April 1, 2025 • 53 mins
The sports card hobby's Only Live Call In Show. Live every Saturday morning at 11am EST/ 8am PST.Features rotating guest hosts from some of your favorite hobby podcasts. Join us live or listen via audio afterwards.
YouTube:https://youtube.com/c/HobbyHotline
https://youtube.com/c/BenchCle...
Twitter:https://twitter.com/HobbyHotline?s=09
Facebook:https://www.facebook.com/HobbyHotline/
YouTube:https://youtube.com/c/HobbyHotline
https://youtube.com/c/BenchCle...
Twitter:https://twitter.com/HobbyHotline?s=09
Facebook:https://www.facebook.com/HobbyHotline/
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:30):
M hm.
Speaker 2 (00:33):
I'm sorry, you're already rocking in the free world, so keep.
Speaker 1 (00:36):
At it anyway. This is a Hobby Hotline episode three
three eight. It is Saturday, March twenty ninth, twenty twenty five,
and I can't believe they let me run this again.
For those of you listening out there in podcast, I'm
Chris Harris from Still Gum and Baseball Kripedia. I'm joined
(01:00):
by the uncle. We all wish we had Rich Klin.
Speaker 2 (01:05):
And it was funny speaking to the uncle. We all
wish we had my great nephew and his uncle who's
his age, And I'll explain that some other time. They
came over to our house to do so. And then
they and my great nephew's mom came over. My niece
came over to the house to do some work. We
(01:26):
could go saturdays, and they went and I don't have
a lot of cards, but went digging in the closet,
and so of course Uncle Rich said, yeah, take the cards.
So yes, I am the uncle everybody wants you had
to go take if you related to me, you could
take my cards. But what was amazing is that I
had ticked up at the trade night at one of
my local Triple Cards stores, and the Triple Card empire
(01:49):
is growing if you follow them on social media. They
announced between Triple Cards Waxed and some of the other
stores they're affiliated, and then some new ventures coming up.
But the one that really struck me was the one
in Singapore. Yes, Singapore, Singapore, Singapore. It's like, okay, now
this is one okay, uh, let me give up my job,
let me move to Singapore and I'll manage that store,
(02:11):
just just for the experience of getting out of this country.
But the point is they are, you know, they are expanding.
And when I was at their last trade night that
they're well out at their raw Lette store, and I
picked up this Dell Crandle PSA four fifty three tops card. Well,
the kid knew what PSA was and it's a nice
(02:32):
looking card, and he was so enthralled. He says, that's
what I want and I and I said, fine, you
can have you know, you can have it. It's like okay.
So it ended up in the exact hands of somebody
should have been with, just in a very circuitous way.
But and I see that Adam has joined us, so
good good morning, Adam.
Speaker 3 (02:49):
Hey guys, Sorry about that.
Speaker 4 (02:51):
That's all right, a third wheel, yes, otherwise we'd be
calling for help desperately. Say, you know, Chris and I
can discuss whether Top should doing Heritage for an hour
and what they should do with TOPS base. But you
know we've done that conversation before we can do it.
Speaker 1 (03:06):
It's been beaten to death like a dead horse. Can
we can beat it some more if we got some time?
Speaker 2 (03:13):
Hey, Heritage High Number came out this week, so I'm excited.
Speaker 1 (03:16):
Why is it coming out now?
Speaker 2 (03:18):
Because they probably didn't realize our friend fall Rich Muller.
Speaker 1 (03:24):
Question, Adam, maybe you can you can answer this? What's
your favorite seventy five Tops High Number series card? Hey?
Speaker 2 (03:35):
I love them off, but they were fifty you know
there were also seventy three high number series and there
was only some parts of the country seven.
Speaker 1 (03:42):
Now I'm just talking about seventy five high number series card.
Speaker 2 (03:46):
Hey, we'll call the minis to high numbers. So in
honor of John Keating who's probably listening to HERB Washington
Mini card.
Speaker 1 (03:53):
Okay, it was a trick question, there was not.
Speaker 2 (03:55):
Yeah, I know That's why I'm playing along with you.
Speaker 1 (03:57):
Okay, I'm excited if Heritage is based on a set
from fifty years ago. Why does this product exist? Heredage?
Why not?
Speaker 2 (04:07):
Look, we were talking about this before Adam came on,
before the show, you know, our mutual friendt Rich Muller,
on one of his Sports Collector Daily articles, said, the
most popular item from the TOPS website last year was
twenty twenty four Tops Heritage. It is what's interesting, it's
a collector based product. And yet one of the topics
(04:29):
we want to talk about is how subtly it seems.
According and I have not been paying enough attention, how
subtly TOPS media is evolving from information about TOPS to
more of a lottery style. Hey, look at this one
grade one of one that got pulled, and so that's
it all ties in together. But yet the most popular
(04:51):
item on the site was a collector based product, and
I find that absolutely fascinating.
Speaker 1 (04:56):
Okay, let's look at the chat here we dead horses
on hobby Hotline. Unfortunately we don't have a horse, much
less a dead or eat Good morning. Heritage connects older
and newer collector, does it? Though?
Speaker 2 (05:16):
It has players and the old people like me? You know,
I get to relive the stuff I dealt with all
those years ago. Bob is absolutely correct.
Speaker 1 (05:25):
H Cooper flag will be then Clark is that men
as a compliment. I don't know, Grab a stick, let's
start beating. Okay, let me trans transition into the one
the topic that I wanted to leave on, and that's
the Paul Schemes card. I know this happened two weeks ago.
(05:48):
We all know the story, kid pulls it on Christmas Day. Okay,
it's sold for. It actually didn't actually sell for one point.
It sold for not The winning bid was nine hundred
and twenty five though, and with the hammer fee it
went up to one point one one. I don't know
(06:08):
about you guys, but I'm kind of happy with who
bought the card. Dick's Sporting Goods, which I don't think
many of us thought was going to buy this. Apparently
they have a new concept for a superstore called the
House of Sport, which you know will have like golf
(06:29):
simulators and climbing walls and almost like a theme park
for adults. And Dix is actually based in the Pittsburgh
and this card is going to be on permanent display
in one of their stores in the Pittsburgh suburb. And
I for one am happy about that. Because it didn't
(06:49):
wind up in the hands of an influencer or some
breaker or some celebrity that's just going to try and
flip it for a cheap buck. To three years from now,
this card is going to be on display in a
store so that people can see it, and that card's
probably never going to be sold ever unless you know, well,
(07:12):
this is the Pirates, so he's probably gonna get created.
Who knows. So what do you guys think about who
bought this card? Dix? Because I don't think that anybody
had that on anybody's radar.
Speaker 3 (07:27):
Well is my connection?
Speaker 1 (07:29):
Okay?
Speaker 3 (07:29):
First of all, I just moved into the new house,
so I'm still working out the internet and everything. You're good, Okay,
I had the same thought as you. I thought I
didn't see it coming, and I thought that was cool
because I kind of had that vision too, like you
were just saying, like I like Dick's boarding goods. I
enjoy going into a Dickboarding good store. And if I
(07:50):
can go in and there's a golf simulator, I can
do a little of that, buy some new whatever, some
new t ball equipment for my kids, and then who knows,
maybe they make like a card section of the of
Dick Sporting Goods moving forward, so I can hit up
a card shop, go to a sporting goods store all
in one, and you get to see awesome cards like that.
I'm just thinking down the road, maybe they expand this
(08:12):
and each location has a card section like a big
almost like a card shop within a Dix, where they
have awesome cards for display and stuff you could buy too.
So I thought it was cool, and I agree with you.
It seems like those cards always land in you know,
someone's lap, or someone buys them, and then you see
it sell over and over and over. I think the
(08:32):
what was one of the last big ones. It's already
sold a couple times since it's sold since it originally sold.
So I thought it was really cool. I'm a fan
of that. I know not everyone likes Dick Sporting Goods
bidding on auctions like that, but I thought it was
cool because you know, I think most of us in
the hobby here aren't in the market for that card anyway,
so it's no skin off our back.
Speaker 1 (08:52):
Darren Ravel actually mentioned on his website, I still don't
know how to pronounce as cult. That pronounced cllc cult,
But anyway, he mentioned that this might be a gateway
for Dix to really get into into cards because and
I was surprised when I read this, but Dick's Sporting
(09:14):
Goods does sell a lot of trading cards, but they're
mostly impulse buys, like a small little box at the register.
They really don't have a card section set up. So
kind of interesting to see. What if this is the
beginning of Dix becoming a large chain of not just
(09:35):
sporting goods stores, but hobby shops as well. Maybe not
card retailer.
Speaker 2 (09:40):
Well, a couple of things. One remember that Otani was
at the card or the ball that home that ends
up in an office like on the fifty seventh floor
in a Tokyo, Japan building, you know where you can
see it. It's a growing trend for corporations to buy
these really high items. I mean, so far it's only two,
(10:02):
but I suspect there will be more of that. You know,
as more and more high end stuff comes into the market,
both old and new, it will be it will be
something that will keep growing. I suspect, And I think
you hit on something that we were talking about even
before Adams shot up and I went on my little monologue.
But again, if Dick's Sporting Goods and all their stores
(10:25):
come up with card sections, or most of them come
up with card sections, you are expanding your audience. And
remember fanatics fanatics mantra includes we want a tenex.
Speaker 1 (10:36):
The hobby.
Speaker 2 (10:37):
Well, you know, not everybody might walk into a hobby store,
but a lot of people who may not be active
card collectors or may not go can go into Dix
and you know, go into a bigger Okay, oh there
are cards here. Okay, I'll get that as part of
my purchase. So again, that's another way to increase the
(10:57):
hobby by not necessarily having people like Mike Petty and
Rex who put us up on their storefront, you know,
on their TVs and their stores, by having another outlet,
as a very successful retail chain outlet to sell their
items in. So it's again good marketing too.
Speaker 1 (11:18):
Yeah, it's a loss leader for Dicks. I mean one,
what's a million dollars to them? They get publicity and
they get an entry into a new business. We shall
see what happens.
Speaker 2 (11:30):
Well, remember in nineteen ninety eight, for those that are
old enough to remember, Todd McFarland basically got his license
to do major league starting figures by being the one
to buy the McGuire seventieth home run book for three
million dollars. That was probably not worth three million today, No,
(11:51):
but it was worth it to him, just like this
may be worth it to dis in terms of getting
the publicity for how act they are in the hobby.
Speaker 1 (12:01):
Let's go through the chat here. We need more schemes.
Wemby the Trumbonitis talk. And that's the hobby of otani
O Tommy. It's on pace to seals zero based. Okay,
I could see a couple. I smell the sarcasm in
that post. Fanatics and Dix already have a relationship. That's
(12:24):
where they shop from the jerseys from no specific game
event or date. Okay, no Dicks around me that can go.
That could be read in hundreds of ways. Aloha better
then than game stop.
Speaker 3 (12:39):
Uh.
Speaker 1 (12:40):
Dix has fourteen and five institutional owners, so that's one
way to ten exit. I did not know that. I
used to buy all my pickleball gear from Dicks, but
they make too much money, so I'll go elsewhere. Uh
cold little news, Catulu news Dollar t Tree has acquired
Angel Reyes. Okay, lots of real funny guys in the
(13:04):
comments like no, I want to transition. Okay, now I'm
not that completely different, Rich, I introduced you as the
uncle those of us in the hobby never had. I
want to focus on something that I think the sister
(13:25):
most of us have never had sues posted on social media.
Everybody knows right, everybody loves sues. She tweeted this that
this was something that caught my eye because I wrote
about it for hobby News Daily a couple of weeks.
This is on the bottom of series one for a
company that doesn't want to represent that cards will quote
(13:47):
unquote attain for future value. It posts a lot of
that about value of card. This is a departure and
the definitive shift in marketing, which is fine, but something
that my brain is trying to reconcile. And I don't
know if this is a case of great minds thinking alike,
(14:08):
but in my most recent post for hobby News Daily,
I actually wrote about how Tops is social media account
and their marketing on social media has changed a lot,
especially over the last couple of months, really the last
year or so. It's more about posting ones of one
(14:30):
that people have pulled ones of one that that are
being put into products, and I think a little more
I don't want to say disturbing, but kind of unsavory.
Is all these posts about how much their cards sell
pH Is this any a good way to market the hobby,
(14:51):
you guys think, Adam, you want to lead us?
Speaker 3 (14:53):
Sure, well, I've been saying this on my channel for
a while now. I think it's fine to do that.
It's fine. I'm okay with there being. You know, ever
since we were kids in the eighties with Beckett magazines,
you know, money has always been a part of it,
but for us it was never like the primary driver.
It was about collecting first and enjoying it, and it
was cool that cards are worth money. But I think
(15:16):
the major companies that really run the hobby now, like Tops, Fanatics, PSA, especially,
like you said, on social media and stuff, I don't
see them highlighting collectors enough. You can do both. It
doesn't have every post on your speed and Instagram doesn't
have to be about one of one's and million dollar
cards and money, money money. You can do a little
(15:38):
collecting too. Here's a guy who put together this set
or I would love to see them do more of that.
It's not like you have a cap on how many
posts you can make on social media? Why not mix
in some of that other stuff too, because I think
it will help them in the long run by promoting
the joy of collecting. And also, hey, these things are
worth money.
Speaker 2 (15:58):
What I find interesting is remember Fanatics is a company,
and we're instance, we're talking about tops, so it's Tops Fanatics.
They are a pro they are a for profit business.
And you know, like Rex talked about the sales in
his store of that TOPS chrome or whatever product that
(16:18):
Skiings card was supposed to be in the day, all
those bounties came out about the Schemes card, including Livvy
Dunn saying, I'll you know, you can be in my
suite for one of the games. And who wouldn't want
to be in a suite with Livvy Dunn. And they
were selling those packs like hotcakes in their store. Tops
(16:40):
understands the root of this hobby nowadays is money. I
agree with you, Adam, you know, I you know, And
I was talking to Chris before you come here. My
old synagogue show was a forty five table show that
was literally a three ring circus. We had, but by
the nature of what we had we had bags of cards.
We gave aware its price, so we had two prize
(17:03):
tables at every show. We have forty five dealer tables.
We you know, it was very accessible. It was a
dollar to get in the door. It was a type
of show that even Michael Rubin would have loved. We
have a new location now it is a smaller facility.
I have twenty one tables. I don't do the bags
of cards. I now still get donations of cards and
(17:24):
I bump them out to local dealer collectors who do
very well with them. And I'm very happy with that.
It's a very good ecosystem. So but and I tell Chris,
if Michael Rubin came to my little show, he'd probably think.
He'd probably shake his head and say, you know, what
type of show is this? Where's all the flash and dash?
Because the world has changed. And I get that what
(17:47):
I'm doing works for what I do. And you know,
my show's Memorial Day weekend, Sunday Monday, it's going to
be what it is. And I understand that, and I
appreciate that. But as a four profit fit business, TOPS
has to and so therefore Fanatics has to do something
to juice up the sales of their tops, now cards
(18:10):
of their of their of their products, and doing some
hype and talking about one of one cards. It makes
sense on a corporate level. And I always tell people
you always have to think about this, this on a
business level, not just on a hobby level. I would
love to go back to the seventies when you've traded
(18:31):
cards and yeah, your Mickey Mantle was worth maybe only
a little more than your geen Stick Michael card. Those
days are done, folks, and it hurts. It's not fun,
I mean, but I still have fun with what I do.
I have my little niche. You have your niche. Chris
has his niche. Chris does Baseball Cyclopedia. He does a
great job with that.
Speaker 1 (18:51):
That's Baseball CARDPDIA.
Speaker 2 (18:54):
Sorry, Baseball Card PDIA. Whatever you do, Chris, but you
know you do a great job with that. It's a
very useful tool we all find how we get by.
And yes, tops can and should feature a little more
of what we do. But as a corporate entity, their
job is to drive sales, and so focusing on one
on ones makes perfect sense. Look my own employer comm
(19:18):
see when I go on their social media, half their
posters are about how people have flipped cards on comm
See for a lot of money. That's perfectly fine. That
is how we draw people to com see again, it's
a corporate thing to do if we don't have to
like it, or we can love it. But either way,
for profit businesses have to think about how to make
(19:40):
for profit.
Speaker 1 (19:41):
Okay, so rich you mentioned earlier about how a local
card shop in your area sold a lot of Tops
Chrome Update to people with the hopes of pulling a
Schemes card. Right, We've drawn in a lot of new
collectors over the last couple years. And this is what
(20:02):
I'm afraid of with this, the chase for all these
ones of one that realistically most people are never going
to be able to pull, and you wind up with
these We're gonna wind up with a lot of these
folks that have come into the hobby hoping, hoping to
make a buck, let's be honest, that really aren't interest
(20:24):
collective and they spend a lot of money on Top's
Chrome Update packs. They don't appreciate the cards that they pull,
and then they wonder why they can't get more than
fifty percent for buyback for the cards that they pull.
And that's going to lead to like a lot of
folks that, because they're getting burned in the pursuit of
(20:47):
this chase, that are going to leave the hobby with
a lot of bad feelings. And I don't think, and
I've said this before, this is not how you ten
x the hobby. You don't ten x the hobby by
making people feel like they've been had or making people
feel like chumps.
Speaker 2 (21:06):
I respectfully disagree because the world is becoming a lottery
type system and everybody has that dream. Not everybody, but
a lot of us who are who by packs. Maybe
not the people watching this program, but a lot of
people who buy packs have the dream. Today's the day
I win the lottery. Today's the day I get the
(21:26):
big hit. Today's the days it's Yes, we never do.
It is not perfect, but it is a fact of life,
hype cells, and whether we like it or not, we
have to understand that.
Speaker 1 (21:38):
You know, I.
Speaker 2 (21:39):
You know, as we talk all the time on Doctor
Beckett's podcast, he I and a few other people, we
have a cadretive people that we basically all go to
the same value boxes as the Dallas Card Show. And
basically our point is we can't lose when we go
through the dollar boxes or the quarterboxes. We have understanding
(22:00):
what we're doing, so we're not trying to win big.
We understand we can't lose. Other people are trying to
win big, but they understand they can lose. And if
you know, and that becomes and that is a hard lesson.
And it's not the way the hobby was even ten
years ago, but it is what it is today. And
we have to understand that the world changes.
Speaker 1 (22:21):
But this hobby is not going to be sustainable if
all we're producing isn't collector but lottery ticket players. You
know that.
Speaker 2 (22:29):
But not everybody is a lottery ticket player. And if
you get a certain percent, a.
Speaker 1 (22:32):
Lot of these guys that have come into the hobby are.
Speaker 2 (22:35):
Well, you know, Chris, not everybody. I go to the
shows and the shows are packed. I mean, tell me
why the shows are so packed with people? I mean,
and you know, and then how many boosts do you
see people saying, I'm buying these cards at eighty ninety
one hundred, one hundred and ten percent. All these people
are buying cards, there's something positive going on.
Speaker 1 (22:55):
Well to me, when I go to a card show,
one of the busiest tables is the guy with the
banner that says buying paying sixty five percent comp and
all the desperate collectors that are looking to cash in.
You know, that's just what I see.
Speaker 3 (23:15):
I see both ends of it, you know. I side
more with Chris on the fact that if Fanatics wants
it to just boom for a short period of time,
further and the current trajectory may do that. But you know,
they have how long of a license? Do they have?
Twenty years? Something like that? I think, I mean, if
they if they really wanted to sustain I think they
(23:37):
do have to mix in a little bit of it.
It doesn't mean it has to be either or, but
they have to mix in a little bit of the collecting,
which I don't think the ship has sailed on that.
I think. You know, Rich my favorite podcast that I
ever listened to her when you go on Doctor Beckett's podcast,
and when you guys talk about the good old days
the past, or even how you interact at card shows
(23:58):
now with the dollar boxes, I find myself, you know,
thinking I like that, I want to do that. I
want to go in those dollar boxes. And I think,
you know, just because things are a certain way right now,
it doesn't mean there can't be some more of that.
You can influence younger collectors, especially the smart ones who
look who look to people who have a lot of
experience in the hobby and see what they do. Uh.
(24:20):
There there are those people, and I think there'll be
more and more of those, especially, you know, I think
some of the things going on now are gonna burn up.
They're not they're not sustainable parts of the hobby, you know,
with repacks and reselling and reselling, and eventually that's not
gonna that's not gonna last. I don't think in that
form unless they reinvent it somehow in some other way.
But I think if they want to think long term,
(24:42):
which any smart business does along with short term, uh,
they gotta they gotta focus a little more on collecting
and less on one of ones. And I like one
of ones. I have some, but I also have you know,
cards from when I was a kid and stuff like that.
So it's just I consider my help more of a
moderate with things, you know. I try to find the
happy medium. But the hobby seems like it's swung way
(25:06):
one way right now.
Speaker 2 (25:09):
And frankly, when hobby swing, anything swings too far in
one direction. Usually there's a counter balance. So that's why
I'm not panicking about this. That's why I say we
understand where we are. We also have to understand, you know,
this is why I always stress for profit business. Their
goal is to make money. They've invested a lot of
(25:31):
money in this. They've invested a lot of money in
getting athletes to sign. They've invested a lot of money
into making the cards. They've invested a lot of money
into buying the printing presses. They've invested a lot of
money all over the place. They have to get that
money back. It is again, business is business, and it's
(25:52):
you know when you know, I'm I'm probably as old
as you as Chris combined, and so.
Speaker 1 (25:58):
Don't be so sure about that.
Speaker 2 (25:59):
I know the two of you combined, her a little
bit older than me. That's okay. But you know, I
understand that things evolve and they don't always evolve the
way we want them to evolve. And that's one of
the saddest things in life. I look, I grew up
on sixties and seventies pop music. I like the eighties.
There were some good songs in the nineties. I can't
(26:21):
listen to pop music today that music is something foreign
to my ears. And yet there are some good pop songs,
but I don't relate to any of them, and I understand.
I understand that. And yet every once in a while,
I'm forced to listen. If I'm in my wife's car,
I either listen to when she's playing current country or
current pop, and so I hear that thing. And yet
(26:43):
I heard a song from two thousand and a country
song from two thousand and two the other day when
I was in her car, and there was a line
about baseball cards in the car. And it's a Mark
Liol song from two thousand and two, nineteen something where
he talked about what it was growing up and the
video shows kids growing up in the seventies and eighties.
Those days are done. We're we're in twenty twenty five now.
(27:06):
It is a different world than nineteen seventy five. And yes,
Chris is right. There were no Heritage high number packs
in seventy five, but there were seventy five cards, and
there'll be seventy six cards and you know, we'll get
seventy six heritage soon enough, and we'll enjoy seeing the
bi centennial, you know, relived again and it's okay. It's
something that attracts old and new, as Bob Boozl says,
(27:28):
and we like that. We need to focus both on
yesterday and today. And today it's becoming a different world,
and we focus on that. Tomorrow it might be a
different world again, and we'll focus on that. We may
not like it, but it is what it is.
Speaker 1 (27:42):
Yeah. I don't know if you saw this, but the
checklist for twenty twenty five Heritage came out yesterday and
it's a little interesting. Well, we'll discuss later, but I
want to get into some of the chat here. I
know a guy in Jersey named Tony Bag of Cards,
and I know him too, you know, always meete him
(28:02):
underneath the Pulaski Skyway. He's got some Mooky.
Speaker 2 (28:06):
Goes to a show I love. By the way, Mooky
goes to the Garfield Card Show. And the Garfield Car
Show is run by my good friend Gary and it's
truly an old school show and he runs it as
an old school show. He runs it as a charity
show for the Boys and Girls Club of Garfield, New Jersey.
Speaker 1 (28:24):
It runs for.
Speaker 2 (28:24):
Five hours a couple Sundays a month, and it's a
kick butt show. There's a lot of business done on
that show, and there's even a group of collectors and
they have their they bring Dunkin Donuts coffee with them
and they have a coffee clatch. You know, that's the
one where I really still want to go to again
and join the clatches. I still know most of the
people in the clatch.
Speaker 1 (28:44):
I've been to that show maybe a couple of times.
And if I weren't, if it wasn't like a three
and a half hour drive to get there from where
I'm at, I'd be there every fifth Sunday too. We
got to shut out for your little show, Rich Thank you.
Speaker 2 (29:00):
Yeah. Fun, it's a fun little show. It is what
it is. I and I almost hand select the dealers
because I know my audience.
Speaker 1 (29:09):
Great take for Adam Hope, the powers of be serious,
considerate market to both but also collector. Okay, most collectors
were not out to get rich from their card collection
than COVID prices were in the moon. And people are
still have their heads in the clouds. I mean, I
see so many kids trying to offload their cards and
(29:31):
they're learning the hard way. What a lot of people
in my generation learn the hard way back in the
late eighties and early nineties. Your cards are not really
worth as much as you thought they were. So I
collect for the love of collecting. If my cards go up, yeah,
I think that's what most folks. Most folks are I
(29:55):
only collect Wander Franco. Okay, let me guess you also
collect uh Luis Polonia and uh Mel Hall and uh
who was that other pedo who played for.
Speaker 2 (30:08):
These Hall still in the Texas Jale by the.
Speaker 1 (30:10):
Way, Yeah, okay, Uh to go with my Andrew Luck collection?
All right, just let the Syracuse Collector's con was blown
away by the gender divers versus the card show balance
in the same venue. Seems like a lot more room
for improvement. Yeah, I mean, the hobby is a bit
of a sausage festival. You can't tex the amount of
(30:33):
people in the hobby, but you can text the money.
That's and that's what I've I've always when Michael Rubin
said he wanted to ten x the hobby, I really
didn't understand what what he was tenexing. What is he
is he tenexing the number of people or the hexing
the money? I still haven't quite figured that out yet.
Speaker 2 (30:55):
Uh.
Speaker 1 (30:56):
Let's see here looking to win the door prize at Garth.
Still have never won a door prize. Give it a
few more decades, you might win once. Buy and large
people who play the lottery at the lower end of
the income curve. True, is it the same for those
ripping ultra modern chasing the big hit? Well, if you're poor,
(31:20):
you're probably not chasing ultra modern buying ultra modern chasing.
That it, but it kind of is like the lottery
for upper middle income folks. But the hobbies, I don't know.
Let's see what else. Dollar box does not smell of
desperation like other vendor areas there are. Well, I'll just
(31:44):
leave that thought myself. I get a lot of people
looking at my ten cent boxes. Okay, the boom is
head and needed for a Fanatics ipo, but I am
blown away how easy it is to move bulk on
Facebook marketplace versus single Okay, I want to hunt for
exhibits in your ten cent box. You could probably find
(32:07):
some of those two thousand and four leaf exhibits in
a ten cent box. I never understood that that inserts
that that's a deep album cut. For those that know
Uncle Rich Wants is Herman's Hermit's back. I only listen
to petty. Nothing wrong with some petty every once in
a while. And you don't have to live like a refugee.
(32:28):
And here come the petty references now running down a
cargo dream.
Speaker 2 (32:33):
So you won't calling this conversation.
Speaker 1 (32:36):
Learning to buy because I'm short on cash. Okay, that's
a repeat. Did the big boy arrive yet? I don't
know what that played.
Speaker 3 (32:46):
Mike, Mike Petty won a big Honus Wagner card in
that recent auction.
Speaker 1 (32:52):
Oh, Tom Petty, Okay, yeah, Steve Jelts, Okay, let's just
move on from this great chat.
Speaker 3 (33:05):
Great some legends in the chat.
Speaker 2 (33:07):
They're all legends. The chat's better than us.
Speaker 1 (33:10):
So later on tonight, in the lovely burg of Fort Lauderdale, Florida,
the greatest soccer team in the world, first place in
the NLS, your Philadelphia Union will be taking on Inter
Miami in Fort Lauderdale. Whatever it's supposed to be temporary,
(33:32):
they've been there for five years and uh inner Miami
of course has one big name well, they have a
lot of big name stars, but probably the biggest superstar
in all of professional sports right now. Of course, I'm
talking about Florida Man, Florida man Leonel Messi, who like
(33:52):
Florida Man, might not be showing up for work tonight
because he got injured. He didn't show up for work
in his for Argentina and the World Cup qualifiers this
week they had. Argentina had no trouble beating Brazil four
to one. But there was a story that rich that
you brought on, that you brought to my attention. It's
(34:15):
behind a paywall, it's the athletic but let me see them.
Get it up here share screen. Can you see that
Lionel Messi who's signing his autographs? And yeah, it's behind
a paywall, so yeah, but this leads me to wonder,
(34:35):
with so many with the trading card company demanding so
many autographs from these guys, how on earth can these
guys possibly sign all these cards? And how do we
know that they're really authentic? Because you remember a couple
of years ago, Dak Prescott got busted for using an
auto pen and now Leonnel Messi's probably may or may
(34:59):
not be signing is on autographs. How do we really
know that the trading card companies are really getting these
guys to sign these autographs? Do what do you guys think.
Speaker 2 (35:12):
I there's a couple of things I want to say. One,
if from what I was able to get through the
article before the paywall hit, PSA are the people that
looked and said this was not an autograph of Leonel Messi,
So kudos. If PSA is right, they are protecting their brand.
And you know, I can and I and I'll teasingly
say I can speak from experience about that because I
(35:36):
have my own TOPS card from way back in the
day and I signed most of them, and PSA had
no exemplars, so they turned down my friend's card. Uh,
JSA and C and CGC have exemplars, so they'll accept it.
That's a different story for a different day. But on
a corporate level, PSA, and I'll use me as an example,
if they're uncomfortable PSA, DNA is uncomfortable with an autograph,
(35:59):
they want to protect their corporate brand and say we're
not just going to accept this card. We have to
be sure. And so especially on the highest level autographs,
I think it instead of just sending a player a
card or whatever, I think TOPS really does have to
go back to the old school days of we witness
you know, at a certain autograph level, we witness the signatures. Now,
(36:23):
there were some problems obviously during COVID where you did
not want to go and travel and witness things in person.
But I think now you go and you witness in person,
and I think that's a good corporate thing to do.
Just say, you know, if you're on the level of
Lebron James, if you're on the Lionel Messi level, if
you're on that level, we'll spend whatever it takes to
(36:46):
get the autographs authenticated in person, in front of in
front of a rep.
Speaker 3 (36:51):
Do you know how has the card company has ever
done it where they, you know, video the person signing
the cards.
Speaker 1 (36:58):
And then I.
Speaker 3 (36:59):
Mean, couldn't they do something like that where they if
you know, Messi has you're going to sign would would they?
Would the players be not for that? You think would
every problems with that? If they just create a video
and let's say a card had a little QR code
on the back, you scan it, boom, it pulls up
the video of him signing that card.
Speaker 2 (37:18):
The problem with that if you're signing in a person's house,
as you saw pop up a few months ago, is
the targeted robberies of these people's houses. So if they
are signing at a top's office or a public place,
that's fine. If they want to sign at their home,
that can be as we saw, as I said, and
(37:40):
some of that was the player's own I don't say fault,
but own responsibility for filming stuff, you know, within their
own houses. But as we saw, that can be a
issue for the players safe. And we certainly don't want
the players not to be safe. But if you like,
you know in Dallas, and let's let's pick Cory Seger.
(38:01):
You know he's not at that level, but let's pick
Corey Seeger as an example, or or Luka Doncik before
he got traded, or Dirk Novitski or Dak or whatever.
You get them to Jerry Jones, to the Star in Frisco,
you know, if it's the Cowboys, or somewhere in Arlington,
if it's the Rangers, or downtown Dallas, if it's a
(38:21):
Maverick or Dallas Star or some other player who lives
in the area. You get them to a public place
and you have them signed publicly. That is fine to
do the video, but as I pointed out, the problem
with doing the video at the person's house has popped
up on high profile robberies, and we certainly don't want
people getting robbed, and that's becoming a legitimate issue. So
(38:44):
you're it's a great theory, but again, it's going to
be the implement implementation to make it work.
Speaker 1 (38:51):
Now from what I understand, at least in the NFL,
and I think this is negotiated as part of the
nfl PA license players during the season only have there's
certain windows during the season when players can sign for
trading card comes and that's usually once during training camp
(39:12):
and once during their bye week, and then I also
during the rookie and during the rookie But for for
veteran players I'm talking about, let's look back in the chat.
I want a Mike Petty signed check.
Speaker 2 (39:28):
Okay, I'll take a Mike Petty sign check too. You
know that's fine.
Speaker 1 (39:33):
You know I want an Al Bundy sign check. Super rare.
You did score four touchdowns for Polkis Mike Baker n
b A might be authentic. Okay. I had to submit
my Marris family Rogers in your sign index card three
(39:53):
times before they had an exemplar Yeah, I mean you
figure there's some autogo some guys that either died young
or who just didn't died before signing became a thing.
How do you authenticate those? Like some guy had at
a card show a couple of years ago had an
(40:14):
autographed Lineman Bostock baseball. Rich probably knows who Linman Bostock was.
He was a player for the Twins who got murdered
I think in seventy eight when he was three years in.
How do you authenticate that game? You judge rapped? Okay,
(40:36):
what if I'm just dead on the inside? Does that count?
I think we all have those existential crises every once
in a while.
Speaker 2 (40:43):
So well, you are in your mid life, so you.
Speaker 1 (40:46):
Know, let's see, we got about fifteen twelve fifteen minutes.
You want to talk about heritage and this Celebration series
one thing that came out with you down for that
or yeah?
Speaker 2 (41:03):
I mean, honestly, I did not even know Celebration was
out there until I saw some photos. It looks like
a fun set.
Speaker 1 (41:10):
Actually, I'm trying to figure out what it is, because
when I first saw the first photos of what this
product might be about a month ago, I thought, oh,
they're just bringing Opening Day back, you know, mascot inserts,
kitty inserts. And I mentioned this like a couple of
(41:31):
weeks ago. I kind of the more I've discovered about
this product, the more I feel like, you know, the
end of a Scooby Doo episode where the gang catches
the bad guy and they ripped the mask off of
the bad guy and it's someone completely different, and they
would have gotten away with it if it weren't for
(41:53):
those meddling kids. The more the more of this Series
one cell aberration I found out about, all it is
is just a rehash of Series one with just new inserts.
I mean, what's the point of this?
Speaker 3 (42:11):
Yeah, I just think there's there's too many products. You know,
I know we've probably been saying that for a long
time now. But yeah, it's not.
Speaker 1 (42:19):
Too many products. It's the exact same products they released
a month ago, just with new inserts.
Speaker 3 (42:26):
I mean, heritage is great. I love heritage. I don't
I don't know. Yeah, I don't understand the need for
to make it more confusing.
Speaker 5 (42:34):
I got enough to remember, well, the price point is okay,
and you know, and and if it's and if it's
designed to get what and I want to use the
word kids or younger people or people who like fun designs.
Speaker 2 (42:46):
It's it looks like from the I just looked quickly,
it looks like a product where they're trying to be
flashy and fun. And if you're going to be flashy
and fun and the price point's okay, it's not the
biggest deal. It's not the biggest deal in the world.
And then do it for series two. Again, you were
complaining earlier about let's say price points and lottery things.
(43:08):
Tell me what the lottery is in Series one celebration.
Speaker 1 (43:11):
Okay, there's at least two or three inserts that are
like one in three hundred and one in six hundred
pack hits.
Speaker 2 (43:19):
Okay, But are they are they hyping the those are
they just?
Speaker 1 (43:22):
Yes, they are?
Speaker 2 (43:23):
Okay, that's fine again, but it's also when you open
the pack you say, oh, they're look at all these
cool cards. Again, I'm okay with.
Speaker 1 (43:31):
This, but you've already bought these cards last month. I mean,
this isn't like right, This isn't like Opening Day back
in the day, where yeah, the cards look like Series one,
but they had that logo on it that said opening Day,
so it's a little different. It's literally the same three
hundred and fifty card Series one base set, and a
(43:52):
lot of the inserts from Series one are also in
these packs. So it's not just the inserts are different.
They've added more in inserts. They've added the mascots walk
this way, which I think is like the one in
six hundred pack. I don't it's funny. Look at I'm
(44:12):
looking on your website. That's a really cool card, by
the way, but walk this way if you could find them, Okay.
Speaker 2 (44:18):
But it's still really cool. It's still a really cool card.
Speaker 1 (44:20):
Yeah, if again you could find them. Let's see, let's
go back to the Uh. Boss Stok is a bit
of a legend up here. Uh celebration is that the
cool in the gang swatches an auto?
Speaker 2 (44:36):
That'sbration.
Speaker 1 (44:39):
I remember when we ripped off the cardboard box of Uncle.
Oh somebody's somebody stole something from your rich and now
they're in your.
Speaker 2 (44:49):
Face, Mookie, we forgive you.
Speaker 1 (44:52):
The green mascot autograph is a real thing. Well here's
the thing. I don't know if you knew this or not,
but they've had wall the green Mosster mascot autographs an
opening day the last couple of years. It was around
not that big of a deal.
Speaker 2 (45:10):
I want to go back. I want to go back
to something because okay, Mookie talks about we've talked about
the Garfield card show. Well, I had two friends no
longer living that had a nice little neighborhood store in
the nineteen eighties in Garfield, New Jersey, Henry Davis and
Hans ju Belt, and it was h and H hobbies
and people. I remember in eighty five they had eighty
(45:31):
five tops packs at fifty cents each. And if you
didn't pull the Mattingly or the good in or the
really hot Clemmens or at the time Eric Davis, you
left your cards on the counter. Well, I can't tell
you how many Mark McGuire rookies they ended up without
of all that. So for people who are complaining, it's yes,
the stakes are hired today. But for people who were
complaining about the hobby and how is a lottery, folks,
(45:54):
it was a lottery in nineteen eighty five. It was
just that the stakes were a lot cheaper. You know,
fifty cents is not hundreds of dollars a box. But
the general principle has not changed in forty years. It's
just the affordability has changed for a lot of people.
But it's the same principle. And if celebration gets people in,
and if they I don't think people are really gonna
(46:16):
go chasing Walk This Way cards. By the way, that's
a good Airsmith song. I don't think they're really gonna
chase that card, and it's okay. But if they do
get it, they know it's a good hit, and I'm
okay with this. This does not seem to be focused
on one hundred dollars things. I look the megaboxes forty
nine ninety five on the tops website. This is a
perfectly reasonable price point. So let's understand, what's you know
(46:40):
for kids? So the packs are three or four dollars each.
When I go to Triple today, I have to buy some.
I actually have to buy some five thousand cop boxes
to work through the donation they gave me. And so
I'll buy a pack because it'll be fun, because the
cards look like they're fun, the insert will be fun,
and that's really all that matters, all right. Maybe the
kids can't even afford fifty dollars. Most of the kids
(47:02):
I know today can't afford fifty dollars well, but they
can afford three dollars for a pack.
Speaker 1 (47:07):
So Walk this Way is forty cards deep and it
is a one in three hundred and twenty pack. Hits
good luck trying to We're not.
Speaker 2 (47:19):
Going to finish that set.
Speaker 1 (47:19):
We get that.
Speaker 2 (47:21):
No, and if somebody does, let Top celebrate the fact
that somebody finish the set.
Speaker 1 (47:25):
All right? Ummm, There's something I wanted to say but
I forgot. Let's see if Celebration has Grimace autos. I'm
a buyer now, Sorry, Mets fans, no Grimmats autos. My
wife can't stop drooling over the Bryce Harper game. Drake
drip card that makes me sick, Grimace patch autos, sesame
(47:50):
seed and you know, don't give Tops any I ideas.
There are already too many parallels. Okay, uh, stay puffed,
marshmallow Man from Goal Goes. I love to attend the
Garfield Show. It's three thousand miles away. Otherwise sounds you would.
Speaker 2 (48:09):
You would love it? Seriously? Would you would love that show?
Speaker 3 (48:13):
Chris? I have a question for you, if that's all right?
Speaker 1 (48:15):
Sure.
Speaker 3 (48:16):
First of all, I love Baseball Cardpedia and using it
for years. Can't thank you enough for creating one of
the greatest resources ever, free resources. As someone who collects
nineties cards, I mean when I went down that rabbit hole,
I couldn't have I couldn't have done it without baseball carpias.
So I want to thank you for that, But question
why have they not created or somebody? I know you
(48:39):
got enough on your hands with baseball. Is there ever
going to be a football card or basketball Cardpedia?
Speaker 1 (48:44):
There was a hockey card Pedia and that lasted about
thirty minutes. If somebody wants to create it, somebody has
a database full of we'd be glad to host it.
I don't collect other sports.
Speaker 3 (48:58):
So because I collect all three major well I guess
it's four major sports, sorry hockey. But for my football
in basketball collecting, I'm always I have the same questions
I have that Baseball card Pedia answered for me, and
sometimes it can cross over. But sometimes I'm trying to
figure out and I'm like, man, I wish there was
a football card Pedia or basketball card because it's just awesome.
Speaker 1 (49:18):
Yeah, just just one sport is enough for me because
I don't want to humble brag, but ninety and ninety
five percent of that is me.
Speaker 3 (49:28):
So whenever I'm looking at something in there I'm thinking, Man,
how much time must have this taken to put all
this in there. It's just amazing.
Speaker 1 (49:36):
That's baseballcardpedia dot com for all your baseball reference needs.
Speaker 3 (49:41):
Fantastic.
Speaker 1 (49:43):
Got a few minutes left. I don't know if you
guys noticed this, but on Friday the checklist for twenty
twenty five herod it dropped and I know Ryan Kracknell
at Beckett posted it. Did any of you guys say it?
Because there are some differences, just not the differences that
(50:04):
I think most of us wanted.
Speaker 2 (50:09):
Look at Itsel if you can provide details.
Speaker 1 (50:12):
So the base set's still five hundred cards with one
hundred shot prints. Y, there's still gimmicks galore, although there
are new gimmicks this year. I think one of them
is you know how in seventy six they have that
little player icon in the corner. That's one of them,
a different player icon, but uh, you're still gonna get
(50:36):
one relic or an autograph in a box. But the
inserts are different. And I think they're going all in
with the bi centennial theme with this because there's a
one hundred card insert set dedicated I think to the
greatest Americans, which seems to me like it would be
(50:57):
more appropriate and something you would see in Ginter. So
I don't know how that would work. But all of
the other inserts that have been longtime staples of Heritage,
like New Age Performers then and now they're gone and
replaced with other ones. So I think TOPS realize that
(51:21):
Heritage needed a bit of an overhaul after twenty five years.
I just think that they have the overhaul in the
wrong place. And again, we we really don't know much
else other than the base checklist. We don't know anything
about parallels. We do know that the whole set, all
five hundred cards will chrome instead of just the one
(51:45):
and fifty cards, and it's normally weel see.
Speaker 2 (51:49):
A lot of Heritage cards were chrome. And what the
print run is going to be interesting because the originally
they printed the print run of the chromes to like
nineteen fifty two, So I'm going to be curious what
the print run on the chromes are.
Speaker 1 (52:02):
I think maybe about six or seven years ago they
lowered that to nine ninety nine, and then for the
Heritage High Number set that just came out in twenty
twenty five, it's it's down to six ninety So I
don't know. Maybe it'll be to like seven sixty or
something because it's seventy six tops. I don't know. So anyway,
(52:28):
you guys have anything else you want to mention? Plug,
we're well past an hour now.
Speaker 2 (52:34):
Just just keep rocking in the Chris, just take us
home with playing Rocking in the Free World, and we're
good to go, all right, Adam anything.
Speaker 3 (52:42):
No, guys, it was an honor being with you. I've
been watching you guys for a long time, so it
was pleasure talking cards with you.
Speaker 1 (52:49):
Same here. I guess that's it, so I'll say the catchphrase,
keep rocking in the Free World and stay hydrated, folks.
Oh and you call it in Chantilli. Next week play
the video come on, yeh,
M hm.
Speaker 2 (00:33):
I'm sorry, you're already rocking in the free world, so keep.
Speaker 1 (00:36):
At it anyway. This is a Hobby Hotline episode three
three eight. It is Saturday, March twenty ninth, twenty twenty five,
and I can't believe they let me run this again.
For those of you listening out there in podcast, I'm
Chris Harris from Still Gum and Baseball Kripedia. I'm joined
(01:00):
by the uncle. We all wish we had Rich Klin.
Speaker 2 (01:05):
And it was funny speaking to the uncle. We all
wish we had my great nephew and his uncle who's
his age, And I'll explain that some other time. They
came over to our house to do so. And then
they and my great nephew's mom came over. My niece
came over to the house to do some work. We
(01:26):
could go saturdays, and they went and I don't have
a lot of cards, but went digging in the closet,
and so of course Uncle Rich said, yeah, take the cards.
So yes, I am the uncle everybody wants you had
to go take if you related to me, you could
take my cards. But what was amazing is that I
had ticked up at the trade night at one of
my local Triple Cards stores, and the Triple Card empire
(01:49):
is growing if you follow them on social media. They
announced between Triple Cards Waxed and some of the other
stores they're affiliated, and then some new ventures coming up.
But the one that really struck me was the one
in Singapore. Yes, Singapore, Singapore, Singapore. It's like, okay, now
this is one okay, uh, let me give up my job,
let me move to Singapore and I'll manage that store,
(02:11):
just just for the experience of getting out of this country.
But the point is they are, you know, they are expanding.
And when I was at their last trade night that
they're well out at their raw Lette store, and I
picked up this Dell Crandle PSA four fifty three tops card. Well,
the kid knew what PSA was and it's a nice
(02:32):
looking card, and he was so enthralled. He says, that's
what I want and I and I said, fine, you
can have you know, you can have it. It's like okay.
So it ended up in the exact hands of somebody
should have been with, just in a very circuitous way.
But and I see that Adam has joined us, so
good good morning, Adam.
Speaker 3 (02:49):
Hey guys, Sorry about that.
Speaker 4 (02:51):
That's all right, a third wheel, yes, otherwise we'd be
calling for help desperately. Say, you know, Chris and I
can discuss whether Top should doing Heritage for an hour
and what they should do with TOPS base. But you
know we've done that conversation before we can do it.
Speaker 1 (03:06):
It's been beaten to death like a dead horse. Can
we can beat it some more if we got some time?
Speaker 2 (03:13):
Hey, Heritage High Number came out this week, so I'm excited.
Speaker 1 (03:16):
Why is it coming out now?
Speaker 2 (03:18):
Because they probably didn't realize our friend fall Rich Muller.
Speaker 1 (03:24):
Question, Adam, maybe you can you can answer this? What's
your favorite seventy five Tops High Number series card? Hey?
Speaker 2 (03:35):
I love them off, but they were fifty you know
there were also seventy three high number series and there
was only some parts of the country seven.
Speaker 1 (03:42):
Now I'm just talking about seventy five high number series card.
Speaker 2 (03:46):
Hey, we'll call the minis to high numbers. So in
honor of John Keating who's probably listening to HERB Washington
Mini card.
Speaker 1 (03:53):
Okay, it was a trick question, there was not.
Speaker 2 (03:55):
Yeah, I know That's why I'm playing along with you.
Speaker 1 (03:57):
Okay, I'm excited if Heritage is based on a set
from fifty years ago. Why does this product exist? Heredage?
Why not?
Speaker 2 (04:07):
Look, we were talking about this before Adam came on,
before the show, you know, our mutual friendt Rich Muller,
on one of his Sports Collector Daily articles, said, the
most popular item from the TOPS website last year was
twenty twenty four Tops Heritage. It is what's interesting, it's
a collector based product. And yet one of the topics
(04:29):
we want to talk about is how subtly it seems.
According and I have not been paying enough attention, how
subtly TOPS media is evolving from information about TOPS to
more of a lottery style. Hey, look at this one
grade one of one that got pulled, and so that's
it all ties in together. But yet the most popular
(04:51):
item on the site was a collector based product, and
I find that absolutely fascinating.
Speaker 1 (04:56):
Okay, let's look at the chat here we dead horses
on hobby Hotline. Unfortunately we don't have a horse, much
less a dead or eat Good morning. Heritage connects older
and newer collector, does it? Though?
Speaker 2 (05:16):
It has players and the old people like me? You know,
I get to relive the stuff I dealt with all
those years ago. Bob is absolutely correct.
Speaker 1 (05:25):
H Cooper flag will be then Clark is that men
as a compliment. I don't know, Grab a stick, let's
start beating. Okay, let me trans transition into the one
the topic that I wanted to leave on, and that's
the Paul Schemes card. I know this happened two weeks ago.
(05:48):
We all know the story, kid pulls it on Christmas Day. Okay,
it's sold for. It actually didn't actually sell for one point.
It sold for not The winning bid was nine hundred
and twenty five though, and with the hammer fee it
went up to one point one one. I don't know
(06:08):
about you guys, but I'm kind of happy with who
bought the card. Dick's Sporting Goods, which I don't think
many of us thought was going to buy this. Apparently
they have a new concept for a superstore called the
House of Sport, which you know will have like golf
(06:29):
simulators and climbing walls and almost like a theme park
for adults. And Dix is actually based in the Pittsburgh
and this card is going to be on permanent display
in one of their stores in the Pittsburgh suburb. And
I for one am happy about that. Because it didn't
(06:49):
wind up in the hands of an influencer or some
breaker or some celebrity that's just going to try and
flip it for a cheap buck. To three years from now,
this card is going to be on display in a
store so that people can see it, and that card's
probably never going to be sold ever unless you know, well,
(07:12):
this is the Pirates, so he's probably gonna get created.
Who knows. So what do you guys think about who
bought this card? Dix? Because I don't think that anybody
had that on anybody's radar.
Speaker 3 (07:27):
Well is my connection?
Speaker 1 (07:29):
Okay?
Speaker 3 (07:29):
First of all, I just moved into the new house,
so I'm still working out the internet and everything. You're good, Okay,
I had the same thought as you. I thought I
didn't see it coming, and I thought that was cool
because I kind of had that vision too, like you
were just saying, like I like Dick's boarding goods. I
enjoy going into a Dickboarding good store. And if I
(07:50):
can go in and there's a golf simulator, I can
do a little of that, buy some new whatever, some
new t ball equipment for my kids, and then who knows,
maybe they make like a card section of the of
Dick Sporting Goods moving forward, so I can hit up
a card shop, go to a sporting goods store all
in one, and you get to see awesome cards like that.
I'm just thinking down the road, maybe they expand this
(08:12):
and each location has a card section like a big
almost like a card shop within a Dix, where they
have awesome cards for display and stuff you could buy too.
So I thought it was cool, and I agree with you.
It seems like those cards always land in you know,
someone's lap, or someone buys them, and then you see
it sell over and over and over. I think the
(08:32):
what was one of the last big ones. It's already
sold a couple times since it's sold since it originally sold.
So I thought it was really cool. I'm a fan
of that. I know not everyone likes Dick Sporting Goods
bidding on auctions like that, but I thought it was
cool because you know, I think most of us in
the hobby here aren't in the market for that card anyway,
so it's no skin off our back.
Speaker 1 (08:52):
Darren Ravel actually mentioned on his website, I still don't
know how to pronounce as cult. That pronounced cllc cult,
But anyway, he mentioned that this might be a gateway
for Dix to really get into into cards because and
I was surprised when I read this, but Dick's Sporting
(09:14):
Goods does sell a lot of trading cards, but they're
mostly impulse buys, like a small little box at the register.
They really don't have a card section set up. So
kind of interesting to see. What if this is the
beginning of Dix becoming a large chain of not just
(09:35):
sporting goods stores, but hobby shops as well. Maybe not
card retailer.
Speaker 2 (09:40):
Well, a couple of things. One remember that Otani was
at the card or the ball that home that ends
up in an office like on the fifty seventh floor
in a Tokyo, Japan building, you know where you can
see it. It's a growing trend for corporations to buy
these really high items. I mean, so far it's only two,
(10:02):
but I suspect there will be more of that. You know,
as more and more high end stuff comes into the market,
both old and new, it will be it will be
something that will keep growing. I suspect, And I think
you hit on something that we were talking about even
before Adams shot up and I went on my little monologue.
But again, if Dick's Sporting Goods and all their stores
(10:25):
come up with card sections, or most of them come
up with card sections, you are expanding your audience. And
remember fanatics fanatics mantra includes we want a tenex.
Speaker 1 (10:36):
The hobby.
Speaker 2 (10:37):
Well, you know, not everybody might walk into a hobby store,
but a lot of people who may not be active
card collectors or may not go can go into Dix
and you know, go into a bigger Okay, oh there
are cards here. Okay, I'll get that as part of
my purchase. So again, that's another way to increase the
(10:57):
hobby by not necessarily having people like Mike Petty and
Rex who put us up on their storefront, you know,
on their TVs and their stores, by having another outlet,
as a very successful retail chain outlet to sell their
items in. So it's again good marketing too.
Speaker 1 (11:18):
Yeah, it's a loss leader for Dicks. I mean one,
what's a million dollars to them? They get publicity and
they get an entry into a new business. We shall
see what happens.
Speaker 2 (11:30):
Well, remember in nineteen ninety eight, for those that are
old enough to remember, Todd McFarland basically got his license
to do major league starting figures by being the one
to buy the McGuire seventieth home run book for three
million dollars. That was probably not worth three million today, No,
(11:51):
but it was worth it to him, just like this
may be worth it to dis in terms of getting
the publicity for how act they are in the hobby.
Speaker 1 (12:01):
Let's go through the chat here. We need more schemes.
Wemby the Trumbonitis talk. And that's the hobby of otani
O Tommy. It's on pace to seals zero based. Okay,
I could see a couple. I smell the sarcasm in
that post. Fanatics and Dix already have a relationship. That's
(12:24):
where they shop from the jerseys from no specific game
event or date. Okay, no Dicks around me that can go.
That could be read in hundreds of ways. Aloha better
then than game stop.
Speaker 3 (12:39):
Uh.
Speaker 1 (12:40):
Dix has fourteen and five institutional owners, so that's one
way to ten exit. I did not know that. I
used to buy all my pickleball gear from Dicks, but
they make too much money, so I'll go elsewhere. Uh
cold little news, Catulu news Dollar t Tree has acquired
Angel Reyes. Okay, lots of real funny guys in the
(13:04):
comments like no, I want to transition. Okay, now I'm
not that completely different, Rich, I introduced you as the
uncle those of us in the hobby never had. I
want to focus on something that I think the sister
(13:25):
most of us have never had sues posted on social media.
Everybody knows right, everybody loves sues. She tweeted this that
this was something that caught my eye because I wrote
about it for hobby News Daily a couple of weeks.
This is on the bottom of series one for a
company that doesn't want to represent that cards will quote
(13:47):
unquote attain for future value. It posts a lot of
that about value of card. This is a departure and
the definitive shift in marketing, which is fine, but something
that my brain is trying to reconcile. And I don't
know if this is a case of great minds thinking alike,
(14:08):
but in my most recent post for hobby News Daily,
I actually wrote about how Tops is social media account
and their marketing on social media has changed a lot,
especially over the last couple of months, really the last
year or so. It's more about posting ones of one
(14:30):
that people have pulled ones of one that that are
being put into products, and I think a little more
I don't want to say disturbing, but kind of unsavory.
Is all these posts about how much their cards sell
pH Is this any a good way to market the hobby,
(14:51):
you guys think, Adam, you want to lead us?
Speaker 3 (14:53):
Sure, well, I've been saying this on my channel for
a while now. I think it's fine to do that.
It's fine. I'm okay with there being. You know, ever
since we were kids in the eighties with Beckett magazines,
you know, money has always been a part of it,
but for us it was never like the primary driver.
It was about collecting first and enjoying it, and it
was cool that cards are worth money. But I think
(15:16):
the major companies that really run the hobby now, like Tops, Fanatics, PSA, especially,
like you said, on social media and stuff, I don't
see them highlighting collectors enough. You can do both. It
doesn't have every post on your speed and Instagram doesn't
have to be about one of one's and million dollar
cards and money, money money. You can do a little
(15:38):
collecting too. Here's a guy who put together this set
or I would love to see them do more of that.
It's not like you have a cap on how many
posts you can make on social media? Why not mix
in some of that other stuff too, because I think
it will help them in the long run by promoting
the joy of collecting. And also, hey, these things are
worth money.
Speaker 2 (15:58):
What I find interesting is remember Fanatics is a company,
and we're instance, we're talking about tops, so it's Tops Fanatics.
They are a pro they are a for profit business.
And you know, like Rex talked about the sales in
his store of that TOPS chrome or whatever product that
(16:18):
Skiings card was supposed to be in the day, all
those bounties came out about the Schemes card, including Livvy
Dunn saying, I'll you know, you can be in my
suite for one of the games. And who wouldn't want
to be in a suite with Livvy Dunn. And they
were selling those packs like hotcakes in their store. Tops
(16:40):
understands the root of this hobby nowadays is money. I
agree with you, Adam, you know, I you know, And
I was talking to Chris before you come here. My
old synagogue show was a forty five table show that
was literally a three ring circus. We had, but by
the nature of what we had we had bags of cards.
We gave aware its price, so we had two prize
(17:03):
tables at every show. We have forty five dealer tables.
We you know, it was very accessible. It was a
dollar to get in the door. It was a type
of show that even Michael Rubin would have loved. We
have a new location now it is a smaller facility.
I have twenty one tables. I don't do the bags
of cards. I now still get donations of cards and
(17:24):
I bump them out to local dealer collectors who do
very well with them. And I'm very happy with that.
It's a very good ecosystem. So but and I tell Chris,
if Michael Rubin came to my little show, he'd probably think.
He'd probably shake his head and say, you know, what
type of show is this? Where's all the flash and dash?
Because the world has changed. And I get that what
(17:47):
I'm doing works for what I do. And you know,
my show's Memorial Day weekend, Sunday Monday, it's going to
be what it is. And I understand that, and I
appreciate that. But as a four profit fit business, TOPS
has to and so therefore Fanatics has to do something
to juice up the sales of their tops, now cards
(18:10):
of their of their of their products, and doing some
hype and talking about one of one cards. It makes
sense on a corporate level. And I always tell people
you always have to think about this, this on a
business level, not just on a hobby level. I would
love to go back to the seventies when you've traded
(18:31):
cards and yeah, your Mickey Mantle was worth maybe only
a little more than your geen Stick Michael card. Those
days are done, folks, and it hurts. It's not fun,
I mean, but I still have fun with what I do.
I have my little niche. You have your niche. Chris
has his niche. Chris does Baseball Cyclopedia. He does a
great job with that.
Speaker 1 (18:51):
That's Baseball CARDPDIA.
Speaker 2 (18:54):
Sorry, Baseball Card PDIA. Whatever you do, Chris, but you
know you do a great job with that. It's a
very useful tool we all find how we get by.
And yes, tops can and should feature a little more
of what we do. But as a corporate entity, their
job is to drive sales, and so focusing on one
on ones makes perfect sense. Look my own employer comm
(19:18):
see when I go on their social media, half their
posters are about how people have flipped cards on comm
See for a lot of money. That's perfectly fine. That
is how we draw people to com see again, it's
a corporate thing to do if we don't have to
like it, or we can love it. But either way,
for profit businesses have to think about how to make
(19:40):
for profit.
Speaker 1 (19:41):
Okay, so rich you mentioned earlier about how a local
card shop in your area sold a lot of Tops
Chrome Update to people with the hopes of pulling a
Schemes card. Right, We've drawn in a lot of new
collectors over the last couple years. And this is what
(20:02):
I'm afraid of with this, the chase for all these
ones of one that realistically most people are never going
to be able to pull, and you wind up with
these We're gonna wind up with a lot of these
folks that have come into the hobby hoping, hoping to
make a buck, let's be honest, that really aren't interest
(20:24):
collective and they spend a lot of money on Top's
Chrome Update packs. They don't appreciate the cards that they pull,
and then they wonder why they can't get more than
fifty percent for buyback for the cards that they pull.
And that's going to lead to like a lot of
folks that, because they're getting burned in the pursuit of
(20:47):
this chase, that are going to leave the hobby with
a lot of bad feelings. And I don't think, and
I've said this before, this is not how you ten
x the hobby. You don't ten x the hobby by
making people feel like they've been had or making people
feel like chumps.
Speaker 2 (21:06):
I respectfully disagree because the world is becoming a lottery
type system and everybody has that dream. Not everybody, but
a lot of us who are who by packs. Maybe
not the people watching this program, but a lot of
people who buy packs have the dream. Today's the day
I win the lottery. Today's the day I get the
(21:26):
big hit. Today's the days it's Yes, we never do.
It is not perfect, but it is a fact of life,
hype cells, and whether we like it or not, we
have to understand that.
Speaker 1 (21:38):
You know, I.
Speaker 2 (21:39):
You know, as we talk all the time on Doctor
Beckett's podcast, he I and a few other people, we
have a cadretive people that we basically all go to
the same value boxes as the Dallas Card Show. And
basically our point is we can't lose when we go
through the dollar boxes or the quarterboxes. We have understanding
(22:00):
what we're doing, so we're not trying to win big.
We understand we can't lose. Other people are trying to
win big, but they understand they can lose. And if
you know, and that becomes and that is a hard lesson.
And it's not the way the hobby was even ten
years ago, but it is what it is today. And
we have to understand that the world changes.
Speaker 1 (22:21):
But this hobby is not going to be sustainable if
all we're producing isn't collector but lottery ticket players. You
know that.
Speaker 2 (22:29):
But not everybody is a lottery ticket player. And if
you get a certain percent, a.
Speaker 1 (22:32):
Lot of these guys that have come into the hobby are.
Speaker 2 (22:35):
Well, you know, Chris, not everybody. I go to the
shows and the shows are packed. I mean, tell me
why the shows are so packed with people? I mean,
and you know, and then how many boosts do you
see people saying, I'm buying these cards at eighty ninety
one hundred, one hundred and ten percent. All these people
are buying cards, there's something positive going on.
Speaker 1 (22:55):
Well to me, when I go to a card show,
one of the busiest tables is the guy with the
banner that says buying paying sixty five percent comp and
all the desperate collectors that are looking to cash in.
You know, that's just what I see.
Speaker 3 (23:15):
I see both ends of it, you know. I side
more with Chris on the fact that if Fanatics wants
it to just boom for a short period of time,
further and the current trajectory may do that. But you know,
they have how long of a license? Do they have?
Twenty years? Something like that? I think, I mean, if
they if they really wanted to sustain I think they
(23:37):
do have to mix in a little bit of it.
It doesn't mean it has to be either or, but
they have to mix in a little bit of the collecting,
which I don't think the ship has sailed on that.
I think. You know, Rich my favorite podcast that I
ever listened to her when you go on Doctor Beckett's podcast,
and when you guys talk about the good old days
the past, or even how you interact at card shows
(23:58):
now with the dollar boxes, I find myself, you know,
thinking I like that, I want to do that. I
want to go in those dollar boxes. And I think,
you know, just because things are a certain way right now,
it doesn't mean there can't be some more of that.
You can influence younger collectors, especially the smart ones who
look who look to people who have a lot of
experience in the hobby and see what they do. Uh.
(24:20):
There there are those people, and I think there'll be
more and more of those, especially, you know, I think
some of the things going on now are gonna burn up.
They're not they're not sustainable parts of the hobby, you know,
with repacks and reselling and reselling, and eventually that's not
gonna that's not gonna last. I don't think in that
form unless they reinvent it somehow in some other way.
But I think if they want to think long term,
(24:42):
which any smart business does along with short term, uh,
they gotta they gotta focus a little more on collecting
and less on one of ones. And I like one
of ones. I have some, but I also have you know,
cards from when I was a kid and stuff like that.
So it's just I consider my help more of a
moderate with things, you know. I try to find the
happy medium. But the hobby seems like it's swung way
(25:06):
one way right now.
Speaker 2 (25:09):
And frankly, when hobby swing, anything swings too far in
one direction. Usually there's a counter balance. So that's why
I'm not panicking about this. That's why I say we
understand where we are. We also have to understand, you know,
this is why I always stress for profit business. Their
goal is to make money. They've invested a lot of
(25:31):
money in this. They've invested a lot of money in
getting athletes to sign. They've invested a lot of money
into making the cards. They've invested a lot of money
into buying the printing presses. They've invested a lot of
money all over the place. They have to get that
money back. It is again, business is business, and it's
(25:52):
you know when you know, I'm I'm probably as old
as you as Chris combined, and so.
Speaker 1 (25:58):
Don't be so sure about that.
Speaker 2 (25:59):
I know the two of you combined, her a little
bit older than me. That's okay. But you know, I
understand that things evolve and they don't always evolve the
way we want them to evolve. And that's one of
the saddest things in life. I look, I grew up
on sixties and seventies pop music. I like the eighties.
There were some good songs in the nineties. I can't
(26:21):
listen to pop music today that music is something foreign
to my ears. And yet there are some good pop songs,
but I don't relate to any of them, and I understand.
I understand that. And yet every once in a while,
I'm forced to listen. If I'm in my wife's car,
I either listen to when she's playing current country or
current pop, and so I hear that thing. And yet
(26:43):
I heard a song from two thousand and a country
song from two thousand and two the other day when
I was in her car, and there was a line
about baseball cards in the car. And it's a Mark
Liol song from two thousand and two, nineteen something where
he talked about what it was growing up and the
video shows kids growing up in the seventies and eighties.
Those days are done. We're we're in twenty twenty five now.
(27:06):
It is a different world than nineteen seventy five. And yes,
Chris is right. There were no Heritage high number packs
in seventy five, but there were seventy five cards, and
there'll be seventy six cards and you know, we'll get
seventy six heritage soon enough, and we'll enjoy seeing the
bi centennial, you know, relived again and it's okay. It's
something that attracts old and new, as Bob Boozl says,
(27:28):
and we like that. We need to focus both on
yesterday and today. And today it's becoming a different world,
and we focus on that. Tomorrow it might be a
different world again, and we'll focus on that. We may
not like it, but it is what it is.
Speaker 1 (27:42):
Yeah. I don't know if you saw this, but the
checklist for twenty twenty five Heritage came out yesterday and
it's a little interesting. Well, we'll discuss later, but I
want to get into some of the chat here. I
know a guy in Jersey named Tony Bag of Cards,
and I know him too, you know, always meete him
(28:02):
underneath the Pulaski Skyway. He's got some Mooky.
Speaker 2 (28:06):
Goes to a show I love. By the way, Mooky
goes to the Garfield Card Show. And the Garfield Car
Show is run by my good friend Gary and it's
truly an old school show and he runs it as
an old school show. He runs it as a charity
show for the Boys and Girls Club of Garfield, New Jersey.
Speaker 1 (28:24):
It runs for.
Speaker 2 (28:24):
Five hours a couple Sundays a month, and it's a
kick butt show. There's a lot of business done on
that show, and there's even a group of collectors and
they have their they bring Dunkin Donuts coffee with them
and they have a coffee clatch. You know, that's the
one where I really still want to go to again
and join the clatches. I still know most of the
people in the clatch.
Speaker 1 (28:44):
I've been to that show maybe a couple of times.
And if I weren't, if it wasn't like a three
and a half hour drive to get there from where
I'm at, I'd be there every fifth Sunday too. We
got to shut out for your little show, Rich Thank you.
Speaker 2 (29:00):
Yeah. Fun, it's a fun little show. It is what
it is. I and I almost hand select the dealers
because I know my audience.
Speaker 1 (29:09):
Great take for Adam Hope, the powers of be serious,
considerate market to both but also collector. Okay, most collectors
were not out to get rich from their card collection
than COVID prices were in the moon. And people are
still have their heads in the clouds. I mean, I
see so many kids trying to offload their cards and
(29:31):
they're learning the hard way. What a lot of people
in my generation learn the hard way back in the
late eighties and early nineties. Your cards are not really
worth as much as you thought they were. So I
collect for the love of collecting. If my cards go up, yeah,
I think that's what most folks. Most folks are I
(29:55):
only collect Wander Franco. Okay, let me guess you also
collect uh Luis Polonia and uh Mel Hall and uh
who was that other pedo who played for.
Speaker 2 (30:08):
These Hall still in the Texas Jale by the.
Speaker 1 (30:10):
Way, Yeah, okay, Uh to go with my Andrew Luck collection?
All right, just let the Syracuse Collector's con was blown
away by the gender divers versus the card show balance
in the same venue. Seems like a lot more room
for improvement. Yeah, I mean, the hobby is a bit
of a sausage festival. You can't tex the amount of
(30:33):
people in the hobby, but you can text the money.
That's and that's what I've I've always when Michael Rubin
said he wanted to ten x the hobby, I really
didn't understand what what he was tenexing. What is he
is he tenexing the number of people or the hexing
the money? I still haven't quite figured that out yet.
Speaker 2 (30:55):
Uh.
Speaker 1 (30:56):
Let's see here looking to win the door prize at Garth.
Still have never won a door prize. Give it a
few more decades, you might win once. Buy and large
people who play the lottery at the lower end of
the income curve. True, is it the same for those
ripping ultra modern chasing the big hit? Well, if you're poor,
(31:20):
you're probably not chasing ultra modern buying ultra modern chasing.
That it, but it kind of is like the lottery
for upper middle income folks. But the hobbies, I don't know.
Let's see what else. Dollar box does not smell of
desperation like other vendor areas there are. Well, I'll just
(31:44):
leave that thought myself. I get a lot of people
looking at my ten cent boxes. Okay, the boom is
head and needed for a Fanatics ipo, but I am
blown away how easy it is to move bulk on
Facebook marketplace versus single Okay, I want to hunt for
exhibits in your ten cent box. You could probably find
(32:07):
some of those two thousand and four leaf exhibits in
a ten cent box. I never understood that that inserts
that that's a deep album cut. For those that know
Uncle Rich Wants is Herman's Hermit's back. I only listen
to petty. Nothing wrong with some petty every once in
a while. And you don't have to live like a refugee.
(32:28):
And here come the petty references now running down a
cargo dream.
Speaker 2 (32:33):
So you won't calling this conversation.
Speaker 1 (32:36):
Learning to buy because I'm short on cash. Okay, that's
a repeat. Did the big boy arrive yet? I don't
know what that played.
Speaker 3 (32:46):
Mike, Mike Petty won a big Honus Wagner card in
that recent auction.
Speaker 1 (32:52):
Oh, Tom Petty, Okay, yeah, Steve Jelts, Okay, let's just
move on from this great chat.
Speaker 3 (33:05):
Great some legends in the chat.
Speaker 2 (33:07):
They're all legends. The chat's better than us.
Speaker 1 (33:10):
So later on tonight, in the lovely burg of Fort Lauderdale, Florida,
the greatest soccer team in the world, first place in
the NLS, your Philadelphia Union will be taking on Inter
Miami in Fort Lauderdale. Whatever it's supposed to be temporary,
(33:32):
they've been there for five years and uh inner Miami
of course has one big name well, they have a
lot of big name stars, but probably the biggest superstar
in all of professional sports right now. Of course, I'm
talking about Florida Man, Florida man Leonel Messi, who like
(33:52):
Florida Man, might not be showing up for work tonight
because he got injured. He didn't show up for work
in his for Argentina and the World Cup qualifiers this
week they had. Argentina had no trouble beating Brazil four
to one. But there was a story that rich that
you brought on, that you brought to my attention. It's
(34:15):
behind a paywall, it's the athletic but let me see them.
Get it up here share screen. Can you see that
Lionel Messi who's signing his autographs? And yeah, it's behind
a paywall, so yeah, but this leads me to wonder,
(34:35):
with so many with the trading card company demanding so
many autographs from these guys, how on earth can these
guys possibly sign all these cards? And how do we
know that they're really authentic? Because you remember a couple
of years ago, Dak Prescott got busted for using an
auto pen and now Leonnel Messi's probably may or may
(34:59):
not be signing is on autographs. How do we really
know that the trading card companies are really getting these
guys to sign these autographs? Do what do you guys think.
Speaker 2 (35:12):
I there's a couple of things I want to say. One,
if from what I was able to get through the
article before the paywall hit, PSA are the people that
looked and said this was not an autograph of Leonel Messi,
So kudos. If PSA is right, they are protecting their brand.
And you know, I can and I and I'll teasingly
say I can speak from experience about that because I
(35:36):
have my own TOPS card from way back in the
day and I signed most of them, and PSA had
no exemplars, so they turned down my friend's card. Uh,
JSA and C and CGC have exemplars, so they'll accept it.
That's a different story for a different day. But on
a corporate level, PSA, and I'll use me as an example,
if they're uncomfortable PSA, DNA is uncomfortable with an autograph,
(35:59):
they want to protect their corporate brand and say we're
not just going to accept this card. We have to
be sure. And so especially on the highest level autographs,
I think it instead of just sending a player a
card or whatever, I think TOPS really does have to
go back to the old school days of we witness
you know, at a certain autograph level, we witness the signatures. Now,
(36:23):
there were some problems obviously during COVID where you did
not want to go and travel and witness things in person.
But I think now you go and you witness in person,
and I think that's a good corporate thing to do.
Just say, you know, if you're on the level of
Lebron James, if you're on the Lionel Messi level, if
you're on that level, we'll spend whatever it takes to
(36:46):
get the autographs authenticated in person, in front of in
front of a rep.
Speaker 3 (36:51):
Do you know how has the card company has ever
done it where they, you know, video the person signing
the cards.
Speaker 1 (36:58):
And then I.
Speaker 3 (36:59):
Mean, couldn't they do something like that where they if
you know, Messi has you're going to sign would would they?
Would the players be not for that? You think would
every problems with that? If they just create a video
and let's say a card had a little QR code
on the back, you scan it, boom, it pulls up
the video of him signing that card.
Speaker 2 (37:18):
The problem with that if you're signing in a person's house,
as you saw pop up a few months ago, is
the targeted robberies of these people's houses. So if they
are signing at a top's office or a public place,
that's fine. If they want to sign at their home,
that can be as we saw, as I said, and
(37:40):
some of that was the player's own I don't say fault,
but own responsibility for filming stuff, you know, within their
own houses. But as we saw, that can be a
issue for the players safe. And we certainly don't want
the players not to be safe. But if you like,
you know in Dallas, and let's let's pick Cory Seger.
(38:01):
You know he's not at that level, but let's pick
Corey Seeger as an example, or or Luka Doncik before
he got traded, or Dirk Novitski or Dak or whatever.
You get them to Jerry Jones, to the Star in Frisco,
you know, if it's the Cowboys, or somewhere in Arlington,
if it's the Rangers, or downtown Dallas, if it's a
(38:21):
Maverick or Dallas Star or some other player who lives
in the area. You get them to a public place
and you have them signed publicly. That is fine to
do the video, but as I pointed out, the problem
with doing the video at the person's house has popped
up on high profile robberies, and we certainly don't want
people getting robbed, and that's becoming a legitimate issue. So
(38:44):
you're it's a great theory, but again, it's going to
be the implement implementation to make it work.
Speaker 1 (38:51):
Now from what I understand, at least in the NFL,
and I think this is negotiated as part of the
nfl PA license players during the season only have there's
certain windows during the season when players can sign for
trading card comes and that's usually once during training camp
(39:12):
and once during their bye week, and then I also
during the rookie and during the rookie But for for
veteran players I'm talking about, let's look back in the chat.
I want a Mike Petty signed check.
Speaker 2 (39:28):
Okay, I'll take a Mike Petty sign check too. You
know that's fine.
Speaker 1 (39:33):
You know I want an Al Bundy sign check. Super rare.
You did score four touchdowns for Polkis Mike Baker n
b A might be authentic. Okay. I had to submit
my Marris family Rogers in your sign index card three
(39:53):
times before they had an exemplar Yeah, I mean you
figure there's some autogo some guys that either died young
or who just didn't died before signing became a thing.
How do you authenticate those? Like some guy had at
a card show a couple of years ago had an
(40:14):
autographed Lineman Bostock baseball. Rich probably knows who Linman Bostock was.
He was a player for the Twins who got murdered
I think in seventy eight when he was three years in.
How do you authenticate that game? You judge rapped? Okay,
(40:36):
what if I'm just dead on the inside? Does that count?
I think we all have those existential crises every once
in a while.
Speaker 2 (40:43):
So well, you are in your mid life, so you.
Speaker 1 (40:46):
Know, let's see, we got about fifteen twelve fifteen minutes.
You want to talk about heritage and this Celebration series
one thing that came out with you down for that
or yeah?
Speaker 2 (41:03):
I mean, honestly, I did not even know Celebration was
out there until I saw some photos. It looks like
a fun set.
Speaker 1 (41:10):
Actually, I'm trying to figure out what it is, because
when I first saw the first photos of what this
product might be about a month ago, I thought, oh,
they're just bringing Opening Day back, you know, mascot inserts,
kitty inserts. And I mentioned this like a couple of
(41:31):
weeks ago. I kind of the more I've discovered about
this product, the more I feel like, you know, the
end of a Scooby Doo episode where the gang catches
the bad guy and they ripped the mask off of
the bad guy and it's someone completely different, and they
would have gotten away with it if it weren't for
(41:53):
those meddling kids. The more the more of this Series
one cell aberration I found out about, all it is
is just a rehash of Series one with just new inserts.
I mean, what's the point of this?
Speaker 3 (42:11):
Yeah, I just think there's there's too many products. You know,
I know we've probably been saying that for a long
time now. But yeah, it's not.
Speaker 1 (42:19):
Too many products. It's the exact same products they released
a month ago, just with new inserts.
Speaker 3 (42:26):
I mean, heritage is great. I love heritage. I don't
I don't know. Yeah, I don't understand the need for
to make it more confusing.
Speaker 5 (42:34):
I got enough to remember, well, the price point is okay,
and you know, and and if it's and if it's
designed to get what and I want to use the
word kids or younger people or people who like fun designs.
Speaker 2 (42:46):
It's it looks like from the I just looked quickly,
it looks like a product where they're trying to be
flashy and fun. And if you're going to be flashy
and fun and the price point's okay, it's not the
biggest deal. It's not the biggest deal in the world.
And then do it for series two. Again, you were
complaining earlier about let's say price points and lottery things.
(43:08):
Tell me what the lottery is in Series one celebration.
Speaker 1 (43:11):
Okay, there's at least two or three inserts that are
like one in three hundred and one in six hundred
pack hits.
Speaker 2 (43:19):
Okay, But are they are they hyping the those are
they just?
Speaker 1 (43:22):
Yes, they are?
Speaker 2 (43:23):
Okay, that's fine again, but it's also when you open
the pack you say, oh, they're look at all these
cool cards. Again, I'm okay with.
Speaker 1 (43:31):
This, but you've already bought these cards last month. I mean,
this isn't like right, This isn't like Opening Day back
in the day, where yeah, the cards look like Series one,
but they had that logo on it that said opening Day,
so it's a little different. It's literally the same three
hundred and fifty card Series one base set, and a
(43:52):
lot of the inserts from Series one are also in
these packs. So it's not just the inserts are different.
They've added more in inserts. They've added the mascots walk
this way, which I think is like the one in
six hundred pack. I don't it's funny. Look at I'm
(44:12):
looking on your website. That's a really cool card, by
the way, but walk this way if you could find them, Okay.
Speaker 2 (44:18):
But it's still really cool. It's still a really cool card.
Speaker 1 (44:20):
Yeah, if again you could find them. Let's see, let's
go back to the Uh. Boss Stok is a bit
of a legend up here. Uh celebration is that the
cool in the gang swatches an auto?
Speaker 2 (44:36):
That'sbration.
Speaker 1 (44:39):
I remember when we ripped off the cardboard box of Uncle.
Oh somebody's somebody stole something from your rich and now
they're in your.
Speaker 2 (44:49):
Face, Mookie, we forgive you.
Speaker 1 (44:52):
The green mascot autograph is a real thing. Well here's
the thing. I don't know if you knew this or not,
but they've had wall the green Mosster mascot autographs an
opening day the last couple of years. It was around
not that big of a deal.
Speaker 2 (45:10):
I want to go back. I want to go back
to something because okay, Mookie talks about we've talked about
the Garfield card show. Well, I had two friends no
longer living that had a nice little neighborhood store in
the nineteen eighties in Garfield, New Jersey, Henry Davis and
Hans ju Belt, and it was h and H hobbies
and people. I remember in eighty five they had eighty
(45:31):
five tops packs at fifty cents each. And if you
didn't pull the Mattingly or the good in or the
really hot Clemmens or at the time Eric Davis, you
left your cards on the counter. Well, I can't tell
you how many Mark McGuire rookies they ended up without
of all that. So for people who are complaining, it's yes,
the stakes are hired today. But for people who were
complaining about the hobby and how is a lottery, folks,
(45:54):
it was a lottery in nineteen eighty five. It was
just that the stakes were a lot cheaper. You know,
fifty cents is not hundreds of dollars a box. But
the general principle has not changed in forty years. It's
just the affordability has changed for a lot of people.
But it's the same principle. And if celebration gets people in,
and if they I don't think people are really gonna
(46:16):
go chasing Walk This Way cards. By the way, that's
a good Airsmith song. I don't think they're really gonna
chase that card, and it's okay. But if they do
get it, they know it's a good hit, and I'm
okay with this. This does not seem to be focused
on one hundred dollars things. I look the megaboxes forty
nine ninety five on the tops website. This is a
perfectly reasonable price point. So let's understand, what's you know
(46:40):
for kids? So the packs are three or four dollars each.
When I go to Triple today, I have to buy some.
I actually have to buy some five thousand cop boxes
to work through the donation they gave me. And so
I'll buy a pack because it'll be fun, because the
cards look like they're fun, the insert will be fun,
and that's really all that matters, all right. Maybe the
kids can't even afford fifty dollars. Most of the kids
(47:02):
I know today can't afford fifty dollars well, but they
can afford three dollars for a pack.
Speaker 1 (47:07):
So Walk this Way is forty cards deep and it
is a one in three hundred and twenty pack. Hits
good luck trying to We're not.
Speaker 2 (47:19):
Going to finish that set.
Speaker 1 (47:19):
We get that.
Speaker 2 (47:21):
No, and if somebody does, let Top celebrate the fact
that somebody finish the set.
Speaker 1 (47:25):
All right? Ummm, There's something I wanted to say but
I forgot. Let's see if Celebration has Grimace autos. I'm
a buyer now, Sorry, Mets fans, no Grimmats autos. My
wife can't stop drooling over the Bryce Harper game. Drake
drip card that makes me sick, Grimace patch autos, sesame
(47:50):
seed and you know, don't give Tops any I ideas.
There are already too many parallels. Okay, uh, stay puffed,
marshmallow Man from Goal Goes. I love to attend the
Garfield Show. It's three thousand miles away. Otherwise sounds you would.
Speaker 2 (48:09):
You would love it? Seriously? Would you would love that show?
Speaker 3 (48:13):
Chris? I have a question for you, if that's all right?
Speaker 1 (48:15):
Sure.
Speaker 3 (48:16):
First of all, I love Baseball Cardpedia and using it
for years. Can't thank you enough for creating one of
the greatest resources ever, free resources. As someone who collects
nineties cards, I mean when I went down that rabbit hole,
I couldn't have I couldn't have done it without baseball carpias.
So I want to thank you for that, But question
why have they not created or somebody? I know you
(48:39):
got enough on your hands with baseball. Is there ever
going to be a football card or basketball Cardpedia?
Speaker 1 (48:44):
There was a hockey card Pedia and that lasted about
thirty minutes. If somebody wants to create it, somebody has
a database full of we'd be glad to host it.
I don't collect other sports.
Speaker 3 (48:58):
So because I collect all three major well I guess
it's four major sports, sorry hockey. But for my football
in basketball collecting, I'm always I have the same questions
I have that Baseball card Pedia answered for me, and
sometimes it can cross over. But sometimes I'm trying to
figure out and I'm like, man, I wish there was
a football card Pedia or basketball card because it's just awesome.
Speaker 1 (49:18):
Yeah, just just one sport is enough for me because
I don't want to humble brag, but ninety and ninety
five percent of that is me.
Speaker 3 (49:28):
So whenever I'm looking at something in there I'm thinking, Man,
how much time must have this taken to put all
this in there. It's just amazing.
Speaker 1 (49:36):
That's baseballcardpedia dot com for all your baseball reference needs.
Speaker 3 (49:41):
Fantastic.
Speaker 1 (49:43):
Got a few minutes left. I don't know if you
guys noticed this, but on Friday the checklist for twenty
twenty five herod it dropped and I know Ryan Kracknell
at Beckett posted it. Did any of you guys say it?
Because there are some differences, just not the differences that
(50:04):
I think most of us wanted.
Speaker 2 (50:09):
Look at Itsel if you can provide details.
Speaker 1 (50:12):
So the base set's still five hundred cards with one
hundred shot prints. Y, there's still gimmicks galore, although there
are new gimmicks this year. I think one of them
is you know how in seventy six they have that
little player icon in the corner. That's one of them,
a different player icon, but uh, you're still gonna get
(50:36):
one relic or an autograph in a box. But the
inserts are different. And I think they're going all in
with the bi centennial theme with this because there's a
one hundred card insert set dedicated I think to the
greatest Americans, which seems to me like it would be
(50:57):
more appropriate and something you would see in Ginter. So
I don't know how that would work. But all of
the other inserts that have been longtime staples of Heritage,
like New Age Performers then and now they're gone and
replaced with other ones. So I think TOPS realize that
(51:21):
Heritage needed a bit of an overhaul after twenty five years.
I just think that they have the overhaul in the
wrong place. And again, we we really don't know much
else other than the base checklist. We don't know anything
about parallels. We do know that the whole set, all
five hundred cards will chrome instead of just the one
(51:45):
and fifty cards, and it's normally weel see.
Speaker 2 (51:49):
A lot of Heritage cards were chrome. And what the
print run is going to be interesting because the originally
they printed the print run of the chromes to like
nineteen fifty two, So I'm going to be curious what
the print run on the chromes are.
Speaker 1 (52:02):
I think maybe about six or seven years ago they
lowered that to nine ninety nine, and then for the
Heritage High Number set that just came out in twenty
twenty five, it's it's down to six ninety So I
don't know. Maybe it'll be to like seven sixty or
something because it's seventy six tops. I don't know. So anyway,
(52:28):
you guys have anything else you want to mention? Plug,
we're well past an hour now.
Speaker 2 (52:34):
Just just keep rocking in the Chris, just take us
home with playing Rocking in the Free World, and we're
good to go, all right, Adam anything.
Speaker 3 (52:42):
No, guys, it was an honor being with you. I've
been watching you guys for a long time, so it
was pleasure talking cards with you.
Speaker 1 (52:49):
Same here. I guess that's it, so I'll say the catchphrase,
keep rocking in the Free World and stay hydrated, folks.
Oh and you call it in Chantilli. Next week play
the video come on, yeh,
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Crime Junkie
Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by audiochuck Media Company.
24/7 News: The Latest
The latest news in 4 minutes updated every hour, every day.