Innholdsfortegnelse for October 15, 2024 i Sports Collectors Digest

LEADING OFF As the 2024 NFL season began, there were a handful of football cards surging on the trading card market. All quarterbacks, of course. C.J. Stroud, the 2023 NFL Rookie of the Year. No. 1 draft pick Bryce Young. Packers rising star Jordan Love. Joe Burrow, looking to bounce back from injury—again. And, of course, a new crop of rookie QBs, led by top picks Caleb Williams and Jayden Daniels. They were all looking to follow in the footsteps of hobby stars Patrick Mahomes II, Josh Allen, Lamar Jackson, Jalen Hurts, Justin Herbert, Trevor Lawrence and Tua Tagovailoa, whose rookie cards have each attracted big dollars in recent years. The question is which new stars will pan out, and which ones will wind up being big busts. It didn’t…

2024 SCORE FOOTBALL 2024 Score Football is one of the first officially licensed releases for the new NFL season. The set, as usual, is a massive 400-card base offering, including 100 cards of the newly drafted rookie class, albeit in their college uniforms. Hobby boxes, which released the second week of September, boast 10 packs with a massive 40 cards per pack and 12 boxes per case. That's a lot of heavy lifting early in the season. In each Hobby box, collectors can expect around 90 rookie cards, four autographs, 10 parallels, and 36 various inserts. For any collector old enough to remember Score cards of past years, the base set will heavily favor the 1990 design with a sprinkle of 1989 included. Just take one look and you will…

WILT CHAMBERLAIN ROOKIE CARD MAKES HISTORY WITH RECORD SALE Wilt Chamberlain was one of the most dominant players in NBA history, and the only player to score 100 points in a game. Now Chamberlain has carved out a spot in sports collectibles history with his 1961-62 Fleer rookie card selling for $1.7 million at Goldin Co. The sale is a record for Chamberlain’s iconic rookie card and believed to be a record for vintage (pre-1980) basketball cards. The card, graded SCG 10, was purchased via private sale through Goldin. It features Chamberlain in his Philadelphia Warriors uniform. He won the first of his four MVP awards during his rookie season in 1959-60, averaging an astounding 37.6 points and 27 rebounds. Two years later, in the 1961-62 season, he averaged an…

THE HOBBY IS THE PEOPLE Collectors with passion, dedication, and perseverance can sometimes solve hobby mysteries. One of those mysteries—whether the original iconic Leaf baseball set should really be a 1949 Leaf set rather than 1948 Leaf or 1948-49 Leaf—might finally be solved. The savior's name in this case is Brian Kappel, who's written a book called “Re: Leaf,” which details the lengths he went to to find out some of the unknowns of the classic Leaf brand. Hailing from Trumansburg, N.Y.—not far from me here in Syracuse—Kappel grew up in the late ’80s and ’90s collecting what kids did during that time. When older with more disposable income and increased knowledge, he started to collect vintage cards. The Leaf set intrigued him because 1948 and 1949 are his parents'…

The sudden rise of collector interest in the 1977 Topps NFL Mexican Football set has pushed values for these rare cards upwards in recent years. Cards that once were difficult to obtain but reasonably priced are now even more difficult to obtain and priced in the hobby stratosphere. Choice items are snapped up by eager collectors, with ultra-high-end hobbyist purchasing whole sets. Longtime collector Jim Ragsdale currently owns what is acknowledged across the hobby as the highest quality set of 1977 Topps Mexican Football cards. His goal was to complete a full PSA registered set at grade 8 or better. For years, Ragsdale has been plugging in higher grade cards, replacing lower grades. “I had my first, ungraded complete 1977 Mexican set done by 2003,” Ragsdale said. “Since then, prices…

NOTE: If you have a show listing, follow the style below and send to jowens@aimmedia.com. ALABAMA Nov 9 AL, Birmingham. Rickwood Field—America's Oldest Baseball Ballpark, 1137 2nd Ave. W, Birmingham, AL 35204. SH: 9am-3pm. T: 20. A: Free. Contact: Mike Newton 205-616-2761; mnewton@rickwoodfield.org ARKANSAS Oct 25-26 AR, Bentonville. GG2 Sports Cards Show, Four Points Hotel, 211 SE Walton Blvd., Bentonville, AR. SH: Fri 11am-6pm; Sat 9am-5pm. T: 145. A: Free. Contact: Matt Canaday gg2sportscards@gmail.com ARIZONA Nov 8-10 AZ, Phoenix (Downtown). Collectibles on College — Arizona State Card Show, Phoenix Convention Center (West Hall 1), 100 N. 3rd Street, Phoenix, AZ 85004. SH: Fri: 1pm-8pm; Sat: 10am-6pm; Sun: 10am-5pm. T: 400 ($250-300). A: $10/day, $25/weekend. Contact: Cole CollectiblesonCollege@gmail.com CALIFORNIA Oct 26 CA, San Ramon. The 680 Card Show, DVHS, 10550 Albion…

There’s a truly wonderful card in Topps’ 1969 baseball set titled “Ted Shows How.” It pictures a spring training photograph of then-Washington Senators manager Ted Williams instructing first baseman Mike Epstein on the finer points of hitting. Now may be the time for a sequel: a Topps card called “Shohei Shows How.” It should feature a photograph from Sept. 19, reflecting the gaudy details of Shohei Ohtani’s hitting that night. All he did was rack up six hits in six at-bats, score four runs, hit three homers, steal two bases, and drive in 10 (ten!) runs. Afterward, a Wall Street Journal headline posed this rhetorical question: “Did Shohei Ohtani Just Have the Greatest Game of All Time?” Well, yes! Not only was it an otherworldly performance, but it gave him…

NEW TOPPS MERCURY WEMBY SET HAS ‘OUT OF THIS WORLD’ PRICE Mercury is the first planet from the sun. To Topps, it also represents the first big season of some of the top athletes in sports. The debut of 2023-24 Topps Mercury, a high-end, eight-card set with a hefty price tag of $8,000, appropriately features one of the biggest new stars in sports—7-foot-4 NBA Rookie of the Year Victor Wembanyama. The name of the space-age product comes from liquid mercury and the silver look of the cards, which are printed with chromium technology, with each card featuring a dripping “M” logo. The Mercury set, which hit retail stores on Oct. 9, is the first of several series focusing on single athletes and their first professional seasons. It is available at…