Baseball Cards

I bought a few Fleer, Donruss and Score cards, but I always preferred Topps. Bummed me out when they stopped putting the gum in the packs. I can taste it now as I type this.

My dad was really amused at my collection, which I kept highly organized, juxtaposed against the perpetual slovenly state of my room.

 

I thought the best book about the era was by a friend named Pete Williams, whose byline you may remember from USA Today's Baseball Weekly.

Card Sharks – The 15-year retrospective « Pete's Blog

 

My dad would get so mad when my brother and I became obsessed with what the cards were "worth." That era legitimately marks a clean break in my childhood, the point at which my dad basically got openly pissed off for a while that his kids weren't little any more. Looking back, work was really up and down for him then, and he was unemployed through long stretches. Anything to do with money and accumulating it was likely to set him off.

 

It always bothered me that kids (and grown-ass adults) discussed "worth" because, deep down, I knew most of the crap was being way overproduced and wasn't going to carry near the "value" that "experts" thought it would down the road, especially compared to the older cards that were being discovered in attics and basements. I think my company helped bring about the end of the trading card boom when it marketed cards as "Guaranteed Scarce" and limited products to 3,000 cases. Of course, to make up for the lack of volume, we increased from 2-3 products to something like 16 different SKUs.

 

I found that when I realized how oversaturate the market was as a teenager, my collecting basically dropped off to nil. I kept all of my cards, though. Even now, with some of them 30 years old, I know they're not worth much more than the stock they're printed on. However, I'm holding onto them to eventually give to my son and I'll give him explicit instructions that he should hold on to them to give to his son (or daughter). By then, they may end up worth something. Until then, they're a fun memory for me.

 

The great thing about cards is that they gave you a vehicle through which you could learn about the game and the players. Fantasy now fulfills that role for many of us, as adults. My nephews learn through playing video games, which is why I'm in the market for a system, as well.

 

You learned about the players and got some stale bubblegum, but they were primarily for schoolyard gambling back in my day. Before school and at recess, you played any of a number of games (colors, positions, etc), flpping, closest to the wall. I excelled. I would win stacks of cards from kids, then teachers would try to confiscate them.

 

I was into card collecting in high school (89-92), but when doing a research paper on it during my junior year, including how good of an investment I was making only to find out otherwise, my interest went to zero almost overnight.

I had a great English teacher who worked with me as I switched my paper at the last minute from the wise investment angle to forecasting the pending bust. I had to write a second rough draft, but looking back-- the lesson I learned had nothing to do with baseball cards.

 

This is a fantastic thread. I was more into basketball cards, but also liked baseball. But my collecting span was short... basically 1990 to 1996ish. They got too expensive. When I started it was 50 cents a pack for 15 cards. By the time I stopped it was like $3.00 for 12. But you know what's funny, in the past year, I've bought unopened boxes on Amazon. Waste of money for sure, but it's really fun to open the packs. I split the boxes with coworkers and we have fun with it. Really brings back some memories. But man, that 1987 box of Topps baseball cards is tough, lots of players I don't recognize. Of course, I was 5 then haha.

 

Looking back on it, this was a big deal in the pre-Internet age and before ESPN had games four nights a week. If you were lucky, you saw your local team every night and maybe the Braves or Cubs regularly. I wouldn't have learned anything about Mark Gubiza or Robby Thompson without being into cards.

I still have a small stash of cards (few thousand, maybe) in a closet. Also have some old Becketts, too.

 

Hell, the Becketts from the late '80s/early '90s are probably more valuable nowadays than the cards.

EDIT: My own post got me curious. 1984 beckett November issue 1 CLEMENTE BASEBALL PRICE GUIDE RARE MAGAZINE

 

Stopped collecting in high school and got totally turned off when the market got flooded in the 80s and 90s. The obsession with rookie cards was a bit much too, especially considering the number of busts.