I Was Wrong (Baseball Cards)

In a previous post, I made a claim about baseball cards, read here. 

Over the last few weeks, I saw graphs like the following below, 

I saw the flat lines and then the spikes around the pandemic, and I assumed these cards weren't worthy investments, maybe even not keeping up with inflation. Of course, the starting point matters. As we will see below.

Comparison

For my initial comparison. I used the data available to me from PSA's website. The site tracks and posts sales of their graded cards. 

I used Rickey Henderson, 1980 Topps #482, PSA 7 graded cards. I plotted all the sales data from PSA. I inserted all the S&P 500 weekly stock prices from Google Finance, and I downloaded the monthly inflation data from Federal Reserve Economic Data. 

Then I created a new table and chart, see below or click here.

This shocked me!

Nominalized Values from May 2013 to October 2024

*Nominalized means to convert. 

I converted all the initial vales to $100 to get the easiest visual comparison. If one purchased $100 worth of S&P 500, US Dollars, and Rickey Henderson rookie cards in May 2013, the baseball cards would be the best investment as of October 2024.

Since May of 2013, Rickey Henderson's rookie card has out perform the S&P 500!

This is the opposite of what I expected. I don't have the data set provided in the first graph above, so I wasn't able to compare back to 2005. When I do, it's going to look different. 

Nominalized Values from Jan 2020 to October 2024

I followed the same process as above. The Rickey Henderson 1980 Topps 482 does less well when comparing starting in Jan 2020. But, still, it does well. Far better than I would have guessed. 

For most of 1980 Topps 482's existence, it would have been a phenominal investment. It's hard to say what will happen going forward, see prediction below.

Next 

I want to compare two more rare, valuable cards like Mickey Mantle, 1951 Bowman #253, and Reggie Jackson, 1969 Topps #260. I also want to compare an extremely common card from the peak of overproduction, Ken Griffey Jr., 1989 Upper Deck #1.

Coming soon.

More Predictions

My last prediction was terrible. I think this one will be close. I already know that Griffey Jr's rookie card (RC) is less valuable than when I collected in the 1990s. Grading was just getting started as I stopped collection, so grading might tell a slightly different story.

Similar to my previous post's prediction, Mickey Mantle's RC should increase its value the most over time, being the best investment of the four cards mentioned above. The Reggie Jackson RC should be the second best investment, due to its relative scarcity, and Rickey Henderson's rookie card should be third of the four cards. Fourth, Ken Griffey Jr.’s RC, due to its abundances, should be competing with inflation as a bad investment for collectors.

Collectors today didn't grow up watching Mickey Mantle play, so he doesn't have the bias that many collectors have with Jackson, Henderson, and Griffey. Collectors in their 50-70s are going to remember watching and owning Jackson's cards when Jackson played baseball. Collectors in their 40-60s will remember watching and owning Henderson. Collects 30s and older are most likely going to have collected Griffey.

I'll still keep my previous concern. As collector get older and die, I'm not sure younger collectors will be filling their shoes with demands for the 1980s baseball cards. The scarcity and legacy of the 1950-60s cards should keep the demand high for the collectors coming of age. But the 1980s? I don't know. There are a lot of those cards...