October 25, 2025 • 49 mins
Whether you're a new sports card collector or a lifelong participant of the hobby, sometimes your collection needs a reset. Maybe you're considering a mild facelift for your collection, or maybe a full overhaul, there can be a lot to think about and difficult decisions. In this episode we listen to Mike share some of his thoughts about his recent decisions with his collection.
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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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(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. This is where we come together
(00:21):
to talk cards. Mike, how are you doing today?
So good, so good, Greg. Yeah, today, you know what?
Today I went, I had to go get myApple, my iPhone fixed.
And while I was there, they haveall their amazing devices out
and you can test them. And I ended up buying a pair of
Airpods. You're, you're like, I mean,
(00:44):
just doing that. It's like going back into the
future. You're like, all of a sudden
you're like in high school and cool.
I I was never cool in high school and I've never been cool
since. OK, well, we can all think that
we're cool though. Sure.
All right, so you released a video recently.
(01:07):
Yeah, I did. And your video was about how
you're looking to sell some of your collection and, and, and
you, you talked about how you were kind of deciding what you
were going to sell and kind of why you were going to sell it
and, and that whole thing. So what spurred this?
(01:31):
And it just take me through the process of, of you being a
collector. You've got all these cards.
And then you said, you know, I'mgoing to start a purge.
What happened? Yeah, so I moved from the corner
of my basement where I wasn't able to display.
I, I think I might have had 33 cards on display or 39 cards, 3
(01:51):
rows of 13 that I was able to display.
And I moved into this office andmy goal always was to have all
of my cards on display, plus some binders and then like one
big box where I can just easily pull cards out where I, you
know, I know where they are. But as I moved in here, I
(02:12):
realized, man, I have. Not only do I have 10s of
thousands of cards, largely fromthe Vermont collection that I
never did anything with due to time constraints from last year,
but I also have a lot of cards that I loved at one point and
still do love, but they don't really fit what I want to do.
And I thought, man, there's so many cards I want.
(02:33):
Do I really want to just leave all these cards in boxes in my
closet or do I want to sell a bunch of these cards and
consolidate down to, I don't know, two or three bigger cards
that I can display and be really, really happy with
instead of these to start, I don't know, 200 ish cards that
(02:55):
are all worth between two and $200.
And if I can sell these for a total of even, I don't know,
$1500 maybe, then that's 2 pretty big cars or one really
big card for me. Yeah, and so that that bigger
(03:16):
card is is scratching a bigger itch apparently than the smaller
cards. Do you feel like, are you
worried about any regret of like, why did I do this or, or
are you just like, because you had mentioned in the video that
you had sold some stuff once before, I think.
And then, and then you're doing this again and you're, you're
(03:38):
kind of feeling confident about it.
Like take me through that because I've recently been
looking at doing a facelift for my collection and dramatic pause
and I've I've been like, well, am I going to regret this?
(03:59):
I sold 18 months ago. I sold a 2021 Sports Illustrated
for kids. Caitlin Clark autographed and
it's the most beautiful example of this.
Has bright yellow autograph of Caitlin Clark.
I paid a grand total of $110.00 for this card.
Autographed, slabbed. I bought it autographed already
(04:21):
before she became big and then Islabbed it with PSA and then her
values just blew up 18 months after that.
And I said, jeez, do I need a $2000 Caitlin Clark card?
I don't. I paid $110.00 for this and I,
so I sold it. I went to the National with all
(04:42):
this cash that I was all of a sudden flash flush with.
And I bought some great, great cards at the National 2024.
And I still, I don't, I can't say I regret it, but I think
about it often and I still monitor.
It's still the number one sale, the highest sale for 2021 Sports
(05:03):
Illustrated for Kids, Caitlin Clark autographed card and I
still monitor any sales that come up with these.
There aren't very many. Like one just sold yesterday for
thirteen, $1400 on eBay. But that one also is a worse
example than than mine. And so I think, jeez, how much
would mine sell for now? I don't know.
(05:26):
But my point is that I do think about it and I but that's a
really, really rare card and I don't have any rare cards.
I, I worry about regretting selling off my Yaz collection.
I'm keeping the 1960 and 1961 but I worry about the rest
'cause I I loved collecting those and I love having them.
Sure. So I want to just keep them in a
(05:47):
box in my closet that doesn't bring me any joy.
Yeah, I mean, I understand what you're saying.
I mean, that that makes sense. And that's kind of where I think
I'm at with some of my thought processes too.
I, you know, last time we recorded was last Thursday.
(06:09):
And I had mentioned you had at the very beginning of the
episode you had mentioned, hey, yeah, it's almost Friday.
And I was like, yeah, I'm taking1/2 day sub.
I'm going to go to Lucy's soccergame on Friday and, and just
work 1/2 day. And so I was like I only have
1/2 day left till the weekend. And so I live kind of southeast
(06:30):
of Sacramento and I had to driveto Santa Rosa which is almost 3
hours from with traffic and everything.
And I went on this big. I basically binged Stacking
Slabs and the Crossover and which are both podcasts and
(06:52):
stacking slabs is mostly modern and I think I referred to him as
Mark McGrath the other day and Mark McGrath I think wasn't he
like. Sugar Ray.
Yeah, he was the Sugar Ray guy. Anyway, he, he, I love his
channel and, and he kept talkingabout this concept that I want
(07:16):
to ask you about because he kepttalking about having like your
North Star, which is like your direction of where you're going.
And sort of like your, your point that you can identify to
keep you on course is like that's kind of fixed.
So you're kind of you start to veer off course and then that
(07:37):
kind of keeps you back headed inthe right direction when you
start to veer off course. And you said a second ago that
they don't fit what I want to doanymore.
And, and I'm curious, did your, did your North Star move or did
(07:59):
your, did you hit some rocks andand you found it a new
lighthouse, a new shiny object that you wanted to go after?
Like how did that happen that you had things you were
acquiring because they did fit, but then suddenly they no longer
fit. Now I understand your you, you
know, you just said you moved the room and you have more space
and you have more area to display things and you don't
(08:22):
want stuff in boxes. But, but that's still just a
piece of what you want your collection to be.
Like when, when you, when peopleadd cards to their collection,
it's, it's more than just a car to your collection.
It's sort of like your collection kind of represents
what you want you're collecting to be.
(08:44):
And so when you're cutting off limbs and, you know,
transplanting new ones in new areas, it's kind of a big thing
to to change like what was your North Star like?
What was your identity? And then what would you say your
identity has become? Yeah, ever since I was a little
(09:06):
kid, I was obsessed with rookie cards and as I was obsessed with
the Hall of Fame, I've always loved Hall of Fame debates.
I've loved Hall of Fame players.Even Jack Morris.
Not really. I don't.
I don't love him, but I respect him.
And so I decided that I didn't want to have second year cards,
(09:28):
third year cards, unless those cards also have the Rookie Cup,
the All Star Cup, and I want Hall of Fame rookie cards.
And then I have a dozen other things.
So this actually fits. I have a Kang Griffey junior
rookie card collection. I want to have all of the Kang
Griffey junior rookie cards, period.
(09:51):
I don't care what grade they're in.
I just want to have every singleone.
And there are a lot of them. You'd be surprised.
They're 30 some odd, I think. And then, you know, like Pedro
Martinez refractors from the 1990s.
Those are things that are reallycool.
Nomar Garcia Para. So there's a Red Sox subset of
my collection. Nomar is not a Hall of Famer,
(10:12):
but I loved Nomar when he was you know, from 1997 to 2003 was
a huge Nomar fan, loved Pedro. Do I want to so I could see
myself getting away. I selling off my Carl Yustremsky
slabs outside of 1960 and 61. Can I see myself selling off my
Ted Williams collection that aren't his rookie?
(10:35):
Probably not, because I have a hard time ever seeing myself
getting one of his rookies, and frankly, I don't even like his
rookie card. So I'm trying to get the Ted
Williams run. I'm trying to get the the Jackie
Robinson all of his 1950s cards too.
But wait a second, You just saidthat you're a Hall of Fame
(10:56):
rookie card guy and then you said you want to do a run for
Jackie and Ted Williams and so and and Nomar and and Pedro and
so are you. I see a lot of rabbit holes that
you're walking by and it it's like is there?
(11:18):
Is there? Are they like black holes where
they're like sucking you down them?
To some extent. So I also have a program, Red
Sox program collection I have, arapper collection I have.
Like like Eminem and and stuff. No wax wrappers as you know
(11:39):
'cause you helped me find 1. Sure I have there.
I have a vintage video game collection.
There's so many things that I like to collect.
I will never finish my collection and that's why I had
to say, holy smokes, I've got toget rid of some of the stuff
that doesn't really fit, doesn'tbring me joy.
Who is it? Marie Kondo?
I've never seen anything she does, but I know that she's
(12:01):
famous for saying get rid of anything that doesn't spark joy.
And these cards that I was getting rid of didn't didn't
spark joy in my collection. So some of them, like couple of
Perez steel postcards, I love Perez steel.
I had loved Don Rus Diamond Kings as a kid.
When I got back into the collection, I learned about the
(12:21):
postcards and various other Perez steel cards and I started
buying some occasionally, like Mike Moynihan sold me some.
But after a while I was like, I can't collect all of these
things. I can collect Don Rus Diamond
Kings, but I can't collect everyPerez Steel thing.
I don't have the money, I don't have the time.
I don't have the space for it all.
(12:43):
I think we OK, so maybe it's nota North Star.
Maybe there's three legs to the stool and the all three legs are
important towards keeping you upright.
And one of the legs is Hall of Fame rookie cards.
That's the big one. That's the biggest leg.
(13:04):
What? And then then you've got the the
Red Sock thing, but not enough so that you want to keep all of
these Karl Yasrim ski cards thatyou're just talking about
wanting to cut. So I mean, he's what, the second
best Red Sock of all time? Maybe, but I'm going to amend
(13:24):
that a little bit. I still want the cards, I just
don't want them slapped. I want them in a binder.
OK. So and, and in a in raw state,
Carl Yastremsky. I have a binder with, I don't
know, 3 or 400 unique Carl Yastremsky cards which I love.
It doesn't take up any space andI can pull it out at any point
and add to it and I I just don'twant the slabs.
(13:46):
I have a giant box of Carl Yastremsky slabs that sit in my
closet. Do you have pliers and a
screwdriver 'cause you can make those slabbed cards no longer
slab. But if I can sell them for
$40.50 dollars, $60.00 and then buy the card raw for three or
four, why would I crack them outand give up all that money that
(14:11):
I that you could sell them for? I mean, I, I'm, you're, you're
like baiting me to, to go on a massive sidebar when you just
said if you could buy this, if you could sell this slabbed
version of it for 40 or $50 and you could buy it raw for three
or four. I mean, that does make my head
(14:32):
want to explode. When you, when you talk about it
that way, it's like, that's insane.
Right. Some of them are, I mean some of
them are $10, right, raw, right.But I'm selling those for
between, I don't know, 30 and $100 slabbed and I can get, I
don't know, 500, seven, 100 bucks and then buy them all back
(14:54):
raw for under 100 a hundred, maybe $200.
Now, when you're selling these cards, you're selling, you know,
a bunch of cards where and I know you talked about on the
video, but that doesn't mean you're, you know, we we can at
least bring it up here. Where do you sell?
Like what is what is the move inselling?
(15:14):
I know that you spoke with ChrisSewell on another Sports Card
Clubhouse video about So you want to, you know, be a dealer
or what was it? No, you got it so.
You want to be a dealer and, andI listened to it.
It was, it was great. And he talked about all the
different places that he sells and how if it meets this
(15:36):
criteria, if it does this, if itdoes that.
So how do you make that decision?
Yeah. So if I were ever in the space
where I needed to sell my collection, obviously I would
sell it to Chris. That's that's a no brainer.
And I have instructions for my wife in case something happens
to me to just call Chris becausehe will take care of me, take
(15:56):
care of her with my collection. But I'm not at that place and I
don't expect to be for decades. And so I reached out to him for
some advice and he said put themin CIA collector investor
auctions, put, he said the ones that are like $50 and up.
And so I picked out nine that I think will sell for over $50.
(16:17):
A couple of them might be a little bit questionable.
And I talked to Theo, Theo was amazing help.
Theo works for CIA now and he was amazing help for me in just
easing my mind. I've never used an an auction
house before. I've never sold anything at
auction other than on eBay. And he made it so impossibly
(16:40):
easy for me and just kind of like, reassured me.
I was like, I was like his little kid.
He'd be like, you can do this, Mike.
Yeah. And it was great.
Yeah, I mean, I've been really impressed.
You know, I, I had heard of collector investor auctions and
then, you know, Theo had told mekind of privately that he was
(17:02):
maybe going to start working there.
And so I started looking into them more and, you know, I met
with you. Actually, I met Jeremy for the
first time at the National. Really nice guy.
Seems like they're doing a greatjob.
So then I was like, well, I'm going to poke around the
website. So I had that episode with Theo
where we look at the website andit was really good.
(17:23):
And then I ended up buying a card on it and I mean it.
I think that there are a lot of people who feel like they can
only buy at a card shop, a card show or eBay.
And I think those people are missing out.
And and I think that us talking about these sorts of places, I
(17:44):
hope that it helps people consider other avenues in which
to acquire cards because I was pretty impressed.
Yeah. And then I have a bunch of cards
probably I don't know, 150 to 200 that'll add to my Comm C
store that are low, low dollar value.
Or some of them might be like $75.00 that I would not want to
(18:05):
auction off because there's not a huge demand for them.
So I'll just list them at the lowest price imaginable to
lowest price you can find them for online and just wait for a
buyer. But I would not auction them
because they're the types of cards that are like one buyer
cards. Yeah.
So COMC is another great place. I, I sent out a box of a couple
(18:29):
100 cards to COMC. A lot of autographs, a lot of
patches or early patches, not like 2020 and up patches of
really, really good players. And those go to COMC.
I have like 400 cards in my COMCalready.
I find that really easy. And you know, I got emails after
I did that video from probably adozen people, emails, texts,
(18:51):
messages saying, hey, that card you showed, I would love to buy
that from you. And I really appreciate those
messages. But the whole reason I've chose
CIA and Com C are because I hatehaggling.
I hate shipping, I hate collecting money.
I just want to send them all in one batch or two in this case
(19:11):
and simplify the process and letthem deal with it.
I don't have to do anything except price them.
Yeah, I mean, there is a certaintime, you know, value element to
where do you put your time and things and where do you there?
I'm, I'm really cheap, like really cheap.
(19:34):
And so, so I have a hard time hiring anybody to do anything
that I, I, my next door neighbor, you know, we needed to
build a fence. And he goes, well, you know,
I'll get some quotes and I'm like, bro, I ain't ever going to
get ahead in life if I hire people to do things I'm fully
(19:54):
capable of doing. But I, I tore my rotator cuff
building that fence by myself. And for the next year and a
half, it's been sore. And I'm like, maybe it's OK if
I'm at the point where I just have some other people deal with
(20:16):
that stuff. Because you're right, it's.
It is a pain to mail stuff and it is it would be easy if I have
a box of stuff. And one of the things I want to
get into is like I have put together a few runs of a few
players and part of the appeal for me of doing a run was the
(20:37):
hunt of the run. So like I did an auto gram run,
like all of his playing days cards from his rookie card all
the way to his his last card. And and then I did a Sammy Baugh
run and I've been working on a Jim Brown run.
And what I noticed is as soon asI finished the autogram run and
(20:58):
the Sammy Baugh run, once they were complete, I was like, why
did I do that? The fun part for me was hunting
for the right specimen of that card that fits with the other
cards. And then I look at the autogram
cards and I'm like, I like all the cards, but the one that I
(21:20):
really like is that beautiful rookie card.
And the other ones, I'm like, I've got $280 of value wrapped
up in that card right there. Like do I really want to have
$280 wrapped up in that card? So it was like I was so in love
with the hunt of finding each ofthem and having all these saved
(21:42):
searches and going to shows and going to the National and going
to Strongsville and looking through cases at football cases
and going, oh, there's another. Let me take a look at it and
looking through the stack of theguy who had multiple.
But I love the hunt and the the pirate set that I did like
everyone, you know, these cards are like most of those pirate
(22:02):
cards between PSA and SGC combined is like a pop 20 to 25
total. And I'm like, I want to build
the set partly because it felt virtually impossible.
And then I built it in like a year and a half and like I, I'm
on some Facebook, you know, non sport Facebook groups and
(22:23):
they're like, I posted a picturewhen I finished it.
I'm like, yeah, I did that in a year and a half.
And there were people like, no, you didn't.
That's impossible. And I'm like, no, I really did.
Like I just, but I love trying to, you know, take a machete
through the jungle to try to, you know, find myself in the
(22:44):
presence of some card that seemslike I'll never find it.
And sometimes that isn't the card itself, but it's the right
card. Like finding like the 1951
Bowman autogram is always off center.
Always. So I finally, it took me two
years to find a centered 1. And then I got it and it showed
(23:05):
up and I'm looking and I'm like,this thing is awesome.
And now what it was like I, I sometimes love the hunt as much
as anything. And so now I'm like, OK, check
that box now the pirate cards. I love the beauty of them 'cause
I'm also an, I like AI appeal person, but not just it has to
(23:26):
have good quote UN quote. I appeal like Dylan double DI
appeal, but it has to be like a pretty card like here's another
card. I Warren Spahn.
I like Warren Spahn a lot. I like his story.
I like that he served in the military.
I like, you know that he's overlooked and I have his 48
Bowman rookie card, his 49 leaf pseudo rookie card.
(23:48):
I have his 53 Bowman color card and I was looking at him the
other day and I'm like the 48 Bowman.
It doesn't really do it for me. I love the 49 leaf and I love
the 53 Bowman. I don't think I need the rookie
card because I like these other cards because I'm I'm, I like
the looks of things like beautiful images.
(24:09):
And so I'm kind of like itching for a new hunt.
And we talked about this last week when I was talking about do
I go out there Patrick Willis refractor cards or what do I do?
Because I'm hungry for a new hunt and I don't know what it
is. And some of the cards that I've
picked up that I haunted and I loved hunting.
(24:31):
I'm like, OK, that was fun and that one and that one I love and
I'm going to keep long term because I love the beauty of
them, but I don't think I need to keep some of these other ones
that I I haunted and I conqueredand, and now it's time to set
them free. Yeah, how about Russell
Westbrook rookie cards now that he's on your hometown team?
(24:54):
I don't think I'm going to be going that route, especially
after how they looked. It looks like it was a salary,
salary acquisition more than I don't know.
I no Russell Westbrook, but there are some former Kings that
I like a lot. But I'm not I'm not as much of a
(25:18):
basketball guy unless it's old basketball.
I like modern football cards andI like modern baseball card, but
there are a couple of modern basketball.
I don't know. I'm a mess right now.
My head is everywhere. I literally Brian, the high pop
professor brothers with iconic owl.
(25:41):
I I messaged him yesterday and Isaid you are the guy that I know
that is most in tune with 90s refractors.
I know that Shane Shoebox legends is there.
I know that Dylan's got some. I know that Adam's Splendid
Sports has some, so I reached out to Brian.
I said if you were to pick like 20 refractors from the 90s that
(26:05):
you think whether a combination of beauty and rarity and what
are the ones. I was just thinking he was just
going to fire off some. He gives me this like 3 hours
later, he sends me this comprehensive list.
And I was like, Oh my gosh. Like he goes, yeah, I really,
you know, I did. And I was just like, this is I
felt like I have like this secret treasure map to all of
(26:27):
his knowledge he put down for me.
And I'm like excited to start going through the list.
Yeah, Adam did the same thing for me with Pedro Martinez
refractors. He sent me, I don't know, top 25
Pedro Martinez playing day's refractors.
I think they're all from the 90sor maybe early 2000s all.
Yeah, and I looked at that. I was like, oh, I was so
(26:49):
excited. But then I started looking at
the prices and holy crap man, I know they are.
So would you rather have a Hank Aaron rookie card or would you
rather have a Pedro refractor? No question, it's a Hank Aaron
rookie card. It's not even close.
But the but but the Hank Aaron rookie card is way more
plentiful than the Pedro refractor.
(27:11):
Sure, but. So you're not a rare guy, You're
an iconic guy, not a rare guy. Exactly.
I want cards that are in demand.I want So when I see
collections, I get jealous of certain cards and that's the
whole point of my attainable collection of envy 100 is when I
see them, I go, oh man, I love that card.
I got to have that card. Most of them are rookie cards.
(27:33):
Most of them are iconic and mostof them are plentiful.
Not all of them, but most of them are.
And I the scarcity isn't for me.I totally get it.
This isn't a criticism of peoplewho want rare cards because
they're rare. It's just that it's, it doesn't
do anything for me. But yeah, the Hank Aaron rookie
(27:55):
is very high on my list. I'm starting to realize slowly
but surely that I'm I'm a nostalgia collector and I
thought I was an iconic card collector, but I think I'm
actually a, a beauty and image beauty collector slash nostalgia
(28:15):
collector. And a lot of the nostalgia comes
from a lot of iconic cards are nostalgic for me because they
were on the magazines, they wereat the, the cases in the shows.
I remember going because we usedto go to some big shows out on
the West. Cause some of the biggest shows
there were nationals that used to be out on the West Coast.
Imagine that even in San Francisco, in LA, there were
(28:39):
nationals and you would go to these big shows.
And I remember looking in the cases and seeing some of these
old tobacco cards. And so I was always like, man,
I'd just love to own one. And then I started buying some
T2O sixes. And then I'm like, well, I need
a project to hunt. I need, I need, I'm not going to
do like a Yankee team set or something.
(29:01):
I I want to do some sort of project.
So I was like, I'm going to do the Hall of Fame run, not Plank
and Wagner. But then I, I was buying them
and I was and then I started going, why do I like these ones?
Why when I picked up this one, did it feel so much better than
this one? And what I think that I'm
(29:22):
realizing is when I was a kid, the cards that I remember the
looks of the best were the portraits.
And I didn't, I didn't really remember the quote UN quote
action shots. And so I'm like, I was picking
up the portraits and the action shots.
But the, the thing I have ingrained in my brain was seeing
(29:47):
these portraits is like, man, that's like the Mona Lisa.
It's like the guy got dressed upin his formal first day of
school, you know, picture and it, it, it was like this formal
look. It was, it was a baseball
player, but it was like his dressed up.
It was like the military guy who's in his formal uniform
picture, you know, it's like it,it, there's something about
(30:08):
that. And, and so I'm starting to
realize, well, maybe some of theaction shots aren't, maybe I
shouldn't cut keep them. Maybe I should cut those loose
so I have more money for some ofthe portrait ones, which are the
ones that I think I'm most nostalgic for.
Because sometimes there are cards that you like, you go, but
you're like, I don't know why I like that.
(30:30):
I think I like this type of thing, but it wasn't that type
of thing that you liked. It was actually something very
specific that you liked, but youthought it was broader than it
actually was. Yeah, plus there are a lot of
Hall of Famers in the T2O6 set that I've never even heard of,
even though they're Hall of Farmers.
But just they're a bunch of themthat you go who?
(30:53):
Who is that? That's really cool name because
I love the names from back then.But yeah.
To me, if they're beautiful cards, they're still worth
having. And then I go back to this, you
know, I've said this before, like I've been very picky in
particular as I've picked them up.
Like there are cards I just waited for two years until the
(31:14):
right one came up and then I bought it.
And now I have these, I think really nice for the grade cards.
So I'm like, OK, if I'm going tocut some of these loose because
I'm going to go after some otherstuff, There's no, there's no
way I'm only going to take that amount for the card, even though
that's what I paid for it. I'm like, I'm not, I can't take
(31:36):
that, you know, because this one's way too nice.
It took two years to find this one.
So that's one of my issues with sending something off to sell is
like I need a human to to appreciate it the way I
appreciate it, you know? Absolutely, Yeah.
(32:00):
And you said something a little earlier about I appeal and with
vintage, and that's part of the beauty of vintage that you don't
get with ultra modern cards is that search for the right card,
the right example of a card withultra modern, you're just
looking for good centering. Corners are very rarely dinged
up. The the surface rarely has
(32:22):
problems, the edges rarely have problems.
And in vintage, if you if you'rean eye appeal nut like I am, you
have that search. You might find the card that
you're looking for, you might find 10 of them at one table.
But if none of them meet what you're looking for, that is the
thrill of the hunt. A. 100% that's, that's the most
(32:46):
exciting part about vintage is that the number of variables are
infinite because there are corners in centering and
surface. And you know, there, there's,
there's so many different things.
It's, it's like hunting for a new car versus hunting for a
used car. The new cars are pretty close to
(33:07):
the same, you know, maybe a little different, but the used
cars, not every 2016, you know, Toyota Camry is equal.
There's a wide variance between them.
And so if you're just looking atthe mileage and you're just
looking at the exterior body condition, like you're probably
(33:29):
missing out on some stuff. That's like why when they price
houses based on square footage, you're like, there's a little
bit more to the what is appealing about a house than the
square footage in the number of bedrooms and bathrooms, right?
Yep, for sure. So where do you go from here?
Like where are you in the process right now and and what
(33:50):
are the next steps in the process?
I've sent the cards off. So the cards that went to CIA,
those will be in their auction starting at $0.99 in the month
of November. There are nine of them if I
remember correctly. And so I don't know what those
will sell for. I honestly don't care.
I'm not trying to profit from them.
I just want to sell them and geta little bit of money and then
(34:13):
I'm probably take the money to Strongsville or something, I'm
not really sure. And then I also, I'm sending off
or sent off a couple 100 cards to come see.
And once those are received, I'mactually paying up to the dollar
tier so that they're received infour weeks.
And then I'm just thinking, wouldn't it be fun to, to,
because I know that I have viewers who want my cards.
(34:37):
If people forward a receipt of acard that they bought from me or
show me the card, I'll, I'll mail them a junk wax hero
sticker, something like that. It would be super inexpensive
for me to do something like that, but maybe people would
appreciate that. I don't know, maybe they
wouldn't, but I I think I'd offer that up.
I think that would be fun just to make sure that the the cards
(35:02):
are more likely to get into the hands of my viewers.
I've thought a lot about how to do the same because I think a
lot of the people who watch yourchannel or watch my channel,
it's because we had some similarinterests, some similar eye,
similar appreciations of the intricacies of the hobby.
(35:24):
And so one of the things I've actually thought about is like,
OK, if, if I'm going to sell some of these, do I put them on
my channel first? Do I say, hey, I'm going to put
these, I'm going to put these upon eBay in 10 days.
If if you have any interest, just, you know, message me and I
know I get your thing of I don'twant to deal with it.
(35:44):
I just, you know, want, I just want to be done with it, which I
think a lot of people are in those shoes.
I probably again, should be morein those shoes, but I'm probably
not as much as I want to be. I thought about that like, well,
maybe I just do like a card show.
Maybe I go, hey, it's all for sale if you're interested.
(36:05):
I mean, it could be kind of fun,like I mean, because if some of
my friends like like I bought a card from Tony Lebrick and I was
like, it's one of Tony's cards. Like it, it's a little bit more
special that it was a card that Tony went out, saw, found, said.
I love that card made the purchase was in his collection.
(36:25):
Like that's I think that's kind of cool.
There's some fun to the history of of where the card came from
like that. Yeah, absolutely.
Well, we have zoomed through 36 minutes.
I know that our target is between 40 and 45, which means
we've got a few more minutes to talk.
I, I, we've gotten pretty heavy into this.
(36:48):
You turning some stuff over, I guess.
I guess if there are people listening and they're thinking
about selling some stuff and, and I've, I've mentioned Hi pop
professor Brian and iconic Al a few times over the last couple
of weeks, but I, I really do enjoy those two.
(37:09):
And they were talking the other day about because values have
gotten fairly high on some cards, higher than maybe some
people realize that they've gotten that.
Maybe they always refer to theircollections as a bonsai tree
that they're constantly shaping and clipping and directing and,
and it's always changing and there's new growth in some areas
(37:32):
and there's cutting off some of the excess and other areas.
And it's just a wonderful metaphor, especially if you're
our age and grew up watching TheKarate Kid.
But but they they were saying the other day, yeah, with the
prices kind of creeping up, now's not a bad time to shake
the bonsai tree and see what comes out because there are some
(37:56):
maybe sometimes to do that. So as a person who is in that
process right now, what advice would you give to anybody
listening saying I'm thinking about shaking the bonsai tree?
Do you have any recommendations?Not again, not on where to sell,
we've talked about that, but on how to identify what really is
(38:19):
loose and what really maybe is actually still attached because
you just went through that process.
Yeah, I would just keep it simple.
So if you're if the bulk of the majority of your collection is
kind of centers around certain things and then you have these
cards that are outside of that, do you have those for a good
(38:41):
reason? Do they make sense for your
collection? So for instance, I have a Carl
Ostremsky what what year was thescorecards that were autographed
by Yaz and Mickey Mantle and Stan Musial is a 92 score I.
Don't know. I have that Yaz autographed and
I love it and I'm not selling itbut I I have like a 2021 Yaz
(39:06):
autograph Panini that I am selling because Panini one gives
me no joy. The score 1 I don't it's hard to
explain it's it's cooler I guessI.
Think nostalgia. Where?
Is the underlying current for a lot of us.
Yep. Can I?
(39:27):
Can I read you a comment that wegot today?
Oh boy. Yeah, go ahead.
He says. I do love both of you guys and
together you seem awkward at best.
Again, I enjoy both of your shows, I really do.
But you guys together are like Abbott and Hardy.
(39:49):
If you remember Abbott and Costello, I don't know.
If you remember Abbott and Costello and Laurel and Hardy,
we would be a combination of them because we don't go well
together apparently. And I think, I think we go great
together, Greg. Yeah, I mean, I hope so.
I I that what makes something gowell together and not well
(40:11):
together. I think for me is how quickly
time moves when I'm interacting with the person.
If I'm constantly looking at theclock going, oh boy, we have
another 74 minutes. You know, like my first period
class, then it's different than my second period class where the
time actually moves a lot faster.
(40:34):
Certain personalities like that can maybe do it.
I appreciate that comment even though I don't necessarily agree
with it because it wasn't done harshly.
It was, it sounded like it was done lovingly.
And I had AI had a guy for reading comments or talking
(40:57):
about I. I had a guy e-mail me a very
long e-mail today, a really sweet e-mail.
I mean, he was over the top trying to not be offensive.
And he was basically telling me that one of the reasons that my
he didn't think that my channel had kind of taken hold as much
(41:20):
as it could was because the tirethat I wear is a little frumpy.
And it's hard to take somebody seriously when they're just like
in like T-shirts and hoodies. And that the setting in which I
record, which is on my bedroom, sitting on my bed wasn't like a
(41:44):
card room like a lot of people have.
That's more card oriented. And it's funny because like I
totally appreciated how he said it, that he was like, I don't
want to, I don't let this guy know because I want, I think of
this might be good feedback for him.
And quite frankly, it was good feedback.
Like it, everything he said, I'mlike, I don't disagree with you,
(42:07):
but I have never tried to be or want to be or think that I am
some sort of guru or some sort of professional presenter of
sports card content. I kind of want to just be a
(42:27):
regular dude who doesn't have any equipment.
And I mean, like the microphone that I got was a gift, you know,
from a, a distant relative over the holidays that I spent six
months to take out-of-the-box and plug in.
But I, I don't know, it's, I think it's very endearing that
(42:52):
people would reach out and say something like, even though it's
not necessarily going to change me or we're like, OK, well,
let's pull the RIP cord on this.Mike.
I guess this isn't working because we got, because it's
Costello and you know, Seinfeld or whatever.
I'd obviously be Seinfeld. I think that it's sweet that
(43:14):
people actually care and are willing to offer that feedback.
Like that doesn't bug me at all.No, no, not at all.
And I think that part of the appeal of us, Greg, is, you
know, you're familiar with the phrase.
He's just a guy. Yeah.
We're just a guy. We're just two guys.
(43:35):
We're not experts. We're not claiming to be
experts. We're not trying to, I don't
know. We're only the very small number
of sponsors you and I have are for products that we use and
believe in. We're not trying to sell you on
a million different things that don't make a whole lot of sense
for us. And so I feel like we're, we're
(43:59):
just regular guys and I, I neverintended to have a channel that
got even marginally popular likemine has.
Yeah, but it has and I've enjoyed it.
I love it, every minute of it. I think that it's sort of like
this. I think that what we've, what
you have done with your channel is you, you are a very, I, I
(44:24):
want to respond to the comment that you read of you, You let's,
I don't want to get political. I was going to use a political
person, but it's not politicallybased.
So Tom Brokaw, right? Tom Brokaw is very well known of
doing his thing and he was very good at, you know, what he did
(44:46):
and, and had his kind of following.
And then Dan Rather, you know, Dan Rather had did his thing and
they did things similarly, but there were differences.
But it was like Dan Rather was sort of like that the head of
his brand and Tom Brokaw was thehead of his brand.
(45:06):
And then to see them on screen together is like, wait a second,
These are these are two different things that that
doesn't seem natural for those two things to be together
because one is doing this one and one is doing this one.
And now they're now they're doing them together.
It it, it's sort of like seeing Don Mattingly as the bench coach
(45:28):
on the Blue Jays. You're like, what?
Like Don Mattingly? Like Don Mattingly is a leader
in the Yankee dugout, not an assistant leader in the Blue
Jays dugout. I just learned I've always felt
that way. He's a coach on the Blue Jays.
What's that? I just learned this week that
he's a coach on the Blue Jays. Oh, really, when they that was
(45:48):
kind of a painful thing for Yankee fans to, to go through
that and, and especially since most of his Yankee fans hate
Boone, even though I think Red Sox fans probably love Boone.
So they don't want him ever to get fired.
We we don't like him. I think he's probably a decent
person after. Come on, it's time, dude.
(46:12):
We continually say as Yankee fans, oh, we got booned again.
Like, I mean, you've become likea verb.
He made a booner. There was there was a a manager
of the Red Sox who I'm sure you'll remember named Jimmy
Williams. I remember Jimmy with one MJIMY
(46:34):
Williams. Yeah, every time he did
something stupid, I called him Jimmy.
There there was a national radioshow and once a week they would
point out the most boneheaded coaching decision of the week.
And it was called the Jimmy of the Week.
I don't remember the name of thenational radio show where I
(46:55):
would give him credit for that. But I remember going, oh, it's
time for the Jimmy of the Week. And he would talk about some
awful decision by somebody. So, well, 47 minutes.
This was a pleasure, though. It is clearly boiling water.
A second period pleasure, not a first period pleasure.
(47:16):
Right. My first period is is a
nightmare. My second period is fantastic.
So yeah, it was a second period style pleasure.
Good. Yes, Anything you want to throw
out there? Oh, I have one thing to throw
out there. I have a live stream on Monday
night. So if you're listening to this
(47:37):
on the podcast format in Monday night, what is that the 27th?
27th. October 27th, I have a live
stream, Midlife live #10 and there are going to be giveaways.
I'm not really a giveaway guy, but I've got a couple of cool
(47:59):
things to give away. Really, really cool things.
I'm giving away A1 year subscription to Card Ladder.
Nice. That's an awesome, awesome
giveaway. Yeah, that's one of the gifts
that I'm giving away, so. Cool.
Anything you want to throw out there?
(48:20):
I'm going to Shriners next Saturday, the November 1st, and
then I'm doing my first live stream in a long time on
November 2nd and it's at 9 PMI should probably tell Sammy.
I should probably confirm with him that I'll be there November
2nd, 9:00 PM, which is way past my bedtime.
Craig, you're hosting or guesting?
I'm guesting. Got it.
Yeah. Very cool.
(48:42):
Yeah. This was great, Greg.
Thanks buddy. Thanks, Oil.
Thanks, Water. That's right.
All right. All right, buddy.
Thanks. Bye.
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. This is where we come together
(00:21):
to talk cards. Mike, how are you doing today?
So good, so good, Greg. Yeah, today, you know what?
Today I went, I had to go get myApple, my iPhone fixed.
And while I was there, they haveall their amazing devices out
and you can test them. And I ended up buying a pair of
Airpods. You're, you're like, I mean,
(00:44):
just doing that. It's like going back into the
future. You're like, all of a sudden
you're like in high school and cool.
I I was never cool in high school and I've never been cool
since. OK, well, we can all think that
we're cool though. Sure.
All right, so you released a video recently.
(01:07):
Yeah, I did. And your video was about how
you're looking to sell some of your collection and, and, and
you, you talked about how you were kind of deciding what you
were going to sell and kind of why you were going to sell it
and, and that whole thing. So what spurred this?
(01:31):
And it just take me through the process of, of you being a
collector. You've got all these cards.
And then you said, you know, I'mgoing to start a purge.
What happened? Yeah, so I moved from the corner
of my basement where I wasn't able to display.
I, I think I might have had 33 cards on display or 39 cards, 3
(01:51):
rows of 13 that I was able to display.
And I moved into this office andmy goal always was to have all
of my cards on display, plus some binders and then like one
big box where I can just easily pull cards out where I, you
know, I know where they are. But as I moved in here, I
(02:12):
realized, man, I have. Not only do I have 10s of
thousands of cards, largely fromthe Vermont collection that I
never did anything with due to time constraints from last year,
but I also have a lot of cards that I loved at one point and
still do love, but they don't really fit what I want to do.
And I thought, man, there's so many cards I want.
(02:33):
Do I really want to just leave all these cards in boxes in my
closet or do I want to sell a bunch of these cards and
consolidate down to, I don't know, two or three bigger cards
that I can display and be really, really happy with
instead of these to start, I don't know, 200 ish cards that
(02:55):
are all worth between two and $200.
And if I can sell these for a total of even, I don't know,
$1500 maybe, then that's 2 pretty big cars or one really
big card for me. Yeah, and so that that bigger
(03:16):
card is is scratching a bigger itch apparently than the smaller
cards. Do you feel like, are you
worried about any regret of like, why did I do this or, or
are you just like, because you had mentioned in the video that
you had sold some stuff once before, I think.
And then, and then you're doing this again and you're, you're
(03:38):
kind of feeling confident about it.
Like take me through that because I've recently been
looking at doing a facelift for my collection and dramatic pause
and I've I've been like, well, am I going to regret this?
(03:59):
I sold 18 months ago. I sold a 2021 Sports Illustrated
for kids. Caitlin Clark autographed and
it's the most beautiful example of this.
Has bright yellow autograph of Caitlin Clark.
I paid a grand total of $110.00 for this card.
Autographed, slabbed. I bought it autographed already
(04:21):
before she became big and then Islabbed it with PSA and then her
values just blew up 18 months after that.
And I said, jeez, do I need a $2000 Caitlin Clark card?
I don't. I paid $110.00 for this and I,
so I sold it. I went to the National with all
(04:42):
this cash that I was all of a sudden flash flush with.
And I bought some great, great cards at the National 2024.
And I still, I don't, I can't say I regret it, but I think
about it often and I still monitor.
It's still the number one sale, the highest sale for 2021 Sports
(05:03):
Illustrated for Kids, Caitlin Clark autographed card and I
still monitor any sales that come up with these.
There aren't very many. Like one just sold yesterday for
thirteen, $1400 on eBay. But that one also is a worse
example than than mine. And so I think, jeez, how much
would mine sell for now? I don't know.
(05:26):
But my point is that I do think about it and I but that's a
really, really rare card and I don't have any rare cards.
I, I worry about regretting selling off my Yaz collection.
I'm keeping the 1960 and 1961 but I worry about the rest
'cause I I loved collecting those and I love having them.
Sure. So I want to just keep them in a
(05:47):
box in my closet that doesn't bring me any joy.
Yeah, I mean, I understand what you're saying.
I mean, that that makes sense. And that's kind of where I think
I'm at with some of my thought processes too.
I, you know, last time we recorded was last Thursday.
(06:09):
And I had mentioned you had at the very beginning of the
episode you had mentioned, hey, yeah, it's almost Friday.
And I was like, yeah, I'm taking1/2 day sub.
I'm going to go to Lucy's soccergame on Friday and, and just
work 1/2 day. And so I was like I only have
1/2 day left till the weekend. And so I live kind of southeast
(06:30):
of Sacramento and I had to driveto Santa Rosa which is almost 3
hours from with traffic and everything.
And I went on this big. I basically binged Stacking
Slabs and the Crossover and which are both podcasts and
(06:52):
stacking slabs is mostly modern and I think I referred to him as
Mark McGrath the other day and Mark McGrath I think wasn't he
like. Sugar Ray.
Yeah, he was the Sugar Ray guy. Anyway, he, he, I love his
channel and, and he kept talkingabout this concept that I want
(07:16):
to ask you about because he kepttalking about having like your
North Star, which is like your direction of where you're going.
And sort of like your, your point that you can identify to
keep you on course is like that's kind of fixed.
So you're kind of you start to veer off course and then that
(07:37):
kind of keeps you back headed inthe right direction when you
start to veer off course. And you said a second ago that
they don't fit what I want to doanymore.
And, and I'm curious, did your, did your North Star move or did
(07:59):
your, did you hit some rocks andand you found it a new
lighthouse, a new shiny object that you wanted to go after?
Like how did that happen that you had things you were
acquiring because they did fit, but then suddenly they no longer
fit. Now I understand your you, you
know, you just said you moved the room and you have more space
and you have more area to display things and you don't
(08:22):
want stuff in boxes. But, but that's still just a
piece of what you want your collection to be.
Like when, when you, when peopleadd cards to their collection,
it's, it's more than just a car to your collection.
It's sort of like your collection kind of represents
what you want you're collecting to be.
(08:44):
And so when you're cutting off limbs and, you know,
transplanting new ones in new areas, it's kind of a big thing
to to change like what was your North Star like?
What was your identity? And then what would you say your
identity has become? Yeah, ever since I was a little
(09:06):
kid, I was obsessed with rookie cards and as I was obsessed with
the Hall of Fame, I've always loved Hall of Fame debates.
I've loved Hall of Fame players.Even Jack Morris.
Not really. I don't.
I don't love him, but I respect him.
And so I decided that I didn't want to have second year cards,
(09:28):
third year cards, unless those cards also have the Rookie Cup,
the All Star Cup, and I want Hall of Fame rookie cards.
And then I have a dozen other things.
So this actually fits. I have a Kang Griffey junior
rookie card collection. I want to have all of the Kang
Griffey junior rookie cards, period.
(09:51):
I don't care what grade they're in.
I just want to have every singleone.
And there are a lot of them. You'd be surprised.
They're 30 some odd, I think. And then, you know, like Pedro
Martinez refractors from the 1990s.
Those are things that are reallycool.
Nomar Garcia Para. So there's a Red Sox subset of
my collection. Nomar is not a Hall of Famer,
(10:12):
but I loved Nomar when he was you know, from 1997 to 2003 was
a huge Nomar fan, loved Pedro. Do I want to so I could see
myself getting away. I selling off my Carl Yustremsky
slabs outside of 1960 and 61. Can I see myself selling off my
Ted Williams collection that aren't his rookie?
(10:35):
Probably not, because I have a hard time ever seeing myself
getting one of his rookies, and frankly, I don't even like his
rookie card. So I'm trying to get the Ted
Williams run. I'm trying to get the the Jackie
Robinson all of his 1950s cards too.
But wait a second, You just saidthat you're a Hall of Fame
(10:56):
rookie card guy and then you said you want to do a run for
Jackie and Ted Williams and so and and Nomar and and Pedro and
so are you. I see a lot of rabbit holes that
you're walking by and it it's like is there?
(11:18):
Is there? Are they like black holes where
they're like sucking you down them?
To some extent. So I also have a program, Red
Sox program collection I have, arapper collection I have.
Like like Eminem and and stuff. No wax wrappers as you know
(11:39):
'cause you helped me find 1. Sure I have there.
I have a vintage video game collection.
There's so many things that I like to collect.
I will never finish my collection and that's why I had
to say, holy smokes, I've got toget rid of some of the stuff
that doesn't really fit, doesn'tbring me joy.
Who is it? Marie Kondo?
I've never seen anything she does, but I know that she's
(12:01):
famous for saying get rid of anything that doesn't spark joy.
And these cards that I was getting rid of didn't didn't
spark joy in my collection. So some of them, like couple of
Perez steel postcards, I love Perez steel.
I had loved Don Rus Diamond Kings as a kid.
When I got back into the collection, I learned about the
(12:21):
postcards and various other Perez steel cards and I started
buying some occasionally, like Mike Moynihan sold me some.
But after a while I was like, I can't collect all of these
things. I can collect Don Rus Diamond
Kings, but I can't collect everyPerez Steel thing.
I don't have the money, I don't have the time.
I don't have the space for it all.
(12:43):
I think we OK, so maybe it's nota North Star.
Maybe there's three legs to the stool and the all three legs are
important towards keeping you upright.
And one of the legs is Hall of Fame rookie cards.
That's the big one. That's the biggest leg.
(13:04):
What? And then then you've got the the
Red Sock thing, but not enough so that you want to keep all of
these Karl Yasrim ski cards thatyou're just talking about
wanting to cut. So I mean, he's what, the second
best Red Sock of all time? Maybe, but I'm going to amend
(13:24):
that a little bit. I still want the cards, I just
don't want them slapped. I want them in a binder.
OK. So and, and in a in raw state,
Carl Yastremsky. I have a binder with, I don't
know, 3 or 400 unique Carl Yastremsky cards which I love.
It doesn't take up any space andI can pull it out at any point
and add to it and I I just don'twant the slabs.
(13:46):
I have a giant box of Carl Yastremsky slabs that sit in my
closet. Do you have pliers and a
screwdriver 'cause you can make those slabbed cards no longer
slab. But if I can sell them for
$40.50 dollars, $60.00 and then buy the card raw for three or
four, why would I crack them outand give up all that money that
(14:11):
I that you could sell them for? I mean, I, I'm, you're, you're
like baiting me to, to go on a massive sidebar when you just
said if you could buy this, if you could sell this slabbed
version of it for 40 or $50 and you could buy it raw for three
or four. I mean, that does make my head
(14:32):
want to explode. When you, when you talk about it
that way, it's like, that's insane.
Right. Some of them are, I mean some of
them are $10, right, raw, right.But I'm selling those for
between, I don't know, 30 and $100 slabbed and I can get, I
don't know, 500, seven, 100 bucks and then buy them all back
(14:54):
raw for under 100 a hundred, maybe $200.
Now, when you're selling these cards, you're selling, you know,
a bunch of cards where and I know you talked about on the
video, but that doesn't mean you're, you know, we we can at
least bring it up here. Where do you sell?
Like what is what is the move inselling?
(15:14):
I know that you spoke with ChrisSewell on another Sports Card
Clubhouse video about So you want to, you know, be a dealer
or what was it? No, you got it so.
You want to be a dealer and, andI listened to it.
It was, it was great. And he talked about all the
different places that he sells and how if it meets this
(15:36):
criteria, if it does this, if itdoes that.
So how do you make that decision?
Yeah. So if I were ever in the space
where I needed to sell my collection, obviously I would
sell it to Chris. That's that's a no brainer.
And I have instructions for my wife in case something happens
to me to just call Chris becausehe will take care of me, take
(15:56):
care of her with my collection. But I'm not at that place and I
don't expect to be for decades. And so I reached out to him for
some advice and he said put themin CIA collector investor
auctions, put, he said the ones that are like $50 and up.
And so I picked out nine that I think will sell for over $50.
(16:17):
A couple of them might be a little bit questionable.
And I talked to Theo, Theo was amazing help.
Theo works for CIA now and he was amazing help for me in just
easing my mind. I've never used an an auction
house before. I've never sold anything at
auction other than on eBay. And he made it so impossibly
(16:40):
easy for me and just kind of like, reassured me.
I was like, I was like his little kid.
He'd be like, you can do this, Mike.
Yeah. And it was great.
Yeah, I mean, I've been really impressed.
You know, I, I had heard of collector investor auctions and
then, you know, Theo had told mekind of privately that he was
(17:02):
maybe going to start working there.
And so I started looking into them more and, you know, I met
with you. Actually, I met Jeremy for the
first time at the National. Really nice guy.
Seems like they're doing a greatjob.
So then I was like, well, I'm going to poke around the
website. So I had that episode with Theo
where we look at the website andit was really good.
(17:23):
And then I ended up buying a card on it and I mean it.
I think that there are a lot of people who feel like they can
only buy at a card shop, a card show or eBay.
And I think those people are missing out.
And and I think that us talking about these sorts of places, I
(17:44):
hope that it helps people consider other avenues in which
to acquire cards because I was pretty impressed.
Yeah. And then I have a bunch of cards
probably I don't know, 150 to 200 that'll add to my Comm C
store that are low, low dollar value.
Or some of them might be like $75.00 that I would not want to
(18:05):
auction off because there's not a huge demand for them.
So I'll just list them at the lowest price imaginable to
lowest price you can find them for online and just wait for a
buyer. But I would not auction them
because they're the types of cards that are like one buyer
cards. Yeah.
So COMC is another great place. I, I sent out a box of a couple
(18:29):
100 cards to COMC. A lot of autographs, a lot of
patches or early patches, not like 2020 and up patches of
really, really good players. And those go to COMC.
I have like 400 cards in my COMCalready.
I find that really easy. And you know, I got emails after
I did that video from probably adozen people, emails, texts,
(18:51):
messages saying, hey, that card you showed, I would love to buy
that from you. And I really appreciate those
messages. But the whole reason I've chose
CIA and Com C are because I hatehaggling.
I hate shipping, I hate collecting money.
I just want to send them all in one batch or two in this case
(19:11):
and simplify the process and letthem deal with it.
I don't have to do anything except price them.
Yeah, I mean, there is a certaintime, you know, value element to
where do you put your time and things and where do you there?
I'm, I'm really cheap, like really cheap.
(19:34):
And so, so I have a hard time hiring anybody to do anything
that I, I, my next door neighbor, you know, we needed to
build a fence. And he goes, well, you know,
I'll get some quotes and I'm like, bro, I ain't ever going to
get ahead in life if I hire people to do things I'm fully
(19:54):
capable of doing. But I, I tore my rotator cuff
building that fence by myself. And for the next year and a
half, it's been sore. And I'm like, maybe it's OK if
I'm at the point where I just have some other people deal with
(20:16):
that stuff. Because you're right, it's.
It is a pain to mail stuff and it is it would be easy if I have
a box of stuff. And one of the things I want to
get into is like I have put together a few runs of a few
players and part of the appeal for me of doing a run was the
(20:37):
hunt of the run. So like I did an auto gram run,
like all of his playing days cards from his rookie card all
the way to his his last card. And and then I did a Sammy Baugh
run and I've been working on a Jim Brown run.
And what I noticed is as soon asI finished the autogram run and
(20:58):
the Sammy Baugh run, once they were complete, I was like, why
did I do that? The fun part for me was hunting
for the right specimen of that card that fits with the other
cards. And then I look at the autogram
cards and I'm like, I like all the cards, but the one that I
(21:20):
really like is that beautiful rookie card.
And the other ones, I'm like, I've got $280 of value wrapped
up in that card right there. Like do I really want to have
$280 wrapped up in that card? So it was like I was so in love
with the hunt of finding each ofthem and having all these saved
(21:42):
searches and going to shows and going to the National and going
to Strongsville and looking through cases at football cases
and going, oh, there's another. Let me take a look at it and
looking through the stack of theguy who had multiple.
But I love the hunt and the the pirate set that I did like
everyone, you know, these cards are like most of those pirate
(22:02):
cards between PSA and SGC combined is like a pop 20 to 25
total. And I'm like, I want to build
the set partly because it felt virtually impossible.
And then I built it in like a year and a half and like I, I'm
on some Facebook, you know, non sport Facebook groups and
(22:23):
they're like, I posted a picturewhen I finished it.
I'm like, yeah, I did that in a year and a half.
And there were people like, no, you didn't.
That's impossible. And I'm like, no, I really did.
Like I just, but I love trying to, you know, take a machete
through the jungle to try to, you know, find myself in the
(22:44):
presence of some card that seemslike I'll never find it.
And sometimes that isn't the card itself, but it's the right
card. Like finding like the 1951
Bowman autogram is always off center.
Always. So I finally, it took me two
years to find a centered 1. And then I got it and it showed
(23:05):
up and I'm looking and I'm like,this thing is awesome.
And now what it was like I, I sometimes love the hunt as much
as anything. And so now I'm like, OK, check
that box now the pirate cards. I love the beauty of them 'cause
I'm also an, I like AI appeal person, but not just it has to
(23:26):
have good quote UN quote. I appeal like Dylan double DI
appeal, but it has to be like a pretty card like here's another
card. I Warren Spahn.
I like Warren Spahn a lot. I like his story.
I like that he served in the military.
I like, you know that he's overlooked and I have his 48
Bowman rookie card, his 49 leaf pseudo rookie card.
(23:48):
I have his 53 Bowman color card and I was looking at him the
other day and I'm like the 48 Bowman.
It doesn't really do it for me. I love the 49 leaf and I love
the 53 Bowman. I don't think I need the rookie
card because I like these other cards because I'm I'm, I like
the looks of things like beautiful images.
(24:09):
And so I'm kind of like itching for a new hunt.
And we talked about this last week when I was talking about do
I go out there Patrick Willis refractor cards or what do I do?
Because I'm hungry for a new hunt and I don't know what it
is. And some of the cards that I've
picked up that I haunted and I loved hunting.
(24:31):
I'm like, OK, that was fun and that one and that one I love and
I'm going to keep long term because I love the beauty of
them, but I don't think I need to keep some of these other ones
that I I haunted and I conqueredand, and now it's time to set
them free. Yeah, how about Russell
Westbrook rookie cards now that he's on your hometown team?
(24:54):
I don't think I'm going to be going that route, especially
after how they looked. It looks like it was a salary,
salary acquisition more than I don't know.
I no Russell Westbrook, but there are some former Kings that
I like a lot. But I'm not I'm not as much of a
(25:18):
basketball guy unless it's old basketball.
I like modern football cards andI like modern baseball card, but
there are a couple of modern basketball.
I don't know. I'm a mess right now.
My head is everywhere. I literally Brian, the high pop
professor brothers with iconic owl.
(25:41):
I I messaged him yesterday and Isaid you are the guy that I know
that is most in tune with 90s refractors.
I know that Shane Shoebox legends is there.
I know that Dylan's got some. I know that Adam's Splendid
Sports has some, so I reached out to Brian.
I said if you were to pick like 20 refractors from the 90s that
(26:05):
you think whether a combination of beauty and rarity and what
are the ones. I was just thinking he was just
going to fire off some. He gives me this like 3 hours
later, he sends me this comprehensive list.
And I was like, Oh my gosh. Like he goes, yeah, I really,
you know, I did. And I was just like, this is I
felt like I have like this secret treasure map to all of
(26:27):
his knowledge he put down for me.
And I'm like excited to start going through the list.
Yeah, Adam did the same thing for me with Pedro Martinez
refractors. He sent me, I don't know, top 25
Pedro Martinez playing day's refractors.
I think they're all from the 90sor maybe early 2000s all.
Yeah, and I looked at that. I was like, oh, I was so
(26:49):
excited. But then I started looking at
the prices and holy crap man, I know they are.
So would you rather have a Hank Aaron rookie card or would you
rather have a Pedro refractor? No question, it's a Hank Aaron
rookie card. It's not even close.
But the but but the Hank Aaron rookie card is way more
plentiful than the Pedro refractor.
(27:11):
Sure, but. So you're not a rare guy, You're
an iconic guy, not a rare guy. Exactly.
I want cards that are in demand.I want So when I see
collections, I get jealous of certain cards and that's the
whole point of my attainable collection of envy 100 is when I
see them, I go, oh man, I love that card.
I got to have that card. Most of them are rookie cards.
(27:33):
Most of them are iconic and mostof them are plentiful.
Not all of them, but most of them are.
And I the scarcity isn't for me.I totally get it.
This isn't a criticism of peoplewho want rare cards because
they're rare. It's just that it's, it doesn't
do anything for me. But yeah, the Hank Aaron rookie
(27:55):
is very high on my list. I'm starting to realize slowly
but surely that I'm I'm a nostalgia collector and I
thought I was an iconic card collector, but I think I'm
actually a, a beauty and image beauty collector slash nostalgia
(28:15):
collector. And a lot of the nostalgia comes
from a lot of iconic cards are nostalgic for me because they
were on the magazines, they wereat the, the cases in the shows.
I remember going because we usedto go to some big shows out on
the West. Cause some of the biggest shows
there were nationals that used to be out on the West Coast.
Imagine that even in San Francisco, in LA, there were
(28:39):
nationals and you would go to these big shows.
And I remember looking in the cases and seeing some of these
old tobacco cards. And so I was always like, man,
I'd just love to own one. And then I started buying some
T2O sixes. And then I'm like, well, I need
a project to hunt. I need, I need, I'm not going to
do like a Yankee team set or something.
(29:01):
I I want to do some sort of project.
So I was like, I'm going to do the Hall of Fame run, not Plank
and Wagner. But then I, I was buying them
and I was and then I started going, why do I like these ones?
Why when I picked up this one, did it feel so much better than
this one? And what I think that I'm
(29:22):
realizing is when I was a kid, the cards that I remember the
looks of the best were the portraits.
And I didn't, I didn't really remember the quote UN quote
action shots. And so I'm like, I was picking
up the portraits and the action shots.
But the, the thing I have ingrained in my brain was seeing
(29:47):
these portraits is like, man, that's like the Mona Lisa.
It's like the guy got dressed upin his formal first day of
school, you know, picture and it, it, it was like this formal
look. It was, it was a baseball
player, but it was like his dressed up.
It was like the military guy who's in his formal uniform
picture, you know, it's like it,it, there's something about
(30:08):
that. And, and so I'm starting to
realize, well, maybe some of theaction shots aren't, maybe I
shouldn't cut keep them. Maybe I should cut those loose
so I have more money for some ofthe portrait ones, which are the
ones that I think I'm most nostalgic for.
Because sometimes there are cards that you like, you go, but
you're like, I don't know why I like that.
(30:30):
I think I like this type of thing, but it wasn't that type
of thing that you liked. It was actually something very
specific that you liked, but youthought it was broader than it
actually was. Yeah, plus there are a lot of
Hall of Famers in the T2O6 set that I've never even heard of,
even though they're Hall of Farmers.
But just they're a bunch of themthat you go who?
(30:53):
Who is that? That's really cool name because
I love the names from back then.But yeah.
To me, if they're beautiful cards, they're still worth
having. And then I go back to this, you
know, I've said this before, like I've been very picky in
particular as I've picked them up.
Like there are cards I just waited for two years until the
(31:14):
right one came up and then I bought it.
And now I have these, I think really nice for the grade cards.
So I'm like, OK, if I'm going tocut some of these loose because
I'm going to go after some otherstuff, There's no, there's no
way I'm only going to take that amount for the card, even though
that's what I paid for it. I'm like, I'm not, I can't take
(31:36):
that, you know, because this one's way too nice.
It took two years to find this one.
So that's one of my issues with sending something off to sell is
like I need a human to to appreciate it the way I
appreciate it, you know? Absolutely, Yeah.
(32:00):
And you said something a little earlier about I appeal and with
vintage, and that's part of the beauty of vintage that you don't
get with ultra modern cards is that search for the right card,
the right example of a card withultra modern, you're just
looking for good centering. Corners are very rarely dinged
up. The the surface rarely has
(32:22):
problems, the edges rarely have problems.
And in vintage, if you if you'rean eye appeal nut like I am, you
have that search. You might find the card that
you're looking for, you might find 10 of them at one table.
But if none of them meet what you're looking for, that is the
thrill of the hunt. A. 100% that's, that's the most
(32:46):
exciting part about vintage is that the number of variables are
infinite because there are corners in centering and
surface. And you know, there, there's,
there's so many different things.
It's, it's like hunting for a new car versus hunting for a
used car. The new cars are pretty close to
(33:07):
the same, you know, maybe a little different, but the used
cars, not every 2016, you know, Toyota Camry is equal.
There's a wide variance between them.
And so if you're just looking atthe mileage and you're just
looking at the exterior body condition, like you're probably
(33:29):
missing out on some stuff. That's like why when they price
houses based on square footage, you're like, there's a little
bit more to the what is appealing about a house than the
square footage in the number of bedrooms and bathrooms, right?
Yep, for sure. So where do you go from here?
Like where are you in the process right now and and what
(33:50):
are the next steps in the process?
I've sent the cards off. So the cards that went to CIA,
those will be in their auction starting at $0.99 in the month
of November. There are nine of them if I
remember correctly. And so I don't know what those
will sell for. I honestly don't care.
I'm not trying to profit from them.
I just want to sell them and geta little bit of money and then
(34:13):
I'm probably take the money to Strongsville or something, I'm
not really sure. And then I also, I'm sending off
or sent off a couple 100 cards to come see.
And once those are received, I'mactually paying up to the dollar
tier so that they're received infour weeks.
And then I'm just thinking, wouldn't it be fun to, to,
because I know that I have viewers who want my cards.
(34:37):
If people forward a receipt of acard that they bought from me or
show me the card, I'll, I'll mail them a junk wax hero
sticker, something like that. It would be super inexpensive
for me to do something like that, but maybe people would
appreciate that. I don't know, maybe they
wouldn't, but I I think I'd offer that up.
I think that would be fun just to make sure that the the cards
(35:02):
are more likely to get into the hands of my viewers.
I've thought a lot about how to do the same because I think a
lot of the people who watch yourchannel or watch my channel,
it's because we had some similarinterests, some similar eye,
similar appreciations of the intricacies of the hobby.
(35:24):
And so one of the things I've actually thought about is like,
OK, if, if I'm going to sell some of these, do I put them on
my channel first? Do I say, hey, I'm going to put
these, I'm going to put these upon eBay in 10 days.
If if you have any interest, just, you know, message me and I
know I get your thing of I don'twant to deal with it.
(35:44):
I just, you know, want, I just want to be done with it, which I
think a lot of people are in those shoes.
I probably again, should be morein those shoes, but I'm probably
not as much as I want to be. I thought about that like, well,
maybe I just do like a card show.
Maybe I go, hey, it's all for sale if you're interested.
(36:05):
I mean, it could be kind of fun,like I mean, because if some of
my friends like like I bought a card from Tony Lebrick and I was
like, it's one of Tony's cards. Like it, it's a little bit more
special that it was a card that Tony went out, saw, found, said.
I love that card made the purchase was in his collection.
(36:25):
Like that's I think that's kind of cool.
There's some fun to the history of of where the card came from
like that. Yeah, absolutely.
Well, we have zoomed through 36 minutes.
I know that our target is between 40 and 45, which means
we've got a few more minutes to talk.
I, I, we've gotten pretty heavy into this.
(36:48):
You turning some stuff over, I guess.
I guess if there are people listening and they're thinking
about selling some stuff and, and I've, I've mentioned Hi pop
professor Brian and iconic Al a few times over the last couple
of weeks, but I, I really do enjoy those two.
(37:09):
And they were talking the other day about because values have
gotten fairly high on some cards, higher than maybe some
people realize that they've gotten that.
Maybe they always refer to theircollections as a bonsai tree
that they're constantly shaping and clipping and directing and,
and it's always changing and there's new growth in some areas
(37:32):
and there's cutting off some of the excess and other areas.
And it's just a wonderful metaphor, especially if you're
our age and grew up watching TheKarate Kid.
But but they they were saying the other day, yeah, with the
prices kind of creeping up, now's not a bad time to shake
the bonsai tree and see what comes out because there are some
(37:56):
maybe sometimes to do that. So as a person who is in that
process right now, what advice would you give to anybody
listening saying I'm thinking about shaking the bonsai tree?
Do you have any recommendations?Not again, not on where to sell,
we've talked about that, but on how to identify what really is
(38:19):
loose and what really maybe is actually still attached because
you just went through that process.
Yeah, I would just keep it simple.
So if you're if the bulk of the majority of your collection is
kind of centers around certain things and then you have these
cards that are outside of that, do you have those for a good
(38:41):
reason? Do they make sense for your
collection? So for instance, I have a Carl
Ostremsky what what year was thescorecards that were autographed
by Yaz and Mickey Mantle and Stan Musial is a 92 score I.
Don't know. I have that Yaz autographed and
I love it and I'm not selling itbut I I have like a 2021 Yaz
(39:06):
autograph Panini that I am selling because Panini one gives
me no joy. The score 1 I don't it's hard to
explain it's it's cooler I guessI.
Think nostalgia. Where?
Is the underlying current for a lot of us.
Yep. Can I?
(39:27):
Can I read you a comment that wegot today?
Oh boy. Yeah, go ahead.
He says. I do love both of you guys and
together you seem awkward at best.
Again, I enjoy both of your shows, I really do.
But you guys together are like Abbott and Hardy.
(39:49):
If you remember Abbott and Costello, I don't know.
If you remember Abbott and Costello and Laurel and Hardy,
we would be a combination of them because we don't go well
together apparently. And I think, I think we go great
together, Greg. Yeah, I mean, I hope so.
I I that what makes something gowell together and not well
(40:11):
together. I think for me is how quickly
time moves when I'm interacting with the person.
If I'm constantly looking at theclock going, oh boy, we have
another 74 minutes. You know, like my first period
class, then it's different than my second period class where the
time actually moves a lot faster.
(40:34):
Certain personalities like that can maybe do it.
I appreciate that comment even though I don't necessarily agree
with it because it wasn't done harshly.
It was, it sounded like it was done lovingly.
And I had AI had a guy for reading comments or talking
(40:57):
about I. I had a guy e-mail me a very
long e-mail today, a really sweet e-mail.
I mean, he was over the top trying to not be offensive.
And he was basically telling me that one of the reasons that my
he didn't think that my channel had kind of taken hold as much
(41:20):
as it could was because the tirethat I wear is a little frumpy.
And it's hard to take somebody seriously when they're just like
in like T-shirts and hoodies. And that the setting in which I
record, which is on my bedroom, sitting on my bed wasn't like a
(41:44):
card room like a lot of people have.
That's more card oriented. And it's funny because like I
totally appreciated how he said it, that he was like, I don't
want to, I don't let this guy know because I want, I think of
this might be good feedback for him.
And quite frankly, it was good feedback.
Like it, everything he said, I'mlike, I don't disagree with you,
(42:07):
but I have never tried to be or want to be or think that I am
some sort of guru or some sort of professional presenter of
sports card content. I kind of want to just be a
(42:27):
regular dude who doesn't have any equipment.
And I mean, like the microphone that I got was a gift, you know,
from a, a distant relative over the holidays that I spent six
months to take out-of-the-box and plug in.
But I, I don't know, it's, I think it's very endearing that
(42:52):
people would reach out and say something like, even though it's
not necessarily going to change me or we're like, OK, well,
let's pull the RIP cord on this.Mike.
I guess this isn't working because we got, because it's
Costello and you know, Seinfeld or whatever.
I'd obviously be Seinfeld. I think that it's sweet that
(43:14):
people actually care and are willing to offer that feedback.
Like that doesn't bug me at all.No, no, not at all.
And I think that part of the appeal of us, Greg, is, you
know, you're familiar with the phrase.
He's just a guy. Yeah.
We're just a guy. We're just two guys.
(43:35):
We're not experts. We're not claiming to be
experts. We're not trying to, I don't
know. We're only the very small number
of sponsors you and I have are for products that we use and
believe in. We're not trying to sell you on
a million different things that don't make a whole lot of sense
for us. And so I feel like we're, we're
(43:59):
just regular guys and I, I neverintended to have a channel that
got even marginally popular likemine has.
Yeah, but it has and I've enjoyed it.
I love it, every minute of it. I think that it's sort of like
this. I think that what we've, what
you have done with your channel is you, you are a very, I, I
(44:24):
want to respond to the comment that you read of you, You let's,
I don't want to get political. I was going to use a political
person, but it's not politicallybased.
So Tom Brokaw, right? Tom Brokaw is very well known of
doing his thing and he was very good at, you know, what he did
(44:46):
and, and had his kind of following.
And then Dan Rather, you know, Dan Rather had did his thing and
they did things similarly, but there were differences.
But it was like Dan Rather was sort of like that the head of
his brand and Tom Brokaw was thehead of his brand.
(45:06):
And then to see them on screen together is like, wait a second,
These are these are two different things that that
doesn't seem natural for those two things to be together
because one is doing this one and one is doing this one.
And now they're now they're doing them together.
It it, it's sort of like seeing Don Mattingly as the bench coach
(45:28):
on the Blue Jays. You're like, what?
Like Don Mattingly? Like Don Mattingly is a leader
in the Yankee dugout, not an assistant leader in the Blue
Jays dugout. I just learned I've always felt
that way. He's a coach on the Blue Jays.
What's that? I just learned this week that
he's a coach on the Blue Jays. Oh, really, when they that was
(45:48):
kind of a painful thing for Yankee fans to, to go through
that and, and especially since most of his Yankee fans hate
Boone, even though I think Red Sox fans probably love Boone.
So they don't want him ever to get fired.
We we don't like him. I think he's probably a decent
person after. Come on, it's time, dude.
(46:12):
We continually say as Yankee fans, oh, we got booned again.
Like, I mean, you've become likea verb.
He made a booner. There was there was a a manager
of the Red Sox who I'm sure you'll remember named Jimmy
Williams. I remember Jimmy with one MJIMY
(46:34):
Williams. Yeah, every time he did
something stupid, I called him Jimmy.
There there was a national radioshow and once a week they would
point out the most boneheaded coaching decision of the week.
And it was called the Jimmy of the Week.
I don't remember the name of thenational radio show where I
(46:55):
would give him credit for that. But I remember going, oh, it's
time for the Jimmy of the Week. And he would talk about some
awful decision by somebody. So, well, 47 minutes.
This was a pleasure, though. It is clearly boiling water.
A second period pleasure, not a first period pleasure.
(47:16):
Right. My first period is is a
nightmare. My second period is fantastic.
So yeah, it was a second period style pleasure.
Good. Yes, Anything you want to throw
out there? Oh, I have one thing to throw
out there. I have a live stream on Monday
night. So if you're listening to this
(47:37):
on the podcast format in Monday night, what is that the 27th?
27th. October 27th, I have a live
stream, Midlife live #10 and there are going to be giveaways.
I'm not really a giveaway guy, but I've got a couple of cool
(47:59):
things to give away. Really, really cool things.
I'm giving away A1 year subscription to Card Ladder.
Nice. That's an awesome, awesome
giveaway. Yeah, that's one of the gifts
that I'm giving away, so. Cool.
Anything you want to throw out there?
(48:20):
I'm going to Shriners next Saturday, the November 1st, and
then I'm doing my first live stream in a long time on
November 2nd and it's at 9 PMI should probably tell Sammy.
I should probably confirm with him that I'll be there November
2nd, 9:00 PM, which is way past my bedtime.
Craig, you're hosting or guesting?
I'm guesting. Got it.
Yeah. Very cool.
(48:42):
Yeah. This was great, Greg.
Thanks buddy. Thanks, Oil.
Thanks, Water. That's right.
All right. All right, buddy.
Thanks. Bye.
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