I have been researching and following 1980 Topps #482, Rickey Henderson's rookie card (RC), for over a year. I bought my first card as nostalgia, but my continued interest grew as I learned more and more about the economics and potential investment of this card. My initial instinct was 1980 Topps #482 was a bad investment, read here. To my surprise, when I looked into it, I found 1980 Topps card #482 has been an excellent investment, read here.
Introduction
Rickey Henderson is considered by many tp be the greatest leadoff hitter in baseball history. He holds the all time records for stolen bases and runs, and his single season and career achievements go on and on.
1980 Topps #482 has become one of the most iconic baseball cards over the last few years. Last month, it sold for a record high, $183,000. The card tops list after list of top baseball cards of the 1980s. When Topps selected 20 historic baseball cards for its Project 2020, 1980 Topps #482 was one of the 20 cards. Based on highest sales prices in the 2020s, it is the most valuable baseball card of the 1980s.
A PSA 10 Gem Mint 1980 Topps #482 Rickey Henderson RC is valuable. But why? How does the grade of a card change the sales prices? Do higher grades increase value at faster rates? How does scarcity influences sale prices?
I'm only looking at 1980 Topps #482. This is a case study into the sales of PSA grades ranging from 7-10. (I want to look into other cards later.)
I am the main audience, but hopefully collectors or general readers interested can follow along.
Methodology
I pulled the S&P 500 from Google Finance and US Dollar inflation data from https://fred.stlouisfed.org, both using formulas in Google Sheets. These are two measures to compare the baseball card sales with.
My starting point is based on the first sales available in VCP's records. The charts below are start with October 31st, 2006. If anyone is interested, they can easily create a new chart from any starting date they choose. All the data is in the spreadsheet I shared.
I used end of the month (EoM) prices for S&P 500 and CPI/inflation. For PSA 10 sales, I used the most recent sales prices. Since PSA 10s only have 1-3 sales most years, taking the median sales wouldn't resolve jumpiness of the data. For PSA 9, PSA 8, and PSA 7, I used the median sales for each month. PSA 9 has averages over 15 sales per month since 2012, PSA 8 over 45 and PSA 7 close to 30. The PSA 10 sales are not statistically equivalent to the PSA 7-9 sales prices, but that is what's available.
I normalized all the values to starting values of $1, see the table on the Master Sheet.
The prices are gross sales prices, including auction company fees. Shipping costs are not included in the prices. The prices are also nominal, not adjusted for inflation.
Limitations
Not all cards of the same grade are of equal value. Some cards look brighter, more centered, etc. There is an artistic aspect to the cards in addition to the objective condition. Grading companies try to remove the subject grader from the grades, but, in the end, buyers and sellers are subjectively valuing cards based on several factors that vary between buyers/sellers.
There is a selection bias with my sales dats. I'm relying on what is available.
There is an asymmetry in my sample sizes, sales of PSA 10s vs PSA7-9s.
Results
All the following sales data and prices are discovered prices, not expected returns. Readers should also remember that sale prices included fees to auction houses, like eBay.
Rickey Henderson's rookie card, 1980 Topps #482 has done well the last 20 years.
Until the pandemic, the PSA 7-9 were very similar to the S&P 500. Post pandemic, the slopes of the PSA 7-9 look similar to the S&P 500.
On the graph, the PSA 10s have a spike upward on five occasions, of those five spikes, the PSA 7-9 had smaller bumps on three of those occasions and a spike up during the pandemic. The most recent spike did not appear to have a significant effect on PSA 7-9. It's possible February will have a direct response to the big news from the record sale.
The pandemic was the largest spike for all grades. This was a market wide spike for trading cards in general. In December of 2024, Rickey Henderson passed away. Rickey Henderson's death created a card specific shock. It's unclear, of course, but unlikely that Rickey Henderson will have many more card specific demand shocks. One possibility would be if a documentary or movie was made about his life or baseball career. Market wide shocks are also very difficult to predict.
Population Size and Scarcity
Based on the data above, it's unclear whether the PSA 10s and 9s sell at higher prices because they are higher grades, or because they are more scarce.
The PSA 10 data has a lot less sales, an average of 3 sales per year the last 19 years. The realized prices of PSA 10 sales are remarkable. But there is not enough data points. The RH PSA 7-10, S&P 500 and CPI Chart shows long flat periods and huge jumps for the PSA 10 sales prices. An economist might call this a scarcity-driven price discovery. Where the lack of supply drives the prices. The total population is low, only 26 PSA 10 Gem Mt. Further, the frequency of sales, opportunity to purchase, is low, ~1-3 sales per year the last few years.
Below are the populations of each Grade of 1980 Topps #482:
The discovered prices of 1980 Topps #482 is strongly correlated with the scarcity of the card. On a log-log chart, see Scarcity vs Price by PSA Grade (Log-Log) below, the plots show that the price and population have a very strong inverse relationship. As population sizes fall, prices rise faster and faster for PSA 9 and PSA 10 respectively. There are only four points on the graph, and these are only the recent sales, but, still, the relationship is steep and consistent.
For 1980 Topps #482, the scarcity between grades is extreme. This card has one of the highest PSA 9 to PSA 10 ratios in vintage baseball cards. The ratio of PSA 8 to PSA 9 is also very high.
Scarcity explains why PSA 9 and PSA 10 sell at a lot higher prices. The CAGR of PSA 10 has over a 20% annual return, but if when you look at the sales chart, the PSA 10s jump and stale. Sales are infrequent; population size is low- especially compared with the cards of that era; supple is low; and demand is high. This explains why demand shocks can drive the prices of the PSA 10s. Scarcity can explain how high the prices will go, but the shocks will determine when they go.
My log-log graph is only one moment in time, the recent sales, which includes a record PSA 10 sale. But if one looks at the sales graph above, the sales appear to keep a mostly consistent projector, with the shocks mentioned above.
Discussion
My hypotheses is that grading is a big part of buying and selling cards, especially online. Online trading card markets increase the demand for grading companies. As a result, the grading data identifies approximations about scarcity of cards. This in return influences buyers and sellers to grade, buy, and sell cards.
As 1980 Topps $482 becomes more and more valuable, more buyers and sellers will send in their cards trying to attain the PSA 10 Gem Mt. This drives the quantity cards graded up, as more and more lower grades become worth grading. This in return, increases the scarcity of the Gem Mint PSA 10s, and, therefore, influence the shocks in PSA 10 sales.
For collectors and investors, it is important to understand how scarcity is related to prices.
For most collectors these results won't be surprising, but it's nice to see that the data confirms what collectors assume.
I want to run these same comparisons with a few more cards and see how and if any of the dynamics different.
Reggie Jackson is probably as popular as Rickey Henderson, but his rookie card is a lot more scarce. Ken Griffey is more popular than Rickey Henderson, but his card was massed produced and has an abundance of PSA 10s. Then the GOAT of baseball cards, Mickey Mantle, he is the most popular and very scarce.
I do assume for all these players' rookie cards the more scarce higher grades will be the best investments over the last 20 years.
