future of each? Well, it might be complicated, and we discuss it.
Graig of YouTube's MidLife Sports Cards and Mike of YouTube's Junk Wax Hero have a weekly podcast about sports cards. We Discuss Key differences between vintage and modern cards, how parallels, inserts, and serial numbers work to understanding autographs and relic cards. The role of grading in modern collecting, tips for transitioning your collecting style, modern sets worth knowing for vintage-minded collectors. Perfect for long-time collectors re-entering the hobby or curious about the hype around modern cards. Subscribe for more insights into every era of the hobby!
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Episode Transcript
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(00:00):
In our massive country, there are card collectors throughout
the land participating in the hobby.
There's Mike of Junk Wax Hero and Greg of Midlife Cards, and
while distance may separate them, here is where they come
together to talk cards. Hey buddy, how you doing?
(00:21):
Oh man, I have never been better.
Really. That's exciting, yeah.
This moment right here, you've seen it.
Wow, wow. OK, I'm going to leave it alone,
but that's great. I'm excited to be a part of this
moment then. It's because of you.
Oh. Well, now it's all starting to
(00:42):
make sense. How has the week gone?
Any pickups? Any new cards?
Anything super exciting? Well I'm glad you asked.
That wasn't really prepared. I have not bought a card in a
while. Well, I, I, I just showed my
pickups yesterday with Diana Taurasi, but that was, I almost
(01:04):
said Diana Ross, Diana Taurasi with that.
I bought that a couple weeks ago.
I'm saving up for the, the New England national.
I'm, I'm now calling it the New England national, the Shriner
Show, which is a massive, massive show just outside of
Boston, Wilmington, Mass. That is on the day that this
podcast airs audio version Saturday.
(01:26):
I'll be there Saturday. I'm very excited about it.
This episode of Surface Issues is brought to you by Chris
Sewell of YouTube. Collector, investor, dealer, in
that order. Chris Sewell here Baseball card
collector, investor dealer in that order.
If you have a collection for sale, whether it be a large one
or a small one, consider Chris Sewell.
He always offers share prices onyour collection and is always
(01:49):
looking to buy. I mean, I don't feel left out or
anything. It's like a bunch of my favorite
people are going to be there andme too.
Saturday. You know what though?
I'm setting up at a card show with my dad.
We've got a table. Well, he's got a table and I'm
tagging along. So we're going to have a fun
(02:11):
time on Saturday. So I'm excited about that.
What a great experience. Yes, yes, he's, I got a few
things to sell, but we'll just be hanging out talking cards all
day with my dad and I have a pickup that I don't think I've
mentioned it on the channel. I I have it.
I didn't, I didn't get it out, but it actually fits perfectly
(02:36):
with today's topic. So as you know, a former student
of mine, Matt Manning, was drafted #9 overall from to the
Tigers. And I had him spring semester
that year. We're on a block schedule so we
have four classes. He had me for first and second
(02:57):
period. Matt did and then I know.
And then in June he was drafted by the Tigers number 9th overall
and got a three and a half million dollar signing bonus.
So a month after leaving my classes he gets this huge bonus.
Anyway, so his rookie cards are 2022 and about six months ago
(03:22):
his tops Chrome super fractor 1 of 1 from 2022.
His technical rookie year came up for sale and I bought it.
And then I was like, man, it would be really cool to have his
Panini black finite, one of one the, you know, the cousin, first
cousin of the Super fractors, the black finite.
(03:46):
And there was one for sale and the guy wanted like 250 bucks
for it. So I just like watched it on
eBay and I just watching, watching, watching, watching.
And finally the other day I'm like, he's not in the news.
He's not affiliated with the team right now.
I'm just going to throw this guylike a $40 offer and I got it
like 40 bucks. So I have Matt's best bass
(04:10):
rookie card, the black finite from Panini, and his best bass
rookie card, the Super factor from Tops Chrome and I am so
excited to have both of us. Are you going to get them
autographed? You know, some people have asked
me that and some people have, you know, I've also talked
about, well, because Matt just had a son like 3 or 4 months
(04:34):
ago, he had his first child and I was at a wedding that he was a
groomsman in, in like February and his wife was there and she
was pregnant. And I was like, how cool would
it be to maybe gift him a coupleof special cards or something?
So I was looking through my double S the other day.
(04:55):
So I think eventually I'm going to gift him some like a like a
binder filled with some pretty cool stuff for his son, maybe
like his son's first birthday orsomething.
But I, I don't, I, I don't thinkthe move is to get him
autographed. I don't think it is.
Yeah, could be. Depends on.
(05:17):
What you use As for a writing instrument.
I mean I guess I I just think those cards are his best non
auto cards. He has a first Bowman, one of
one auto. He has a tops Chrome, you know
rookie auto. He has a one of one auto in
(05:39):
paninis. These are like his best 2 cards
that aren't auto cards. I don't, I don't think, I don't
think you ought of them. Important question for you that
will tell me how well you knew your student.
OK? What was his ERA his senior year
of high school when he was a student of yours?
I mean, it was low, but it wasn't as low as you'd think.
(06:02):
Well, California is much more competitive than Maine.
California high school baseball is pretty high quality baseball.
Yeah, I would expect it to be inthe ones probably.
I think it probably was. I went to a game and there were
15 scouts behind home plate and I kept walking over to see what
(06:22):
they were clocking him at when he was a senior and he was
hitting 9495 consistently. And then the second he came out
of the game, they all left. Yeah, I mean that.
But anyway, so that the topic today, the topic is, you know,
manufactured scarcity, which I kind of feel like is said and
(06:44):
sometimes sort of like, I don't know it, it's not said in a very
loving way at times, like, oh, it's just manufactured scarcity
versus organic scarcity. And there and the reason this
came up and I was thinking aboutit is Theo does that series of
dealer, collector and investor and he has, you know, one of
(07:08):
each give their opinions and then change shoebox legends.
The other day he gave this really good conversation piece
starter. I think.
I mean, it was a really good argument for manufactured
scarcity and a lot of people in the vintage community have long
(07:29):
been anti manufactured scarcity and for a long time I leaned
that way too. But I feel like I'm starting to,
I'm starting to change my opinion.
So let me start with this. Where do you stand on the
numbered manufactured scarcity? Again, I do not say that in a
(07:51):
detrimental way or a derogatory way.
I should say, where do you standon this?
Well when you talk about let's say pre war cards and the
scarcity of pre war cards, you know that if you invest in the
highest grade of a card, if you think about the Black Swamp,
fine for instance, you invest inthe highest grade of a card, you
pay a ton of money for it. There could be a find of more of
(08:14):
those cards down the road that significantly devalues yours.
If you have the only PSA 8 or only SGC 8, somebody might find
10 of them that are perfect and all of a sudden there are a
bunch of SGC nines and 10's and yours is worthless.
That is never going to happen with a super factor.
(08:35):
There's only one. Well well I say that, but there
are many examples where tops somehow produced multiples of
one-on-one one of ones. But I am still not out there
chasing one of ones, number to 10, number to 20.
If I see one and it's the right price, I would consider buying
(08:57):
it for the right player. But there's I'm not, I'm not
ripping packs. I'm not doing anything like
that. It's pretty rare that I'm going
to buy a numbered card as a single.
It's just it's just not something I'm interested in.
What I am interested in is a different kind of scarcity,
which is your iconic card. Let's say a 1954 Topps Hank
Aaron rookie card. That hat is in a 1.5 and looks
(09:23):
like A5 the great I Appeal vintage card.
So, OK, so you are you are not afan of the numbered manufactured
scarcity thing in modern cards, is that what you're saying?
I don't want to put words in your mouth.
I just want to clarify. I'm not not a fan of it.
(09:45):
It's just not necessarily for me.
I have some numbered cards for sure.
I have a, we're looking, I'm looking right now at a numbered
Jayson Tatum rookie card that I have.
But it's just not something thatgets me up.
That makes me, I mean, when I'm going to the show on Saturday,
I'm almost exclusively thinking vintage.
(10:06):
I'm thinking 90% vintage about my targets and then if they have
the right Roman Anthony card, ifthey have the right or Nomar
card which are cheap, or a nice Pedro card.
But even though it's probably wouldn't be numbered, at least
not very low numbered. But I understand the appeal of
them. I totally get the appeal, it's
(10:28):
just not something that is high on my list of things to obtain.
So in your collecting, in your collection, that's not something
that gets your juices flowing, but you understand why it would
get someone else's juices flowing.
Absolutely. See, because I, I was kind of an
(10:50):
anti anti number scarcity guy for a long, long time.
I, I collected some soccer cardsback in like 2020 and I was, I
was kind of into getting some ofthe lower numbered ones.
That was pretty cool, but then it felt what it felt like to me
(11:13):
is, do you know who Thomas Kincaid is?
I know the name. So Thomas Kincaid is an artist
and what he started doing was opening up lots of galleries all
over the place with numbered prints that had like touch up
work on them on canvas and became like a mainstream artist
(11:41):
with a very wide array of natureand night time and cabins and
lighthouses and and he became fairly popular.
And what happened was he kind ofjust kept creating new
parallels. Like he would go, well, there,
(12:02):
here's the cabin in the mountains out of 25 and here's
the gallery print out of 10. And this one's hand signing.
And he was doing things like that.
And then eventually now, like you go to an estate sale and
everybody has a Thomas Kinkade for sale and they're not really
in high demand because the market kind of got flooded
(12:23):
versus like an original Picasso or, you know, Renoir or
something. It's like that's priceless
because there are so few of them.
So I think where I have gotten because when I got Matt's Super
factor, one of one tops Chrome and I held it.
(12:44):
I'm like, this is really cool. Like this is really cool.
There's the attitude 50 and out of 150 out of 99, all the
different numbers. But there was one of these and
it was put somewhere in a pack. Somehow it got found like the
golden ticket in Charlie and theChocolate Factory and it
surfaced and then I was reunitedwith that one like it was really
(13:10):
cool and this black finite. I feel that way about two and
here's here's my hypothesis or or here's my thought.
I want to run it by you. You and I are very similar age
and we grew up through the late 80s and early 90s collecting
cards, you know, the high population era, the junk wax
(13:33):
era. And we were told, hold on to
that Jose Canseco card and that Mark McGwire card.
It will be worth something someday.
And most of that stuff isn't worth anything, like anything.
So we literally were told this is going to be valuable and it
(13:55):
has no value. And as a result, I feel like
there's this, like we touched the stove, you know, like you
reach up and you touch the stoveand you go, ha, it's hot.
And then the little kid from that point forward isn't going
to reach up on the counter 'cause it might be the stove
again. And I think that there's some
PTSD from people our age about modern cards, that all modern
(14:21):
cards are a scam because we lived through the greatest scam
that there was when there were just pallets of 1989 Donrus at
Costco and Price Club that we were told, Nope, you got to pull
the good cards, hang on to it, keep it in mint condition.
It'll be worth a fortune someday.
(14:43):
And now we don't believe that that could be true.
But the the hobby now for modernis so much different than it was
in 1990. It's it's not the same thing.
And I think some of these modernparallel cards are legitimately
(15:05):
different in a good way then when we grew up.
But but a lot of us just refusedto believe it because we touched
the stove. Well, this goes back to what we
talked about. Was it last week or the week
before that when we talked aboutthe the modern cards to chase
and you were starting to exploreultra modern cards.
(15:29):
And I said if you stick to certain types of cards, you're
going to be fine in the long run.
If you care about value, and youknow most of us do care about
value, we would like our cards to go up in overtime.
The vast majority of cards rightnow, ultra modern 2025 cards
will be worth nothing many yearsfrom now, right?
(15:51):
But some of them are going to maintain their value and some
most parallels, there are millions of parallels.
Most parallels are worthless. You know, you get a like AI
don't know those weird design pumpkin or Halloween parallels.
Whatever they are, there are 1,000,000 of them that are just
weird parallels that will never ever mean anything.
(16:13):
Numbered to 99. So and so means nothing.
But if you collect very specificnumbered parallels, even
unnumbered parallels, I think you're good.
And This is why the 90s refractors and early 2000s
refractors are so popular. Also why early patch cards from
the 90s, early 2000s, or patch cards are are popular and still
(16:38):
valuable because they meant something and there weren't a
million of them at the time. And you know, you can get a 90s
refractor, maybe 4 different variations or three.
Probably not even that many in the 90s.
But in the early 2000s there weren't that many variations.
And I think that for the most part you're looking at the same
(16:59):
thing now. So I just saw a post on maybe
Reddit, I'm not sure where I sawit, where somebody thought they
were buying a true green parallel, true green refractor
of a player. And when they received it in the
hand, it was actually the I don't even know what the
parallel was. It was a bizarre green OH Green
Wave parallel which is far less desirable than the 2 green true
(17:24):
green. And they, they paid true green
value for this Green Wave parallel.
And that's they're this number to the same, I think it was like
number to 99 or something like that.
Both of them have the same numbering, but the true green is
worth a lot more, just like the true gold is always going to be
(17:46):
worth more because some parallels are a lot more
desirable to collectors. Well, a lot of it, I think it
has to do with the consistency of it.
It it's, it's been, you know, the black finite from Panini for
a long time. It's been a Chrome super factor
for tops for a long time. And and you go that hasn't
(18:07):
changed. The, the the gold out of 50 have
been the gold out of 50 for a while.
You know, the red out of five has been like that for a while,
but the red out of five, geometric red is like will that
probably doesn't have staying power.
And so the consistency of it matters.
(18:28):
So the original design and theiroriginal philosophy behind it,
because that's one of the thingsI get confused with this.
I'm like, well, at one point gold's in Chrome weren't
numbered and then they were numbered out of like 450.
And then they started being numbered out of like they were
like jersey numbers and then there was like out of 50 and
then and now they there has become some stability.
(18:51):
And I think those cards that have that stability are the ones
that are going to have the staying power, like the new, you
know, snakeskin parallel out of 50 or the big baller out of 50
is not the same as just the regular gold out of 50 like
(19:13):
that. But, but I just think, and I'm,
I mean, I know I'm not preachingthis to an audience or to many
people who are collectors of modern, but I just think that I
think that it's different. I think that it's different than
(19:35):
it was. And I think that people need to
accept that not all modern and not all numbered stuff is a scam
just because the cards in the late 80s and early 90s were
mostly a scam. I just don't think that that's
the case. Well, well, help me understand
what was the scam in the late 80s or in the early 90s?
(19:57):
Weren't you told, oh, this 87 tops Jose Canseco rookie Cup,
you keep this at for a long time, that's going to be worth
something. This Brian Taylor, you know who
the Yankees drafted, he's going to be a superstar.
That's going to be worth a lot of money.
And we were told that those cards, if you keep them and you
(20:18):
keep them nice in a long time, they'd have value and and none
of them do like. There's no 89 TOPS card that has
any. Value, right.
But was Tops saying that or wereour parents saying that?
I think the hobby was saying that.
(20:40):
Right, but I I think a scam would be if TOPS were saying
that and Tops knew that they hadprinted 1.3 million of every
single card. I think that yes, you're right.
It, it, it's not I, I'm not blaming tops for this.
I'm blaming I, I, I think that it's just that, that the people
(21:03):
our age, the, the people who arekids around our age at this
time, there's a bit of drama that we're not going to believe
that modern is any good because we've been told before that
modern was good when it wasn't. And, and now that's got to still
be true. And I don't think that all
modern that's true. I do think the base card from
(21:27):
tops one flagship, the base card, the paper is not going to
be worth really much of anything.
But there are cards coming out of that product that I do think
are legit collectible items thathave long lasting collectibility
(21:48):
and value. And, and I, I just don't think,
I think that some people don't believe that.
And my dad is a person who is big time against manufactured
scarcity. And I understand that.
I mean, we've all been to people's houses who have those
little, those little statues, not starting lineups, but the
like porcelain, Well, the Hummels too.
(22:10):
And I was thinking like the baseball ones, like, you know,
or it's like Hank Aaron, what dothey call them?
Mcfarland's. I guess I don't know.
And, and you know, it's like, oh, I've got still got the
original package over there and stuff.
And they're numbered. This one's numbered out of 150.
And you know, people buy the little Disney statues and, and
(22:31):
you these are going to be worth something.
And they're this one's a limited, ultra limited edition.
And and so a lot of manufacturedscarcity isn't really all that,
but I do think some of these consistent cards I really think
have long term value and not theMatt Manny.
(22:52):
Don't get me wrong, like I love Matt, great guy.
If you ever met him, you'd go totally awesome dude.
That's not the card I'm talking about.
But I do think some players it'slegit card.
No, yes. No, I I agree some players and
(23:12):
some parallels have staying power but but it's few and far
between. Well, there's a difference
between collecting prospects andcollecting superstars.
Like, and I said this the other day, that's one of the issues I
have with your boy Jeff. Is that he's do not.
(23:34):
He he gives investment advice about an unproven prospect and
that's not an investment that isthat is going to the casino and
spinning the wheel. And one of those has a jackpot
and all the others have $2.00 and it was a $50 buy in like.
(23:55):
But we can agree that Freddie Freeman's going to the Hall of
Fame, right? I would think so, yeah.
Are his cars going to be worth anything in 20 years?
They'll be worth something, right?
But if you buy his cards today on the high of him winning
another World Series game with ahome run, walk off home run,
will it be worth accounting for inflation more or less in 20
(24:17):
years than you buy it for today?And we're I mean, are we talking
about an out of 150 rookie or are we talking about a rookie
super factor autographed card orare you saying either?
Either any card. I mean, I, I see where you're
(24:41):
leading me. You are leading the witness,
Your Honor. I, I think they'll probably not
be worth as much as they are right now, but that that's not
for sure. Because if you had asked me five
years ago, would these Jordan 90s refractors, you know, or
(25:02):
early 2000s refractor insert cards numbered out of 50, I
would have said there's no way that they'll keep this value.
But they've gone bananas. So I think Freddie Freeman is
different than Jordan and I think I think these cards are
different. But I think that there's a
(25:24):
strong possibility that an out of 50 gold Shohei rookie Otto is
worth more in 15 years than it is now.
I think that's possible, but Freddie Freeman?
Probably not. Right.
I agree. There are probably fewer than a
(25:45):
handful of players right now whose cards will be more
valuable in 20 years than they are today.
And that's terrible to say. I love Freddie Freeman.
I think Freddie Freeman is amazing.
He is virtually a lock for the Hall of Fame in in my Hall of
Fame he is in and probably was ayear or two ago, but he doesn't
have the staying power and the hobby requires staying power.
(26:07):
He helps with. He's the, I think, the only
player in history to have two walk off World Series home runs
and that helps. You're just taking salt and
you're just rubbing it in so deep.
You're just saying, oh, what were the teams that happened
against? The Toronto Blue Jays and who
did they play last year? The team from the American
(26:28):
League that made the World Series?
I can't remember. Who was in the World Series?
Oh, the New York Yankees. Oh, I forgot.
You're kidding, right? I'm not.
Yeah, I I just didn't care aboutthe World Series last year.
I followed it because Shohei mostly, honestly, Shohei and
Aaron Judge are maybe Acuna if he can make a big comeback and
(26:50):
have like 6 or 7 huge seasons. But there's nobody else that has
Mookie Betts. Yeah, but he's already amazing
and and there's really not much of a story.
Like Mookie Betts is kind of a poor man's Albert Pujols.
People appreciate him, but he's not one of the there's not much
(27:12):
of a story behind him. He's kind of vanilla and I love
Mookie, one of my all time favorite players.
So this isn't a knock on any of these guys.
Just thinking about what does the hobby care about?
What do future long term values care about when it comes to a
baseball player and its long standing stories?
It's legends. Judge has them, Shohe has them.
(27:37):
Does Ichiro have that? Each row does, and he also has
the benefit of a massive global market.
What about pool holes? Does he have it pool?
Holes does because he his top, his first ten seasons were
absolutely legendary. He also topped 700 home runs.
He, yeah, I mean, he's, he's up there, but he's certainly not a
(27:59):
big one. Did pool holes take performance
enhancing drugs? Absolutely.
Don't you think so? I, I think that he, I think that
if I had to place money on if hedid or didn't, I think that he
(28:20):
probably did. But somehow he was able to not
be on any lists. Therefore, he gets to be in the
Hall of Fame. Right.
But David Ortiz, we know he did steroids or performance
enhancing drugs. He made it into the Hall of
Fame. There are a.
Lot of them should bury bonds, be in the Hall of Fame.
(28:40):
Oh, we're getting into some, some big territory with that.
It's going to really upset some listeners here.
And I'm, I'm a believer that allof the PED guys should be in if
they if they, if their career was enough to get in, even with
the steroids. And we know Bonds would have
gotten in without them. Clemens, your guy would have
(29:03):
been in without them. Would Rafael Palmero?
Probably not. I would not penalize a guy
because he took steroids, but ifI don't think he would have made
it in without them, I I wouldn'tlet, I wouldn't put them in.
Would pool holes have made it inwithout them?
That's a good question. I think so.
I don't know that Pool Holes wastaking them in 2002, but you
(29:28):
can't give a guy steroids and have him go from mediocre to 710
home runs or however many home runs he hit.
Have you ever heard of Sammy Sosa?
That sounds so familiar. Didn't he go from regular dude
to he man? But he, well, Sosa was young
(29:50):
when he all of a sudden got really, really good.
And I think that Sosa, if you look at his career, he had the
typical trajectory of a guy. Yeah, you're looking up his
stats right now. I think he he went from pretty
good to amazing. There was certainly no Brady
(30:10):
Anderson in in Sammy Sosa, right?
Luis Gonzalez. Luis Gonzalez, another example,
but I think if I remember correctly, Sosa hit like 29 home
runs the year before his big breakout.
So home runs the year before, I don't know what we would call
the year, the big breakout. So he went
(30:32):
1510833253640366663506449403514.Yeah.
So this makes my point. The 33 home runs I just pulled
it up to was at the age of 24. That's not unreasonable.
And the year before that, in fact, that was only his second
(30:55):
full season in baseball. The year before that, he only
had 67 games. So if we if we go to his, I'm
doing this blind because I've never looked at his minor
leagues before, but he was a home run hitter.
Let me see here. He hit.
OK, so he wasn't a home run hitter in the minor leagues, but
(31:16):
he was also only 1819 years old.So I think perfectly reasonable
at the age of 2324 to hit 33 home runs and then 3325364036
and then at the age of 29 he hit66.
(31:36):
We should do an episode one time.
If you follow Jose Canseco, he's.
Crazy. If you take Jose Canseco and you
follow the teams that he played for and then the other players
on his teams and what happened to those players when he showed
up, it's like, it's like you could write a book on it.
(32:02):
What happened to the Rangers? What happened to the Blue Jays?
What happened to the A's? Like just follow Canseco and his
path and there's just like this power boom across the lineup.
Yeah, and he's talked about the guys that he injected.
Yeah. Like Yvonne Rodriguez?
Yeah. So let me ask you this.
He said Clemens didn't do anything, but he threw everyone
(32:24):
else under the bus. But he didn't throw Clemens
under the bus. What do you think he just didn't
know about Clemens? Or do you think Clemens paid him
off? Or do you think Clemens is
innocent? Clemens is definitely not
innocent. Come on.
You know he's not right. Oh.
I mean I. Or the record for those of you
(32:46):
who are listening? Greg shrugged.
I did. I.
I will say this, I was, I was ina jury box one time and this is
a true story. I had jury duty and I'm sitting
in there and they're talking about, you know, they're going
around asking the I get called, I'm in one of the seats.
(33:09):
And the judge says, Mr. Miller, is there any reason that you
think you couldn't be a fair andimpartial juror?
And I said, I kind of have this thing where unless I'm certain
about something, I'm not like going to say definitively
(33:32):
anything. Sure.
And he and the judge says, well,don't you think everybody feels
that way? And I said, your Honor, I'm not
fully convinced that OJ did it. And they go, Mr. Miller, you're
excused. And I'm like, I wasn't trying to
get out of it. I was just being honest.
Like, do I think OJ did it? Probably, but I wouldn't bet my
(33:56):
life on it. He admitted it.
No, he didn't. He did.
OJ. He wrote a book called.
He said if I had done it, this is how I would have done it.
I I just, I am a person who doesn't like to make claims
about others if I'm not certain about it.
(34:18):
That's how I am. I'm, I'm now adding in to our
group chat, our our text chat. Greg thinks who OJ was innocent.
No, I didn't say that. That's not what he said.
I said I'm not convinced. I'm not fully convinced that OJ
is guilty. I think that he did the do I
(34:41):
think Bonds took something. And here's another thing.
OK, so I was on a trial, one I was in not on a trial.
I was on a jury. And there was a guy who was on
trial for long story, but Long story short, he was in
possession of stolen license plates.
(35:02):
And in order to convict him, it had to be proven not just that
they were stolen, but that he knew they were stolen.
Right. So part of my thing is, I think
it's possible that some people were injected with things or had
(35:23):
creams rubbed on them or whatever, where they thought
they didn't know for sure what it was.
They just said, hey, I've got this new drug.
It helps boost strength. You want to take it, it's, you
know, put it on. Yeah, let's try it out.
Or they had a Chipotle burrito that somehow had nandrolone in
(35:44):
it. I just think that's possible.
I think it's possible that thereare guys do I do I think Bonds
took stuff. I think he probably did.
I'm not certain. I think he probably did.
But what about feminists? Hold on.
And I think it's possible that Bonds didn't know that he was
(36:06):
taking something he wasn't allowed to take.
I think that's possible. I think Clemens knows he was
getting injected with stuff. I think Clemens was getting
injected with stuff. I don't know if Clemens knows
what he was being injected with,and I am not certain that he was
being injected with something hewasn't allowed to take.
(36:30):
Do I think he probably was? Yes.
Do I think that he knew It may. I'm less certain about that.
I think these guys say to their trainers give me what I need,
make sure I'm good, and they don't know what it is.
I think that's possible. Have I just lost all credibility
(36:50):
because what I'm being, I'm not trying to be funny.
I'm not trying to defend. I'm not trying to defend
anybody. All I'm doing is what I'm saying
is I tend to give people the benefit of the doubt.
I've said you many times in chats.
You know, I don't know if that guy meant to do what he did.
He's a really nice guy. You've heard me say that a
(37:10):
million times. Yes.
And I tend to give people the benefit of the doubt, and maybe
that's a fault of mine, but that's just how I am.
Because I hope that someday, if anybody ever hears me say
something or sees me do something and they go, what?
They give me the benefit of the doubt because most likely I
didn't mean to do whatever it isthat I did.
(37:33):
Yeah, I give Ben. You know, I'm probably just
behind you in terms of giving people the doubt.
And anytime we're in this in a group chat and somebody's upset
with somebody, yeah, I'm, I'm right there with you.
Maybe not quite to the same level as you of giving people
the benefit of the doubt, but I'm pretty close behind.
But I am sure that Bonds and Clemens knew what they were
(37:57):
taking. I think, OK, just for final
putting this to rest, I and the fact that we're only talking
about Bonds and Clemens right now is a little annoying to me
because Mookie's out there listening to this and we're not
including Piazza or the others. But I will say this about Bonds
(38:18):
and Clemens specifically, I think over 95% that they both
took something. I would go, I would say 97% that
they took something. That's what I think.
That you knew they took something.
No, no, no, no. That they took something, OK.
I think both of them, I think 75%, they knew that they were
(38:46):
taking something. I think there's a good 25% that
they had something injected and they didn't quite know that what
it was was legal or illegal. I think they said, don't tell me
what you're giving me, just giveme what I need.
I think that's possible. I think there's about a 25%
chance of that. That's my official stance.
And if people are out there listening, they go, Greg's a
(39:08):
lunatic, that's OK, That's OK. I'm just being honest.
I'm just being honest. And it bugs me that one of the
best hitters of all time and oneof the best pitchers of all time
are not in the Hall of Fame whenwe have multiple people who we
know took stuff, who tested positive, who are in the Hall of
(39:29):
Fame. That makes as soon as Ortiz was
voted in first ballot. Now Yogi Berra, by the way, is a
second ballot Hall of Famer. David Ortiz was a first ballot
Hall of Famer and he tested positive.
But Clemens and Bonds aren't in I.
I have a hard time with that. I have a hard time with that.
(39:52):
I agree. Put them in.
I I think Ortiz deserves to be in.
I think Bonds. I think Clemens, I think Piazza,
Mark McGuire, Sammy Sosa. You think Sosa should be in?
I do, yeah. Wow.
That one How did we get here my.I have no idea.
(40:12):
We're 40 minutes in. It's a great discussion.
I didn't, we didn't expect this,but I'm we are going to promote
the heck out of your crazy opinions.
I think this Darren and I tend to go off topic, but today we
took such a hard right hand turnwhen Siri was saying continue
(40:35):
straight on the route and we just took a hard right and here
we are somewhere like in Coming to America where they're
stealing the hubcaps off of the wheels because they are not in
the place they're supposed to be.
It's a great movie, by the way. I haven't seen it in too long.
It's a great I've seen that movie 150 times.
(40:59):
All right, well, we have to go because we have another thing
we've got to take care of. It's 41 minutes in.
This was fun. I mean, I hope that people don't
think I'm a lunatic, but this isthe thing I've said from the
beginning. I am who I am.
I don't hide behind my opinions.Some people will agree with me,
(41:20):
some people won't. I don't say what I think people
want to hear. I say what I think.
And am I naive? Possibly that's possible, but
that's just that's just where I'm at.
Next week, we'll talk about why Jack Morris doesn't belong on
the Hall of Fame and why Harold Baines does.
(41:40):
Oh my gosh, that will be a horribly boring conversation.
Yeah, we won't be talking about that, OK.
All right, buddy, thanks for hanging out with me for 41
minutes and 30 seconds. You too.
All right.
In our massive country, there are card collectors throughout
the land participating in the hobby.
There's Mike of Junk Wax Hero and Greg of Midlife Cards, and
while distance may separate them, here is where they come
together to talk cards. Hey buddy, how you doing?
(00:21):
Oh man, I have never been better.
Really. That's exciting, yeah.
This moment right here, you've seen it.
Wow, wow. OK, I'm going to leave it alone,
but that's great. I'm excited to be a part of this
moment then. It's because of you.
Oh. Well, now it's all starting to
(00:42):
make sense. How has the week gone?
Any pickups? Any new cards?
Anything super exciting? Well I'm glad you asked.
That wasn't really prepared. I have not bought a card in a
while. Well, I, I, I just showed my
pickups yesterday with Diana Taurasi, but that was, I almost
(01:04):
said Diana Ross, Diana Taurasi with that.
I bought that a couple weeks ago.
I'm saving up for the, the New England national.
I'm, I'm now calling it the New England national, the Shriner
Show, which is a massive, massive show just outside of
Boston, Wilmington, Mass. That is on the day that this
podcast airs audio version Saturday.
(01:26):
I'll be there Saturday. I'm very excited about it.
This episode of Surface Issues is brought to you by Chris
Sewell of YouTube. Collector, investor, dealer, in
that order. Chris Sewell here Baseball card
collector, investor dealer in that order.
If you have a collection for sale, whether it be a large one
or a small one, consider Chris Sewell.
He always offers share prices onyour collection and is always
(01:49):
looking to buy. I mean, I don't feel left out or
anything. It's like a bunch of my favorite
people are going to be there andme too.
Saturday. You know what though?
I'm setting up at a card show with my dad.
We've got a table. Well, he's got a table and I'm
tagging along. So we're going to have a fun
(02:11):
time on Saturday. So I'm excited about that.
What a great experience. Yes, yes, he's, I got a few
things to sell, but we'll just be hanging out talking cards all
day with my dad and I have a pickup that I don't think I've
mentioned it on the channel. I I have it.
I didn't, I didn't get it out, but it actually fits perfectly
(02:36):
with today's topic. So as you know, a former student
of mine, Matt Manning, was drafted #9 overall from to the
Tigers. And I had him spring semester
that year. We're on a block schedule so we
have four classes. He had me for first and second
(02:57):
period. Matt did and then I know.
And then in June he was drafted by the Tigers number 9th overall
and got a three and a half million dollar signing bonus.
So a month after leaving my classes he gets this huge bonus.
Anyway, so his rookie cards are 2022 and about six months ago
(03:22):
his tops Chrome super fractor 1 of 1 from 2022.
His technical rookie year came up for sale and I bought it.
And then I was like, man, it would be really cool to have his
Panini black finite, one of one the, you know, the cousin, first
cousin of the Super fractors, the black finite.
(03:46):
And there was one for sale and the guy wanted like 250 bucks
for it. So I just like watched it on
eBay and I just watching, watching, watching, watching.
And finally the other day I'm like, he's not in the news.
He's not affiliated with the team right now.
I'm just going to throw this guylike a $40 offer and I got it
like 40 bucks. So I have Matt's best bass
(04:10):
rookie card, the black finite from Panini, and his best bass
rookie card, the Super factor from Tops Chrome and I am so
excited to have both of us. Are you going to get them
autographed? You know, some people have asked
me that and some people have, you know, I've also talked
about, well, because Matt just had a son like 3 or 4 months
(04:34):
ago, he had his first child and I was at a wedding that he was a
groomsman in, in like February and his wife was there and she
was pregnant. And I was like, how cool would
it be to maybe gift him a coupleof special cards or something?
So I was looking through my double S the other day.
(04:55):
So I think eventually I'm going to gift him some like a like a
binder filled with some pretty cool stuff for his son, maybe
like his son's first birthday orsomething.
But I, I don't, I, I don't thinkthe move is to get him
autographed. I don't think it is.
Yeah, could be. Depends on.
(05:17):
What you use As for a writing instrument.
I mean I guess I I just think those cards are his best non
auto cards. He has a first Bowman, one of
one auto. He has a tops Chrome, you know
rookie auto. He has a one of one auto in
(05:39):
paninis. These are like his best 2 cards
that aren't auto cards. I don't, I don't think, I don't
think you ought of them. Important question for you that
will tell me how well you knew your student.
OK? What was his ERA his senior year
of high school when he was a student of yours?
I mean, it was low, but it wasn't as low as you'd think.
(06:02):
Well, California is much more competitive than Maine.
California high school baseball is pretty high quality baseball.
Yeah, I would expect it to be inthe ones probably.
I think it probably was. I went to a game and there were
15 scouts behind home plate and I kept walking over to see what
(06:22):
they were clocking him at when he was a senior and he was
hitting 9495 consistently. And then the second he came out
of the game, they all left. Yeah, I mean that.
But anyway, so that the topic today, the topic is, you know,
manufactured scarcity, which I kind of feel like is said and
(06:44):
sometimes sort of like, I don't know it, it's not said in a very
loving way at times, like, oh, it's just manufactured scarcity
versus organic scarcity. And there and the reason this
came up and I was thinking aboutit is Theo does that series of
dealer, collector and investor and he has, you know, one of
(07:08):
each give their opinions and then change shoebox legends.
The other day he gave this really good conversation piece
starter. I think.
I mean, it was a really good argument for manufactured
scarcity and a lot of people in the vintage community have long
(07:29):
been anti manufactured scarcity and for a long time I leaned
that way too. But I feel like I'm starting to,
I'm starting to change my opinion.
So let me start with this. Where do you stand on the
numbered manufactured scarcity? Again, I do not say that in a
(07:51):
detrimental way or a derogatory way.
I should say, where do you standon this?
Well when you talk about let's say pre war cards and the
scarcity of pre war cards, you know that if you invest in the
highest grade of a card, if you think about the Black Swamp,
fine for instance, you invest inthe highest grade of a card, you
pay a ton of money for it. There could be a find of more of
(08:14):
those cards down the road that significantly devalues yours.
If you have the only PSA 8 or only SGC 8, somebody might find
10 of them that are perfect and all of a sudden there are a
bunch of SGC nines and 10's and yours is worthless.
That is never going to happen with a super factor.
(08:35):
There's only one. Well well I say that, but there
are many examples where tops somehow produced multiples of
one-on-one one of ones. But I am still not out there
chasing one of ones, number to 10, number to 20.
If I see one and it's the right price, I would consider buying
(08:57):
it for the right player. But there's I'm not, I'm not
ripping packs. I'm not doing anything like
that. It's pretty rare that I'm going
to buy a numbered card as a single.
It's just it's just not something I'm interested in.
What I am interested in is a different kind of scarcity,
which is your iconic card. Let's say a 1954 Topps Hank
Aaron rookie card. That hat is in a 1.5 and looks
(09:23):
like A5 the great I Appeal vintage card.
So, OK, so you are you are not afan of the numbered manufactured
scarcity thing in modern cards, is that what you're saying?
I don't want to put words in your mouth.
I just want to clarify. I'm not not a fan of it.
(09:45):
It's just not necessarily for me.
I have some numbered cards for sure.
I have a, we're looking, I'm looking right now at a numbered
Jayson Tatum rookie card that I have.
But it's just not something thatgets me up.
That makes me, I mean, when I'm going to the show on Saturday,
I'm almost exclusively thinking vintage.
(10:06):
I'm thinking 90% vintage about my targets and then if they have
the right Roman Anthony card, ifthey have the right or Nomar
card which are cheap, or a nice Pedro card.
But even though it's probably wouldn't be numbered, at least
not very low numbered. But I understand the appeal of
them. I totally get the appeal, it's
(10:28):
just not something that is high on my list of things to obtain.
So in your collecting, in your collection, that's not something
that gets your juices flowing, but you understand why it would
get someone else's juices flowing.
Absolutely. See, because I, I was kind of an
(10:50):
anti anti number scarcity guy for a long, long time.
I, I collected some soccer cardsback in like 2020 and I was, I
was kind of into getting some ofthe lower numbered ones.
That was pretty cool, but then it felt what it felt like to me
(11:13):
is, do you know who Thomas Kincaid is?
I know the name. So Thomas Kincaid is an artist
and what he started doing was opening up lots of galleries all
over the place with numbered prints that had like touch up
work on them on canvas and became like a mainstream artist
(11:41):
with a very wide array of natureand night time and cabins and
lighthouses and and he became fairly popular.
And what happened was he kind ofjust kept creating new
parallels. Like he would go, well, there,
(12:02):
here's the cabin in the mountains out of 25 and here's
the gallery print out of 10. And this one's hand signing.
And he was doing things like that.
And then eventually now, like you go to an estate sale and
everybody has a Thomas Kinkade for sale and they're not really
in high demand because the market kind of got flooded
(12:23):
versus like an original Picasso or, you know, Renoir or
something. It's like that's priceless
because there are so few of them.
So I think where I have gotten because when I got Matt's Super
factor, one of one tops Chrome and I held it.
(12:44):
I'm like, this is really cool. Like this is really cool.
There's the attitude 50 and out of 150 out of 99, all the
different numbers. But there was one of these and
it was put somewhere in a pack. Somehow it got found like the
golden ticket in Charlie and theChocolate Factory and it
surfaced and then I was reunitedwith that one like it was really
(13:10):
cool and this black finite. I feel that way about two and
here's here's my hypothesis or or here's my thought.
I want to run it by you. You and I are very similar age
and we grew up through the late 80s and early 90s collecting
cards, you know, the high population era, the junk wax
(13:33):
era. And we were told, hold on to
that Jose Canseco card and that Mark McGwire card.
It will be worth something someday.
And most of that stuff isn't worth anything, like anything.
So we literally were told this is going to be valuable and it
(13:55):
has no value. And as a result, I feel like
there's this, like we touched the stove, you know, like you
reach up and you touch the stoveand you go, ha, it's hot.
And then the little kid from that point forward isn't going
to reach up on the counter 'cause it might be the stove
again. And I think that there's some
PTSD from people our age about modern cards, that all modern
(14:21):
cards are a scam because we lived through the greatest scam
that there was when there were just pallets of 1989 Donrus at
Costco and Price Club that we were told, Nope, you got to pull
the good cards, hang on to it, keep it in mint condition.
It'll be worth a fortune someday.
(14:43):
And now we don't believe that that could be true.
But the the hobby now for modernis so much different than it was
in 1990. It's it's not the same thing.
And I think some of these modernparallel cards are legitimately
(15:05):
different in a good way then when we grew up.
But but a lot of us just refusedto believe it because we touched
the stove. Well, this goes back to what we
talked about. Was it last week or the week
before that when we talked aboutthe the modern cards to chase
and you were starting to exploreultra modern cards.
(15:29):
And I said if you stick to certain types of cards, you're
going to be fine in the long run.
If you care about value, and youknow most of us do care about
value, we would like our cards to go up in overtime.
The vast majority of cards rightnow, ultra modern 2025 cards
will be worth nothing many yearsfrom now, right?
(15:51):
But some of them are going to maintain their value and some
most parallels, there are millions of parallels.
Most parallels are worthless. You know, you get a like AI
don't know those weird design pumpkin or Halloween parallels.
Whatever they are, there are 1,000,000 of them that are just
weird parallels that will never ever mean anything.
(16:13):
Numbered to 99. So and so means nothing.
But if you collect very specificnumbered parallels, even
unnumbered parallels, I think you're good.
And This is why the 90s refractors and early 2000s
refractors are so popular. Also why early patch cards from
the 90s, early 2000s, or patch cards are are popular and still
(16:38):
valuable because they meant something and there weren't a
million of them at the time. And you know, you can get a 90s
refractor, maybe 4 different variations or three.
Probably not even that many in the 90s.
But in the early 2000s there weren't that many variations.
And I think that for the most part you're looking at the same
(16:59):
thing now. So I just saw a post on maybe
Reddit, I'm not sure where I sawit, where somebody thought they
were buying a true green parallel, true green refractor
of a player. And when they received it in the
hand, it was actually the I don't even know what the
parallel was. It was a bizarre green OH Green
Wave parallel which is far less desirable than the 2 green true
(17:24):
green. And they, they paid true green
value for this Green Wave parallel.
And that's they're this number to the same, I think it was like
number to 99 or something like that.
Both of them have the same numbering, but the true green is
worth a lot more, just like the true gold is always going to be
(17:46):
worth more because some parallels are a lot more
desirable to collectors. Well, a lot of it, I think it
has to do with the consistency of it.
It it's, it's been, you know, the black finite from Panini for
a long time. It's been a Chrome super factor
for tops for a long time. And and you go that hasn't
(18:07):
changed. The, the the gold out of 50 have
been the gold out of 50 for a while.
You know, the red out of five has been like that for a while,
but the red out of five, geometric red is like will that
probably doesn't have staying power.
And so the consistency of it matters.
(18:28):
So the original design and theiroriginal philosophy behind it,
because that's one of the thingsI get confused with this.
I'm like, well, at one point gold's in Chrome weren't
numbered and then they were numbered out of like 450.
And then they started being numbered out of like they were
like jersey numbers and then there was like out of 50 and
then and now they there has become some stability.
(18:51):
And I think those cards that have that stability are the ones
that are going to have the staying power, like the new, you
know, snakeskin parallel out of 50 or the big baller out of 50
is not the same as just the regular gold out of 50 like
(19:13):
that. But, but I just think, and I'm,
I mean, I know I'm not preachingthis to an audience or to many
people who are collectors of modern, but I just think that I
think that it's different. I think that it's different than
(19:35):
it was. And I think that people need to
accept that not all modern and not all numbered stuff is a scam
just because the cards in the late 80s and early 90s were
mostly a scam. I just don't think that that's
the case. Well, well, help me understand
what was the scam in the late 80s or in the early 90s?
(19:57):
Weren't you told, oh, this 87 tops Jose Canseco rookie Cup,
you keep this at for a long time, that's going to be worth
something. This Brian Taylor, you know who
the Yankees drafted, he's going to be a superstar.
That's going to be worth a lot of money.
And we were told that those cards, if you keep them and you
(20:18):
keep them nice in a long time, they'd have value and and none
of them do like. There's no 89 TOPS card that has
any. Value, right.
But was Tops saying that or wereour parents saying that?
I think the hobby was saying that.
(20:40):
Right, but I I think a scam would be if TOPS were saying
that and Tops knew that they hadprinted 1.3 million of every
single card. I think that yes, you're right.
It, it, it's not I, I'm not blaming tops for this.
I'm blaming I, I, I think that it's just that, that the people
(21:03):
our age, the, the people who arekids around our age at this
time, there's a bit of drama that we're not going to believe
that modern is any good because we've been told before that
modern was good when it wasn't. And, and now that's got to still
be true. And I don't think that all
modern that's true. I do think the base card from
(21:27):
tops one flagship, the base card, the paper is not going to
be worth really much of anything.
But there are cards coming out of that product that I do think
are legit collectible items thathave long lasting collectibility
(21:48):
and value. And, and I, I just don't think,
I think that some people don't believe that.
And my dad is a person who is big time against manufactured
scarcity. And I understand that.
I mean, we've all been to people's houses who have those
little, those little statues, not starting lineups, but the
like porcelain, Well, the Hummels too.
(22:10):
And I was thinking like the baseball ones, like, you know,
or it's like Hank Aaron, what dothey call them?
Mcfarland's. I guess I don't know.
And, and you know, it's like, oh, I've got still got the
original package over there and stuff.
And they're numbered. This one's numbered out of 150.
And you know, people buy the little Disney statues and, and
(22:31):
you these are going to be worth something.
And they're this one's a limited, ultra limited edition.
And and so a lot of manufacturedscarcity isn't really all that,
but I do think some of these consistent cards I really think
have long term value and not theMatt Manny.
(22:52):
Don't get me wrong, like I love Matt, great guy.
If you ever met him, you'd go totally awesome dude.
That's not the card I'm talking about.
But I do think some players it'slegit card.
No, yes. No, I I agree some players and
(23:12):
some parallels have staying power but but it's few and far
between. Well, there's a difference
between collecting prospects andcollecting superstars.
Like, and I said this the other day, that's one of the issues I
have with your boy Jeff. Is that he's do not.
(23:34):
He he gives investment advice about an unproven prospect and
that's not an investment that isthat is going to the casino and
spinning the wheel. And one of those has a jackpot
and all the others have $2.00 and it was a $50 buy in like.
(23:55):
But we can agree that Freddie Freeman's going to the Hall of
Fame, right? I would think so, yeah.
Are his cars going to be worth anything in 20 years?
They'll be worth something, right?
But if you buy his cards today on the high of him winning
another World Series game with ahome run, walk off home run,
will it be worth accounting for inflation more or less in 20
(24:17):
years than you buy it for today?And we're I mean, are we talking
about an out of 150 rookie or are we talking about a rookie
super factor autographed card orare you saying either?
Either any card. I mean, I, I see where you're
(24:41):
leading me. You are leading the witness,
Your Honor. I, I think they'll probably not
be worth as much as they are right now, but that that's not
for sure. Because if you had asked me five
years ago, would these Jordan 90s refractors, you know, or
(25:02):
early 2000s refractor insert cards numbered out of 50, I
would have said there's no way that they'll keep this value.
But they've gone bananas. So I think Freddie Freeman is
different than Jordan and I think I think these cards are
different. But I think that there's a
(25:24):
strong possibility that an out of 50 gold Shohei rookie Otto is
worth more in 15 years than it is now.
I think that's possible, but Freddie Freeman?
Probably not. Right.
I agree. There are probably fewer than a
(25:45):
handful of players right now whose cards will be more
valuable in 20 years than they are today.
And that's terrible to say. I love Freddie Freeman.
I think Freddie Freeman is amazing.
He is virtually a lock for the Hall of Fame in in my Hall of
Fame he is in and probably was ayear or two ago, but he doesn't
have the staying power and the hobby requires staying power.
(26:07):
He helps with. He's the, I think, the only
player in history to have two walk off World Series home runs
and that helps. You're just taking salt and
you're just rubbing it in so deep.
You're just saying, oh, what were the teams that happened
against? The Toronto Blue Jays and who
did they play last year? The team from the American
(26:28):
League that made the World Series?
I can't remember. Who was in the World Series?
Oh, the New York Yankees. Oh, I forgot.
You're kidding, right? I'm not.
Yeah, I I just didn't care aboutthe World Series last year.
I followed it because Shohei mostly, honestly, Shohei and
Aaron Judge are maybe Acuna if he can make a big comeback and
(26:50):
have like 6 or 7 huge seasons. But there's nobody else that has
Mookie Betts. Yeah, but he's already amazing
and and there's really not much of a story.
Like Mookie Betts is kind of a poor man's Albert Pujols.
People appreciate him, but he's not one of the there's not much
(27:12):
of a story behind him. He's kind of vanilla and I love
Mookie, one of my all time favorite players.
So this isn't a knock on any of these guys.
Just thinking about what does the hobby care about?
What do future long term values care about when it comes to a
baseball player and its long standing stories?
It's legends. Judge has them, Shohe has them.
(27:37):
Does Ichiro have that? Each row does, and he also has
the benefit of a massive global market.
What about pool holes? Does he have it pool?
Holes does because he his top, his first ten seasons were
absolutely legendary. He also topped 700 home runs.
He, yeah, I mean, he's, he's up there, but he's certainly not a
(27:59):
big one. Did pool holes take performance
enhancing drugs? Absolutely.
Don't you think so? I, I think that he, I think that
if I had to place money on if hedid or didn't, I think that he
(28:20):
probably did. But somehow he was able to not
be on any lists. Therefore, he gets to be in the
Hall of Fame. Right.
But David Ortiz, we know he did steroids or performance
enhancing drugs. He made it into the Hall of
Fame. There are a.
Lot of them should bury bonds, be in the Hall of Fame.
(28:40):
Oh, we're getting into some, some big territory with that.
It's going to really upset some listeners here.
And I'm, I'm a believer that allof the PED guys should be in if
they if they, if their career was enough to get in, even with
the steroids. And we know Bonds would have
gotten in without them. Clemens, your guy would have
(29:03):
been in without them. Would Rafael Palmero?
Probably not. I would not penalize a guy
because he took steroids, but ifI don't think he would have made
it in without them, I I wouldn'tlet, I wouldn't put them in.
Would pool holes have made it inwithout them?
That's a good question. I think so.
I don't know that Pool Holes wastaking them in 2002, but you
(29:28):
can't give a guy steroids and have him go from mediocre to 710
home runs or however many home runs he hit.
Have you ever heard of Sammy Sosa?
That sounds so familiar. Didn't he go from regular dude
to he man? But he, well, Sosa was young
(29:50):
when he all of a sudden got really, really good.
And I think that Sosa, if you look at his career, he had the
typical trajectory of a guy. Yeah, you're looking up his
stats right now. I think he he went from pretty
good to amazing. There was certainly no Brady
(30:10):
Anderson in in Sammy Sosa, right?
Luis Gonzalez. Luis Gonzalez, another example,
but I think if I remember correctly, Sosa hit like 29 home
runs the year before his big breakout.
So home runs the year before, I don't know what we would call
the year, the big breakout. So he went
(30:32):
1510833253640366663506449403514.Yeah.
So this makes my point. The 33 home runs I just pulled
it up to was at the age of 24. That's not unreasonable.
And the year before that, in fact, that was only his second
(30:55):
full season in baseball. The year before that, he only
had 67 games. So if we if we go to his, I'm
doing this blind because I've never looked at his minor
leagues before, but he was a home run hitter.
Let me see here. He hit.
OK, so he wasn't a home run hitter in the minor leagues, but
(31:16):
he was also only 1819 years old.So I think perfectly reasonable
at the age of 2324 to hit 33 home runs and then 3325364036
and then at the age of 29 he hit66.
(31:36):
We should do an episode one time.
If you follow Jose Canseco, he's.
Crazy. If you take Jose Canseco and you
follow the teams that he played for and then the other players
on his teams and what happened to those players when he showed
up, it's like, it's like you could write a book on it.
(32:02):
What happened to the Rangers? What happened to the Blue Jays?
What happened to the A's? Like just follow Canseco and his
path and there's just like this power boom across the lineup.
Yeah, and he's talked about the guys that he injected.
Yeah. Like Yvonne Rodriguez?
Yeah. So let me ask you this.
He said Clemens didn't do anything, but he threw everyone
(32:24):
else under the bus. But he didn't throw Clemens
under the bus. What do you think he just didn't
know about Clemens? Or do you think Clemens paid him
off? Or do you think Clemens is
innocent? Clemens is definitely not
innocent. Come on.
You know he's not right. Oh.
I mean I. Or the record for those of you
(32:46):
who are listening? Greg shrugged.
I did. I.
I will say this, I was, I was ina jury box one time and this is
a true story. I had jury duty and I'm sitting
in there and they're talking about, you know, they're going
around asking the I get called, I'm in one of the seats.
(33:09):
And the judge says, Mr. Miller, is there any reason that you
think you couldn't be a fair andimpartial juror?
And I said, I kind of have this thing where unless I'm certain
about something, I'm not like going to say definitively
(33:32):
anything. Sure.
And he and the judge says, well,don't you think everybody feels
that way? And I said, your Honor, I'm not
fully convinced that OJ did it. And they go, Mr. Miller, you're
excused. And I'm like, I wasn't trying to
get out of it. I was just being honest.
Like, do I think OJ did it? Probably, but I wouldn't bet my
(33:56):
life on it. He admitted it.
No, he didn't. He did.
OJ. He wrote a book called.
He said if I had done it, this is how I would have done it.
I I just, I am a person who doesn't like to make claims
about others if I'm not certain about it.
(34:18):
That's how I am. I'm, I'm now adding in to our
group chat, our our text chat. Greg thinks who OJ was innocent.
No, I didn't say that. That's not what he said.
I said I'm not convinced. I'm not fully convinced that OJ
is guilty. I think that he did the do I
(34:41):
think Bonds took something. And here's another thing.
OK, so I was on a trial, one I was in not on a trial.
I was on a jury. And there was a guy who was on
trial for long story, but Long story short, he was in
possession of stolen license plates.
(35:02):
And in order to convict him, it had to be proven not just that
they were stolen, but that he knew they were stolen.
Right. So part of my thing is, I think
it's possible that some people were injected with things or had
(35:23):
creams rubbed on them or whatever, where they thought
they didn't know for sure what it was.
They just said, hey, I've got this new drug.
It helps boost strength. You want to take it, it's, you
know, put it on. Yeah, let's try it out.
Or they had a Chipotle burrito that somehow had nandrolone in
(35:44):
it. I just think that's possible.
I think it's possible that thereare guys do I do I think Bonds
took stuff. I think he probably did.
I'm not certain. I think he probably did.
But what about feminists? Hold on.
And I think it's possible that Bonds didn't know that he was
(36:06):
taking something he wasn't allowed to take.
I think that's possible. I think Clemens knows he was
getting injected with stuff. I think Clemens was getting
injected with stuff. I don't know if Clemens knows
what he was being injected with,and I am not certain that he was
being injected with something hewasn't allowed to take.
(36:30):
Do I think he probably was? Yes.
Do I think that he knew It may. I'm less certain about that.
I think these guys say to their trainers give me what I need,
make sure I'm good, and they don't know what it is.
I think that's possible. Have I just lost all credibility
(36:50):
because what I'm being, I'm not trying to be funny.
I'm not trying to defend. I'm not trying to defend
anybody. All I'm doing is what I'm saying
is I tend to give people the benefit of the doubt.
I've said you many times in chats.
You know, I don't know if that guy meant to do what he did.
He's a really nice guy. You've heard me say that a
(37:10):
million times. Yes.
And I tend to give people the benefit of the doubt, and maybe
that's a fault of mine, but that's just how I am.
Because I hope that someday, if anybody ever hears me say
something or sees me do something and they go, what?
They give me the benefit of the doubt because most likely I
didn't mean to do whatever it isthat I did.
(37:33):
Yeah, I give Ben. You know, I'm probably just
behind you in terms of giving people the doubt.
And anytime we're in this in a group chat and somebody's upset
with somebody, yeah, I'm, I'm right there with you.
Maybe not quite to the same level as you of giving people
the benefit of the doubt, but I'm pretty close behind.
But I am sure that Bonds and Clemens knew what they were
(37:57):
taking. I think, OK, just for final
putting this to rest, I and the fact that we're only talking
about Bonds and Clemens right now is a little annoying to me
because Mookie's out there listening to this and we're not
including Piazza or the others. But I will say this about Bonds
(38:18):
and Clemens specifically, I think over 95% that they both
took something. I would go, I would say 97% that
they took something. That's what I think.
That you knew they took something.
No, no, no, no. That they took something, OK.
I think both of them, I think 75%, they knew that they were
(38:46):
taking something. I think there's a good 25% that
they had something injected and they didn't quite know that what
it was was legal or illegal. I think they said, don't tell me
what you're giving me, just giveme what I need.
I think that's possible. I think there's about a 25%
chance of that. That's my official stance.
And if people are out there listening, they go, Greg's a
(39:08):
lunatic, that's OK, That's OK. I'm just being honest.
I'm just being honest. And it bugs me that one of the
best hitters of all time and oneof the best pitchers of all time
are not in the Hall of Fame whenwe have multiple people who we
know took stuff, who tested positive, who are in the Hall of
(39:29):
Fame. That makes as soon as Ortiz was
voted in first ballot. Now Yogi Berra, by the way, is a
second ballot Hall of Famer. David Ortiz was a first ballot
Hall of Famer and he tested positive.
But Clemens and Bonds aren't in I.
I have a hard time with that. I have a hard time with that.
(39:52):
I agree. Put them in.
I I think Ortiz deserves to be in.
I think Bonds. I think Clemens, I think Piazza,
Mark McGuire, Sammy Sosa. You think Sosa should be in?
I do, yeah. Wow.
That one How did we get here my.I have no idea.
(40:12):
We're 40 minutes in. It's a great discussion.
I didn't, we didn't expect this,but I'm we are going to promote
the heck out of your crazy opinions.
I think this Darren and I tend to go off topic, but today we
took such a hard right hand turnwhen Siri was saying continue
(40:35):
straight on the route and we just took a hard right and here
we are somewhere like in Coming to America where they're
stealing the hubcaps off of the wheels because they are not in
the place they're supposed to be.
It's a great movie, by the way. I haven't seen it in too long.
It's a great I've seen that movie 150 times.
(40:59):
All right, well, we have to go because we have another thing
we've got to take care of. It's 41 minutes in.
This was fun. I mean, I hope that people don't
think I'm a lunatic, but this isthe thing I've said from the
beginning. I am who I am.
I don't hide behind my opinions.Some people will agree with me,
(41:20):
some people won't. I don't say what I think people
want to hear. I say what I think.
And am I naive? Possibly that's possible, but
that's just that's just where I'm at.
Next week, we'll talk about why Jack Morris doesn't belong on
the Hall of Fame and why Harold Baines does.
(41:40):
Oh my gosh, that will be a horribly boring conversation.
Yeah, we won't be talking about that, OK.
All right, buddy, thanks for hanging out with me for 41
minutes and 30 seconds. You too.
All right.
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